Jordan Harbinger
Appearances
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
When I have a movie coming out or I have something big going on, like this book, my profile does rise in the zeitgeist for a moment. And I'm recognized a lot more in those moments. I don't know. It's just not as big a deal as it was.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
That's a remarkable insight that you're expressing. And it's something that dawned on me at a certain point. I've shared with people close to me at times. There's that old adage like, oh, like someone who gets famous and then everyone- Don't forget where you came from. Yeah, or you've changed. What's usually the case is that whoever the person saying that
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
is the one who's changed their perception of you. That's interesting.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
I don't know if I'm the one that's changed.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
And I find that such a fascinating lesson in projection, like how we perceive each other and what we project onto each other. And to look at your friend who's become famous and is now maybe has more boundaries, but still your friend. Yeah. But then to look at them and say, like, you've changed when actually you're the one nervous around them.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
And you've become nervous, but you're projecting that change onto them. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
And they're just like, you've changed.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
I just want to hang out. You've changed. You're so different. If you haven't changed, why am I so uncomfortable?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
Yeah, I don't know. I honestly thought a bunch of those years on The Daily Show, I was like, this is it. This is all I've ever wanted to do. This is the pinnacle. And then at a certain point, I was like, I'm 30 years old. I need to start thinking what's next.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
Let's see. Success or fulfillment. I think the obvious answer that is true is that I wanted so badly to be on Saturday Night Live or The Daily Show. And I prepared relentlessly. It's why I moved to New York. It's why I started doing stand-up comedy and started doing improv comedy. It's why I joined the community. And I surrounded myself with the friends that I had. And I just loved that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
And I had this goal. And then I got on The Daily Show. And I had never thought beyond that horizon. And I thought somewhere in the back of my head, I was like, once I get on The Daily Show, everything falls into place. Like everyone's career. Except for the guys where that doesn't happen.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
Yeah. You just think you're going to thrive. Yeah. And I guess it was the realization that the work never ends. That was a valuable lesson because especially at that time to learn on one of my first major gigs, because while the office happened and then the hangover, I still have to hustle. I got to keep hustling.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
Yeah, for sure. Oh, for sure. From that point forward, I didn't assume that everything was going to be fine whenever I crossed a threshold. Because of course, my next goal became like, I want to get on a TV show where I can act instead of the daily show where I'm kind of this one note thing. Now I have to show the world like I can act. The office gave me that opportunity.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
But I was already looking ahead again, but not in a desperate, starving, hungry way, just in a way of like, I have to be thinking about my next moves as a responsible adult and as someone with career aspirations. So then it was like movie pursuit.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
It's not entirely true. I definitely had some stuff across my desk that was maybe a little more serious or dramatic, but I was just very focused on comedy, probably to a fault for a while. I just was like, this is what I've always wanted to do. And I just want to be in these big, funny scenes. crazy movies. And looking back, honestly, I wish I had expanded my repertoire a little more earlier on.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
I've changed things up a little bit. Even at that time, I was doing movies like Jeff Who Lives at Home, which was a Duplass Brothers movie that's funny, but very real and a little bit dark. And then Cedar Rapids is another one that Again, it's a comedy, but it's dramatic. But I didn't go, like, full drama. That's something I wish I had done earlier on. I'm curious why.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
It's not like it didn't work out for you. Because I think it would have opened up more possibilities over time. Now I'm definitely more open to those kinds of roles. And I just did one that's, like, super dark. And I'm excited about it. And it was fun. I'm just... enjoying variety of challenges now, I'll still always love comedy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
There's nothing like just trying to come up with the best bit on a movie set. It's so fun. The pressure is so high. Everybody's, ah, this joke isn't working. Like, what do we do? What do we do? And you just like, your body just does it and you start figuring stuff out. And I love that. I love that process. I love the collaboration, but there's something about drama and comedy
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
the intensity of certain moments and roles. I just am drawn to that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
Yeah. Wow. I got really into RC helicopters when they were first coming out at a consumer level. Yeah. And as a kid, I was into RC cars, and I had had the Kyosho Optima. Those are cool. Oh, they're so great. Those are a little out of reach for actual kids, unfortunately. Yeah. Yeah. And then it's so weird when I got super into those little helicopters.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
Yeah. I had just done a pilot for NBC before that, that had gone really, really well. And it was a multi-camera pilot. So it's one of those ones with a big studio audience. I see. And that was terrifying because I had never done anything like that before. But like I said, it went really well.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
And so at the end of the day, it was just exhilarating and incredibly fun and also a huge confidence builder. So I went into the office and I already knew Steve Carell because he had worked on The Daily Show, not for long, but we had overlapped on The Daily Show. And I had also done a little bit part in Evan Almighty. So I had that comfort. And then I also wasn't thrown to the wolves.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
I was invited in by Greg Daniels to have a conversation about it. They didn't offer me a part. They just were like, hey, we have this idea for this character who's like a Connecticut Yacht Club kid, went to Cornell. And we just want to talk to you about it and see if it resonates. And I was like, yes, that sounds hilarious. And we start pitching and just have a conversation.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
So I felt very brought in and kind of part of the process from the get go in a way that I think is extremely rare and was very lucky for me. And Greg Daniels had also seen a little short movie I had done about a zombie that who it was like a little documentary about a zombie trying to go on the dating scene. And of course, as a zombie, like everyone's grossed out by him.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
So he's really struggling on the dating scene. And it was a very funny, like little five, 10 minute short film. And we really committed to the zombie makeup. So it looked really good, but it's him like talking to camera, like, Yeah, I don't know. It's just hard. The minute they see me or smell me, like, they're grossed out.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
Yeah, it's like, how do I even get, like, anywhere with these people? So he liked that because it had a very office-y kind of vibe. Yeah. And then the cast was so warm and... I'll never forget like John and Rashida and I were both new at the time. So we were kind of buddies and we were in the Stanford branch. I always said to John, you guys were just like this basket for Rashida and me.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
And you just welcomed us in. There was no like, let's see what these guys can do. Let's see if these guys screw up our show. It was just like, come on.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
Yeah, that came very naturally because I grew up in the South. People punch balls. Very few people are presenting a transparent version of themselves in the South. There's very much a sort of facade that people... Not just in the South. We're in Hollywood right now. I know, right? This is humanity. What it means to be human is to struggle with how we present ourselves with how we really feel.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
The office writers just got that so well. I've always understood that, that tension between who we present and who we want to be and who we hope we are. That's such a funny battle within us.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
I'll be delicate, but there were aspects of Andy's story that I really struggled with. Yeah. especially after years of building a character and committing your life to this thing. I think all of us on that show, one of the things that was so special about it was how much we loved our characters. And then certain scripts come in and you're like, this doesn't feel like this character.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
And I remember there was a hobby shop right next to my hotel in Ypsilanti, Michigan, where I was filming the movie Cedar Rapids.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
And we all felt pretty possessive or not possessive, but just a lot of ownership and affection for our characters. And so there were a lot of times where us as a cast would push back with writers or producers. Like, I don't think Andy would do this. And a lot of times that was a very fruitful conversation.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
There were times, though, that I just felt like all this work I'd put into redeeming Andy, who sort of on paper was a pretty hard to like guy. But I really tried to find heart, a deep goodness in him. And it was his internal battle. Anyway, I felt like at a certain point that was not factoring in to things, and it was tough. There were some tough moments.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
But they're like, but it will be cool.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
It's going to be great. That's actually kind of a good analogy because there's also, from a high altitude standpoint, I think there's value in blowing things up. There's value in destroying something to rebuild it in a narrative context. And so I won't presume that I understood all the choices that were made and I held no grudges.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
I truly look back on that time with nothing but just like epic, epic thanks and gratitude. And like, it was such a joyful time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
But yeah, there were some narrative moments where I was like, what?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
Let's see. I'm sure there's tons. This one you'll never see anywhere, but there were some really funny jam sessions off camera between me and Creed, because he's a great musician, guitar player. Oh, yeah. He was in a band in the 70s. A big rock band. Really? Okay. Yeah. Forget the name of the band. It's killing... How am I forgetting? But they had a big hit. The chorus is...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
Na, na, na, na, na, na, live for today. Creed was in that band. So anyway, he's a great guitar player and I'm banjo guitar player. And we would just hang out and jam. And then Zach Woods joined the cast. Guess what Zach Woods plays? Trumpet. No kidding. Jazz trumpet. And he just brings it with him. And we were like, Zach, you got to bring your trumpet. And we had some banjo guitar trumpet jams.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
That's pretty fun.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
How in character is that?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
Creed for Creed, Andy and Zach. Like it was pretty great. Sound guys. Can you tell them we're trying to work over here? This was like out in our trailers and stuff. But the other thing I'll tell you is the Christmas episode. I think people have talked about this a lot. The Christmas episode where Steve is dressed as Santa Claus and Kevin's sitting at his lap. And Steve is like suffering.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
And the way that he's performing that it has all of us laughing so hard. And I'm in the background of a shot and I'm almost positive it's in the show where I keep ducking behind a plant because I'm laughing so hard. And there are so many instances where I just couldn't look at them because they were being so funny.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
Even if you're off camera, if you're talking, you're in a dialogue with someone, you can't break and laugh at them because then you'll ruin their take.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
So I had developed this practice where when I had scenes with Steve, a lot of the time I would look at his chin or his ear because I couldn't look into those eyes. They would destroy me and just make me laugh too hard. But this Christmas episode... I definitely am like, I think I'm over in the corner with Mindy and she's skirting around and we're both trying to hide.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
Yeah. It's not that crazy of a story. I was born without that tooth. So I had the baby tooth, but when it fell out, there was no adult tooth. So I had a flipper, a retainer with a fake tooth on it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
So I also had a flipper. No, but it was just a tooth. I could pop out on a retainer. And it had a little tooth on the front that would go right in there.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
So then I turned over like around 17, I got an implant, but an implant is just like a nut that is screwed into your bone. And they put a little post into the implant, which they then put the tooth on top of. So we're in testing, doing like wardrobe testing and camera tests for the hangover. And Todd's like, we got to figure out how to get rid of your tooth.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
So we did some camera tests, blacking it out. and these other things and nothing looked good. Now you could probably do it digitally, like no problem. We didn't have that then. So I said, this is an implant. Let me go talk to my dentist. And so he's like, go to my guy. I got a guy. I got the best guy here in Beverly Hills. And I was like, okay.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
If you're going to pay for it, I'll go to the guy in Beverly Hills. So I go to this dentist and he's like, yes, we can take the tooth off the post, unscrew the post out of the implant, And it will look like you have no tooth there. And we just have to like keep your gum healthy throughout production. So that's what we did.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
And he then made me a couple of flippers that I could use for the shots where I have a tooth. I see. So I was able to pop that tooth in and out at will. And I also was shooting The Office simultaneously. And I didn't tell them that I had taken my tooth out. Yeah. But it affected my speech a little bit. We got a little air outlet. Like I couldn't move my tongue the same way.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
There was a PA that worked on the movie who was like my guy. And I would just be like, Hey, run to the hobby shop. I broke a rotor. Will you go get me another one? So he was back and forth all the time. And sometimes I'd be like, all right, here's a hundred bucks. Just buy something cool and bring it back. And he'd come back and like, here's this cool car.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
So I sounded just the tiniest bit off. But fortunately, one of the episodes that I did while I had the fake tooth was where Andy and Oscar are on a business trip and Andy gets trashed and calls Angela and has some like drunk dials. But anyway, I was drunk. The speech thing didn't really matter.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
I honestly can't say for sure it was safe. No, it's... Oh, man. I remember the scene where we're pushing the car with the tiger in it, and it's nighttime. So... The tigers are on a truck in the production area. They're like in these big cages on the back of a truck. And we're waiting for night to start shooting as the sun's going down. This is when tigers hunt.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
And this is when they're like energy comes up. And so the sun's going down. The Santa Ana's start blowing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
The trees are going and all the grass is moving and the tigers are pacing in. There's two or three tigers that we use for the, and they're just pacing in their cages. And we're like, what the hell's going on? You're not going to open the cages. And we get all these safety lectures about how to like never turn your back on a tiger because that's when they pounce.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
It's like, as long as, I don't know if you've seen the India, the people that would hunt tigers. Yeah. had masks on the face on the back of their head. And that was to confuse the tiger because they won't pounce if they think you're looking at them. Good to know. I suppose. I don't know. Anyway, it was always nuts. There was like a leash with a cable, but I always was looking at that leash.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
Like really this 800 pound cat can't just snap that thing in a second or pull the person who's holding. Yeah, exactly. And then we're doing all those crazy photos in the hotel room. And I remember Bradley's like, can I feed it? And I was like, buddy, what are you? And he's like, no, come on. I want to be like they're feeding it. Why can't I? And they're like, sure, just hold the bottle like this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
And so there's pictures in the closing credits of Bradley feeding the cat. Oh, my God.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
And we just like race them around wherever we were. So yeah, like all over the set, I was constantly like, like buzzing people with these little helicopters. The crew was getting super annoyed.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
He has this theory that I used one of the sauces or something. It's like week one in Bangkok. And this is Hangover 2. And we're so excited to be there. And the first AD, this guy, JP, is like, there's this awesome restaurant. It's like a hole in the wall. Let's all go out. And we're all just eager for adventure, eager to see the city and do whatever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
And like JP's like this boss figure on the set. He's our first AD. He's looking out for everybody. And we're like, yeah, sure. Let's go. We all go out. And it's basically Bangkok street food. And we go back and I just explode. That's the only way to describe it is that a bomb went off inside of me and that every orifice was where the explosion went. Oh man. I remember I was so sick.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
It's this weird thing. Like when you're in a foreign country and you're really sick, your mind just starts going to really dark places. And I was like, I'm going to die. And I'm thousands of miles from my family and people that love me. And I'm definitely going to die. And I called JP and I was like, I am so sick. I think I need to go to the hospital. And he's like, your pickup is 6 a.m.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
tomorrow to go to set.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
To go to work. Not for the hospital. Yeah. And so we'll see you then. Okay. And it just was like, that's right. I'm here to work. I have a job to do.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
And like this production that costs like a million dollars a day, you can't just pause because I have a tummy ache or whatever. And that like whips me back into shape. And I wind up going on some crazy intense, I don't know if it was the antibiotic or whatever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
And the next day we're shooting this scene where Cassavetes, he's showing us the video of the riot we started the night before on his iPhone. And we're shooting the riot. So it's the riot scene. Yeah. And I'm leading the riot. So I'm shirtless like, F the police. There's fires. It's a pyrotechnics everywhere and crowds all around.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
in games until a red camera gets beamed with a $100,000 camera. And then Miguel Arteta, the director, was like, you know what? There's a face you make when you're flying that helicopter that I've never seen you make otherwise, and I want it in the movie. So we're going to have a scene where Tim Lippe, your character, is flying this helicopter. And he did, and it's in the movie.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
And we're also in Soy Cowboy, which is the red light district of Bangkok. And it is grimy. It is not like a chill part of town. And yet- I'm still in between every take I'm curled up on the sidewalk on a blanket cowboy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
And with Bradley and Zach, like feeding me little sips of water or Sprite and like gently patting me. And I will say I never felt more supported and bonded. Like we went through so much together. That was one of the things that I was like, I will love these guys forever. Like they really took care of me. And then I would just get this adrenaline rush every time I had to stand up and do a take.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
And I got the greatest compliment of my entire acting career ever the next day, which is when Larry, the DP was talking about something that we had shot the day before. It was like laughing about it. And I was like almost comatose with food poisoning that day. And he was like, really? Yeah. Wow. You sold it, dude. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
We'll be right back.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
I'm just sitting in my office, like, and you see the little helicopter fly by.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
Oh yeah, so that beautiful Mercedes from the first Hangover, we're in Vegas and we're shooting... The car just goes missing. We have three or four of those Mercedes because you see it in various states of distress. It's getting beat up throughout the movie. And so in order to do that in movies, you have four cars.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
Because you have to shoot out of sequence.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
And you can't have a car dictating the sequence of your production because that's a much bigger expense. And also if you need to reshoot something or change something or fix something. And it's the same with wardrobe. When you see people's clothes get more and more tattered over time, you're actually looking at eight sets of clothes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
It's almost like a meditative state. Yeah, truly. It's like I'm elsewhere. I'm in this little helicopter that's flying around. There's something so exhilarating about controlling an apparatus that when I was a kid, helicopters were the coolest thing. And now I can pilot one. It totally ignites my childhood enthusiasm.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
It's one of many of the sort of like beautifully creative things that you just never know about movies.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
But yeah, one of those production cars of the Mercedes, and I think it was one of the ones that was a little beat up, got stolen. And the production is freaking out.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
What are we going to do? We still have to shoot this thing. And they put like an APB out on it and they catch the guy who stole the car. And there was like crack in the front seat and all this stuff. And he presumably just wanted to probably sell it for drug money or something. I don't know. But so the good news is we got the car. The bad news is it's lightly dusted with crack.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
Yeah, every office table read, I was so giddy. It was like going to a movie you're excited for every time. And then also those table reads, the production days are long and they're hard. And the table read was like this fun little party. Like we get in the middle of the day. It was once a week, so it would be like on a Tuesday or something at 10 a.m.,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
It's also one of the rare moments when the entire production team and cast and writers are in the same space.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
And so it's the office family. And then, of course, you have some network people there, too. And that can be good or bad in the office case.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
Why is this person in there? They're usually there to give some notes or a few thoughts or just so they're aware of what's happening creatively on the show. And later on in the run of the show, of course, they weren't giving notes like to Greg Daniels. because he was like God status, but everybody's together.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
So like you might be good buddies with someone on the crew or someone in the writer's room, but you don't get to see them that much during normal production. But then everybody's together for those things. And it's just, the energy was always so great. You get to hear these jokes for the first time and you're kind of like nervous. Like how much am I in this episode? Do I have good jokes?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
Am I going to sell them? Those were just incredibly fun. The hangover scripts would come, Like the second and third hangover scripts, you just get those. Through your agent, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
And then you read those on your own. But still, it was the same thing of, oh, my God, what are we in for?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
Oh, that's an interesting question. I think it's when you're starting out, you're less picky because everything's new and you're just eager to work and your criteria are very different.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
Now that I have so much work under my belt, I have a body of work, but I also have a ton of experience and I kind of know the types of people that I'm going to work well with or the types of people that I want to work with. So that's going to be a much bigger part of the evaluation of something now than it ever was before. Early on, you still want to work with great people.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
So you're just happy to be there. But you're also just like, you want me to do this? Sure. I'll be there. And also I have a family now. And so my life needs are so different. And if I get a script, it's like, this is Steven Spielberg. It's you and so-and-so in Antarctica for five months.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
I'm like, no. Well, it's still Spielberg though, but no, but like, I'm not going to be in a place where I'm inaccessible to my family during formative years of my kids' lives.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
Yeah. I'm always like, they need me. This is for them. I want to be there for them to like raise them and give them the pillar of a parent.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
But also I'm like, I can't handle being apart. Like I'm too mushy to like be apart from them. The whole family. It's a good crew. We got a good crew.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
It's funny because in my 20s, or I should say my early 30s, when I was really like firing on all cylinders, there were times between the hangover in the office, those overlapped.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
I was doing it at the same time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
The office had really graciously agreed to crossboard my scene so that I was working Monday and Tuesday of the week. And then the hangover shot Wednesday through Sunday.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
It's completely insane. And there were a couple of nights where I chartered my own flight from Vegas to Van Nuys after a night shoot in Las Vegas. to go straight to the Van Nuys Airport, which is just minutes away from the office. And I would go shoot all night in Las Vegas, get on a plane that I paid for, chartered, to land in Van Nuys at 5.30 in the morning so I could make my 6 a.m.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
call time at the office Work all day, work all the next day, because I'm cross-boarded, meaning I don't have any downtime. They've squeezed all my stuff in. My eyes are dry just thinking about it. And then get back on a flight, like a Southwest flight from Burbank to Vegas that evening, and then work all the next week. And that was probably four or five weeks in a row.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
Yeah, it's nuts. But it was... so fun. I was having the time of my life and I was so exhilarated and thrilled to be a part of these things. I loved everyone I was working with. I couldn't have been more excited and like grateful. And it was just, it was incredibly fun. Now, what I was saying is, At that time, I would think often, I want a family. I want a family. How is this going to work?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
And I just thought I was like, okay, I'm going to be like a traveling dad.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
I'm going to be a guy who's gone for chunks, but that's going to be okay. Our family is going to manage that and we're going to be a family that can figure that out and I'm never going to not do awesome movies. This is incredible. I was so naive.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
I truly was so naive. Even before I had kids, I was starting to realize the pace and the pattern of life. I really wanted to carve out for myself and the value that I was giving to some of my hobbies, honestly. Not RC cars, but music and some other things that I was just deriving tremendous pleasure from. Not just pleasure, but identity. Sure.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
Those were things that were starting to feel important. And my wife, I don't want to be apart from this incredible person for huge stretches. What was I thinking? And so... It's just evolved a lot over time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
Yeah. Movies are very intoxicating because it's so all consuming. It's very easy to detach from a lot of things in your life, whether they're difficult or good. Also, as an ADHD person, I thrive in hyper focus. So when I get into that mindset, it's like I'm in go mode. And It's thrilling, but there's a cost.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
It didn't have its nuclear core in it, but it was dropped in North Carolina by accident, basically, on a training mission. It landed on this guy's property. Fortunately, no one was killed. There were some injuries, but it was killed. And the guy whose property it landed on was a World War II vet. And he was like, you know what? I get it. I'm a vet. I get it. These things happen.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
I get that 100%. I've gotten into the crawlers recently, you know?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
And you guys are going to take care of me. Well, surprise, surprise, the government didn't take care of him, kind of boned him. So he got pissed, but wound up getting, I think, an okay settlement at the end of the day. But that's just one of many examples. This book, every chapter is a crazy snafu that has happened in our history, basically from the 50s.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
It's divided up into decades, 50s, 60s, 70s, 80s, 90s, and 2000s, basically 2000 to present.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
So they're the really slow RC trucks. It's like this meditative thing because they'll go like over rocks and trails and stuff. I never thought I would be into a slow RC car, but it's really fun. And of course they go fast too, so you can zip them around. But on hiking trails, it's like a little road for a little car. That's right. Yeah. How many people have turned this podcast off at this point?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
there's 31 snafus in here so it's good bathroom reading it's divided nicely it's good toilet reading you can just kind of sit down and open it anywhere and have fun with it yeah lots of great stories the uplifting message though is that we've always been on the brink of something sort of horrible and maybe you don't know about it maybe you do but
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
Yeah, I write about that in the introduction, how there is something, when you look back at crazy disasters in history or snafus, They're weirdly reassuring for that exact reason. We do get through things. And obviously, I think a lot of people, myself included, feel like we're in a fraught moment right now.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
And this isn't to say there isn't reason to feel real anxiety and or fear or whatever feelings you're having. But From a very high altitude standpoint, there's reassurance in the long view that humanity, we're just constantly screwing up and constantly falling on our face. And somehow we usually get back up again.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
Yeah, it's the first one in the book, yeah. Kid toy that had... In the 1950s. Actual uranium in it? Yeah, the guy who invented the erector set, which was a huge hit. He invented a little nuclear lab for kids to play with.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
And it had radioactive materials in it. And that's not what you want kids playing with.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
I honestly, the one you just brought up about trying to train cats to be spies, like they tried to implant microphones in their ears because the ears are directional and they're so astute. But then they tried to train them to actually go and sit next to someone so that you could spy on what they're saying. And of course, that's a debacle.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
And they're really harming cats in the process, which is like crazy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
And it also is more evidence of why working with tigers on a movie set is terrifying. You can't train cats. You just can't train them. They also did the same thing with pigeons. And that's in the book. They tried to put a little harness on pigeons that had surveillance gear. So, so funny.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
MKUltra is a wild story that's in here where I basically explain how the CIA in the 50s was trying to figure out if LSD can be used as a mind control serum or a truth serum or just what its potential might be. How can we weaponize that? That's how the military or the CIA is always thinking. How can we weaponize this? And so they just start drugging people.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
Sex workers that they're spying on, which is very- That's so creepy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
And the name of that operation was Midnight Climax. come on. That was so unethical. Like just drugging people with these really powerful high doses and then just taking notes. Let's see what happens.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
My daughter just told me one that I loved. Okay. What is it? Why did the chicken cross the playground? Oh no. Why? To get to the other slide. That's not bad. That's pretty good. It's a good kid joke for sure. I also heard a new take on why did the chicken cross the road? So what's the answer? To get to the other side. Yeah. So how have you always thought about that? What does that mean to you?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
What is he talking about?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
It's just funny, like the chicken crosses the road to get to the other side. And it's a funny joke because that's so dumb, right? Of course it's dumb. Yeah, I just thought it was a kid joke. Okay, what if the chicken is crossing the road to truly cross over To get hit by a car.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
It's suicide. That's dark. Right? But what if that's what the joke always meant? To get to the other side. Oh, man. You've been doing that MKUltra stuff. Someone was like, that's what the joke really means. I heard that recently. I was like, wait, what? Now it's like one of the most profound jokes ever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
Wait, you didn't know you wanted to be a podcaster before podcasting existed?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
I can't explain it, but at least I knew I wanted. I didn't know that it was realistic or even plausible for a long time. But even as a little kid, and so many comedy people say this to the point where it's almost hacky, but it's 100% true with me, which is that watching Saturday Night Live and watching Eddie Murphy and Mike Myers and all these guys that I just started watching.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
I think Eddie Murphy was on when I was eight years old. How is that allowed? Sneaking downstairs with my best friend, Nick, and we would watch these things and then recite them for hours and reenact them. And we didn't get them. Like we didn't get the jokes, like Mr. Robinson's neighborhood. Like I got that as a kid, but I loved it. I just loved the energy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
And it was something I knew I wanted to be a part of somehow. And I took it for granted. This is what I want to do. And as I got older, it started to feel more possible. Like I developed this mindset of like, Any job that I want to have or any adventure that I want to be a part of, somebody's doing it. That person had a path to get there.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
There's no reason I can't find a path to get to the thing I want. I don't know. That's a very hopeful mindset. And I don't know where it came from. Honestly, I think I credit my parents somewhat with giving me a lot of safety and self-confidence to kind of like find that mindset. But I also think there was a part of me that really wanted to get away from my home.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
I was raised in the South and I always felt like a fish out of water there. I need more. I need some adventure. I need something bigger, which is also a fallacy. And so I moved forward with this clarity that I took for granted. And I look back, I'm like, I'm so grateful I had that clarity. And I used to look at other people and be like, why are you so lost?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
Just dig in, figure out what you want to do. And it took me a long time to realize, oh, that's actually a very rare gift that I was given is that clarity. Now I don't take it for granted at all. I'm so grateful that I had such a specific passion. I can't totally explain it, but it was something I had and was lucky enough to follow.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
And I think also having the circumstances in your life, even as a young person, to chase that thing. I was fortunate enough that I wasn't saddled with student debt. My parents were able to pay my college and things like that, that I just... I'm so grateful looking back. Those are the things that enabled me to make some probably riskier choices than a lot of people have an opportunity.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
I have evolved so much on my understanding of meritocracy as a concept. I used to look at my career and my success and be like, I built it. I did all this. I took huge risks. I worked my ass off. And both of those things are true.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
And also I am lucky as hell in a thousand different ways. And I had opportunities that other people don't have. And I had access to whatever that maybe other people didn't have. My career wasn't handed to me, but it's just important to look back with gratitude at some of the things that paved the way.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
Or they had access to a mentor in a certain space. I go back to this a lot because I have little kids now and I think about this all the time, just about when a kid feels safe, what they have access to inside of themselves. So many kids aren't safe for a thousand different reasons, whether it's food insecurity or an abusive home or an addicted parent or whatever it is.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
There are so many things that safety interrupts and... There's so many ways, obviously, that kids persevere through these things. And my childhood wasn't 100 percent safe and that there were certain difficulties. But I do think that Bill Gates grew up in a home where it was safe for him to be like a nerdy kid.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
He didn't have the jock dad like screaming at him to go to football practice or whatever that could have looked like.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
So you're right. There are so many factors. It's just a constellation of factors that allow us to get on these paths. pathways, especially unusual or special ones like the careers that we've had. And you just have to be grateful.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
Yeah. Gosh. I do remember being in London when we were doing Hangover Press, right? And we were in London for a premiere and we were out to dinner with, it was me and Bradley and Zach and a few other Warner brothers brass. And I think a couple of other cast people were with us and they were getting numbers from the U S box office. And the Warner brothers, people were like, this is unbelievable.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
This is incredible. And one of the executives like turns to me and goes, your life is about to completely change. But I just remember being like, I just took a bite of this steak. And now the next bite I take of the steak, I'm a different person.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
It's like a totally different thing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
The second bite I took was inadequate. I didn't measure up. The first bite was the best one I ever had. What's your celebrity at? Nothing measures up. It sort of hit in a way that was like, okay, intellectually, I can understand that, but what's it going to feel like? And then it just creeps into you. And I think the strangest thing about
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
your profile rising so quickly and massively is that you no longer control your experience of an environment.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
So like an airport is probably the most easy one to understand.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
Right. So you walk into an airport as a. anonymous civilian and you can go and stand at baggage claim. And if there's some crazy person next to you or like really obnoxious person or stinky person or whatever, you just walk away, go stand in another place and whatever, read your book, listen to your podcast.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
But at a certain level of celebrity, you can no longer take those little measures of control. You might've walked away from a situation in that instance, but at a certain level of celebrity, you can no longer take Take those little steps because they won't matter. They won't fix anything.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
Yeah, or there's still people yelling at you. You go to a different place, people are still yelling, nard dog, or worse, like they do. That's very fearful. I can no longer control my environment. And you take for granted how much anonymity allows you to actually control your circumstances.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
So in a weird way, it's been this lesson in letting go that I probably needed at some level when we were on The Daily Show. This is we have toy fame, meaning it's fun to play with. You get to go to an airport. Nobody really recognized it. It's basic cable fame because we were all on The Daily Show. So like fans recognized us, but nobody else.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
You can walk through the airport and you're pretty much fine, but you're going to go to like an Einstein bagels and they'll be like, do you want some free cream cheese on that? I'll hook you up, man. Yeah, I'll hook you up. It's like you just bump into fans here and there and there's like really fun energy around it. And then as it grows and grows, it's real. It's like real adult fame.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
And that has a lot of consequences that go with it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1146: Ed Helms | Fame, Family, and Finding Joy in Failure
Yeah. It's the change in your existence that's the hardest thing to accept. And once you've gotten through that, like any change in your life, any dramatic change is going to upset the apple cart in some way. Yeah. There's going to be some good things and some difficult things. But honestly, I don't know. I've gotten so used to it and it's tempered now.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
What are you doing? That's right. This probably will work. Some of you will die, but that's a price I'm willing to pay.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
At best case scenario, you have decades left. I found you because I told my brother-in-law, this is probably like three or four years ago, I'm going to do TRT because everybody needs TRT over age 40. And then he was like, I don't know, man. And I was like, yeah, I don't know. A lot of people are recommending it, but I'm on the fence.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
And he sent me this video with this big bald dude who said stuff that made a lot of sense. And I was like, oh, I actually have changed my mind as a result of this YouTube video. We're going to link it in the show notes because I was about to click buy on whatever website has a doctor that will just write a prescription without ever seeing you. And I was like, oh, I love those sites. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
I mean, look what they don't tell you. The overview of your video that really got me was once you pop, you can't stop. Like once you start TRT and your balls go, I'm off, we're retired now. They don't come back. Maybe when you're 25, they will. If you're 45, probably you're just going to be on TRT forever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
Oh, conveniently locked into the guy who's selling you the stuff that made your balls stop working in the first place.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
Really?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
Today on the show, Dr. Mike Israetel, fitness and performance expert, author, competitive bodybuilder. He is the co-founder of Renaissance Periodization. I don't know why they thought that was, who can spell that? I can barely say, you know how many takes that took? Anyway, you've maybe seen him on YouTube where he is enormously popular.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
Yeah, especially if you go to Denmark, they might be like, oh, yeah, OK, we've seen this. If you go to Turkey or you're visiting your cousins in Saudi Arabia or whatever, you're just going to go to jail unless they've got some kind of connections and they can convince people that that doctor is real. It's not worth it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
So their telehealth doctor will tell you what my telehealth doctor says, which is leave all this stuff at home. Just don't even bring it. You're going to survive for a few months. I'm not on TRT, but like other things, don't even bring it. And hormones are especially important. I think as we age, I'm sure you would agree, like having a decent amount of testosterone.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
But once we hit our 30s, our natural supply starts to dip, and yeah, you might start feeling a little creaky. Notice your skin and hair just aren't what they used to be. Daily collagen supplementation can help with skin, joints, hair, nails. Vital Proteins is the number one collagen peptides brand in the US, so they know what they're doing. It's super easy to take.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
I had my testosterone checked and the regular doctor was like, it's normal. And I was like, oh good. So I told my friend who is in a similar field as you, I was like, oh yeah, it's normal. He goes, hang on, show me the actual numbers. Because when doctors say normal, they mean, are you below the range that an 80 year old man would have? Because that's not normal.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
He's also a professor of exercise and sports science at Lehman College, and perhaps most importantly, my sometimes lifting buddy at the CCRB back at the University of Michigan during my college days. That's right, I lifted with Dr. Mike. Jealous much?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
And if it's way higher than you have a tumor that's making testosterone or some weird thing going on, that's not normal. But everything between like, What is it, like 200 and 1,200 is normal? And they're not taking into consideration the fact that you're a 44-year-old athlete. They just don't care about that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
Today, we dive into testosterone, hormones, steroid use and abuse, roid rage, body and muscle dysmorphia in men, dieting, muscle memory, and even how AI might affect the future of exercise. This is a really fun conversation. Dr. Mike is a riot. We got along really well. freaking sharp and science-based and just all the things that I love and a total meathead.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
Yeah, he's trying to get it in. It's interesting because my doctor at Kaiser Permanente is a smart dude. He's like, you need blood work. I was like, I'll actually do blood work every 10 weeks because I take supplements and stuff like that. Here is the blood work. And he's like, all right, I'll look at it. My previous doctor goes, wow, this is really good.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
This doctor goes, yeah, you don't really need to have this and this and this, this high. It wasn't out of the reference range. It was my DHEA or something was like too high. And I was like, I got to lower the dose of this DHEA because when I don't take it, it's way low. And it's like red alert. You don't have any of this. Just spouting my medical crap on this podcast.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
But I take some incolomaphene and HCG to get my testosterone higher. I don't take actual testosterone. And the doctor's like, don't mess with that at all. And other doctors are like, yeah, you can do that. Just don't get like 2,500 nanograms per deciliter of testosterone. You're 44 and you work out every day. Probably shouldn't have 250, 350 or whatever it was when I did my blood work.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
I think people are confused between TRT, what testosterone replacement therapy is, what steroids are, and what steroid abuse is. Because they think, oh, it's like the same thing or steroids are totally different. My wife was asking me the other day. She's like, but don't you do steroids? And I was like... No, not at all. I showed her a photo of you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
She's like, you're not going to get like that, right? I was like, don't worry.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
No. She was like, wow, that guy works really hard. But you're a bodybuilder. I'm not a bodybuilder. She doesn't know the difference between somebody who goes to the gym in their backyard and somebody who's building muscle so that they can show it off or whatever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
So it's like Deca-Durabolin or whatever?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
So this is a great show just for me particularly. I think y'all will like it. I normally don't cover health, but he is an authority and knows what he's talking about. And this was beyond interesting in my humble opinion. Here we go with Dr. Mike Isretel.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
You're open about steroid use, correct? Can we talk about that? So I would love to address this because I think some people are going to go like, oh, I've heard Dr. Mike talk about how he uses steroids. So he's a hypocrite for even saying that it's bad in any way right now.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
Yeah, exactly. Remember when I crashed at 200 miles an hour and I flew out of the car and it was a f***ing miracle that I'm still alive?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
As I drink from my Not Your Lawyer mug that a show fan made for me, filled with only the healthiest Diet Coke, I actually am curious, is this stuff so bad for you? Because people tell me, like, you drink poison as they shovel nicotine patches into their mouth or whatever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
Yeah, that's true. You just came from Afghanistan. Who are you to tell me war is... Right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
Are you shredded with single-digit body fat? If not, prop up your self-esteem with one of the fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back. If you're wondering how I manage to book all these great authors, thinkers, and creators every week, it is because of my network, the circle of people I know, like, and trust.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
And I know that networking is kind of a dirty word, but I'm teaching you how to build yours for free over at 6minutenetworking.com. This is a very decidedly non-cringe, down-to-earth course. There's no awkward strategies. Nothing is cheesy. It's just practical exercises that'll make you a better connector, a better colleague, a better friend, and a better peer in a few minutes a day.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
And many of the guests on the show subscribe and contribute to the course. Come on and join us. You'll be in smart company where you belong. You can find the course at 6minutenetworking.com. And I don't need your credit card number, none of that crap. It's just free. I know, hard to believe. All right, back to Dr. Mike. An old friend of mine, he became a man.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
She's trans and he told me, he goes, I gotta tell you, I used to think you guys were just like obsessed with sex and it was really sort of juvenile. He goes, I get it now. Like, I get it, man. This is purely hormones on the brain. Once I started injecting testosterone, I was like, oh, now it all makes sense.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
Tell me a little bit about the brain changes that happen with steroid use. People know you get big muscles. People know that you get maybe a little bit more aggressive or whatever. But I'm curious about the brain changes because I actually, when my testosterone was like 350 or 300, I was one person. And when my testosterone was like 1100 or 1200, it's a different story.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
Aren't steroid users typically sort of off the charts?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
Do you find that happening when you go on higher doses? I assume you're not just always slamming that stuff, right? You cycle it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
I'd love to talk about muscle dysmorphia in men where guys look in the mirror and they're like, I'm too small. And it's like, dude, you look like the Hulk went on a diet. You're fine.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
Yeah, yeah, exactly. Well, that's the thing is, like, I see dudes who look like a CGI version of a Marvel guy from a movie, and they're like, ah, but I only have six abs instead of eight, and there's no veins on them, and you're just like, oh, man, this is a never-ending thing for you. I'm talking about myself, probably, but whatever. Let's talk. For sure.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
I was reading online that someone works at a hospital. They deal with anorexia patients. And she'd said something like, if you fail out three times, we won't take you back. And all the comments were like, why? Those are the people that need the most help. And she was like, I know. But the problem is we have limited beds for these people.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
And if you fail out three times, statistically, you're never going to actually survive this. And we just have to let you die. And people were like, oh, my God. I myself was like shocked.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
I'd love to focus on the muscle dysmorphia specifically in men. So you're right. It is horrible. It's probably an entire separate podcast. But for men, nobody really seems to talk about this because we kind of laugh at these guys. And I get it. It is kind of weird to see dudes flexing in the mirror and they're like, my right delt is like a little bit bigger than my left delt.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
And you're like, dude, you're just weird. Let's go get sushi. What are you talking about?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
Exactly. But I also, you know, look, I used to be the guy who used to be like, oh, roll their eyes at the guys flexing in the mirror at the gym. And I still probably do that. But I will tell you, as soon as I dieted for like a year and I ended up with a six pack for the first time in my entire life and I had that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
six pack for maybe three weeks before I was like but I want like the sides to go in more and then I want like this stuff to go away my original goal was it would be great if I fit into my pants again and now it's like but I kind of want like the V thing and it's just ridiculous and you keep moving the goalposts and I know myself well enough to go I could be built like the cover of men's fitness and I'd still be like ah but like my back muscles are like not the same size it's just human nature or something like that or am I just neurotic
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
Like arsenic, famously good for you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
Whenever I meet retired bodybuilders, they're almost always quite a bit happier, even though they're not at the peak anymore because they can go and eat like seafood pasta without beating themselves up and being like, well, can't eat tomorrow or whatever it is. And they still look amazing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
Yeah, to serving to your coffee, smoothie, even water. It doesn't taste like anything, so it just blends right in.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
You know, you see a woman at the pool with like abs and delts and triceps and you're like, wow, are you a fitness model? Like, oh no, 10 years ago I used to compete and you're just like, blown away. Meanwhile, it looks like crap compared to her peak fitness, right? But she's actually super happy about it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
I talked to a lot of people in that boat, and a lot of it has to do with them finally doing the psychological work as well as the physical work. And then they're like, oh, I actually don't feel the need to only eat protein and broccoli every single day for 18 months to work up to and then spray myself tan to show. So A lot of it has to do with patting yourself on the back.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
Pat yourself on your steroidy, hairy, pimply back and enjoy your success. Disgusting.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
Looking at the diet I needed to lose weight is not the same as the diet that I needed to maintain the healthy weight. And a lot of people when they're dieting, the reason this is important, a lot of people when they're dieting, they go, God, this sucks, right? My wife looked at my diet and she's like, you're eating turkey breast every day for dinner. You're eating protein shakes for breakfast.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
I ate whatever I wanted for lunch. That's why I did that. And I did it for 10 months straight. And then I did it again for like three months, a year or two later. But After you make those changes, and I got down, I lost like 40 or 50 pounds of fat, and I gained a bunch of muscle during that time. Yeah, and people are like, wait, but you weren't fat.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
But honestly, it was all between my organs if I looked at a DEXA scan.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
My doctor was like, you're going to need to start taking blood pressure medication because you're genetics. And I was like, let me try this one thing. Now my blood pressure is completely fine because I don't have literal like lard between my kidneys and everything. Maintaining the diet has been really easy. I still track everything in this app called Macro Factor. It's a great app.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
I cannot recommend it enough. I don't get anything if people sign up, but I recommend it to everyone who's willing to do this. People think like, oh, weighing your food, it's such a pain in the ass. It's not though. And you learn so much about food. I'll link to the app in the show notes for people. It's just such, it's one of the best purchases I've ever made in my life.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
But maintaining it, you get that 500 or whatever extra calories per day. I usually can't even eat all of the calories that I'm allowed in my maintenance diet because I'm just not hungry anymore.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
Oh, I tried eyeballing. I was like, I'm going to eyeball this. And I was like, oh, I'm getting fatter. And then I went back to weighing and I was like, oh, yeah, no, I'm just shit. That's just because you're not that smart. Most people will do better than you. Most people don't lie to themselves when they eyeball the meal.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
Yes. Yes. Oh God. I can relate. Like I said, the first time I died and I went for 10 months, I had a coach and he's like, you should take a break. And I was like, do I have to? Cause I'm actually fine. He's like, you're not hungry. So like my superpower was not being hungry on 1400 calories or whatever it was.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
Like, people go, oh, you're lying to yourself. Like, no, I'm fine. Like, I would eat 1,300 some days, and I was just like, I'm full, I'm good. That's incredible. Yeah, it was pure luck. But the problem that I had was, then I was like, I want to go rucking for three hours, and then I'm going to hit the gym later, and I'm also going to eat 1,400 calories. And then I sort of stopped losing weight.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
Yeah. And my friends who know about this stuff that are smart like you, they were like, yeah, you're probably screwing with your metabolism. And I was like, oh, I thought that was like a fake thing that people say when they're really fat that their metabolism's slow. They're like, no, no, no, you're actually damaging your metabolism.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
How does that work?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
My dieting coach would tell me to take a break and he goes, I go, what are the rules for the break? He goes, just don't eat like a teenager. Like don't have pizza three times. Yes. That's it. Exactly. I was like, oh, just, he's like, just have like normal meals that an adult would order in a restaurant. That's all.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
All right, y'all. Dr. Mike is going to roid rage if you don't support the amazing sponsors that make this show possible. We'll be right back. Let me share a little behind the scenes info that y'all might not know. Using our promo code, it doesn't just get you a discount. It helps out the show too. So we don't earn a commission from direct sales or anything like that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
But when companies see that people are responding to an ad on this show, they're more likely to continue their partnership with us. So if you decide to sign up or buy anything, please use our code. It's usually Jordan, but all the codes can be found over at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. When you use our codes, it is a double win. You get a great deal and you help keep the show thriving.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
Thank you for supporting those who support the show. Now for the rest of my conversation with Dr. Mike. So TMI, but I had a vasectomy, right? I had to stop working out. It's a terrible idea to work out. They're like, really don't mess with it. If you work out, it's going to bleed and you're going to be in a whole world of hurt. So I was like, okay. So I stopped and then I went to Hawaii.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
Oh, you do a study and I'm like, oh, I want to just make sure that that's correct. Let me do the same study. And then I do it and I'm like, I didn't get that result.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
I ate whatever I wanted. I mean, like an adult. And I was like, wow. I thought I was gonna like blow up a little bit, eat all the sushi and stuff. I weighed myself. I had lost three pounds and I was absolutely shredded in the mirror. And I was like, this is so confusing because I haven't worked out at all.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
And I just got done killing myself in the gym and rocking and all this stuff and eating on this diet. And then I changed that up. And I was like, what could this be? And it's probably what you just said. I probably peed out a whole bunch of bloat and ended up looking better than ever. And of course, other friends are like, oh, you just lost a bunch of muscle.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
But I've heard you say that you don't lose muscle right away when you stop working out. I used to think like, oh, if you don't work out this week, everything you did last week, your body's just metabolizing it immediately.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
Yeah, I started instead of just going on these long diets, which I don't need anymore. Every two or three months of like going on a diet basically just take two or three months. And I'm like, I'm just going to stay where I am. And now I could stay where I am forever. Like I look fine. I don't need to like have the bottom two abs with veins on them or whatever the hell like the next thing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
few steps are. I think it's important. Dieting seems impossible if you think you have to starve yourself and eat kale forever. And it's just, it's not true and I always want to beat this into people's heads because if somebody had been able to explain this stuff that we're talking about right now to me 10 or 15 years ago, I probably would have started living a healthier life earlier.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
I just thought it was like, I don't want to end all of the joy that I have from eating now. I was like, I'll do it later. But now I realize I didn't have to end the joy of living life and eating at all, actually.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
This is the whole like getting in shape for spring and summer, but in a way that's conscious and not just like, oh, crap, I haven't done anything for five years and I want to get in shape. Now I want a six pack for summer. It's like that's not going to happen.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
But if you have five pounds that you need to get off and you just haven't worried about your diet other than protein before that, then it's so much easier to do. And again, I wish people had told me that like a decade and a half ago. The other thing I needed to learn was that diet will always outrun exercise or basically you can't outrun your diet maybe is a better way to look at that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
You know, you look at the calories in a donut. It's like 150 or maybe it's 200. I don't know. It's like 300. It's like, oh, God, it's brutal. And then you're on the treadmill running a mile and you're like, wait, 82 calories. I'm tired already. What's happening? This can't be right.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
But I'm curious about muscle memory. You mentioned earlier, if you lose this, it's really easy to gain it back. What is muscle memory? How does it work?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
This is a curveball that maybe there's no answer to yet, but what if I build my initial physique on a crap load of steroids, and then I come back in a decade and I work out again, but there's no steroids? Do I still have the fire station and the police station, or are they like, ah, we left when the steroids left?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
How long does muscle memory take to kick in? Is it like taking two months off or two years off or does it just kind of stay there forever and like come back 20 years later and suddenly I can reactivate these police stations?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
Wow, that's incredible. That's great news.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
It's especially good news for those of us, like, I know you went to high school with a friend of mine, my college roommate, Rob Brode. We were lamenting a couple months ago. We were like, oh, remember when we used to go to the gym at CCRB every day at Michigan Workout? And, like, we used to be so, like, jacked and fit. Ah, never again.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
Coming up next on the Jordan Harbinger Show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
But now it's like, actually, the fire stations are still operational. They're just waiting for us to get off our ass.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
Electricity's already running in. The plumbing's in there. You just got to plug everything in. Yeah. Yeah. I've heard the argument that having more muscle burns more fat. So are jacked dudes or jacked ladies just sitting there burning more calories?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
That's a good rule of thumb. What is this about a world without exercise because of AI? I've heard you mention this, but never explain it. And I'm dying to know when I can stop actually working and look at my chat GPT.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
Yeah. I mean, my personal trainer is probably like, oh, I'll be retired before then, hopefully. But like, you know, I don't think there's always going to be a market for people who actually enjoy exercise, which somehow I've become one of those people. What the hell happened there? But yeah, weird question to end it. But what are you most proud of?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
It's a weird question, but we are just two dipshits from Michigan who both went to the same college and did OK for ourselves. I'm curious what stands out to you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
What do you think your parents are most proud of that you've done?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
That's a very, probably a similar answer than I would give. Although you're right. It's hard to be proud of stuff. And I don't know if that's how we were raised or it's just like how normal people think about achievement. Well, that's something to unpack for next time. I'd love to have you back and talk about getting, actually getting into shape some more. I appreciate it, man.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
You're about to hear a preview of The Jordan Harbinger Show on how big pharma broke American health care and what we can do to repair it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
Prior to the pandemic starting, Americans lived 3.3 years less than the citizens of 19 other wealthy countries. And in those two years of the pandemic, that 3.3 years less grew to 5.3 years less. I think it's a very powerful testimony of the fact that our healthcare system is not as well-oriented towards producing health as the healthcare systems of the other wealthy countries.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
Here's the problem, Jordan. The drug companies have paid for the research. The drug companies have analyzed the research. The drug companies have written up most of the research. These written up manuscripts that are brief summaries of the whole study are then submitted to journals for publication.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
When they're submitted to journals and the peer reviewers and the medical journal editors look at these manuscripts, they don't get to see the underlying data. The drug companies have one primary mission. We've got to remember this. It's not to make us healthier. It's not to improve the quality of our lives. It's to maximize the financial returns to their investors. And they do it very well.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
That's their job. That's what they do. They do it. They are world class. And they fight tooth and nail against it. And as you were saying, the wealthier they get, the more money they have to fight anything that's going to threaten their profits. But even when they blow it completely with a disaster like Vioxx that killed 40,000 to 60,000 Americans, even then, they break even.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
Nobody went to jail about that. And that is the introduction of the conversation about why is this happening? How could this possibly be happening?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
To hear John Abramson's take on how our health care system can be overhauled to benefit people over profits, check out episode 709 of The Jordan Harbinger Show. love this conversation with Dr. Mike. I watch a ton of his videos. I highly recommend giving him a follow on YouTube if you're into exercise and fitness.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
And he is already on the books for another round here on this show because I got through like one third of my notes and I will probably keep having him on because I love this stuff. Look, the trick to being in the best shape of your life is to be in terrible shape for the first part of your life. And I don't want to ever go back to that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
I'm 45 and I really do look and feel the greatest that I ever have. And I'm sort of trying to evangelize a little bit about that as much as I can to you all without being annoying about it. Hopefully I'm towing that line decently. All things Dr. Mike will be in the show notes at jordanharbinger.com.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
Advertisers, deals, discount codes, ways to support the show, all at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. Please consider supporting those who support the show. Also, our newsletter, We Bit Wiser, something specific, something practical, something that'll have an immediate impact on your decisions, your psychology, your relationships, in under two minutes every Wednesday.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
If you haven't signed up yet, I invite you to come check it out. It is a great companion to the show. JordanHarbinger.com slash news is where you can find it. Don't forget about 6-Minute Networking as well over at 6minutenetworking.com. I'm at Jordan Harbinger on Twitter and Instagram. You can also connect with me on LinkedIn. And this show is created in association with Podcast One.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
My team is Jen Harbinger, Jace Sanderson, Robert Fogerty, Ian Baird, and Gabriel Mizrahi. Remember, we rise by lifting others. The fee for the show is you share it with friends when you find something useful or interesting. The greatest compliment you can give us is to share the show with those you care about.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
So if you know somebody who's interested in dieting, weight loss, building muscle, fitness, definitely share this episode with them. In the meantime, I hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn, and we'll see you next time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
That is a huge relief personally, but I'm glad that we can straighten that out. There's like a sacred cow among wellness influencers that diet soda is terrible for you. The new sort of edgy bros who are, I don't even know if they're wellness influencers, they're just dudes who say weird things on the internet. But I'm hearing like nicotine is good for you. What is that all about?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
That's gonna be something if you haven't addressed yet, people are gonna be asking you a thousand times next year.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
Welcome to the show. I'm Jordan Harbinger. On The Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the stories, secrets, and skills of the world's most fascinating people and turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you. Our mission is to help you become a better informed, more critical thinker through long form conversations with a variety of amazing folks
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
I've got some friends that are, let's just say they have some city miles on them from living in Hollywood for a long time. They have all told me that nicotine was harder to kick than cocaine.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
Yeah. Yeah, that's true. The most wholesome kind of date or meeting is going out for coffee, right? If you were like, hey, you want to get together and do a couple of lines, you'd be like, I don't know if I want to meet up with this person or.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
From spies to CEOs, athletes, authors, thinkers, performers, even the occasional cold case homicide investigator, Russian spy, real-life pirate, or astronaut. And if you're new to the show or you want to tell your friends about the show, I suggest our episode starter packs.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
That's my exact sort of theory on this as well. It's like, do I need to talk more quickly? I don't think so. Not really.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
Coffee drinkers are like, what are you doing? There's so many better ways to do this. None of which you care about. But it is quite interesting how demonized it gets. And then usually, though, if you trace the wellness influencers, it's like no coffee and then it's a dot, dot, dot. Here's the grift, right? No coffee. Caffeine's bad for you, but not all caffeine.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
These are collections of our favorite episodes on topics like persuasion and negotiation, disinformation, China, North Korea, psychology, geopolitics, crime and cults, and more. That'll help new listeners get a taste of everything we do here on the show. Just visit jordanharbinger.com slash start or search for us in your Spotify app to get started.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
This particular type of tea is good for you. However, that stuff's really hard to get. So I have created a product that has only the good kind of caffeine and you can buy it from me on a subscription basis for $60 a month. And it's like, oh, OK, so caffeine is probably not that bad. You just want.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1109: Michael Israetel | Fitness Myths and Science-Based Solutions
Exactly. Yeah, it's dot dot dot grift and it's either their product or an affiliate product.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
You should probably keep better company. You said the key skills are count and kill. This is probably a dumb question, but I don't care. Is every gang member violent? Because it seems like they have to be, but it also seems like if you want to run a business, shouldn't you find smart people to do it? I don't know.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
And it's just one legal substance after another. And that's the stuff they can say on air because they don't want to lose their job or their pension. Like, I was on meth. I'm sure that some of these guys probably do get hooked on that stuff.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
Is that his operating capital or is that his profit, 250K a week? That was his profit. Wow. So these guys are making a million dollars in profit. How much do you think these kingpins are personally taking in?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
Yeah, it seems like these kingpin guys are, it's almost like they're smart enough or maybe they're just violent enough. Shouldn't they be making enough money and going, all right, if I can't buy expensive things because it puts me on the radar too much, I got to stash this money and eventually I can retire.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
I mean, is there any success story of anybody who's just like worked really hard, made a bunch of money and then was like, I'm going to go live in the suburbs of Atlanta in a really nice house and pretend I made it all from this car wash. Yeah. There has to be. Come on, man.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
You've got to launder it somehow, but then also not have it be in your name so that when you get out of prison, you can access it and it doesn't get seized.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
All right, time for a little crack break. We'll be right back. This episode is sponsored in part by Dell and AMD. What if the first sign you've been hacked was your own voice reading a script you never wrote? That's what happens in episode six of the Cybersecurity Tapes, a gripping, story-driven podcast from Dell Technologies and AMD.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
A CEO takes the stage to launch a new AI-powered finance app, but seconds into the presentation, things go off the rails. Wrong slides, glitched teleprompter, a nightmare that unfolds right in front of a live audience. Was it a man-in-the-middle attack, a targeted exploit, something worse?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
I really like how the Cybersecurity Tapes podcast takes real world cyber threats and turns them into suspenseful fictionalized stories while actually teaching you how to protect yourself. It's entertaining, yes, but it also makes you realize how vulnerable we all are to these kinds of attacks and what you can do to stay safe.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
Search for the Cybersecurity Tapes wherever you get your podcasts and check out episode six. It might just save you from learning some of these lessons the hard way. This episode is also sponsored by Factor. If you're serious about making this season count, Factor is your secret weapon. We're talking nutritious meals ready in just two minutes. That's it. Heat and eat.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
Suddenly you got a ton more time on your hands to do what you actually want to do. Instead of being stuck inside prepping and cooking, you're out there living your life. Factor delivers fresh, ready to eat meals that fit right into your active lifestyle. I know that there's a zillion of these types of companies, but... The options with Factor are really crazy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
They have 45 weekly meal options, so you can pick exactly what fits your goals. Calorie Smart, Protein Plus, Keto, you name it. I've been crushing the Protein Plus ones lately. They have a really good lemon herb salmon and black pepper beef. I really love these. I know you're supposed to, it's like, yeah, they're paying you to say that. No, I really actually do love Factor meals.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
They actually taste good. and they have a ton of protein. Helps me stick to my macros. Factor fuels you from breakfast to dessert. Satisfying breakfast, easy lunches, premium dinners, guilt-free snacks. They have all kinds of juice shots and stuff that we end up getting. They're really good. They make eating well so simple. Savor more this spring, less fuss.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
Factor packs in the flavor without the work. We've been ordering them for years, honestly. Try it out, and Jen will let you know how.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
This episode is also sponsored by Progressive. Fiscally responsible, financial geniuses, monetary magicians. These are things people say about drivers who switch their car insurance to Progressive and save hundreds because Progressive offers discounts for paying in full, owning a home, and a whole lot more.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
Plus, you can count on their great customer service to help you when you need it, so your dollar goes a long way. Visit Progressive.com to see if you could save on car insurance. Progressive Casualty Insurance Company & Affiliates. Potential savings will vary. Not available in all states or situations.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
If you're wondering how I managed to book all these amazing folks for the show, it is because of my network, the circle of people I know, like, and trust. I actually taught this six-minute networking stuff I'm about to pitch to you. Two, three-letter agencies that use it in their undercover work to generate connections, maintain connections.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
I'm teaching you how to do the same thing for free over at sixminutenetworking.com. This is an easy course. You can binge the whole thing. It takes a few minutes a day, and many of the guests on the show subscribe and contribute to this course. So come on and join us. You'll be in smart company where you belong. Again, the course is totally free over at 6minutenetworking.com.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
Our mission is to help you become a better informed, more critical thinker through long-form conversations with a variety of amazing folks, from spies to CEOs, athletes, authors, thinkers, performers, even the occasional rocket scientist, neuroscientist, music mogul, or tech luminary. And if you're new to the show or you want to tell your friends about the show,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
Now, back to Teagan Broadwater. I think a lot of people are probably wondering how a white dude infiltrates the Crips. How does that happen? Because at first, when I heard about your story, I was like, Tegan Broadwater, not a typical name for a black dude, but what do I know?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
A little bit, but I don't know. What do I know? And then I talked to you on the phone and I was like, I'm suspecting that this person might actually be Caucasian. And then you said, yeah, not a lot of people expected a white dude to infiltrate the Crips. And I was like, okay, okay, there's a story here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
Oh, it's smart.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
So try talking with a New Jersey accent and then I'll trust you. I mean, it seems like it's too tall of an order. Everyone in the Crips and Bloods, do you have to be African-American or is it?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
You're going. I'm white. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
Yeah, they'll say, oh, I saw him waiting in line the other day, actually, because I had to take my test. That's smart. So you just show up at the courthouse, hey, Joe, just drink a coffee, go back out the front door, pretend like you took a piss test, and everybody assumes that you did.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
So are you kind of pretending you're bankrolling this young dude? It's almost like poker, right? So you get a poker player who's pretty good, but he's 25. And then you get some guy like some tech bro who goes, I'm not that good at poker, but I do have $500,000 and you can use it. And then we split the winnings or however that works. That's almost like what you're doing with drugs.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
And the person that you're bringing around, is this somebody that's just been arrested before and that's why they're working with you? Or is it another undercover?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
Sure.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
Why do they call it the fishbowl?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
That's smart. That's clever, man. You got a few clever little bits in the book, and we'll get to that. Did they train you to do that, or did you just think about doing that? Man, I didn't have any training.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
I see. Well, it all originated here in Los Angeles. I guess it's not a huge surprise. No, of course not. Yeah. Capital. Right. So there's regular families living in this area, which is, of course, there are because it's a neighborhood. But who lives there? The kids can't walk to school, I assume, in a place like this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
Yeah, because like you said, there's a lot of people who have young kids and then there's old folks who can't move and they're just stuck with all these guys who are 25 years old shooting each other. Yeah. And the bullets going through your living room window while you're eating dinner. It's ridiculous. Yeah, to say the least. And these guys are so violent.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
I mean, you mentioned in the book people are getting executed because somebody sticks a rifle up their ass and fires. It's just like super sociopathic sounding.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
Oh, so he deserved it. I guess so. Never mind, man. I'm fine with it. I guess so. Yeah. Okay.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
You said by the time you were doing undercover work or you wanted to do undercover work and infiltrate the Crips, you had executed 500 warrants.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
If you get shot, this might just disintegrate. So try not to get shot. What expires?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
Yeah, we didn't read the labels.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
I'm just imagining you have a bunch of guys laid out on the front lawn with the handcuffs on and the guys like, hey, the van won't start again. It's like, call a couple Uber XLs. Get these guys booked. Who's got a minivan at home? Take the car seats out. Bring it over here. Way more embarrassing. Oh, man. Like, why are there so many Cheerios on the floor of this cop car? Don't worry about it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
Shut up. That's practically what it was.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
Yeah. I would imagine busting a college kid is like the rookie job. Like, all right, find some guy who sells weed and also delivers sandwiches. See if you can actually make an arrest.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
As long as you find ketamine in the sandwich, maybe that'd be a good case. Yeah, my buddy who I grew up with, he used to deliver sandwiches and he would also sell marijuana. So it was like a good gig for him because he's driving around all day and he's got sandwiches in the car.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
And it's not like really suspicious if he's going walking around buildings because he's the Jimmy John's guy, for God's sake.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
Plausible deniability. So sometimes people would order sandwiches and he'd be like, he'd show up and they'd be like, all right, Mark, we want an eighth. And thank you. You got my Hunter's Club, you know? And he's like, of course. He's probably like a lawyer now. Actually a good guy. But he told me he got caught once.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
And the way that he got caught was he had stopped selling weed because he didn't want to run into any trouble. He was graduating. He didn't really need the money anymore. He was going to get a real job. That was the plan all along. It is for a lot of college kids to sell weed. And somebody was like, I really need it. I really need it. I really need it. You're the only guy I know. I really need it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
And just kept pestering him. And he was like, fine, I can get you an eighth of good stuff. Just tell me where to drop it off. And that guy... he was like rolling over on him and basically he was a snitch because he had gotten caught doing something else. I can't remember what it is. And so he was like, The rule is if you're in the game, you're in the game because then you're being careful.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
And he's like, because he thought about it a lot when he was doing his probation. The reason I got caught was I didn't take any of my usual precautions at all with transportation, vetting, making sure this whole thing seemed legit. And he's like, 2020 hindsight, the whole thing stunk to high hell. I just didn't pay attention because he was like done with it and let his guard down fully.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
And so he's like, when I was actively doing this, I never would have fallen for this particular trick. I don't remember all the circumstances. I thought that was kind of interesting because I suppose it makes sense. Some of the guys that you busted, like the guy who had you over to his house, if he was really thinking, he probably wouldn't have had you over to his house.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
He would have been like, no, I have these rules for a reason. They're there for a reason. That's a reason. It's a rule. Maybe I don't want the cop in the kitchen. Yeah. Oh, Tegan's not a cop. Oh, the one time I make an exception. Yeah. It's the guy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
I can't remember exactly, but I think it was a snitch. I think it was just like, okay, well, you're going to be on probation. He didn't try to fight it. This was entrapment. It was like an eighth of marijuana, for God's sake. This is such a small amount of marijuana. I think a prosecutor would have gone, why am I freaking looking at this? Even in Ann Arbor, Michigan, it's, what are we doing here?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
In fact, almost every ATF and FBI agent has told me that they don't do the drugs. And they're cornered. They have ways of fake doing the drugs, which they won't discuss on the show because the upside is minimal. We just get a little curiosity bump and criminals find out how people pretend to do drugs. But then... The reason is not just so that you don't get addicted.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
Look, back in the 90s, cocaine was bad. But there were still kids who were from New York and stuff who were like, it's not that bad. My parents do it, you know, whatever. And so you'd go to these parties with these New York kids. This is Ann Arbor, Michigan. And they would have cocaine. And I was like, I don't want to be anywhere near this stuff.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
And then when I went and moved to New York after college, I was like, oh, they're not kidding. This stuff is just like everywhere. And there's a lot of casual users. Even in the 90s. When was this? This is like 2000, 2001 by the time I graduated. Wow, that's crazy. And New York had a lot of casual users everywhere. I worked on Wall Street. So guys, I'd be like, I am so tired.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
I got to go buy a Red Bull. And they're like, that ain't shit. Try this. And I'm like, you're a fifth year associate at a firm. Why do you have this in your desk? And he's like, well, try it. And then you'll know why I have it in my desk. Because at 11 p.m. on a Sunday, when you've been working for seven days... It beats Red Bull. You want to finish this brief or not, pal? And I'm like, okay.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
So in Ann Arbor, there were kids that were doing it. And I remember my friend Jason was like, I got this cocaine. And I was like, I don't want any part of this. And I was like, why did you get this? And he goes, Larry. And I go, we only know one guy named Larry. So which Larry? And he's like, Larry. And I'm like, the physics major? Yeah. The guy who's got like a Ph.D.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
thing going at Caltech after this. And he's like, yeah. And I couldn't believe it because it wasn't like junkies who were rolled up in a gutter who are screwing up their lives. It was like the guy who's in medical school is also the cocaine dealer.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
Dumbass kid stuff where the consequences are just illusory and you can't quite wrap your mind around it. But, yeah, it was exactly that. And he ends up being a felon.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
Yeah, that's terrifying, because a lot of these guys were perfectly nice, normal guys. They just liked to dabble in a little bit of the white powder, and I remember being terrified of this stuff, because I grew up in the 80s and 90s, where it's, this is your brain on drugs. Any questions? I don't want that to happen to me. Yeah, I have plenty of questions.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
Yeah, I have a lot of questions, but I don't want this guy to answer them, because he's freaking me out with his frying pan. All right, now it's time for me to sling some dope deals on the fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back. Thank you so much for watching. Right now, I'm listening to Good Inside by Dr. Becky Kennedy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
The variety makes the membership way more valuable, so you never run out of great stuff to check out. One day I'm deep in a parenting guide, the next it's a podcast or a spy thriller. So whether you're into suspense, self-development, or you just want to make traffic suck less, Audible's got you covered.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
Start listening and discover what's beyond the edge of your seat. New members can try Audible now free for 30 days and dive into a world of new thrills. Visit audible.com slash JHS or text JHS to 500-500. That's audible.com slash JHS or text JHS to 500-500.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
I was surprised to find out that, I guess it's no surprise, being a former practicing attorney, that attorneys go, you're a druggie too. You did a bunch of drugs with him. And then the jury, if they're a bunch of Puritans, will go, you're just as bad as the criminals. How do you remember that? You were high on meth at the time. He made me do it. Not a great look, not a great excuse, you know?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
This episode is also sponsored by Bowlin Branch. All right, let's talk about getting quality sleep without the usual tossing and turning. You know how your mind races when you finally get in bed? Bowlin Branch sheets are designed to quiet all that noise. Their signature sheets made from the finest 100% organic cotton are incredibly soft and breathable.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
With a special cooling weave, they feel crisp and keep you cool all night, even as the weather warms up. I'm just thinking about sleeping in butter. I grabbed a set myself and the quality really is undeniable. It doesn't matter what adjective you want to use for it. You can feel the difference immediately.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
This episode is sponsored in part by The Defender. You ever meet somebody and instantly know they've been places, that calm and chaos, I've driven through a storm and found the sunrise kind of energy? That's The Defender in vehicle form. It's not just a car, it's a statement, a nod to the ones who don't wait around for life to hand them an adventure, they go and get it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
And whether you're a seasoned trailblazer or just figuring out how to swap city limits for tree lines, The Defender is built to back you up. It's capable of great things just like you. It's a celebration of grit, curiosity, and pushing past the usual. So if you've been waiting for a sign to finally take that trip, forge that new path, or just see what you're made of, this is it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
The Defender's ready when you are. To learn more, visit DestinationDefenderUSA.com. If you like this episode of the show, I invite you to do what other smart and considerate listeners do, which is take a moment and support our amazing sponsors. They make this show possible.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
All of the deals, discount codes, and ways to support the podcast are searchable and clickable on the website at JordanHarbinger.com slash deals. If you can't find a code, you're not sure if the code exists, definitely email us jordan at jordanharbinger.com. I am happy to surface codes for you. It is that important that you support those who support the show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
Now for the rest of part one with Tegan Broadwater. I understand you think a lot of the advice given to undercovers is nonsense. I touched on this at the top of the show. One of the tips is make your car dirty, get an earring, talk with an accent. And I'm thinking, this can't be real. Is this really what people are learning? You said you had no training, so I don't know.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
What's worse, that training or no training?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
If I'm an undercover, I change my name, but I'm still from a suburb of Detroit. I still moved to California. I still did a little bit of time when I lived in New York. Maybe I wasn't a lawyer in New York, but maybe I was, I don't know, working at a bar that I hung out at a lot in New York that's no longer open, something like that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
That way, if I have to recall it, or I say, yeah, when I lived in New York, and the guy's like, wait, I thought you said you lived in California. This doesn't make sense. oh, no, I lived in New York before, and I don't have to change my story. It's actually my story, just with a little 15% bullshit.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
Before I sell you this kilo of uncut cocaine, I need to see some identification to make sure you're over 18.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
I never knew that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
I could see the ID thing coming in a little bit. Like you deliver the information in a way where the person thinks they're clever for getting it. Like maybe you need to chop a little bit off of a brick. So you take out your ID and he notices it has your fake name on it. And then it's like, Oh, his name is Tegan narrow water. I love it. Huh? I love it. Is that a realistic?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
Also, I think it's outrageous government conduct is one of the defenses. So he'll say something like, Well, this officer made my client do drugs. No, he didn't. He did. You do the drugs. Yeah, I did. But I did him after him. Well, OK, now it's your word against his. But if you say I didn't even do the drugs, he did the drugs. He had drugs in his system when he did the test.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
Welcome to the show. I'm Jordan Harbinger. On The Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the stories, secrets, and skills of the world's most fascinating people and turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
Yeah. I didn't leave it on the table when you look at it and then you take it. Okay. And then you pick your ID up and of course he's eyeballing it, but you're just pretend you don't notice that. Yeah. Yeah, that's the kind of thing I feel like, yeah, I like thinking through this stuff. It's fun. Yeah. The part that wouldn't be fun for me is wondering if I'm going to get shot.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
That's the part that doesn't sound as fun.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
Yeah. there's a point at which some guy brandishes a gun and says, you want some of this? And you're just like, whatever, fool, and roll your eyes. What are you actually thinking in that moment? Because I would not be thinking, whatever, fool, idiot. I'd be like, oh my God, this guy's threatening me with a weapon.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
Yeah. Yeah. So how do you train yourself to do that without worry? Like, oh, he might actually shoot me when I'm like, whatever, sucker.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
Oh, wow. That's a real thing. Wax bullets.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
Yeah, it's like paintball, where you're like, I thought I was wearing a protective neck gaiter. Like, no, man, not from five feet away when the guy hits it five times in a row. Yeah. There was something in the book that I didn't fully understand. So you go and buy drugs, and the guy, I think, is trying to sell you crack, and you're like, no, I don't want to buy crack.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
I didn't have any drugs in my system. OK, well, then they weren't doing drugs together. One guy was doing drugs and the other guy was pretending to because he's a police officer. But if both of you are high out of your minds on meth that you just baked in a trailer, the gap between you and the criminal starts to shrink quite a bit.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
My guess was that you wanted to find powdered cocaine because that's the expensive ingredient in crack.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
I suggest our episode starter packs. These are collections of our favorite episodes on topics like persuasion and negotiation, psychology and geopolitics, disinformation, China, North Korea, crime and cults, and more. It'll help new listeners get a taste of everything we do here on the show. Just visit jordanharbinger.com slash start or search for us in your Spotify app to get started.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
Because if you're getting it after it's been cooked, this guy's an underling from the cook who's an underling from the guy who gets the cocaine. You're skipping, whatever, three levels. by refusing to deal with crack, which is gross anyways. But like you said, culturally, it's sort of, you're not a druggie, you're not a user because you don't want crack, you want cocaine.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
It's, oh, so he's gonna cook it or he uses cocaine or his people that he sells to use cocaine so they have more money because crack is just cheaper cocaine basically at that point, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
Do some of these folks think that if you ask a cop if they're a cop, they have to answer truthfully? This is like a Hollywood movie thing, right? I remember in the movie Blow, Pee Wee Herman, whatever his real name is, says, are you a cop? You have to say yes if you are. If not, it's entrapment. And it's a joke because that's not true, right? That's not true, yeah. Of course it's not.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
So do you benefit from Hollywood movies miseducating people?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
So, yeah, I wondered about that. I wonder, does it make undercover work easier that people don't trust cops because the criminals never trusted cops? But now if they see you guys all as just as bad as them, maybe it's not as hard.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
Yeah, yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
Oh, hold on a second.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
hell's going on with this damn nokia yeah i can't figure this out i'm thinking just forget it i'm not recording this oh god the modern equivalent would be an app on your phone that says police recorder basically and it beeps when it's out as a police recorder time is up oh what is that that's just my kid sending me a text message it's just so sad the technology is just so bad it just makes no sense you mentioned when people are suspicious of you just touch on this in the dialogue that's in the book you ask them questions back
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
You kind of flip the script to get them thinking about their answers maybe instead of your answers. Can you give me an example of that? I think that's a good technique to deflect suspicion, and I'm wondering what other techniques you have to deflect suspicion.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
That makes sense. So it seems like if there's supposed to be that distance between you and the person you're dealing with, giving away too many details about yourself might be an indicator that you're lying.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
So you're not in a hurry to make the bust, which probably gives you a little bit more credibility, I guess.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
This is a high-trust business, the drug game. It has to be because... I can't do a credit check on your LLC to make sure that you are current. I can't get a proof of funds from your banker. There's no third party verification other than, oh, T says you've been dealing with him or you sell good stuff or whatever. I mean, that's as good as it gets.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
You're about to hear a preview of The Jordan Harbinger Show with a Black man that befriends members of the Ku Klux Klan.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
For more on how Daryl Davis convinced 200 KKK members to give up their robes, check out episode 540 on The Jordan Harbinger Show. That's it for part one, part two coming out in just a few days here. All things Tegan Broadwater will be in the show notes at jordanharbinger.com. Advertisers, deals, discount codes, ways to support the show, all at jordanharbinger.com slash deals.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
Please consider supporting those who support the show. Also, our newsletter, We Bit Wiser, it gives you something specific, something practical, something that'll have an immediate impact on your decisions, your psychology, your relationships in under two minutes. And if you haven't signed up yet, I invite you to come check it out. It's a great companion to the show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
JordanHarbinger.com slash news is where you can find it. Don't forget about 6-Minute Networking as well over at 6minutenetworking.com. I am at Jordan Harbinger on Twitter and Instagram. You can also connect with me on LinkedIn. In this show, it's created in association with Podcast One. My team is Jen Harbinger, Jace Sanderson, Robert Fogarty, Tata Sidlowskis, Ian Baird, and Gabriel Mizrahi.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
Remember, we rise by lifting others. The fee for the show is you share it with friends when you find something useful or interesting. The greatest compliment you can give us is to share the show with those you care about. If you know somebody interested in the undercover scene, police work, drug trafficking, maybe they like stories like this, definitely share this episode with them.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
In the meantime, I hope you apply what you hear on this show so you can live what you learn. And we'll see you next time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
That makes sense. I want to back up the truck a little. One of the first things you say in the book, actually, is that you can't eradicate dope. And this is probably a silly question, but what do you mean by that? Isn't that what we're trying to do out there is eradicate? No.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
And I don't know if that's working. I mean, I see fentanyl and stuff. And fentanyl deaths are down in the last 12 months, which is, I don't know.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
The scariest thing about fentanyl is one, how lethal it is, like you said, but two, where it really freaks me out is I see people that I know that are like, hey, my friend's having a going away party. These are not people who normally do drugs.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
or it's like a bunch of lawyers or something like that, and somebody just buys cocaine, but they get it from their cousin's friend instead of their usual guy and has fentanyl and they're dead. And that's scary because certain people who use drugs recreationally like to think, look, man, I'm spending $500 on these drugs. It's for a party. I do this once a year. We don't overdo it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
Those people are now dying from drug overdoses from fentanyl. And the gross truth about it is people care more when it's like recreational, high-performing drug users than when it's somebody who has spiraled out of control for the last five years, going from a back injury to taking heroin to then doing fentanyl on the street and has been homeless for three years. It sucks.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
Today on the show, former undercover cop Tegan Broadwater, who infiltrated the infamous Crips street gang. We dive into the drug war and how we are not going to arrest our way out of the dope problem.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
And people can send me the nastiest emails they want, but it's true. Society just cares about those people, which is a shame. Those are the innocents.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
That's a good point. A lot of the drug users that I've known, because they were college wrestlers and did something weird to their back, started taking pills after a surgery. Their pill prescription got cut off, but they were already hooked on this pain med, so they started buying it on the street. And then when their source ran out, they started doing heroin, which they didn't want to do.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
They just wanted their doctor to keep prescribing them, but the doctor wouldn't because it's been five years or something. And they have to act criminally in order to get what they need. And then they're hooked on fentanyl and they're like, what the hell? I was a Division I wrestler.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
How am I a junkie now? Yeah. That's the scariest part of this for a lot of people. Because it's easy to say this is someone else's problem. But as somebody who does exercise every day, I'm like, I would take a pain pill if I slipped a disc. Oh, wait, I could become a junkie in about three years through the exact same process. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
And it's one of those things where once the consequences become possible for you, it's a much bigger problem now. Now we better pay attention to this. Of course. It might affect me. Yeah, that's everybody, though. Is it? Okay, that makes me feel better.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
Never mind. I don't want to get into this. So dealers, you say in the book, never do business from their house. I would be a terrible drug dealer because it made sense to me, but I probably would have just invited people into my backyard to sell drugs. I'm in the right business. You are, yes. But some of these guys had you in their house.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
So what does that tell you when somebody's like, hey, come on over? And you're like, oh, he actually lives here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
We also explore undercover tactics and strategies, close calls that almost cost him his life, becoming close friends with gang members, building trust, building rapport, and how he dealt with a leak inside his own police department. This is a really good, solid two-part episode here that I know you'll enjoy. Here we go. Part one with Tegan Broadwater.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
It seems like a bad idea for them to put their guard down like that. Is that a mistake on their part or is it a business decision to say, I'm going to show this guy that I trust him enough to bring him into my house and might benefit our business relationship?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
That's what I was wondering. Is it a concerted decision, like, I'm going to have my closest contacts over? You see The Godfather, they invite all the guys to the daughter's wedding, and it's like, look, we're social, we're friends, you're close enough to my family, it's my daughter's wedding, it's a whole thing, you're invited.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
It seems like gangster version of that is, look, sit in my kitchen while my wife makes us some eggs and we'll do the deal there. Now you're in the inner circle. But it sounds like what you're saying is the guy was like... I don't want to drive all the way downtown. Just, it's fine. Come to my house.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
Yeah. Tell me how the Crips do business, because it actually sounds quite a bit like a real business where they open up a test market, they run their guys in there, and then suddenly they go, oh, this is a serious moneymaker. We got to get an experienced branch manager to go run these few blocks. It sounds kind of like that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
Yeah, because that's one of those jobs where everybody says, various interviews have been like, my stress was so high, one of my teeth started falling out. And where my stress was so high, blood work said I was going to basically die young because my cortisol was through the roof or had no cortisol or whatever it was. My stress level was so high, I was addicted to hydroxycut.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
Yeah, that's interesting because, of course, from the outside, we think, oh, there's Crips and there's Bloods. The Crips are all on the same team. The Bloods are all on the same team. It's like pretty serious business. But it sounds like almost from block to block, it's like those guys don't get along with those other guys and those guys don't get along with those other guys.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
And these guys are doing business with the Bloods, but those guys won't do business with the other Crips. And it's like, well, what the hell's the point then? Why wear the blue? Why have the colors? Why have the jersey? Why have it? It doesn't mean anything. You're still shooting each other.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
I see. Yeah. It's probably harder to prove you didn't know what was going on when there's three separate cases on your property with different people that you have known associations with. Okay. We can go and prove this or you can stay in jail for six months because we're going to find out that you did this. But yeah, if it's just one guy did a drug deal in your driveway.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1160: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part One
Starts to look bad at some point when it keeps happening. Wow, you have the worst luck, man. You keep getting arrested with drugs and guns near you all the time. That are never yours. That are never yours.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
This episode is sponsored in part by Vital Proteins. I want to tell you about Vital Proteins Collagen Peptides. That's a mouthful. It's a daily supplement that supports your hair, skin, nails, bones, and joints all in one in one simple step each day. Collagen makes up about a third of the protein in our bodies, but as we hit our 30s, it unfortunately starts to decline.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
How capable are these guys? Because whenever I see photos of guys like this, The comments are always like, oh, meal team six is in action or like here are the gravy seals. Because it's always a guy who looks like he probably wouldn't make it three blocks walking with all the crap he's got Velcroed to himself. And he's got like Velcro extenders to go over his fat belly so the plate carrier fits.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
Is that what we're dealing with or are these guys in good shape training?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
Yeah, that's quite scary. I want to back up a little bit. You mentioned that some of the white supremacist gangs have biblical rationalizations for what they're doing. Can we get a brief overview of that? Because I think it's kind of interesting.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
So the KKK still exists, right? Oh, yeah. This guy, Daryl Davis, who's been on the show, I don't know if you know him. He's essentially talked a bunch of these guys over years and talks them out of the KKK and he keeps their robes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
Yeah, amazing guy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
Surprise, surprise, I guess, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
I mean, it's amazing to me they still exist. I can only assume it's just a bunch of people whose lives haven't worked out the way they wanted it to. And they're like, oh, blaming brown people? That's easier than looking at all the mistakes I've made. Where do I sign up for this?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
That's kind of the impression I get of a lot of these people, especially the interviews with the guys that Daryl's talked to. They just grew up as ignorant as possible with terrible parents. They're not the cream of the crop. And they also say things like they're not white supremacists. They're separatists. Do you know what the difference? What does that mean?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
Even then, what does that mean? Like you're German and Slavic. OK, the Nazis thought the Slavs were below. So it's like, where do you draw the imaginary line to put yourself above these people? I found it interesting that a lot of these white supremacist gangs will pimp out white women to non-whites. And it's like, how's that jive with your whole no race mixing thing?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
And it's like, well, we need the money.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
These are collections of our favorite episodes on topics like persuasion and negotiation, psychology and geopolitics, China, North Korea, crime and cults, and more. That'll help new listeners get a taste of everything we do here on the show. Just visit jordanharbinger.com slash start or search for us in your Spotify app to get started. Today, part two with Scott Payne.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
Let me guess, the serpent's a black dude.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
Those are two things. Okay, I didn't know those were two separate things.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
We had so much to talk about before. He's a retired FBI undercover. He's been with biker gangs, helped take down a bunch of these outlaw biker gangs, one percenters.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
Here it is from the ADL is a reference to the most popular white supremacist slogan in the world. We must secure the existence of our people and a future for white children. That's the phrase. And that is essentially yada yada. The whole world is controlled by Jews. Just in case anybody was confused. Yeah, okay. So that's where the 1488 thing comes from, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
That's when you might notice things aren't working quite like they used to. Your joints, your skin, maybe even your hair. Vital Proteins steps in to help keep those areas supported so you can stay active and keep doing what you love. Vital Proteins is the number one collagen peptide brand in the U.S., so they know what they're doing. It's super easy to take.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
This week, we're talking about how he, well, kind of accidentally joined the Ku Klux Klan, white nationalist violence, something called accelerationists, which are guys who just kind of want to see the whole world burn so they can start a white supremacist or white separatist ethnostate in the United States of America. These people are real, folks. Absolutely nuts. By the way, this episode...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
The eighth letter of the alphabet is H, and that's... So 88 is HH, which is Heil Hitler. So 1488 is a white supremacist code number. I forget the name.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
From some donkey banging party.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
More of a goat killing party. Okay. Okay. You went to a KKK meeting, and I was surprised to learn that they don't burn crosses, they light crosses, and that's apparently a difference that you need to know.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
Okay, I was going to say clud. Never heard that word. All right.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
Very clever. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
Yeah, I'm pretty sure we could put that one together. Like, oh, okay, the metaphor is really literal in this particular instance.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
Oh, I see. Interesting.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
The KKK stuff, it really sounded all so stupid in Mickey Mouse, right? It was like, nobody say anything and be quiet. And then 10 minutes later, if anybody needs to speak up now, you're like, but you told us to be quiet. Oh, yeah. Forget about that. Forget about that. Don't move. But raise your hand if you you just told us not to move and not to talk. OK, forget about that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
It would be funny if it weren't sinister domestic terrorism and violent racism, basically.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
I guess the good news is they're so disorganized. They're not unified at all that it's hard to come up with sort of a big overarching plan for everything because it's a bunch of punks.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
And especially this part right here in the beginning starts off graphic. No kids in the car for this one, for sure. Man, I appreciate you coming back. Last time we talked to you, we talked about some of the ups and downs of undercover and going into the outlaws biker gang.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
Yeah, I think that's just one of those every accusation is a confession, right? They have so much shame around it that they're like, ah, I can balance this out by being the most anti, most racist, homophobic, whatever, and then it all balances out. And then if anybody ever catches me with it or there's ever any rumors, they'll be like, oh, that guy? No, it can't be.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
He's a grand wizard of the Ku Klux Klan with a K. I didn't know that guy was black.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
Yeah, that wasn't me. That would be very anti all the things that I clearly believe, as per my Facebook profile. I was undercover. Yeah, I just wanted to see how they operate.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
Anything for the cause. It's crazy stuff. And now for a word from our sponsor, Al-Qaeda. That doesn't sound right. We'll be right back. This episode is sponsored in part by EveryPlate. Every plate delivers delicious restaurant-quality meals like crispy chicken Milanese or roasted garlic Dijon butter steak right to your door for less than you'd spend on groceries.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
Thank you so much for watching. What I like about Up First is the tone. The hosts know their stuff. They're not trying to scare the crap out of you. There's no real agenda being pushed. I caught the episode the other day on breaking down the latest with the economy and some election updates. It's just easily digestible.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
But the next level up in craziness is some of these, I don't even know if you still call them gangs are almost like cults with some of the weird stuff that that they were doing. Can you outline some of this? Because I rarely don't know where to begin, but the book has a man having sex with a donkey, and the donkey bit his fingers off. It's just like, okay, is that where we open the show?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
They gave me just enough to know what's going on, so they hit the sweet spot, in my opinion. It's national and international, fact-based but still conversational, and a great thing to add to my morning routine while I'm fixing my coffee. So if you're over the news but you still want to actually know what's happening, check out Up First. Short, smart, and actually useful.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
Listen now to the Up First podcast from NPR. If you're wondering how I know all these great authors, thinkers, and creators, it's because of my network. I'm teaching you how to build your network for free over at 6minutenetworking.com. I know networking is kind of gross, but hey, undercover folks like Scott Payne, this is their bread and butter.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
These relationship building skills, inspiring other people to want to develop relationships with you, get them to trust you. In a non-cringe, very down-to-earth way, nothing awkward, nothing cheesy, nothing unethical, just practical exercises that'll make you a better connector, a better colleague, a better friend, a better peer at work. Six minutes a day is all it takes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
And hey, many of the guests on the show subscribe and contribute to the course. I have taught this course to three-letter agencies all over the U.S. and abroad. Come on and join us. You'll be in smart and somewhat dangerous company where you belong. You can find the course for free over at 6minutenetworking.com. All right, back to Scott Payne. in this meeting though.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
And like, did you accidentally join the clan through going through that whole rigmarole?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
And I think that might be where we open the show. It's just, there was a guy banging a donkey.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
Thank you. Thank you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
Thank you. Thank you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
Yeah. My church group is going to read this particular book. page of this book. You're undercover with some of these gangs, and we'll get into what these are, but no disrespect for people who are upstanding citizens of these particular areas of the country, but this is real, like, can you say redneck country?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
Thank you. Thank you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
At the point where somebody's having sex with a donkey at a party, I think we are all on the same page here, right? That's a little... Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
Thank you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
Pill sick. The guy was pill sick, meaning he like hadn't had a dose of Oxycontin in enough time and he was suffering through withdrawal.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
Just add a serving to your coffee, smoothie, even water. It doesn't even taste like anything, so it blends right in. The key is consistency. Making it a daily habit is how you see the benefits.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
Man. And it works on damaged people. You've got some depictions of some pretty crazy folks. Tammy, the torturer. This is a person. She just had screws loose in every part of her psyche. You think?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
Two specific people, I assume, not just two random. Okay.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
Yeah, Tammy, did you think of that one yourself? That's a little disturbing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
I guess he'd been up that long. I guess that's lucky that he didn't wake up from that. But I bet when he woke up, he was very unhappy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
And the first thing you do is you try to get up. So that's how you wake up is you try to roll over like, I need some water. Holy moly.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
Good luck finding the phone. It's 20 feet away, buddy. Dang on a string in front of you. I'm sorry, honey. People will do anything but get a marriage therapist.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
She's tweaking. Meth head. Somebody like that, I do not want to know what their childhood is like. This is a person who is terrible, but obviously they were not born that way. She is the product of abuse that is unspeakable, I'm sure.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
Oh, yeah, I bet you have, Tammy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
Yeah, but not as unlucky as her ex-boyfriends have been in love. Those guys.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
Yeah. Okay. I don't want to know what your upbringing was like. She must make a mean macaroni casserole if you're putting up with that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
That's probably true. From the stories I heard, I kind of am too. Yeah, exactly. Exactly. My God, that's crazy. So I found it interesting. You mentioned this early in the book. De-escalation is your best weapon. Even as a big guy, right? As a dude who can handle himself, you say multiple times. I found that quite interesting.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
And now a word from our sponsors, almost none of which are Nazi terrorist militias. We'll be right back. This episode is sponsored in part by Airbnb. As Anthony Bourdain once said, travel isn't always pretty. It's not always comfortable, but that's okay. The journey changes you. It should change you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
Whether you're saving for your dream getaway or you're just looking for financial flexibility, Airbnb makes it easy to turn your space into extra income. Find a co-host at Airbnb.com slash host. I've got homes.com as a sponsor for this episode. Homes.com knows when it comes to home shopping, it's never just about the house or the condo. It's about the homes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
And what makes a home is more than just the house or property. It's the location. It's the neighborhood. If you've got kids, it's also schools, nearby parks, transportation options. That's why homes.com goes above and beyond to bring home shoppers the in-depth information they need to find the right home. It's so hard not to say home every single time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
And when I say in-depth information, I'm talking deep information. Each listing features comprehensive information about the neighborhood, complete with a video guide. They also have details about local schools with test scores, state rankings, student-teacher ratio. They even have an agent directory with the sales history of each agent.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
So when it comes to finding a home, not just a house, this is everything you need to know, all in one place, homes.com. We've done your homework. This episode is also sponsored in part by Progressive. Do you ever find yourself playing the budgeting game? You shift a little money here, a little bit over there. You just hope it all works out.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
Well, with the Name Your Price tool from Progressive, you can be a better budgeter and potentially lower your insurance bill too. You tell Progressive what you want to pay for car insurance, they'll help you find options within your budget. Try it today at Progressive.com. Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and Affiliates. Price and coverage match limited by state law.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
Not available in all states. If you like this episode of the show, I invite you to do what other smart and considerate listeners do, which is take a moment and support our amazing sponsors. They're the ones who make the show possible. All the deals, discount codes, and ways to support the podcast are searchable and clickable over at jordanharbinger.com slash deals.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
Got our AI chat bot that should also help you surface codes. And hey, if you can't find it, you're not sure it exists, email me. I am more than happy to surface any code for you. It is that important that you support those who support the show. Now for the rest of my conversation with Scott Payne.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
I think a lot of people assume, oh, if you're this big, tough dude, the best thing you can do is just show how tough you are all the time. But it does make sense to deescalate, especially if you're trying to build trust with people. You're trying to show, hey, look, I'm smart enough to let cooler heads prevail because we're all on the same team here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
We're trying to do business, not just break bottles over each other's heads or whatever it is. One observation I noticed towards the end of the book is the irony of a lot of these accelerationist gangs, white supremacist gangs, is that they are in many ways the biggest bunch of seemingly dumbass, inbred loser drug addicts. Not all of them, but a lot of them that you described.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
It was. It all came out at once. But the point I'm trying to make is if actual Nazis took over the government like these guys want, they would be the first ones to get exterminated because they are total waste to society. They don't have any skills. They're not smart. They have all these hangups and weaknesses.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
They would be the first ones to get euthanized under an actual sort of pseudo neo-Nazi government.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
I can understand that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
I can get behind that because otherwise it gets glorified.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
I'm not saying these people aren't dangerous. I think they are especially dangerous. I just mean that if they ever got what they wanted, they would be down the drain first thing. This would be the first wave of people you get rid of is these...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
Exactly. You're one guy or two guys with a rifle. I'm going to bring 20 guys and tell them you got all this stuff in your house. Yeah. Well, you're not going to take us all out.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
Most of them become software engineers or some kind of genius level thing. They don't become Nazi or white separatist, whatever Christian identity.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
Yeah, I've had a few of those guys on the show. Christian Picciolini, maybe you know him, former skinhead. He's been on the show. And I had Eamon Dean on who was like, memorized the Koran, went to Bosnia to fight the infidels. And then he just witnessed all these guys he thought were good Muslims chainsawing someone's head off who was just essentially...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
in the army and he's like this is corrupting all these nice people and he eventually went undercover did incredible work and is now speaking out on the right side that's a courageous move some of these guys are making to come out of that and then go on the other side it's really impressive honestly because you have to admit that you were wrong in public for a long time and it becomes part of your identity and then you have to help other people in the way that you are helped it's really a gutsy thing we'll link to those episodes in the show notes
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
I know we're running out of time. Can you go out in public with your family? Because it seems like somebody could spot you. Or do you just live so far away from all these areas where you used to operate?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
Wow. That must be a hell of a moment for some of these guys, because they don't suspect you initially. Otherwise, they wouldn't be in the place where they are if they suspected you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
Yeah, that's why you just sold me an RPG, because you knew it. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
Yeah, just because you knew. I don't get political on the show, so I'm curious if we can handle this in a nonpolitical way. But what do you think about all the cuts at FBI, ATF, these organizations right now? I'm worried we're going to end up with super strong organized crime groups or a terrorist attack because we're getting rid of all these qualified people.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
That's an interesting perspective.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
What happened with those people? I'm not in the loop on that. That was the Russia hoax and all that stuff.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
I see. So that was selective release of information.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
The math doesn't work.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
No, you don't. That's why I asked that question at the end, because I was curious what your actual opinion was. And you did not disappoint. What keeps you up at night? Former FBI could be in any sort of subject matter. I don't care. What keeps you up at night? What are you worried about right now when it comes to this country or the FBI in general? That's a good question.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
I should do this for a living.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
Battling evil, yeah. There's a lot of stuff you could be worried about, but like you said, glass half full. That's probably the only way you stay sane in your line of work, though, glass half full. Otherwise, the whole world just looks like a pretty horrific place full of accelerationists and dudes missing fingers from their donkey party and all that kind of stuff.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
I mean, that would make you go nuts.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
Who knows, man? But you're right. You've got to have that glass half full kind of mentality. Otherwise, your whole world is like that. And then what's the point of saving it?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
So far, so good.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
I can accept that, I suppose.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
Yeah. Oh, yeah. We have that in common, too. Tell us about the goat sacrifice. How do you even end up in a situation where they're sacrificing a goat, first of all, asking for a friend?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
Oh, geez. So this is someone's livestock or pet goat or whatever? Oh, man.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
Jeez, are they just sitting in a van? Are they pretending to camp nearby or something like that?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
As one does, I suppose.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
Yeah, donkey style.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
By the way, this episode, and especially this part right here in the beginning, starts off graphic. No kids in the car for this one, for sure. Coming up next on the Jordan Harbinger Show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
Oh, God. That's how you get your fingers bit off, man.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
Time to go to Tampa.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
Thank you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
Go get some mittens for the dog and continue.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
That's right. Stay away. Exactly. Man, that is just... How high do you have to be to engage in something like that? There's not enough cocaine in California to make most of us probably want to do that kind of thing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
This is where they film that kind of stuff, and then as you take your hard drive out and throw it into a river, yeah, that's exactly where they film that stuff. Jace, we're going to have to mark this as explicit on Apple Podcasts and any platform that doesn't take kindly to all of the things that have happened in the first 10 minutes of this show. You can just bleep it out. It's too good.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
It's too good. All right, so these white supremacist gangs... Tell me about these, because when you start infiltrating these groups, they're a whole different animal, right? This isn't like bikers moving guns and meth. They've got a weird and totally different ideology.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
This is like the, I'm not a criminal anymore because I have glasses on now. Okay, pal, we see through the disguise. You have a tie on. You're still a scumbag.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
Welcome to the show. I'm Jordan Harbinger. Former jihadi, drug trafficker, rocket scientist, or Emmy-nominated comedian. And hey, if you're new to the show or you want to tell your friends about the show, I suggest our episode starter packs. It's a great place to begin.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
They call themselves the base. Isn't Al-Qaeda in Arabic the base? So is that a coincidence?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1132: Scott Payne | Infiltrating America's Extremist Underworld
Wow. Where do they get it? I remember back in the day I had to buy a bulletproof vest for work. I just had Gulls, which is a police catalog, and they had these Safariland vests or whatever, and then they had generic ones, which I got because it was like $100 cheaper. So are they getting these plates and plate carriers just straight out of these police catalogs?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Da ist ein Kaffeeshop und ich bin da rein, um den Kofferraum zu nutzen oder so. Zuerst mal, der Ort ist schrecklich und die Leute, die rein und raus kommen, ihre Augen sind immer blutgeschossen. Sie sind immer ethnisch Vietnamesisch. Es ist nicht wie einer dieser Orte, wo trendige Leute reinkommen und Vietnamesische Kaffee trinken. Es sind immer mittlerjährige Jungs.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
They go in and they come out, their eyes are bloodshot. They're just crazy looking, tired. They'll come out at all hours, any hours. And I'm like, what is this place? This is not just a coffee shop. There's either a brothel in the back or there's a casino in the back. Trying to get the bloodshot eyes. Maybe a lot of smoke, maybe? I don't know. Yeah. Or they stayed up all night doing something.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Das bedeutet nicht, dass sie etwas falsch tun, aber es scheint ein bisschen schräg zu sein. Ich sage, meine Frau ist Asiener, sie ist Taiwaner, China. Sie hat gesagt, was Sie wahrscheinlich nicht sagen sollten, dass Asiaten Gambling lieben. Viele Leute lieben Gambling, aber Asiaten aus Asien lieben Gambling. Und ich glaube nicht, dass das rassistisch ist oder so etwas.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Ich glaube, das ist nur eine kulturelle Sache. Aber es ist illegal in Kalifornien. Also gibt es alle Art und Weise, wie Leute es tun, die entweder illegal und schrecklich sind oder völlig gut sind. Wie mein Vater-in-Law hat Mahjong-Games in seinem Haus, aber niemand handelt Geld. Es ist nur für Spaß und es sind alle seine Freunde. Ja, besonders wenn sie es überbringen.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Honestly, if it's gambling, I personally don't really care. It's just when it gets to be like dicier than that, it starts to make the neighborhood a little less safe. That's the only time I take issue with stuff like that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Und dann, was machst du mit den Prozeden? Nun, wir müssen das Geld durch den Nudel-Store auslösen. Ich sage nicht, dass es okay ist und legal sein sollte. Ich sage nur, ja, richtig, es ist ein dreckiger Slope. Das ist 100 Prozent wahr. Für den Lohnabschluss, ja. Du musst diese weiße Linie haben, Mann. Boom. Das ist richtig. Das macht Sinn.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Es gibt ein lustiges Visual im Buch, wo diese beiden Jungs in der Kaffeeshop, wo du gehst, dich für Untercover-Arbeit befestigen. Das ist ein lustiges Visual, das ich hoffe, es in irgendeine Netflix-Serie macht, oder wo auch immer du endest. Nimm uns durch. Ich dachte, das wäre lustig.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
These are collections of our favorite episodes on topics like persuasion and negotiation, psychology, geopolitics, disinformation, China, North Korea, crime and cults and more. That'll help new listeners get a taste of everything we do here on the show. You know, I've said that so many times introducing the show that I wonder how many of you out there
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Das stimmt. Ja, ich glaube, wenn du Kokain verkaufst, hilft es, wenn es so aussieht, als hättest du dich geträumt, während du ein wenig Kokain trinkst, richtig? Nicht sehr ungekämpft, aber auch ein wenig, wie, überwiegend zusammengelegt, vielleicht, oder wie ein wenig futuristische Oakleys, nicht Cop Oakleys, die futuristischen, die niemand kauft. Du fragst dich, wie sie diese Dinge verkaufen.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Das ist eine Linie.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Ich habe blaue Jeans und T-Shirts, Mann. Das ist fast alles, was ich habe. Ich weiß nicht, was du mir helfen willst. Es hat wahrscheinlich alle ihre Willkür genommen, zu sagen, unser Coke-Händler trägt so etwas. Hier ist ein Fotograf von ihm. Vielleicht sollten wir das nicht tun. Vielleicht sind sie die Coke-Händler. Wer weiß. Das ist wirklich lustig.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Sie sind so, wir werden ihn niemals verletzen, weil wir ihn einen Meilen weg sehen werden. Wir sind diejenigen, die ihn trägt. Smart. Smart Counterintelligence.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Oh man. Again, if something is off, you just don't look the part. It's not going to work, man.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Yeah, I'm curious about that. I want to get through the FBI application process a little bit first, though, because I have to admit, I'm a little surprised you got hired in law enforcement, especially the FBI, with all the stuff that you did before that. Because I got buddies who I went to law school with, and they were basically told, you've smoked weed a few too many times to join the FBI.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
And these are like... Sie haben gesagt, 15, wie ich in dem Buch gesagt habe. Ich habe nicht verliebt. Und wiederum, ich sage den Leuten, die mich in meiner Behördenlehre verliebt haben,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Yeah, I know which one I would pick. Yours sounds fun, but I'm also like, well, you know, expensing this five-star dinner in a hotel room sounds a little bit more comfortable.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Yeah, it seems like some of these guys think, I'll never go to jail, I'll never get caught, I'm too smart for this, I went to a private school. Those are the people that seem like they're probably likely to have a crazy meltdown in the moment, because they've never been tested before.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Yeah, yeah, that's interesting. I guess for me it was a little mystifying how the FBI wants, in theory, the agents to be able to think like criminals, but then they also have to be squeaky clean Boy Scouts who've never smoked weed or only smoked weed a certain number of times. I would have never gotten hired.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Really interesting, of course, as these guys always, always are. Going undercover, close calls, how he may have been born for this and how he made it through the FBI Academy despite his unusual appearance and history. He's a really smart, really sharp undercover agent. This book was fascinating. I think you're really going to enjoy this conversation as well.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Ich dachte nicht daran. Ja, ich glaube, das macht einen Sinn. Du machst all diese Drogenkaufs, wie du gesagt hast, Hookers, Kokain. Ist es dann seltsam, deiner christlichen Frau zu sagen, As a Christian, hey, I spent the evening buying cookers and cocaine. What did you do, honey? And she's like, I crocheted this blanket or whatever. I moved furniture because I was worried about you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Ja. Das bedeutet nicht, dass es jetzt einfach ist. Erzähl mir über die Outlaws. Wir hatten vorher Undercover-ATF-Agenten und solche Dinge auf dem Show, die mit den Hells Angels untergegangen sind. Wir hatten einen anderen Mann, der mit, ich will nicht sagen, was haben sie genannt? Sind das die Pagans? Could be the Pagans of the Mongols. Pagans, that was also ATF.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
So the Outlaws, are they also a name brand like those two motorcycle gangs?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
And while you're holding a bladder full of pee on a surveillance operation, that's the perfect time to support the amazing sponsors who support this show. We'll be right back. Vielen Dank. Untertitelung des ZDF für funk, 2017 Untertitelung des ZDF für funk, 2017
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
So if you've ever struggled with putting together a cheap flimsy bed frame or worse, you moved and you had to break one down, you're gonna wish you had a Thuma. It's time to upgrade your space and create an oasis with Thuma.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Here we go with Scott Payne, which, by the way, definitely sounds like a fake name that an undercover agent would actually use. I read the book, I really enjoyed it, but then I was like, oh, what does this guy look like? Did you look like the world's hairiest skinhead when you joined the FBI or do you pick up like the Beth Cook biker chic thing after you get an assignment?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Das ist der Grund, warum Jen und ich EveryPlate lieben. Es macht es sehr einfach, besser zu essen, mit leckeren Rezepten des Chefdesigners und frischen, vorgebogenen Zutaten, die eigentlich weniger kostet, als wenn man Geräte kauft. Und jetzt ist jeder so, oh, ich bezahle einfach zu viel für alles. Nein. Ich liebe auch die Flexibilität.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Es gibt viele Möglichkeiten, egal ob du in deinem Ernährungsstil bist, egal ob du vegan bist, dich auf deine Carbs beobachtest, oder du bist wie ich und willst nur extra Protein. EveryPlate hat Smart Swap Rezepte. Sie lassen dich deine Zutaten customisieren.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Du kannst Tortillas für Lettuce Wraps, normale Pommes für Süßpotatoes, Fleisch für extra Veggies, kleine Tweets, das macht eine große Unterschiede, wenn du auf einer Art Diät bist. And the convenience is unmatched. No more wasted produce rotting in the fridge because every plate sends exactly what you need. It's an easy way to cook at home, eat healthier and save money while you're at it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
You've heard Scott on this episode talk about the value of relationships. I'm teaching you how to build and improve your relationships and scale them for free in our course over at 6minutenetworking.com. This is a course about improving your relationship building skills, inspiring other people to develop strong relationships with you. I know what you're thinking.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
I'm already good at this or this sounds cringy. It is decidedly not cringy. I've taught this to law enforcement agencies. Now, back to Scott Payne. How do you approach a gang like that? You mentioned in the book that you had this vehicle theft power tool thing going on. Can you tell us about that?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Yeah, not a very popular guy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
It didn't matter. They're like, we're not listening. We know what you Marines want. Here you go. The number one. Yep. That's funny that you have mustache regulations. I mean, look, it makes sense that you do have that. But it explains why there's essentially a police officer mustache. Yeah, for sure. Ja, das erste Mal, als ich an einer Raid-Party war, weiß ich nicht, was es war.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Ich sehe. Also, hey, komm zu unserem Barbecue, wo wir andere Leute lassen, um uns herumzuhängen. Yeah, you buy raffle tickets and you can win a raffle and whatever. Sort of weird to think about, but I guess they do legitimate club stuff and then they do all their criming on the side, I guess.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Isn't that the point? I've asked this before, but tell us what 1%er means, because I thought that was the point.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Yeah, that's right. So the guys essentially co-opted the one percenter term, slapped the one percenter label on themselves, which is, yeah, we're not the ones out there just riding motorcycles. We're the ones that are breaking the law. The badasses.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
What's interesting about these guys is you started some pretty clever, I don't even know what you'd call it, like a fake side hustle, where you say, hey, I'm moving cars. And the guys, hey, I thought you had drugs or guns in this truck, but all I see is power tools. And you're like, exactly.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
So you're kind of implying, maybe I'm drug trafficking, maybe I'm weapons trafficking, but I'm not necessarily saying that. And getting these guys to talk to you or ask you about doing more serious crimes, it didn't seem like they needed a whole lot of prodding.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
I don't know. Ja, ich glaube, das ist der Punkt deiner Investition, um herauszufinden, wenn Leute Drogen verkaufen wollen, wie man sie nicht zufällig helfen kann, Drogen an amerikanische Menschen zu verkaufen.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Weil du ihnen Drogen verkaufst, oder vielleicht sind es falsche Drogen, oder vielleicht willst du ein bisschen verkaufen, um viel zu erreichen, aber wie kannst du zufällig nicht ziemlich ernsthafte Krimine verursachen?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Das ist wie einen schlechten Mann eine Waffe zu geben. Wow. Es ist wie Fast and Furious, den ich in einem vorherigen Show gesprochen habe. Du gibst ein paar Menschen Waffen und dann, ups, schießen sie Border-Control-Agenten mit diesen gleichen Waffen. Ups. Ja. Wir versuchen, herauszufinden, wer die Pipeline ist. Could be you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
We get it from this undercover FBI guy. He thinks he's playing us, but man, he's got the best shit in town. That would be a major issue. You do not want to hear that on the witness stand when you're in court trying to prosecute. Where'd you get it? Oh, we got it all from the FBI. And you knew they were FBI? Yeah, but they had great stuff that they'd seen in the cartel.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Eine Sache, die ich interessant und einzigartig fand, war das Stollen-Zigaretten-Business. Und das war für mich ein großer Flashback, denn als ich in Detroit arbeitete, als ich ein Teenager war, wurde ich als Armguard in Zigaretten-Trucks eingeladen, denn sie wurden ständig verhaftet. Und ich wusste nicht, warum.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Ich dachte, sie handelten von Geld, aber es ist so, dass sie etwa 100.000 Dollar von Zigaretten oder mehr in der Rückseite des Trucks tragen. Und dann gehen sie nach 7-Eleven, und dann gehen sie nach dem anderen, und dann gehen sie nach dem anderen, und dann gehen sie nach dem anderen, und dann machen sie das den ganzen Morgen, bevor das Gebäude wirklich öffnet, bis es 24 Stunden dauert.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Und dann verkaufen sie die Zigaretten. Und wenn jemand den Truck steuert, ist es viel einfacher, als einen Bank zu robben, und es ist mehr günstig, weil es einen Fahrer gibt, der sagt, das sind nicht meine Zigaretten, und er geht einfach nach Hause, und du nimmst den Truck.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Yeah, I was there asking 18-year-old kids if they had pills dressed in a kangaroo suit. Ich weiß, du bist ein Undercover-FBI-Agent, natürlich. Aber eine Sache, die ich nicht völlig verstehe, und ich glaube, ich sollte es sagen, die Antwort ist wahrscheinlich nur irgendwo zwischen der Unkompetenz von diesen Leuten, die wir haben.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Ich würde diesen Baby runternehmen. Ich bette, ich bin gespannt, wie der Anruf stattfand, aber ich bin auch... Du hast in deinem Buch erwähnt, dass deine Aufmerksamkeit auf die Opioid-Entzündung und die Ärzte, die sozusagen Verschiebungen für Menschen geschrieben haben, aber sie wollten nicht, dass Leute in den Parkzimmer dringen wollten.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Erzähl mir über dieses ganze Racket, das sie hatten, mit den Vans, die Addukte in die Klinik nehmen. Das war schockierend.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Aber wenn ich an Partys gehe, sagen wir in San Francisco oder in einer anderen Stadt, ist es außergewöhnlich, wer die Undercover-Polizei sind, weil sie zu alt sind, um dort zu sein. Und sie tragen ein Kostüm, das ist wie eine Sache, die man auf Amazon kauft. Es ist nicht, es gibt kein Gedanke darauf, oder so etwas. Und sie sind auch nicht regelmäßig gekleidet.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Jeez, that's so tragic and gross. But, oh man, what a mess. And the doctors, of course, are just, they're getting paid, so they don't care. It's part of the racket.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Und sie sagen niemals, hey Mann, dieser DJ ist großartig, lass uns ein bisschen reden. Hey, hast du irgendwelche Pillen? Sie gehen einfach hoch und sagen, hey Mann, hast du irgendwelche Pillen? Und es ist so, du bist so offensichtlich ein Polizist. Und zu Beginn dachte ich, vielleicht ist es nur ein Typ, der wirklich Pillen will.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Wow, ja, das ist enorm. Diese Opioid-Sachen, die Größe ist einfach verrückt. Du hast Dirty Nurse erwähnt. Wir sind beide genug alt, um zu erinnern, als Dirty Nurse einfach nur ein tolles Halloween-Kostüm war. Jetzt ist es eine kriminelle Aktivität. Legit. Und es sah nicht so gut aus wie der Outfit.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
I'm sure there's a discrepancy between the East Tennessee Dirty Nurse and the Halloween 90s Dirty Nurse. When do cover teams have to step in to an operation? If you get into a bar fight or something like that, that's one thing. But how do they assess what level of danger there is in an operation? You don't want somebody to come get you because somebody is...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
schießen, aber du willst, dass jemand kommt, um dich zu holen, wenn sie dir sagen, oh, es gibt Jungs auf dem Ruf mit Waffen, die an unseren Mann geahnt sind, und sie werden ihn töten. Und wir haben auf dem Radio geredet, aber es muss ein Mittelland sein, wo es ist, okay, das sieht gefährlich aus, aber wir sind nicht sicher, wie gefährlich es ist.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Und dann sehe ich immer, dass sie jemanden aus der Rückseite verabschieden. Und ich bin so, ein Junge ist dafür gegangen. Aber wenn du einen echten Dealern willst und nicht nur den trankesten Jungen, der einen extra Pillen in seinem Koffer hat, musst du ein bisschen schwieriger versuchen. Wie kann es sein, dass sie das nicht machen können? Es kann nicht so schwer sein.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
I was wondering if you had a code word. Pineapple, pineapple, pineapple.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Ja, Schattenboxen.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Selbst dann war ich so 270 cm. Ja, das ist das andere. Wenn du einen wirklich dünnen Mann hast, der in die Akademie kommt, dann denkst du dir, okay, du wirst unser Krack-Head im Hintergrund sein, weil du 140 Kilo wäschig und sechs Fuß groß bist. Aber wenn jemand 270 cm ist, hey Mann, kann ich ein bisschen Krack machen?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Du, Sir, hast das definitiv nicht mehr als einmal gemacht, weil du sehr robust bist. What if I was getting it for the hooker I have back at the motel? That's fine. Yeah, I guess that's the way out. Hell no, I ain't using it with this girl. Yeah, she does this. This isn't going to make her pass out, is it? Oh man, no, you're coming to the right guy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Most people don't forget their middle name under normal circumstances or any circumstances.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
We all know that from Breaking Bad, right? Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Ja. Ja. No kidding. Wow, that was scary.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Yeah, you'd have to come up with a one-liner backstory. Speaking of who trains you, you do know some legends, man. Jack Garcia, that was episode 392 of this show. Joe Pistone, aka Donnie Brasco. Is he still around? He's like 85 probably. Let's see, it's February now.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
And I'm like, yeah, well, if I'd have seen plastic. And he starts laughing. You know what's better than being stripped naked and having your head blown off in a root cellar? The fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back. This episode is sponsored in part by Airbnb. Find a co-host at airbnb.com slash host. Das war's für heute. Bis zum nächsten Mal.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Bis zum nächsten Mal. If you're ready to embrace the impossible, the Defender is your perfect partner. Be uncapable and ready to go wherever you're headed next. Build your Defender at LandRoverUSA.com.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Es lässt dich einfach mit all den Agenten in der Gegend, die du suchst, verbinden, damit du den richtigen Agenten findest mit der richtigen Erfahrung und letztendlich das richtige Zuhause für dich. Homes.com. Wir haben dein Zuhause gemacht.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Wenn dir dieses Episode des Shows gefallen hat, bitte tun, was andere smarte und besonderere Zuhörer tun, nämlich einen Moment zu nehmen und die tollen Sponsoren zu unterstützen, die dieses Show möglich machen. All of the deals, discount codes and ways to support the show are searchable and clickable over at jordanharbinger.com. Our AI chatbot also on the website can surface them for you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
And if you can't find it or the AI can't find it or you're not even sure if it exists, email me. I'm happy to surface that code for you. It is that important that you support those who support the show. And now, back to Scott Payne.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Yeah, man, he'd be an interesting guy. I wonder if he even does media or if he's just like over it at this point. He's more of an introverted guy, but he does stuff. He still pitches shows and stuff like that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Like, oh, I just nipped the mafia in the bud after a legendary career. I can retire. Nope, still working, age 85. That's pretty impressive. Yeah, I mean, he's a go-getter, so. What is it like being taught by these legends of undercover police work? I'm sure it's an honor, but I assume also you feel some kind of pressure to not blow it after you take a course from one of these guys. Sure.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Es ist einfach furchtbar. Du hast erwähnt, dass du mit diesem Mann nahe bist. Du machst mit diesen Kriminellen echte Freunde, weil du so viel Zeit mit ihnen spielst. Und sie sagen dir Dinge wie, ich vertraue nur einer Hälfte der Menschen in der Leben. Und du bist einer von ihnen. Und es ist dein Job, sie zu töten und sie auf den Straßen zu halten.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Aber auf irgendeinem Niveau, außer wenn sie dich in einem Wohnzimmer suchen und dich vielleicht töten, muss es sich schuldig fühlen, diese Leute zu zurückzulassen, oder? Gibt es nicht ein bisschen davon? Außer dem, was du gesagt hast, über das Tötchen und das Stribben. Ja.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Yeah, man, it's got to be tough emotionally. Does the FBI have any kind of program where maybe they keep an eye on your mental health a little bit during your career or the operation?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Ich habe viele Bilder gesehen und es hat mich für eine Woche verletzt. Normale Menschen brauchen wahrscheinlich etwas nach dem. Du hörst das mit den Leuten, die das für Meta, für Facebook, tun. Niemand will diesen Schiff. Es war ein Interview an Vices und niemand will das. Es ist der schlimmste Job in der Unit.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Right, it colors your judgment, which affects your safety. No, it makes complete sense. One thing I've noticed a lot with a lot of yellow undercover guys, whether it's ATF, FBI, regular police, you always end up not sleeping and getting addicted to stimulants like ephedrine, caffeine, whatever it is. And that would also affect your judgment.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
If you haven't slept for weeks on end or months on end and you're taking 700... 1.000 Milligramm Kaffee pro Tag mit einem Bikergang zu funktionieren. Du brauchst jemanden, der vielleicht einen normalen Schedule schläft, um deine Entscheidungen zu beurteilen. Ich wurde so, ich war immer ein Speedfreak.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Eigentlich sind wir alle Adrenalin-Junkies. Ja, das klingt so. Wie schlägst du die Mannschaft ab und entscheidest, wir haben genug Fische im Netz. Wenn wir das Netz jetzt öffnen können, ist es ein Erfolg. Weil ich mir vorstelle, dass es bestimmte Parteien gibt, die sagen, zwei mehr Wochen. Glaub mir, ich habe das. Wir machen noch einen wirklich großen Deal.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Und jemand anderes sagt, nein, wir haben eine verdammte Menge Beweise. Wer macht diese Entscheidungen und wie wird diese Balance gemacht?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Wow, ja, das wäre so ein seltsames Gefühl, weil du sagst, ich habe meinen Job gemacht, indem ich diesen Mann überdrückt habe, aber er war ein Kriminal. Also sind der Teufel und der Engel auf deiner Schulter, sind sie ein bisschen wie, naja, das ist deine Schuld. Sie bewegen sich einander, richtig? Ja. Es ist eine seltsame Sache, die in der Meinung läuft.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Speaking of the next case, man, I'm definitely going to have you back to talk about these white power gangs, because that was what originally got me interested. These guys make the outlaws look stable and mainstream in many ways. And then some. Yeah, exactly. Scott Payne, thank you very much. We'll see you back in a couple of days. Absolutely, brother. Thank you for having me on.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
You're about to hear a preview of the Jordan Harbinger Show with an undercover ATF agent that infiltrated the infamous Pagans Biker Gang.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
To hear how Ken Croke spent two years risking his life, going through initiation in one of the most ruthless biker gangs in the world, check out episode 673 of The Jordan Harbinger Show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Und es scheint so zu sein, dass man so etwas machen kann, weil man müde und entspannt ist, aber es ist nur eine wirklich gute Illustration, wie diese kleinen Teile der Attitüde, diese kleinen Teile dieser kleinen Akutramonts, diese kleinen Dinge dich in deinem Familienleben folgen. Und er hat gesagt, dass ich zu Hause im Grunde ein Geist war.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Es hat eine große Bedeutung auf die Familie genommen, wie es immer ist. Wir sollten diese Leute wirklich für die Anzahl der Selbstsacrifice, die sie machen, in Bezug darauf, die Rest von uns sicher zu halten, anerkennen.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Oh, und nach seinem geschlossenen Anruf mit Clothesline, dem Jungen, der ihn fast in einem Wohnzimmer getötet hat, einer seiner geschlossenen Freunde, in dem Buch spricht er darüber, wie er nach dem Anruf die Skripte auf einige seiner Zielgruppen wechseln würde und sie unterdrehen würde, um sicherzustellen, dass sie keine Schraube tragen würden, was ziemlich lustig ist.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Erinnere dich an einen Unterkopf-Kop, der dich unterdreht, damit er sicherstellt, dass du keine Schraube trägst. Obwohl, es gibt viele Interferenzen in Unterkopf-Operationen, also gibt es manchmal die Möglichkeit, dass du jemanden unterdrehen machst, um zu sehen, ob er eine Schraube trägt, und ein Kopp findet einen anderen Kopp, der eine Schraube trägt.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
And that must be confusing and somewhat humorous. And it probably diffuses the tension when you find out that you're both cops. Although I'm sure it's not good for the operation. All things Scott Payne will be in the show notes at jordanharbinger.com. Advertisers, deals, discounts and ways to support the show all at jordanharbinger.com slash deals.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Please consider supporting those who support the show. Don't forget about 6-Minute Networking as well over at 6minutenetworking.com. I'm at Jordan Harbinger on Twitter and Instagram. You can also connect with me on LinkedIn. And this show is created in association with Podcast One. My team is Jen Harbinger, Jace Sanderson, Robert Fogarty, Ian Baird, and Gabriel Mizrahi.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
I suppose that makes sense though. You want people who can operate under pressure and really one of the best ways to enhance that pressure without injuring somebody is to make sure that they're dog tired when they do something and they can't think straight.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Remember, we rise by lifting others. The fee for the show is you share it with friends when you find something useful or interesting. The greatest compliment you can give us is to really share the show with those you care about.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
So if you know somebody who's interested in the FBI, undercover cops, these sort of true crime-ish stories told from the law enforcement perspective, definitely share this episode with them. In the meantime, I hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn. And we'll see you next time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Coming up next on the Jordan Harbinger Show. Welcome to the show. I'm Jordan Harbinger. On the Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the stories, secrets and skills of the world's most fascinating people and turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
When I was 20-something, now, no. If I'm not in bed by 9 p.m., now it's like, oh, Dad's pissed. What's wrong with Dad?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Yeah, look, it's good that not everybody makes it. It would be too easy if that's the case, that everybody who gets tapped for it makes it through.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Oh, das ist schrecklich. Ja, es zeigt wirklich, wie gefährlich dieser Job ist. Und wir werden ein bisschen darüber sprechen. Erzähl mir über deine erste, ich glaube, wir nennen es deine erste Unterkunftsoperation in der Hochschule.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Ja, das ist interessant. Das ist schwer, wenn die Leute es nicht akzeptieren oder sagen, oh ja, Tommy hat es gemacht. Er hat es während der dritten Periode gesprochen. Es ist anders. Es ist eine Verleumdung der Evidenz, die lauter ist.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Also es scheint, als hätte man eine Intuition für das oder eine natürliche Talent für das, weil ich nicht weiß, wie viele Leute unter der Kante gehen würden, ein paar Leute fragen und dann die Person bemerken, die nicht gesprochen hat. Sie sind wahrscheinlich nur so, dass niemand es mir akzeptiert hat. Also ich glaube, niemand sagt, dass sie wissen, wer es war. Wir sind verbunden.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
It just depends. Tell me about your first few drug buys when you became an undercover. First of all, you mentioned surveillance in the book. Where do you pee when you're sitting in a car for 12 hours? I could never do that. I pee every 20 minutes. I don't know how these guys, what do they just bring a Gatorade bottle and they, okay. I'd need like a whole case of Gatorade bottles. It's not sexy. No.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Females clearly have a harder time, but Gosh, you got to order something off Amazon to make that work, I guess.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
or just your information. This is off topic, but whatever. There's a place near me in this Vietnamese shopping center, and I swear something is going on there. There's a really popular restaurant next to it, but this is a coffee shop, and no matter what hour of the day you go, whether it's at night to eat dinner or during the early day to eat lunch,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1120: Scott Payne | How the FBI Turned Me Into the Perfect Outlaw
Our mission is to help you become a better informed, more critical thinker through long form conversations with a variety of amazing folks, spies, CEOs, athletes, authors, thinkers, performers, even the occasional rocket scientist, CEO, neuroscientist or tech luminary. And if you're new to the show or you want to tell your friends about the show, I suggest our episode starter packs.
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1095: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part One
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1095: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part One
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Jordan here. This episode contains adult themes. No kids in the car for this one. Coming up next on The Jordan Harbinger Show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Wait, per day?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Oh, my God. That's a lot of ads.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
We have content moderation.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Which were all monetized, I assume.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Good for him. Good for him. What is he, 20 now? It's been so—I mean, they've never— He recently turned 18.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
I was exaggerating to try and keep it light, but it really took six years and counting, and this stuff was up for months and months when he was a child. This is terrible.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
This is an important episode with a really great guest. Here we go with Layla Micklewaite. By the way, I read the book. I enjoyed it. That's a weird thing to say, but I did enjoy it. It was well-written and good. The payoffs are satisfying.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
They just buy everything?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
There's 10 people who have eight hours to go through 400,000 uploads a week or whatever it is.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
This is like psychological trauma.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Oh my gosh. So the content moderation thing is just a joke. It's one of those like, we have to technically have this department because just say we have it. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Look, I'm a guy who went to college with internet, so like I've seen my fair share of porn, especially in the early days. You see videos with drunk women who can barely move, and that's the point of the video. And it's really gross, and that is, I would imagine also, no one can consent when they don't know where they are and they can't keep their eyes open. This is everywhere.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
You don't have to look very hard, I would imagine, on a site like Pornhub to find something bad. My question is, Google's indexing all this, so if you're indexing something and it's 12-year-old boy gets raped, Your search engine is indexing this, which means it found this, and you're just gonna go, yeah, okay, well, we're just gonna surface that as the first result because it matches the best.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Let's start from the beginning. So you're on a mission to take down Pornhub. That's a heavy lift. What sparked this?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
How is there not a flag in Google that goes, we found a lot of these rape videos that are on a website. Should we block that entire website or call the FBI or something? No, just put it on the list like the other search results. That's an unreasonable course of action.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
If they didn't index all these titles, they wouldn't need to create all these different videos.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Oh, they don't?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Yeah, I've never thought to Google that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
That's a very interesting case, again, from a legal perspective, because Google is also monetizing things via ads and sponsored links and it's okay. How much do the search results that you're indexing result in monetization for your company? Arguably there's a nexus there.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
So you're also in a way, of course they got that section 230 where they're like, Hey, we're not responsible for the things people put on the internet. Okay. But you're creating another product by creating the index and the search results.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Yeah, the image search. It's all there. Google creates that on their own servers. The lawyers are making the argument that I would also make. There's a nexus there because of that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Yeah, I would agree. And it's amazing how much power they have to stop something like this. They just aren't doing it because there's not enough noise. Well, you're working on that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
The thing that I didn't understand necessarily was if the uploaders are making money from uploading the videos, you have to know who they are because you have to know who to pay. How are they getting paid?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
I see. That maybe points to another website where somebody can go, I'm trying to figure out why somebody would upload free.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
But you're going to prison for 40 years so you can get comments?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
I see.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
So the risk was nil, basically.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Imagine abusing somebody like you're not even also getting paid for. It's like the height of sociopathy, right? It's like you're not even just a heartless bastard who will do anything for money. You're a heartless bastard who is just wasting your time on this. just to get comments and you're ruining someone's life.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
I can't wrap my mind around it as a normal person who doesn't have massive psychological damage. I don't get it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
I wonder why they allowed downloading and re-uploading. They must have wanted people to re-upload it with different titles.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
You have a thousand of the same video on Pornhub with a different title and they don't care.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Go and edit stuff or whatever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Somewhere, a bunch of guys made a decision that said, hey, if we do this, we're potentially liable for distributing child and illegal pornography, child sexual abuse material, rape videos, et cetera. But if we do allow it, we get more inventory. And they were like, we're never going to get caught for the illegal thing. So just do the other thing that makes us.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Or there's just no lawyers anywhere near this place, which I don't believe if you're making.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Wow. That's a dirty attorney right there. And I mean that in the figurative sense. I'm not accusing this person of any crimes. I am accusing him of being a disgusting scumbag, though.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
I want to talk to the lawyer and go, what was your plan? For when this eventually came crashing down.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Right. So if we block this tag, we can do it, but it's going to lose us $10 million a month.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
And they were like, let's not do that then.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
How desensitized are you to stuff like this? Because you just said a bunch of stuff that I was not really necessarily expecting you to... to say it, there's a part of your brain that's just so deep in this, but then you're like a normal person with a child also. It's gotta be kind of strange. Lawyers do this too, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
You're a defense attorney and you're looking at gory murder crime scene stuff and then you have to go get a latte and maybe not think about that for 10 minutes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
It doesn't come across that way, but I just didn't expect you to say, well, there's the small tits category.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
No, you could tell the publisher was probably like, do we need this page? Oh, they were, yeah. Like, can we remove the chapter on the thing? Because that's really like, yeah, we want to sell this in other areas, other countries. When this comes out in another country, you're going to find out what censorship is really like.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
You know, when the Russian edition comes out, we need all of the stuff that refers to sex removed from this book.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
When you read the book, it is clearly not that it's very clear. What would you say to somebody who believes that the trafficking or the exploitation on these platforms? Oh, it's rare. She's exaggerating. I'm sure you've heard this before.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Somebody getting murdered in New Jersey doesn't go, look, people get murdered in New York, too.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
You all go to prison.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
It was interesting in the book that you mentioned that adult film stars, like the ones who work in legitimate, vetted, industrial, whatever, porn, they are the ones who often report the videos because they're looking for their pirated, stolen content. But then they come across something where they go, oh, my God, this is a child porn. So they find it all the time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
So she got kidnapped and then put in videos? Yes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
And it's funny, because you see somebody like Jenna Jameson being like, this is a cesspool that needs to be taken down. And you go, what an unlikely ally. Because people will say, and I'm sure that your critics say this, you're just a prude that's against porn. That's your problem.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Now, feast your perverted ears on the pornographically good deals on the fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back. This episode is sponsored in part by Wayfair. Whether you're going all in on renovation or just swapping out some fixtures, Wayfair's got you covered. It's basically your one-stop shop for stylish, high-quality home upgrades at every place.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
They'll even help you set it up, which, trust me, is really important if you've ever tried to install a freaking chandelier solo. So if you're looking around your space thinking, yeah, it's time to fix that up, Wayfair is the place to check. From lighting, furniture, outdoor storage, hardware, they've got it all.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
This episode is sponsored in part by Airbnb. I got to give a shout out to Brian McDonald, who listened to the show and absolutely hooked me up in Vietnam recently. Brian runs A Taste of Hanoi, and I had this layover in Hanoi, and he's like, I got you. Sets me up with one of his guides for a motorbike tour in Saigon.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Now, if you've never been in the back of a motorbike in Vietnam, it's something, man. You're weaving through scooters and traffic like a video game where you can actually die. And then all of a sudden, we're inside someone's house, literally inside. We rode the motorbike. I'll tell you, the guide pulls into what looks like an alley.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
OK, but it turns into a hallway and then he turns around, grins and goes, OK, put your hands on my shoulders, duck your head down, pull your knees all the way in. The next thing I know, we're riding through someone's living room, not even kidding, like actually someone's living room to get to this little courtyard kitchen where this auntie is making pho that'll just ruin your life.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
No pho will ever taste as good. And Vietnamese egg coffee upstairs on the balcony. I don't even know how to describe it. It's like tiramisu and espresso had a beautiful caffeinated baby. Short trip, chaotic, absolutely incredible. And I can't wait to go back and bring Jen next time because I know she's going to love it. And next time, we'll put our place on Airbnb to help fund the adventure.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
You can too. Airbnb makes it super practical. It doesn't take a lot of effort. You set it up before you leave. And then boom, your house is earning money while you're on vacation and making memories. Your home might be worth more than you think. Find out how much at airbnb.com slash host.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
If you're wondering how I managed to book all these great authors, thinkers, creators, activists every single week, it is because of my network, the people I know, like, and trust. And I'm teaching you how to build the same thing for free over at 6minutenetworking.com. I know you're probably not booking for a podcast. It doesn't matter. You might not even use this for work.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
It might just be a great set of personal or work-related skills. Honestly, this course is about improving your relationship-building skills in every area. The course does all of that in a super easy, very non-cringy, down-to-earth way. It's not awkward. It's not cheesy. It's just very practical. It's very simple. It's going to take very little time. Six minutes a day is really all it takes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
When you're a parent, it all hits so different, right? I was telling friends of mine about the book, and some of the guys were like, oh yeah, that's gross. And I was like, no, man. But then I was like, I have a daughter and a son, so there's just that layer of what if it were my kid. But guys, especially who don't have kids, are like, yeah, that's really gross.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
And many of the guests on the show already subscribe and contribute to the course. So come on and join us. You'll be in smart company where you belong. You can find the course at 6minutenetworking.com. Now, back to my conversation with Layla Micklewaite. When I was in my early 20s, a friend invited us to a porn shoot in, of course, the Valley, and we thought, oh, this would be funny to go and see.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
And it was gross, right? The girls were not in good condition. They were probably partially intoxicated. But what was interesting was the guys who were shooting it, they were like, you gotta leave. You're not in a condition to work. And I remember thinking like, oh, this is a professional operation. They sent home the girls that were intoxicated or high. That was not expecting that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
And it made me realize there's these different tiers, right? There's the horrific illegal gross stuff that we're talking about now. There's professional adult film shoots that happen where there's like catering and lighting people and stuff. And it's not necessarily my thing, but it's a thing that it's an industry. And then there's also like
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
The Playboy Mansion, which is like adjacent to that, and it's not appropriate to mix all this into one snowball. There's just these different layers and they get really seedy and gross as you go down.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Welcome to the show. I'm Jordan Harbinger. On the Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the stories, secrets, and skills of the world's most fascinating people and turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
She's super famous, correct? I feel like I've heard that name.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
And it's just like another horrible thing they've heard that week.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
there was a point at which you're applying enough pressure where you can see them swapping out and deleting videos. And so, essentially proved they knew that the problem was there the whole time, because they had no problem finding all these videos they needed to delete once you applied enough pressure.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
What's interesting to me was, in the comments under the videos, you mention this in the book, they censor words like rape and underaged,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
So if that's flagged and censored automatically, theoretically, if you see that pop up 15 times in the comments of one video, you could block that video and then have a manual review of that, thinking, oh, maybe there's underage, rape, whatever in this video, because people keep saying that there is. They just didn't do that. They just went, oh, let's just block the words out.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
It's really so clear as you look at the way they handled this problem, and I put that in radio air quotes, they handled. This is not just they were lazy or they were incompetent. This is clearly deliberate at a certain point.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
There's a door open in my heart that didn't exist when I was a dude thinking about the gym and my next pizza or whatever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
It's terrible. And Pornhub staff out there, if you send me a takedown request for this, I'm really backed up. I've got 800,000 requests for taking down this podcast. It's going to be a few years, but I'll get to it. I promise.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
You can imagine somebody going, you need to take this down. You're defaming my corporation. We're on it. I got somebody who works three hours a week, and they are just slammed. It's a busy operation we got over here. So the private sharing on Pornhub, which I didn't know existed. I guess this is like unlisted videos.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Tons of pedophiles are using this because it's basically like YouTube, but you can put up sex videos. and you can put up private stuff that is essentially not even going to be found by anybody, because you need a specific link. So they're hosting this content, too, which is, again, obviously illegal to even possess, distribute, monetized or not, because it's child sexual abuse material.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
There's points at which this book is upsetting. If you're a normal human who's even moderately well-adjusted, there's gross depictions of rape and abuse. You did a good job of toeing the line Of this where it's not gratuitous, but you did a good job of explaining just how bad it is without making it traumatizing, I think.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Yeah, that's true. Based on your research, what percentage of videos on mainstream platforms or on platforms like this might feature exploited minors?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
And I just wanted to give you props for that because it's not an easy topic to cover.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Yeah, you're welcome.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
And your editor was probably tearing her hair out. Just what can we leave in?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
You do get that pit in your stomach feeling without being like, I need to vomit out of my car window right now. I was listening to it while driving and it was just like, there's points where I was just like, this is pause, take a couple breaths, roll the window down and get some air. But I think people will enjoy this book because again, the payoffs are there and we're getting to those in a bit.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
The ownership of Pornhub, my producer actually said, hey, aren't they just in Montreal? Can't the RCMP just go in there and be like, hey, you guys are hosting child porn, child sexual abuse material. Get this out of here. They're in Montreal. What's going on? Isn't this Canadian owned? But not really. So tell us how the ownership is structured.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
I used to do real estate finance and you have these investors from like Saudi Arabia and you go, oh, that person's not investing in our US entity. They're investing in our Cyprus entity, which whenever I hear Cyprus and British Virgin Islands, especially if you hear them all in one cluster, now you also hear like Dubai or UAE, of course. So you hear these, there's certain places where you go,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Where's Guernsey again? Oh, it's an island off the Isle of Man. It's like these are all places where you can basically hide money. Vladimir Putin's friend has an account there. That's the company you're in.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
So this is like shell company owned, I'm guessing, or different shell companies.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Yeah, you basically need a lawyer to decipher this nonsense.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Oh, they're not going to like that, are they? The payment processors, I assume Pornhub takes credit cards for selling, what is it, premium stuff or whatever?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Things are grim when PayPal is the upstanding citizen in this particular story because you think of credit card companies like, oh, yeah, they're behind me, that somebody charged me for something they didn't charge me. You know, I called them right away. They did not immediately respond to your query and were horrified and unplugged the money machine.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
They were so concerned until they saw how much money they were making from.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
I didn't even think about that. So instead of one percent, they're like, hey, look, we've got to charge three point eight percent or more. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Yeah. But hitting them in the wallet, that's always a good, generally a good idea.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
So tell me about this Firas guy. First things first, he sounds like a dangerous psychopath. This is not a nice person. He's gross by every metric that you can find. He just strikes me as a disgusting human.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Isn't that weird?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
It's also very mafia. The whole thing, the banking and shell companies, just reeks of organized crime. And then, yeah, you got the heads of this thing. I'm a family man. I have breakfast with my mom every day. But also, I have child sexual abuse material on my website. And if I don't do it, someone else is gonna do it. These sort of justifications that mobsters have.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
It's interesting, right? Because if you're in Silicon Valley and you invested in Uber, you cannot shut up about your good investment in Uber. And if you've invested in Duolingo, you can't stop talking about it. You invest in Pornhub, you got 13 shell companies, a fake name, another fake name, a fake house, a PO box, a fake car. Maybe...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
You're doing something that you are not proud of at this point, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
It's very obvious. This is not a hedge fund that says, I've got thousands of investments. I don't look at every single one. Mind Geek, what is that? No, you knew damn well that there was something wrong because you hid your identity from that investment. And yet you're on Squawk Box talking about all your other investments. Make it make sense, pal.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Have you been threatened because you're dealing with a mafia-like business and shady characters with zero scruples?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
And that's kind of almost predictable, right? We're going to accuse you of doing the thing that we're doing because it's so ambiguous now. It's an old play.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
There was that strange... Possibly not a coincidence that happened where a couple of the victims came out speaking about this and then weren't they attacked somehow?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
It cannot be a coincidence. It's not like somebody got mugged in Spain and another person had a threat happen in Baltimore. It's like very specific.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Dealing with organized crime, though, that's the thing. I'm comfortable saying that because it's a company that engages in criminal activity, knowingly or otherwise, depending on who you ask. By the way, you've been a bit of a vigilante in the past as well, yeah? There's the plumber who scammed your sister's car transmission. Tell me a little bit about that. Because this is in your DNA, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
This is something you do.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
But that was when they investigated themselves.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Imagine how much worse it actually was.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
That's always the key, isn't it?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Oh, my gosh.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
I'm just imagining this son of a bitch sitting at an airport sipping champagne like, I've gotten away with it. This is amazing. And the police are like, there he is. Yeah. And then $400,000 plus interest later, this guy's just sitting around lamenting. I just couldn't let it go.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Yeah. Jeez. That's really something.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Yeah, because the news covers it once and it's like,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
They didn't know. I thought they were going to be like, oh, no, the news didn't cover that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Wow. Yeah. He did the math finally.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
You'd have to be crazy to buy a car from a dealership with a protester standing up front saying he sells lemons. Jeez. I love being on your team. I also am a person who has trouble letting things like that go.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Sometimes you have to, of course, but if you don't, if you're just wrong by somebody, I've got this personal policy where if a company screws me over, I want to do at least 10, ideally 100x the financial damage. So if I lose 50 bucks, yes, I should let it go, but really I want to do $500 in damage. And often I overshoot because I've got a big platform.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
So if I say this online company screwed me over, don't buy from them, companies pay me a lot to advertise positive things on this show. So a negative impression, is it worth at least that much? So all I have to do is a minute and a half of monologue about why this company sucks. And usually after a while, you don't have to do that because you go to the live chat, they go,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Well, our policy is we're not going to refund this. And I go, here's what happened to the last company that I did. You just explain it. You go, I'll save you the Google. Here's a link. Here are the stats. I'm going to say what happened. And I've got this chat logged. It's not going to look good. And then it's give me 24 hours.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
And you get an email from a manager that says, we're refunding the entire year. Sorry for the billing mistake. Good for you. I can't let it go because they're doing it on purpose. It is an item in their revenue. The amount we've been able to bill from people where they just don't check their statement for this particular charge. Yes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
And they go, we'll refund 90 days because that's what you can dispute on your credit card. No, you added this without my permission. I am not paying you for whatever international phone service for a year. I would rather swap my cell phone over and cost you $25,000 in lost business. That's what I'd rather do.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Our mission is to help you become a better informed, more critical thinker through long-form conversations with a variety of amazing folks, from spies to CEOs, athletes, authors, thinkers, performers, even the occasional arms dealer, drug trafficker, rocket scientist, or Russian chess grandmaster. If you're new to the show or you're looking for a I suggest our episode starter packs.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
That's what really pisses me off. I can afford to lose 50 bucks. I can afford to lose 500 bucks. You know who can't? Somebody who that was their rent and now they're screwed. That really pisses me off. Yeah. So we have that same.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Yeah. The threats you were getting were scary. They created escort ads with your name, which is creative a little bit. What do they do? They expect people to then call you and then the people are trying to set you up?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
100 million.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Uploaders, partners, whatever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
You eventually got the credit card companies. How did you eventually convince these companies to drop what had to be a multimillion dollar line of business?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
And you think, oh, some of them are false. There's even more unreported, I would imagine, than there are false reports. That's how it always goes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Look, we solved the problem that we swore was technically impossible, and we did it overnight.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Look, it's a different entity called Traffic Junkie and not Pornhub.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Sure. And I assume they settled, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Oh, it is?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
The discovery involved in this is a nightmare for them.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
I'm taking hell for this at the country club. That was the final straw for me now that I'm personally being embarrassed.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Bill Ackman.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Okay, time to unzip and lube up for the barely legal deals and discounts on the fine products and services that support this show. Yeah, I'm getting canceled or at least going to hell for that one. We'll be right back. I'll see you next time. I listen on 2 or even 3x speed, which lets me cover a lot of ground without sacrificing quality.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Right now, I'm listening to Good Inside by Dr. Becky Kennedy. She's got this really down-to-earth way of talking about parenting that is not preachy. And here's what a lot of people don't realize. Audible is not just audiobooks anymore. You get access to thousands of titles with your membership.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
So whether you're into suspense, self-development, or you just want to make traffic suck less, Audible's got you covered.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
I've got homes.com as a sponsor for this episode. Homes.com knows when it comes to home shopping, it's never just about the house or the condo. It's about the homes. And what makes a home is more than just the house or property. It's the location. It's the neighborhood. If you've got kids, it's also schools, nearby parks, transportation options.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
That's why homes.com goes above and beyond to bring home shoppers the in-depth information they need to find the right home. It's so hard not to say home every single time. And when I say in-depth information, I'm talking deep. Each listing features comprehensive information about the neighborhood, complete with a video guide.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
They also have details about local schools with test scores, state rankings, student-teacher ratio. They even have an agent directory with the sales history of each agent. So when it comes to finding a home, not just a house, this is everything you need to know all in one place, homes.com. We've done your homework.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
If you like this episode of the show, I invite you to do what other smart and considerate listeners do, which is take a moment and support our amazing sponsors, those who make the show possible. All of the deals, discount codes, and ways to support the show are searchable and clickable over at jordanharbinger.com slash deals.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
If you can't remember the name of a code, a sponsor, you can't find it, email us jordan at jordanharbinger.com. We are happy to surface codes for you. It is that important that you support those who support the show. Now for the rest of my conversation with Layla Micklewaite. the credit card companies eventually bailed, but how do they get paid now? Bank wire?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
When he rejected their motion to dismiss.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
The lawyers must have got that in their, you know what, puckered up real tight. Because when, and it's just, no, I want to hear what the other side says. That's bad enough. But when it's, no, I think you enabled this completely and you were crucial in that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
They just have to make a tough call. We're going to lose $25 million a year in fees.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
But on the other hand, you're profiting from a criminal enterprise. It was good while it lasted. Turn off the faucet. It's the right thing to do. You mentioned that they buy user-generated content in bulk from developing countries that don't verify or moderate.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
So they might buy a million videos, I don't know, from a Vietnamese website or something, and you just have no way of knowing if any of that is legal in the United States or not. There's a near certainty that at least some of it is not. To the categories you describe in the book, we won't do it on the show. They're so barfy. Examples are like runaways or like raped homeless teens.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
The one that stuck with me was people being sealed into vacuum bags or tortured in ice and waterboarding. It makes you go, what sort of unhinged psychopaths are watching this? I get confused. the drive to watch people bang. Like, I get that. The torture part, that's where you go, wow, this is really feeding some unhealthy stuff.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
I can relate a little. I mean, I get it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
The rabbit hole thing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
I would imagine there's also morbid curiosity that leads to, I don't know if they have an algorithm, maybe they do.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
I wonder if Google and other companies are retargeting you. Do you get weird ads that pop up where you're like, oh, this has to be because of the Pornhub clicks?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Clever copy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Oh my gosh, disturbing. That's what I'm saying about like the rabbit hole, like the hell hole of your algorithm. Man, it really does show you how this can corrupt your mind. I'm not religious at all, but there's no way this kind of stuff is not horrible for you, just psychologically to consume. You hear about it all the time with people who've been through things.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
There's no way there's not like some sort of porn PTSD that you get from looking at this crap on the web over a certain period of time, especially the horrible stuff.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Right, well, yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Where is that guy now, I wonder?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
It's horrible. Six years old. My son is five and a half. I have to help him build Lego sets, for God's sake. It's just way too young. That's really disturbing. How do law enforcement and regulatory agencies fall short when it comes to addressing these crimes?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
So this is just cost of doing business at this point.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
What a terrible life that has to be. Nice place.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
It has to be a sort of catastrophic amount of money. That's why like the hot coffee case from McDonald's, right? If they just had to pay her $600, $6,000 medical expenses, they would have been like, we're not changing the temperature of the coffee. Once they had to pay whatever, $12 million, they're like, dang, we need to change the temperature of this coffee.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
You got to do something like that against these websites. So they're not going to listen.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
That's actually often how it goes. The standard of proof is a little bit lower. Standards can be a little bit lower. It's just slow.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
It is.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
I would love to talk about the impact and the payoffs from your investigations and your takedown because the insurance and the lenders dropped the CEO and the executives. Tell us what happened here. This is the part where I was just like, oh, I need to go get a coffee and turn the volume up, right, when I'm in my car.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
A moral risk. So it's strange, right? Because let's say I drive a Lamborghini and then I suddenly get caught doing blow at a club with Leonardo DiCaprio. Now my car insurance can say, hey, man, you're immoral. The drug use aside, we don't like what you do. I love that these guys got dropped, but it is a little scary that an insurance company can decide what's appropriate behavior.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Yeah, it seems like, wait a minute, what am I missing?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Just taking Uber everywhere.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
My God, tell me you didn't immediately crack open a bottle of wine and just feast on the deliciousness of that revenge. That must have been so nice to see his personal life imploding. Like, couldn't happen to a better guy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Not while he was a fugitive, though.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
It was so satisfying, and this is in the book as well. It's so satisfying to hear the Canadian parliament tear apart the CEOs and the executives of Pornhub over at MindGeek. They're not prepared for the questions, and you could just see the guy just sweating on TV and being like, oh my God, my life is over. Why did I agree to this? Somebody help me, and no one's coming to his aid.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
It makes me want to download the video of that and the hearing and upload it to Pornhub with the title, CEO brutally on camera by Canadian parliament. Hashtag gangbang. I know you have that on your computer for rainy days where you're just like, no, I'm having a bad one. I'm going to watch for us get bent over by.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
You thought you were above the law. Here's you not being above the law and being embarrassed on TV internationally.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Of course, later evidence shows they hid evidence from law enforcement. Shocking.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
What about the employees? 1,800 employees. Don't these people wake up and go, oh, yeah, that New York Times article. Wow, I had a feeling we were up to no good. And surely people started.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
You work there? Isn't that the thing from New York Times where you abuse kids? And you're like, look, I'm just an accountant. Leave me alone.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
That's a hell of a resume gap if you've been a mind geek for 10 years.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
One little petty bit of satisfaction as well. Firas' new mansion that's being constructed, it mysteriously burns down. This is where people go, oh my God, that's terrible. But didn't it turn out to be his neighbors or do we not know?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
That was the last straw. Tony Soprano.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
You were on the wrong side when the mafia's, you're just too immoral. I can't live near you. These guys who've made their living embezzling and, I don't know, extorting small business owners or whatever. Good point. I draw the line at this. Did you ever think about quitting? I mean, people are threatening your family. They're threatening your kids. They're accusing you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
You're getting calls from the sheriff that say you're being accused of having child sexual abuse material or whatever. I mean, there's got to be days where you woke up and went like, I can't do this anymore.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Oh, I see. But even still, multi-million dollar business.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
That's great to hear.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Yeah. Pornhub is still online though, man. Like what's next for you? Because it's not gone. Do you want to get rid of the whole thing? What's the goal here? There's still work to do.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
People who are.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
You made an example out of that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
So they were tricked into doing the porn.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Otherwise, it's just trust me, bro.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
I can't imagine they have. This is all stored encrypted, and we're not going to misuse this at all.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
They'll figure out a solution to this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Because it creates an immediate market for that third-party verification. And that overnight becomes a $100 million plus or whatever business.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
For sure. I mean, even if you charged at scale 25, 20 cents per verification or five cents, the scale is enormous. Pornhub has more traffic than Netflix. Those millions of videos, let's say it costs 25 cents to validate the models in each one. This just adds up so stinking fast.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
It's crazy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
It's their money.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
In part, thanks to you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Those people are very brave. The victims are very brave because... If I had a video of me being drugged and raped as a kid, I don't know if I'd be like, I'm going to shout from the rooftops about how wrong this is. I might just be like, I just want to go on with my life, man. This is humiliating.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Yeah, very admirable. Why do you think the public remains largely unaware of this particular issue?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
That's true. Even my friends and my producer wife were like, oh, this is kind of an icky topic. Not like we shouldn't cover it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
You know what, though? Podcasts that will cover this, we sell way more books than those morning shows, as fun as they are.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
The five-minute segment on Morning Joe is just not going to move as many copies of something like this anyways.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
No. If you're not going to talk about things that matter, you might as well have a morning TV show on network TV. No thanks.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
If you could speak directly to the executives at Pornhub or the financial institutions, what would you say to them?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Until they were forced to.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Holding their feet to the fire. You're a badass, man. Maybe I'm just a former half-ass lawyer with a strong sense of justice, but it is so satisfying to see these people's feet held to the fire. The banks, the credit card companies, the abusers, the traffickers. I just, I got to hand it to you. I'm on team takedown for sure. And I'm waiting for them to come after me for, oh, she was slandering us.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
I don't shy away from a good fight. Scientology tried that too. And I was like, let's go to Discovery where we dig in all of your records. Good for you. Go ahead. And then they just suddenly don't care anymore because they were never actually going to do it. They love to scare you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
And then when it comes down to, no, I want you to pay your lawyer $30,000 retainers so that I can dig into your records too. They're just like suddenly, well, actually, you're a small fry. We don't really care. Now you need to decide whether or not this fight is worth it for you. Good for you. I really like you. Likewise. Right back at you. Layla, thank you very much for coming on the show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
You're about to hear a preview of The Jordan Harbinger Show with Amanda Katarzy, who was raised in a cult and later sex and labor trafficked.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
You had the Christmas sweaters and stuff. And you're like, these are whimsical and fun.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
And now I'm like, I'm not getting one of those.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
These are collections of our favorite episodes on topics like persuasion and negotiation, psychology, geopolitics, disinformation, China, North Korea, crime and cults and more. It'll help new listeners get a taste of all the things that we do here on this show. Just visit Jordan Harbinger dot com slash start or search for us in your Spotify app to get started. My guest today is just fearless.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
To hear how she escaped her dire situation, check out episode 631 of The Jordan Harbinger Show. Fantastic conversation. Man, I really love this one. The gross irony here is that this video is almost certain to be demonetized on YouTube. Audio version, we have much more leeway. But on YouTube, they're going to demonetize this almost certainly because of the subject matter that we are discussing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
But if we were, I don't know, say, raping underage kids and filming it, we could easily monetize that video with no problem whatsoever on sites like Pornhub. And that is just insane to me. Horrifying. By the way, how satisfying was it when the dude had his unoccupied house and probably uninsured house burned to the ground by his neighbors? His cars are uninsurable.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Like they say on the classier parts of the Internet that I frequent, the dildo of consequences rarely comes lubed, which is very apt for this episode and something I would normally never say, especially in public. But while we're here, am I right, folks? All things Layla McElwain will be in the show notes at JordanHarbinger.com.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
This show, it's created in association with Podcast One. My team is Jen Harbinger, Jace Sanderson, Robert Fogarty, Ian Baird, Gabriel Mizrahi. Remember, We rise by lifting others. The fee for this show is you share it with friends when you find something useful or interesting. The greatest compliment you can give us is to share the show with those you care about.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
If you know somebody who would be interested in this particular conversation, I'm going to leave it at that, share this episode with them. In the meantime, I really hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn, and we'll see you next time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
All those people working at home were just like, let me take a quick break that I couldn't do.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
The scale is crazy. In your opinion, how much responsibility do executives at companies like Pornhub bear for the child abuse happening on their platforms? Because I assume their argument is we didn't know about this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
What are the common signs that a video on a site like Pornhub might involve exploitation or trafficking? Is it just the tags?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Well, it's interesting because I first got this book and I was like, okay, she's going to be some like super religious person who's against porn. And then we had our phone call and I was like, okay, that wasn't what I expected at all. Like a normal person who has a vendetta rightfully so against this horrific website.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Layla McElwain helped expose, if you'll pardon the pun, the flagrant, out-of-control sex trafficking on Pornhub. I didn't really ever think about this before, but a lot of the people there are not up there consensually, and they're not getting paid, unfortunately, a lot of the time. I mean, it's worse than not getting paid. I don't even know how to summarize this. You'll get it here on the show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
And then I read the book and I was like, wow, this is an organized crime operation. This is not a sort of sex workers put their stuff up here. You watch a dumb ad and you're done with your business. It's organized crime, period. An international crime ring. that just happens to be something that everybody knows about and a lot of people use.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Once you read the book, it's like there's no difference between this and the Albanian mafia shipping cocaine or something across, at least there's fewer victims with people who are shipping drugs across the border, which is crazy to think about. And hiding in plain sight. Hiding in plain sight, that's the phrase I was looking for, yes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
So weird. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
I'm probably not alone. It makes you feel guilty for ever watching porn in your whole life because you're like, oh my gosh, have I contributed to the bottom line of this company? The answer is almost certainly yes in some small way. Or have I consumed abuse material and just not known?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
Because the element of fraud and the crime of sex trafficking, that's important and interesting to me on a nerd level just as an attorney because what that means is essentially you could say to somebody,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
hey, I'm gonna pay you to appear in a video, and then they leave and I just say, I'm not paying you, or I trick you in some way saying, hey, I've got a job for you, you're gonna have to strip, and then it turns into a sex video, and that is illegal, that is sex trafficking.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
It's a little bit of a shade there, it's not like, you don't have to grab somebody off the street and then force them, it's not taken with Liam Neeson, it's not some crazy thing like that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
You can have somebody who thinks they're getting a job at a restaurant in another state or another country and dot, dot, dot, they're sex trafficked because they don't have any money and they don't have a way to leave and you're telling them you'll let them go if they do this and you're telling them it's not gonna be uploaded anywhere, but then it is. That is trafficking.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
So you could even have somebody who you say you're going to have sex on camera for money and they say, okay, fine, but you don't tell them it's gonna be uploaded, that's still sex trafficking. That's the important point here, I think.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1143: Laila Mickelwait | Exposing Pornhub's Dark Trafficking Empire
She also helped hold some of the owners and controlling managers of the site and the company to account. This story is wild. It is very satisfying at points. We really clicked. I'm a big fan of her and her cause, and I think you'll really gain some insight from this episode. Insight that might make some of us, myself included, quite uncomfortable.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1106: Amanda Ripley | The Secrets to Surviving an Unthinkable Disaster
I came to the U.S. to give me the right to dream. In Egypt, you don't have that option. It's not cliche. I'm not trying to recruit people to join the army. But I was like, here is a key, actually, to be as American as anybody can argue with you. And it was joining the military. You end up there by pure determination, by having grit, and by being a bit lucky.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1106: Amanda Ripley | The Secrets to Surviving an Unthinkable Disaster
So we were basically getting our tasks from Secretary of Defense level. Joining Special Operation Command in charge of three main missions. Counter-narcotic, counter-terrorism, and hostage rescue. I believe myself, if my dad did not push me towards getting the right education, then maybe I would have went in the wrong direction. So education is going to help people prosper.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1106: Amanda Ripley | The Secrets to Surviving an Unthinkable Disaster
They're going to help people actually critically analyze the information they are receiving. So when somebody is bullshitting them about, hey, if you go to the bathroom with your right foot, not your left foot, you're going to hell. If you have an educated person going to look at him and say, you know what, man, this doesn't make any fucking sense.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1106: Amanda Ripley | The Secrets to Surviving an Unthinkable Disaster
And then I believe to educating women is crucial because they are raising us. A lot of people spend more time with their moms than with their dad because they nurture us and they do all of these things. So if we have a population of educated women in the Middle East or in any of these countries, I think these countries will prosper.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1106: Amanda Ripley | The Secrets to Surviving an Unthinkable Disaster
And it would be harder to convince these guys to become terrorists. Business is war and business is good. When we give people the proper education, we all live a better life.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
This episode of The Jordan Harbinger Show has some explicit language, so if you're offended by that, well, skip to the next one. Welcome to the show. Russian spy, real-life pirate, or special operator. And if you're new to the show or you want to tell your friends about the show, I suggest our episode starter packs.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
A friend of mine, Neil Strauss, wrote a bunch of cool books. He was like, what would you do if you had six months to live? And I was like, oh, I'd record so many cool podcast interviews. And he's like, why? No one's going to remember you in 100 years. And I enjoy doing it. And I think, oh, it's going to be a great legacy. But he's not wrong.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
It's also like you should just really only spend that time with your kids and your family because none of the rest of it matters at all.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
It is. It's very hard for guys like us. You don't have kids now, do you? No, I want to though. Yeah. Once you have kids, this was before I had kids. So I was like, no way, man, you know, do the podcast. And then once I had kids, I was like, pfft. Love y'all listeners. This is great. We're going to be in reruns because I have terminal cancer or something like that. This is not true. Not true.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Not true, folks. But if that were the case and I'd be like, I'm just going to go to Greece with my kids. I'm going to China. I'm literally not going to answer any more email. If you want to write me, my wife will check it probably after I'm dead. The end.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Yeah. Make those memories, right? It's her birthday or your birthday?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
It can be moved. Yeah. Just move it, dude. Yeah. Whenever I miss important stuff, I regret it a hundred percent of the time. Yeah. And like I missed Halloween with my kids this year because I was in another country and I was like, oh, it's early Halloween. My dad's taking the kids. My wife's taking the kids. And I was like, how was it? She's like, oh, they had a good time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
And then she goes, okay, if I'm 100% honest, all week they said, why is dad missing Halloween? Why is dad missing Halloween? And then the day of, they were all really bummed that you weren't there. And then the whole time they were like, you think dad will meet us later? And she's like, I'm not telling you this to make you feel bad. I'm just telling you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
And I'm like, I am never going to miss Halloween again. Because for me, I'm like, Halloween, it's like 90 minutes max before they get bored and tired. Who cares? They're not going to miss me. My whole family's there. They only wanted me to be there. And I was like on a plane. Damn. So this year you're going to be extra happy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
hell or high water i'm waking up with my costume thousand dollar makeup that's right yeah i'm calling somebody from marvel studios to come do my you're like i'm gonna scare people in my neighborhood my own kids are gonna be scared shitless that's right it's gonna be voltron with my daughter on my right arm and my son on my left arm you guys live here in california we live up in san jose yeah oh cool yeah how do you feel about staying in california
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
I like it because my wife's family's there and my parents are there. I moved them in from Michigan. And I like my neighbors, speaking of community. It's actually really cool. We have neighborhood watch because somebody tried to break into my house a couple months ago and freaked everyone out. We were home, so I scared them off. Holy shit, that's terrifying. It's really scary.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Luckily, the cops were like, look, this is a break-in crew. This is not a, like, come and kill everyone in your house crew. And you could tell because on the cameras... They kick my window in after looking in our windows and not seeing anyone because we're in bed like eight because I got little kids. And I was in my bedroom. They kick the window in and you're like, get the fuck out of here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
From you? Yeah. And then they stand up like, oh, crap, there's someone home. And they just took off. So it's not like I'm some hard ass. I actually didn't see them. I would have bought a MAGA hat for the day after that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Yeah. Yeah. So look, at the end of the day, I like California because I love the weather and I go outside like every day. I'm always outside doing stuff. I grew up in Michigan where literally half the year I'm depressed AF because apparently seasonal affective disorder is a thing. And I didn't know that growing up. I just thought, wow, I really hate life for six to eight months. This is normal.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
And then when I went to LA for a temporary period, when I lived here, I was like, wait, you can just skip winter? You can just opt out? This is awesome. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Don't you have an accountant that's like, Andrew makes $60,000 and everything else goes through the business?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
I know. That's true. You can spend a lot of time in California and live and have your business in another state. It's just, do you want to spend every other week in California and then your business is in Nevada? That's a pain in the butt. Once you have kids, you can't really do that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Yeah, that's depressing. When I was in New York and doing the finance hustle thing back in the early aughts as a lawyer, that place was electric energy. And it was awesome. I would live in New York again. Even in winter in New York is dope because it's just so much going on. And you're inside and stuff. It's like whatever. You can wear... Nice winter clothes. You feel stylish, whatever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
But winter in Michigan is just... So I have to get in my car right now for 20 minutes. I got to warm up my car for 40 minutes to take that ride. The nose is terrible. So if my family didn't live in California, I don't think I would live here. It's tough. But also all my friends who moved to Austin are like, same problems, different weather.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Yeah, I'm with it. I shouldn't admit this. It's usually like a category of porn. I didn't know it was a real category of journalism.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
That's a really good point. There's a lot of people who moved to Austin, for example, from California, and they brought a lot of their same mindset that didn't work in California down to Austin. And it's funny because the people in Texas are like, God, get out of here. But they're also still annoyed with how Austin has turned up. And I'm like, you guys are doing that to yourselves.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
But I also have a lot of friends who moved to Austin that love it, but they don't live necessarily in the city. They live in like my friend Ryan Holiday in Bastrop, Texas. Just
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
out there just like out in the middle of nowhere runs a bookstore and this is for me so look this is a little bit of a tangent but I agree with you a lot I think there's a lot to think about move before you have kids it's so much harder to move after you have kids it's nearly impossible you mentioned those three core needs security significance connections when this happens to teenagers you mentioned in the documentary they go into dangerous attention seeking behavior
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
So when someone's assaulted or has issues at home, they start getting into trouble. And that's why we look at the homes of teenagers when they go off the rails. But what about adults? What do we see with adults? Because not everybody who goes through a personal trauma ends up being a QAnon four-banger.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
I think now it's like most porn is that. I don't know because I wrote the stuff off a while ago for like mental health reasons and physical health reasons actually. But I think now it's like what most of the videos are. I think back in my college days and like the early aughts, it was like, yeah, it's not like in a studio. It's like a guy has a camera in a bed.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
That is a good point. A few decades ago, maybe I'm delusional. Maybe you've got some info on this. A few decades ago, I feel like Americans could disagree with each other without hating each other. And politicians from opposite parties, they played softball together or whatever. But also there was just this totally different level of respect, I feel like, in the 90s.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
And if somebody was a Republican and you were a Democrat, you didn't shame them or call them names or anything. You were just like, oh, I voted because I care about education. And they're like, taxes are too high. And that was kind of it. It wasn't like Uncle Frank's spit takes spitting his food. Also, dude, like politics were boring back then.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
When I see British politicians, like maybe 10 years ago, 20 years ago, when I was in college, I was like, these people are ridiculous. So they're like, and they're like yelling at each other. And you see these other, I don't know, like Lebanon's parliament or whatever. They're all freaking out and yelling and screaming. Serbia, they're launching tear gas. I just remember thinking-
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Gosh, look at our Congress. Like we have our shit together now. It's nope. We're the same slash worse than all these other sort of like you said, WWE showdown in government. It's like, what are you talking about? Marjorie Taylor Greene's talking about Jewish space lasers. And it's how did this happen?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Yeah, that's a really interesting point. It'll be like cigarettes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
You did too. Yeah, climbing up trees and stuff. Now, if you have your kid climb a tree now, other mothers will call the police on you sometimes. My buddy has this kid who's eight climbing trees and he climbs quite high. He'll climb up and other mothers are like, that's dangerous. And he's not really, he's going to fall in the grass. It's not going to be a big deal. And also he's not going to fall.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
And then they called the police and the police came and they were like, yeah, that's pretty high. What's the problem? And the guy's like, Women are harassing me about how high my kid's climbing in a tree. And he's like, the cop was like, you called the police for this? Also, they did respond to the call. They weren't like, click. What are you talking about? They showed up for that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
That's insane to me also. And you're right. I think that next generation is going to be like, yeah, my dad's always on the virtual thing. And I'm going to be sitting there like, no, this is cool. The movie looks 3D. And it's going to be like, dad, touch grass, man. Totally.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
That is quite fascinating. I'm actually looking forward to that. I do need my son, who's five right now, to slap the iPad out of my hand like I want to slap it out of his hand. What's funny about this is my kids, they love iPad. They love watching stuff and they learn a bunch of stuff. They always want to play with actual toys.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
If they have a choice between iPad and Legos every time, if they have a choice between iPad phone and running outside, run outside every time. Bubbles, flying planes, whatever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
That's awesome. They're three and five and they'll love the iPad if they're eating. When they're done eating, they don't want that thing at all. And sometimes my son will be like, iPad, please. And we're like, no, we're going to talk. And he's like, okay.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
And I'm like, wait. That doesn't work on anyone over the age of 10. Yeah. What's going on here? And look, sample size of two, because I have two kids, but it's pretty incredible to see. Yeah. And all you hear is that kids are addicted to devices. Sorry, mom. Sorry, dad. My parents are addicted to the devices.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Look at this picture. This is a photograph. Holy shit, you sound like a kid. Yeah, this is like a kid who's intellectually disabled and doesn't understand that it's a cartoon. That's crazy to me. Do you subscribe to the idea that any of the, speaking of conspiracies, is any of this culture war stuff a manufactured distraction or is it just the result of bad incentives?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
I suppose that's true. I don't know the stats or anything around that stuff.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Scale. Yeah, that's an interesting way to look at it. You're right. I do feel like certain things are nonsense distractions, especially the trans hysteria. And during the election, it was crazy to me.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
when you looked at what they were talking about, the politicians, you would think that was the biggest problem or issue in the entire country was whether trans women could play soccer or something like that. It was just unbelievable. Meanwhile, I was thinking, don't we have massive debt and trade issues and education issues and stuff? It was just like, can you believe they're going to let them
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
use the bathrooms and it's okay i thought we moved on three years ago this is still the number one thing it's absolutely insane to me that part i think is distraction by design because it's real easy to just harp on that instead of being like we have a complicated question we got to figure out about our education system or like health care it makes for more potent reactionary content and headlines that capture the average person like i said the showmanship the wwe wrestling style nature of political discourse today makes it so the real boring shit just isn't talked about
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Yeah, no, that's a good point because it doesn't get enough clicks.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
That's true. It does depend. You're right. Erewhon, definitely highest chances of getting a piece. Totally. So you actually used to live in a van, is that correct?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
No, you're right. I look at these things and I go, I'll read a book about it later because I can't control it now. That's partially an excuse. The other part is it's not interesting enough compared to the other things that I'm looking at. Now, look, I'd like to think the things I'm looking at are objectively interesting. I'm profiling people like you or whatever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
that's more interesting than learning more and more about what somebody did yesterday that's no longer the case, especially because Trump changes his mind so often that it's like, I don't need to learn the whole plan. The plan's going to change on Monday.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Yeah, what you need to do is buy refundable flight tickets. Otherwise, you're just wasting your money. That's a good piece of advice. Yeah. Until I get my dead baby parts business off the ground, I need you to help me pay the bills by supporting the amazing sponsors that support this show. We'll be right back. This episode is sponsored in part by Wayfair.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
And that's what pushed us to level up the outdoor space. We hit up Wayfair, and man, they have everything. I'm talking lounge chairs, dining sets, string lights, you name it. I got a modern, sleek-looking patio set. This is what old people care about. Seriously, folks. What happened to me? It's comfortable. You can take calls. You can lay around and take a breather for a minute between calls.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
The prices were great, too. Fast, free shipping, even on the big stuff. And it's furniture. It's big. So if you're low-key dreaming about turning your backyard into an oasis, check out Wayfair. They got outdoor gear for every style and budget. If you do it now, you'll actually get to enjoy it all season long.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
This episode is also sponsored by Hammermaid. You ever throw on a high-quality shirt and you just feel like, I don't know, got my life together? That's how I feel when I put on my Hammermaid. I grabbed a couple shirts for a conference I'm speaking at, and I figured I'd level up a little bit because, you know, dad mode. Man, it looks sharp.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
I've got to say, Hammermaid shirts, they're not mass-produced. They make small batches, so each one feels a little bit unique. And the quality is top-tier, made in the same factories as high-end designer brands without the, how is this shirt $300 type of price tag. They've also nailed the fit, too, even with the slim fit option, which normally, like, doesn't fit me.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
The arms are always too tight on those things. No big deal. Just been working out a little. Hammermaid nails it. It's tailored, clean, nothing boxy. That stuff always looks boxy on me. They don't have that problem. They don't look stiff. Great to wear for meetings, events, date nights, even just after dinner. Somebody always comments.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
And they got options with stretch and wrinkle resistance, which I appreciate because I am not going to iron anything. And if you want to step up your style, Hammermaid is where it's at. Just a solid way to show up looking like you got a little bit of your ish together.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Okay. So you started the all gas, no brakes, which by the way, I love that. But then it blew up so fast. I can only imagine that you were not also expecting that to happen.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
If you're wondering how I managed to book all these great authors, thinkers, creators every week, it is because of my network, the circle of people I know, like, and trust. I'm teaching you how to build the same thing for free over at 6minutenetworking.com. Now, this isn't just for booking podcast guests, obviously.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
This is all about improving your relationship-building skills, and the course does that in a super easy, non-cringe, very down-to-earth way. No cheesy stuff, just practical exercises that'll make you a better connector, a better friend, a better peer. You're seeing this a lot at work now. Dig that well before you get thirsty, folks. Build relationships before you need them.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
And many of the guests on this show subscribe and contribute to the course. So come on and join us. You'll be in smart company where you belong. Again, it's all free at 6minutenetworking.com. All right, back to Andrew Callahan. I'm curious why you make some of the choices you do when you produce and edit documentaries.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
For example, I think it was Kelly talking about he's describing his villain origin story. And you're like, let's set him up in the bathroom. And I'm like, OK, that's a deliberate choice. He's talking about how he loses his house to fraud, according to him. He's either you were on the toilet or he was on the toilet and someone else is like on a little stool.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
And I'm thinking you could have set this up anywhere, but you set him up in the bathroom.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Okay. Yeah. I just, I wondered if that was, Oh, look at the juxtaposition between us being in here and like him telling him this to this. Okay.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Hidden message. Yeah. Hidden messages. We're sick of flushing down the problem or just like, this is really silly and we're not taking it that serious, even though he's taking it that serious, but that's kind of a mean way to look at it. Cause you actually did treat him with a tremendous amount of respect. Yeah. So this guy, Kelly, once again, lost his home. He'd lost his business.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
He was disbarred and he lost his family. His version is what I lost my home because of Bill Joyner. But then it was more like, actually, you got out of your skis financially. Then when you got disbarred for literal tons of misconduct, which maybe was related to a mental illness, because that's a lot of misconduct, dude. Then he loses his home because he lost his business.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
And then it's like his family's like, yo, we can't take any more of your shenanigans. So they go their separate ways. Yeah. And he just blames it all on this one event, which is the foreclosure.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Yeah, it's sad. You start to feel sympathy for him, but then you also go, I wouldn't end up in this situation because I would make different choices all the way. By the way, the misconduct thing, did you ever get further insight on that? Because getting disbarred is actually hard to do.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
I wonder, do you think it's like an egg, right? Was it like mental illness? Then he starts doing the misconduct stuff because he's not all there. That results in him also overspending and then losing his house because he didn't lose his house to a bank. He took something that might be alone with aggressive terms because banks wouldn't deal with him most likely. Totally. So, chicken egg, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Was he mentally not all there?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
That's true. That's a really good point. Yeah. When you see this guy, so he has 47 animals, which is wild. And it's like a stingray. It's not just like a bunch of cats. It's like a stingray. There's a bunch of, the aquarium is probably like 25 grand.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Yeah, that's a good point. You know, this super interesting fact, you talked about the January 6th rioters. 60% of January 6th Capitol rioters had recently filed for bankruptcy. 20% had recently lost their home and 50% were in severe debt. That was like a real wake up call, I guess you would say for me, because I was like, who are these people? Is it just a random cross section?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
The beef is squashed. Wow. That's pretty awesome. I also lost an old business in a way where it was like, hey guys, I want to leave. And they were like, cool, we'll just do this amicably. And then they were like, wait, what if we screw you out of everything? And then you just have to sue us.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
No, it's the same people who have this deep personal tragedy. Bankruptcy is serious because it's not just that you're out of money. You usually lose your assets, which is like your home and your business as a result, which can have profound personal consequences. So those are the people by and large that ended up breaking into the Capitol building.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Actually, I felt bad for most of them because the way that they end up there, these are not universally losers, right? Some of them were like the guy with the Auschwitz t-shirt. Like this is a guy who clearly looked never a productive member of society. But when you look at a guy like Kelly from your documentary, yeah, he's a lawyer. He had a great business. He had a couple of kids.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
He had a nice home in Laguna Hills. He lost all of that stuff. And it doesn't really even matter whose fault it was. The fact is that he lost it. And so it's sad to see that downfall from somebody. And it can result in those sort of mental health consequences that result in radicalization.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
I'm not trying to get too in the weeds on this particular guy, but I do think it illustrates the complexity of factors behind the breakdowns that these people have in their lives that lead to extreme belief systems.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
What's the spider web thing? I don't even know.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
That is quite fascinating because for me, I would think, wow, this guy got into skateboarding and the rest is history.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
And as an attorney, I was like, not only am I going to do that, but I also know that this is going to take forever. So I'm just going to start over. And there's so many layers to how crappy that all is. Like, can I do this again? Was that lightning in a bottle that I can't do anymore? Why did these people do this thing when they could have done it a million different ways?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
That's quite fascinating. So political fanaticism, you said something along the lines of it's built on top of unprocessed trauma. You think that's both for the right and the left?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
What is that movie I just saw where the guy does it in private and there's a camera on him? What movie was this? I think it was actually a Bill Burr movie called Bad Dads or something like that. And they show the guy doing it in the privacy of his own home and he's listening along there, but then he's not comfortable.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Yeah. Yeah. No, that makes sense. This guy, man, he's obsessed with these causes and he's basically dead to his kids. And that's a little bit unfair, but he's a strange completely.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
And then it's also my identity was the all gas, no brakes guy. So who am I now? And can I redo that? Or is it, am I still that person? I assume you went through a lot of that. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Not just annoying. It's more than that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Jeez, you've been to some of the most charged, chaotic, bizarre events in America. What's something that shocked you, something that you didn't expect going in? I didn't know furries would be that cool. Really?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Tell us what that is again, because I think some people don't know.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Oh, it's nonverbal.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Oh, so you talk like, oh, hey, everybody. Yeah, hello, I'm Andrew. Oh, really? Yeah, sometimes. So that's strange. What's going on there? I don't know.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
That almost seems, I hate to say this. I kind of want to see that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Do I have to get one? And you can't just be like, yo, I'm here to cover this as a journalist.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
I kind of feel like I'm you in one of your videos right now interviewing somebody. Why do you think I'm so good at it? That's really funny. Guaranteed somebody who listens to this show, many people, are furries. I would love for them to email me and tell me, you said given a fursona, right? So do other furries tell you what they perceive of you?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Man, I am dying to know how I come across to that community. Yeah, they're cool. And no judgment, I'm just genuinely interested. I feel like I've asked this question before and I got a couple emails about it, but I replied and I didn't get answers. I don't want anybody to think I'm making fun of them. I'm actually just genuinely- No, no, you're coming off with respect. It's all good.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Yeah, good, good. Is there any specific interview or rally moment that's haunted you aside from when you went to TJ Maxx and bought a bedazzled cowboy hat by accident?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Yeah, what's your favorite interview? And I'm like, gosh, I can't even remember the ones I did this week. I literally don't know.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
I could maybe come up with a couple. Yeah, yeah, totally. Yeah, something like that. I know you did. I saw this, something about psychedelics and you have visuals and you can't drive. Is that true?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
That can cause that?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
That's alarming. The dose must have to be massive to cause that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
So do you see snow or whatever right now?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
So I'm seeing white noise based on things my eyes are seeing and my brain's like, we ignore that because it's everywhere.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Wow. And I'm surprised that your brain can't then be retrained to forget to see those things or to not tell you that those things are being seen.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
I apologize for eating all that garlic last night since you're relying on your other senses. No, I can't even smell it. This Jordan guy freaking stinks. This guy fucking reeks, man. He's a genius, but he smells like shit. That's right. Garlic shit, actually. What is depersonalization? You mentioned this in another interview, and I remember it was terrifying because this is called HPPD. HPPD.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Something that can get rid of the symptoms is what? Benzodiazepines, which you should never take, and alcohol, which can go wrong.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Yeah, that's smart. Even, and I don't mean to scare you, people always, they would go, oh man, that happened to you as a lawyer. Dude, you got to get these certain kinds of agreements. And what people who aren't lawyers don't realize is you can have the best lawyer in the world draft something. And if I go, yeah, well, I'm not going to follow that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Oh, no way. Wow. So this is something you can get from a lot of different pharmaceuticals.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Oh, I just assumed that you were like, hey, it's college. I'm going to do this seven days a week for a year. No, I was 14. No kidding. So it must just have to do with developing brains and like you have a pathway that wires or unwires that shouldn't be unwired or wired. And that's the end of that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Don't do drugs. How about abstinence? Those are the same people that are like, oh yeah, a lot of unwanted kids. How about just find Jesus and don't have sex before you get married? Exactly. That's not working.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Once all that stuff gets legalized and 200,000 people get HPPD the following year, then they're going to work on it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
This is maybe a reach, but whatever. Do you think that interviewing other people in the very authentic way that you do and then being able to watch yourself on video maybe proves to you in some way that you are actually real?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
You then have to sue me and hire an attorney to do it. And it's going to cost you 50 or $100,000 when all is said and done. And then the judge is going to take three years to go through this whole thing. Like I had a judge tell me, Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You get up and close to some objectively crazy people. I don't know if that's a fair assessment. Depends, but definitely sometimes. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Yeah. Wow. So do you feel that way now or do you know that's not the case?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
I've never heard of derealization.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
I think one of the reasons that this came about was because
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
I can't even put my own finger at it, but these conversations that I have with people like you on this show, it gets you so far outside your personal opinion, so far outside your belief system, so far outside your personal experiences, so far outside your own upbringing, whatever it is, that it also, I suppose, makes me realize that other things are actually... real.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
It's not the same though as yours is like way more acute. I don't think I've ever thought I'm the only thing real in this universe. That's too heavy. It's making my heart race thinking about it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Yeah, you're a hallucination. It's just like when you dream something, that's not real. But it's got to be hard to talk about because other people might also think, oh, look at this narcissistic piece of crap. You're the only person in the universe that's real.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Sorry, there's something else to worry about.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Yeah, literally. Oh yeah, we all exist in your head, bro. We don't have feelings or wants or lives or anything.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Derealization, is that also a result of psychedelic use? No, no, no, no.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Not everybody can become a creator that gets spotted on the street. So what do we recommend for those people?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
We're going to be walking down Venice Beach and someone's going to go, hey, man, I came up with this idea based on your podcast. And it's going to be like, what? Making sandcastles? Yeah, man. The only thing that makes me feel real, and I guess we'll have to pound it out. Yeah, I can see that happening in the future, especially if this episode pops off. Who are some of your influences?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Because to me, it seems like a mix of certain people. Look, of course, yourself, but I don't know. You know Louis Theroux, right? Yeah, yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
What about the Ali G show, Sacha Baron Cohen?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
What do you think about when it comes to substance abuse and creativity? Because I know you did the psychedelic thing. A lot of people like the Hunter S. Thompson, like, oh, I've got to be like super drunk all the time to write.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
The subject of the new documentary, this guy Kelly, it's, I'd rather die than wear a mask. People are selling baby parts at Planned Parenthood. That's another thing this guy Kelly believes. What part of this is brainwashing and what part of this is mental illness and where does the Venn diagram overlap, you think?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Going out, seeing the homies. Yeah, getting over hangovers and stuff like that. All that stuff. That's a good message. Look, I've done a lot of drinking, way too much. I've also done other things. One of my big realizations also was you don't need that stuff to be creative. But like you said, your addiction brain tells you you're more creative when you're abusing substances.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
It's like a rationalization. And look at the end of Hunter's life. Yeah. A lot of these guys. Right.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Yeah, I think a lot of us can relate to that, I suppose. You hitchhiked for a long time, eh? Yeah, for sure, man. Tell me about that. I would love to do that, but I'm also scared because I grew up in the 80s and the 90s where it's like, they're going to get hatchet murdered if you hitchhike.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
These are collections of our favorite episodes on topics like persuasion and negotiation, psychology and geopolitics, disinformation, China, North Korea, crime and cults, and more. That'll help new listeners get a taste of everything we do here on the show. Just visit jordanharbinger.com slash start or search for us in your Spotify app to get started.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Yeah. They had streetcars going up and down Woodward, which is like the main street all the way from downtown all the way up towards Woodward. And I want to say Ford bought it and was like, let's rip these out so people have to buy cars, which is a damn shame.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
I don't know if they're still that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Yeah, that's true. You have to drive on the highway and it's like, prison area, do not pick up hitchhikers. Yeah, Pahrump, Nevada, it's every fucking mile.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Other countries have pretty robust hitchhiking culture. Like Israel, you can hitchhike. And if you're a soldier, you're expected to hitchhike. That sounds annoying as shit. It is. But I remember going to Israel in college and we were on a bus tour or something and we picked up a soldier because you always pick up soldiers.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
They're going home or whatever and they're carrying like an automatic rifle. And I remember being like, yeah, whatever. And I remember this girl next to me and the guy next to him were like, I don't think my parents would be too happy if they knew we picked up an armed man. And I was like, When you put it that way, it is kind of sketchy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
One o'clock in the morning, we're driving and we picked up two armed dudes who are carrying an automatic weapon with ammunition.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
I was in Ukraine 20 plus years ago and single girls would hitchhike. And it was the craziest thing. I remember hanging out with my host sister. So these girls that were like, I don't know, 19, 20 years old. And they would just wave a car down, dude would unroll the window, and they would lean in like you see prostitutes doing in the United States.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
And they'd lean in and go, hey, we want to go downtown. And the guy would be like, all right, 10 bucks. And they'd be like, how about five for each of us? And then my friend's free. And the guy's like, all right, fine.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Yeah. He's like, oh, it just kind of smells better when you guys are in the car. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It's really common in other countries to hitchhike.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Yeah, that's a weird gripe. Yeah. Yeah, it's a male privilege thing. Lots of things are. Does anybody else have a real question about this?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
All right. Now, I don't get sued nearly as much as Andrew Callahan, but I've still got bills to pay. And you can do your part as a patriot by supporting the amazing sponsors that support this show. We'll be right back. This episode is sponsored in part by Notion. I've got a confession. Jen and I totally judge people by how they handle email. You know you do it too.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
If somebody never replies, they seem buried. It's hard not to think that they're a little disorganized, but honestly, I get it. Email feels like quicksand sometimes. My inbox gets slammed with guest pitches of various quality, listener emails, coordination with the team, you name it. It used to be pure chaos. But since switching to Notion Mail, it's actually manageable.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Notion Mail is the inbox that thinks like you. It's automated, personalized, flexible to finally work the way you work with AI that learns what matters to you. It can organize your inbox, label messages, draft replies, even schedule meetings. There's no manual sorting required. We already use Notion to run the podcast, so having email built right in, obvious win.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Everything's connected, all in one workspace. And I love the snippets. I send a lot of repeat emails, intros, follow-ups. With one click, it is done. Attachments, links, whatever. If email stresses you out, try Notion Mail. It is built for people who actually rely on their inbox. and it works the way you work.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
This episode is also sponsored by Oura Ring. How you feeling today? And the real question is why? Why do you feel that way? Most of us have no idea. We wake up a little groggy, feel a little bit off in the afternoon, but with Oura Ring, you stop guessing. You actually start understanding what your body needs. I've been wearing the Oura Ring for years, years and years.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
I just bragged to Jen this morning how I got an 87 sleep score and I feel great. It's wild how much insight that gives me. We're talking... 30 plus biometrics, heart rate variability, sleep stages, stress, recovery, body temperature. It's all tracked from this sleek little ring that looks like something you'd wear anyway.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
And what I love about Aura is it's not just about hitting your steps or telling you like, hey, you didn't sleep enough. Yeah, cool, thanks, I know. Aura connects the dots. It gives you long-term trends, personalized recommendations that actually help improve your health span, not just your day-to-day.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
It's helped me realize how often I push through stress or skimp on recovery, and the ring doesn't let me off the hook. This little device is up to eight days of battery life. So I take it on trips. I don't need to charge it every day or whatever. It's so sleek. I forget I'm even wearing it. Definitely has a serious cult following now.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
So if you're looking to stop winging it when it comes to your health, give Aura the finger. Learn more at auraring.com slash Jordan. This episode is also sponsored in part by Quince. Quince is where Jen and I go anytime we need a closet refresh. The quality is legit. Same premium fabrics as the big name luxury brands, but without the insane price tags.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
They work directly with top tier makers and skip the middlemen, so you're not paying for branding or a fancy storefront. What I really appreciate is that they are doing it right. Everything's made in factories that follow safe ethical practices and the materials are really top notch. So you can look sharp and feel good about what you're wearing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Jen is obsessed with their washable stretch silk tanks. She has them in basically every color now. Lightweight, super flattering, perfect for summer. She also picked up a couple delicate gold necklaces that somehow go with everything they never come off. If you're looking for a crisp white linen shirt that nails that laid-back coastal vibe, Quince has you covered there too.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Bottom line, Quince makes the stuff you actually want to wear at prices that don't make you flinch. I've already got a few go-to pieces. Just try not to follow Jen's lead and buy the same thing in five colors.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
If you like this episode of the show, I invite you to do what other smart and considerate listeners do, which is take a moment and support those who make the show possible. All of the deals, discount codes, and ways to support the show are searchable and clickable over at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. Also, if you can't remember the name of a code, you're not sure if it exists, email us.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
We are happy to surface codes for you. It is that important that you support those who support the show. Now for the rest of my conversation with Andrew Callahan. You got mistaken for a gay prostitute? Tell me how that happened.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
I take it you didn't provide the handjob.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Let he who hasn't been confused for a gay prostitute cast the first stone.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
I was one of the first 500 members of Couchsurfing, and I heard you're really into it. Oh, shit, okay, dope. Yeah, it's a great community. It was so awesome. I remember emailing the guy who started it. It was like a month after he started it, and his name was Corey, and I was like, hey- This is the greatest idea. Let me know if you need help. And he's like, I might need some website help.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
And I remember like using Dreamweaver to try to make like a template or something for him. And the stories I have from couch surfing have changed my life. There were times where I had 13 random people who would otherwise be homeless basically in LA in my crib, like German girls, Brazilian dudes, Colombian girls, like guys and girls from all over the world, Lithuanians.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
And I'd be like, it's going to be hard to sleep in here because the floor is taken, the couch is taken, the chairs are taken. There's girls like snuggling in my bed and I'm on an airbed on the floor next to them. We should go to a bar and we would just invade a bar. And I remember- It was so fun. It was so fun. Because imagine you show up and the bartender's like, how do you know all these people?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
And I'm like, I don't. I met them all yesterday, today, and the day before. And they're all from all over the world. And we're all just hanging out like we've known each other for a year.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Yeah, that makes sense. Otherwise, you get mad spent.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
So there's so much chaos in my world. Lost my family, lost my house, lost my car. Kids won't talk to me. Career falls apart. It's part of an evil plan. It's not the result of all these terrible decisions that I've made over the last 20 years or 10 years. It's part of a plan. And also just even collectively as a country, like everybody I know is worse off economically now.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
And so I got there. So it's not really optional.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Yeah, or just don't force it on other people. I think it would be a little strange if everybody I was in a couch surfing house with for a night was naked, but it's way more weird if they're like, hey man, you're supposed to be naked too. And it's like, came here to sleep, maybe watch a couple episodes of The Office. I'm not here to like compare dong sizes or like.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Because you're going to look at everybody's dick. Obviously. There's no way around it. I'm doing that even with my clothes on.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
I don't even know. Yeah, you shouldn't be lying about that's hilarious. But if you're out there, get in touch with me. We have a documentary crew ready to find you. The man with the two foot long dick. Yeah. That's one of those where you're like, oh man, props. Oh wait, actually everything for you probably really sucks. There's no woman that can like handle.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
And you can't even use the urinal because your dick probably falls. Oh gosh. You got to carry sanitizer wipes because it's always dangling and things it's not supposed to be. Jeez. I almost feel bad for that guy. Me too. Almost. By the way, Insane Clown Posse is from my hometown in Michigan. Royal? Yeah. Cool. The Juggalos, you know of this community, right? Yes. Oh my God. Have you covered them?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
I didn't catch anything.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Oh, you have the ins. So for people who don't know, Insane Clown Posse is a rap group that's clown themed, for lack of a better word. And their juggalos are ICP, Insane Clown Posse fans, super fans, and they have goth clown theme makeup.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Yeah, this is probably mean, but whatever. It's like white trashy kind of stuff. So there's a lot of getting super drunk and like wrestling. No, they own that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
There's all these things going on. Surely someone is pulling these strings. It's not just a series of bad decisions by the leaders that we have voted in collectively.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Oh, man. Yeah. Really gross. What's this about getting shot in the ass by the National Guard?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Okay. Is there more to the story?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
This is a dumb question.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Yeah, man. Shot in the ass. I've seen people get shot. Actually, my friend got shot in the nuts with a rubber bullet and he's suing LAPD for that. I would too. Obviously, I believe lost that one. No way. Yeah. No, not the lawsuit. Sorry, the nut. That's what I figured. Oh yeah, yeah. The nut's gone. And he used to be one of Nelson Mandela's security guys. So this is not like some kid.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Are people still trying to kill Mandela? Not anymore. For Connors tracking him down. Not anymore. Yeah. Back in the day, he foiled an assassination plot against Nelson Mandela. He was on the show. But yeah, he protested against LAPD and they shot him in the balls. And yeah, now he lives in South Africa. That's where he's from originally, but.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Not too bad, huh? Yeah, it kind of hurts. That's crazy. Jeez. I heard people lost their shit when you had Alex Jones in the documentary.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Yeah. Why, though? I mean, it's clear that you're not like, this guy's amazing. On a corporate level-
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
It's really interesting to see that or hear that because when you watch this, you're lifting weights with Alex Jones. Alex Jones is a conspiracy theorist. He said Sandy Hook was a hoax. He's, in my opinion, a terrible guy for doing that. He dragged those families through hell. But you're weightlifting with him and he's like pouring whiskey down your throat.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
I mean, it's objectively ridiculous and it doesn't portray this guy. Oh, this is a credible source of news. I should listen to it. Oh, this is a ridiculous person.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
I just feel bad about somebody who lost their kids and then is being threatened to be murdered because it's quote unquote fake or a false flag when they lost their kids and now they have to move. They got to change jobs. I mean, it's just like.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
The soundbite he's most well known for is they're turning the freaking frogs gay. Yeah. Which is funny because that's kind of true. I looked it up. Frogs aren't turning gay. They're just reproducing, what, asexually or something. And it has to do with the chemicals in the water. So it's like the most ridiculous thing that he said is true. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Anyway, you shot yourself in the foot with this media tour that you were doing for, was it the last thing on CNN? It was for the HBO thing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Tell me about this because I laughed when I heard the story originally, which I know is bad because it was not good for you. But it's funny, 2020 hindsight.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
I didn't know that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Sorry, it sucks. But you know what? It also illustrates one of the exact points that you're making, which is like these are all in cahoots and the messaging is essentially curated in some weird way that maybe shouldn't happen.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Really? Yeah. I don't blame you. The reason I thought it was funny was because you innocently proved your point in a way that embarrassed a lot of people in a kind of a funny way. But yeah, you're right. A news channel didn't get the answer they want. So HBO, where the documentary was like, ah, we're not going to platform this guy anymore.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
That's right. No, that totally makes sense. Do you think January 6th could happen again? That kind of thing?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Yeah, that's interesting. Yeah, they got pardoned, but hopefully some of those examples were set. I guess we'll see.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
You're very attuned to other people's trauma, I noticed. Do you personally relate to that on some level? You're really empathetic with them in a way that I don't think most people would be. I think most of the time you see an interview with these people, it's kind of like, oh, look at this guy. You're not really doing it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
What sort of eroded some of that?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Yeah, I think you're right. Most people are good, but you're right. It's kind of like the people who are up at these other echelons. They're less wholesome.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Yeah, that's so interesting. I wonder, aside from politics, you mentioned the person's life is falling apart. What does that look like? What factors make people so susceptible to being brainwashed, persuaded by QAnon-esque ideology, other kooky ideologies?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Jeez, that does not sound super healthy. I'm sorry to hear that. I hate to pile on with this, but I want to address these sexual misconduct or whatever allegations. What happened there? I've heard your version of events before, but I think it's important to get it out there because if I don't address it, people are going to be like, oh, avoided it because you guys want to be buddies.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
And so you're not going to hold them to account.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
When I heard it originally, it sounded horrific. And then when I researched it, it was possibly a misunderstanding.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
So can you tell me a little bit about that?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Do you worry about meeting a girl when you're out having fun? And this scares a lot of people. I mean, look, I feel bad for her too if she's been traumatized.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Yeah, that's interesting. When you're young, you're like, I'm going to hook up with girls. I'm going to drink and party. And now it's I'm married now. But let's say I was single. I would probably not be having one night stands and random encounters with people I met.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Today on the show, Andrew Callahan of All Gas No Breaks, aka Channel 5, one of the most iconic personal brands on the internet today. We dive into a lot on this one. Why people radicalize and attach themselves to extreme political ideologies, gonzo journalism in the age of the internet, psychedelic use and drug abuse, cancel culture, and a whole lot more. We get into some real-ish on this episode.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Yeah. Did people stick by you or did you get dropped by Hollywood?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Just get paid, sign a whatever, not NDA, but like a... That's what they said. Essentially an NDA, yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Yeah. No, that's a good point. That's strange.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
I'm just randomly like assaulting people or something.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Because at first I was like, oh, I don't know. This guy's allegations against him. And I was like, well, I'm going to look into it. And then I was like, what am I missing? And the answer was I wasn't missing anything. It just got completely destroyed, blown out of proportion by the news media.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
You said something, or at least I gleaned this from something you said, TV news has basically replaced reality TV for nonsense clickbait attention-grabbing headlines. And that's a fascinating take because I hadn't heard it phrased that way, but you're not wrong. When you create, you're coming at this from a very different approach than legacy media.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
I'm curious why you think mainstream media has lost the public trust, not just because of blown-up stupid headlines that are clickbaity, but there's more to the story.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
I have that with certain things online. I definitely have that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Yeah, that's true. That's a good point. It's really obvious when you list the events because those are the things with the most conspiracies around it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
It's like, we're not mainstream, but do you know that Democrats drink adrenochrome from babies? And it's, well, okay, you're not the mainstream in that you have no accountability, but this is the same dumb crap rebranded.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Do you think mainstream outlets can earn that trust back or is it too late? No, that's too late. Yeah, I think it's too late too. I agree with you. This is random. I noticed that the editing style of your videos has changed over the years, just like a slightly different style. But you got rid of, what do you call it, like the office where it's like look straight at the camera. Yeah. That's gone.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
And a lot of the slapstick stuff, what are they called? Like those crash zoom?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
I see. It seems like it worked. It totally worked.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Yeah, good for you. What do you make of the projection from some of the folks in your videos, like the QAnon type stuff? I'll give you an example. There's a man who's like Hillary, Biden, Oprah, they're all pedophiles. And then you were like, here's your criminal record where you were convicted of raping an eight year old boy. You know what I'm talking about? Right? Yeah, of course.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
And it's like, what do you think is going on here? Yes, projection, obviously. But what function is that serving in this guy's life?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Wait, wait. With everything you've seen from QAnon rallies to protests to political conventions, do you have a take on how we can begin to heal as a country?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
That is insightful, right? It's the easy answer to complicated questions.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
What are you working on right now?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
That's totally different than what you. So this is a completely new.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
It's a true story, I assume.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Can I ask you about your tats? Yeah, sure.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Yeah, we'll get more into this dude, Kelly, because he's, what a find, right? When you come across a guy like this, you've got to go, wow. This is great. But also, I feel bad for this guy. But holy crap, I'm so glad I met this guy because you ran into this guy like in the street.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
So that tattoo saved you 360 days in jail.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Oh my gosh. Did not know that. Jeez. That's a PSA and a half right there, man. Thank you for coming on the show, dude. I really appreciate it. It was a lot of fun. Yeah. All things Andrew Callahan will be in the show notes at jordanharbinger.com. Advertisers, deals, discounts, ways to support the show, all at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. Please consider supporting those who support the show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Also, our newsletter, We Bit Wiser. The idea is to give you something specific and practical that'll have an immediate impact on your decisions, psychology, relationships in under two minutes a week. So if you aren't signed up yet, I invite you to come check it out. It is a great companion to the show. jordanharbinger.com slash news is where you can find it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Don't forget about 6-Minute Networking as well over at 6minutenetworking.com. I'm at Jordan Harbinger on Twitter and Instagram, or feel free to hit me up on LinkedIn. This show is created in association with Podcast One. My team is Jen Harbinger, Jace Sanderson, Robert Fogarty, Tata Sidlowskis, Ian Baird, and Gabriel Mizrahi. Remember, we rise by lifting others.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
The fee for the show is you share it with friends when you find something useful or interesting. The greatest compliment you can give us is to share the show with those you care about. If you know somebody who's interested in Andrew Callahan's work or just loves a good zany story, maybe they're interested in political extremism, definitely share this episode with them.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
In the meantime, I hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn. And we'll see you next time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Yeah, that's so funny. So they probably were like, hey, dude, we're just trying to catch some Antifa violent guys or whatever. You don't need to be here with your triple flag thing. The four banger.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Yeah. At the top. That's funny. So you get into conversations with a lot of these people. I mean, I talk to some of these people casually, not on the show, but you talk to these people professionally. Yeah. And one common thread is that a lot of them have a deep personal tragedy. So it's not just, oh man, 9-11 was really bad, traumatized all of us. They had something severe happen to them.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Or usually more than one thing happened to them. In the case of Kelly, it's like he lost his home, but it was like, eh, that's not the beginning of the story for this guy. They connect that to this...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
wider spiritual war like it somehow becomes god jesus versus the democrats and it's like dude you had your home foreclosed how does that happen so that leap is what i'm interested in but also i feel like that's the common thread is that these people have a personal tragedy and then it's like instead of dealing with that they do like a sidestep and they go now i'm a spiritual warrior well it makes it so they don't have to complete the grief process and they can be stuck in between between denial and anger is pretty much where that radicalization happens
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
In fact, he even says as much towards the end there. I know you'll dig the conversation whether you're already a fan of Andrew's work or not. Now, here we go with Andrew Callahan. The thing is, a lot of the people you interview, I think, would just urinate in their pants. Yeah, that's for sure.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
I think a lot of people have that experience, not the gay meth dealing neighbors, but the community issue. Reminds me of that movie Office Space, which I'm sure you've seen, where he's like talking on the phone. He's like, hey, man, you want to come over? And the guy already heard everything. No, man, I don't want you fucking my life up too, man. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Oh yeah, he's already heard the whole thing because he's right there. Those two gay meth dealing dudes are like, guys, I need your help. And they're like, yeah, we heard the whole thing. We're on it, man. We're on it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Yeah. And they both like down and out. Like one dude's like a construction guy and the other guy works in that crappy office. They look forward to hanging out. They can count on each other for stuff. They can lean on each other. They have pretty much nothing in common.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
Yeah, and you almost get the sense that in a community like that, there's gleeful gossip going on. Oh, did you know that he lost his home? The family had to move out. Well, I thought he was a lawyer. Yeah, well, not anymore. You got disbarred. And it's like, I see a little bit of that in...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
The online space, there's a lot of people who really we should all be like helping each other out and cheering for each other. And I mean, you saw this when you got accused of stuff, which we can talk about a little bit later. There was a lot of people that were like, dang, I can't really believe that. And I was like, OK, I want to hear the detail.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
I always, especially as a lawyer, I'm like, I want to see the details and the receipts. But a lot of people were like, I knew that guy sucked. And I'm like, no, you didn't. You know nothing. You still know nothing. What are you talking about?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1156: Andrew Callaghan | Documenting America's Shadow Self
I've been known to leak a little bit. That tan suit, you would not be able to hide. How would you, by the way, describe what you do? Because I had some trouble with that when I was prepping the show. I was like, gonzo journalism?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
This episode is sponsored in part by Mint Mobile. You know how those big wireless companies always find a way to squeeze every last dime out of you? Like, hey, here's your bill, and surprise, there's an extra fee for existing. It's ridiculous. That's one reason we finally tried Mint Mobile. The other reason is because they paid us handsomely to do so. But
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
I know you met him in a place that not a lot of Mormons maybe hang out. Or do they?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
That's an interesting idea, because if he's going to meetings that where he has to decide if somebody is essentially credit worthy, he's not able to run a JPMorgan Chase background credit check on the people that are walking in. He only has a little bit of data and people can mask that data forever. if they're trying really hard.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
Welcome to the show. I'm Jordan Harbinger. On The Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the stories, secrets, and skills of the world's most fascinating people and turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
But if there's a bunch of naked women around, maybe it's harder to do that because you're operating with less bandwidth to mask whatever he happens to be looking for. That's an interesting strategy. That was very well stated. It's a fascinating strategy though, right? Because otherwise, where would you do that kind of thing?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
You'd have to do a lot more work to figure out if somebody was a credit risk than just observing them. So I guess also you didn't have to worry about running into guys from church at a script. Well, you actually, who knows? You never really know. But nothing would be spoken. Right. Yeah. Nobody would say anything. I didn't see you there. Nope. No, I was out. I was out of town on business.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
So he loans you this money. Does he just give you a stack of cash? How does it work?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
That's a little bit of money laundering then, probably. If he's paying you with a check and it's a business expense and you're paying him back in cash and that cash just vanishes, okay. He had another angle that was working there, for sure. He did indeed. Yeah, wow. Okay, so the guy in New York, the racist guy, he doesn't pay you for the brochures Now you've got a loan from a loan shark.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
What was the interest rate? Like 10%, something like that? Crazy? It was 10% per month. Oh my gosh.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
Oh my gosh. And now you have no hope of getting paid back at this point. Yikes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
Yeah. But you can't just buy the paper that money is on. Isn't that sort of special?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
Our mission is to help you become a better informed, more critical thinker through long-form conversations with a variety of amazing folks, from spies to CEOs, athletes, authors, thinkers, performers, even the occasional former jihadi, investigative journalist, or Emmy-nominated comedian.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
The real bills have those tiny little hairs, basically.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
And if you're new to the show or you want to tell your friends about the show, I suggest our episode starter packs. These are collections of our favorite episodes on topics like persuasion and negotiation, psychology and geopolitics, disinformation, China, North Korea, crime and cults, and more. That'll help new listeners get a taste of everything we do here on the show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
When you made this work, you must have been pretty excited because I know the feeling of getting something to work. You got this theory. No one else has ever done it. You didn't just look it up. You figured it out yourself and then it works. You kind of get a little bit giddy. Did you have a feeling like that? Oh my God, I'm going to do it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
Mint Mobile starts at just $15 a month, so you won't have to pay handsomely to try it out. That includes high-speed data, unlimited talk and text, and it runs on the nation's largest 5G network. Mint Mobile is significantly cheaper than our old carrier. They do keep the cost down because you prepay for 3, 6, 12 months, whatever, and they make it really easy. You can keep your current phone.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
Just visit jordanharbinger.com slash start or search for us in your Spotify app to get started. Today on the show, Russ Swain. He's a Mormon, a counterfeiter, and an art forger. And yes, that sure sounds like a contradiction. And this is a story of his attempt to essentially walk that line. Russ's career began when he created a fake postage stamp in order to get a job.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
Yeah, it wouldn't absorb anything. It would just be covered with the ink and that's it forever. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
Yeah, I can definitely see what you mean by the creativity taking over. That gives way to excitement, which pushes the fear out. Because now you're not shaking, thinking, oh my gosh, what if the police find me? You're just thinking, wow, this looks like a real $20 bill. And it feels like a real $20 bill. I did it. I got a masterpiece by the tail, creatively.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
This was not your first attempt at forgery. What's this about report cards? that you had created for friends as something like a business back in the day. I wanna hear about this, because I think it's funny, of course you would never think about doing this as an adult, except for the fact that you ended up using your art skills for the dark side a little bit when you were a teenager as well.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
And it all snowballed from there, resulting in huge amounts of counterfeit U.S. currency. But he got away with it. Sort of. I love this conversation. We had a lot of fun with it. I think he's just a really subtly entertaining guest that you'll love as well. I think you'll know what I mean by subtly entertaining once we start this conversation here. So here we go with Russ Swain.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
I'm doing the inflation calculation on this right now. What year was this?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
Yeah, I cannot imagine. That must have been a really big deal because not only are you forging the notes to get people out of school, but Then you're forging the fake report cards. Then you're forging the parent signatures on the real report cards to say they saw them. I mean, there's just a sort of definition of a slippery slope.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
And you're making one problem begets another problem begets another problem. And suddenly you're just in way over your head. It was only a matter of time until you got caught, for sure.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
So to me, it was just a lot of creative fun, I guess. Now grab your inkjet and print out some crispy $100 bills. It's time to support the fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back. This episode is sponsored in part by the Moonshot Podcast. If you love hearing the real stories behind world-changing tech, you've got to check out the Moonshot Podcast.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
This isn't just a deep dive into cool gadgets. It's a behind-the-scenes look at Alphabet's Moonshot Factory, aka X, where some of the craziest, most ambitious ideas of the last 15 years were born. We're talking self-driving cars, AI that writes its own code, robots, laser-powered internet, even tech that predicts wildfires, stuff that sounds impossible until it's not.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
And the guy leading the conversation is Astro Teller, literally the captain of moonshots. In this 10-episode limited series, he sits down with people who built these wild ideas and tackles some big questions, like can we actually achieve the clean energy dream? Can technology help save the planet?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
What I love about this podcast is it's not just about futuristic tech, it's all about the mindset behind innovation, the risks, the failures, and the relentless optimism it takes to push boundaries. So if you've ever wondered how impossible ideas become reality, the Moonshot Podcast is your kind of show. Just premiered on March 10th with new episodes every week.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
Find it wherever you get your podcasts. This episode is also sponsored by Quince. Upgrading your wardrobe can feel like a serious investment, especially if you're after quality, and quality usually comes with a hefty price tag until we found Quince take their Mongolian cashmere sweaters, just 50 bucks for the kind of soft luxe knit that usually costs triple the price.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
So I read the book and there's so many funny things in there that you could theoretically never get away with now. And there's so many great stories in here. And I just want to say it must have been hard to write a book about a lot of the places where you made your biggest mistakes in life. And I don't know if I could do that. I don't know if I want to be that honest with myself.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
And Jen is rocking head to toe quints from their 14 karat gold necklaces and washable silk tanks to their stretch pont pants. Is it ponte? I don't even know how you pronounce that. So how does quints keep prices 50 to 80% lower than similar brands?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
They cut out the middleman and they work directly with top tier factories, meaning you get premium pieces without the premium markup and they're doing it right. Partnering only with ethical manufacturers that use high quality materials and only the best children assembling these clothes. But it's not only clothes. Quince has everything from bedding and baby essentials to travel must-haves.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
So instead of spending a fortune on just a few luxury pieces, build a wardrobe and home that is effortlessly stylish without the guilt and the designer price tag.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
If you're wondering how I managed to book all these great authors, thinkers, creators, forgers, counterfeiters every single week... It is because of my network, and I'm teaching you how to build your network for free over at 6minutenetworking.com. This is not a schmoozy, gross, awkward course.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
It is all about making you a better connector, a better colleague, a better friend, and a better peer in a few minutes a day. Very decidedly non-cringe, very down-to-earth and super easy, and many of the guests on the show already subscribe and contribute to the course. Come on and join us. You'll be in smart company where you belong. You can find the course at 6minutenetworking.com.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
Now, back to Russ Swain. So growing up Mormon, all I really know about the Mormon church, well, I know a few things here and there. A lot of blonde people, a lot of getting married when you're like, I don't know, 20 and having a huge number of kids. Huge number of kids. And the mission where I'll run into Mormon kids in the middle of places where, honestly, tourists should not generally be going.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
And they're standing on the street corner with a sign that says free English lessons in Albanian or whatever. And I'm like, what are you doing here?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
Even Brazilians feel that way. I don't know. I'll have to check my inbox after this. It's going to be full of interesting notes from people of all various faiths and nationalities. So how long are the missions? Are they two years? Two years, yeah. Wow.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
Does that make sense?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
It must have been a real shock going from Ogden, Utah, I've never been there, but I can kind of imagine what a mid-sized city in Utah is like, to Sao Paulo, Brazil.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
It's probably three times that size now, but that's just, that's a place that when you see it from satellite pictures or from YouTube, you just go, this is pure chaos. Ogden, Utah, it makes Ogden, Utah look like a rural farming village. It's just the size difference alone and the traffic and the air quality and the music. I can't imagine more night and day, Ogden, Utah and Sao Paulo, Brazil.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
I can imagine as an artist also just having a lot of new input is valuable.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
Yeah, man, I could not agree more. I'm trying so hard not to go off on a travel tangent of my own, because I have so many other things to talk to you about here. I love everything you're saying here. It makes complete sense, and I couldn't recommend traveling any more than I already do. I think it does change your life when you stay somewhere for a long period of time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
You're not there for a week, you're not at a hotel, You are walking around the market looking at somebody selling crabs and learning the language, and you really get all those cultural nuances. Two years in a place like that is a long enough time for you to really absorb a lot of nuance, a lot of language, and a lot of culture.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
Yes, yeah, thank you. Yeah, I've stayed in a lot of places for a year, 10 months, whatever, even several months. There's just a huge shift that happens after, it's hard for me to pinpoint, but four, five, six weeks, two months, three months, it probably depends on the person and the place and everything like that. But there's a shift that happens where you just go, all right, I live here now.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
Not, okay, when I get home, I gotta remember to throw the blanket and the laundry and all that stuff goes away. You start thinking in the other language after however many months, then your foot's on the gas. in this different kind of understanding. Okay, so you've got all these bills. You've made them. You're pretty happy with the product.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
You've been in your print shop while your family's been away camping or whatever, making the ink, the paper, right? But aren't the bills just spotless and unused? That's a little suspicious.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
How ironic and coincidental that you are literally putting the money on your feet to make it look weathered. And that Bible verse, yeah, no wonder that was fresh in your head. Feet that are quick to run to mischief and or stepping on literal forged $20 bills. By the way, did they smell like feet? Were you spending foot-smelling money? I'm sure they did. Money has a kind of a crappy smell anyway.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
So... On the plus side, your mistakes are entertaining. And that's what we're going to talk about today.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
Yeah, it does. I can just imagine her being like... What is that smell? And why is this slightly wet? Where have you been keeping this money? It's kind of a funny visual. Man, this guy's so nervous, even he's sweating through his pants pocket. The money's damp. Oh my gosh. What about the serial numbers on the bills?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
Because doesn't that take a different kind of machine to do 10,001, 10,002, 10,003? That's very perceptive, yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
Yeah, why would you?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
Great. Tell me how you went from essentially an art school grad to a forger, to a con man with a postage stamp. You essentially turned on almost a dime or a postage stamp, if you will, and that was the beginning of this whole thing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
I assume you didn't just pay the loan shark back with a stack of fake $20 bills with the same serial number on them either, right? So you had to buy the tampons, get the change back. Did the tampon thing do the trick? Did you just eventually collect the 10 grand that you needed in the time that you needed it?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
Oh, yeah. Ogden, Utah, you might run out of tampon shops, right? Right.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
Before people start giving you side eye. Yeah. Oh, exactly.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
Or they just didn't care. Baseball cap and a jacket, not an amazing disguise, right? No, it's not an amazing disguise.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
Isn't there a thing with UV, or was this not a thing back then? Real bills, they glow, or real bills don't glow under the UV light? Or is that only $100 bills, or is that only from 1995 on? Do you know what I'm talking about?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
Yeah, people right now are probably thinking, how did people not notice this? But I did an episode with a brain scientist named David Eagleman. He told me that people just don't study currency. They assume it's real. Nobody who gets handed money assumes that the bill is fake. That's why they have checks like drawn it with a marker, put it under the UV light. And if those checks come up...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
you're already assuming the bill is real because you've seen a hundred of those that week that are real. It would be so weird to find a fake one that you're expecting it to come up as real. So even if it glowed like a little bit, you'd just go, ah, whatever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
As long as you're not looking at 10 bills, the same serial number with each vendor, and it's not completely obvious that it's fake in some other way, people just are not going to really notice this. I'm curious though, what did it feel like being rich overnight? Did it make you any happier? Did it alleviate your stress level or were you too stressed out about getting caught potentially?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
I do wonder, though, you're printing all these bills. Are there bad ones? Are there duds that come out or like, oh, that's smeared because something happened or I touched that with my thumb and it wasn't dry yet? What do you do with those?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
I assume you've got to inspect all these bills and make sure that they look good because that's how you get caught is you have a thumbprint on one of your bills or something.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
At least you didn't burn the house down. That would have been worse.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
Yeah, there's no really good way to explain yourself out of that one. You'd have to come up with a real whopper. No, it's fake money that I wanted to get rid of for absolutely no suspicious reason whatsoever. And don't call the police. Yeah, there's just no good way. You eventually pay the loan shark back, right? Right. With the laundry. So how did that feel?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
That must have been at least a relief because now you're not going to get kneecapped by some gangster.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
And then you stopped printing the money and lived happily ever after. No, that's not why we're here. How long did you print the money? Because you kept printing it after that, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
We want this criminal on our roster immediately.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
And they've seen all kinds of shady gangsters and mafia and criminals come through with fake bills and fake checks and fake everything.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
So for people who are unclear about this, because at first I was like, wait, how do you draw a postage stamp? The answer is you're not supposed to do that. You go to the post office, you buy these books of stamps that stick onto things. And I know people over 40 are like, Jordan, are you really explaining this?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
What is kiting checks? Like just writing bad checks? Is that what that means?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
Wow. So at this point, they rat you out immediately because they're scared, understandably. And they knock on your door eventually, I assume?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
Look, there's a lot of people who are under 30 listening to this show, and they probably have never seen a postage stamp that sticks onto things because they're all printed now, right? Oh, that's right.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
And once you get the first bottle, they send you eco-friendly refills every month.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
Yeah, I can't even tell you the last time I got a piece of mail where there was a stamp stuck on there that somebody had hand placed on there that wasn't barcode or some kind of thing rolled on there with a machine.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
Visit Progressive.com to see if you could save on car insurance. Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and Affiliates. Potential savings will vary. Not available in all states or situations. If you like this episode of the show, I invite you to do what other smart and considerate listeners do, which is take a moment and support the amazing sponsors who make this show possible.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
You can always dig up codes using the AI chatbot on the website, but they should all be listed and clickable over at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. And if you can't remember the name of a sponsor, you can't find the code, you're not sure if it ever existed, please do email us jordan at jordanharbinger.com. We are happy to surface that for you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
It is that important that you support those who support the show. Now for the rest of my conversation with Russ Swain. I assume that they went, yeah, where's the international organized crime syndicate that's helping you do this? Because it's pretty impressive that you printed all these bills. They're of this quality. They passed the UV test. They got the diamond dust in them.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
Just doesn't seem like a thing you do in your garage or your print shop.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
And you decided to, let's say it's a little American flag with, I don't know, cannon on it or whatever the old stamps used for the first class mail. You basically just drew that so well that the post office went, yeah, that's a stamp, and sent that thing along. The machines or whatever they were using, or maybe it was human eye back then, That's a stamp and delivered the letter.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
Can't imagine it would be so tempting to whitewash your participation in something like this, but you're right. There's no alibi big enough. And the Secret Service is very thorough.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
You mentioned they found thumbprints on the edges of the bills that you tried to burn because they went through the ash in the garbage and things like that with tweezers, which must have been a really long day or week for that agent.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
Oh, my God. So incriminating.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
Do you know how much counterfeit U.S. currency is in circulation? Do you have any idea? I can imagine it's a lot.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
You know what? I'll look it up right now. Okay, in the United States, the U.S. Department of Treasury estimates that 70 to 200 million in counterfeit bills are in circulation at any given time. That is roughly one counterfeit bill for every 10,000 genuine bills. I don't know if that's more than I thought or less than I thought. I feel like that's less than I thought. 70 million?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
That doesn't seem like that much somehow, but I guess it is at the end of the day.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
This is international, too, because remember, North Korea is making these. Iran was or is making these. So that's probably the bulk of it. But still, wow, that's crazy. Did you do any good deeds with the fake cash? You're a good person, right? So it wouldn't just be, oh, I'm playing carnival games and buying tampons. I mean, it would just be so tempting to do nice things with it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
I feel like if you've got an unlimited money glitch, one of the most fun things you could do would be to help other people with it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
So that was the proof in the pudding that you were a good enough artist to get this thing done. But stamps, it's hard to explain. It's a sticker, right? So it's got the edge at least is 3D. You could run your finger over it or look at it and see that it was drawn on there. Or did you draw that too?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
Tell me about the Mexican cab driver. This is a fun use of funds as well.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
This is before your arrest, by the way, for people who are like, wait a minute.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
While she's in labor. Hi, who's this stranger in the room? No, thank you. That's so funny.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
That must have been the best and most fun use of the money, other than getting kneecapped by a gangster. All right. Wow. So, okay. Secret Service catches up to you. You get arrested. The agent is impressed that you didn't lie to him, but that's not getting you out of trouble entirely. Surely there's fallout from the family too.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
Like your wife must've been, I don't even know if angry is quite going to cut it here. She must've just been shocked and horrified.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
I mean, surely they detected them and they just destroyed them like they do with other counterfeit bills. They documented it and destroyed it. And it didn't make it back to whatever probation officer's desk that you were dealing with. You got really stinking lucky.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
But the worst punishment was that I assume the relationship with your wife deteriorated as a result.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
What about your kids? How old were they? How do you explain to them what happened?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
And you suckered him into driving you to studio today, which is really nice.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
Yeah, there's a joke in there somewhere about paying with a $20 bill, but I'm not quite quick enough to come up with it. Man, it's such an interesting story and you got so lucky. I just can't get over it. Although I'm curious, you said years later, this cop walks in and maybe tests you. Tell us about this. I'm still trying to figure this one out.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
So it's not really good ROI for time if you're just trying to save on postage, but it was great ROI for time if you were trying to get a job, which was what you were doing. Trying to get a job. Correct. You think nowadays, if that happened, somebody would call the Secret Service or whatever, and that would be the end of your job hunt, I think, because you'd go to jail.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
Yeah, probably walked out and got into that Secret Service agent's car and went, I think you made the right decision. You told me to get lost. Yeah, maybe so. I hope that was the case. How long after the trial was this? Was it years later, months later?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
What about the church? Did they find out about this? And what happens with the church when stuff like this happens?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
So you were on probation from church too.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
As we wrap here, I'm very curious. It sounds like your old principal gave you a chance to forge one last item.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
Yeah, for sure. I think it's more the confession letter inside the envelope that would have gotten you in trouble, I think. True that. Okay. So you needed to stand out. You draw the stamp on there. And after that, did forging or counterfeiting things get easier or was it just kind of like, oh, that was a one-off. Now I work at this company. I have no intention of doing that again.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
That's really funny. So somewhere, if Weaver High School is even still called Weaver High School and is still around, there's a jug there that everybody thinks, oh, it's from us winning all those championships against Ogden. And it's just something you made in your garage. Yep.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
It's not valuable enough to do. And also, this was you finally getting into the good graces of that principal who had one out for you for decades. That's so funny.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
Russ Swain, thank you so much. You're a great storyteller. One of the things I love about this is when you talk to a mafia guy or a criminal, right, they have this little edge to them that they got that little kind of criminal. You just don't have that. You've got the Mormon guy thing going on. I made a twenty dollar bill and I painted a potion stamp and then the Secret Service arrested me.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
And they thought it's just the way you tell the stories is so funny. Because it's so unassuming. And I think that might be one of the reasons you got away with it for so long is everybody went, he is not a counterfeiter.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
Yeah, thanks. I guess in another life, I would have been a Secret Service agent arresting you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
You're about to hear a preview of the Jordan Harbinger show with a skilled art forger who made millions selling his fakes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
But they never actually got you. Why did it go away? Why did you never get indicted? How are we having this conversation? Ha ha ha. I guess that's the greatest story of all. To hear details of how Ken Pereni evaded the scrutiny of everyone from the mafia to the FBI and lived to tell the tale, check out episode 282 of The Jordan Harbinger Show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
Some of the way he solved problems with his counterfeit currency, it really reminded me of episode 282 with Ken Pereni. A lot of creative problem solving goes into counterfeiting and forging. Things like using old nails from flea market art in his forgeries so they'd look old to the naked eye and on x-ray machines.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
taking the varnish off of an old painting and putting it on the forgery, that kind of stuff. Really, these guys all have this in common. They have to solve these really unique problems. Also, Russ got some early advice for his art career, namely, steal with both hands. That's what he was told about art. And, you know, there's a book, Steal Like an Artist.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
I think he might have taken that advice a smidge too literally, but, you know, you be the judge. Man, though, the fallout from his deeds. The kids couldn't play at other people's homes. That would hurt a lot. Not as bad as prison. maybe not as bad as losing your wife, but it sure would sting.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
I think that's really, having to look your kids in the eye and tell them what you did and see their disappointment, that one would really cut to the heart. All things Russ Swain will be in the show notes at jordanharbinger.com. Advertisers, deals, discount codes, ways to support the show, all at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. Please consider supporting those who support the show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
Our newsletter, We Bit Wiser, also quite fun and entertaining. Very practical, something that'll have an immediate impact on your decisions and your psychology and your relationships. In under two minutes, we send it out on most Wednesdays. If you haven't signed up yet, I invite you to come check it out. It's a great companion to the show. jordanharbinger.com slash news is where you can find it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
Don't forget about 6-Minute Networking as well over at 6minutenetworking.com. I'm at Jordan Harbinger on Twitter and Instagram. You can also connect with me on LinkedIn. And this show, it's created in association with Podcast One. My team is Jen Harbinger, Jace Sanderson, Robert Fogerty, Ian Baird, and Gabriel Mizrahi. Remember, we rise by lifting others.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
The fee for the show is you share it with friends and you find something useful or interesting. The greatest compliment you can give us is to share the show with those you care about. If you know somebody who loves a good forgery or counterfeiting story, definitely share this episode with them.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
In the meantime, I hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn, and we'll see you next time. Thank you for watching. Vital Proteins steps in to help keep those areas supported so you can stay active and keep doing what you love. Vital Proteins is the number one collagen peptide brand in the U.S., so they know what they're doing. It's super easy to take.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
Just add a serving to your coffee, smoothie, even water. It doesn't even taste like anything, so it blends right in. The key is consistency. Making it a daily habit is how you see the benefits.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
Especially yourself. I was going to say, especially yourself. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
Yeah, that's 30 grand in today's money. That's an annual salary for somebody who's making, let's say, minimum wage. That's a lot of money.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
I will say it is a little surprising to hear how this man reacted because you're right. Jewish people, a lot of people are cringing right now. I am also of Jewish descent. So I feel like I'm qualified to talk about this without offending half the planet. First of all, even in the civil rights era, Jewish people and people of color, African-Americans stood side by side during that movement largely.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
So it is a little bit more surprising that, When you hear like old white dude, you think, okay, maybe there's some racism, generational stuff. But when you hear old Jewish dude, it's, yeah, you have like a higher percentage of them being a little bit more tolerant, you would think. And also New York. Sure. The guy in New York City, typically also even more liberal. More so. I agree.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
It's surprising that he reacted that way. He sounds like just a piece of crap. This is not a good guy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
Yeah. So just a note for people who are wondering about that, because your assumption that he was maybe more tolerant was reasonable, in my opinion. I would have made the same assumption. An older Jewish guy. Yeah, he's going to love this, especially that he okayed everything. But I didn't see the Chinaman on the front because you sent him a written description or whatever of the brochure. Sheesh.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
So this loan shark guy, how do you meet somebody like this in the first place? Because you don't seem like the type of guy. First of all, you're Mormon, correct? Correct. It doesn't seem like Mormons and loan sharks are hanging out in the same... Strip clubs.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1129: Russ Swain | The Good Mormon Who Made Bad Money
Yeah, desperation. The loan shark, how did you even meet this guy? You don't walk around going, hey, does anybody know anybody who will lend me a ridiculous amount of money at a ridiculous interest rate? How do you find somebody like this? Surely somebody pointed you his way or did you grow up with this guy? Where did this guy come from?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
Coming up next on The Jordan Harbinger Show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
So isn't that one of the chief allegations by Putin was that he invaded Ukraine because NATO was expanding?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
Well, that's for sure true.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
It's almost like, OK, well, this is a person who's a little bit progressive, but also has a firearm in the house and also believes in this, but also has these thoughts about immigration and these thoughts about the economy. And so if someone's getting their line of thinking exclusively from one side of the aisle or the other, they have so many issues with me that they don't stick around generally.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
It seems like when Putin or whoever says, hey, NATO is expanding towards our borders, they maybe were pointing to what, like Romania or something like that. I just know that it's a common refrain among people who say, well, the reason Ukraine happened was because NATO was right on Russia's doorstep.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
Look, I agree with that. I'm not arguing that. I'm just having you give me some ammo against these people because I see that argument a lot.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
That's fine with me. Yeah, I figured. I've always found it strange, though. If you think about in today's age, the more you actually think about your positions or change your mind when presented with new information, the less of a team player you are for some reason. But don't we want somebody who takes new information into consideration and then changes their mind?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
That's crazy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
What do you think of the situation in Ukraine right now, the peace plan to basically just, I mean, it sounds like capitulate to Putin and cut the country in half. Do we think that that's the best way to end hostilities, or do we think that's just going to give Russia time to regroup and attack Ukraine again?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
And it's like, no, we don't want that. We want somebody who's cheerleading for the thing that we believed in before, even if we've long since decided that that's wrong. We're still sticking to it. That never made sense to me.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
The Twitter peace plan, the one you see on Twitter.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
You know who won't starve your whole family to death? The amazing sponsors who support this show. We'll be right back. If you're wondering how I manage to book all these great authors, thinkers, and creators every single week, it is because of my network, the circle of people I know, like, and trust.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
And I'm teaching you how to build the same thing for yourself for free over at 6minutenetworking.com. I teach this class to journalists. I teach it to spies. I teach it to law enforcement. And I teach it to regular old corporate Joes, just like many of you. And not that there's anything wrong with that. The course is about improving your relationship-building skills. It is not cringey.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
It is very down-to-earth and practical. It is not fluff. I can tell you that. And it's six minutes a day is all it takes. Actually, it takes like five, but five-minute networking was taken. Many of the guests on our show subscribe and contribute to the course. Come on and join us. You'll be in smart company where you belong. You can find the course at sixminutenetworking.com.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
Now, back to Anne Applebaum. I've heard even if Putin did want to end the war, let's say this week, he would have trouble doing so, not just because he would look really bad at having not achieved his goal, but also... and I don't know how much you know about this, but the entire economy of Russia at this point is on a wartime footing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
So if you just go, all right, we don't need radar tanks, guns, ammunition, it's kind of like saying, all right, no tech companies in California. Well, that's kind of a big number of jobs and GDP that we're just turning off with the flip of a switch. So it's almost like they can't afford to stop the war at this point.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
It's not something you can grind to a halt overnight without causing massive damage.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
This is a unrelated sort of tangent here, but why do autocratic states spend so much time disparaging the West? What does it do? I noticed that there's almost like a it's not a part time job. It's several people's full time job to think of reasons why the West sucks. I see it from China a lot and I see it from Russia a lot. I see it from other places and alliances a lot.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
I see it from people who pretend to be Americans a lot online as well or Europeans.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
That's for sure. Yeah. What is the function of this?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
Yeah. It just shows you how everything is seem to change. It's like your position, you think I haven't moved or I haven't moved that much. And you realize that now you're basically a centrist when you were a Republican 20 years ago or 30 years ago. It's a little disconcerting because that shift in one direction or the other just shows you that the extremes are more polarized, I suppose.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
So a critic might say, come on now, we spend a ton of time disparaging China, Russia, North Korea. How is this different?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
And that leads to scary things, which you are now writing about, such as and your latest book, Autocracy, Inc., which we'll link in the show notes, I gave it a read. It was one of those things you can kind of read in one quick airplane ride.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
Thank you. Thank you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
Yeah. It's not loaded with a history of the Bolshevik Revolution in Chapter 3. It's like, okay, we don't have to get that much in the weeds on stuff, which I appreciate, because I don't think people realize the characteristics of autocracies, and they'll simply parrot news talking points, but they don't realize that there's kind of an axis of these autocracies folks working together.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
Thank you. Thank you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
Thank you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
And that might even be a good place to start. Autocracies and authoritarian regimes, they seem to work together in some ways. But I always found that kind of weird because they're not aligned ideologically, right? It's not like fundamentalist Islamic regime of Iran. They don't really have a ton in common with Venezuela, unless I'm missing something. But yet these are allies somehow.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
Thank you. Thank you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
Welcome to the show. I'm Jordan Harbinger. On the Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the stories, secrets, and skills of the world's most fascinating people and turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
I actually set up a shell company a few years ago just to see if it was hard. It's not hard. And I know people say, well, you're a lawyer. You know how to do that stuff. Honestly, you could figure it out in a few hours. It's really easy. It's easy. And if you can't do it because you can't read English, you can hire a lawyer and they can do it in a Saturday afternoon.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
I mean, it's so ridiculously simple. Movies would have you think that it's this complicated system that you need half of Deutsche Bank's analyst department working on it. No, you can do it online. I mean, it's just... so damn easy. The hardest part is finding a place to headquarter it. But once you do a few hours of research, I mean, you can do it in Delaware.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
You can do it, I think, in Nevada or like you said, was it North Dakota? There's all these different places you can do it that you kind of wouldn't expect. You think like, oh, I I can't do it in the US. Actually, we're kind of in HQ for a lot of those. It really is.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
By the way, you mentioned Oliver Bullough on the show episode 228 for people who are looking for that and not finding it because it's pretty old. You mentioned in the book that Chinese censorship is, of course, on the rise and the tech has evolved to the point where they're working on being able to predict political dissent based on internet activity.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
Can you give us an overview of how that would work? That's kind of incredible because you're talking about mind reading.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
Yeah, I saw a video on Instagram a couple of days ago. My wife sent it to me and she's like, look how cool this is. And it was the cops finding somebody who had robbed some institution. And it's like him driving and then another camera of him driving and then him driving this way and that way and this way and that way and then getting out of the car and then it just keeps switching cameras.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
But all the comments are like, oh my gosh, this is terrifying. This should be scary. This is not cool. This is scary. So you do think, wow, it's great they can catch this guy because he's a dangerous armed robber. But on the other hand, yeah, if you have a government that's willing to misuse this technology, now you can't get away from being observed at all. Right.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
Yeah, exactly.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
It's like that Will Smith movie from the early 90s, Enemy of the State. You ever see that?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
Not a standout movie, but yeah, I remember being like, wow, they turned his credit cards off. This is the future.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
Right. It'll be like, oh, we have him on camera at a shopping mall. How are you viewing this camera from this far away? This is amazing. Yes, it uses satellites. Oh, wow. Space.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
This is a long time before you could literally just buy an AirTag for 30 bucks and throw it in your kid's shoes so that they don't wander off at the mall. Right. What's up with the falling out of windows in Russia? It's a cliche now. It's a joke now. Surely this is now being done deliberately because otherwise, geez, hit someone with a car. Switch it up a little bit.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
They're not trying to make it look like an accident, right? They're trying to say, we killed this person. We just didn't use a bullet to do it because, I don't know, it's more poetic. I don't really get it. What's going on with this?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
The poisoning of, I think, is Alexander Litvinenko with the polonium-212. That was one of those where it has to be able to only have been us, right? So they get this weird substance that only exists, I don't know, inside a nuclear reactor that's in Siberia, and they use that to kill the guy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
Yeah, it's so interesting because it's counterintuitive, right? The people online who are saying, oh, it's not the Russians. No, they want us to think this. No need to defend these people for free, especially. They want us to know who did this. There's a reason they picked this particular method or this particular poison. I want to switch gears a little bit.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
It's funny because I'll get a review that's like, this guy is nothing more than a right wing fascist with a fashy haircut. And I'm like, OK, fine, guilty on the haircut. But the other stuff I don't really get. And then the next review is like this left wing commie, idiot, tanky. And I'm just like, guys, make up your mind. Am I a communist or a fascist? Come on already. Yep.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
Yeah, I have that problem, too. It's almost like you have to average the two and I end up in the middle. You've written extensively on the failures of communism. Why do you think the appeal persists in certain circles, especially in the West? This always baffles me.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
How long does it take to go, wait a minute, this is not a democracy anymore? In history, how does it work with other countries or how has it worked with other countries where you're just a dictatorship now? How does that happen?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
Yes, I am. I'm glad to know.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
I know I've taken a lot of your time. In closing, maybe this will end up in a positive note. What steps can citizens and leaders take to reinforce democratic resilience in the face of these challenges?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
Our mission is to help you become a better informed, more critical thinker through long-form conversations with a variety of amazing folks, from spies to CEOs, athletes, authors, thinkers, performers, even the occasional rocket scientist, Russian chess grandmaster, gold smuggler, or hostage negotiator.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
And Applebaum, thank you so much. This is fascinating. And I really appreciate you humoring all my probably relatively silly questions about elementary topics.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
You're about to hear a preview of The Jordan Harbinger Show with geopolitics analyst Peter Zion.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
For more about how globalization and our way of life will change dramatically in the coming decade, check out episode 781 of The Jordan Harbinger Show. Thanks to Anne for doing this one. She is always kind of hard to nail down. Poland, D.C., Ukraine, elsewhere. All things Anne Applebaum will be in the show notes at jordanharbinger.com.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
Advertisers, deals, and discount codes, ways to support the show, all at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. Please consider supporting those who support the show. Also, our newsletter, We Bit Wiser. If you want something practical and specific that'll have an immediate impact on your decisions, your psychology, and your relationships in under two minutes a week, definitely check this out.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
If you haven't signed up yet, it is a great companion to the show. JordanHarbinger.com slash news is where you can find it. Don't forget about 6-Minute Networking as well. It's over at 6minutenetworking.com. I'm at Jordan Harbinger on Twitter and Instagram. You can also connect with me on LinkedIn. In this show, it's created in association with Podcast One.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
My team is Jen Harbinger, Jace Sanderson, Robert Fogerty, Ian Baird, and Gabriel Mizrahi. Remember, we rise by lifting others. The fee for the show is you share it with friends when you find something useful or interesting. The greatest compliment you can give us is to share the show with those you care about.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
If you know somebody who's interested in geopolitics, dictators, autocratic regimes, definitely share this episode with them. In the meantime, I hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn. And we'll see you next time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
Yeah, it's almost like corporations that happen to work together on something as opposed to nations that work together.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
Yeah, they help each other have their intelligence services travel around, launder money. I mean, you see this with BRICS, right? One of the funny things that I see online a lot is like, oh, the U.S. dollar is going down. BRICS is getting stronger. And then you talk to somebody who is like deep PhD economist or something like that that's worked for a large international organization.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
And if you're new to the show or you want to tell your friends about the show, and I appreciate it when you do, I suggest our episode starter packs. These are collections of our favorite episodes on topics like persuasion and negotiation, psychology, geopolitics, disinformation, China, North Korea, crime and cults, and more.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
They're like, BRICS? You mean the countries that can't even get along or agree on one single thing and have no reason to trust each other are all suddenly going to band together and create a non-dollar international currency when they won't even float their own currencies on the international market? Sure thing, buddy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
Yeah, I should have been clear. I don't mean that the BRICS countries are an axis of evil, per se. I just brought it up as an idea that these countries work together when it sort of suits them, my outside opinion. But these alliances, almost by definition, can't be as strong as, say, an alliance between the United States and Australia or...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
the UK, for example, because if the only thing you have in common is, man, it sure is hard to make money when we're under sanctions, man, those Americans are really getting under our skin economically. That's sort of a weaker tie than we share hundreds of years of common values of language and culture.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
It'll help new listeners get a taste of everything that we do here on this show. Just visit jordanharbinger.com slash start or search for us in your Spotify app to get started.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
Look, I'm 45 years old and I'm not a historian, so you might have to explain some relatively simple things to me. I grew up in the 80s, right, in the Cold War. And the Soviet Union, the main autocracy of that time, at least kind of pretended to care about norms and international order.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
When I look at these old videos, I wanted to see what the foreign ministers of the Soviet Union were saying about things just like they do now, where they sort of pretend to care about the international order when the United States does something. But then when they do something like, oh, it's our own affair. Don't get involved. Right. Ukraine is a domestic affair or whatever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
They pretended they cared about the superiority of, say, Soviet communism. This system is superior. Everyone look at how well we're doing now. It's like they just don't give a crap. You have the dictator of Belarus or Putin, for that matter. They just flout any semblance of order of rule of law or like we follow this specific system.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
It's just all kind of like the mask is off and they're like, OK, that failed. We don't need to replace it. We can still do whatever we want. Try and stop me. That's kind of what I see from them now.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
Today, historian, author, and journalist Anne Applebaum joins us to discuss dictators and autocratic regimes, how and why these regimes, these crazy, kooky governments work together against their own people, and of course, against the West, what communism might look like in America, propaganda, censorship, and more.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
Anne is a great speaker and writer, and I know you'll enjoy this conversation, especially if you're paying attention to geopolitics and you like those episodes, like many of us do. Here we go with Anne Applebaum. This show doesn't fit neatly into a box. It's not like, well, we do right wing talking points or left wing talking points.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1117: Anne Applebaum | Inside The Fortune 500 of Modern Dictatorships
It seems like it, but some critics might say that's what the U.S. wants. They're forcing NATO spending to be higher in these other countries as well. What would you say to somebody who says, well, hey, you said these countries work together. U.S. and their allies work together.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1092: Gene Simmons | KISS and Make-Up
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1092: Gene Simmons | KISS and Make-Up
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1092: Gene Simmons | KISS and Make-Up
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1092: Gene Simmons | KISS and Make-Up
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
Coming up next on the Jordan Harbinger Show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
If these people have grievances and that's the major motivation or one of them, is it just bullying gone wrong? Is it things that are being taken to another level or does that not even matter?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
We'll also explore why target hardening measures, which is mostly what we do now, right, adding different doors or barricades or security, isn't actually working, and how social media might actually be able to help us not only predict, but actually prevent violence. Here we go with Mark Fulman. I can't even remember how I found the Mother Jones piece. It was probably mass shooting of the week.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
I know the forum that he was on because it started off by hating dating coaches, which I know sounds random. So I was mentioned in there a lot because I was actually doing that at that time. Oh, interesting. I didn't know that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
a lot of the people there became the 4chan people, which if people don't know what that is, like imagine Reddit or whatever, but like no moderation and really gross and there's like Nazi stuff in there. Way out on the fringe. Way on the fringe.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
And a lot of those people, it started off as almost like dark humor and then there was some people who tried to be helpful and they got mercilessly ridiculed because it was all like, oh, that's not how reality works. You can never improve yourself. And it was very negative. And the stuff that came out of there was really scary. And he was on that message board.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
And it didn't surprise me at all when I saw that mentioned in the news sources because I had gone through that message board because I'd get alerts for my name or somebody would say, hey, you're mentioned in this. And I'd see the other posts and I'm just thinking, who are these people? And they are not all, but some are these crazy, violent incel sort of folks.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
That board is where the incel movement began as well.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
And I just was like, why does this keep happening? And I still don't know, but your article did shed some light on it because everybody remembers Elliot Rodger, who we'll get to in a bit. Everybody remembers the Columbine shooting. That wasn't the first, but it was the first big school shooting, at least of my lifetime. And that really just changed everything for a lot of people.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
What did Elliot Rodgers go on to do?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
And he originally had wanted to attack, I think, a sorority, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
It's hard to decide, do we just talk about school shootings or do we talk about mass shootings in general? Because there's unfortunately a wealth of material on both of those things. And I just want to, at the top of the show, acknowledge how horrific this problem really is. I often make jokes about things on this show. I don't really want to do that here because it's so dark.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
Is there a connection between autism and these kinds of things? Because I've heard people theorize, of course, on Twitter, whatever, but I'll stop you right there. Yeah, I know. I want to break that potential stereotype as well, because Elliot Rodgers presented some of these signs that people are like, oh, my God, these autistic people are dangerous now. And it's like, OK, no.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
I also want to focus on what we can look for, what we can do about it, not just lament the problem, because that's all they do on the news anyways. Yeah. What's that Onion headline? We've tried nothing and we're all out of ideas. No way to prevent this, says Only Nation, where this regularly happens. Right. Yes, exactly. It's a depressing topic, man.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
I wanted to address that as well, because after Elliot Rodger, a lot of people were like, oh, you got to be careful. These autistic incel guys. And it's the Venn diagram is not overlapping the way you think it's overlapping.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
I guess people just assumed it based on the video. I really don't know. Now, some of these shooters are clearly nuts. They're out there getting Columbine shooter tattoos. They're dressing in the trench coat uniform. That might not be mental illness. That might just be like edgy teen 101, like trying to look... tough. But some of the warning signs are absolutely wild.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
I think he was a Korean guy pulling out knives and stabbing at the carpet in the library, threatening people, especially women, who's going to gun ranges with multiple guns and practicing reloading while shooting, which I guess if you work at a gun range is like a red flag when people are training to do that because you're not a special forces guy. You're a Random college student.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
Okay. I wasn't sure if that was the same thing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
Why couldn't you write a book on AI like everyone else?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
Wasn't there a van attack in Toronto and the kid basically said like, Elliot Rogers is my hero, some version of this. And it was like, the revolution is beginning. And then when he went to prison, he was like, I just said that because I knew you'd put it in the paper.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
This is a show about school and mass shootings, so I am not going to be doing a snarky ad pivot. We'll be right back. We'll see you next time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
stocked up on a few quince staples breathable tees pants i can wear anywhere one of their insanely comfortable lounge sets that's a thing i guess and i'll just pretend that's for the flight but let's be honest i'm probably going to live in it everything costs way less than it looks as well quince sells premium gear at 50 to 80 percent less than those overpriced designer brands because they cut out the middlemen they work directly with top factories
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
And they actually care about how their stuff gets made. Ethical practices, premium fabrics, quality finishes, no corners cut. So if you got a trip coming up and you want to look sharp, feel good, not drop a month's freaking rent on a travel outfit, check out Quince. Save your cash for the croissants. And let Quince upgrade the travel wardrobe.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
This episode is sponsored in part by Audible. People always ask me how I managed to get through so much content, especially since I prep for every interview. I'm talking two to three books a week, and it's all thanks to Audible. I've got Audible in my ears while I'm getting my 10,000 steps in, running errands, even doing stuff around the house. I don't mess with physical books anymore at all.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
Audible's just way more efficient. I listen on two or even 3x speed, which lets me cover a lot of ground without sacrificing quality. Right now, I'm listening to Good Inside by Dr. Becky Kennedy. She's got this really down-to-earth way of talking about parenting that is not preachy. And here's what a lot of people don't realize. Audible is not just audiobooks anymore.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
You get access to thousands of titles with your membership, podcasts, Audible Originals, and cool stuff like their Words in Music series where artists tell their stories in their own words. The variety makes the membership way more valuable, so you never run out of great stuff to check out. One day I'm deep in a parenting guide, the next it's a podcast or a spy thriller.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
So whether you're into suspense, self-development, or you just want to make traffic suck less, Audible's got you covered.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
If you're wondering how I managed to book all these great authors, thinkers, creators every week, it is because of my network, the circle of people I know, like, and trust. And I'm teaching you how to build your network for free over at 6minutenetworking.com. This course is all about improving your relationship building skills and inspiring other people to want to develop a relationship with you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
Of course, it is non-cringy. Very easy, down to earth, no awkward strategies or cheesy tactics, just practical exercises that'll make you a better connector, a better colleague, a better friend, and a better peer. In six minutes a day is really all it takes. Many of the guests on our show subscribe and contribute to the same course. So come on and join us.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
You'll be in smart company where you belong. You can find the course at sixminutenetworking.com. And now back to Mark Fulman. You mentioned in the book that we can't simply label all shooters as mentally ill because it might cause us to ignore other more important warning signs. So what about narcissism specifically? It seems like a lot of these guys, they feel like nobody's. Okay, fine.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
I went through that in middle school too, but I didn't do anything. But I'm also not a narcissist, despite what many people who comment on our YouTube videos or in my inbox might say. Is that one of the triggers? They feel like a nobody, but in their mind, they're this grandiose, amazing, world-changing person.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
Whereas in middle school, most of us, when we feel like nobodies, we just go, oh, well, them's the breaks. These guys are like, no, this can't be true. I'm so important. I'm so amazing. I'm going to force everybody to realize this. And the way I do that is by running them over or putting a bomb in my school.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
You hinted at this earlier, but is it safe to say that this is only an American problem? I know there's been mass shootings in, I think, the Czech Republic. There was one in Australia, and they were kind of like, all right, that's enough guns for everybody. And everybody in Australia kind of went, oh, okay, and just turned in their guns. Not going to happen here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
I think it's important to note that this is not random. And I think a lot of folks say, look, this is totally random and we can't stop it. That's not true. The fact that these people have a zillion red flags and warning signs in a lot of cases is evidence of that. You wrote in the book that social barriers are what prevent most people from deciding to kill. But
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
I got to clarify what this means, because it sounds like what you're saying is if many people could get away with killing, they would do it. I don't know about that. I'm already doing all the rape and murder that I want to do, which is zero.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
Wow, that was that long ago. So didn't he leave a note that said something like, there's something in my brain, do an autopsy and you'll see it. And they found a tumor in his brain.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
Welcome to the show. I'm Jordan Harbinger. On The Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the stories, secrets, and skills of the world's most fascinating people and turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
Yeah, I remember speaking of Catcher in the Rye, there was a Mel Gibson movie. I think it was called Conspiracy Theory. It was probably a 90s movie. But his whole shelf is full of Catcher in the Rye. And there's a scene in the beginning where he walks into a bookstore and walks out with a copy of it and puts it on his shelf next to 500 other copies.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
So this meme or trope or whatever has been around for a while. You mentioned that journalists like us are mentioning these people's names. Does that help or hurt? Because we've been rattling off a bunch of names here. Is there a way to... mention them in a way that's diminished so that they don't watch this and go, oh, look how much attention these guys are getting. I don't want to do that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
Because you see that already pretty much any mass casualty event. People on Twitter, for example, are like, it was ISIS. And then sometimes they're right. But often it's like, no, it wasn't. It was a dude dressed up like Batman. The disinformation is already out there. Now you've got people who are confused slash they're just consuming conspiracy theories on Twitter instead of real news.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
I don't know how much we can educate those people. They want to believe the wrong thing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
During the Boston Marathon bombing, I think the internet slash Reddit, they found evidence The guy who did it and then they were wrong, but that person's life is just ruined. I think he actually died.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
You mentioned Ronald Reagan. It seems like the Secret Service should be all over this profiling threat assessment thing. I mean, don't they have to predict who's an actual danger to the president versus who's just like shit talking on X? Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
Some people do think this is not possible to solve. It's hard to think about how we would do this. And just as a side note, I know that we have mass shootings in other countries. It seems like people who are perpetrating a mass casualty event or whatever you want to call it, if it's not a shooting, they just use whatever weapon they can get their hands on.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
Oh, yeah. Sure.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
I remember that. That, of course, was talked about quite a bit, considering that we were all right from there. And I remember our postal workers. It's Michigan. You talk to your postman. We don't do that in California for whatever reason. But in Michigan, it's like sit down and have a drink or like he'd give your kids candy and you'd be like, OK, that's fine. It's a different time. Oh, yeah, man.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
And I remember talking to the postman and being like, hey, what's going on? And they're like, yeah, let me just say I like being in the truck. Basically, they don't hang around the actual post office because they're nervous about it, which is just terrible. And you hear that from teachers now. They've got a lot of other things to worry about, like having a teacher class in the hallway.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
What about the police? It seems like they can't be very proactive. They react to crime, maybe not prevent it so much.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
And that's why people say it's a gun problem in America because in China they use cars or knives And in China, the crimes tend to be a little bit different. Someone will go into a daycare and stab as many kids as they can because most people only have one kid in China. So it's like the way to hurt the most people in one place where they'll run their car through a crowd of people.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
Stalking is tough. It's hard to make a lot of the elements of crime, gifts and calls. It's legal to do that. You can't make it a crime to give someone a gift. They suddenly don't want it and you go to prison. That doesn't work. But we did manage to do it in California here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
I looked this up, California Penal Code, section 646.9A. It's all up here. No, but California stalking law- I'm impressed you can remember that number. Yeah, no, I'm right. It makes it illegal to harass, follow, or threaten another person. There are certain elements of the crime.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
The defendant must have willfully and maliciously harassed or followed the victim, made a credible threat to put the victim in fear of their safety, like you said. The penalties, it depends. It can be a misdemeanor or a felony, a year in jail, a fine of up to $1,000. Or if they have a restraining order against you and you're still doing it, it's worse. It's not just violating a restraining order.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
You can be two to four years in a state prison or up to five years, depending on if you've been convicted of certain other crimes. And we also have our three strikes law here in California, which can end up putting you in prison for 25 years if you've done a bunch of other things. So I guess that's sort of a response to the Hollywood stuff, right? Because celebrities get stalked so much.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
Other states have surely taken this model.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
We have that here too, of course. You mentioned in the book, Trigger Points, which by the way, if people buy books, please use our links in the show notes. That does help support the show. You mentioned in the book that gun control No, you didn't say that's all the problem. I just want to be clear before people are already like cracking their knuckles to write the emails to me.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
I don't want to get too derailed on the stalking thing. I just thought it was kind of interesting. In terms of mass shooters, what should law enforcement agents be looking for? And what can non-law enforcement be looking for?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
I think it was the morning of, yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
You said that gun control would help reduce the number of shooting deaths just across the board by 40,000 annually.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
there were kids growing up that did crazy stuff. Like they would talk about guns all the time. They would blow things up all the time. They would drink even when we were like in sixth grade, which is not, maybe that's normal for some schools. For my school, this was not. And I remember he would say like, what did you do this weekend? And I'm like, I don't know, watch TV. I'm 13, you know?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
And he's like, Yeah, I stole beer from this person's garage and I drank 24 of them and I woke up on the road and I'm like, dude, what are you doing? Yeah, I remember him showing me photos of the principal with the head cut off and him as the executioner. He's like, I joined the National Rifle Association. I was like, what is that? I didn't grow up in a community where people hunted.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
This is a suburban town, so that was a little odd.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
He was sent to the principal's office all the time. That's why he hated the principal. And he was a tough kid to control. But he was actually always really nice to me. I remember kids in his grade, he was a grade above me. Kids in his grade were like, he's such a loser. And I was like, oh, he just feels isolated and lonely. I think he was in seventh or eighth grade and I was in sixth grade.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
When I was in eighth grade, I wasn't talking to sixth graders. They were like little babies. So I think he was just a lonely guy, but it's hard to tell. Nowadays, a lot of this, I listen to Nine Inch Nails. I wore oversized flannel shirts. I was isolated. I was on my computer all the time. I had tons of friends, I think, and I was nice. So that maybe didn't scare people.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
I feel like I read before this happened, they quit the swim team and they quit the wrestling team. And then nobody hung out with them for two months or something. And then it's dot, dot, dot, this violent thing happened. So it seems like those are some signals.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
Our mission is to help you become a better informed, more critical thinker through long-form conversations with a variety of amazing folks, from spies to CEOs, athletes, authors, thinkers, and performers, even the occasional Hollywood filmmaker, music mogul, or tech luminary. And if you're new to the show or you want to tell your friends about the show, I suggest our episode starter packs.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
The book mentioned something called leakage, where the fantasies of a killer will eventually seep out because they just can't control themselves. What are some examples of this that people could look out for?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
If you see something, say something.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
As you all know, I highly value my career, so I shan't be doing a tasteless ad pivot in an episode about mass shootings. We'll be right back. We'll see you next time. Airbnb can make that a reality. Hosting on Airbnb is an easy way to earn extra income without taking on a second job, and now, with Airbnb's co-host network, it's even simpler.
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1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
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1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
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1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
If you like this episode of the show, I invite you to do what other smart and considerate listeners do, which is take a moment and support our amazing sponsors who make this show possible. All of the deals, discount codes, and ways to support the show are searchable and clickable over at jordanharbinger.com slash deals.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
You can also always search for any sponsor using the AI chatbot on the website as well. And if you can't remember the name of a sponsor, you can't find the code, you're not sure if the code even exists, feel free to email us jordan at jordanharbinger.com. We are more than happy to surface codes for you because it's that important that you support those who support the show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
Now, for the rest of my conversation with Mark Fulman. Look, I used to write violent stories as a kid too. The only thing I stocked at the end of the day was a bag of Cheetos. So it really, you're right, all these factors have to be in play because I didn't have a crazy, miserable, child abuse home life. I was just bored.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
I honestly was just kind of bored and was into internet culture at an early age before anybody had internet, so I was weird. But again, had friends, was on the football team, wasn't getting bullied or beat up or anything, just had like an alt mindset. thing going on that wasn't that severe but if there was a checklist it would have been like oh maybe we should keep an eye on this jordan kid
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
That's the problem with the checklist though, because you have a million kids on the list. You would. I got sent to the principal's office once for horsing around with some of the guys. I remember the assistant principal who was the disciplinarian. He looked at me and he goes, what are you doing here? Because it was like, as if you caused trouble. He literally just told me to go away.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
That's so difficult.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
And then it was almost insulting. It was like, what? I can be bad. And he was like, yeah, get out of here, mathlete. What are you doing here? I know earlier in the show, we mentioned interventions. When we find somebody who sets off red flags, what do these look like? You said the police showed up at Elliot Rogers' apartment and he was like, ah, my mom's a worrywart. Great.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
So they just leave after that? I mean, there has to be something that's more than just, he said he was fine and we took his word for it, so now we can't do anything.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
Jeez, I can't relate.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
The FBI profiling for serial killers that you brought up earlier in the show, I'm not even sure I know what that means slash is, but obviously it exists. Why can't we use that for shooters again? Because they're too different than serial killers are similar to each other. I don't get it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
Courtboard, strings, and syntax, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
It's so hard to find metrics, not quite the right word, but regular teen angst versus actual threatening behavior. It just seems like that would be so hard to-
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
So making it harder for people to buy guns might not necessarily even solve this problem because they could just go to their friend's house and steal one. Look, I think that's a question that applies to gun violence broadly. Right. Because I think a lot of people oversimplify this. They're like, oh, we just need to stop selling guns to people at stores.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
And it's like, okay, there's 400 million guns floating around the United States, most of which they're not held by drug cartels. They're like in your uncle's attic. And he hasn't looked for it in 20 years, but you know it's there.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
Yeah. The Second Amendment thing is I'm always so torn on this. Another red flag you mentioned were specific plans, right? Was it the specificity that makes it more serious?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
I've heard people mention things like if the shooter talks about future plans that they have, that means they're maybe less serious or if they don't have any future plans because they know they're going to die on a specific day. Do you know what I'm talking about? Oh, like positive things in the future. Say someone says, I'm really looking forward to graduation.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
I think I'm going to take a gap year. Maybe I'll learn how to ski. That's different than somebody just not having any future plans after school.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
This sounds so labor-intensive, but I guess if you think about it, school shootings, while they seem like they happen all the time, They're rare enough where you could probably have something like this at the sheriff's office at the county level where they just collect reports and then intervene as needed. And that might not even be most of those people's full-time thing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
And if that prevents people from getting shot at school, it's a worthy investment, I would say.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
Does the target hardening stuff work? I feel like we've seen that after Sandy Hook and Stoneman Douglas, the shootings, but I Yeah, metal detectors. And then these doors are bulletproof. I think we all remember the fear mongering with the bulletproof backpacks for kids or whatever that came out after that stuff. It was gross.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
You mentioned leakage before. Are there warning signs on, say, social media? Because I feel like don't these guys post things online? You mentioned the one guy posted something online right before the van attack in Toronto. Are there other warning signs?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
Is this something where AI could monitor someone's communication habits on Instagram or Reddit or whatever, and then eventually say like, hey, this person is writing weird screeds in their DMs and it's triggering something?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
So it's valuable that way. What about video games? I remember people used to blame video games and music, whether it was Nine Inch Nails, which is now stuck in my head, or Marilyn Manson. That's out of the Columbine case too, right? That just seems like BS, right? Tens of millions of us played Grand Theft Auto and we've beaten up zero gangsters or prostitutes with baseball bats.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
Yeah, that seems to be the only real solution to this. And it's crazy to look at some of the parallels, which we'll get to later on in the show here, about the kids that present these certain issues. And I'm like, I'm checking the boxes from when I was a kid. And I was like, I would have been on whatever list, but I'd never planned anything like that, obviously.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
I have used zero rocket launchers in Los Angeles. It doesn't seem like it leads directly to that, but maybe it does.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
Probably not. I did show my kid a boxing video and he ran around punching everyone for the rest of the night. So we're not doing that anymore. But yeah, I can see where there's clear limit to reenacting violence. By the way, how do we have the best chance of surviving in an active shooter situation?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
Run, hide, fight.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
It's run if you can. If you cannot, then you hide. If you get found, then you fight.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
Do we know the statistics of one in X people will be in a mass shooting? Do you have anything off the top of your head?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
These are collections of our favorite episodes on topics like persuasion and negotiation, psychology, geopolitics, disinformation, China, North Korea, crime and cults, and more. That'll help new listeners get a taste of everything we do here on the show. Just visit jordanharbinger.com slash start or search for us in your Spotify app to get started.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
Mark, thank you for coming in today. I know it's a dark topic. I'm glad you did a deep dive on this. Somebody had to, I suppose. I can't imagine this was a fun thing to research.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
I agree. Thank you so much, man.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
Here's a trailer featuring Tom Harden, once entangled in insider trading, who transformed into Tipper X, a pivotal informant, instrumental in exposing major securities fraud cases for the FBI.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
It's a complex problem. It's interesting. If you look at the online debate, and I know some of these people in real life, like extreme libertarians who are like, the government shouldn't even be putting out roads or whatever. I have no taxes. Anybody should be able to buy a rocket launcher.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
Don't miss this compelling story of a transformation and redemption on Episode 918. All things Mark Fulman will be on the show notes at jordanharbinger.com. Advertisers, deals, discount codes, ways to support the show, all at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. Please consider supporting those who make the show possible.
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1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
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1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
Remember, we rise by lifting others. The fee for the show is you share it with friends and you find something useful or interesting. The greatest compliment you can give us is to share the show with those you care about. If you know somebody who's interested in this topic, as sad as it might be, definitely share this episode with them, especially if you think it could help them in some way.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
There's a couple people like that I know, but I'm not even 100% sure that if you took them to task on that, that they would really back all this stuff up. Most of the people that I know, and I know lots and lots of gun owners, they're not
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
In the meantime, I hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn, and we'll see you next time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
kooky right wing crazies who are like, oh yeah, you should be able to buy a machine gun because the government's coming for, you know, I need a tank in my backyard. They're mostly hunters, first of all, or they're like, hey, they have a saying. It's like when seconds count, the police are only minutes away. I can sympathize with that. You're home with your kids.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
You live in a city like you want to protect yourself. Most of them are not like, yeah, 15 year old crazies should be able to go out and buy an unlimited amount of automatic weapons. No one has sat here or Right.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
Today, my guest Mark Fulman on school shootings and other mass shootings. This is a horrific problem. It's kind of a little bit of a depressing topic to do a show on. I was a little hesitant at first. Actually, this conversation turned out amazing. It's an almost uniquely American problem, or is it? Either way, this problem isn't or shouldn't be as impossible to solve as it seems to be.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
Actually, quarterly reminder that most mentally ill people are not dangerous in any way. Thank you for adding that. I should have said that as well.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
I always have to do that because whenever we talk about mental illness and we talk about crime associated with anything like this, we get emails from people who are like, hey, my life's hard enough without you guys painting with this hugely broad brush. that says schizophrenic people or people who have bipolar disorder are potential mass shooters. I want to be really clear about that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
And usually if those people are dangerous, they're dangerous to themselves, which means they need our help not to be not invited to your birthday party because you're scared of them. And they're also more likely to be the victims of violence, too. Yes, that is also true. What about the research and planning involved in the crimes?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
Maybe we can interdict that stuff somehow, because it seems like these guys, they have plans. They assemble the weapons. They know where they're going to go in the school. They don't just wander in there and go, oh, now's the time. There's a whole thing going on.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1140: Mark Follman | How to Stop Mass Shootings in America
Turns out that gun control is not the whole story here. Today on the show, we'll discuss predictive measures, such as what to look for in a potential shooter, how we could even potentially profile these people, or maybe not quite that, before they become violent.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
If you're wondering how I managed to book all these great authors, thinkers, and creators every single week, it is because of my network, the circle of people that I know, like, and trust. I'm teaching you how to build the same thing for yourself for free over at 6minutenetworking.com. This is non-cringy. It's very down-to-earth, very practical. Six minutes a day is all it takes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
And many of the guests on the show subscribe and contribute to the course. So come on and join us. You'll be in smart company where you belong. Once again, the course is free. I don't need your credit card number, nothing like that. It's over at 6minutenetworking.com. Now, back to Marcel Derzis.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
You mentioned that these dictators, let's say Putin, for example, pilfer left and right, but they don't take the money. I read these stories about Putin where it's like his friend who he grew up with, who's the conductor of the orchestra, is worth $400 million, but his salary is like $15,000 a year, whatever, 25%. Why bother? No one's going to arrest Vladimir Putin.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
Your pitch was something like, I wrote a book about dictators, and I was like, I don't need to read the rest of this. I'm sold. Because they're just so weird. Dictators are just almost universally weird as hell. And I want to know... What's up with that? You got Gaddafi, right? He had all this plastic surgery. He looked like an old Persian woman from L.A. by the time he'd gone out.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
You don't have journalists keeping him to account. Why do I have to spread it out and be like, it's not my money. Who cares if everyone knows I'm filthy rich? I'm Vladimir Putin. What are you going to freaking do about it? Why bother?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
Why not stop pilfering when you have more money than you can spend in your entire life? Why continue to loot the state if you don't need it at all?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
Okay, if it keeps you in power and it has this sort of survival purpose, right? If he stops pilfering at a billion, but then an oligarch has 10 billion, people might say, why don't we just follow that guy? Look at how well he's doing compared to Putin. We should put that guy in charge. He clearly knows more about what he's doing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
I guess if you pilfer 100 billion, you can spread it out as you need it. So if somebody like the military says, look, that other guy has more money, he's offering us something, you can say, well, I can top that because I have more resources. So I suppose there is a survival element there too.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
Yeah, this would make a dictatorship less stable, right? If you can only lose 50 families, if somebody loses 50 votes, even in a swing state, you're not going to notice that. It's never going to come down to that. If you lose 50 families, 50 votes in your group of 200, you're getting replaced by somebody else suddenly or whatever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
He had all female bodyguards that ride on horses. He seemed legitimately mentally ill, talks for hours at the U.N. about nothing slash himself, was a terrorist domestically, a terrorist abroad, seemingly just didn't even realize how much his own people hate him. And then you got Kim Jong-un and Kim Jong-il, who bought like a million dollars a year in Hennessy. Crazy North Korea stuff.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
That's got to keep you up at night if you're Kim Jong-un or a dictator anywhere. You mentioned before that a tyrant needs somebody strong and cunning enough to protect them when they're no longer in power. But someone that's smart like that maybe doesn't want to play second fiddle.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
Maybe they want to seize assets and resources, which I guess explains why a lot of these guys say they just give it to their kids. Because maybe your son won't have you murdered in a brutal way because he's your son. You know, maybe.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
We've done entire episodes on this. You can search the site for it. And then Turkmenistan, which we'll get to later. The dude renames the months after himself, and his mother tells all the women to rip their gold teeth out, builds an ice palace in the desert. Why are all these guys seemingly just totally off their rocker, out of their tree, and yet they're in charge of an entire country?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
I'm sure some people are thinking as I was, okay, dictators are on this treadmill. These guys must see the writing on the wall at some point. Why don't they turn the country into a democracy? Hey, look, all right, I've lived a great life. My kids all have a billion dollars and they live in London.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
Our mission is to help you become a better informed, more critical thinker through long-form conversations with a variety of amazing folks, from spies to CEOs, athletes to authors, thinkers to performers, even the occasional Russian chess grandmaster, music mogul, tech luminary, or real-life pirate. And if you're new to the show or you want to tell your friends about the show,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
What's going to happen now is I'm going to retire and you're going to vote on who's next and I've picked the following five people who aren't going to murder everyone.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
Yeah, you're really holding the wolf by the ears, as I think Abraham Lincoln said about slavery, right? How do you let it go at that point? So many people want you dead. There's other people that are near you that are thinking... No, thanks. I'm making a billion dollars every year from you being around or somebody like you being around. I don't really feel like dealing with that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
I don't feel like getting my assets expropriated because there's a democracy now. It's impossible. You almost have no choice. I'm not saying I feel bad for these guys because they made their bed and they're living a crazy, opulent life, but I wouldn't want to be any one of these guys. I'll tell you that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
How does this happen?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
That was what Ceausescu's major issue was. Him and his wife were in charge of communist Romania, I guess you would say, during the Soviet times. Didn't he just not make a backup plan? Him and his wife got shot against a wall. It was pretty unceremonious, I think. It was just kind of like, all right, you guys are guilty. Trial's going to take a few hours. Line them up.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
You're right about these people having really nowhere to go. I guess you wouldn't necessarily want... let's say, a Ceausescu or a Kim Jong-un in a democracy in the United States, for example, we got human rights groups, we got voters who are like, I don't think so. We are not harboring these bastards in Miami. We got enough bastards in Miami. We're not doing this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
In other autocracies, it seems like, okay, why don't you just flee to, if you're Assad, why don't you just flee to Russia like you did? But maybe if you're not Assad, if you're not Kim Jong-un, or even if you are Kim Jong-un, I don't know how his standing is with Putin, Maybe you just don't need to give this guy safe passage.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
Or maybe other people who take over after you have a little bit more clout with Russia. And it's like, hey, if you give us back the old guy so he can tell us where all the gold is buried and all the others, we'll give you, I don't know, a bunch of weapons systems. And it's like, hope you enjoyed your weekend in Moscow, but we're sending you back home, pal. That's not so safe either.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
I was hoping we would get a Gaddafi out of that situation. I wanted to see that dude strung up in Damascus swinging from a lamppost with a bunch of, I don't know, daggers in him or something. I know it's a gross visual and I sound like a psychopath, but this is a bad guy, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
Right, at all costs, yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
Is that like a famous German expression?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
Ah, okay. I don't have to bank that. It happens a lot in life. Yeah, it sure does. Yeah, I'm going to bank that next time my family asks me to go on a vacation. All right, give us an example of this. I know Assad, he flew to Russia. We don't really know the ins and outs of that. But Ferdinand Marcos, for example, the United States took this bastard in.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
His official salary is, what, $13,000 a year, and he stole $10 billion-plus from the Philippines.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
and when i hear that we're harboring this guy i just get angry it's so un-american somehow yet is maybe it's the lesser of two evils that we let this guy out without him i don't know blasting half of the philippines or shelling his own people with the navy i don't know yes but when you look at marcos who was the dictator of the philippines during the cold war
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
Is it his son is running again for election in the Philippines? One of my flatmates from law school, he is a government official in the Philippines. I talk to him occasionally and he's like, can't believe this guy's kid is running and that people actually support him. You'd think everyone would go, boo, don't even think about putting your name on that ballot. But he has a chunk of support.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
And it's just like, how on earth does it happen? The answer, by the way, is Facebook. That's how it happens. Crazy social media propaganda. But you would think somebody who killed all those people and stole all that money, their kid would never have a chance. And yet here we are.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
Isn't that convenient? Yeah. Please don't remember all of the terrible things both of my parents are mostly known for in this country. Think about all of the terrible things that I might do once I'm in charge. Jeez. How would we get rid of someone like Kim Jong-un, though, for example?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
Do we have to have Russia or China give them the Assad treatment where they roll out the red carpet and let them live out their days there? Is that kind of the trade we might get?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
You mentioned one man. I wonder, has there ever been a female dictator? Surely in history there's been one or two, but there's none right now currently, correct?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
Yeah, people always blame the United States for this, and rightfully so, because we've tried regime change in several places, and it's probably never worked well in the long run or in the short run. I mean, us, right? The Germans. Yeah. Are you kind of the only example of that actually working out?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
Nobody thinks you're a Nazi for saying that German economy was functioning. Yeah, don't worry. You see what I mean, right? I do.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
I see. That is interesting. The only reason we invaded Germany is because Hitler kind of forced everybody's hand at that point. It wasn't like, let's just do this. I need to distract from getting a BJ from an intern. This was like a serious... global conflict. By the way, I know people are going to email me about this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
You say that at the end of World War II, the regime change was Germany became a democracy, asterisk, because East Germany was famously not a democratic state. But we're talking about West Germany and then eventually after reunification, Germany and then Japan. Was that immediately a democracy after Hirohito abdicated? I don't know how that worked.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
So this is Operation Paperclip, right, where we took all the Nazi rocket scientists and we said, hey, stop with all the Jew stuff, but come live in Florida and launch rockets.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
It was the bath party, right, that we just said, hey, none of these people can work. And it's like, cool, but you do know who runs the water treatment plant, right? And it's everybody who works there is a member of this. Hopefully the guys who work there that weren't part of that can figure it out. And spoiler alert, they did not do a good job of that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
Tell me about the International Criminal Court. You say in the book that it actually helps or I should say makes dictators want to stay in power. Why is that the case? What's going on there?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
Yeah, you might have to go to The Hague or worse, you got to live in Essex. No! Yeah. So the court actually makes it harder for them to retire because they're going to get pursued by the ICC.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
So there's no winning here, really. I promised we'd talk about Turkmenistan, so before I lose that thread again, let's do this. This place is so kooky. The people are poor, the country is rich, but the leader is just a bizarro guy. I don't know if he's still the head honcho in charge, but didn't he make everyone learn everything from his memoirs?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
And he said something like, women don't look good with gold teeth, so they all pulled out their gold teeth. And he renames the days of the week and the months. And this is just like absolutely bonkers 1984, but like Saturday Night Live version of 1984. It's just ridiculous.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
There's even more goofy crap about... Everyone's car had to be white, I think. You had to get it washed before you drove into the main city so that there were no dirty cars. There's all this weird stuff like this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
Yeah, the way they look at North Korea, the only insight we have is like, is this person in photos a lot now? And if they are in state photos a lot now, there's a reason for that. It's not just because that person happened to be around. And so you see Kim Jong-un's daughter, who I think is like nine or ten. And then you see one of his sisters around a lot. So it's like maybe she's the next one.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
But he was completely alone. The dude has brain worms or something. That's really bizarre.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
It is that important that you support those who support the show. Now, back to Marcel Durzis. Shifting back briefly to Turkmenistan, this country is super rich, but the people are very poor. I think they have something like 10% of the world's natural gas. Maybe there's some other resources there. Maybe I'm just wrong. Maybe this is just selection bias.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
Why does it seem like most dictatorships sit on top of some sort of vast natural resources?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
We don't know. Is that kind of the rule here?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
I guess it's also easier to drill holes in the ground or have other countries come in that can do this already and drill for oil than it is to say, I don't know, building a thriving startup tech industry that leverages AI or whatever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
You're not going to do that if you can just start ripping things out of the ground using forced slave labor in the case of diamond mining or coal tan mining and things like that. It makes sense. You mentioned in the book that malignant narcissism is a common trait among dictators. No surprise there.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
Something fascinating you said, and I'm paraphrasing here, which is a certain amount of mental illness is healthy in a dictator, but there's a limit. You also mentioned this crazy guy from Equatorial Guinea. Where's the healthy crazy person? Can we get an example of that and tell us where the line is?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
It seems like you need a strong one to protect your country from outside threats or internal threats or whatever. But if I'm running a military for a dictator and I'm the general, why do I need the dictator? Why don't I just run the place?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
Yeah, that was confusing for a lot of us, I think, when we saw Wagner, who Prigozhin was in charge of, this military group in Ukraine. And then suddenly he's saying that one of the heads of the military in Russia, he's saying, hey, you're not giving me enough ammunition and your guys are incompetent.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
What a strange setup that has to be, not knowing who's going to be in charge next. And I know one of the reasons Kim Jong-un was in charge is his older brother, Kim Jong-nam, who he murdered. But before that, didn't he get busted going to Disneyland or something in Japan? And it was embarrassing. So they were like, ah, this guy's not going to be the leader of the country. It's too weird.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
And it's just so bizarre for us over here in the West to see this mercenary group publicly involved. throwing shade and dragging the head of the military in Russia. And what's going on here is Putin set up multiple chess pieces to bash against each other so that they didn't turn on him.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
And in this case, the fighting just got a little out of hand and Prigozhin had a mechanical failure of his airplane when he was leaving Moscow and died. And now I think Wagner is severely weakened, although from what I understand, they're operating in Africa, yada, yada. So generals do decide sometimes they want to be in charge.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
The problem is there's different generals and they're in different military. Isn't this also what happened with Sudan? Wasn't one of the original belligerents that's now fighting against the government, weren't they also started by the government as a counterbalance to the actual military?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
It's funny to hear you say Angela Merkel. Even Americans, I think, say Angela. You have to do that in media, I guess. Say it wrong.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
That is weird. That is unusual. In the East, they definitely say Volkswagen. Yeah, I've never heard him say Volkswagen when I lived over there. That's very weird to hear coming out of a German. You mentioned coup-proofing and picking different leaders, different militaries, creating a Republican Guard, for example. You also, in the book, you mentioned something called ethnic stacking.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
Tell us about this, because this is what Assad did, right? He put his minority in charge of everything?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
I suggest our episode starter packs. These are collections of our favorite episodes on topics like persuasion and negotiation, psychology and geopolitics, disinformation, China, North Korea, crime and cults, and more. That'll help new listeners get a taste of everything we do here on the show. Just visit jordanharbinger.com slash start or search for us in your Spotify app to get started.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
Yeah, I know he gassed the Kurds and just killed all these men, women and children in villages that were Kurdish. Yeah, that's an interesting, totally psycho strategy. Make people do horrific things that at best case scenario is they get killed for doing it. Worst case scenario, they're tortured to death or whatever publicly after the regime falls. So you really just have to go to bat for Saddam.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
It seems like by focusing on all these internal threats, dictators almost have to mismanage the military and their defense against external threats. So I'm going to guess that dictatorships are not as powerful against external threats just because of the mess they have to create in order to stay in power.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
I take it it's really bad for a dictator if they lose a war. I keep hearing about how Putin is going to have a bad time if it looks like he lost in Ukraine. And surely it has to start seeming that way right now, given how long this is taking and how many Russian boys are coming back and boxes are just not coming back at all. Is that the case with dictators?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
With any politician, they have to win, but dictators can die if they don't.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
How do we topple tyrants or empower their people? And should we even be doing this? Because sometimes it just makes things worse. Look, I'm going to catch flack for this either way. Assad was objectively a horrible human being. And like I said, I wanted to see him strung up in Damascus full of holes. But also stable, psychopathic asshole is better than... ISIS, for example.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
We'll get into why that's the case in a little bit. Let's back up and talk more about Gaddafi because the guy's so weird. Tell me about the golden gun paradox. Ironically, wasn't he killed with his own gold-plated gun?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
I'm not saying the current regime is ISIS, but that's what could have happened, right? We could have ended up with a giant country full of Islamic terrorists, and we still might. We don't know. So uncertainty is generally bad. Should we be empowering people to topple tyrants? How do we enable them to do that? Can we even do that?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
I am actually helping run a workshop for independent journalists. I can't say where, but it's funny. That's one of the things I'm doing this month with the idea that they're going to then use their skills to chip away at the dictators in the countries where they're from.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
What do you think of Lukashenko in Belarus? This guy has just barely kept power by the skin of his teeth. It seems like Putin doesn't even necessarily like the guy. He just tolerates him because he doesn't want to lose another ally. But man, did he almost have a moment a couple of years ago when 100,000 plus people were out in the streets of Minsk. I thought that was the end for him. I did.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
Welcome to the show. I'm Jordan Harbinger. On The Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the stories, secrets, and skills of the world's most fascinating people and turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
I've got friends in Belarus, and I pay attention to some of the English subreddits and things like that. And people are just not up for protesting anymore. Tikhanovskaya, Svetlana Tikhanovskaya of the opposition, she's exiled right now, I think, in Lithuania. And she's like, go into the streets. And people in the subreddit are like, why? So I can get bayoneted to death by the police?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
No, our moment has passed. It's not worth it. A lot of the leaders are dead or in prison of the opposition. There's nobody who's going to really go out there and do this again because they know that Putin, since he can't afford to lose an ally, is going to send those like special police over there again on a couple of buses and they're going to shoot and kill people.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
It's like it's just not worth it. Even the KGB, the Belarus still has the KGB. They're killing people allegedly in Kiev. They killed that opposition leader. They hung him up from a tree in a park, made it look like a suicide when he was out for a jog. So this is a guy who's not going anywhere. But then again, that's what I thought about Assad. And two weeks later, He's gone.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
Do you think any Western leaders exhibit any characteristics that are often associated with tyrannical leadership? And if so, who and what?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
No. This is a really good episode, man. Marcel Derzes, thank you very much. Thank you very much for having me. You're about to hear a preview of The Jordan Harbinger Show with Yasmin Mohamed, who grew up under the tyranny of radical Islam.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
For more about Yasmin's harrowing story and her escape, check out episode 748 of The Jordan Harbinger Show. I realized when I was talking about Lukashenko, the dictator over in Belarus, I didn't really explain what was going on with him. So in 2021, there was a huge series of mass political demonstrations and protests against the Belarusian government and President Alexander Lukashenko.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
And what he did was he had Russian police, special police, riot police come in and kill a bunch of people and beat people up and throw them in vans and throw them in jail and torture them in jail. His own regime probably did the jail torturing part, but it's hard to say.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
And so this is the way that he kept control because he probably had an inkling that his own troops were not going to fire on his own people. But he can always call Putin for that kind of backing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
So I'm not sure we're going to see change in Belarus until we see his patron, Saint Vladimir Putin, not need him anymore, which is unlikely, or not have the power to protect him anymore, which is probably what's going to happen. But who knows how long that's going to take. Something from the book that we didn't discuss, The Dictator's Dilemma.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
Dictators create a climate of fear, which keeps people silent, which means they never know what people really think, even their closest advisors, thus their ability to make decisions degrades considerably, and they also never know who is loyal. So this is kind of one reason that they go nuts and they're so paranoid and they have to kill people because there's never anybody keeping them in check.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
Yeah. Couldn't happen to a nicer guy. I really have no sympathy for him at all. Although maybe I'm the weirdo in this case.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
But it's also the reason they make so many bad decisions because they can't get good information from anyone. Everyone's just thinking short term. How do I survive this next interaction or the next few months or years or whatever with the dictator? They're not thinking about how they can do the best thing for the country. They're just trying to survive.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
One of the reasons it's so hard to overthrow dictators is that winning a civil war, for example, overthrowing a dictator, that's a lot harder than simply not losing. And that's what a dictator has to do. Assad basically, for example, just has to hold out. He failed at that, of course, but he doesn't have to win. So that's why he was able to hold on for so long.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
All he had to do was barrel bomb hospitals and people at zero real cost to him and just survive and outlive the rebels. That's really all he had to do. And that worked for a while until he lost his Iranian backing. And then everything came tumbling down. We discussed this towards the end of the show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
Tyrants, they are terrible, but getting rid of them, it doesn't mean that democracy is forthcoming. Only 20% of dictators in the past century were followed by a democratic regime once they lost power. So most, of course, were followed by what? Another dictator? Maybe just a big old civil war? So it's not all roses once you get rid of a dictator.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
It's kind of step one, and what comes after that might be really, really bad. So as bad as these people are, and I wouldn't want to live under one or even next to one for that matter, it's often better than the alternative, unfortunately. All things Marcel Derzis will be in the show notes on the website.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
Advertisers, deals, discount codes, ways to support the show are all at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. Please consider supporting those who support the show. Also, I'd love to hear what you think of our newsletter, We Bit Wiser. The idea is to give you something specific and practical that'll have an immediate impact on your decisions and your psychology and your relationships.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
In under two minutes every week, we throw these out on Wednesdays. And if you haven't signed up yet... I invite you to come check it out. It really is a great companion to the show. JordanHarbinger.com slash news is where you can find it. Don't forget about Six Minute Networking as well over at SixMinuteNetworking.com. I'm at Jordan Harbinger on Twitter and Instagram.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
You can also connect with me on LinkedIn. And the show is created in association with Podcast One. My team is Jen Harbinger, Jace Sanderson, Robert Fogarty, Ian Baird, and Gabriel Mizrahi. Remember, we rise by lifting others. The The fee for the show is you share it with friends when you find something useful or interesting.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
The greatest compliment you can give us is to share the show with those you care about. So if you know somebody who's interested in dictators, geopolitics, kooky leaders, definitely share this episode with them. In the meantime, I hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn. And we'll see you next time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
Yeah, that's interesting. And it should, right? It should be like, oh, he didn't get flown to Russia and live out his days in Moscow like Assad. He ended up getting a bayonet or whatever up his keister. I got to like mental note, avoid this. And didn't they display his mangled body in a shopping mall or something like that? Is it weird that I wished I'd seen that? That's weird. I'll admit that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
So most dictators, you say, end up dead or in exile. And you contrast that with Democratic leaders who end up golfing or whatever. I choose exile over golf if that's an option. But how come these guys can't just retire?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
Today we're talking with Dr. Marcel Derzis. We are diving deep into dictators. Who are these guys? Why are they always so crazy? How do they stay in power? What kind of crazy dictators are out there right now? There's so many weird quirks these guys have. They rename them months after themselves. They kill a bunch of their own people. Okay, that's not a quirk.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
Yeah, that's tricky. You mentioned transparency. Democracies are relatively transparent, as you said before. Dictatorships, not really. I guess what you're talking about here is in dictatorships, journalists vanish. There's no real opposition. Like North Korea, I doubt there's some sort of like pro-America party in the parliament, right? There's no real opposition.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
He always gets reelected with like 99% of the vote. And I can't even imagine that there's actually anybody who votes against him. It's probably just like, oh, someone abstained because we have to make it look like it's not 100%. percent, whatever. I mean, it's just a farce.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
And you mentioned in the book that the bodyguard may have more power than the prime minister of a dictatorship because he's the one who's driving around with the dictator all day. And they're kind of maybe best friends, if you can call it that. So that's insane, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
Some guy who's just like an ex-special forces dude who's around him 24-7 has more power than the person who's supposedly also running the country with him. And part of the reason these guys seem to go nuts, right, has to be that they're surrounded by yes men versus actual critical thinkers. You don't want to tell Kim Jong-un, hey, man, this looks like a really bad idea.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
I think you're going to regret this. You're just going to go, oh, yeah, love the idea of launching a missile at Japan today. And then you turn around to your guys and you're like, how do we stop him from doing this?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
That's, you know, sort of a different thing. They ban haircuts. They kill people with anti-aircraft cannons. They ban hot dogs. A lot of that stuff might not even be true. Who knows what is in the mind of a dictator? But it's not just their crazy. It's their violence. It's their evil, really, that keeps them at the top of the game. But it's a precarious position to be in.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
It sort of boggles the mind a little bit. You see a guy like Putin, who is reportedly not very smart, but let's admit it, he's smart enough to run Russia. He was smart enough to get to the top. Yes, he's probably surrounded by yes-men, but the dude can read the Wall Street Journal and figure out, oh, this Ukraine thing is not going well.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
At some point, these guys have to also realize, huh, I did kill the last few people that told me something I didn't like. Maybe I'm getting bad information, but it just doesn't seem to occur to them, or are they just stuck and they can't get off that treadmill, like you said?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
Yeah, Siloviki. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
You're right. 30 years in the KGB probably trains you to just be uber paranoid. Whereas like the oligarchs since the 90s Russia, they were like, how do we just make a ton of money and then get it out to the Cayman Islands, which is also not good for people, which set up the whole sort of stage for Putin to take power in the first place. Okay. Dictators are on the hamster wheel or the treadmill.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
We're going to talk about how dictators fall today on this episode. And here we go with Dr. Marcel Durzis. Let's talk about dictators, shall we? Sure. First of all, thank you for joining me. I appreciate your forthcoming expertise here. Yeah, thank you very much for having me. I've always been fascinated by dictators.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
They can't step off safely. They have to keep running. If it's so bad on the wheel, why do you get on there in the first place? You just want a bunch of money? Is that it? I think there's a bunch of advantages, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
So a lot of it is really attractive. Can you explain in brief, of course, how do dictators pilfer things? Because if you're Putin, you're not the one counting stacks of money or messing around with bank wires at whatever their equivalent of the Federal Reserve is. They've, what, got a crony in charge who's like, oh, we have a $200 million tax deposit from Gazprom.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
We should put that in this account. And it's like, actually, why don't you deposit it in these eight accounts? A bunch of them are my kids, a bunch of them are my friends, one of them is yours. And they're like, okay. And then everyone just goes along with that because they don't want to get thrown into jail or get killed.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1103: Marcel Dirsus | How Tyrants Fall and Nations Survive
Yeah, that's interesting. I hadn't thought about that. Hey, check one of your Swiss bank accounts, or I made this Swiss bank account for you, and look, it's got $300 million in it. Thanks for letting me drill in Siberia. I suppose there's something to that. And now a word from our sponsors. Better than being torn to shreds by a mob of your own people. We'll be right back.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Yeah, and he said you're funny as hell.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
That's the genesis. That's why I'm famous. Yeah. It makes you think, really, like, how many people have come just close and then were too nervous or, like, couldn't handle the pressure or self-sabotage?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Just visit jordanharbinger.com slash start or search for us in your Spotify app to get started. Today on the show, the one and only Drew Carey, comedy legend, host of The Price is Right. This episode is really full of funny stories from a long career in Hollywood and comedy, plenty of laughter, and of course, inside baseball on one of the most popular game shows of all time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Yeah, yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Yeah, UTA.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Dick move. With new comics. You mentioned in your book that it's important to talk to the audience like they're drinking buddies. I think that's such an interesting way to look at, because you're not out there like, I'm going to entertain everyone. You're just thinking, I'm going to tell some funny stories that happened to me. A little bit of a different mindset.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
I wondered, and of course asked him if anybody had ever cheated on The Price is Right or tried to, some hard times in his career, and his love for raves and partying, which I did not see coming at all. Of course, I wanted to hear about the downsides, how he handled rejection, setbacks, and a I feel compelled to say, Drew Carey, come on down. You look good for, are you 66? Wow. I'll be 67 in May.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
I thought you were trapped in the car. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
We're going to get to the clip.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Wow.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
That's true.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
I noticed that you do have really good rapport with the people on The Price is Right, the contestants. And it seems very natural. Is it something you think about or had to think about consciously? Or is it just from comedy, you kind of already had it in the bag? Both.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Like a Bill Burr situation?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Congratulations for living this long, I guess. Less and less like Dilbert every year. Thanks. You went to Kent State, yeah?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Oh, God.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Oh, no, he did.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Yeah, it's like a comics comic. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Yeah. The networks are probably like, yeah, just make sure he doesn't say, oh, wait a minute.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Yikes. Yeah, no.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
I bet they love you now, though. Like, oh, that Drew Carey is one of ours, kind of.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
That was his attitude. You've said as comedians make more money, they get less funny, and you've got to guard against that. Why is that? I learned this from Steve Martin.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Okay.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Now follow it up with another one.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Yeah. That's what everybody does at work, I think.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
They get the business angle of things. They're selling shirts with Drew Carey, went to Kent State on the front in the gift shop. They should. Leave money on the table. Damn it. You kept that Marine Corps haircut for a long time in your career, or the pseudo-Marine Corps.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
I see. So when you're richer, you're just insulated from more and more of this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Oh, yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
So the key is the more successful you get, live it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
And now take your fat, drunk ass to the Gap and or Disneyland. We'll be right back. Thank you. In episode six, a CEO steps on stage to unveil a breakthrough AI-powered finance app. Everything unravels in front of a live audience. Wrong slides, glitch teleprompter, was it a man-in-the-middle attack, a targeted exploit, or something worse?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
In a world where AI is accelerating everything, including cybercrime, these dramatized stories show you what's possible, how these attacks unfold, and most importantly... what you can do to protect yourself, your team, and your data. Because today's cyber threats are not just a tech problem, they're a business problem, and no one is immune.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Subscribe to the Cybersecurity Tapes wherever you get your podcasts and hear how it all goes down when security fails in real time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
episode is also sponsored by simply safe a few months ago our house was broken into at night while we were home i was in one room lights off jen was in the other room reading bedtime stories to the kids then out of nowhere boom three masked guys kicked in the glass door they must have been watching the house they saw our nanny's car leave kind of late they noticed the lights were off and figured we were an easy target our simply safe sirens went off the whole house lit up they took off no one got hurt thankfully but it was a wake-up call to beef up the security around here
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
We've had SimpliSafe for a while now. Jen set it up herself in an afternoon. Cameras, door sensors, glass break sensors, 24-7 monitoring, all connected to our phones. So whether I'm at the store or in Asia with the whole family, I know what's going on at home. There's no long-term contract. Plans start at around a dollar a day. More than 4 million people already trust and use it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
They were also just ranked number one in customer service by Newsweek and USA Today. After the break-in, our whole neighborhood banded together. We got a watch group now, an official sign. There's a sign. You know, we mean business. And a local officer came out to speak. One of the first things he said, get a home security system. It's one of the simplest things you can do.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
If you're wondering how I managed to book all these great folks every single week, it is because of my network, the circle of people I know, like, and trust. I'm teaching you how to build your network for free over at 6minutenetworking.com. The course is all about improving your relationship building skills. A lot of people who are trying to make it in comedy, I realize, are using this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Make it in any industry, frankly, because it's about relationships. And this course is down to earth, not awkward, not cheesy, just practical exercises that'll make you a better connector, a better colleague, a better friend. In six minutes a day is all it takes. And many of the guests on the show subscribe and contribute to this course. Come on and join us.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
You'll be in smart company where you belong. You can find the course again. It's free. There's no weird tricks. I don't want your credit card number or anything. Sixminutenetworking.com. All right. Now back to Drew Carey. You do see when really popular comedians lose touch and they lose the plot a little bit. And people really hate that. Even more than an unfunny set.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Oh, he went a little too far with the trans stuff. It's like the worst thing a comic can do is just appear out of touch. It's like career suicide in some ways.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
I guess being from Detroit, it was like, oh, we're playing Green Bay. You think everybody knows. I was the only kid who didn't really care about any of that stuff. I was an outcast for that reason. You weren't the only kid.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Oh, I see. Yeah, so you're on K-Rock or whatever. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
What was your competing show at the time? Do you remember? Like what was on at the same time? Oh, for a while it was West Wing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
It's at 8 p.m. I would be like, hey, any chance we can move to 7.30 before people tune into West Wing, for God's sake? You're killing me here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
I could buy my own jet. I wouldn't need Disney.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Oh, Timu. That's one of those Chinese, like, it's only $3. Yeah. And then you click on it. It's like everything. They just knock off products, sell you the crappiest version. But I clicked on it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Don't buy anything from Timu. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Yeah. No, that stuff's made by, like, child slave labor. I want my children who manufacture things to be compensated fairly. Yeah. So The Price is Right, which aired the 10,000th episode on my birthday. Thanks for doing that. I appreciate that. It was just for you. Yeah, I know. That was the pitch for bringing you on. When the Drew Carey show ended, did you have any sort of identity crisis at all?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Because this is aimed after you, for God's sake. Huge. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Tell me about that. Rug pull, you know. Because you're losing a part of yourself when the thing ends.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Oh, that's not going to happen in the comments of this episode at all then. Yeah. Well, I don't care anymore. Okay, good.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Well, yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
I just walked out of the bathroom. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
And you and I are contractually prohibited from doing drugs, so we don't do drugs. When I go to EDC, I'm sad when the night's over.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
I love that you love EDC. Love it. Electronic Daisy Carnival. Electric Daisy Carnival, yeah. It's basically a rave. It's a rave. Exactly what it is. Yeah. In the middle of the desert, on a racetrack in the middle of Vegas.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Do you have to be careful about things you do in public? You can't go to EDC and go, you know what? I'm going to do Molly with my friends. Let's say you don't do drugs. All right, I'm going to drink. But then it's like, you can't just be like stumbling drunk because someone could video that. And it's not a good look for Drew Carey. I have been. It's happened, I'm sure.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Four days?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
I see.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
That's a lot of drinks.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
This is also before smartphones.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Oh, wow.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Oh, my God.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
What's in there?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Oh, you do? That's what you put on the t-shirts for the Price is Right.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
This episode of The Jordan Harbinger Show has some explicit language, so if you're offended by that, well, skip to the next one. And mom, it wasn't me. It was the guest. Coming up next on The Jordan Harbinger Show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Yeah, you're not pretending to be like a religious influence or something like that. Never do such a thing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
That's crazy. I didn't realize it was that significant.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
That was the joke. It's funny because I have a morality clause in my contract. It's like a whole page. Everybody does. And my lawyer's like, we got to argue this. You might want to read that. It might be in the fine print. And my lawyer's like, we gotta argue this because this can be construed in so many different ways.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
And you're in this weird position where you have to be like, I would never do that. Except there are these things that I do do that I wouldn't necessarily say in public. And that's going to fall under this thing if somebody doesn't like you. I'm always never hurting anybody. Yeah. Just having fun. No, of course. But there's things where these things can be construed so loosely.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
But if I say, oh, yeah, you know, weed should be legal federally because one time I mailed weed to my friend. I didn't realize it was a felony. And then it's, oh, you admitted to that on a podcast. And since we're trying to get rid of you because you did some other thing, we're going to use this as an excuse to get rid of you. Now, if you're crushing it, you got that eight share or whatever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Then they're like, he's joking.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
No. It'll be like, oh, he's a comedian. It's just a joke. Right, Howard? And he goes, no, I really did that. And they're like, shh.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
No.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
I wonder if it's because they think, oh, we don't want you to be boring or talk about something somebody else already talked about. What's the point?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Who could afford to fill up the, yeah, I wonder what the price equivalent was.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
I see.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Thank God.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Tell us what you really think. The good news is I'll be here next week. I don't know about you. Puffing a cigar, just not a care in the world.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Yeah. Time with my kids now, especially.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
That's my workout in the gym. I don't want to take a phone call when I'm in there.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Oh, yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Yeah. It was two bucks worth, five bucks worth. You mentioned that you used to eat macaroni and cheese, but you just put water in it. That's all I could afford. That's crazy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Yeah. And he's that Drew Carey.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
I've heard this before somewhere. That's so funny. Drew and I are going to take a quick break from laughing at our own jokes. We'll be right back. This episode is sponsored in part by Oura Ring. I've been rocking the Oura Ring since Gen 1, back when people would go, what is that weird thing on your finger?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Now we're on Gen 4, just looks like a regular ring now, and I've got to say, it just keeps getting better. Sleeker, more comfortable, smarter. I wear mine 24-7 without even thinking about it. What sets it apart is it's the best sleep tracker out there, period. Much more accurate than the watches. Thank you so much for having me. My brother-in-law wears one. Yeah, we compare scores.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
I know it's nerdy. I don't care. It's made us all more aware of how we are treating our bodies and how much better we feel when we're getting real rest. So if you're ready to optimize the one thing that affects everything else, give Aura the finger. Learn more at auraring.com slash Jordan. That's O-U-R-A ring.com slash Jordan. This episode is sponsored in part by Airbnb.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
I gotta give a shout out to Brian McDonald, who listened to the show and absolutely hooked me up in Vietnam recently. Brian runs A Taste of Hanoi, and I had this layover in Hanoi, and he's like, I got you, set me up with one of his guides for a motorbike food tour in Hanoi, which was awesome. Now, if you've never been in the back of a motorbike in Vietnam, it's something, man.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
You're weaving through scooters and traffic like a video game where you can actually die, and then all of a sudden, we're inside someone's house, literally inside. We rode the motorbike. I'll tell you, the guide pulls you to what looks like an alley, okay?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
but it turns into a hallway and then he turns around, grins and goes, okay, put your hands on my shoulders, duck your head down, pull your knees all the way in. The next thing I know, we're riding through someone's living room, not even kidding, like actually someone's living room to get to this little courtyard kitchen where this auntie is making pho that'll just ruin your life.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
No pho will ever taste as good. And Vietnamese egg coffee upstairs on the balcony. I don't even know how to describe it. It's like tiramisu and espresso had a beautiful caffeinated baby. Short trip, chaotic, absolutely incredible. And I can't wait to go back and bring Jen next time because I know she's going to love it. And next time, we'll put our place on Airbnb to help fund the adventure.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
You can too. Airbnb makes it super practical. It doesn't take a lot of effort. You set it up before you leave, and then boom, your house is earning money while you're on vacation and making memories. Your home might be worth more than you think. Find out how much at Airbnb.com slash host. This episode is sponsored in part by Audible.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
People always ask me how I manage to get through so much content, especially since I prep for every interview. I'm talking two to three books a week, and it's all thanks to Audible. I've got Audible in my ears while I'm getting my 10,000 steps in, running errands, even doing stuff around the house. I don't mess with physical books anymore at all. Audible's just way more efficient.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
I listen on two or even 3x speed, which lets me cover a lot of ground without sacrificing quality. Right now, I'm listening to Good Inside by Dr. Becky Kennedy. She's got this really down-to-earth way of talking about parenting that is not preachy. And here's what a lot of people don't realize. Audible is not just audiobooks anymore.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
You get access to thousands of titles with your membership, podcasts, Audible Originals, and cool stuff like their Words in Music series where artists tell their stories in their own words. The variety makes the membership way more valuable, so you never run out of great stuff to check out. One day I'm deep in a parenting guide, the next it's a podcast or a spy thriller.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
So whether you're into suspense, self-development, or you just want to make traffic suck less, Audible's got you covered.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
If you like this episode of the show, I invite you to do what other smart and considerate listeners do, which is take a moment and support our amazing sponsors, those who make the show possible. All of the deals, discount codes and ways to support the show are searchable and clickable on the website at jordanharbinger.com slash deals.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
You got to choose one. You got to pick one. I think the butter does it better than the milk.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
If you can't remember the name of a sponsor, you can't find the code, you're not sure if it even exists, email us. I'm jordan at jordanharbinger.com. We are happy to surface codes for you because it is that important that you support those who support the show. Now for the rest of my conversation with Drew Carey.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Why jump into hosting The Price is Right after a successful TV run on The Drew Carey Show? Howie Mandel was on the show a zillion years ago, and he said when he was looking at deal or no deal, he told his wife, he goes, is this going to be good for my career? And she said, what career? So he was like, well, I guess that answers that question. Wife will always tell you, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
It's been a long time since Bobby's World, Howie.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
When you made it, did you get those shells with the Velveeta that you could squeeze out of the foil bag?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Oh, okay.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
So tired. Working on TV. Let me walk backstage and get a steak cooked just the way I like it. And a peanut butter cookie that they bought just for me because they know I like these. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Be in a good mood, yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
That's my only job. This show has lasted 50 years with 10,000 episodes, which is what, 5,000 hours of middle-aged women screaming? And even the crew seems to be having a good time. Is that real?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Talk shows where you're not allowed to, I won't mention the name, don't look her in the eyes. Stuff like that. She'll go psycho on you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
People are so excited to be there, too. That's got to be fun. They all run up. They hug you. I saw you get taken to the ground, actually, at least once by one gal in a clip. Doesn't bother me. And is it true someone kicked you in the nuts? I assume that was an accident. Yeah. She jumped up on me, and when her leg was coming up, she kicked me in the nuts. Nice.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
So do they run that, or is it like, okay, give him five minutes, let's retake him? I doubt it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Yeah, that makes sense. I don't see why you would necessarily.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Yeah, I can relate. I only listen to this occasionally to make sure that everything sounds right. But I also rely on my team and I go, hey, how did this bit come across? Or how did this little segment come across? And if my producers don't say anything, I'm not going to download the show and listen to it myself. I was already there. Yeah, I was there. It's not cringy or anything.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
It's just, I was there. I've heard it already, right? That's how I am. Unless the final production got screwed up, which that's not going to be on me 100%. There's nothing for me to say other than, what am I going to do? Chastise my producer for not cutting something? I'm not going to tell them how to do their job.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
So is there anything that annoys you on the prices, right, besides getting kicked in the nuts by a contestant? No. I always wonder, sometimes you look off camera, and I guess you don't know if you're looking off camera. I'm looking at Chris, the game guy. The announcer?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Doesn't matter. I was raised on that stuff, too. Oh, you want to eat when you come home?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
I see.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
I see.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
I see. Okay.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Okay.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Yeah, of course. Yeah. Once in a while, you don't get it. Right. And they're, or they're like, you've been randomly selected. I'm like, this seems to happen almost every other time I fly. What is it about me that looks scary?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
That's the moral of the story. How heavy is that wheel that you spin? It looks like it's got a weight.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Interesting. Yeah, so some guy's at home building one of those in his basement and trying to get the weight right. That's how people have beat roulette wheels. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
And they did it 10,000 times.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Oh yeah. It's been on the show. Oh, it's a friend of mine actually.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
He's a very interesting and cool guy. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
He was off by one. Still impressive somehow, yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
How does the producer or whoever pick who goes on the show? I know you pick someone and say, come on down, but then... It has to be... It's whoever shows up.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
All aspirational.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Are there any tips for people who want to get selected or is it just, hey, come in and be a delightful personality?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Oh, that's funny.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Pick him, it's his birthday, and that guy's like, yeah, it's my birthday. You want to turn it up to 11.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Yeah, can't beat it. Bob Barker, the previous host, for those who don't know, used to have this awkwardly long microphone that was like thin. And you have a very similar, it's an updated tech. Mine's wireless.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
They got a lavalier. Now they are. Oh, okay. Because, you know, it's something about entertaining a crowd while you're holding a microphone in your hand is different than... being mic'd up with booms on a stage.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
He doesn't care.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
What has been the craziest fan encounter on The Price is Right? Name a day. Oh, God, really? There's always something. There was a woman who, I think you'd said this in another show, she peed her pants. Peed her pants. But she'd already been picked.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Oh my gosh.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Speaking of not giving- Like, what are you going to do? Yeah. Jeez. Has anyone ever tried to cheat on The Price is Right? Surely there's been some attempt at something.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Yeah. I didn't bring my assistant on my road trip across the United States to go out of the car and get the gum for me. Yeah. That's funny. The Celebrity 7-Eleven had a huge line, so I decided to hop over to this one.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Cheater, yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Over and over again, yeah. I know the feeling.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
This is like a savant.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Interesting.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
You said something interesting that's almost as a throwaway line in the book. You don't celebrate your birthday because you'd sit around and think that you could have or should have made different choices in your life. Now that you've made some money, you've had some success, this process happens a little bit less. This is something you wrote in the 90s.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
What advice do you have for people who also ruminate? Because it seems like the message is that It ain't over till the fat lady sings, essentially, and you don't know the impact of your choices potentially until long after you've made them. Because a lot of the things that you beat yourself up for in this book in the 90s are probably the reason that you're so successful now. Right, yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Low carb.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Oh, you're so Ohio. I want to know what that is. You got Riz? What does so Ohio mean? That doesn't sound like a compliment. It's not. It's like you're so meh. Ugh, mid.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Yeah. I got to ask, who's your favorite DJ right now? If you're going to EDC and listening to all this stuff. Diplo, Cascade, Afrojack.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
That was Johnny Carson, 1991.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
So you must've been 50.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
So that's a pretty cool perk. You go in and they're like, oh, Drew Carey's here. Yeah, you want to go up, hang out on stage? Yeah, you're a national treasure at this point on The Price is Right. Thanks for coming on and being so open and candid, man. Oh, it was really fun talking to you. Anytime you want to be back, let me know. Yeah, of course.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Yeah, I'd hope I see you at some of those shows, EDC or something like that. It would be really fun to run into you in the wild. Coming up in May. Yeah, man. I'll be there. Thanks, man.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
If you're looking for another episode of the Jordan Harbinger Show to sink your teeth into, here's a trailer for another episode that I think you might enjoy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
For more with Howie Mandel, including some pretty awkward moments of my own making, check out episode 210 here on The Jordan Harbinger Show. All things Drew Carey will be in the show notes at jordanharbinger.com. Advertisers, deals, discount codes, ways to support the show, all at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. Please consider supporting those who support the show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Also, our newsletter, We Bit Wiser. You guys are fans of this. I love writing it. You love responding to it, and that makes me feel great about it. The idea is to give you something specific and practical, something that'll have an immediate impact on your decisions, on your psychology, on your relationships in under two minutes a week.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
And if you haven't signed up yet, I invite you to come check it out. It is a great companion to the show as voiced by you, the listeners and readers. JordanHarbinger.com slash news is where you can find it. Don't forget about Six Minute Networking as well over at SixMinuteNetworking.com. I'm at Jordan Harbinger on Twitter and Instagram. You can also connect with me on LinkedIn.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
This show is created in association with Podcast One. My team is Jen Harbinger, Jace Sanderson, Robert Fogarty, Ian Baird, Gabriel Mizrahi. Remember, we rise by lifting others. The fee for the show is you share it with friends when you find something useful or interesting. The greatest compliment you can give us is to share the show with those you care about.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
If you know somebody who's interested in showbiz, game shows, Drew Carey, comedy, you share this episode with them. You do that right now. In the meantime, I hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn, and we'll see you next time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Yeah, I'm the average weight of an American male at my age. Well, then you're fucked. Yeah. Exactly. Good luck. Yes. Yeah, on Larry King, RIP, typical Larry, he's like, how did you get to be so overweight? Just flat out. Gradually, then suddenly. Yes, exactly. But you described your diet, and I was like, wait, is this real? It was like, do you remember that at all?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Oh, wow.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Yeah. It's brown. It's healthier.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Saturday.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Welcome to the show. I'm Jordan Harbinger. On The Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the stories, secrets, and skills of the world's most fascinating people and turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Oh, yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
My friend Roseanne said they make you racist.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
You hear about people driving and they're like not remembering how they got somewhere and they were asleep.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Yeah, because you don't sell XXL shirts. Yeah, geez. It was crazy how I thought. Yeah, but the rationalization machine is powerful, man. Yeah. I watched your Johnny Carson appearance from 1991, and it was pretty good. It stands up really well. Yeah, it does. It stands up really well. And they did things differently back then, I think.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
You're kind of in this position where, come on out and entertain us right away. You don't walk in and be cool and just chat. It's perform, and don't blow it, or this is the last chance you'll ever have of making it big. No presh. Yeah. No pressure. That's exactly what it was like. Were you nervous back then? Do you remember?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Our mission is to help you become a better informed, more critical thinker through long-form conversations with a variety of amazing folks, from spies to CEOs, athletes, authors, thinkers, and performers, even the occasional organized crime figure, war correspondent, or neuroscientist.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
At the end.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Oh, yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Yeah, folding towels at Equinox.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Oh, yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Oh, yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Man.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1153: Drew Carey | The Price Is Right, But These Stories Are Priceless
Wow.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
Coming up next on The Jordan Harbinger Show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
Maybe 20 more years. I don't know when they finished developing that thing. Mine took a while. It is about 20 years. My daughter will say something like, Jaden will be standing on the picnic table and she'll go, that's dangerous. And he's like, I'm going to try to fly. And I'm like, listen to your sister on this one. I don't think this is going to work out the way you think it's going to work out.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
And it's just like constantly monitoring them. And then finally, now he'll say that's dangerous and then he'll do it anyway. And I'm like, That's not the point we're trying to bring across. But I remember when I was younger, my friend Katie was a really good student. And they gave us these student homework books.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
And you would write the subject and write what you had to do in the lines next to it and write when it was due. And I would ask my friend Katie, how do you remember to look at that when you have homework? And she goes, when I come home, I just look at it. And I go... how do you remember to write down what you need? And she goes, when the teacher's telling you to do it, you write it then.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
And I go, but then you go home and then you pull this out and you read it and then you do your homework. Because I couldn't get all those steps. That was not happening. She's like, idiot. All you do is write it down and then you do it when you get home. That was impossible for me to do. I didn't even get that until towards the end of high school.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
I think you will as well. And now here we go with Richard Reeves. All right. You've said we're in a crisis of male inequality, and you've highlighted in your work how society often overlooks men's struggles. And even saying that, I've got this little, like, itch in the back of my head where I go, now I'm going to get a lot of emails just about this particular thing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
Yeah, that sounds about right. And even if the teacher's like, bring your homework up, I'd just be sitting there staring at the wall. And then it's, did you turn in your homework? Oh, I don't know. It's like, where was I? I don't know. That gap widened all the way, seemingly, for me anyway, widened all the way through school.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
A lot of the girls that I studied with in high school, it wasn't that they were smarter than all the guys, it's that they were organized in a way that now I see with my wife and I is like still there.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
We've done this with my son. We put him in preschool, then pre-K. And we're like, okay, he's finally ready for kindergarten. So we held him back because he was on the age line. And now we're like, oh God, that was such a good idea. I mean, it was just so dang necessary. Meanwhile, my wife said, we need to hold Juniper back? I don't know.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
And it's hard to tell because she's three, but she is so much more ready, like I said, even than Jaden is at five for school. It's just absolutely unbelievable. Starting boys a year later probably wouldn't have been a bad idea. I didn't even think about just starting everyone later.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
What about investing more in trade schools? To go back to what we were talking about at the top of the show, it seems like I went to college because my parents were like, if you don't go to college, you're never going to get a good job. That was sort of like peak 90s parental wisdom. Yeah. from two parents who were the first in their families to go to college, I think, or one of the first.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
That made sense, but I also didn't totally need to do that. I ended up at what you might call a trade school anyway because I became a lawyer, but it's not quite the same thing that people are envisioning.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
It's funny. I always say I was painted into a corner and I did what a lot of people do and they're back to have no other options and became a lawyer. It's true. It's just like a catch all for college overachievers that are like, I have no idea what to do with my life. They just go to law school.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
When I was in Germany, there were different high schools for people who didn't show like they were going to go to college. And then they would go to a trade school. And by the time they were 18, they were pretty much ready to go be a tool and die maker or a railroad track repair person or engineer of some kind. And then you could go to college.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
And usually when we're talking about a gender gap, we're talking about the gap that women face. It's a brave move for you to have even written about this. I would imagine there were a couple of publishers that were like... How about writing about AI like everybody else? What do you think?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
But that was like you were going to be academic and you were going to go to a professional level of something. But even in Yugoslavia, they had a high school just for people who are going to be police officers. It was like, this is where you go to high school and then you get out in your cop.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
It's a totally different thing that we have here where it's like, oh, if you can make it, you can go to college. And if you can't, I'll take fries with that. It's like you really just give up on those people a lot of the time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
I've been trying to pop that bubble for years on this show where Mike Rowe from Dirty Jobs. So he used to get really upset because people would say, oh, hey, Mike, I always watch your show with my son. And I tell him this is what happens when you don't stay in school. And Mike's, oh, you mean the people that bring electricity to everyone in the city are not as good as you? What are you again?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
Like a... CPA? Go F yourself, pal. And it's just like, what do you mean this is what happens when you don't stay in school? You get a pension? You get outside every day? You get to work outside, work with your hands, helping people? It's just such an offensive notion that somebody who runs a railroad where you live is not as good as you because you spent more time indoors in school.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
It's ridiculous.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
Yeah. So basically, the jobs that many men would be well suited to do, we don't want to do them because we don't want to have people go, ah, couldn't make it in the academic world. Well, no, I actually kind of wanted this job. You snobby SOB. Right. I understand that you also you've talked before about heel jobs. I've never actually heard the term heel jobs.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
I guess it's a term that's being contrasted with STEM jobs. Tell me about this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
I just paid my HVAC guy the price of a small sedan. So yeah, the guy's doing fine.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
That's a really good Because I even remember my friends saying, oh, languages are for girls, which is such a weird thing to say.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
Speaking of being a provider, I can feed my kids when you support the fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back. This episode is sponsored in part by Factor. We all need food and figuring out what to eat can be a chore. Eating well is a priority, which is why our family relies in part on Factor. These are not your typical frozen meals.
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1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
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1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
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1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
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1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
I've got homes.com as a sponsor for this episode. Homes.com knows when it comes to home shopping, it's never just about the house or the condo. It's about the homes. And what makes a home is more than just the house or property. It's the location. It's the neighborhood. If you got kids, it's also schools, nearby parks, transportation options.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
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1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
They also have details about local schools with test scores, state rankings, student-teacher ratio. They even have an agent directory with the sales history of each agent. So when it comes to finding a home, not just a house, this is everything you need to know, all in one place, homes.com. We've done your homework.
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1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
If you're wondering how I managed to book all these great authors, thinkers, and creators every single week, it is because of my network. I am now teaching you how to build your network for free over at sixminutenetworking.com. Networking is kind of a dirty word, but hey, we talked about in this very episode how men need to reach out and make stronger connections.
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1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
That's what this course is, non-cringy ways to become a better connector, a better colleague, a better friend, and a better peer in just a few minutes a day. And many of the guests on the show subscribe and contribute to the course. So come on and join us. You'll be in smart company where you belong. You can find the course at 6minutenetworking.com. Now, back to Richard Reeves.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
You know, another weird thing that got coded wrong, in my opinion, is study abroad. It's almost always women doing it, which blows my mind because when I was an exchange student in the 90s, there were more women than men doing it. But I just thought that was random chance. It turns out I looked this up. Women are much more likely to study abroad even now.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
I assume that affects hiring because that's been one of the most standout things in my resume since 1998.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
You know what? The only thing that occurred to me, and I tried so hard to figure this out just based on my own personal experience, which is all anecdotal, but whatever. When I told everyone I was going to be an exchange student and go abroad, one, it was a woman's idea, my girlfriend at the time. It was her idea for me to do this in the first place.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
She's the one who encouraged it the most when I brought it up. She gave me the idea originally. All of my female friends were like, that's going to be amazing. Let me help you pick the country that you go to. Let's do pros and cons. And all my buddies, my guy friends were like, Man, why are you going to leave when you're going to be a senior? It's going to be awesome.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
We're going to run the whole school. And it was like, who cares? Run the whole school. I'm going to Europe for a year. What are you talking about? Run the school. That's the dumbest possible smallest thinking goal I could ever think of. And all the women were like, oh, I'm so jealous. You don't have to be here next year. That's going to be amazing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
So I was encouraged by my female friends to pack up and go somewhere. And my guy friends were they all thought I was just nuts for leaving. You have a gym here. What more could you want? It's just a total opposite.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
So she was moving to Norway to go to boarding school. So that was already happening. That was like, hey, by the way. So she wanted to get you closer. Maybe. I don't think she cared anymore. But then I said, oh, I'm so jealous that you're leaving. Same thing that most of the women were saying to me. And then I said, all my friends were getting in trouble. They're getting in more trouble.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
They're doing way more drugs than I'm comfortable with. I don't want to sit around drinking all day in Russ's basement. This is getting old and we're only juniors. And she's like, why don't you become an exchange student like Jane? That was a girl from Norway that was in our class. And I said, that would be cool. How do you do that?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
She goes, oh, I have a brochure sitting on my coffee table right now. Next time you come over, I'll give it to you or I'll bring it over to your house. And I just read this thing and looked at every country and the world just opened up right before my eyes when I saw this brochure. And she was like, you have to do it. And I said, it's expensive.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
And she's like, my mom will help you convince your parents. And she did. Her mom was a senator. So she was like, I'm calling your parents and telling them why this is important for you to do. And they believed her. So that's how I ended up an exchange student.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
Welcome to the show. I'm Jordan Harbinger. On the Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the stories, secrets, and skills of the world's most fascinating people and turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
Another thing I'm worried about, I know we just got done talking about how great the trades are, but isn't automation replacing a lot of what was traditionally men's work? I know Uncle Frank's spit takes at the dinner table say that it's because the whole generation got lazy, but that's not really what's happening, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
I know flight attendants have that, but that's because they got to be able to put people's luggage in the overhead thing. That's true. I hadn't thought of that. They still count. I'm sure they do. I've heard them say that to me because I'm like, oh, isn't that heavy? And she's like, we literally have to be able to do this for our job or we can't work.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
It's coming for us lawyers. I know that. All the lawyers are like, oh, it's never going to be able to do. And I'm like, let me stop you right there. Everything that you can do, unless you're like a partner in a very specialized area of law, it can already do that. You just don't know how it works.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
It is. Yeah. Like it can't stand up at trial and argue for your client, but that's not what you do. You manage the spreadsheet. You write briefs. You said, I may be paraphrasing here, men and women's grip strength is now largely the same, which is such a weird. First of all, who's measuring this across generations? That's such a bizarre metric to even exist.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
OK, because I thought that cannot be just genetically from testosterone levels. That can't be true. But what do I know?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
Yeah, I agree with you. I thought, what a strange thing to even be measuring.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
Just because they're inside all day doing nothing?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
And the sons are inside. It's true. Yeah. I certainly now at age 45 am doing way more than I did even as a teenager. Friends of mine are like, oh, remember when you were a kid and this happened? And I was like... man, I must have been even more of an indoor kid than I thought. Because all this stuff's happened to me now. Now I'm finally 45, living life. Before then, I was an indoor kid.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
Better late than never. Better late than never. That's right. I always tell people, say, I'm in the best shape of my life. They're like, wow, what's your secret? The secret is be in really bad shape for most of your life. That's really the trick. From a really low base.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
The bar is on the floor. It's only up from there. Do you worry at all that the drop in male employment will result or maybe even already has resulted in electoral shifts in the United States and in Europe for that matter?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
Yeah, I worry that if responsible parties don't address all these issues, that irresponsible people will take advantage of that. We've seen that throughout history in many ways.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
And I'll get some stats in a second about how men are doing, but why do you think there's a tendency to downplay or ignore the struggles that men face? Yes, it seems like, okay, we don't want to be labeled as a misogynist, but is that it?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
Yeah, we've seen that with the rise of guys like Andrew Tate, for example. I don't think that's a partisan comment.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
I'd love to talk about the term toxic masculinity, because I don't think it's done anybody any favors, because it basically doesn't mean anything. If it ever did, it doesn't mean anything now, to me anyway. I don't even know what people are talking about when they say it. Do they mean that masculinity is toxic? Do they mean that too much of it is toxic?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
Or is it a different variation of masculinity that is toxic? I don't have a clue.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
Yeah. That's all I know. That's all I know is they're trying to throw a label and get me to stop talking.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
What do you think of some of these alt-men's movements? Like, you mentioned earlier red pill. I think you mentioned men going their own way, MGTOW. I don't know if they say that as an acronym or not.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
Yeah, it's awkward. But first of all, what are those for people who've never heard of this, and what do you make of those?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
But who needs friends and relationships when you have the fine products and services that support this show? We'll be right back. This episode is sponsored in part by Airbnb. As Anthony Bourdain once said, Airbnb can make that a reality. Hosting on Airbnb is an easy way to earn extra income without taking on a second job, and now, with Airbnb's co-host network, it's even simpler.
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1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
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1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
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1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
Whether you're saving for your dream getaway or you're just looking for financial flexibility, Airbnb makes it easy to turn your space into extra income. Find a co-host at Airbnb.com slash host. This episode is also sponsored by Progressive. Do you ever think about switching insurance companies to see if you could save some cash? Well, Progressive makes it easy.
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1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
Just drop in some details about yourself and see if you're eligible to save money when you bundle your home and auto policies. The process only takes minutes and it could mean hundreds more in your pocket. Visit Progressive.com after this episode to see if you could save. Progressive Casualty Insurance Company & Affiliates. Potential savings will vary. Not available in all states.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
This episode is sponsored in part by The Gist Podcast. If you like The Jordan Harbinger Show, you also want to check out interviews where the hosts actually do their homework, you can check out The Gist, hosted by my friend Mike Peska. The Gist is the longest running daily news and commentary podcast.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
He is genuinely curious, open to having his mind changed, and willing to explore the gaps between the stories we tell ourselves and the reality that we live in. The guest list is top tier. Ben Rhodes, former Obama speechwriter, Congressman Seth Moulton, even Jesse Eisenberg. But what really sets The Gist apart is Mike himself. Mike knows a little bit about everything.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
He's actually a fascinating company in person, just as he is on the podcast. One day he's breaking down First Amendment law, the next he's talking about musical theater, and his interviews actually feel like real conversations because they are. He's naturally good at this, or at least well-practiced, again, even in person. He's not just another stop on a guest publicity tour.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
So if you're looking for smart, engaging commentary that challenges the way you think, check out The Gist. Great for anyone who loves to stay informed. And again, Mike and his whole team, you're going to want to add this one to the rotation for sure. I also want to let you in on a little inside baseball.
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1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
Many of you probably do not know when you use our promo code, it really helps support the show. We don't get a percentage of sales directly, but it lets the company know that people are hearing the ad. They're more likely to renew their campaigns with us. So if you're signing up, buying something, please check out the deals page, jordanharbinger.com slash deals. Use our codes. It is a win-win.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
You get the discount and you help keep the show going strong. Thank you for your support. Now back to Richard Reeves. often about these men's movements, I just think, but for the grace of God, I was lucky I was born at the right place at the right time in a good family. I'll let people decide if I have good genetics based on whoever's watching on YouTube.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
But I had luck in the job market, especially with timing. I had luck in business. But if any of those things at any kind of point had gone wrong, I might also easily be blaming women or society for my life not turning out the way that I expected it or wanted it to. So I kind of, in a way, I have real empathy for these guys. Me too.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
They're handling it terribly, just the worst way possible, whining online all day. But I also really, I understand how they got there.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
I agree. I think we push people to extremes. A lot of times it's to the right, but it's not always to the right. But we push guys like this to extremes because, like you said, some of what they say is correct. And then we refuse to acknowledge that, which just gets them to dig in their heels more.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
And it's not that this is a group of guys that wanted all women to be barefoot and pregnant in the kitchen. That's an extreme reaction to stimuli that they're getting it elsewhere. Our mutual friend Ryan Holiday likes to say, we can't let the crazy people make us crazy people. And the algorithms are trying to radicalize you. Political parties are trying to radicalize you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
Grifters on the internet are trying to radicalize you. So like, can we be surprised that some of us get radicalized by the system that is doing that? Especially when, you know, you get divorced, you lose your kids, then you get laid off. And of course you're not doing well. Of course you're going to look for a scapegoat. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
What advice would you give to young men navigating societal expectations and redefining their roles in today's world? I know that's a really broad question, but you're the man for the job.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
That makes sense. You're right. It's a tough line to walk because you do hear from... people who say, hey, you're aggressing in this area. But then you get people who are like, finally, Jordan is coming with us to the dark side. And we'll get to some of what the dark side means in a little bit. But do you have stats off the top of your head about how men are not doing well?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
Oh yeah, when it's a boy's trip is you're going to do something and then everyone's going to, yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
Our mission is to help you become a better informed, more critical thinker through long-form conversations with a variety of amazing folks, from spies to CEOs, athletes, authors, thinkers, performers, even the occasional pirates. Yeah, they still exist. Hacker, astronaut, or music mogul. And if you're new to the show or you want to tell your friends about the show,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
Wouldn't you say? Do you like being a guy? Yeah. I mean, personally, I like it. It's great. I couldn't handle being a woman, first of all. So it's the only option left on the table. That's right. Debatably. So yeah, I have to replay that clip for my wife when I want to go on a boy's trip this summer. Hey, I'm sorry, Richard Reeve says.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
To authority, exactly. Doctor's orders, I have to go get drunk in Berlin. I'm sorry, I don't have a choice. What steps can both men and women take to bridge this? maybe this growing disconnect in modern relationships too, because we see this all the time in marriage. Men work less when they're not providers. They don't see themselves as providers, so they're working less.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
Divorce is harder on men psychologically. I read that in your book as well. And lower earnings from men result in less marriage. So it's not just like women are taken off without us. It's like, actually, everything's getting screwed up now, and it's going to get worse.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
No, I remember that contempt is the number one indicator of divorce and rolling your eyes sounds like it's part of that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
I love that. This is totally a non sequitur, but oh well. I gotta say, I'm worried about AI relationships supplanting human ones. Just given the changing landscape where women no longer need men as much economically and men are kind of like, well, if this isn't gonna work and I'm not good enough, I'm just gonna retreat into the internet. What impacts do you foresee for men moving forward?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
It's only a matter of time until guys are like, who doesn't give me any crap? My AI girlfriend and the woman who doesn't cost me money and tell me bad things and make me feel bad because he's emasculated. My AI boyfriend that I can turn off when I go to sleep or whatever. I feel like that's just right around the corner, man.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
Well, yeah, that might come first because it's harder to program what women need for an AI boyfriend. Whereas AI girlfriend, I think we can all imagine the ingredients that go into that and how simple that might actually be.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
You can use this for as long as you want, honey. It's 20 bucks a month. I got it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
It is. And people, they'll say, I don't really think that's going to happen. And I think, okay, I tell them the following, and maybe you can disagree with me on this example here, but imagine that your friend is dating someone and they don't really like them that much, but they're in a relationship. It's the first girl that he's dated for this long.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
And there's so many things wrong with that relationship and they both see it. But they don't break up because they don't want to be alone. So what is he not doing? He's not going out and meeting new people. He's not really working on his social skills for meeting new people. He's not really raising his standards much above where he's at with her. He's just complaining about the death.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
Yes, what if he's not in a relationship with a girlfriend? What if he's in a relationship with an AI? He's got the exact same set of problems except for he's got no reason and no motivation to go out to a bar with his buddies and get rejected or laughed at or maybe just not talked to by the girl that he liked. Why deal with that?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
You have to constantly be charging into battle almost socially until you get good at it and then you start to enjoy it. But if you never make it through that developmental phase... you probably won't ever be able to do that comfortably.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
Yeah. Yeah. It's right. All jokes aside, what are some of the long term consequences of neglecting these issues for both men and society as a whole? Because this could affect future generations, societal cohesion. I know I might sound like I'm overstating it, but if people siphon off too much, that's a really big problem.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
One, that's alarming, and two, it completely makes sense and jibes with just the anecdote. I always ask my younger cousins and friends and show fans questions like this, and I don't think any of them have said they want a kid. Some of the more sort of conservative or religious people are like, yeah, I want to have five kids because I grew up in a family of eight.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
It's like, oh, you're only having five? It's one of those. But my cousins and stuff, they're like, no, why would I have kids? My life is really good right now. And I hope they change their mind. But when I was 20-something, I said, yes, definitely, I want to have kids. So did my wife. She was always like, yeah, I definitely want to do this. My parents were quite similar.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
With a lot of this, I think it's hard to update our beliefs to match the new facts at hand. So I can see a lot of people just saying, there's still so much work to do with racial equality and with women's rights, and they are correct on that. But I think it's hard to say men need help and then update our belief structure to match that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
Richard Reeves, thank you very much. That was an awesome ending. I didn't want to step on you. I hope that was where you wanted to land it because it was great.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
Thanks, man.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
You're about to hear a preview trailer of our interview with Mike Rowe, host of Discovery's Dirty Jobs and Returning the Favor, on why the advice follow your passion is complete BS.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
For more with Mike Rowe, including a behind-the-scenes look at some of his shows, and why we shouldn't view a blue-collar career pursuit as a cautionary tale, check out episode 264 right here on The Jordan Harbinger Show. I want to be clear again, this is not supposed to be something sort of anti-women. I know some people, they love to be offended.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
Those people that do this for sport, they're going to look for something wrong with this episode. I will finish with this. The U.S. economy is $2 trillion larger than it would be without women. That is great for the country all around. Again, this episode is not about what women are or are not doing. They are doing great. But this episode is about where men are actually falling behind.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
Nobody expected gender equality in the other direction. There's actually a bigger gender gap now than there was when Title IX was passed in the other direction. That's pretty serious business. And I'm not saying we need to get rid of any of these reforms. I'm just saying us guys, we need to catch up. We need to pay attention to each other. We need to help each other out.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
And men are even much more likely to drop out of school at every level. Additionally, one in four boys is diagnosed with some sort of learning or developmental disability. That is a lot. One in four. Holy moly. Seems like the system is the problem, not necessarily the diagnosis here. Look, I've got some ADD. I'm able to do quite a bit, if you haven't noticed. So far, so good.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
I made it through a top law school. I practiced on Wall Street. Now I've got a little podcast that some of you all seem to enjoy here and there. Turns out I just can't sit still for hours on end listening to somebody talk about calculus equations. I am not really convinced that that's a disability, but, you know, I'm no doctor.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
All things Richard Reeves will be in the show notes at JordanHarbinger.com. Advertisers, deals, discount codes, and ways to support the show, all at JordanHarbinger.com slash deals. Please consider supporting those who support this show. Also, our newsletter, We Bit Wiser, comes out most Wednesdays. It's practical. It's specific.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
It'll have an immediate impact on your decisions, your psychology, and your relationships. In under two minutes, we like to make things snappy. And if you haven't signed up yet, I invite you to come check it out. It is a great companion to the show. JordanHarbinger.com slash news is where you can find it. Don't forget about Six Minute Networking as well over at SixMinuteNetworking.com.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
I'm at Jordan Harbinger on Twitter and Instagram. You can also connect with me on LinkedIn. And this show, it's created in association with Podcast One. My team is Jen Harbinger, Jace Sanderson, Robert Fogarty, Ian Baird, and Gabriel Mizrahi. Remember, we rise by lifting others. The fee for the show is you share it with friends and you find something useful or interesting.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
The greatest compliment you can give us is to share the show with those you care about. So if you know somebody who's interested in how men are falling behind, what we can do about it, definitely share this episode with them. In the meantime, I hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn. And we'll see you next time. Thank you for watching.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
It would be different if it was like, hey, most men are just going to trade school, but they're still making six figures. There's a lot of plumbers, electricians and other experts or whatever. That's kind of the myth. Yeah. That's what people say. That's just not true anymore. Oh, that's interesting. Yeah. That's kind of what I was hoping was true, I guess.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
When I read about the statistics for college, I thought, oh, well, maybe more men are just getting apprenticeships or something like that. Yeah. But that's not the case.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
A single friend at all. Does that mean even online? Or like they just mean no real life friends? No friends at all.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
They're dating 40-year-old guys, but whatever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
I can see that. Women's role in the household has expanded to provider, of course, as well as caring for children. Men's role has not necessarily expanded similarly to also caring for children. Look, obviously there's stay-at-home dads. You don't have to email me and tell me you take care of your kids. I get it. But it's probably not quite the same scale.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
Here with me is Richard Reeves, author and social scientist. He's also a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution and president of the American Institute for Boys and Men. Didn't know that existed? Kind of glad it does. Today, we're talking about the gender gap. Probably not the one you're thinking of. Well, actually, it is the one you're thinking of.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
It's not a very actionable game plan. Yeah, and we'll get to toxic masculinity later, whatever that means. But it is, there's this evolving masculinity, but Your masculinity has to evolve. Okay, tell me what that means. Oh gosh, I don't know. Figure it out, bro. And good luck out there. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
Right. Yeah. We're really not doing a great job. Those of us that are trying are also overshadowed by grifters who are like, oh, I can come in and take advantage of this. But you've mentioned that men are often treated as malfunctioning women, essentially. Can you explain what this means? I love that idea, that concept. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
It's just kind of upside down from what you might assume. It turns out that men are falling behind women in pretty much every area, at home, at work, and at school, and the gap is only growing. Today, we'll explore what this crisis looks like, particularly in areas like education, work, mental health, and beyond. I actually found this episode both alarming and enlightening.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
This explains so much of the problems that I had in school. I've got two kids now. One's five. My boy is five and a half. My daughter is three. And I will tell you right now, my daughter's probably more ready for school than my son, or at least they're close. And he's two and a half years older than her, almost twice as old. And it's crazy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
We'll say, okay, put on your socks and shoes and put your jacket on. And my three-year-old daughter will have a little bit of trouble just physically putting it on. And then she'll be by the door and my son will be playing with matchbox cars. And it's, hello, we told you to put your socks and shoes on. And then 10 minutes later, he's got one sock on and he's looking for a snack. And it's like,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
In certain respects, yes. But also, I can really relate to this because as a kid, I was the exact same way. I mean, they were like, oh, he's got attention deficit disorder and all these things. And it just turns out that, OK, maybe that's true. But also, it just turns out it was a boy. Hello. All the boys were like that. Come on.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1126: Richard Reeves | Rethinking the Purpose of Modern Masculinity
It's, I have to just realize that he's so young that I'm essentially his external prefrontal cortex that's operating outside of his body.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
There's a video for people who want to make changes similar to this. You say a better question than am I ready to change is do I wish I were somebody who wanted to change? Can you bring the difference into the foreground here? I've never heard this before. And also, it seems weird to ask, do I wish I were somebody who wanted to change? Because isn't the answer kind of always yes?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
It's anxiety that feels real, but is ridiculous because half of that email is like, I'd like to pitch this financial planner for your show. And it's like delete. But it still feels real.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
Yeah, my trainer knows a lot about exercise and that's the main reason I'm working out with him. But the other reason is it's really easy to lollygag when you're working out by yourself. You half-ass it and then you leave when you're bored. Yeah, absolutely.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
I love this. It's scary to admit that you want to be a different person. I think, because it feels shameful. Yeah, but just about everyone does. Yeah. So why lie about it? There's a shame element maybe involved or like you can be a different person, which is actually empowering if you think about it. It's just that, wow, that's going to take a lot of work to become a different person.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
But for people who are hell-bent on self-actualization and personal growth, you're already becoming a different person. People say every seven years, every five years, every 10 years, whatever it is. You're already essentially, in many ways, a fundamentally different person than I was, let's say, before I started to value my health. Not just work out, but value my health.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
I was in denial before that. I look at photos and I'm like, oh my gosh, how did that happen? Luckily, about 11 or 12 years ago now, I went to one of those executive health screenings. Have you ever done one of these? No, but I'm somewhat familiar with them. You get like a DEXA scan, which is a bone density and fat scan, and they take your VO2 max and they weigh you. And I was like 40% body fat.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
I was 33 years old, pre-diabetic. My lean mass is like 127 pounds, but I weighed like 192 or 193. I mean, it was ugly. And I was like, but I'm not that fat. And the doctor was like, you are going to get diabetes. You're going to get this. This is going to happen. You're probably going to die early. Or you can do all of this totally different stuff that you have never done.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
These markers will all change. And you're young. You can and should do this. I was on blood pressure medication. Dude, 33 is on blood pressure medication. And they're like, you're never gonna be able to stop taking these. And the guy who did the screening is like a really well-respected doctor. And he goes, look, I'm not your primary care physician. You should definitely not need those.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
There's no reason for you to need those. That's horrible. Get yourself in shape. And so it took me a few more years of farting around. I'm gonna work out on my own. I'm gonna eat a little bit less. And then when I finally started to actually value my health, I look back at that other person and I'm like, what is wrong with you?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
Like, who is that idiot who's just like, I'm going to eat whatever I want, do whatever I want. What are you thinking? And now I value other things in my life in a totally different way that you can sort of change fundamentally who you are.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
And the reason I'm bringing all this up is because I think there's a lot of resistance to, you can't just become a different person that's wishful thinking, or you play the hand that you're dealt. And I just don't necessarily always believe that you're stuck where you are.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
It is. Everybody in the developed world has this feeling. They call it the Sunday scaries. Have you heard of this? Yeah. For people who don't know what this is, Sunday night comes around and you're like, oh, I got work on Monday. Oh, the Turner account. The boss is going to, oh, we have that meeting. I've got to like make sure my... PowerPoint slides are good. I got to do that at 8 a.m.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
That's fascinating. I love that. And I'm going to ruin it by switching gears into OnlyFans addiction because this is such a juicy, I shouldn't say funny. It can be tragic, but it's also it's such an odd 2024-ish phenomenon. I got a letter on Feedback Friday, which is our advice segment of the show, where a woman who does OnlyFans, she was our listener.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
She finds out that this person who's sending her and paying her to do some pretty like kinky, gross stuff. And I'm not kink shaming. She said this is like really denigrating and gross stuff that this guy was having her do. But she's like, well, he's paying me a lot of money. She finds out it's her friend's husband who's a devout Jehovah's Witness. And it just ruined their marriage and everything.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
And he was clearly addicted to it, right? It wasn't good for him. This wasn't something he wanted to be doing. It just ruined his marriage. But what was more weird for her was his arousal seemed almost like it was the social element of the relationship. Despite all the weird stuff he was having her do, it was actually the fact that he had like an intimate connection with her in this way.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
And I know a lot of people are doing this. They're being intimately connected or they're chatting with who they think is this person on OnlyFans. And it's this bizarrely 2024 kind of phenomenon.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
3% to 11% sounds insanely high. You mean 11% of the population in 2010 was addicted to porn? It's higher than that now, I assume? That's crazy. Yeah, so it's crazy. 49% to 75%.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
And so you're preloading all the stuff that you have to do and it's causing you anxiety because it's not time to do it yet. If you're doing it, you probably feel better. Yep. But it's basically worry, but it's like the other side of the worry coin.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
That is very alarming. In fact, there was so much talk of porn addiction that I was basically like, I'm just never going to watch porn again. And I had absolutely no problem with that. It was it was actually really easy. Most of it is dumb. I don't know if you've ever seen it, Dr. Kanoja. It's actually mostly garbage and silly and ridiculous.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
I found it as a 44-year-old man pretty easy to just be like, I'm never going to use this again. The fact that there are maybe 70% or whatever that number was of people who say that they probably can't stop or that they would have trouble stopping, it's beyond alarming. You can't overstate it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
I see where you're going with this. The social element of being able to say, good morning to your favorite, whatever, OnlyFans person. That is the circuit of like, hey, I'm connected to this person. We're talking about our day. She's asking how I am. That doesn't happen in my real life because I sit around coding all day or playing games. And then it's like, dot, dot, dot, almost an afterthought.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
After 11 p.m., you're watching some videos of her, I don't know, getting railed by her boyfriend or whatever the hell you're paying for. But like, it hits you. All these different switches as if they're a real person that's really in your life that really cares about you. And that's more than just watching a video.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
Jeez, does not sound healthy, doctor. As long as you pay money, this person does what you want. All you got to do is pay for it. Oh my gosh. That's a dirty secret though, right? Yikes. Maybe I should start an OnlyFans. I already have a parasocial relationship going with many of my show fans. No videos though, because that might be a deal breaker for a few of these folks.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
I will never show you anything below the belt. How's that? All right, here's my money. It's scary.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
Right. I'm never going to show you anything below the belt unless you give me like 10 grand, in which case, yeah, there might be a dick pic coming your way. Just saying.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
The person who's addicted to OnlyFans, right? You're talking about it. Yeah. I see. Oh, yeah. And the flip side, too. That's a different podcast. Now help me support my OnlyFans addiction by purchasing one of the fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
If you're wondering how I managed to book all these great authors, thinkers, creators every single week, it is because of my network, the circle of people I know, like, and trust. I'm teaching you how to build something similar for free over at 6minutenetworking.com. I know you're not booking for a podcast, but this will help you in your personal life,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
your professional life in a very down-to-earth, non-cringy way, no awkward strategies or cheesy tactics, just practical exercises that will make you a better connector, better colleague, a better friend, and a better peer. In six minutes a day is all it takes. Many of the guests on the show subscribe and contribute to the course. So come on and join us. You'll be in smart company where you belong.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
The course is free over at 6minutenetworking.com. All right, back to Dr. K. This is so damn fascinating. But what do people do if they find themselves in this trap? Because when it's an addiction, right, you don't just say, hey, you know what you should do? Stop chatting with the person who's actually just an Indonesian chatbot agent, not the girl in the video.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
You have to stop being intimate with this person because it's a trick. It's an illusion, right? We tend to think so.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
Welcome to the show. I'm Jordan Harbinger. On the Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the stories, secrets, and skills of the world's most fascinating people and turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
Thank you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
Because I used to feel this way about working out. Oh, man, I got my workout tomorrow. It's leg day. It's going to be really hard. Now I look forward to it, but it took three years. But with email or other work, I don't know, I'm 44. I still don't go, I have so much opportunity to do email tomorrow.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
It's going to be great because the outcome is there's just more email later, whereas the outcome of fitness is I feel and look good, which is kind of nice.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
Yeah, so at first I thought, oh, a trainer's going to yell at you and demean you until you puke. So that went away after the first week because my trainer's actually really good and that's not actually what good trainers do. They don't just yell at you and tell you you're a piece of crap and demean you and make you vomit in your living room.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
Thank you. Thank you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
That was the first change and that kept me going for at least the first year or two. And then I think later... Just the positive association that I had with having a good workout, reaching the edge of my ability, but never having a heart attack as a result or something like that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
Thank you. Thank you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
And then looking in the mirror and going, I lost 40 pounds of fat and I gained 20 pounds of lean mass or whatever it is. That was pretty awesome. And that itself becomes addicting, probably because there's a visible and even measurable result. But with email, the visible result is zero inbox for 13 seconds if you're lucky. And then everything floods back in.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
You're going in with that handicap, right? Absolutely. All right. I'm already down one because I'm not the person in the pictures and they're not the person in the pictures. But I'm not thinking about that. I'm not thinking we're starting on even keel because we're both down one. I'm just thinking about how crappy I look compared to this fake AI version of myself on the Internet.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
And then the result is, I don't know, I guess some stuff got done. It's hard to quantify. Certainly in there, some of those were important, but most of them weren't. And then it just starts over again. So, yeah, maybe that's the difference.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
I'll be honest, Feedback Friday, where people write in with these really serious problems, one of the main things people like about it when we did a survey and what we see on our subreddit is people go, wow, other people have really serious problems, my life isn't so bad, and I'm rooting for them to be better because we're all humans, we're all helping it, like Jordan and Gabriel are helping them, and I want them to be in a better situation.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
It's actually quite healthy. And also I think interviewing people who have made a giant mess of their lives, you know, like Sammy the Bull or Mafia Hitman, That doesn't hurt either. Right. Because you realize that not everybody's Richard Branson or Alok Kanoya.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
Yeah, well, thank you. Yeah, it wasn't super conscious at the time. It just sort of evolved that way. That's what happens when you answer hundreds of fan mails and you actually listen to your audience instead of ignoring them. You find that they guide your work in a really positive way most of the time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
I've heard you say something along the lines of undiagnosed ADHD is causing depression for thousands of adults. Is that accurate? I don't want to misquote you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
That makes me so sad.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
Our mission is to help you become a better informed, more critical thinker through long-form conversations with a variety of amazing folks, from spies to CEOs, athletes, authors, thinkers, performers, even the occasional extreme athlete, Emmy-nominated comedian, hacker, pirate, or special operator. Apparently they're still pirates. Or search for us in your Spotify app to get started.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
That is a really great explanation. And also, man, as a parent of two small children and as a guy who had undiagnosed ADHD until college, that really hits. I did not get invited to birthday parties, but I also think my ADHD is nowhere near as severe as a lot of other people's.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
And when I meet other ADHD people to look at their coping strategies and stuff like that, it's like, oh my gosh, you are on another level. I've got a friend who's a very successful fitness entrepreneur. She has an assistant and one of that person's jobs is to text her things she has to do. And I'm like, don't you just use a calendar? She's like, yes, but I need someone to text me.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
And she showed me screenshots of her assistant texting her. It's you have a call in one hour. You have a call in half an hour. You have a call in 15 minutes. That call is in five minutes. That call is in two minutes. Your call is now. Are you on that call? Are you sure you're on that call? If you don't answer me, I'm going to assume you're not on that call.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
And that is for every appointment in her calendar. She does that for everything because she will forget
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
I remember I was doing pretty well in business and I was doing pretty well. I just met my wife and stuff like that. So I wasn't super depressed or anything like that, but I certainly wasn't feeling as good as I feel now at 44. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
Really? Because we can multitask like crazy because we don't have a choice? Yeah. What's the reason?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
This explains so much about how my days look as well. This makes complete sense. I'm proudly sort of unemployable in any other person's business, I suppose. But for what I do now, being able to function and do a conversation while producing a show, while running the business and switching from, you need to rehearse this thing. Now you need to review this document. Now you have a phone call.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
Now you have a show, which is essentially a performance. And then my hobbies are like voice acting and video games and boxing. And it's like, I could do all of those things in one day. And it's not weird to shift between those activities.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
All right. Now, unless you want me to have to start an OnlyFans of my own, please consider supporting some of the fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back. Here's a little inside scoop you might not be aware of. When you use our promo code, you're not just scoring a discount. You're also giving the show a big boost.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
So we don't earn commissions directly from sales of each little thing that you buy. But when companies see that listeners are engaging with an ad that they buy or an endorsement that they buy, it encourages them to keep supporting us. So if you're planning to sign up, please remember to use our codes. They're all at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. It's win-win.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
You get a great deal and you help keep the show going strong. I truly appreciate your support, as does the whole team. And if you can't find a code, you can always email me, jordan at jordanharbinger.com. I am more than happy to surface that code for you. It is that important that you support those who support the show. All right, now for the rest of my conversation with Dr. K.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
What are some of the easiest things that we can incorporate in our lives that give us a high return on maybe happiness, energy, et cetera, relative to the effort that it takes?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
Yeah, definitely. When I go through 150 emails or more, I feel accomplished, similar to having worked out that day. But somehow I don't look forward to the emails, but I do look forward to the working out. So what's going on there?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
Maybe they're more in touch with themselves and they realize they're in the wrong career. That's what I think really happens.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
This is like 90% of lawyers. You go to undergrad and you do well and then you're like, crap, I don't know what to do for work. And then you go to law school and you're just like, well, there's going to be a lot of money in this. And you become an investment banker or a lawyer. And then you turn 27 a few years later and your brain is fully developed.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
You're like, what the actual hell am I doing in this office doing this job? This is insanity. And you move.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
Yeah, I want to help people and make a bunch of money and have my parents finally love me because they always wanted me to be a doctor.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
At least this person's being honest. Right. Man, I'm so curious what you think of psychedelics and the use of psychedelics in treating mental illness or even just for self-actualization and personal growth. I know those are two very different use cases.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
I worry when I hear about people using these either without any supervision or their shaman who's running their ayahuasca ceremony in the middle of nowhere six hours away from the nearest hospital was a stockbroker a month ago. That kind of stuff. And I'm not even exaggerating. I've got a buddy who had a really bad ayahuasca experience.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
And he was like, yeah, we went into the woods and we did it with eight dudes in one room in a cabin laid out on yoga mats on the floor. And I jumped out the window into the woods and they couldn't find me because the shaman was high, too. And then I finally hit a highway and turned around and came back. I'm like, in the winter, you went outside. You ran until you found a highway through the woods.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
And somehow you find your way back to the cabin. And of course, everybody was like, dude, where did you go? We couldn't find you. He could have died doing that. And they were, again, hours away from the nearest hospital if somebody has a seizure or whatever. Just absolutely insane.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
The realization that I need a virtual assistant. That's what's come out of that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
Right. Because in meditation, there's no real shortcut, but just downing a bunch of a substance, it just drops you right out of the airplane.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
I did some breath work a couple of weeks ago with people where you're just like inhaling, exhaling, inhaling, exhaling. And it was apparently 75 minutes long. For me, it seemed like it was about 15 minutes long. At the end, I was like, this is kind of some BS. What is this? And then I just started like massive emotional release. It was very interesting. I couldn't stand up.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
People who listen to the show are going to be like Jordan, because I am not the woo woo guy. I'm the guy who's like, whatever, this is dumb. And I was like disoriented and physically unable to stand. It was wild experience.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
Is it Sisyphus in the boulder? Is that the guy that's holding up the boulder? And it keeps sliding down. And that guy's already jacked because he's a Greek god. But let's say that he wasn't. If he was like, man, my shoulders are starting to look really good after pushing this boulder, maybe he wouldn't be so miserable. But that's what email is, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
Oof, yeah. Yes, thank you for that disclaimer. I think there's a lot of people who think they can just learn this from YouTube, and it's a little scary. I'm curious what you think of the backlash against talk therapy these days. I'm a huge proponent of therapy. I recommend it all the time on the show, but good therapists are very hard to find.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
And there seems to be this impossibly rare balance of a therapist who will get you to open up and talk about your feelings and your issues, but also actually help you accomplish your goals and not just keep you on the couch for... I don't know, two decades complaining about your mom or whatever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
It's the boulder and you're never building anything as a result so far. Or at least that's not how I'm looking at it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
Okay, I'm not the only one. I'm glad to hear you admit this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
You're like, why am I tearing up? This is weird. It's funny because society does this to us, right? It's super embarrassing. You're watching The Lion King and you're like, oh man, I hope that guy doesn't die. I'm going to lose my mind. And then it happens and you're just like, I have to go to the bathroom because I'm going to cry right now.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
Oh, my God.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
Right. You basically have to look and this person's $300 an hour and this person's $50 an hour. Okay, which one can I afford? They're probably different. But that's nothing. That's marketing. That's the area where they live. I mean, I've gone through a bunch of therapists. Some were great in past years and some are great now.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
But I will tell you it's often I'm hitting that switch therapist button a few times when I select therapists.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
No, a good therapist guides you there and holds your feet to the fire, but in a way that keeps you coming back, I suppose.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
It's like a trainer, right? If you barf, you might not come back, but maybe you're just really out of shape. And when you work out in any reasonable way, you barf and you just got to push through that. I see what you're saying.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
This makes sense. Yeah, I basically, I look forward slash dread therapy and training sessions. And I guess that's the balance you need to have. But I'm also used to pushing through discomfort and finding results on the other end. And if you've never done that before, therapy and working out and anything you do in life is going to be hard, man, I think.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
So what can someone do to get the most out of therapy? I don't think we're probably asking that enough.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
Jordan, have you thought about making YouTube shorts? Yes, actually 50 times today because that's how many times I've gotten this email. Yes, it's true. And I see what you're saying. So he's got a pretty good direct link where he goes, look, I send 5,000 cold emails over these hundreds of hours. And 13 of them result in six-figure clients through the year.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
That's interesting. Yeah, I guess you're absolutely right. That's something I'm going to have to remember as well. I selfishly wanted to ask, as a parent of two young kids, what does the research say slash what do you think about screen time? Because my kids, they watch iPad, but they learn so much stuff from it. They're learning different words. They're learning about how things work.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
I'm always blown away by what they seem to learn from that. But whenever I look at screen time research, I don't find a whole lot of clinical research. I just find parents shaming other parents on Instagram or whatever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
It's really hard for most of us, myself included. For example, fan mail is a big part of the mail that I get, which is, look, hashtag blessed, right? It's good to have people telling you how awesome your show is or something like that in your email. When I was a lawyer, I didn't get a ton of that, as you might imagine. But also, it's hard to go, wow, I just answered 100 really nice people online.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
This makes so much sense. I always worry that kids who get a ton of screen time are being raised maybe, but maybe by disengaged parents, maybe that disengagement is actually the thing causing the adverse outcomes that people say is caused by the screen. So it's not the iPad. It's the fact that dad works until 9 p.m.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
every night and doesn't always come home and mom works during the day and she gets home late and then she's got to deal with running the whole household and gets no help or there's a substance issue. Like maybe it's not Cocomelon that's causing the damage here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
Thanks once again for doing the show, man. You got a ton of wisdom to share. I really appreciate you taking the time. Yeah, likewise, Jordan. Thank you for being here. Ever find yourself trapped in a cycle of always wanting more, never feeling content?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
You're about to hear a preview of The Jordan Harbinger Show, where Scare City Brain author Michael Easter unravels the mysteries of our primal drives and how they can be both our downfall and our salvation.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
, , , , , . . . .. B B B B G G G G G P P P P P P P P P P P P P P P P P P P P P P P P P P P P P P P and
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
That did something for my business because it really kind of didn't. It did something for my ego only. But like, yeah, the marginal difference between doing 10 of those and 100 of those is really tiny, right? Like I get one nice letter. It's really nice. I get 100. I have 100 emails.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
And it's nice to talk to these people like I enjoy it at some level. And so when I get the email back, I'm like, oh, this nice person with this funny story wrote me back. So I enjoy that. But yeah, it's still running on the treadmill. It's still an extra step on the treadmill. Whatever. Now I just feel like I'm complaining about something most people would kill to have.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
Yeah, I suppose most of my emails are nice, except for the YouTube shorts pitches. I'm never going to make YouTube shorts. And if I do, it's not going to be with you, person who's sending that email. So just don't bother. They're never going to listen because I'm on a list. You touched on this a little bit earlier. I'm exaggerating here. This email is not traumatic, but trauma is so fascinating.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
And I've heard you discuss the idea that if we have a traumatic experience, like a car crash, for example, our mind will play a trick on us and convince us that driving is scary and dangerous. I had a friend like that. She got in a car accident, and then we went driving in Morocco in the Atlas Mountains, and she was just frozen.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
having a nervous breakdown in the backseat because there's no guardrails and it's Morocco, so they're going 100 miles an hour down a blind curve. I get it. She was losing her mind. But even at home, she said, I've been driving for 30 years and now I can't drive anymore. So it's kind of like your mind is correct that driving is scary, but also you do it so often. Why is it scary again?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
Or food poisoning. Maybe that's a better example. You eat out maybe hundreds of times a year. Maybe your favorite is sushi. You eat sushi a dozen times a month maybe, but you get food poisoning once, you're never eating sushi again. Maybe it takes you years to recover. We don't really think, huh, less than 1% of the time I eat this, I get food poisoning.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
So trauma hijacks this logical response and puts it into overdrive.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
But I'm not doing that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
Today, back by popular demand, Dr. Allo Kunoja is here for round two. We dive into trauma and our response to trauma. Something called OnlyFans addiction, which honestly I did not know was a real thing, and it's crazier than you'd think. Also, porn addiction, ADHD, therapy and psychedelics, and more. Dr. K was a huge hit last time. I really enjoyed my conversation with him.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
Yeah, that's some bullshit, isn't it?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
That's interesting. This reminds me a long time ago, one of my friends, she was very unfortunately, she was assaulted while on a date and she wouldn't date after that, obviously.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
But then she realized, OK, I'm miserable doing this because of this feature, as opposed to a bug of the human mind where the trauma is sort of every time I'm alone with somebody on a date or whatever, this could happen again. So I started to go to the same restaurants and sit where she could see me, but the guy couldn't. And we did that several times.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
And the strategy was if she came up and said, oh, my gosh, are you Jordan? I haven't seen you for so long. We grew up together. I would be like, oh, my gosh. Hi. And give her a big hug. And then we would just like leave. Lucky to have a friend like you, Jordan. You know, I just had no life. But also, I didn't want to keep seeing her suffer. That's the truth.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
But that never actually needed to happen. Basically, she just went out on a bunch of nice dates with nice guys and had nice dinners. Didn't feel scared because... If the guy did anything, she was literally looking right at me and he was going to get choked probably if he tried to do anything. Plus, we're in a public place, so it was just an easier sort of thing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
And then she was like, hey, I don't really need you to show up anymore. And I remember being like, we were really happy about that because it was like, hey, I can actually go to this Italian restaurant and not have a panic attack that I'm going to get attacked and, you know, happily married. That was her sort of self-designed stimulus response, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
She kind of had to desensitize herself to this thing most of us consider normal that to her was an existential threat.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1114: Dr. Alok Kanojia | Breaking the Cycle of Digital Dependence
So here we go, round two with Dr. Allo Kunoja. I got to get my energy going, man. It's one of those mornings where I'm just like under caffeinated slash I have a thousand unread emails because I just got back from a trip and I'm like vibrating with. It's not actual anxiety because it's not like there's anything actually going on.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1089: Victor Vescovo | Into the Abyss: Reaching Earth's Deepest Places
On the surface, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1089: Victor Vescovo | Into the Abyss: Reaching Earth's Deepest Places
Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1089: Victor Vescovo | Into the Abyss: Reaching Earth's Deepest Places
Okay.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1089: Victor Vescovo | Into the Abyss: Reaching Earth's Deepest Places
Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1089: Victor Vescovo | Into the Abyss: Reaching Earth's Deepest Places
Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
There's got to be some training class run by experienced undercovers, yeah?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
How do you approach a gang like the Hells Angels? You can't just walk into a biker bar and be like, yeah, transporting meth and guns sure sounds like a good gig. You got a warm introduction at the very least.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
Hey, man, thanks for coming back on the show. I know we just had you on, but we had such a good audience response from it. We had a really good, long conversation about your work at the ATF and how you started the undercover operation, but we never actually got into the Hell's Angels stuff. We basically just dipped our toes in it and then bounced off of it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
And nobody in the first gang knew that you guys were law enforcement, I assume?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
That's true. It's the Nike, the name brand out there, I suppose.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
Now, a lot of listeners were asking after our previous conversation, is there some sort of initiation? Is there a ceremony for admittance to the Hells Angels? There's got to be hazing and stuff like that. A lot of people brought it. There's no way a group or a club like that, as organized as they are, just lets anybody in, which of course they don't.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
I assume there's hazing in your prospect phase where you're on probation?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
If people haven't heard the first couple episodes I did with you, I recommend they do go back and listen to those just so they get a little bit of a basis for some of this, your work in the ATF, outlaw biker gangs. how some of them operate and your undercover work in general. How did you get started doing undercover work?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
I don't suppose you can have them take their shoes off when they get into your house. That would be a deal breaker. My wife would never allow that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
Because I assume you don't just join the ATF and you're like, okay, so I want to do undercover work. Someone else makes that choice for you probably, right, in the beginning?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
Yeah, so you get ahead of it by just admitting you don't know what you're talking about. That makes sense.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
That all makes perfect sense. You were undercover for two years, which I think is a pretty long time. Is that sort of objectively longer than usual?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
As always, this podcast is sponsored by Hydroxycut and Unfiltered Cigarettes. We'll be right back. This episode is sponsored in part by the Moonshot Podcast. If you've ever wondered how big world-changing ideas go from crazy concept to real-life innovation, you've got to check out the Moonshot Podcast.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
If you're wondering how I managed to book all these great authors, thinkers, and creators every single week, it is because of my network, the circle of people I know, like, and trust. I'm teaching you how to build your network for free over at 6minutenetworking.com. It's funny because I just taught this to a class of undercovers recently.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
I don't think I could say which agency, so it doesn't matter. But basically, this stuff works. Yeah, a lot of people think, like, I don't need this. I've been in sales for three years. Cool. I just taught this to, well, again, I can't say who it is, but... They need it so they don't die. So you might want to pick it up because there may be a thing or two in there for you to learn as well.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
It's down to earth. It is not cringy. It is all practical exercises that'll make you a better connector, a better colleague, a better friend, a better peer in a few minutes a day. And that's all it takes. And many of the guests on our show already subscribe and contribute to the course. Come on and join us. You'll be in smart company where you belong.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
You can find the course at sixminutenetworking.com. All right, back to Jade Obbins. What does a typical day look like when you're undercover? I mean, are you full time hanging out with these guys and doing stuff? I would imagine so.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
Jeez, that must have been a huge challenge because not only are these guys probably largely drugged up or whatever, so they have a little bit of extra fuel, but they don't have to get up at four to start the day at six. You do. And then you have the additional stress of trying to keep your cover story intact, whereas they're just living their life, even if it is a challenging 18-hour day.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
Yeah. Oh, that makes me feel a little bit sick just thinking about it. the amount of stimulants coming off of that must have been terrible. That must have been a hard crash.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
Oh, I thought you were going to say that was your wake-up call, but the opposite. It was your denial.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
Yeah, man, that stuff was dangerous. And I remember taking it in college. Just, oh, it's like a vitamin. It can't hurt you. You can buy it on Amazon or wherever we bought that stuff online. It's like 20 bucks.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
Yeah, it's like Tylenol. Okay, you take a couple more than they say you should, whatever. No big deal. You don't think, oh, I'm going to get a heart attack from this. The reason I stopped using it, I wasn't using it like that, but I would take it occasionally. I remember having that and a bunch of soda, which has caffeine in it, and I just went, I got to lay down.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
And I could hear my heart in my ears, and I was like, what causes this? I've definitely drank a lot of soda before. It's not just the soda. And then I thought, oh, I wonder if this hydroxy cut plus the caffeine in the soda is doing something. And I remember I was probably like 19. I feel like I'm going to die. My heart is racing. I'm sweating, but I'm cold. I'm never taking this again.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
And who knows how close I came? I really don't even know.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
Thank you. Thank you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
So you mentioned in our last episode, your undercover name was Jaybird Davis and you were like a gunrunner. I'd love to hear more about the gun running backstory. I guess you have to draw on previous experiences to paint a convincing story that is kind of true. And I know you were busting some firearms traffickers in a previous case. Can you tell us about that?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
Yeah, I like that actually. That's how you build wisdom. Hopefully you don't get killed in the process, I suppose.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
What were some of the more risky moments you encountered during those two years? Surely there were some close calls that you faced.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
To your house where your family lives?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
Oh, God, that's f***ing terrifying.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
Yeah, this is interesting. The margins on trading guns for, let's say, cocaine, street value, I mean, it's just, you can really arbitrage that. If you have a criminal gang in the United States, they can get guns and can distribute cocaine, for example.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
That is something else, man. You guys are just built different. That's for sure. All right. It's time to blow my cover as a shameless capitalist and bring you some great deals on the fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back. This episode is sponsored in part by Airbnb.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
They list your space, they manage reservations, they communicate with guests, they keep it all in tip-top shape, and that unused space could cover your flights to Asia, book you a cool hotel in Spain, even help with everyday expenses, giving you the freedom to explore more.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
Whether you're saving for your dream getaway or you're just looking for financial flexibility, Airbnb makes it easy to turn your space into extra income. Find a co-host at Airbnb.com slash host. This episode is also sponsored by Progressive. Do you ever think about switching insurance companies to see if you could save some cash? Progressive makes it easy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
Just drop in some details about yourself and see if you're eligible to save money when you bundle your home and auto policies. The process only takes minutes, and it could mean hundreds more in your pocket. Visit Progressive.com after this episode to see if you could save. Progressive Casualty Insurance Company & Affiliates. Potential savings will vary. Not available in all states.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
Welcome to the show. I'm Jordan Harbinger. On The Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the stories, secrets, and skills of the world's most fascinating people and turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
If you're wondering how I managed to book all these great authors, thinkers, and creators every week, it's because of my network, the circle of people I know, like, and trust. And if you're not wondering how I book all these great people, I don't really care. I'm shoving my course down your throat. It's at sixminutenetworking.com. It's about improving your relationship building skills.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
It's a free course. It's not cringy. It's very easy. It's not awkward. All of the excuses that you have for doing it are moot. And I'm not going to get into detail on that because that would require actual effort. And I am not going to make that effort.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
I'm just going to give you the URL, again, 6minutenetworking.com, and let you know that many of the guests on our show already subscribe and contribute to the course. So come join us. You'll be in smart company where you belong. Now, back to Jay Dobbins.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
I got to also say, like, being a female and putting yourself in a situation where a lot of just really terrible things can happen to you around guys like this, that is extra fearless. There's just an extra layer there. I know in the book you say you were anyway in the minority of cops who think that women are just as capable undercover as men. Am I reading that right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
The majority of cops didn't, at least at that time, think women could do this job?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
It also seems like if cops think that way, maybe criminals also think that way, which would make women even better for the job. Because if they're thinking they've never said a woman is an undercover, that'd be ridiculous. Then you have another layer of cover before people start to get suspicious.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
Oh, my God.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
I'm going to lighten it up a little bit if I can. Yeah, please do. Does the ATF pay for your expenses? Yeah, I'm sure if you buy some food or something, they pay for it. But you had a bunch of tattoos. Don't they make you or ask you to get tattoos? And it's, I'm not paying 300 bucks for this, this death's head. The U.S.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
taxpayer at least has to pay for it if I'm going to get needled up by the hell's angels.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
That's almost a whole sub conversation because they're going to ask you probably what the tattoo means to you. You almost need a cover story about that. You can't be like, wow, this one is my son and this one's my daughter and she loves to play the guitar. You have to be like, yeah, this is something totally different.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
No kidding. Yeah. Wow. You got to think about all these little tells, man. Everything. Yeah, that's crazy. You guys went to some pretty extreme lengths to prove credibility. There's this fake murder of one of the Mongol gangsters. This kind of got you, what, patched into the angels eventually. This was like your official graduation murder. I don't know.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
I didn't ask about this yet.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
That's like millions of dollars in payroll over two years.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
So the Hells Angels are essentially correct in that it's just too resource intensive to take them down. This operation, which nabs like a couple of guys in one segment of the organization, costs millions of dollars and takes two years.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
Gee, so even when you do something that you think is going to be the thing that they like the most, you're like, they might also kill us for doing this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
I was joking about how you pick the guy who gets covered in pig blood, but I assume, I don't know, it's a funny role either way. I am more curious about the FedEx box. So is there somebody who liaises with an office like FedEx and goes, we need a fake package from Mexico that really looks like it's from Mexico? Nobody drives to Mexico with this thing and then mails it FedEx.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
Yeah, just you never want somebody that like, my cousin works for FedEx. Let me just run this tracking number through her system. Yeah, you know, this doesn't exist. This is fake. It's not even the right number of digits.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
Yeah, I guess you could just take another package from Mexico and put the label, whatever. I'm sure you thought of all this. What ended up happening with the case? There was some disappointment, I would imagine, with how this shook out.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
Man, I don't fully understand, of course, what happened there, but I can certainly imagine your frustration. How did your undercover experience in such a dangerous gang change your outlook on life after the experience?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
Yeah, of course.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
Our mission is to help you become a better informed, more critical thinker through long-form conversations with a variety of amazing folks from spies to CEOs, athletes, authors, thinkers, performers, even the occasional special operator, national security advisor, economic hitman, or arms dealer. And if you're new to the show or you're looking for a handy way to tell your friends about it,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
Your family's house?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
Yeah, rightfully so. I mean, I can completely understand that. I mean, do you have to worry about them coming after you now? Or is it just too long ago?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
I can't defend that. I remember that mess was so bad that even Barack Obama took a punch for that one, right? People were saying, look, how did this happen under your watch? Look how egregious this is. And that was kind of the wake up call for everybody realizing that the guns that the cartels get are actually from the United States. I think many people didn't know that before.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
Thanks for coming back on the show, man. We had such a good response to the last one. I know everybody really appreciates it, especially me. You're a great storyteller and you tried to do the right thing. You're continuing to try to do the right thing. It's really admirable. It is a shame that you didn't have support when you needed it, though. I'll tell you that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
That's very disappointing to hear. Jay Dobbins, thank you very much, man. Right on. Thank you for having me. You're about to hear a preview of the Jordan Harbinger show with an undercover ATF agent that infiltrated the infamous Pagans biker gang.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
To hear how Ken Croke spent two years risking his life going through initiation in one of the most ruthless biker gangs in the world, check out episode 673 of The Jordan Harbinger Show. All things Jay Dobbins will be in the show notes at jordanharbinger.com. Advertisers, deals, discount codes, ways to support the show, all at jordanharbinger.com slash deals.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
Please consider supporting those who support the show. Our newsletter, We Bit Wiser, is a great companion to the show. I invite you to come check it out. It's practical. It'll have an immediate impact on your decisions, your psychology, your relationships. In under two minutes, we strive to make it concise, folks. Almost every Wednesday, jordanharbinger.com slash news is where you can find it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
Don't forget about 6-Minute Networking as well over at 6minutenetworking.com. I'm at Jordan Harbinger on both Twitter and Instagram. You can also connect with me on LinkedIn. And this show, it's created in association with Podcast One. My team is Jen Harbinger, Jace Sanderson, Robert Fogerty, Ian Baird, and Gabriel Mizrahi. Remember, we rise by lifting others.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
The fee for the show is you share it with friends when you find something useful or interesting. The greatest compliment you can give us is to share the show with those you care about. If you know somebody who's interested in these kinds of law enforcement undercover type of episodes, definitely share this one with them. This one's a banger.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
In the meantime, I hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn, and we'll see you next time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
Yeah, I'm sure I'll get emails from people in the audience. But is there anyone out there that can justify, hey, I got 25 AK-47s for legitimate personal use? I guess if you own a gun range, you could buy them and say, we rent these to people who come in and they want to shoot them. And we need this for like bachelor parties. We need 25.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
But other than that, I cannot think of a person who would need 25 of these unless you just have a lot of properties and you want one in every room and every property that you have.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
I suggest our episode starter packs. These are collections of our favorite episodes on topics like persuasion and negotiation, psychology and geopolitics, disinformation, China, North Korea, crime and cults and more. To help new listeners get a taste of everything we do here on the show, just visit jordanharbinger.com slash start or search for us in your Spotify app to get started.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
I'm actually not even worried about the people that buy that stuff. I'm just worried that they're going to get robbed by somebody who wants to commit crimes with those weapons. That's my main worry. The guy who makes a YouTube channel showing off his... silenced .50 caliber or whatever machine gun that he mounted to a truck. Like, that's just funny.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
Yeah, I assume most of these guys, one, you'd have to make sure they're not home because they're certainly armed. But two, I don't know how it works, but I assume once you start buying weapons like that, don't you have to get a license from the ATF? Certain kinds of weapons, you have to get some sort of permission, right? Some sort of special permission, yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
That seems quite reasonable.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
Look, I'm a gun owner as well, so I can relate. There are people that make reasonable arguments against having any kind of list. I don't want to be on a list. As a Jewish person, being on lists is never a comfortable thing for us either. So I get it. I understand not wanting to put your name on a list that makes you a target.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
Although you are a federal agent, right? So you have much more leeway about what you can buy and carry, right? Can't you guys carry higher capacity magazines and things like that?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
Today, Jay Dobbins back on the show. He joined the ATF, that's the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms, and went undercover in the Hells Angels.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
This might be a little bit outside of the area of your expertise, but what do you think about the cartels being labeled terrorist organizations, foreign terrorist organizations? I don't know if that actually happened or if it was just being discussed, but what do you think of that sort of change in policy?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
Yeah. As far as cartels being terrorist organizations, I mean, they murder tens of thousands of civilians in their own country and their products kill hundreds of thousands of people in our country. So I don't have any sympathy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
Last time we had him on, we talked about undercover operations, prepping for those in general, a few details here and there, but we didn't really get into the weeds on what it's like to go undercover in the Hells Angels, the most notorious biker gang in the world. In this episode, we're going to do a deep dive on that. I won't spoil it. Here we go with Jay Dobbins.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
Yeah, it'll be interesting to see what happens because eventually you would think that we're going to end up utilizing the ability to do that. Instead of having Mexican police go and round these guys up and then let them all go because they're on the take, you might see an A-10 just take down an entire plantation of cocaine or manufacturing facility.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
I'm curious what the counterarguments are to this. I'm worried about Mexican civilians, obviously, being anywhere near a military operation because being in a war zone is bad. But you could argue that they're already in a war zone. There's just no control or responsible parties involved.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
We see these photos online of the CNG cartel and they've got armored vehicles and all kinds of crazy tactical gear and weapons that you expect to see in Afghanistan or like the Gaza Strip. And they're just rolling around in these things in Mexico. They must get a lot of that from the United States. I don't know where they get the armored vehicles or if they make them somehow. I'm not even sure.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
That's something you would think you'd be able to figure out how somebody gets an armored personnel carrier into Mexico, but maybe not.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1137: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Three
Yeah, they wouldn't even hear us coming, I think. They would hear a loud jet engine and that would be the end of that whole convoy that they're taking photos of on Instagram. It'll be interesting to see how that plays out. So what kind of training do you get to go undercover? Who runs that? I assume the ATF doesn't just throw you into the deep end.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
This episode is sponsored in part by What Was That Like podcast. Have you ever wondered how it feels to watch your house burn down, be attacked by an alligator, or learn that your spouse hired someone to kill you? What Was That Like is the podcast for you, if you're that person. Not the person who got hired to be killed, but the person who wondered, more thankfully.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
Well, yeah, neither of us do. I mean, you're lucky in that those guys know you. So I think that you could probably sell a convincing story about you not meaning anything by this particular thing. I'm a fiction writer and I golfed with him two months ago. I'm not the guy. Although, wasn't there an impersonator of you that attracted the Secret Service's attention at a hotel or something?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
There's some story like this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
Our mission is to help you become a better informed, more critical thinker through long-form conversations with a variety of amazing folks, from spies to CEOs, athletes, authors, thinkers, and performers, even the occasional rocket scientist, investigative journalist, real-life pirate, or special operator.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
But that must have been super embarrassing for him to be like, oh, yeah, no, I was just saying that because I have nothing better to do. I can buy, you know, the James Patterson. Okay, yeah, God bless him. Putting shit on his room tab and he will stop impersonating you immediately.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
Good thinking.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
Sure, and you've got a story to tell. It's worth it. For mangoes and a story, sure, why not?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
And if you're new to the show or you want to tell your friends about the show, I suggest our episode starter packs. These are collections of our favorite episodes on persuasion and negotiation, psychology, geopolitics, disinformation, China, North Korea, crime and cults and more. That'll help new listeners get a taste of everything we do here on the show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
Yeah. Depending on how the food is, we'll tell you where you're at. You're listening to The Jordan Harbinger Show. We'll be right back. If you're wondering how I managed to book all these great authors, thinkers, and creatives every single week, it is because of my network. I'm teaching you how to build your network for free over at 6minutenetworking.com.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
This is the circle of people that you know, like, and trust. I know networking is kind of a schmoozy, gross word, but this course is about improving your relationship-building skills, inspiring other people to want to develop a relationship with you, and the course does all of that in a super easy, not cringey, very down-to-earth way, I'm not doing the awkward strategy thing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
I don't want people to feel bad or gross doing this. And it just takes a few minutes a day. And by the way, many of the guests on the show subscribe and contribute to this course. So come on and join us. You'll be in smart company where you belong. You can find the course at sixminutenetworking.com. And now back to the show. How did you discover that you could actually write?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
Wow. I should have addressed this at the top of the show, but I think, is it 114 New York Times bestsellers, or are we up? Is that old news?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
I don't know. You don't even care anymore. Yeah, and 67 of them or so started at number one. Surely that's a world record of some kind. Do you know that much?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
Just visit jordanharbinger.com slash start or search for us in your Spotify app to get started.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
You mentioned there was a series, was it Women's Murder Club, which you hated? Yeah. How does that happen? I guess they don't consult you too much on how these go.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
Yeah. And so when things go wrong, what usually goes wrong? The series that you didn't like, what happens?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
That is just insanity when you think about it. That's more than one book for every person in the United States. And that's just when he stopped counting. Apparently, there's like other numbers he just stopped. I guess at that point, it's like, eh, eh. Whatever, I've got the title. I don't need to wake up every morning and update it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
Real people come on every episode to explain the unbelievable situations they've been through. I think it's a funny concept for a show. I kind of wish I'd thought of it because I always get crazy stories from people. Not everything turns into a Jordan Harbinger episode. But What Was That Like?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
I think so. Yeah, I think so for sure. You're right. I don't get too much into politics on this show either, just because I think people need a break from it. You can find it literally anywhere. Maybe I can tune into Jordan and Jordan won't shove something down my throat. I'm always just sort of like, okay, let's keep a refuge from the drama.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
Before I forget, I heard Hollywood wanted to make one of your most popular main characters, Alex Cross, who we've mentioned before, they wanted to make him a white dude. So this is an awkward question, but why do you think they wanted to do that?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
Sure. And later that role was played by Morgan Freeman. So amazing, iconic kind of thing. You used to write ad copy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
No, I'm just trying to celebrate your sobriety or whatever we call it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
But you did keep that day job for, was it a couple of decades? Yeah, it was a long time, 24 years. 24 years to an overnight success, I guess, yeah. There's one ad that you wrote. I think you were recruiting writers and you wrote an ad.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
Here we go with James Patterson. Thank you for doing the show. I think you're on vacation or attempting to take a vacation.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
What does writing ads teach you about writing novels or about writing anything?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
100%.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
And licking it a little, eating a little cream pie. Calories don't count if it's stuck to your face. I know also with ads, one sentence has to flow into the next one. There's limited space. Each sentence has to be there for a reason. Does that affect how you write your novels? I mean, you have plenty of space when you write now. It's a little bit different story.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
What gave you the initial courage back in, was it 1996, to leave a good career in advertising and then go do something where almost nobody succeeds, actually?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
Yeah, good for you. I like that. I kind of feel the same way most of the time. And it's truly a privilege to be able to do something you love. And it sounds like you're in the same boat. Yeah, 100%. Your story in your autobiography about golfing in winter, that's why I don't golf, man. Someone tried to teach me in winter in New York, and you couldn't hammer a tee into the ground.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
No, I don't want more money. I'm going to leave. I was going to say, probably try to give you a raise. You're lucky it was back then, because now they'll be like, what if we let you work remotely? That's how they keep you now.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
I know that you, at least back in those days, would get up early and right, like 5 o'clock in the morning. You probably don't have to get up then now. I do. Really? I still get up at 5.30ish, yeah. You mentioned some imposter syndrome, feeling a little bit like a fraud. They're going to find out I'm not supposed to be as successful as I am. Do you still have that?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
You won. Yeah, exactly.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
Clever. Super disappointing, but clever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
It doesn't work for podcasters. If you tell somebody you're a podcaster, they rightfully chuckle to themselves and then ask which basement you live in, your mother's or your father's.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
Yeah, you're right. That is worse. It's funny you had trouble getting published, man. Every successful author always mentions how hard it was to get anyone to believe in them.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
What keeps you going? Did you ever start to think maybe they're right? My book is not worth publishing after all.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
Was it goose turds or seagull turds? I was going to say, those are some small tees at that point if you're using seagull turds.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
Yeah, I guess you never know, I suppose. Have you ever had writer's block? Have you ever been like, wow, nothing's coming into my brain?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
No, just cut me, doc. Yeah. Is this going to be forever? All right. Give me the anesthesia.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
Yeah. No, just give me a couple Tylenol, man. A few. Yeah. That's scary. That would be like, you're not going to be able to talk for a few days. And then three weeks on, I'm like, how many days did you say this is going to be? Yeah. A few. Yeah. That would not work for me. I can't imagine that feeling. You're listening to The Jordan Harbinger Show. We'll be right back.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
If you like this episode of the show, I invite you to do what other smart and considerate listeners do, which is take a moment and support those who make this show possible. All of the deals, discount codes, and ways to support this podcast are searchable and clickable over at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. You can also use the AI chatbot on the website, jordanharbinger.com slash AI.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
You can ask that thing just about anything, including promo codes. And if you can't remember the name of a sponsor, you can't find the code, there's a problem with the code, whatever, shoot me an email, Jordan at JordanHarbinger.com. I am more than happy to surface those codes for you whenever I can. It is that important that you support those who support the show. And now, back to the show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
I suppose it must certainly happen where you run into a little bit of a block and it sounds like you jump into something else.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
Your agent must love that when he gets a manuscript. He's like, TBD for the next three chapters, and then you jump ahead. Let me fill those in for you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
So you're big on literacy, obviously. Thanks for that. I think more of us need to be big on literacy. But you're also big on, I think you've coined this term, thinkeracy, which resonates well with me. Teaching people how to think. It's the mission of the show, actually.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
All the time. I'm a judgy SOB. That's my problem. I'm a judgy guy. So I always get it wrong. I have to be open to that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
Get lost. Yeah, exactly. How do you improve thinkeracy inside your home? What do you do with your own kids? Or what did you do with your own kids?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
Yeah, it's hard, right? We want our kids to be happy. We want them to follow their interests, but we also want them to be gainfully employed at some point in their life. Now, okay, so your outlines are 50 to 80 pages. You mentioned also that you use a pencil because you like to erase. No computer. Is that still the case?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
So if you get stuck, you just move to the next chapter or even a different book. So if that's what happens, do you have a zillion partially written book manuscripts laying around the house? No.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
Gotcha. I was thinking you're going to be like Tupac releasing a new album every year after you've been dead for 20 years. 2065, James Patterson at the top of the New York Times list once again. The new, right. Because we opened up a sock drawer, found it at the bottom of his sock drawer, three unpublished. Right, right, right, yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
is hosted by my friend Scott Johnson, who's naturally curious and gives his guests the opportunity to share how they've really felt during some of their most surreal experiences. What they did in the morning before an earthquake, what song was playing as a gunman entered, was their stomach growling as they hid? Guests share everything they remember about their crazy, crazy experiences.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
You know, New Yorkers, man. For me, that was the beginning and the end. I think if I learned to play in California, maybe it would have been a different story.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
Big boys, too. Big hugs. Big boys and men need hugs, too, man. There's nothing wrong with that. I'm a firm believer in that myself. I think it's a great idea to give your kid a hug every single day, no matter how old they are. Before I forget, I want to wrap up some of the tactical creation stuff.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
You craft the bones of the chapter first, and I've heard you never polish the chapter before the book is starting to really take shape and be done. And is the logic here that if you polish something too much, you might not want to get rid of it, even if you really should?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
Yeah. You know what? I understand that. What's that showbiz saying? Kill your darlings. Sometimes you got to do that. I do that with show notes. Oh, this story is so funny, but it's not the time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
That's the story of my life. My to-do list is an exercise in futility a lot of the time. And it's a lot of stuff in there is designed to keep me busy and away from the actual work that matters. That's a whole separate topic. Make sure you research the best screen cover for your Apple Watch, like just meaningless tasks, meaningless. You've met a lot of amazing people, presidents, celebrities.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
I was reading your bio prior to the show. You have a lot of honorary degrees. So how does that work? Do we have to call you doctor, doctor, doctor, doctor, doctor, doctor?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
And some of these stories, I have to say, are pretty odd. Warren Beatty sending someone to meet you in a restaurant and he was in the restaurant just watching you. And then the Tom Cruise thing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
Oh, I'm at CAA too. God knows what rung I'm on if you're on a lower rung than Tom Cruise.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
Yeah, that is surprising. That's not the brand most people... You know, she's smart. Right. I've heard that you put your favorite products in your books to get free stuff. Yeah, that's a little bit of a joke. Oh, it's a joke. I was going to say, I do that with this podcast all the time. Usually while drinking an ice cold Spindrift flavored water. Delicious. Didn't work very well.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
There's people out there that are going to try and use those chewed up erasers to clone you someday. Just throw that out there.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
I did officiate a wedding. I don't know if that makes me a minister. I'm not sure how that works. But this show would gain a lot of credibility if this was hosted by Dr. Jordan Harbinger instead of just me in a T-shirt. Sure, you can do it. Will you still be in a T-shirt? I'd have to wear a white lab coat to cement my authority. Yeah, I think so. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
It's a lot. Yeah, that's impressive. I know that you finished a book that was being written by the late, great Michael Crichton, who did Jurassic Park and everything. And his wife brought the book to you to finish it, which is a really cool honor, I would imagine.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
It was very cool. How do you balance honoring Michael Crichton's legacy with adding your own style to a collaboration like this where your collaborator's literally not with us?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
You mentioned doing a lot of interviews with radio personalities who just ask you what the new book is about, and I just find that kind of hilarious. This interview might actually have some substance. I hope that's okay with you. I'm going to give it a shot. That'll be a switch, yeah. The autobiography was really good, though. A lot of people's autobios are not that interesting.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
It is a cool honor. And look, I know we're running short on time. Your newest book, American Heroes, is available now. And I know that because I was just in an airport. And if you set foot in any airport, you can't miss it. I'm getting it for my dad. He just had a hip replacement and he loves this kind of stuff. Speaking of covers that stand out, it's really well designed.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
It's quite timely because I think a lot of people are having the patriotism conversation now.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
Just do the right thing. Just do the right thing. Look, I'm thinking easier said than done, but not necessarily sometimes. It's tough in this day and age, I think, for people to live their values because there's a lot of pushback, especially depending on how loud you live in those values.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
Yeah. That's for sure. Yeah. That does make it more of a challenge, but maybe it shouldn't. James, thank you so much for doing the show. I know I'm honored to just be sitting here with you today and I appreciate your time. Cool. All right. I hope it turns out good for you. Thank you, Jordan. It was a pleasure. Yeah, this was fun.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
Join us as Mustafa Suleiman, Microsoft AI CEO, discusses the pivotal role of artificial intelligence in shaping the future, from job automation to national security.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
Character development may have left a little to be desired, but other than that, I enjoyed it. You know, some plot holes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
To explore the critical ethical, societal and geopolitical challenges AI poses in the 21st century and what we can do to harness its power responsibly on episode 972 of The Jordan Harbinger Show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
And honestly, his most famous body of work is probably still, I think most of us of our generation could probably still sing it. I know I could.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
Also, our newsletter, We Bit Wiser. The idea behind this is to give you something specific, something practical, something that'll have an immediate impact on your decisions, your psychology, your relationships in under two minutes. And if you haven't signed up yet, I invite you to come check it out. It is a great companion to the show. jordanharbinger.com slash news is where you can find it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
Don't forget about Six Minute Networking as well over at sixminutenetworking.com. I'm at Jordan Harbinger on Twitter and Instagram. You can also connect with me and or Gabriel on LinkedIn. This show is created in association with Podcast One. My team is Jen Harbinger, Jace Sanderson, Robert Fogarty, Ian Baird, and Gabriel Mizrahi. Remember, we rise by lifting others.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
The fee for the show is you share it with friends when you find something useful or interesting. The greatest compliment you can give us is to share the show with those you care about. If you know somebody who maybe needs to rebuild or reboot their creativity, definitely share this episode with them. In the meantime... I hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
The European versus USA press interview differences, I've never heard anybody talk about this. You seem to think the Europeans actually sounds like they prepare for the interview as opposed to just... They prep a little better, but it's just different kinds of questions.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
And we'll see you next time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
It just seems like that would be such a tedious thing to create from an interviewer perspective. But it also must be tedious for you to do the rounds when you're like, this person looked at the back cover.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
That's right. Yeah, I don't expect the end for a while if you're writing as much as you are, and we'll get to that in a minute. I have heard you say some books and things like that are too long, where a paragraph could actually just be one sentence.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
I feel that way about most media, especially podcasting. The new trend, I'm not sure if you've experienced this yet, but the new trend is three to four hour long shows. I think I'm experiencing it right now. You are experiencing part of it right now.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
The trend is like these four hour long shows that I can assume are only listened to as background noise or by long haul truckers or somebody who's really stoned or something. But usually the interviews could have been done by somebody better prepared in about an hour. And that's kind of what we're going for here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
I'm curious how you think about this process, because for me, it's about respecting the listener's time. Do you think about the reader in the same way?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
So if you want to hear some disturbing slash inspiring firsthand stories about the thoughts that go through your head while surviving a kidnapping or winning the Price is Right, What Was That Like? is the podcast you've been looking for. Every story is thoroughly researched and fact-checked so you know even the most unreal stories are actually someone's reality. Listen to What Was That Like?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
It's a really nice, at least the first season. I've heard you say something along the lines of, I started leaving out the parts that people skip. How did you find out what people were skipping? Did you literally ask or did you just assume?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
I kind of like that mindset, actually. Like you said, you're writing as if somebody is sitting across from you. What does that actually do if I'm trying to write something?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
Other than that, it's great. There's something you said in your autobiography, I think, which was something like, beginnings and ends are great, but middles get you the Nobel Prize. Nobody writes middles.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
Yeah, I can appreciate that, though. You as a guy who's done a ton of media, me as a guy who's produced a ton of media. The worst part about media is any sort of structure that changes the conversation in a way that's less authentic or tries to get to the root of things quicker in some ways.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
Look, there's a difference between being prepared for a conversation and saying this has to fit into 44 minutes. No more, no less. So we're going to fluff out this beginning part because I think it's going slowly. But then at the end, we have to crash into this wall and get all of this stuff done.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
wherever you get your podcasts. Coming up next on the Jordan Harbinger Show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
You're known for, do we call it colloquial writing? Is that a fair thing to say? Yeah, sure. We could do that. It's sort of what Larry King pioneered, but on radio. Larry King was the guy who was like, I'm just going to have a conversation. And your writing is more like, I'm just going to tell you a story as opposed to some sort of flowering.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
We're good friends. Yeah. I read that. What a gem she is. I don't know anybody that has a negative sort of impression of Dolly Parton. That's hard to do over a career that long.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
How do you think about structuring your work? What does the idea generation phase look like? Maybe that's a better place to start.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
That's something I didn't necessarily expect. So how do you plan the outline? Because it sounds like you plan the outline, but like you said, you're not married to it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
Yeah, this is fascinating. I'm always blown away by, you're familiar with this as well, a director sees the movie in their mind and then goes to make it and they're moving things around. It sounds like you're doing that with your books and your stories.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
Yeah, I think a lot of writers are probably not a big fan of that kind of thing. Where do you get the ideas slash inspiration for some of these things?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
That's the whole whole idea.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
Anything you write seems to do well, so you don't need the peanut gallery over here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
If somebody steals it, we'll sue them. Nobody listens to this podcast. You have nothing to worry about. Oh, perfect. Okay, all right. So the ideas that are in the box, those are also your ideas. You watch TV and movies and go, oh, there's a funny thing. Or are you sitting in a room full of chiropractors giving a keynote and you're like, what if the FBI kicked the door down and arrested everyone?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
That's a good opening scene.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1100: James Patterson | Building the Architecture of Addictive Fiction
Welcome to the show. I'm Jordan Harbinger. On the Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the stories, secrets, and skills of the world's most fascinating people and turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
I make a good living. Would you ever buy a Rolls Royce?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
So not metal.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Okay, why do you do that?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
They got air conditioning now. You know that, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
It's liberating to drive something like that, isn't it? Yeah. Oh man, it's a tight parking space. What if someone swings a door open? Whatever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Just visit jordanharbinger.com slash start, or search for us in your Spotify app to get started. Now, today on the show, lead singer of metal band, and it's probably even like Heavier than that, but whatever. Lamb of God. Randy Blythe joins me here in studio.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
It's not mine. Exactly. I know what that's like. The more crap you have, there's this phrase like possessions own you or something like that. It's,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Whenever you get, like if this is Aura Ring, it's a sleep tracker.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
You've lost two? Okay.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
They're fun. When you get one, you're like, oh, it's pristine. It looks so nice. And then you hold a fork and you're like, oh, did that just scratch that thing? And you get mad for a couple hours and then you realize, now I can scratch it a hundred more times. It doesn't matter because it's no longer. So once you get over that hump, Or you never had it because you bought the car used.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
You just don't have to worry about that. And it's very freeing to be like, yeah, this is the phone that has a crack in the side already. So it just doesn't matter.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
What do you think you'll get?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Like, oh, my God. The trick is to get it, kick a dent in the door with your boot the first day. Yeah, there you go. No worries. Yeah. There was a show, Californication, where David Duchovny was in it or something. He buys a new Porsche. He looks at it, scowls, and he whacks one of the headlights with like a metal rod and breaks it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
And he's like, all right, it's some sort of metaphor or whatever for the show that I probably didn't pick up on. But I was like, oh, I see what you did there. Make sure it's no longer pristine. There's a viral video of you trying to go backstage. I don't know where it is, but this is- Bloodstock. Okay.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Yeah, and the woman stops you, and someone's like, do you know who this guy is? And it was one of the reasons I booked this interview, because you handled that so well. Do you mind telling us the little anecdote? Sure.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Like an ID card thing?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
I'm not much of a metal guy, but Randy has quite a story from his upbringing to his music career, the way he views the business, creativity, touring, recording, merch, and more. He's battled addiction, the music industry, even a murder charge that landed him in a Nazi prison castle in another country, which, well, yeah, we'll hear about that. It wasn't necessarily a fun time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Right. I could be anybody.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Yeah, I think a lot of people said, whoa, this guy's super down to earth and really cool for not, that's how low the bar is though, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
It's not hard. Yeah, that's how low the bar really is. Or they expected less out of you, Randy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Resting jerk face? Not really.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
It stops you from getting mugged.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
don't you know who I am? No, I just work here. Yeah, exactly. And I don't listen to this crap.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
That's great. Yeah, having worked venue security, do you know who that is? No, I'm literally wearing headphones because I don't want to hear this shit.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
It was pretty funny. She's a very sweet girl. That's what people loved about that. I think it was a wholesome interaction. By the way, what happened? He had so many dreads. Then I looked you up and I was like, oh, that's not the same guy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
How does that even work? Because soaking wet giant mop of dreads, it's got to weigh like 30 pounds.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
No, but my brother-in-law and all my friends.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
However, this conversation was fun. It's insightful, and I think you're really going to enjoy it. even if you don't listen to music that's loud enough to break your car windows. All right, here we go with Randy Blythe. 30 years in the band. That's an objectively long time for any project, but I think for music, it's got to be top percentile of we haven't killed each other yet.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Yeah. Why can't I put, oh, right, because I'm holding myself down. My buddy, he surfs He ended up with, have you ever heard of surfer's myelopathy? It's a super rare disease, a rare thing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
You're not going to get this. Apparently, every case has been Asian men because of where their nerves are located in their back. But I guess something where you put your hands on the board and pop your spine, like that cobra yoga position. Yes, that's a pop-up. that can pinch nerves in your back, but again, only in Asian males or something, generally.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
And he got that, and what it does is it makes it so that you can't really walk, because it's some sort of impingement of a nerve. You can't really walk, and then he couldn't pee. So he goes to the hospital, and he's like, I have to pee super bad, but I can't relax whatever muscle that is. And they're like, okay, this is gonna be uncomfortable.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
They put a catheter, and he's like, it was actually the best, most welcome, because imagine having to pee Worse than you've ever had to pee in your entire life.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
I suppose that's what has to happen, right? So where the muscle gives out and it just dribbles out. What do I know? The awkward transition. But what happens if you're playing on stage and you really have to go to the bathroom or something? Are you just stuck?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
What I do before the show, but I still end up taking a break in the middle of having to go to the bathroom. Sure.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
It's coming out one day. You know?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Oh, man. Yeah, that's interesting because you think, okay, you can empty your bladder, say, okay, no drinking an hour beforehand. Well, then you're dehydrated. You're dehydrated then, especially if you're playing outside in the summer and it's 95 degrees in the shade. You have to deal with that. And yeah, being sick, what happens if a band your size has to cancel a show? What is the process like?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Do you have to refund everybody?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Sure, they flew in and took a week off or whatever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Yeah, the venue.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Oh man, you need like startup capital. Yes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
God, and your bandmates would be pissed too. Because look, if you're dying from food poisoning, they understand, I would assume. But nobody wants to go, oh, he's a little tired. Let's cancel the show. Hey, that's my $15,000 and your $15,000. Each of us are chipping in for all the deposits. And we're paying for everything else. Right. This is my kid's college tuition money.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Yeah, it's got to be for a damn good reason. Oh, yeah, let's go out for sushi. You know what? Actually, we're headlining tomorrow. Let's not go out for sushi.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Really? Sadly. Oh, man. I feel like mine has gone up, much like you needed the headphone volume turned way up. I need my spice volume turned way up now that I'm 45.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Yeah. But it's wise. You have to think about what you're going to eat. For me, it's before a plane ride or a big interview. It's, hey, do you want to have this questionable oyster omelet for breakfast? Right. Sure, sir. Oh, I think we're going to do some sausage and pancakes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
I always just thought it was a great expression. Definitely true. The only times I've had food poisoning has always been like, I will have the seafood pasta. Oh, that one tasted funny. The rest of it was fine. And then the next day you're just like, cancel everything for the next four days. No bueno. Done. You guys can't make too many mistakes on it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Yeah. It's surprising when you read that. You go, wait, what? That was seven years?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Like I can go, uh, what else do I want to talk about? Oh, we already talked about that. And then they'll just edit it out and make it look like I know what I'm doing. Sure. Surely there are mistakes that happen during shows, and then what do you do when that happens?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
It'd be refreshing. It's like an outtake at the end of a comedy movie where you're like, oh, they screwed up the line in that scene.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Do you guys do pyrotechnics and stuff?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
What do you think about that?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Including the fireworks?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
We need more fire.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
What genre would you say it is?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Because you see it now with lasers and lasers are cool. They're super cool. There is something missing when there's no explosion. Maybe I'm just old fashioned. It's a primal thing. Fire is very primal. The feeling of the explosion going off is also absent when you just have a laser thing happening or drone thing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
And now your ears will ring from the explosively good deals on the fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back. This episode is sponsored in part by Oura Ring. I've been rocking the Oura Ring since Gen 1, back when it looked like some sort of gadget from the future. Now we're on Gen 4. I've got to say, it just keeps getting better, sleeker, more comfortable, smarter.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
I wear mine 24-7 without even thinking about it. What I really love is it's hands down the best sleep tracker out there. I'm not just talking about, hey, you got six hours and 12 minutes of sleep. And yes, I did last night, hence the coffee. Oura gives you actual insights, your sleep stages, recovery, heart rate variability, temperature changes. It's like a full sleep lab on your finger.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
And sleep isn't just about feeling rested. Quality sleep is one of the biggest factors for long-term health and longevity. So if you want to live better, longer, you really have to start with how you sleep. Jen wears one. My brother-in-law wears one. Gabriel wears one. We definitely compare scores because we're nerds like that. There's circles so you can basically check in on your family.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Do you guys all get along pretty well? Yes. That's important, eh?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
It helps keep us aware of how we're sleeping, how we should be sleeping. It's made me way more conscious about stuff like rest, recovery, going to bed on time, not just powering through exhaustion like some sort of hustle culture maniac. So if you care about how you feel, start with how you sleep. Give Aura the finger. Learn more at AuraRing.com slash Jordan. That's AuraRing.com slash Jordan.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
This episode is sponsored in part by Airbnb. I gotta give a shout out to Brian McDonald, who listened to the show and absolutely hooked me up in Vietnam recently. Brian runs A Taste of Hanoi, and I had this layover in Hanoi, and he's like, I got you, set me up with one of his guides for a motorbike food tour in Hanoi, which was awesome.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Now, if you've never been in the back of a motorbike in Vietnam, it's something, man. You're weaving through scooters and traffic like a video game where you can actually die, and then all of the sudden, we're inside someone's house, literally inside. We rode the motorbike. I'll tell you, the guide pulls you to what looks like an alley, okay?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
but it turns into a hallway and then he turns around, grins and goes, okay, put your hands on my shoulders, duck your head down, pull your knees all the way in. The next thing I know, we're riding through someone's living room, not even kidding, like actually someone's living room to get to this little courtyard kitchen where this auntie is making pho that'll just ruin your life.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
That's impressive.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
No far will ever taste as good. And Vietnamese egg coffee upstairs on the balcony. I don't even know how to describe it. It's like tiramisu and espresso had a beautiful caffeinated baby. Short trip, chaotic, absolutely incredible. And I can't wait to go back and bring Jen next time because I know she's going to love it. And next time we'll put our place on Airbnb to help fund the adventure.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Grievances add up over time. I think every human knows that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
You can too. Airbnb makes it super practical. It doesn't take a lot of effort. You set it up before you leave, and then boom, your house is earning money while you're on vacation and making memories. Your home might be worth more than you think. Find out how much at Airbnb.com slash host. If you're wondering how I managed to book guests like Randy Blythe, it is because of my network.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
These always come through warm intros, folks. It's not just falling in my lap for no reason. I'm teaching you how to build your network for free. Now, I know you're probably not booking for a podcast, but everything that has come through in my life and business, including meeting my wife, has come through this circle of people that I know, like, and trust. So I don't care if you're retired.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
I don't care if it's your first day of work or you're still in college. These are skills that are going to pay off for the rest of your life, professionally and personally. The course is not cringy. It's not the sort of stuff you see on Instagram. I don't want to get in too much detail about that. It's not silly. It's not going to make other people feel gross, make you look dumb.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Six Minute Today is all it takes. And many of the guests on the show subscribe and contribute to that course. So come on and join us. You'll be in smart company where you belong. You can find the course again. It's all free at sixminutenetworking.com. All right, back to Randy Blythe. You had a bout with alcoholism. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Yeah. I would love to hear about that because it sounded like your life revolved around booze for that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
14. I don't know where I got 10. It's a nice, easy number to say. It's probably in your book. And I was like, oh, time has not evolved since I've read this piece of thing that he wrote four years ago.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
He's an artist. It's normal for him to have whiskey for breakfast.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Oh, so you're like, should we burn the boats?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
You're not writing pop songs for Taylor Swift.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Right, I see.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Who was it? Sid Vicious who died of heroin when he was like 21.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
That's like a child.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
And he was a hardcore junkie.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
It's beneficial for my voice to smoke this cigarettes and nonstop.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
I see. Shut the machine down.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
We were wondering if you were going to have this conversation.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Yeah, exactly.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Did you have withdrawal symptoms and everything?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
That is fortunate, yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Oh, that's terrible.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
I was just going to say the same thing. Kill your darlings, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Yeah, geez. Yeah, it depends on your organs. Did you get fat during this time? Because alcohol is a shitload of calories. I tried my best to get a beer gut. Didn't happen? Oh, yeah, I have a six-pack now because I've been eating too much fast food.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Yeah, that's nonsense. Nobody likes you for that. You said in the book, no one is more educated about your beliefs than yourself, in theory. And then I'm paraphrasing here, but you go on to say, but if you don't question or analyze these or look at your beliefs critically, you just take them at face value, then you're driven by fear. Can you expand on that a little bit?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
That is my plan.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
You really understand it when you do something. I'll make a joke that I think is hilarious or something. And then my producer will go, I took the liberty of deleting that terrible, unfunny, somewhat offensive joke. And I'm like, not that one. That was gold. What do you think? Show notes guy. And he's, oh, that doesn't strike me as something that you should say.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Black and white thinking.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Everybody else in my bubble agrees.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Evolve, yeah. A friend of mine, she asked why I eat meat. She's a vegetarian. And we were hiking, so I had eight hours to think about the answer. I was like, let me get back to you. And at the bottom of the mountain, I said, I think it's because I'm a hypocrite. And she's, what do you mean? And I said, I would never let anybody eat my dog just because they eat dog in their culture or whatever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Right. But I will eat chickens and cows and lambs and I just don't care.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
I understand if someone is starving and they steal my dog, I can empathize with that. But it's not like I would butcher my own dog because I'm just too lazy to go to the grocery store. No. But then you go, yes, I know these animals are mistreated, but I'll still eat them. And the only honest answer is because I just am able to compartmentalize it and not look at it and not care. Absolutely.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
And it's hypocritical to do that. Yes. And you just have to accept that about yourself. And it's not comfortable to be like, yeah, I have beliefs that don't make sense because they're convenient.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
It is. It's really gross.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
And I'm like, actually, these guys are looking out for me.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Yeah. Once you have kids, it's even harder, man. I got to tell you, like I looked at my electric, I used to be one of those guys, turn off all the lights, wash clothes once a week. I looked at my electric bill. I goes, that line us. And she goes, no, that's the line of how average people, our house size in our area, their electricity that they use.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
And I was like, what's the giant line that goes all the way across the page? That's our house. And I was like, how do we use 300% more electricity than other average people in our area? And she's like, we work from home. We have two kids. Your parents come over every night. We have an electric stove. And this is horrifying, but what are you going to do? Have your kids sit in the dark?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Wear poopy clothes? Yeah. And you have to just eventually go, damn, I'm not this good person that I thought I was, or I'm not this environmentalist that I thought I was.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
But the batteries were mined by children in Africa.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
I agree. I got a little derailed there, but you said in the book, my head is a bad neighborhood to get lost in.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
What do you mean by that?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Complete destruction of your life.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
I forgot my laminate. Dot, dot, dot. Exactly. Thermonuclear warfare.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Deliver a story well.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
She went to college after having a bunch of kids and stuff? Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
That's good.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
We didn't know anything was wrong. That's how well they handled it. That's very impressive.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Yeah, oh God, I can relate, man.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Really? Skateboarding wasn't cool in the 80s?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
We were just using it as a random insult. Until your friend goes, hey, by the way, that's a slur. I had a friend who was like, I'm gay and that's a slur. And I was like, oh, come on. And he's like, no, it's like the N word for gay. And I was like...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Thank God we didn't have social media when we were kids. Dude. Can you imagine all the crap that would have been filmed of us doing?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
I did and said so many dumb things, even through college, everything. Oh, yeah. Unbelievable. Yeah, absolutely. You and I would not be able to have careers because they'd be like, here's a tape from... 10 years ago where you were saying all these different, yeah, but I was just drunk at a party. We don't care. You're a racist.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
The only saving grace now is in a few years you'll be able to go, that was AI. That's fake. That wasn't me. Yeah, yeah. It's getting real scary. Look, here's the full video. And then the kid starts flying through the air. You just have to make a fake one.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
It's only funny because of your unique personal experience and context with that particular story. And when people hear it, they're like, oh, that was the punchline? Okay.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
By the way, you taught me something in your book that I've never heard, which is also really scary, that you can rip your larynx if you hold back a sneeze. This is true. One, how did you learn that? And two, that sounds terrible. Do you know anyone who's done that? No, I do not.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
The boy in the bubble. There's a reference of people who are younger than us are not going to understand. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
It might have been. Actually, you might be right. Wow, that was seriously old. So for people who have no idea what we're talking about, this is a kid who, based on a true story, had autoimmune disease. Or like no immune system or something?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Basically, he had to live in like the equivalent of a big old fish tank kind of thing with a fan blowing the air.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
When you're driving? Yes. So that you don't slam on the accelerator?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Yeah, get to clean the windshield afterwards, I guess. I put a hand over my mouth.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
But theoretically, your fans are also some of those people. But yeah, if you get zero laughs, it's like you start crossing stuff off the set list.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Yes, of course. And spread my germs all over. Spread it everywhere. Do you have vocal damage or anything from years of essentially screaming?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
You don't have nodules in there or anything? Maybe. It doesn't sound like it. Sometimes you can tell, like when Steven Tyler's got something going on. Yeah, that's vocal damage. I don't think he always sounded like that. He can still sing, like, high notes and everything. It's just there's one segment of his larynx or whatever that's probably shredded up.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Is there a range that you can't sing? Like, do you ever go, oh, I'm going to sing to my nieces and nephews and go, oh, God, I can't actually do the Frozen soundtrack at all?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
You give them the Lamb of God version of it?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
The gold never bothered me anyway. Do you have, was it tinnitus, the perpetual ringing in your ears? It comes and goes. I see. Do you actually have hearing damage from?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Yeah, it's terrible.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Yeah, that's one of those scary things. There's no cure for it. And you think, oh, yeah, mild annoyance. But yeah, multiple people have told me that when they have it, it's beyond annoying. It's like they consider making it all end because there's no way to stop it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
I heard you don't actually like recording music. You just tolerate the recording of the music.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Why is that? I think that probably confuses people.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
What do you mean?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Like when you play a video game for too long and you go to sleep and it's in your head.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Lamb of God got popular over a longer period of time. This was not like one album, oh my gosh, these are the greatest. Play it on every radio station. No, no, no.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Yeah. Then also, you don't want to record it at classical music volume and find out it doesn't sound quite right at 11 or whatever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Oh, that's funny. You tuned it right away.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Where the Muppet thing was? Oh, that's cool. That's got to be a kind of a cool place to do something like that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
I forgot about that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Do you feed off the crowd, too? Oh, 100%. Even with the lights where you can't see anybody, or does that not happen at your kind of shows?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Yeah, that's what they're paying for.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
You know what's better than doing time in a Nazi Czech prison castle? The great deals and discounts on the fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back. This episode is sponsored in part by Audible. People always ask me how I managed to get through so much content, especially since I prep for every interview.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
I'm talking two to three books a week, and it's all thanks to Audible. I've got Audible in my ears while I'm getting my 10,000 steps in, running errands, even doing stuff around the house. I don't mess with physical books anymore at all. Audible's just way more efficient. I listen on two or even three X speed, which lets me cover a lot of ground without sacrificing quality.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Right now, I'm listening to Good Inside by Dr. Becky Kennedy. She's got this really down-to-earth way of talking about parenting that is not preachy. And here's what a lot of people don't realize. Audible is not just audiobooks anymore.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
You get access to thousands of titles with your membership, podcasts, Audible Originals, and cool stuff like their Words in Music series where artists tell their stories in their own words. The variety makes the membership way more valuable, so you never run out of great stuff to check out. One day I'm deep in a parenting guide, the next it's a podcast or a spy thriller.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
What did you do?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
So whether you're into suspense, self-development, or you just want to make traffic suck less, Audible's got you covered.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
I've got homes.com as a sponsor for this episode. Homes.com knows when it comes to home shopping, it's never just about the house or the condo. It's about the homes. And what makes a home is more than just the house or property. It's the location. It's the neighborhood. If you've got kids, it's also schools, nearby parks, transportation options.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
You do go into some kitchens and hear crazy music going on in there. And you see the tats, especially in LA. You're like, that guy is at the Viper Room tonight.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
If you like this episode of the show, I invite you to do what smart and considerate listeners do. That is take a moment and support the amazing sponsors who make this show possible. All of the deals, discount codes, and ways to support this podcast are searchable and clickable over on the website at jordanharbinger.com slash deals.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
If you can't remember the name of a sponsor, you're not sure if there's a code, seriously, just email us jordan at jordanharbinger.com. The team is happy to surface those codes for you. It is that important that you support those who support the show. All right. Now for the rest of my conversation with Randy Blythe. What is this Czech prison story? I know a little bit about it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Stacey, who's out there, who I think is maybe my boss, I'm not sure. Right. Basically, if the company had to choose one of us, they would choose her over me. But anyway, she was like, you got to ask him about the Czech prison story. And I thought it was going to be like some hilarious night out that ended in you going to prison. Not really the case. No, no, no.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
At the previous show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
I was going to say, they just didn't tell you. No, no, no. Because you got flown back there, obviously.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Oh, shoot. So this wasn't like a long weekend.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Oh, I see. Wow.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
So I'm sure that everyone said, hey, don't go back there because the trial could go any way and you have no control and they're not going to extradite you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Especially if the U.S. government said this is nonsense. They're not going to cooperate. So why did you go back?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Yeah, man, that's got to be tough ending a tour and being like, I'm on top of the world. And then you go back and they're like, yeah, you can have the crappiest hours. And also the chef is still an asshole and the tips are still not shared with the back of the house.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
It's horrible. As a parent.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Sorry to hear that, though.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
That's fascinating that you can draw a line from that to being dead, essentially. Yeah, that's fascinating. I was not really expecting that. That's quite fascinating. What is Czech prison like, dare I ask? Have you been to a jail in America? Sure. I've been to the drunk tank a few times. What's Czech prison like comparatively to...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Oh, wow. So it's like a dungeon or something like that?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
We're going to put you in the most depressing place. Exactly. So they put you in the basement. Oh, my gosh. And if you're not suicidal, you're going to be when you get out of here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Oh my God, that blade's dull.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Oh my God.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
And then the German government gave it to him. They have to. Okay, we had you do this work for us. We don't like it. Are we then going to also stiff you on the payment? What an awkward situation that is.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
You've had bandmates say, like, I hate touring. This is prison. Are you sure about that, bro?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Not really.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Wow. Yeah, the Nazi prison that was then probably like a communist gulag or something.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Oh, I didn't know that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Have you been back since the acquittal? No. Is that no thank you, or is it like, oh, we just haven't had a tour there?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
So you don't want it to come out and they're like, oh, we're reliving this now.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Yeah, that's understandable. You're very passionate about this charity, Be The Match, which is funny because I've done this and I'm waiting for my call so I can pat myself on the back for saving someone's life. But I just thought, oh, I'm going to get a call like next week after that. It's been like 15 years. It's not like a blood type thing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
We'll link to it in the show notes. Because people should do this. All you do is spit into a vial. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
That's an interesting way to look at it. That's a very sort of Ryan Holiday, who I know you know. He's a good friend. Good mutual friend of ours. It's a good way to look at it. He's got that memento mori thing, but he's also got the kind of stoicism where it's, you're the emperor today and tomorrow you're sweeping the streets. Yes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Oh, that's significant.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
I didn't even know you could die that fast. That's terrible.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
How does it... I can't even wrap my mind around it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
I'm like, oh, I'm feeling tired. And then it's like, you just die?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
We talked about how your band grew slowly-ish over the 30-year period. Do you think that was healthy for you guys? 100%, I'd be dead if not. Because the overnight fame's not good for anybody, but you see these bands where the kid's like 21 or 20, and you go, wow, there's no human on earth that's equipped to deal with this, and your brain's not even fully developed yet. Yeah, it's not done yet.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Okay. That would drive me crazy. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Oh, that's pretty cool.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
So Be The Match, we'll link to it in the show notes. And I know a lot of people say, I'm scared to do it because they have to drill into your bone.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
It doesn't hurt. No, it doesn't hurt. I want to make it clear because I don't want to scare people off.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Yeah, you would do it. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
You mentioned, oh, I hope he's not a grand wizard of the Ku Klux Klan. I think, honestly, there would be some rich, karmic justice in me, as a Jew, donating blood to this person. I'd write him a letter, and they're like, yeah, I'm a grand wizard of the Klan. And I'm like, I got some bad news for you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Oh, that's weird.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Now you're scaring people off from donating that plate. No, no, no, no, no.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
No kidding.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Oh, wow. I don't have any allergies.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Exactly. Oh, man, now you got to come over for Passover.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
And you're like an A-list celebrity. You're never going to recover from this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Exactly. Remember all those guys you used to make fun of? You're one of them now. Here's your hat. Tell me about punk rock guilt. This is such an interesting concept. It's essentially like you make money by doing something that's great, and then you're like, oh, I got to feel bad about this now.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
You got to live in the gutter and get that metal spike bracelet.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
I can relate.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
It doesn't seem like a worthwhile goal at all.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Black cotton salesman? Okay.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
What's a cattle land?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Catalan, man. Is that like a catamaran?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Yeah, exactly.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
So gross. That's post-apocalyptic. Yes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Oh, my God.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Ecuador is a crazy place, man. Isn't that where they shot the presidential candidate and then the TV station got taken over by gangsters? That was like a Batman movie.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
To be grateful for it. Yeah. But yeah, that's an interesting way to look at it. It probably keeps you thinking about how lucky you are to be in the position that you are.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
That was crazy. People should look this video up. It literally is, oh, is this a Batman movie trailer?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Oh, I see. Handled him. One of those where nobody saw anything.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
it's hard to ethically wrap your mind around that. And now you get a single grain of fentanyl in there and you're dead. So it's not worth it anymore.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
That's really scary.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
It's not even all drug addicts. I read an article about this. It'll be like, let's say that you don't have healthcare. You're an undocumented person or something like that. And you are existing off the good graces of your grandkids who are giving you a hundred bucks a month. So you get your prescription for your back pain. This is $300. Oh no, there's a guy down the block. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
And it looks the same, so why not? But it's counterfeit. Juan's making it in the kitchen, and it's got a gram of fentanyl mixed in with a thousand grams of the real whatever. Or it was fentanyl diluted so that you could take it orally. Oops, I misread the dosing, and the decimals moved over one place. Good night, grandma.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Typically, somebody making drugs in their kitchen is not going to be the most terrible, conscientious supplier of medical devices, pharmaceuticals. Man, you said you look at everything in your life as building blocks for a potential song, as fuel for a creative reality. What's that process like?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Do you have an example of like, oh, I'm going to make a song out of this particular thing that I saw or learned?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
I could report you, but then I probably wouldn't be able to keep my job.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
To be fair, that guy was doing you a favor by paying you at all. Yeah, he was. I don't know how useful 12-year-olds are in any environment, generally speaking.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Yeah. Yeah. They knew they were going to die. Suicide mission. That's crazy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
That's an interesting way to look at. You said once you start to view your life this way, things begin to appear very differently in that everything is fuel for a song. Just how a skater views an urban environment very differently than a non-skater does, which I thought was a really good analogy. I used lifelong skater, mostly surfing, but I look everywhere.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Yeah, that's a really cool way to look at things. I always wonder how people get inspired to write songs. When I hear an interesting story, it's a pretty easy straight line to, would this person make a good interview? Yes. And I just get that story, other stories, other elements of their life. It's not that hard, but you're creating essentially
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
yeah all right he was maybe it was a mutual exploitation that yeah sure and a lot of music of course and especially it seems like a lot of metal bands there's an act it's a performance like most people on stage and you've been in the band for 30 years and i wonder if there's any difference between randy blythe in person and randy blythe on the stage that's because eventually it just blends together i would imagine after 10 years you're like it's the same guy
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
ear-splitting poetry about something that's historical. Right.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
You described the artistic writing process as boxing with yourself. What do you mean by that?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Tell me about it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
If they did, my job would be a lot easier.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
What kept you going in the early days when basically nobody cared about your music at all? Nobody paid attention, you guys are on stage, people are just like, now's a good time to pee and get a drink while these, whoever this is, finishes up.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Internal motivation, basically. Yes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Oh, that's interesting. When I think of things and don't write them down and then I can't remember them later, that is painful for me. I hate that feeling.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Oh, I see. That's fascinating. This basement prison was made out of stone and stuff, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. You're like in a castle dungeon type situation. That's spooky. It's pretty gross. Yeah. You say in the book, expect to be mocked as an artist. Expect for people to root for you to fail. Never give a crap about anyone's opinion who isn't successful at what you are trying to do.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
That's pretty wise, although it's gotta be hard to not care about people's opinions. It's taken me 18 years and I still get reviews and I'm like, this person is 15 years old, but they're like,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
face that negative body language where you've made someone sad and you go, oh, that wasn't nice of me.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
I'm so sorry about that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Welcome to the show. I'm Jordan Harbinger. On The Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the stories, secrets, and skills of the world's most fascinating people and turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
That's a good point.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
That's a really good observation. What's this about being caught in a riot in Asia?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
You can pick any riot you want. I just chose the Asia one.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
What is that? I don't even know what that is.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
He was well-respected.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Very metal scene. Blood everywhere. What's going on? Was Gwar here before us? What's going on?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Oh, my God.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Man, you guys go to some crazy places at some crazy times. I looked you up a little bit. You've managed to get in a little trouble ever since. We are those outcasts, man. The kids that grew up. Oh, you don't like sports? How about some reading? How about go to another country and get arrested? We have a lot in common, actually. We sure do. And thanks for coming in, man. Thank you so much, Jordan.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Appreciate it. It was a lot of fun. All things Randy Blythe will be in the show notes at JordanHarbinger.com. Advertisers, deals, discounts, ways to support the show, all searchable and clickable over at JordanHarbinger.com slash deals. Please consider supporting those who support the show. Also, our newsletter. You guys are great with this. I send it out. I get a ton of replies.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
I love the engagement. Apparently, you love reading it as much as I love writing it. For those of you not in the loop, it is something specific and practical that'll have an immediate impact on your decisions, on your psychology, on your relationships in under two minutes. We send it out on Wednesdays. If you haven't signed up yet, I invite you to come check it out.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
It really is a great companion to the show. JordanHarbinger.com slash news is where you can find it. Don't forget about our course, Six Minute Networking. It is free. There are no shenanigans. SixMinuteNetworking.com. I'm at Jordan Harbinger on Twitter and Instagram. You can also connect with me on LinkedIn. And this show is created in association with Podcast One.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
My team is Jen Harbinger, Jace Sanderson, Robert Fogarty, Ian Baird, Gabriel Mizrahi. Remember, we rise by lifting others. The fee for the show is you share it with friends when you find something useful or interesting. The greatest compliment you can give us is to share the show with those you care about.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
So if you know somebody who's interested in heavy metal, Lamb of God, Randy Blythe, the recording industry at large, definitely share this episode with them. And hey, in the meantime, I hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn. And we'll see you next time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Why not? It's L.A. You could get away with it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
You know, I was really surprised. I went to, this is 25 years ago now or something, but my friend worked for our student newspaper back at Michigan. And we went to go see Disturbed, I think it was. And it was really hot in this crappy little venue that it was down in Detroit. These guys are like, yo, you got to mush with us. And I was like, oh, these are really scary guys.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
We need to get away from these guys. They're really aggressive. And I was like, no, thanks, man. I'm just watching it. It was Oh, okay, no problem. And I was like, oh, I thought we were about to get punched in the face by some aggressive psychopath. And he was like, oh, it's like a sport. It's like if you're not playing, you're not playing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
But if you're playing, you run into each other at full speed, and it's just part of the game.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Our mission is to help you become a better informed, more critical thinker through long-form conversations with a variety of incredible people, from spies to CEOs, athletes, authors, thinkers, and performers, even the occasional hacker, astronaut, or even real-life pirate. Yes, those still exist.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
I was also surprised by how nice, the staff was nice. We went to the tour bus to interview, not super familiar with that band, and it was a long time ago. The singer? The lead singer, yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
And he looked really scary.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
And he's talking to us, he's like, what's up, guys? And he's taking these giant metal horns out of his face and stuff and putting them in a little container. He was so patient with what had to probably be the most surface-level college student, never done this before interview in the world. Sure, sure. And his girlfriend was like, all right, I'll be back there.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
And he's like, okay, go take a shower. I'll be done soon. He gave us all the time. And when we were done, he's like, okay, is that it? You take all the time you want. We're like, oh, well, you're probably tired. It's fine.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
And we're like, oh, so this super famous, really doing super well, successful guy not only invited us into his tour bus when he could have just talked to us outside for two minutes, he was in absolutely no real hurry. And I just thought, wow, if I ever get really famous for anything, I got to be cool. This was really surprising.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
My mom loves your music.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
It's like a metal rave.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
that whole gorilla make it your own, that's way more popular and common now because you have social media. So any sort of niche, if you can get traction, you're good. But yeah, back then it was like handing out tapes out of the back of the car.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
And if you're new to the show, or you're looking for a handy way to tell your friends about it, I suggest our episode starter packs. These are collections of our favorite episodes on topics such as persuasion and negotiation, psychology and geopolitics, disinformation, China, North Korea, crime and cults, and more. That'll help new listeners get a taste of everything we do here on the show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Yeah, the whole hip-hop scene, exactly. You do seem, and you have a reputation as a down-to-earth guy, Isn't being the front man of a successful band kind of like gasoline for an ego? How do you keep that in check? Because that could be a problem.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
And they were terrible.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
Yeah, why do you think that happened? Drew Carey said something similar on the show earlier. He said comedians get decidedly less funny as soon as they start making money. His rationale was comedians are griping about everyday things. So if you're taking your private jet with your assistant and they're going shopping for you, you just get less material that people can relate to.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1150: Randy Blythe | Making Peace with the Wars Inside His Head
But with a band, why is that happening with music, for example?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
Yeah, they can retool them to take Apple Pay. That's my suggestion. The phone pay. That's only a matter of time anyways, I suppose. Yeah. This kind of reminds me of, I think Darren Brown did this, the illusionist. He's been on the show. One of the things that he or someone else did was he had somebody asking for directions in some place. It was probably at Stanford or something like that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
And then he would interrupt them with guys that are carrying a huge backpack.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
painting or drywall or i forget what it was door and then he would switch out the person behind so you've seen this right this he'd switch the person out behind it it gets to the point of ridiculousness where it's like they change a guy with brown hair that looks a little bit like me to another guy with brown hair that looks a little bit like me and then it was like now they're changing it to a guy with no hair now they're changing it to an old man now they're changing it to african-american dude
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
And then it becomes like a guy that looks like me and then like an African-American woman. And the person who's talking just doesn't notice that's not the same person that asked for directions. We'll link to this in the show notes because it's insane.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
Thanks for coming back to your semi yearly appearance on the Jordan Harbinger show, man. I love it. I say this every time I think, but we met through our mutual friend, John Levy, who runs the unfortunately named influencers dinners, which he picked that word before it was like a slur influencer. Oh, And he was great at connecting people. And I'm almost sure I've told this before, too.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
It's shocking when you see this video. And again, we'll link to it in the show notes. I want people to go check it out and watch it because you think this either has to be fake and or I would never fall for this. These people all need to get a clue or a cup of coffee or whatever. But then I'm dying to know if it would work on me because I assume that it would.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
I assume I would also just not pay attention to who that person is.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
I'll send you the link. This isn't quite the same thing, but it reminds me of that video where they say, count how many times the basketball is passed back and forth. Same idea. This is the same idea. Bob, the show notes guy is going to have a field day with this one, but we'll link to this in the show notes too.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
It's count how many times the basketball is passed back and forth and you're counting the basketball and then it's okay. How many of you noticed the gorilla walking in the background and you go, oh, there's no gorilla. And then you replay it and sure enough, there's a guy in a gorilla suit that's just walking in between all the people. It's ridiculous that you don't notice it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
And if you don't tell someone to look at the basketball, all they see is a video of a gorilla walking past. Yeah. Because that's what you would obviously notice if you weren't deliberately distracting yourself.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
But somebody had not shown up. And then you and I were tapped to give like a in the pinch five minute TED talk. You did something about the brain and I did something about North Korea because whoever it was didn't make it. They were stuck in traffic or something. Right. And then a woman asked, if this thing with the brain, that means telepathy must be real.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
This must be part of what magicians rely on, right? So they're like talking to somebody in the audience like, hey, have you ever been to a magic show? And they're like got a hand behind their back folding something into a paper crane.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
I didn't notice that. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
That is so interesting. And that's, what, thousands of years old? I don't know how old magic is. I assume it's thousands of years old. I assume thousands, yeah. Because, of course, somebody sat around. They had nothing else to do. It's just trying to think of tricks. Except for survive. Yeah, except for survive.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
Yeah, once they were done haunting and gathering, they were probably like, look, it looks like I took his nose off and he believes me. Ha ha! Because mirrors don't exist. Yeah. Tell me about this pain matrix in-group versus out-group empathy thing. This was a little alarming. Yeah. Almost.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
I'm like, who's volunteering for that? Like, all right, I really need these 30 bucks. Go for it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
And you very diplomatically handled telepathy. So that question was handled without making her look ridiculous, which I thought was nice of you. You've been up to some fun stuff. Tell me about the anti-counterfeiting. I was going to say, tell me about the Benjamins you're printing in the basement at Stanford.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
Speaking of counterfeit money, dust off that inkjet and print out some fresh $100 bills and support the fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back. This episode is sponsored in part by design.com. All right, if you're starting a business or even just thinking about it, let me tell you about design.com.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
It is an amazing set of tools that makes creating a professional-looking logo super easy. All you have to do is type in your business name and industry, and in seconds, it generates thousands of custom logo options for you to choose from.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
And these aren't generic kind of meh designs, and it's not that thing where like people in Uzbekistan, no offense, create 8,000 different designs that just kind of look like the Uzbekistan flag. but with your logo somewhere or whatever. These are handcrafted by top designers from around the world.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
And once you find a logo that you like, you can tweak it, change the font, colors, layout until it's perfect, then download everything you need to make your business look polished and ready to roll. And design.com is even more powerful than that. You can generate templates for social media posts, ads, business cards, even websites and way more.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
If you already have a logo, you can upload it and instantly get access to thousands of design templates that actually match your brand's look and color scheme. So the tool saves you a ton of time. It lets you focus on growing your business instead of getting stuck in the weeds with marketing materials. They've got a 4.8 star Trustpilot rating. So design.com is legit amazing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
It's run by a friend of mine. I know when people are like, ah, you say that about a lot of businesses. I got a lot of friends. What can I say? Popular guy. No, the truth is that this company's been around for a while. I've known Alec for a long time. They really care about their customers. Try it for free at design.com slash Jordan. This episode is also sponsored by Progressive.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
Do you ever find yourself playing the budgeting game, shifting a little money here, a little there, and just hoping it all works out? Well, with the Name Your Price tool from Progressive, you can be a better budgeter and potentially lower your insurance bill too. You tell Progressive what you want to pay for car insurance, and they'll help you find options within your budget.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
Try it today at Progressive.com. Progressive Casualty Insurance Company & Affiliates. Price and coverage match limited by state law. Not available in all states. Quick bump for Six Minute Networking. This is our relationship building course. It is non-cringy. It teaches you how to be a better networker. That's a gross word. Nobody wants to be a better networker.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
How about a better connector, a better colleague, a better friend, a better peer? In a few minutes a day, and many of the guests on the show already subscribe and contribute to the course, come on and join us. You'll be in smart company where you belong. You can find the course at sixminutenetworking.com. All right, now back to David Eagleman.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
I feel like we're seeing a little bit of this now in discussions, at least online, about the L.A. fires, right? So a lot of my friends were in the Pacific Palisades. They lost their homes. Other people are like, my house is heavily damaged but still there. And I feel really bad for them because they're my friends and they lost their homes and their kids don't have any toys anymore.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
Yeah. It seems obvious that you wouldn't want to talk about anti-counterfeiting efforts. I guess they don't want an organized crime group to get to you and be like, we will pay you $10 million if you do this one thing for us. Put in this thing that we happen to be doing with our counterfeits.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
Imagine young kids and they lost all their clothes, all their toys. It sucks for the adults, but they can wrap their heads around it. They're trying to comfort their children. It's a terrible situation. But online, people are like, ah, who cares? Bunch of rich people lost their house. Or they're like, good, now they know what it feels like when nobody wants to help us when we have problems.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
And I'm just like, these people just ran a fundraiser for... I don't know, whatever, the hurricane victims or something like that. And you're glad because you lost your house in the hurricane and you think that these people don't care about you. Therefore, you're glad their house is gone. I just see tons and tons of that. Now, granted, people are not their best selves on the internet.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
So I take it with a little bit of a grain of salt. Some of them are probably 15-year-old kids who don't know what they're talking about or just pushing buttons. But I see it and I hear about it from other people too. In fact, I text from another friend of mine who I was really disappointed in. I said, oh, did you hear that so-and-so lost his house? And he goes, yeah, well,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
Welcome to the show. I'm Jordan Harbinger. On the Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the stories, secrets, and skills of the world's most fascinating people and turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
The place wasn't that great anyway. And I'm like, it was on the shore of the Palisades. Like, it was a pretty nice place. And I'm sure he's pretty upset about it. Maybe show a little empathy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
That's a better example. People were like, OK, I totally understand why people felt that way. But also, he did have kids. If you can't feel bad for him, at least feel bad for his kids.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
I'm not saying I can relate to it. I just I can wrap my head around why they're upset if their mother died because she couldn't get chemo from an insurance company. You might pin that on that one guy. It's not fair to do that, but I can rationalize how other people have done that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
With fires, those people don't know you exist and you didn't know they existed until they told you their house burnt down and your first reaction is good. Right.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
And we'll pay you or threaten you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
That makes me feel a little better because you're right. There's probably something where, I don't know, if something happened in, I can't even think of a country that I don't like and I'm hesitant to name one, but you're right. My gut reaction might be like, that's what you get for, well, who am I? I'm a terrible person for thinking that. Exactly. Women and children, what am I doing?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
I would think less of myself for a minute after that, but you're right. I wouldn't probably go right about how they deserved it on the internet.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
When all those Hezbollah pagers blew up, I was not super upset for a long time. I was like, ha, but then you hear that like it blew up in their daughter's face and then you're like, oh, that's terrible. But yeah, I wasn't like, oh, those poor Hezbollah terrorism supporters, Hamas or whatever. I don't feel a ton of sympathy for the actual people who were guilty of terror to get blown up.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
But yeah, there was a lot of collateral damage. And then you feel bad because you're like, that guy could have just been a doctor who was associated with Hezbollah. That sort of sucks.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
But here's the thing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
Yeah, totally.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
So it's just a matter of which in-group and out-group you belong to. Yeah, that's interesting. And of course, we care more about people in our group. I think there's something, I don't like admitting that about myself. I can't be alone in that. I can't be alone in being like, not me. Surely most of us think that way.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
Yeah, I was going to say they're mostly thinking about the group that they're in.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
Of course.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
Yeah. I don't even do bad things. And I still feel like I'm constantly rationalizing behavior where I'm like, I really shouldn't let myself go on this, but I'm feeling awful about it. I'm just going to make up an excuse and then never do this again. Yeah, exactly. I do that all the time, unfortunately.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
There's a sort of similar term. It's not exactly the same thing. I'm trying to remember the name. I think it's called moral license, where people say, well, I drive an electric car so I can fly more because I'm not using carbon when I drive. Something along those lines. And it seems like a stretch.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
Wow. Is it easier, I wonder, to counterfeit euros or dollars?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
And yet, of course, people like you test for these things and they find that, I don't know how you make that connection if somebody doesn't make it directly, but they've found that over and over. And I remember there was something that people who drive electric cars slash Prius, Prii, Priuses, that they do, and they found that they were correlated.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
And either it's the hypothesis that it's moral licensing, but there's something here that's similar to what you're saying. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
I walked this morning out extra far because I took the dog out so I can eat these 300 calories.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
Yeah, we all do that for sure. Yes. It's just it's uncomfortable to admit that we do that. And it's much more comfortable to admit we do that with a chocolate chip cookie than it is to be like, I'm only a little bit racist against this one group because and it's I don't want to write that down on any surveys.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
That's a terrible thing to think about yourself. Yeah. So then you have to go the extra mile when you philosophize about it because otherwise you're a racist. And that's a really uncomfortable thing to admit to yourself.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
Really? Yeah, apparently those exist in the South. North Korea is supposed to be making those, I think. Super notes? Jesus. Yeah. Which makes sense, right? Because they can dedicate a billion dollars to trying to figure out how to do this. God. And there's no authorities are breathing down their neck at all because it's the whole regime is just isolated.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
Yeah, that's for sure. True. I think whenever you watch these documentaries about the super racist folks, there was one documentary recently. This I think she's a Muslim British gal. She did a documentary about going to all these very like. Deep South neo-Nazi things. And she was like, but you guys and I get along. And like, well, you're different, the rest of your kind.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
And it was just so fascinating to watch them do these gymnastics around her because they liked her. She was nice to them and they were nice to her. And they were like, you're one of the good ones. And she's like, I'm very... very average, run-of-the-mill Muslim girl from the UK. And they're like, that's not true.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
And they refused to recognize that they were normal, middle-of-the-road, secular-ish Muslims. The dance they did around her, that was the fascinating part of the documentary.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
Have you ever heard of Daryl Davis? He's this African-American dude, great jazz musician. And I won't say it's a hobby because that's a weird way to phrase this, but he's been on the show. What he did one day, he played jazz at a club and there were these Klu Klux Klan guys there. And one guy was like, can I have a drink with you? And he's like, sure. And then the guy told him he was in the KKK.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
And he's like, okay, what's about to happen? Because if you haven't noticed- I'm black. And the guy was like, yeah, but you play like Jerry Lewis. And he's I did play with Jerry. These guys got acquainted. And like over years of talking, this Klansman turned in his robe and his I just can't hate black people anymore. It doesn't make any sense because of my interactions with Daryl.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
So it's like nuclear program funded by counterfeiting. So why bother counterfeiting the euro if there's more US dollars in circulation?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
So he got that robe. And then he's done this 50 times with 50 different Klansmen. He's de-radicalized them by just becoming their friend and not being judgy. And it's weird because it's crazy, right? Because this guy will have a daughter who gets married and like Daryl's there and half the wedding is Klansmen or former Klansmen or people who are the brothers in the Klan.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
And it's like, okay, so the best man is this black dude here. What's going on? He's a fascinating guy because of his level of empathy and his ability to... Take shit from people, I guess, is part of it. I mean, he's an incredible human.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
Yeah. I see.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
So the anti-counterfeiting, why did they tap you for this? What are they looking for?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
Then you relegate me to the outgroup. That's interesting. So if we can figure out how to get the social media algorithm to make the in-group kind of everyone-ish, that would change society. But instead, the algorithm is everyone's in the outgroup except for the people that have my particular beliefs on these particular issues.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
Yeah, you're not going to prevent those people from getting health care because they like Dachshunds instead.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
And then you emphasize that stuff. Good luck with that mission. I hope you get to do that. The counterfeiting thing was interesting, but changing society via this way would be absolutely incredible. Okay, I'm going to shift gears here a little bit. Can we ever upload our brains to the internet? Because my body, I work on it a lot. It's a losing battle. The hair turns gray no matter what.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
You get those weird dots on your skin or whatever, no matter what. It's harder to lose weight or keep it off. I'm not going to say I gave up on the body, but I'm aging and that's that. But my brain, so far, so good, man. Maybe I should freeze a snapshot now and upload it if that's a thing. But can I ever upload my brain?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
It doesn't have to be the internet, but can I ever upload a replica of what's in there into the digital sphere? Great question.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
I don't know how I feel about that. Yeah, like I'm not doing that bad where I need to be euthanized right now with my brain uploaded. Yeah. Yeah, so then you would only want to do it when you were about to maybe die or you're living your last few days in a hospital bed with a morphine drip and it's like, okay, hit the upload now and transfer me.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
I guess you'd have to kill the person right away because otherwise there's two of you, one who's in a hospital bed with a morphine drip and then one that's in the computer that's like, why are you keeping my body alive?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
Yeah, exactly. Whereas if I do it just 100 milliseconds before, then it's a transfer. Jeez, that's crazy. It's so not necessarily right around the corner. One thing that was fascinating that programmers could change time for the simulation that's in the digital sphere. So right now, time just goes however nature and I'm not really sure how time works in the brain.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
That's a whole podcast probably, but there's no physical body to maintain. So in theory, in the digital sphere, I could just spend the next billion years in one Earth year. Hanging out with all my friends and one big long party consuming things that would normally make my body hurt. Hey, there's nobody to worry about now and just enjoy myself in the matrix.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
Our mission is to help you become a better informed, more critical thinker through long-form conversations with a variety of amazing folks, from spies to CEOs, athletes, authors, thinkers, performers, even the occasional Russian chess grandmaster, Hollywood filmmaker, cold case homicide investigator, or money laundering expert.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
speaking of reading minds I can tell that you are absolutely desperate to hear from the amazing sponsors who support this show we'll be right back This episode is sponsored in part by The Defender. We all have those big goals that seem just out of reach, right? But the truth is, that's what keeps us moving forward. For the people who embrace challenges and explore their way, there's The Defender.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
This episode is sponsored in part by Airbnb. As a family, we're planning to spend more time away from home and exploring the world. It's been 10 years since we last visited China and a lot has changed since then, obviously. We're excited to take my parents on this journey before mobility becomes a challenge for them.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
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1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
If you like this episode of the show, I invite you to do what other smart and considerate listeners do, which is take a moment and support the amazing sponsors who make this show possible. All of the deals, discount codes, and ways to support the podcast are searchable and clickable on the website at jordanharbinger.com slash deals.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
We have our AI chat bot there that should help you surface codes, but if it doesn't, you can always email us jordan at jordanharbinger.com. I am more than happy to surface that code for you. It is that important that you support those who support the show. Now for the rest of my conversation with David Eagleman.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
I guess this is probably one of the only ways we can actually do super wide space travel, though, too, right? Because you can't put a body on a... I don't know how far away things are, but in the cosmos, it's like thousands of light years or whatever it's going to take. Even if we figure out light speed travel, it's going to take centuries for these computers that we send to get there.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
And in theory, you could put a person's brain in a robot over there, but that's the only way to do it, because otherwise... The whole freezing of the body thing, even that's not going to work over that time span.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
That's pretty cool. It seems shockingly informal for how a government would normally go about anti-counterfeiting. Yeah, I met this guy at a conference. We were hanging out in the back, having a couple of pina coladas or whatever, and then I decided to hire him to figure out how to stop counterfeiting these euros.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
Every time I learn more about this, I'm like, maybe we really are in a simulation. I don't know. What do you think of that theory?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
It's sims all the way down. It seems like there'll be people in our generation when we're older and we're not in our best form and maybe we can't walk. We'll just be living in one of those little simulations. Some of us will be like, I'm not doing that. But the younger generations, they'll probably be almost looking forward to that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
And then eventually there'll be a generation that you can't, like with our phones, you just can't pry them away from it because it's better than real life. You mean living in the metaverse as opposed to uploading their brains? Living in the metaverse. Because look, say I'm 85 and I'm like, ah, walking hurts. And a lot of my friends have passed away. I put this thing on and sit on my couch.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
Not only do I not have to walk, but all my friends are 25 again and we're hanging out. That's a pretty compelling offer. I'll tell you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
Yeah, it seems compelling even now. And look, you hear about these people who've gone through grief or trauma. Imagine your whole family gets wiped out in a car accident and you're the sole survivor. You can either sit around being depressed and dealing with that, or you could potentially go to one of your favorite family vacations with all of your kids again in this imaginary world.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
I don't know if that would make dealing with grief easier or harder because they're still there in that way, but maybe there's a way to use that in a therapeutic sense.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
What great practice that would be. That's actually not bad. You could make all of your teenager, young adult mistakes. while maybe also having a real girlfriend who would be really pissed and jealous. But also then you would go, you know, you could say like, what about this? What about that? You know what? That's not going to go over well with your real girlfriend. Exactly. So don't do that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
And you're like, oh, thank God I was able to simulate this particular conversation. Yes. That would be interesting.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
Yeah, smart.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
And it can simulate millions of different women's potential opinions. I can just imagine my AI girlfriend saying there's an 80% chance that she finds this argument totally uncompelling and does not believe you at all. So I would pick a different strategy. Interesting. That's fascinating. What about reading someone's thoughts via fMRI? I mean,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
That seems like a good use of brain tech, but everyone's brain would have to kind of be the same organization, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
Who's going to do that? Yeah, exactly. Oh, come on, man.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
So everyone has the same input and then you're looking at that. So then you would have to measure someone's input for their whole life then, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
Yeah, that makes sense. If I got a counterfeit $100 bill, unless it was really bad, I would never notice. And it's also kind of not my problem because I'm going to go spend that at, I don't know, a gas station or something. And then they're going to put it in the bag. And then the bank is going to go, oh, crap, this is fake. And then I don't know how it works.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
Funny, I did so much of that walking in. Exactly. Oh, this word looks cool. It's in the middle of the living room. You must think it's important.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
Oh man. Yeah. Because I'm not giving you the full background with each thought. I'm not going, I have to tell my brother who, by the way, is this person, he lives over here and this is what he looks like that none of that happens in that moment. Exactly. So you'd almost have to be able to know all of this person's input that they got through their whole life in order to read their thoughts.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
And I don't know how you would do that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
It's imagination, right? Yes, it's creativity. So that doesn't even, that wouldn't even be in the input monitor sensors that you have. Jeez. So yeah, that does not bode well for mind reading technology coming anytime soon. Exactly.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
That's right. Lie detection.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
Yeah. So that's true. Yeah. I go through and I remember the time my idiot friend at the U.N. was like, I have a bomb. And then they were like, now we're going to search all you dumb ass kids. Because we know you're joking, but we want to make an example out of you. That was fun. But what about lie detection? Is this in the same boat as mind reading?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
It seems like it would have to be because lies are so complicated.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
But I think the business loses that money. And if they use the marker and it's a good counterfeit, it's going to work with the marker. I don't think anybody pays attention to this. So somebody just gets screwed later down the line. It's not going to be the person who's selling flowers at the stand on the side of the road who gets it. It's going to be somebody who's going to the bank.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
Yeah, that makes sense. I'm a terrible liar. So I have all the tells, right? It's like, I started to hurt my face and sweating and fidgeting with my hair and looking at the floor. And it's funny, we did this game like two truths and a lie a while ago at a dinner. And the women at the table were like, you're one of the worst liars I've ever seen. They were laughing at me.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
And they're like, this is just pathetic. You should never lie. just about anything important.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
I suppose they would. I suppose they would, although they probably wouldn't also then start sweating and looking at the floor. They would do that purposely sometimes, sure.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
So now, so I'll let everybody guess as to which one of those is true. Either I'm a great liar or I'm a terrible liar, and you'll find out. With fMRI or whatever, lie detection, I'm trying to think just from a legal perspective. Would you need a court order that says you can invade someone's brain?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
So these little tiny, oh, this dollar has a spider in the corner on top of the five. No, unless you're a little kids look for that. Not grown ass adults who are handling a thousand dollars an hour in currency.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
Yeah. Yeah. It depends on the police state we have in a thousand years when this technology exists.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
Yeah, I think the whole premise of that movie was there was three psychic women. That was beyond ridiculous. But I guess that's how they handled that plot hole by being like, yeah, they have supernatural powers. Don't ask too many questions. I know our time is coming up. We have so many other topics for the next one, which is great. Thanks for having me over to your house.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
It's a fun little change. Terrific. For those not watching on YouTube, we're surrounded completely by human brains and jars that I assume you've taken from other podcasters.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
Or I'll do it from my jar. Thank you, David.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
You're about to hear a preview of the Jordan Harbinger show about how technology can augment our brains and allow the blind to see and the deaf to hear.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
To learn how it's possible to create completely new superhuman senses, check out episode 655 with David Eagleman on The Jordan Harbinger Show. There is always so much more. I've got to do another one with him later this year. I barely got even through half my notes. I love that though. Love a good high quality problem. Must be exhausting being as fascinating as Dr. David Eagleman.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
I personally couldn't handle it. Thankfully, I'll never have that problem. All things Dr. David Eagleman will be in the show notes at JordanHarbinger.com. Advertisers, deals, and discount codes, ways to support this show, all at JordanHarbinger.com slash deals. Please consider supporting those who support the show. Also, our newsletter, We Bit Wiser, comes out pretty much every Wednesday.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
I'm not going to say every Wednesday, but the idea is to give you something specific and practical that'll have an immediate impact on your decisions, your psychology, your relationships in under two minutes. And if you haven't signed up yet, I invite you to come check it out. It is a great companion to the show. JordanHarbinger.com slash news is where you can find it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
Don't forget about Six Minute Networking as well over at SixMinuteNetworking.com. I'm at Jordan Harbinger on Twitter and Instagram. You can also connect with me on LinkedIn. And this show is created in association with Podcast One. My team is Jen Harbinger, Jace Sanderson, Robert Fogarty, Ian Baird, and Gabriel Mizrahi. Remember, we rise by lifting others.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
The fee for the show is you share it with friends when you find something useful or interesting. And the greatest compliment you can give us is to share the show with those you care about. If you know somebody who's interested in the brain, mind reading, uploading our brains to the internet, anything along those lines, definitely share this episode with them. In the meantime...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
I hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn. And we'll see you next time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
And if you're new to the show or you're looking for a handy way to tell your friends about it, I suggest our episode starter packs. These are collections of our favorite episodes on topics like persuasion and negotiation, psychology and geopolitics, disinformation, China, North Korea, crime and cults, and more. It'll help new listeners get a taste of everything we do here on the show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
Let's see, who had control over a large portion of Europe for any period of time? Nobody that you want to put on the money these days. Exactly. I meant Napoleon, for the record. Yeah. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
So looking at buildings is confusing for us. Not confusing, but we don't see the small differences and that's part of the problem. And that for faces, we have more neural real estate. Do we know why that is? I got a painting of myself from a sponsor. And my initial reaction was, that doesn't look anything like me. How did they get this so wrong?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
But everybody else, including my wife, was like, what are you talking about? It looks exactly like you. It's totally fine. And then we shared it with my parents. And they're like, oh, it really does. And I was just thinking, are you all insane? This doesn't look like me. So that sort of familiarity with our own face, or maybe the faces of others...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
We just have much higher degree of specificity that we can look at. Because there's two issues in there.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
Just visit jordanharbinger.com slash start or search for us in your Spotify app to get started. Neuroscientist Dr. David Eagleman is back on the show. He's been on several times. He's always a huge hit with all y'all.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
Starting off with podcasting is tough for a lot of people because they always go, I hate the way that I sound. And I always have to tell new podcasters that will eventually fade. And they go, oh, why will my voice change? And I thought, no, you're just going to get so used to hearing yourself in a recording.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
It'll be almost like you're hearing yourself when you talk, but it's going to take a year or two because you need to build up the reps or the hours of hearing your own voice. But yeah, until then, it sounds like the answering machines in the 80s where you go, oh my God, is that what I sound like? This is horrible news.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
Today, we're talking about counterfeiting money, why a neuroscientist was brought in to help solve this complex problem that largely relies on our brain's ability to detect counterfeits in the first place. Also, will we be able to upload our brains to the internet? How would that work? Of course, there's a lot that goes into this. Also, some philosophical questions come up as a result.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
Yeah, that's interesting. So back to the money, people notice faces more than buildings. Since that's intuitive, maybe? Yeah. thing that we might notice because Loan's like, wait, this doesn't have that little strip on the side. When I shine the UV on it, it's not there. Or they mark it with a marker if you pay with 100 at Chuck E. Cheese to make sure they're not going to counterfeit.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
They really just need to be able to look at it and go, eh, that face looks a little bit too cartoony. Maybe this is fake. Exactly.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
So it would have been like a blank white or off-white colored paper with a hologram in the middle and the number 20 on it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
I get the logic. They're like, oh, we hired this guy for the science and we were hoping the science would look a little nicer at the end of the day. Be a little bit neater, fit into our bucket more. We were kind of hoping you'd come back with a really simple design that we could print on the side. Yeah, they were probably regretting that. That makes sense though.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
Blank money with a hologram only sounds like future money. It sounds like something you'd see 100 years from now.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
I guess if you probably look at transaction amounts, maybe all that's digital when one company's wiring $300 million to another one. But if you look at the volume of individual transactions, you're right. It's probably like $2 or whatever. The average is probably globally like $4 or something like that. And usually done in cash in exchange for, I don't know, goat milk. or something like that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
Because that totally makes sense. The only counterfeit money I've ever had, I went to Cambodia and I was in a non-regular border. I took a boat from Vietnam to Cambodia. And so I was in the middle of the jungle and somebody offered to break money for me. And he gave me a $5 bill that was so obviously fake.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
Who's the real me after that? My body or my virtual self? Do I have to kill one of them? That seems a little creepy. Maybe we'll get into that here on the show. And will we be able to read people's thoughts using fMRI or some other similar technology? Why or why not? And more importantly, when? All this and a whole lot more here today with Dr. David Eagleman. Alright, here we go.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
And I could have said something, but I thought, eh, this is kind of a cool souvenir that I got for five bucks. I think It's like dark black ink. The paper's definitely just like trash quality Monopoly money paper. And it looks good. And I could almost surely get rid of it and spend it if I wanted to go to prison. But it's the kind of fake you get in the middle of the jungle in Cambodia.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
But first of all, who's printing $5 bills? Like that's the low rent.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
And they just out of luck or do they have to have somebody be like, this is a 20. Let me fold the corner. Yeah. How does that work?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1123: David Eagleman | Your Prehistoric Brain on Modern Problems
All right, blind listeners, tell me how this works. Tell me how this works.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1111: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part One
This episode is sponsored in part by Vital Proteins. I want to tell you about Vital Proteins Collagen Peptides. That's a mouthful. It's a daily supplement that supports your hair, skin, nails, bones, and joints all in one in one simple step each day. Collagen makes up about a third of the protein in our bodies, but as we hit our 30s, it unfortunately starts to decline.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1111: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part One
And if you're new to the show or you want to tell your friends about the show, I suggest our episode starter packs. These are collections of our favorite episodes on topics like persuasion and negotiation, psychology, geopolitics, disinformation, China, North Korea, crime and cults, and more. That'll help new listeners get a taste of everything we do here on the show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1111: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part One
You're right in the middle of it. You know what's better than being shot in the head and left in a ditch by the hell's angels? The fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back. If you're wondering how I managed to book all these great authors, thinkers, and creators every single week, it is because of my network, the circle of people I know, like, and trust.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1111: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part One
I'm teaching you how to build the same thing for yourself for free over at 6minutenetworking.com. Look, this is about work stuff, personal stuff. It's going to make you a better connector, a better colleague, a better peer. And it's not cringy. It's not awkward. It's not networky, if I can say that. And six minutes a day is all it takes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1111: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part One
Many of the guests on the show subscribe and contribute to the course. Come on and join us. You'll be in smart company where you belong. We turned questions on. Somehow the software had turned questions off automatically. Thanks for that. We turned them back on. You can always ask questions in the course there as well. It is free. I don't need your credit card. None of that nonsense.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1111: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part One
6minutenetworking.com is where you can find it. Now, back to Jay Dobbins. How do you gain the criminal's trust? That's got to be tricky isn't even quite the word, right? I mean, you show up, you got to be friends with somebody initiated into this thing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1111: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part One
And you don't just knock on the door of the Hell's Angels and say like, hey, I'd love to traffic some of those drugs you guys keep running back and forth across the country. That's not going to fly. So where do you begin?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1111: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part One
Just visit jordanharbinger.com or search for us in your Spotify app to get started. My guest today joined the ATF, Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms. A lot of you haven't heard of that, I noticed. And he went undercover in the Hells Angels, the most notorious biker gang in the world.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1111: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part One
And you've got to bury that, right? Because if you go into it thinking, I've got to keep these guys at arm's length because eventually I'm going to throw them all in prison, you're tying a weight around your leg.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1111: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part One
So you basically have to keep that fear of, they're going to murder me if they figure out that this is BS. And that outweighs... whatever other psychological protections you're maybe subconsciously running in your head?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1111: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part One
Yeah. God, the Hells Angels, especially, it's just an understatement to say they're a rough bunch. But tell us what one percenters are, right? Because I think this kind of goes to it, right? They're proud of being these one percenters. Tell us what this means.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1111: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part One
In this episode, we'll discuss what it takes to go undercover, especially in such a dangerous organized crime organization. We'll discover why it's so hard to dismantle an organization like the Hells Angels or any biker gang. We'll also learn about the customs and culture of the Hells Angels. They have a lot of rules. It's actually quite complicated and surprising.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1111: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part One
Yeah, it's a fascinating subculture that someone normal would not want to be a part of this. In the book, you discuss you're hanging around these guys before you go undercover or try to even get in the gang. You're hanging around and guys are asking you for favors. Hey, can you kill this guy for money? And you can't be like, no, I don't do that sort of thing, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1111: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part One
So you have to say yes, but then you can't actually do it because you're a cop. So how does all this work, right? How do you say, sure, I'll shoot that guy in the back of the head for $1,200 or $20,000, whatever it is, but then not actually do it, but somehow that still builds your credibility. They don't think you chickened out. How do you do something like that?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1111: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part One
That's when you might notice things aren't working quite like they used to. Your joints, your skin, maybe even your hair. Vital Proteins steps in to help keep those areas supported so you can stay active and keep doing what you love. Vital Proteins is the number one collagen peptide brand in the U.S., so they know what they're doing. It's super easy to take.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1111: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part One
Of course, I also wanted to know how to build an undercover identity, stay safe while hanging out and partying and engaging in criminal activity with ultra-violent criminal bikers, and how you build a case against such a powerful crime organization as a cop, as an undercover officer trying to take down the Hells Angels. Here we go with Jay Dobbins. Do you know Ken Croke? I do.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1111: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part One
I experienced it. Meanwhile, you bought the guns from a cop, from an ATF agent who seized them from somebody else three months ago.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1111: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part One
So do you just sit in an office and meet up with the other guy and go, okay, you're going to bring this and we got to get the judge to sign off on that and got to get the boss to sign off on this. And you say, hey, aren't you the guy that killed Tony, and then I say, yeah, what's it to you? And then we do this gun transact. Like you're sitting there discussing this, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1111: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part One
And drinking coffee and you do it the next week. How do you plan something like this?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1111: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part One
So I vanished for a couple of months, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1111: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part One
Yeah, he was on here a couple years ago. That was a super interesting episode. A lot of people really liked it. Were you before or after or the same time as him?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1111: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part One
Yeah, it seems like that's a pretty easy decision. I'm sorry I'm stuck on this. Why does a home invasion crew need an RPG? What good could that possibly do? If you're breaking into someone's home, even if you're stealing drugs... Why do you want a grenade launcher? That just seems like the loudest, least covert thing that you could use.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1111: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part One
I see. So it's almost for show because I'm imagining this home invasion cruise not blowing someone's door off with an RPG. That's insane.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1111: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part One
Yeah, that's a good point. OK. And how much does it cost to have someone killed? I'm obviously not going to do this, but I'm curious what someone says. Hey, go kill Jordan. Are you like it's fifteen hundred dollars or is it fifteen thousand or is it one hundred and fifty thousand? Like what is the price range of a murder for hire? I have no idea.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1111: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part One
Yeah. So in his book, he mentions other undercover operations. He's probably talking about yours, right? Because there's not tons of undercover biker gang. There's not, but there's some other operations of significance that he might be referencing. I see. Okay. Yeah, I wasn't sure because he specifically didn't talk about them very much, probably for good reasons.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1111: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part One
Right, right. So you have to put everything on hold and go fake murder somebody because if they need him killed fast and they do it because you were too slow or tomorrow was your day off, then that person's dead and it's kind of your fault.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1111: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part One
Look, I mean, the book starts with you getting shot. So this stuff is dangerous. And I'd love to start with that story because frankly, it sounds like a good reason not to join the ATF in the first place.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1111: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part One
Don't be ashamed of who you are. That's your parents' job. We'll be right back. deals, discount codes, and ways to support us are searchable and clickable over at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. The AI chat bot also on the website can help you surface the codes. If you can't remember the name of a code, you're not sure if there is a code, shoot me an email, jordan at jordanharbinger.com.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1111: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part One
I am happy to surface that code for you. It is that important that you support those who support the show. Now, back to Jay Dobbins. So you're involved in some of these home invasion crew stuff. Robbing a normal person would be just a weirdly distressing event.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1111: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part One
Maybe I just don't have a good idea of what this is all about and maybe I'm naive, but it seems like it would be weirdly thrilling to go in with a group of criminals and rob a drug dealer because you're not robbing somebody who's like a hardworking person. You're not robbing a normal person who's trashing their kids' rooms. You're robbing a drug dealer. So I'm with scumbags robbing a scumbag.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1111: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part One
Is there an element of... Thank you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1111: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part One
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1111: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part One
Right. High level of authority as well. Yeah. Why specifically is it hard for a bureaucracy like law enforcement to go after motorcycle clubs like the Hells Angels? From the book, not that law enforcement isn't up to the challenge, but it's almost like a design flaw. It's more fashionable maybe to go after one or two big volume drug dealers or gun dealers.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1111: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part One
Or if you want to make a ton of cases, you just go after small timers and you just rack them up, one guy per week. But going after a big organization seems really difficult. Takes too much time and resources and then maybe a questionable result.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1111: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part One
Just add a serving to your coffee, smoothie, even water. It doesn't even taste like anything, so it blends right in. The key is consistency. Making it a daily habit is how you see the benefits.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1111: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part One
You're about to hear a preview of the Jordan Harbinger show with an undercover ATF agent that infiltrated the infamous Pagans biker gang.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1111: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part One
To hear how Ken Croke spent two years risking his life going through initiation in one of the most ruthless biker gangs in the world, check out episode 673 of The Jordan Harbinger Show. That's the end of part one, part two, out in just a few days. All things Jay Dobbins will be in the show notes at jordanharbinger.com.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1111: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part One
Advertisers, deals, discount codes, ways to support the show, all at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. Please consider supporting those who support this podcast. Also, our newsletter, We Bit Wiser, is just waiting for you. It's a great companion to the show. It's very practical. It's a two-minute read every week. Many of you have been sending me awesome feedback on this, and I love writing it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1111: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part One
I love creating this with you, and I love the dialogue that results. jordanharbinger.com slash news is where you can find it. Six Minute Networking over at sixminutenetworking.com. I'm at Jordan Harbinger on Twitter and Instagram. You can also connect with me on LinkedIn. And this show, it's created in association with Podcast One.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1111: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part One
My team is Jen Harbinger, Jace Sanderson, Robert Fogerty, Ian Baird, and Gabriel Mizrahi. Remember. We rise by lifting others. The fee for the show is you share it with friends when you find something useful or interesting. The greatest compliment you can give us is to share the show with those you care about.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1111: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part One
If you know somebody who's interested in the Hells Angels, undercover cops, the ATF, crime and criminal activity, definitely share this episode with them. In the meantime, I hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn. And we'll see you next time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1111: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part One
Exactly. Wow. So that's a hell of a first week on the job. You're still here. So you survived that clearly. I'm guessing he didn't.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1111: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part One
All the dumb rookie jokes probably stop if you've gotten shot during an arrest, even if it was your first week.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1111: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part One
Coming up next on the Jordan Harbinger Show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1111: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part One
Sure. You were married at this point, right? Already? I was. Did your wife think like, oh, okay, he's going to resign and become a science teacher now? 100%.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1111: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part One
I'm guessing that wasn't the answer she was hoping to hear. No, that didn't go over real well. Did getting shot so early in your career, did that change how you approached the job afterward?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1111: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part One
How did you end up becoming an undercover? You have to lean in to do that, right? Because it's a 24-7 kind of version of the job?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1111: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part One
Why do we have a separate bureau for alcohol, tobacco, and firearms specifically? Is that a prohibition thing? Because can't the FBI handle that? I don't understand why those things are separate.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1111: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part One
Most people don't even know, like they maybe have heard of it. And internationally, people have no idea what it is generally. But everyone's heard of the FBI because it's in movies. If it's in the movies, it's like there's a guy from the ATF who's like a weird foil character for somebody else, right? Like The Rock or whatever shows up in Fast and Furious. I don't even know if that's part of it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1111: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part One
Welcome to the show. I'm Jordan Harbinger. On The Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the stories, secrets, and skills of the world's most fascinating people and turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1111: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part One
But yeah, it's rare. You guys don't get a lot of front page media.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1111: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part One
Going back to your undercover skill set, this seems almost like the ATF's bread and butter, at least according to some of the books. Or maybe these books are just focused on undercover operations, and maybe that's why it seems like that. But you mentioned earlier, if you want to do undercover, you want to be in the ATF. Why are undercover operations so... Popular is not quite the right word.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1111: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part One
Our mission is to help you become a better informed, more critical thinker through long form conversations with a variety of amazing folks from spies to CEOs, athletes, authors, thinkers, performers. even the occasional gold smuggler, economic hitman, former jihadi, or extreme athlete.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1111: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part One
Prolific, maybe? And why is this one of the main things that the ATF does? Is it because organized crime is usually associated with alcohol, tobacco, and firearms, and that's what you need in order to break these rings up?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
This episode is sponsored in part by Vital Proteins. I want to tell you about Vital Proteins Collagen Peptides. That's a mouthful. It's a daily supplement that supports your hair, skin, nails, bones, and joints all in one in one simple step each day. Collagen makes up about a third of the protein in our bodies, but as we hit our 30s, it unfortunately starts to decline.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
And then it was like two years, three years later, it was... How the hell do they know so much about me and why are they trying to influence what I purchase or the elections that we have? It was such a rapid downfall.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
Yeah, exactly. How many digital footprints do we leave each day? Can you take us through a typical morning? Because a lot of people, again, they're going to say, I don't post updates on Facebook and I don't let the phone track my location or I don't even take my mobile phone with me when I go to the gym, whatever it is.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
They're going to have some sort of reason that this doesn't apply to them and that the amount of data we create is insane.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
I suggest our episode starter packs. These are collections of our favorite episodes on topics like persuasion and negotiation, psychology and geopolitics, disinformation, China, North Korea, crime and cults and more. That'll help new listeners get a taste of everything we do here on the show. Just visit jordanharbinger.com slash start or search for us in your Spotify app to get started.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
It's really impressive when you think about it that way. To give people who aren't tech nerds an idea of how much data this is, this is a MacBook Pro storage every week or maybe two. So if you bought a laptop, it'd be full at the end of the week or halfway through the week, depending on how much storage you get in that thing. And companies are storing this because there's so many people.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
So are they really storing a terabyte of information? Are they storing 52 terabytes of data on me personally every week? Because where is all of that data?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
Yeah, I suppose you don't really need every shred of data, right? If you have, say, someone's path that they walk every day to go get breakfast and then they go to the gym and then they come home, you can just say, it's basically this times a thousand. They don't have to get every time you cross the street.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
So yeah, I would say this times seven, but on the eighth day, she went across the street real quick and came back. But then it was this again, 10 times in a row. I mean, that's not that much data, right? It's not every step, every longitude and latitude repeated over and over again. And you're right, storage is super cheap. If you've got some sort of
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
data farm or whatever in Iceland that's buried underneath the snow for cooling purposes, that just gets cheaper by the day. So it doesn't really matter that much. It's just a crazy amount of data, given that it's one terabyte per week times hundreds of millions of people using these things. The amount is just bananas.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
It's quite impressive.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
Today, my friend Zandra Mats shows us how companies steal our data, use our data to target us, not only to sell us things, but how they can essentially read our moods, almost read our minds.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
Right, yeah. I suppose. It's all just math. It's way above my pay grade. Facebook knows us better than our closest friends and families. You wrote this in the book, and that is not terribly surprising, a little scary, because I'd like to think my family knows me pretty well, but Facebook does know me better.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
They'll show me some clothes where I'm like, oh, I have to buy that, even though I know objectively that I'm going to be disappointed as soon as it arrives and I find out that it was made by small children in Bangladesh or whatever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
I was doing a show yesterday with my producer. We were doing some work and I was like, isn't there a different word for pedophiles who are attracted to people in different stages of puberty? And he's like, one, how do you know that? And I was like, oh, it's a bit from a comedian. Let me just look it up. And he goes, please tell me you didn't just Google different types of pedophiles.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
And I was like, oh, yeah, shoot. I did. I did.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
How AI and computers get to know us on such an intimate level, what they can do to predict things like depression, which unfortunately they monetize instead of helping us solve, and how we leave millions of digital footprints each day. This is a bit of a deep episode on the data we leave and how it is used. A lot of fascinating details in here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
your absurd questions that are super intimate there's stuff that i've asked chat gpt where i feel the need to tell it a friend of mine has asked the following question asking for a friend of a friend exactly because in 20 years when it's like here's what you searched this day in 2025 i'm like i do not want it to pop up i just don't want that to show up anywhere and if it does i want it to be like you asked on behalf of a friend and i'm like see it wasn't me sure sure pal
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
We have an AI chat bot on our website where people can use it to search for things that are inside episodes, and we get an occasional report of what people have searched for just so we can make it more useful. And it's not my team that's behind it. It's an AI company. And they'll say, hey, FYI, this was a pretty funny month for searches. Here's our top five favorites.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
And some of the stuff that people are searching is they're trying to get the AI version of me to tell them how to commit a crime because they think maybe Jordan knows how to get away with this. It's interesting because obviously I'm not liable for that because it's not really me telling them how to do something.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
But it's a little scary that somebody can get inside my brain something I would never tell them. And my AI version is, sure, I'll tell you exactly how I would hide a dead body. And it's like, why are you letting my AI brain tell it this?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
Yeah, it's not a person on the other side. It's theoretically infinite number of people that can look at this at any time with no context and zero ability to defend yourself in the moment because you've been dead for 20 years. Yeah, if you're lucky. How do companies like Meta and other social media companies, how do they get to know our preferences?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
That's when you might notice things aren't working quite like they used to. Your joints, your skin, maybe even your hair. Vital Proteins steps in to help keep those areas supported so you can stay active and keep doing what you love. Vital Proteins is the number one collagen peptide brand in the U.S., so they know what they're doing. It's super easy to take.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
Is it just me telling them that I like something when somebody posts something? Because I don't always like the things that I like. Does that make sense?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
Great vacation. I couldn't care less, but you're going to feel bad if I don't click like on this and we're friends. I'm supporting you, but no, you look like an ass.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
This is 87 selfies of your vacation. These are completely uninteresting. You're clearly a narcissist. Here's my like.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
Algorithms can tell if someone is gay 81% of the time just using their face. That's pretty interesting. They might have better gaydar than humans. How computers actually test their assumptions about us. And what having a low phone battery means about you. And yes, we already know you're one of those. Now, here we go with Zandra Motz.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
What was that about first-person pronouns indicating depression? What does that mean? Because I'm not sure I understood what you just said.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
That's interesting. So in theory, that happens when we're talking to people in real life also, or is this mostly online communication?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
40 times more.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
That's interesting. That's unmistakable. Yeah. It's like pretty substantial. Wow. So in theory, even a smart TV or my phone, which is listening, even if I don't want it to be, or my Amazon Alexa thing, that could tell me if I'm depressed just by hearing what I'm talking about in the house or overhearing a phone conversation.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
You mentioned in the book that within 300 likes of me liking things on photos or whatever, the platform knows me better than my spouse. 65 likes, it knows me better than my friends. That doesn't seem like that much.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
I think everybody knows that companies collect a lot of data on us, but I guess I didn't personally realize how granular they could get with psychological targeting. Can you explain what that is, first of all?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
Yeah, that's not super surprising. I guess if you think about it this way, and I'm sure this isn't a one-to-one kind of comparison, but if I had to remember 300 things that my spouse likes at the same time, I don't know if I could do that. That's a lot of different things. How do they measure that?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
Is it like the newlywed game where you get asked questions and the computer just gets it right more than the spouse?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
Wow. Yeah, that's interesting. And the computer gets it right more than the spouse. Again, though, I think trying to remember 300 different things about your spouse at one time, it's a lot. It's just a superhuman feat of memory alone, let alone knowing someone that well.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
Now it's time for us to hopefully monetize you. We'll be right back. Bye. Bye. Bye. even laser-powered internet. I'm not sure how that works, but I want to find out. Get an inside look at the people, the challenges, and the wild process of turning impossible ideas into reality.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
You're basically sitting down with the minds behind these projects to answer big questions like how we can make clean energy work and if we can get tech to actually help save this planet. What I like about this show is it's not just about success, it's also about failure, risk, and relentless optimism.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
So if you're into bold ideas, breakthrough tech, and the untold stories behind innovation, the Moonshot podcast is your kind of show. Premiered March 10th with new episodes dropping every week. Find it wherever you get your podcasts. This episode is sponsored in part by Airbnb. As Anthony Bourdain once said, travel isn't always pretty. It's not always comfortable, but that's okay.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
They list your space, they manage reservations, they communicate with guests, they keep it all in tip-top shape, and that unused space could cover your flights to Asia, book you a cool hotel in Spain, even help with everyday expenses, giving you the freedom to explore more.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
Whether you're saving for your dream getaway or you're just looking for financial flexibility, Airbnb makes it easy to turn your space into extra income. Find a co-host at Airbnb.com slash host. If you're wondering how I managed to book all these amazing thinkers, authors, creators every week, it's because of my network, the circle of people I know, like, and trust.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
And I'm teaching you how to build a network for yourself for free, whether for personal or professional reasons, whether you're retired or just entering the job market. I have a course over at 6minutenetworking.com. The course requires no payment. I don't want your money. I don't even need to know who you are. You can be totally anonymous. It's all super easy, down to earth, non-cringy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
It's about your relationship building skills. In just a few minutes a day, you can binge this course, practice a few things from it. It will change the way that you relate to others. And that's the whole idea. And many of the guests on the show subscribe and contribute to the course. So come on and join us. You'll be in smart company where you belong.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
You can find the course again for free at sixminutenetworking.com. All right, now back to Sandra Motz. How do computers test their assumptions about what they know about us? I know I'm anthropomorphizing computers a little bit, but whatever. How do they test and see if they're right? Because they have to do that somehow, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
I see. So it's just tons of trial and error. You have a really good analogy in the book about chick sexing. Don't worry, it's still safe for work, folks. This is not the chick sexing that I tried in vain to accomplish in my 20s. This is the kind of chick sexing that happens on a farm. Yeah. Tell us about this, because this is a very good metaphor.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
You know, it just occurred to me, I wonder if they collect data in the same way when I pay with my phone. And the answer is now I'm just telling Apple and the credit card company everything that I buy. And I know that they know this because it'll pop up like, your Amex has been charged $47 for eating at this restaurant. So of course they're logging that, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
Thank you. Thank you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
They'll eventually use that against me.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
Thank you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
Yeah, it goes through a bank, but it's also, I'm telling Apple, which is what business do they have about what I'm buying? And the answer is they're in the business of data just like everybody else, probably.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
Thank you. Thank you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
Thank you very much. Thank you. Thank you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
Thank you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
Yeah, I noticed whenever you install something new, it's like this app wants to track you. It's ask app not to track. It doesn't say we won't track you. It says... We're not going to let them track you. Don't worry, though. We're still tracking you, obviously. We're still tracking everything that you're doing. It's like location data.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
Thank you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
Somebody told me the other day, oh, I turned off location data so they don't know where I am at. And I'm like, they know. They're just not sharing it with you and your friends and your mom. It's not like the FBI can't find you. Come on.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
The new cameras that are out there for sports photography, I think when you hold the button, first of all, it sounds like some kind of machine gun from Terminator. But it'll take, I want to say, 100 photos in a second or something like that at maximum speed, which is great if you're trying to catch something.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
a jumper at the peak of their jump at the Olympics and you want to get the perfect moment of them going over a bar or something like that. That's when it makes sense. But when you're taking a picture of your kids deuce in the potty at home, it's like before they're smashing their head into the wall.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
Yes, I want the wave in the skin of the forehead when it smashes into the drywall.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
Exactly. Oh, my gosh. Tell me about Facebook status updates and word clouds. I miss Facebook updates. I mean, maybe they still exist, but it used to be... And I know I sound old AF when I say this. AOL Instant Messenger. Do you remember that? Did you use that?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
ICQ and... Right, you had your away message, and you're like, okay, I gotta think of something creative and fun.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
Like, off days, you just pick a quote from an author you like or something, but on days where you think of something really funny, you put that in there, and everyone's checking everyone else's away message all the time to see if there's a... And it was like, if you could do that day in and day out and make it fun, people were like, this guy's smart. And Facebook...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
The original Facebook status updates where you just typed in the box what you were doing, that was almost like a status game for good writers in college.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
So I was doing training for some journalists a couple of months ago in another country. And one of the things that they did was they put all of our phones in like a safe box. And I said, oh, I'll just turn it on airplane mode. And they were like, oh, sweet summer child. That's not going to do anything to stop.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
Just add a serving to your coffee, smoothie, even water. It doesn't even taste like anything, so it blends right in. The key is consistency. Making it a daily habit is how you see the benefits.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
How the rich and poor talk online is actually quite fascinating. The idea that people who have lower socioeconomic status or people who are really having trouble making ends meet, can we just say poor? If you can't make ends meet, you're not doing so well.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
to live it's tough and I never thought about that because of course if I saw somebody who only talked about themselves and things they were doing that day it would seem to me that they were not thinking long term because of some character defect or they're not smart enough or something like that but now of course it makes total sense that if you can't think far enough in advance because you're just trying to literally feed your kids or you don't have gas to get to work and
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
And you're that poor. It's not necessarily a character defect or you having screwed up your life. Rich people, is it really that obvious that they just talk about luxury brands and vacations? Or are there some more subtle cues that out people as high socioeconomic status?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
Because I can't name one single time where I've been like just getting back from my business class flight to Turkey and staying at a five star hotel. Here's my dinner. I just don't do that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
intelligence services or whatever from finding or turning on the microphone to hear what we're doing. And I thought, oh, that makes sense. Especially if they want to get the location data, they can do that. If the phone is in a lead box, then it just sort of vanishes. And I guess they had us put it in the box in one place and then we moved to another place. So they just couldn't track us that way.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
That is a good point. I hadn't even thought about that necessarily. There's still a stat that something like less than half of Americans have a passport or something like that. Yeah, you don't have to say I'm going to a five star hotel in the Seychelles. You just have to say, oh, immigration is so slow in India. OK, well, you went to India, even though you're complaining about something.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
Good point. Yeah, I suppose if you're just excited that it's the first time you've ever left the country, you're not complaining about immigration status. You're like, I can't wait to eat after I get out of the six-hour line. You're just excited to be there. I thought it was quite fascinating about how these algorithms can tell if you're extroverted or introverted.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
You mentioned based on likes, if you like fantasy novels or if you like going to music festivals, that makes sense. There was a theory in the book or a hypothesis in the book that attractive people become more extroverted and outgoing because of the attention they receive as kids. That makes a lot of sense. Or is that just pure speculation?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
This makes so much sense. And it seems like it might be something that you could encourage in kids, regardless of how attractive they are, just by interacting with them a lot, putting them in environments where they are interacting with other people, adults and kids. You're right. There's still that spontaneous element. My daughter, she's three. She loves to sing and dance.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
And she'll be like, turn your chair around. The show's going to start. And I'm just like, where did you learn this?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
crazy extroverted behavior but then she's in music class and then the teacher's paying attention to her and the other kids are paying attention to her so it is a reinforcing cycle my son who looks exactly like me so he's very cute he has it in sort of an almost like a negative way where he's like whenever i do bad things people pay attention to me at school or otherwise and i'm just like oh no this is not the reinforcing that's you were hoping for yeah
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
This is not what we want. We want him to be reinforced. He's good. But he is not shy at all. It's crazy. He talks to the cops when they're here. He just has no fear at all.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
But that was the only method they had. And you had to put your watch in there, everything.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
You mentioned, though, facial recognition can take faces from photos or videos taken by other people or just the CCTV that's present in whatever stadium you're in or on a street corner if you live in China. So it doesn't really matter if you don't use social media. You're still a part of this surveillance capitalism system or whatever we want to call it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
It is creepy, and there's not much we can do about it. Because if an AI is making a decision to give someone a loan or not, and by the way, you know damn well it's going to be like, this person's battery was 25% at lunchtime when they applied. We're not giving them a loan. They're totally irresponsible. It's not going to say that's the reason.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
It's going to say, oh, based on 20,000 factors that weighed a little bit to the left on whatever line, you're just short of making it. We're not gonna be able to weigh all 10,000 of those factors. The fact that you applied and didn't finish the application all at once, and your battery status at the time, and your location kept changing, and the fact that your jobs have changed so much.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
There's gonna be 10,000 of those. It's not gonna be like, we didn't give you a loan because you're brown. That's gonna be an obviously not okay thing, but when it's 10, 20, 30,000 different little factors, and they don't interrogate the AI as to why, they just blindly accept it because it's accurate 99% of the time, That's where we start to run into these problems, I would imagine.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
I do want to address those counter-arguments in a little bit, but first I want to scare the crap out of everybody a little bit more. The way that computers and AI get to know us at an intimate level is really hard to describe to people who have lived with some level of privacy their whole life.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
You untrustworthy, good for nothing deadbeat. We'll be right back. This episode is sponsored in part by Tonal. Getting in shape is not easy, and the older I get, the more I realize how important, of course, it is. You hit a certain age, suddenly it's not about looking jacked, it's about, hey, how do I get out of this chair without grunting like my dad? I still grunt, though.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
I think it's part of, I think you have to. I think you are mandated to do that after age 40. Anyway, that's why Tonal is great. It's basically like having a full gym and a personal trainer mounted to your wall.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
It uses digital weights, so it adjusts in real time as you lift, meaning it knows when you're struggling and it backs off just enough or pushes you when it knows you got more in the tank, which frankly is smarter than most of us when we're training solo. It's a great idea. Gym memberships and personal trainer fees, they add up fast. With Tonal, you're making an investment once.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
You're getting way more out of it. Plus, no commute. You finish a workout. You're already home, which if you've got kids, you've got a busy schedule, is huge. You could put this thing in your office, which would be awesome. Another thing I love is Tonal doesn't just throw random workouts at you. There are structured programs designed by legit coaches.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
It keeps track of your progress, adjusts your weights automatically, and they make it addictive in the best way. It's gamified. You can actually see yourself getting stronger, which keeps you coming back.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
This episode is also sponsored by Progressive. You choose to hit play on this podcast today. Smart choice. Progressive loves to help people make smart choices. That's why they offer a tool called AutoQuote Explorer that allows you to compare your Progressive car insurance quote with rates from other companies.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
Growing up in the 80s in a medium-sized town, some people were all up in my business, but they didn't really know that much about me. I could hide stuff from parents pretty easily, but you had the ability to do that. You, on the other hand, grew up in a really small town and everybody knew everything about you. This analogy was actually really good to illustrate the idea here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
So you save time on the research and you can enjoy savings when you choose the best rate for you. Give it a try after this episode, of course, at Progressive.com. Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and Affiliates. Not available in all states or situations. Prices vary based on how you buy. This episode is also sponsored in part by BetterHelp.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
You know what is wild, we will spend hundreds of dollars on a new phone and supplements to optimize ourselves, but when it comes to our mental health, suddenly it's like, eh, I'm good, I'm just gonna power through the existential dread.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
Here's the thing though, therapy, it's not just for when everything's falling apart, it's like maintenance, it's like changing the oil in the car, you don't wait until the engine explodes. And therapy's helped me through all the curveballs thrown my way personally, traditional therapy, it can be expensive, I get the hesitation. That's why BetterHelp is actually pretty brilliant. It's online.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
It's flexible. You pay a flat weekly fee, so no surprise bills that make you need more therapy. They've got over 30,000 therapists, like a small army of people ready to help you get your head on straight. And if you don't vibe with your therapist, there's no awkward breakup text. You just switch. Easy. No driving across town. No weird waiting room chairs. You just click a button. Boom, you're in.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
Bottom line, your mental health is worth it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
If you like this episode of the show, I invite you to do what other smart and considerate listeners do, which is take a moment and support our amazing sponsors who make this show possible. All of the deals, discount codes, and ways to support the show are searchable and clickable over at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. You can always surface codes using the AI chatbot on the website as well.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
And if you can't remember the code, you're not sure if there is a code, go ahead and email us jordan at jordanharbinger.com. We are more than happy to surface that code for you. It is that important that you support those who support the show. Now for the rest of my conversation with Zandra Motz.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
I also found it shocking how easy it is to identify somebody personally based on, what was it, three credit card transactions? It seems like if it's that easy, you could also extrapolate a lot of info about people from those transactions once you identify them.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
So if you find me based on three transactions, some software I bought, a haircut, and where I ate lunch, now you've got a zillion other transactions you can identify me with that are like, here's every bit of clothing he bought. Forget Facebook status, where I spend my money is at least as identifying and intimate as that data.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
Those people are just looking at the photo where it's Look, I just woke up and I'm in full makeup and I'm in my yoga gear sponsored by Aloe. That's what people mean by curated, but you can't fake the rest of it. The fact that your battery's low, your late fees are half your credit card transaction, you have a massive balance from month to month that keeps running because you can't pay it off.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
Oh, big time. It's 100% bigger.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
That stuff you can't really hide. You can put on a brave face, a shellacking, a veneer over what it is, but you can't hide from the company. They know you're full of crap. And I have to admit, I pat myself on the back a little bit when you said in the book, the person who buys gym equipment and then donates to charity is an example of somebody who has their shit together.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
I looked at my credit card statement and I was like, what have I done? Okay, I spent 500 bucks on gym equipment. Oh, there's my Amnesty International donation. And I was like, I'm a good person according to the data. Science doesn't lie.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
That's really funny. Like, we don't have underwear, but all of our cereals are alphabetized in the cabinet.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
Yeah. This is what you're doing. Yeah, yeah. That's really funny. Moran is a really interesting, your husband is a really interesting character. By the way, he was on episode 265 of this show. And you had your first impression of him, which was that accurate? Because you went out on a date or something. How much of your predictions of him initially turned out to be right later on?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
That sounds about right. I mean, he's French and he's Jewish. So you're lucky he didn't miss your wedding, actually. Yes. That's really funny. And also you ended up at his place after the talk. Location data says you're a little bit easy there, Sandra.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
I remember vaguely in the 90s when I started dating, there was a cliche that a woman would come into your house and look in your medicine cabinet to see what sort of drugs you had in there.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
That actually was the original snooping around thing before digital stuff existed because you would open that cabinet and you'd be like, oh, okay, here's the real stuff that they're not going to tell me for months.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
That's a good point because this is sort of before all the personality pills and Adderall and everything. So I don't know. Are you looking to see if they're diabetic? Back then, what would have mattered? I don't know. Yeah, but it was a thing for sure.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
Hemorrhoid cream. Who doesn't have a couple tux laying around? I remember I was interviewing a very important, very distinguished man. He's like, can you come to my hotel and do it? So we did. We set up in his hotel and I was like, I need to use the restroom real quick. And I remember going into the restroom and he had all this hemorrhoid stuff laid out on the counter.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
And I was like, good to know that the CEO of this giant, massive multinational company has serious hemorrhoids. Poor guy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
Yeah, because you can't be like, hold on, I'll be right back. Nope. He's just going to find out about my hemorrhoids.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
He did. He played it very cool. But I guess at that point when you're a billionaire, it's like, yeah, I got hemorrhoids. What are you going to do about it, podcaster?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
You can leave if you have a problem with that. What is the limit of psychological targeting? Can I change someone's mind entirely or do I just influence people who are straddling the fence?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
Yeah, that's interesting, because it does seem like the sort of most basic, mediocre use of all this psychological targeting is selling me shirts. It just seems like, can't you do more with this? And I remember Cambridge Analytica, right? It was like, oh, they totally influenced the election. Did they or was it not much?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
Can we use this technology to decrease political polarization? These companies, they know what we're all like. They can file us into echo chambers. Can we reverse that process?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
Oh, man, that would be really irritating because, you know, it's like your parents theoretically have your best interest in mind. But the woman who lives five doors down, who babysat you twice when you were little, they don't really know you. They think they know you because they've made all these assumptions about you, but they could be wildly off base.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
That would be an interesting experiment. Again, though, it has to be profitable or these companies won't actually want to do it. Back to the privacy idea. What about people that think they don't need privacy because they have nothing to hide? I hear that argument all the time. There's so many people that say, look, I have nothing to hide. I don't care if they're collecting data on me.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
That's a good point. Being gay is illegal in more than half the world.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
So it's illegal or at least could be illegal in a large number of places. Religious affiliation. As a Jewish person, we don't like lists. We don't like tracking.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
And also, oh, I think she should date that boy. Why? Because they both have dark hair. What the hell does that have to do with anything? You're not exactly using your genius matchmaking skills. It's like, the boy she's dating now, I don't like him because one day he dropped something on my lawn by accident. Okay, 20 years ago, he dropped something on your lawn by accident.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
Speaking of stalkers, surely it's happened that somebody has used online data to find and hurt someone. I'd be shocked if that hasn't happened multiple times already.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
No kidding. Yeah. Hey, we got to protect judges. OK, what about these zillion other people that don't necessarily have political power that don't try to take their stuff offline? I remember that case that was particularly disgusting. And I get that judges are in a more vulnerable place than a lot of other folks. But what about all the other people that are in a similar place?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
You've got prosecutors. Sure. OK, part of the legal system. What about police officers? OK, what about teachers or disciplinarians in the school environment? Or just like maybe I don't want to stalk her either. How's that?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
How do we do this? The book goes into detail, so we don't need to go into like weeds too much. But one of the ideas you had was preventing companies from getting too many data points. Why is that a good idea?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
His dog peed in your yard, so he's a bad kid now.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
I know in the book you talk about taxing data brokers. I liked your idea, and this is very European, and I cannot see how it would happen here, but God bless you. Data co-ops, where essentially we all own our data. How would this work? Because that's like crazy talk to us Americans, that we would own our own data.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
Coming up next on the Jordan Harbinger Show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
Thank you. Thank you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
Thank you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
Thank you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
Thank you. Thank you for watching. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
It's funny because people will ask me something like, wow, your life is really not that private because you have a podcast and you have this online brand. But the difference is I have been for the last 18 years-ish thinking about what goes online because I realize, oh, if I post this, it's part of my brand. If I post that, it's part of my brand.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
Not that everything I do is branding, but it's just I'm consciously aware that I can't start talking about... I don't know, buying a gun without people being like, okay, so now you're this political, this, or maybe you're this guy, or maybe you're that guy, or maybe you're having a midlife crisis or whatever, right? You're doing something there.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
Whereas normal people, they post on Facebook and they go, I'm just telling my friends that I got a new rifle for hunting. But what you're doing is telling the entire world for all of eternity that you are now a certain type of person or with 50% probability or maybe this person.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
You forget you posted that last Monday, but the algorithm never forgets that you own a Browning with a scope that you can use to shoot 100 yards. They will never forget that for the rest of your life.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
That's interesting. I hadn't even thought about the fact that you don't have to post it. It just comes out of the data exhaust or whatever they call it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
Where it's like, location data, oh, we don't need that. Actually, now we can tell where this guy goes to lunch every day. Oh, that's useful. We can advertise similar restaurants in the area. That all becomes useful as soon as they figure out what to do with the mess of data that they have, which is what AI is getting better at doing and these kinds of things.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
One thing I thought was super interesting in the book was that these clues or data can predict depression. And lots of people are depressed. I don't think that's a big surprise. There's like a million suicides a year. Is that global? I assume that's global because that's enormous.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
That's a huge number of people, no matter which way you slice it. 280 million people, give or take, are suffering from depression. I don't know how they figured that out or if it's an underestimate. So if we can predict depression, I have to assume that these companies are doing everything in their power to help users who are at risk as soon as they get word.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
Not telling me a leather jacket and telling me it's going to make me feel better.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
It seems like if you're not a complete psychopath, a profiteer, I get it, advertising to people is profitable. It seems like if you find out that teenagers are depressed, one of the best ways to get every parent on your side as a tech company would be like, hey,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
Imagine this headline, Facebook saves 10,000 teenage lives per year with depression tracking, notifying teachers or caring adults, parents, doctors, healthcare people, authorities, whatever it is, every year by tracking them online. Parents would be like, here's your new phone so that you can use Instagram because this is the only insight we really have into your life and they're keeping you safe.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
Welcome to the show. I'm Jordan Harbinger. On the Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the stories, secrets, and skills of the world's most fascinating people and turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
As opposed to the current narrative, which is the complete opposite.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
It seems like this would be so easy to implement because obviously they can trigger advertising if you're depressed. They could easily trigger an email, a phone call, a notification in your spouse's use of that app or whatever. It could literally just call the police or there could be some sort of central way to handle this. It surprises me that they haven't done it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
Now, maybe that's naive because they're saying, oh, you'd say that's not profitable. Why would they do that? It seems like it would long term be such a massive PR win and create almost an incentive for parents to get these products in the hands of their children that it would be ROI positive. I don't know. What do I know?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
Our mission is to help you become a better informed, more critical thinker through long-form conversations with a variety of amazing folks, from spies to CEOs, athletes, authors, thinkers, and performers, even the occasional cold case homicide investigator, hostage negotiator, gold smuggler, or Russian spy. And if you're new to the show or you want to tell your friends about the show,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
I don't think I trust them, but this is because of what they do with the data that they're already getting. If they years ago had said, hey, we can use this to target advertising. Hey, and by the way, This looks like you might be starting down the path of having an eating disorder. We're going to notify somebody who you told us to notify or your school authorities.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1135: Sandra Matz | How Algorithms Read and Reveal the Real You
Then maybe we would have a totally different opinion of Facebook instead of... Remember early, it was like, wow, I can keep in touch with all my friends from school. This is incredible. I know what my aunt is up to. I only talk to her like once a year. Now I see her photos every week. This is such a glorious product. I don't see what could possibly go wrong with this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
Special thanks to Cayman Jack for sponsoring this episode of The Jordan Harbinger Show. Coming up next on The Jordan Harbinger Show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
You just have your phone call going to him. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
Jeez, and he's just hanging out at Tim Hortons waiting for the call? Yeah, basically, yeah. But he's thinking about it as a patrol officer. That's exciting stuff to do, too. I guess it's better than, yeah, I mean, he's Carl Winslow in Die Hard, right? He's hanging out outside of...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
It's something to do. Sure. Somebody who actually wants to work. No kidding. So you mentioned you did a bunch of stuff off the books. We touched on that. But why did you need to do that again?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
So it's expensive. So you're just like, I'm going to go do it by myself, even though I'm not supposed to do it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
And how wired do you need to be when you're just playing John Madden to build rapport? You're just taking unnecessary risk at that point. But of course, their protocol is, no, you're wired at all time. We have a team ready to help you. And you're like, we're going to be here for five hours drinking and playing John Madden. It's a waste of time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
So I see the temptation to be like, I'm just going to go do this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
Now, time to crip walk your way to some deals and discounts on the fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back. This episode is sponsored in part by Northwest Registered Agent. If you've been thinking about starting a business or maybe you've already dipped your toes in those waters, let's talk about the smart way to do it. Forget the headaches, the piles of paperwork.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
I'm talking about Northwest Registered Agent. These guys make it real easy. You can get more when you start your business with them. We're talking your entire business identity set up in 10 clicks in 10 minutes. They've been helping businesses launch and grow for nearly 30 years, so they know what they're doing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
Plus, you can use their address on your official documents, keeping your home address out of public view. They even have premium mail forwarding for a physical business address separate from your private info. It's a smarter way to get your business off the ground.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
This episode is also sponsored by Oura Ring. All right, here's an easy question. How are you feeling today? Now the tougher question, why are you feeling that way? If you had an Oura Ring on your finger, that wouldn't be such a mystery. This thing gives you personalized updates on your sleep, stress, activity, heart health, recovery, everything. It's a sleek, smart ring, not a bulky gadget.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
You get incredible data about your body, not just daily stats, but long-term trends that actually matter for living a longer, healthier life. That's why you're seeing these rings everywhere. It looks like a sleek ring, looks like a normal ring. but it gives you serious health tracking benefits. It's accurate, comfortable, durable. The battery lasts like a week. You forget you're even wearing it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
Aura isn't just about counting steps or telling you that you're tired, which you might already know. It's about understanding the bigger picture, your recovery, mental health, heart health, stress levels. It's about balance and rest, not just about performance. If you want to unlock the mysteries of your own body and live better, longer, there's really only one thing to do.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
Go to auraring.com and give Aura the finger. Learn more at auraring.com slash Jordan. O-U-R-A-R-I-N-G.com slash Jordan. If you're wondering how I managed to book all these authors, thinkers, creators every week, it is because of my network. And funnily enough, I have been teaching this class to three-letter agencies because they are using it in their undercover and not-so-undercover work.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
And I've set this up in a free course for you, 6minutenetworking.com. I don't need your credit card. It's not like a bait-and-switch type thing. It's a course about improving your relationship-building skills in ways that are decidedly non-cringy and not weird. It'll make you a better connector. And six minutes a day is all it takes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
Many, many of the guests on the show subscribe and contribute to this course. So come on and join us. You'll be in smart company where you belong. The course, again, for free, no shenanigans, over at sixminutenetworking.com. All right, now back to Teagan Broadwater. So the budget gets exceeded and you go to the feds, but they want to take over the case. Is that normal? Yeah, I think it is.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
Doesn't make any sense, though, because you're the guy who ran the case. What is their best argument? If you can sort of steel man this, what's their best argument for taking this case away from you?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
Yeah. No, it seems like a bad idea. I'm surprised they didn't offer you a job after that because it seems like you did a pretty good job on the case.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
Sure. So I'm just surprised the FBI wasn't like, you should apply here, citing your undercover work here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
Yeah. Tell me this story about you going in a dope house and then you end up, you were on TV at the same time. This is such a good story, man. This is the worst story, actually. No, I assume you can laugh at it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
There are 13 Ford Fusions in the neighborhood, and usually there's zero. What's going on? It's that bad in a lot of cases.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
PlayStation 4. Of course.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
You're just on TV in a police uniform behind you while you're dealing with these Crips telling drugs in the trap house. That must have felt like an eternity until that Arby's commercial or whatever comes out.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
It's Cobb, so it's either that or $2.99 or yada, yo, man. And you're like, oh, thank God, Denny's Commercials. Hey, can we turn off this TV? It's really distracting.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
Who else is watching cops at this exact moment that I also work with right now?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
You look familiar.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
You get labeled as a snitch eventually. How did that happen? And what do you do about that?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
You know, it's a good use of your off-the-books drug money. The fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back. This episode is sponsored in part by Cayman Jack, America's number one margarita. We had a little backyard hang recently, just a bunch of us friends catching up, snacks on the table, music playing, you know that kind of thing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
That makes a lot of sense. Also, I think it's funny you had the budget issues, right? So you have this wide, this big wad of cash. You got $200 on the outside. You're like, I hope he doesn't need any more than that. Because once I rip off this first $100 bill, everything under that is ones. It's all about the Washingtons, baby. Yeah, we're taking them to the strip club after this deal.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
A few lawn games that somehow get way too competitive. You know how it goes. Eventually, everyone hit that moment of looking around like, okay, so who brought the good stuff? That's when we broke out the Cayman Jack. Crackin' went open, it was like flipping a switch. Instant margarita state of mind. It's got that perfect laid-back beach bar flavor, but without any of the effort.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
No squeezing limes, no sticky blender cleanup, just real blue agave nectar and lime juice ready to go right out of the bottle. People were really into it, like really into it. Someone even was like, oh, is this bottled? You serious? Yeah, that's how good it is.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
So if you're hosting a crew, you just want to feel like you're on vacation for a minute, crack into your margarita state of mind with Cayman Jack.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
This episode is sponsored in part by Airbnb. Just got back from my fourth trip to Taiwan and it was a blast. As soon as we landed, Jen and I hand the kids off to the grandparents like a hot potato, head straight to a local cafe to get some work done because we do work on vacation. Anyway, we're sitting there typing away, feeling very international power couple.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
Special cafe energy, laptops out, coffee flowing. And we're packing up to leave and the guy goes, excuse me, are you Jen and Jordan Harbinger? And listen, I'm not gonna lie, that felt pretty darn cool. Minor celebrity moment unlocked. Shout out to Daniel T. It was awesome meeting you. We had a great chat.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
Honestly, it's one of my favorite parts of traveling, meeting sharp, interesting people who somehow still recognize us, even disheveled after 13 hours on a plane. And while we're out there living our best D-list celebrity spotted life abroad, It hit me, our home could have been making money the whole time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
If you've got a place sitting empty while you're traveling, you could be picking up some extra cash by hosting on Airbnb. Find out more at Airbnb.com slash host. This episode is sponsored in part by The Defender. You ever meet somebody and instantly know they've been places, that calm and chaos, I've driven through a storm and found the sunrise kind of energy? That's The Defender in vehicle form.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
It's not just a car, it's a statement. A nod to the ones who don't wait around for life to hand them an adventure, they go and get it. And whether you're a seasoned trailblazer or just figuring out how to swap city limits for tree lines, the Defender is built to back you up. It's capable of great things just like you. It's a celebration of grit, curiosity, and pushing past the usual.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
So if you've been waiting for a sign to finally take that trip, forge that new path, or just see what you're made of, this is it. The Defender's ready when you are. To learn more, visit DestinationDefenderUSA.com. If you like this episode of the show, I invite you to do what other smart and considerate listeners do. Take a moment and support our amazing sponsors.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
They make this show possible after all. All the deals, discount codes, and ways to support the podcast are searchable and clickable over at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. If you can't find something, you're not sure if something exists or if it's not working, just email me jordan at jordanharbinger.com. We are happy to surface that code for you, help you get stuff from the sponsors.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
It is that important that you support those who support the show. Now, for the rest of my conversation with Tegan Broadwater. You pull this clever move where you switch up an order at the last minute and it leads to a big supplier. Tell me how that worked.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
That's right. Little bit of sample and then we're going to go to the strip club and we'll have a blast. Man, you got word of a cop that sells Crips info on police action. What was your initial reaction to that? Because that's like the sinking feeling in your gut at that point, right? Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
And this is the kingpin who's running the whole show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
So how do you eventually get all these guys indicted and arrested? Does it happen kind of all at once? It seems like it has to, otherwise everybody goes to ground, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
What's a TFO? Just like a liaison?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
I bet. I bet. Oh, we didn't get so-and-so. Oh, no. So now he knows. Yeah. Where is he? Oh, okay. Three weeks later, we found him. He was hiding out in somebody's house. In your backyard. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
I know we're closing here, but before I forget, one of the reasons I wanted to do this episode with you was because you are donating some of the money from this book. Tell me about that, where that's going.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
It's that Chris Rock bit. You ever remember that Chris Rock bit where he's like, you tell a white kid he can do whatever he wants. He turns around and says, I don't know that. That's exactly right.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
Yeah, I was going to say like. Absentee father, but your father before was staying up all night killing people. Yes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
Yeah, wow, that's really awesome. And I hope that it's successful. I mean, it sounds like it is so far. But man, how do we get out of this mess? It seems like a huge chunk of the next generation doesn't have functional parents, doesn't have role models, and we can't really arrest our way out of this dope problem
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
It sort of reminds me of that scene in the movie Blow where they're interrogating the guy and they're like, what do you think you're doing selling drugs? And he's, you can't arrest your way out of this problem. There's all these drugs that go across the border. It's all about demand. There's always a market for it. What do we do about this?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
Teagan Broadwater, thanks so much, man, for coming in. We went way over. I appreciate you hanging in there. I'm honored to be here, man. Thank you for letting me come on. If you're looking for another episode of The Jordan Harbinger Show to check out, here's a trailer of our interview with Jack Barsky, former KGB spy who posed as an American in a truer-than-life version of a Hollywood movie.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
Welcome to the show. I'm Jordan Harbinger. On the Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the stories, secrets, and skills of the world's most fascinating people and turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
This is one of our most popular episodes of the show. Jack not only dodged the FBI for decades, but also defected from the Soviet Union, secretly becoming a real American. We'll learn how spies were recruited and trained during the Cold War, and what skills Jack used to assimilate seamlessly into American culture.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
How did you flip to eventually becoming full American? I know they tried to call you home. Can you take us through that?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
Tell us how you got caught, because the story is just not complete until you, like you said, had to face your past.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
For more from Jack Barsky, including how Jack was finally caught by the FBI and what happened after that, check out episode 285 of The Jordan Harbinger Show. All things Teagan Broadwater will be in the show notes at jordanharbinger.com. Advertisers, deals, discount codes, ways to support the show, all at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. Please consider supporting those who support the show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
Our newsletter, by the way, great companion to the show. Specific, practical, two-minute read, maximum. Every Wednesday-ish, jordanharbinger.com slash news is where you can find it. And don't forget about 6-Minute Networking as well. That's free over at 6minutenetworking.com. I'm at jordanharbinger on Twitter and Instagram. You can also connect with me on LinkedIn.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
And this show, well, it's created in association with Podcast One. My team is Jen Harbinger, Jace Sanderson, Robert Fogarty, Tata Sidlowskis, Ian Baird, and Gabriel Mizrahi. Remember, we rise by lifting others. The fee for this show is you share it with friends when you find something useful or interesting. The greatest compliment you can give us is to share the show with those you care about.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
If you know somebody who's interested in this kind of undercover work, drug trafficking, police work, et cetera, definitely share this episode with them. In the meantime, I hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn. And we'll see you next time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
Oh, I see. So he might not have even been corrupt.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
Oh, because he would call and say, we're going to. Oh, wow.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
That's really crazy. So how do you handle that at that point? My gut would be... Try to ask for an introduction so that you can, quote unquote, buy info on police activity. I don't know. But you don't really want to meet him because he'll be like, Deegan? Yes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
Oh, I see. So you get to use him slash prove that he's corrupt without actually going face to face. That's smart. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
Our mission is to help you become a better informed, more critical thinker through long-form conversations with a variety of amazing folks, from spies to CEOs, athletes, authors, thinkers, performers, even the occasional drug trafficker, former jihadi, gold smuggler, or Russian spy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
That's crazy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
There's a part of me that wants to go, oh, he must have been in another operation and it was only at the high level, but that doesn't even make any sense.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
Jeez. So it's almost like, oh, I've known Bill for years. He wouldn't do that. Throw this thing in the trash. He plays golf with me on Saturdays. He would never do this. It could be. I don't know. That's crazy to me. That's really scary. Talk about not having your back.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
Jeez. You did say something that I hear from almost every undercover who's ever been on the show, which is, you're working like 80 hours a week, 60, 80 hours a week, you begin to forget who you really are. How did that show up in your life? Because some guys really, they became more of their persona, methed out biker, except maybe more like hydroxy cut out biker. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
How did it sort of manifest in your life? Because it seems unsustainable. It's like a game or an addiction almost.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
And if you're new to this show or you want to tell your friends about this show, and I appreciate it when you do that, I suggest our episode starter packs. These are collections of our favorite episodes on topics like persuasion, negotiation, psychology, geopolitics, disinformation, China, North Korea, crime and cults, and more.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
You got to infiltrate a gang that works out every day. Yeah. And they're like, hey, man, you look rough. You need to take a nap. Go in the back.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
I can just imagine like, hey, look here. It's Southeast Side Crips, man. We value self-care. If you're going to be a part of this gang, man, you got to take care of yourself.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
I found it interesting. You said the whole gang love, loyalty stuff is just all fake. It's just all bullshit and that they don't really care. They just go right back to selling and banging.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
It'll help new listeners get a taste of everything we do here on the show. Just visit jordanharbinger.com slash start or search for us in your Spotify app to get started. Today, part two with former undercover cop Tegan Broadwater, who infiltrated the Crips Street Gang. Obviously, if you haven't heard part one, go back and listen to that. Part two, even crazier, more wild stories.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
Sure. They can certainly speak for a position of credibility if they go to, I don't know, middle school and like, Oh, yeah. You think being in the gang is cool? Here's what my life was like. Yeah. And then I went to prison for 25 years. You want to know what prison's like? And it's like, oh, geez, maybe not.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
You said you wanted to get to know your informants enough so that you could steer them into a normal vocation. Is that so you're getting to know these guys and you're like, hey, have you ever thought about not doing crime for a living? How possible is that?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
actually go pretty far seeing others that are dead now so i mean it kind of runs the gambit there too you always want the best for people though yeah of course you're making at one point triple the amount of drug buys whatever but you're not making that many arrests building up trying to find the top don't get pressure like hey can't you arrest some of these guys isn't there pressure like you're spending a lot of money i'm not seeing a whole lot of warrants or whatever coming through from you pal
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
We're just getting warmed up. Here we go. Part two with Tegan Broadwater. You said you did a lot of stuff off the books. What does that actually mean? Sounds like something you're not supposed to be doing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
Yeah. I'm happy to have you along working with me if you guys want to actually get off your ass.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1161: Tegan Broadwater | How a White Cop Infiltrated the Crips Part Two
You actually wanted to be a cop. Yes. The other guys wanted to get a paycheck. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
And I also think that those who try really hard to do that end up with resentful kids. I don't think that's a good plan at all. I'm not saying don't enforce discipline on your kids. I'm not saying don't have structure, don't have rules, let your kids eat junk food all day. I'm not saying any of that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
But I think coming in with the idea that your kids are going to be a certain way is a recipe for disaster for both you and for them. And that is probably one of the worst environments. An environment in which a kid is not meeting expectations is probably one of the worst environments to grow up in. Your mom probably really wanted you to be a doctor. Did she? Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
There you go. That's fine. We all know people who are like, their mom wanted them to be a doctor when they were nine. And now they're a doctor. Are they the happiest doctor? Not always. Was childhood nice for them? Maybe it was too much pressure involved.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
I think so.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
It doesn't mean you shouldn't have, I shouldn't say, maybe expectation is the wrong word. It doesn't mean you shouldn't have an idea of what your kids could achieve and you should support them in getting there. But I think a lot of people, you hear these stories about bad parents, right? And it's almost always something like that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
There's horrendous cases, but it's the sort of damaging stuff that seems sort of everyday pedestrian is, oh, my dad always really wanted a boy and he ended up with a girl. And you're like, oh, and then you just hear how that has messed with this person's self-confidence and self-worth every single day of their life. And you're like, wow, what a crappy environment to grow up in.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
You seem to be doing okay, right? So the way that you do, the only way in my opinion is to do the math. And it's funny because every year I kind of do the math and I go, okay, how long do I need to do this and earn at this level? And what happens if I lose 50% of my income through some tragic turn of events like podcasting CPMs, amount people pay for ads, goes way down. What can I survive with?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
Or you hear, my dad always thought that I would be an engineer like him, but has said I'm an artist. And it's like, you can just, you can feel the disappointment from the parents coming through the kid. And they're 40 and it's still there. Their parents are gone and still there. That's ugly. It's really bad.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
Yeah, so I liked this a lot, this subject, because having kids changes you in a lot of ways. And it certainly limits your career. much of the time. I don't think it has to, but I think if you're going to be like a really involved father, then it probably should limit your career in some ways. You almost don't even care. And that's a weird feeling.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
Cause I was like, nothing's going to stop me from achieving this. And now, and I used to work till like 8 PM and really just bust my, and then when my kid, now when my kid comes home, I'm like, Okay, I'm done working. And he wants to play Legos or throw water balloons outside. And I'm like, all right, this is what I'm doing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
And I don't go, oh, God, I have to do this thing instead of doing this or creating that. It's just the change is maximize time spent with kids, especially while they're young, because there's a day that comes and you don't have any warning where they don't want to hang out with you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
They want to go hang out with their friends and your heart will explode at that point or implode, I guess is maybe a better term.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
And that could be any time. Or they could be taken away from you by something horrible. Or you could be taken away from them by something horrible. So what are you going to do? You're going to spend an extra hour going through the spreadsheet again? Are there days where I work a little bit later even though my kids are playing? Yeah, of course. I try to avoid it, first of all.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
And I've set up systems to avoid that for the most part. And it's great. It really reminds you that the most important thing in your life is raising those kids. Even if you don't end up with the same amount of YouTube subscribers you would have or whatever had you not had kids, right? You're listening to The Jordan Harbinger Show. This is me with Ali Abdaal. We'll be right back.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
This episode is sponsored in part by BetterHelp. The holidays are my favorite time of year. There's nothing better than cozying up with Jen and the kids, watching classic holiday movies, sipping hot chocolate while the lights twinkle on the tree. But let's be real, life is not always that cozy. Stress, you got work, you got family dynamics, it can all pile up.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
Sometimes you need just a little extra support. That is where therapy comes in. It's not just for people going through something huge. It's for anybody who wants to handle life better, manage stress, or simply grow into the best version of themselves. Therapy has helped me navigate through tough situations with a lot more clarity.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
If you've been thinking about trying therapy, BetterHelp makes it really easy. It's entirely online, which means it's designed to work around your life. You fill out a short questionnaire, get matched with a licensed therapist, and start when it works for you. If you don't connect with your first match, no problem. You can switch therapists anytime, no extra charge.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
Thank you. Thank you. You don't need to have a marketing degree. Constant Contact's writing assistance and automation features make it easy to say the right thing at the right time. And with a 97% deliverability rate, you can be confident your emails are actually landing in your customers' inboxes. Their expert live customer support is always there if you need help.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
Plus, with a 30-day money-back guarantee, there's no risk in giving it a shot. So if you're ready to market smarter, grow faster, and connect with your audience, Constant Contact is the answer. So get going and start growing your business today with a free trial at ConstantContact.com. Constant Contact, helping the small stand tall.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
Here's your thrice-weekly reminder to sign up for 6-Minute Networking. It is a relationship course. It is a free course. I don't need your credit card for the course. It is not cringy. It is very, very practical, and it takes a few minutes a day. Many of the guests on the show subscribe and contribute to this course. 6minutenetworking.com is where you can find it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
All right, back to my conversation with Ali Abdaal.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
How do I make more money doing different things, put other irons in the fire, like product or something like that that's something I actually believe in? Or like one thing I do now is voice acting for video games. It's not a massive income stream, but it's like, oh, if I quit podcasting and I only did that, I could earn a living doing that. It wouldn't be the same living, but I could do it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
I know, God, you trust me. Now we're like, oh my God, what did you do? My cousins, they're so well-adjusted and they're adults now, but as teenagers, they were also just so nice and really awesome and didn't fight. It's a brother and a sister. And I asked my aunt, what did you do? And she's like, I wish I could take credit, but they've just sort of always been this way. And I'm like, damn it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
Because you look at your own kids and you're like, uh-oh. I don't have the same experience. So what does that mean? I will say that there are some, it's not that there's no patterns, right? Parents are involved, but not too involved. The parents are interested in their lives, but they're not controlling their lives. They're not trying to steer them all the time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
They are encouraging of good behavior, but they are not domineering. They encourage their kids to explore curiosity. They set up a safety net so that when they fall, they're caught, but they don't set up a safety net so that there are no consequences to doing something stupid or bad or against advice, all good advice. They don't plow the way for them.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
They let the kids fail, but they're there to support them when that happens. It's a delicate balance, but I don't think it's impossible. I think what's hard is watching your kids fail, wanting to do something, realizing that you shouldn't, and then letting them deal with the consequences. That seems to be hard. With toddlers like I have, there's not a ton of that. It's low stakes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
Oh, he can't build the Lego thing and he's getting really frustrated. I'll just build it for him. No, I should really just patiently help him do this and realize that he can do it himself. But with teenagers, it's... they call you from jail or something like that. And you're like, I'm going to go bail them out right now.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
And you go, actually, that might not be the best course of action if this is their third time getting arrested. Maybe they need to sit there for a few days in scary jail and realize they can't just call dad and get them bailed out of jail. Because you see that patterns with bad parents and kids who are super spoiled and those patterns are remarkably similar. So-
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
Unfortunately, a lot of it seems to be the dice roll of having kids that are like get along and are intelligent enough and don't throw things at each other.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
Yeah, it's tough because I grew up with significantly, we weren't poor by any stretch. I don't want to indicate that. My parents were both hardworking, but my mom was a teacher and my dad was an auto worker. So now we live in California and we're in a higher income bracket than I was when I grew up. My kids have way too much crap. I told my parents this. They agreed my kids had way too much crap.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
And then they said, but you had way too much crap. And I go, yeah, that's true. So every generation thinks the next generation has too much crap. What I've found, though, is my kids don't really care about material things. They like new stuff like anybody else. But they're not super attached to that stuff.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
And I don't know what it is we did right or if we have done this right, but they don't seem to care as much because they don't have any sort of sense of scarcity, right? They might not want to share their Legos. They might not want to donate their old toys. That's just a toddler thing. But they're not really attached to that stuff. And it's interesting to see that. So-
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
So then you do the math and you go, all right, if I have this much now and it's generally going to appreciate a 5% per year and I only need to do this for X number of years until I have this, in which case if I have this amount of money and I needed to withdraw from that every year because I was retired forcibly or otherwise, how much money would I have each year to survive on before that hits zero and it better not hit zero before I'm dead, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
When you show somebody the value of experiences, and this is hard to do with toddlers, but me and my wife are big on experiences over things, right? Like I said, we share a car. There's no need for us to really do that. We just do. That I think is a good – all the science shows that happy people prioritize experiences over material things. Material things, you just end up on the hedonic treadmill.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
Experiences build character and stories and shared experiences and things like that. So we're planning to show them that early on. Like money can buy you things like freedom and being debt free and getting good experiences and enjoying those experiences and lower levels of stress. What we're trying not to show them is money can buy you every single freaking Lego set.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
Money can buy you every toy that you want on a whim. Money can buy you every little material thing that you want, even if it's just temporarily because you're bored, you want to go buy something. That stuff is, that's a dangerous slope. And I grew up with kids like that. I grew up with like wealthy kids in my school. And a lot of them turned out to do absolutely nothing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
Their parents indulged those materialist whims and they've never accomplished anything.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
My wife and I agree. We had no idea how much work it was going to be, which sounds remarkably naive now. Everybody with kids is like, you didn't understand that kids are a lot of work. We understood that kids were a lot of work. Understanding and really understanding, it's very different. You know, it's like running a marathon is probably hard. I've never done it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
I'm pretty sure that's an understatement. And if I went and ran a marathon, I would be like, why did I decide to do this? This is terrible. You know, you hear about people running a marathon and they have like raw nipples and they're bleeding. That's what having kids, that's the level of pain that you get from having kids. Like, oh, it's going to be a lot of work.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
You're going to have to, your life's going to change a lot. And you're like, yeah, yeah, no, totally. I get it. And then you have kids and you're like, I mean, you said we'd get less sleep. You didn't say we weren't going to sleep for three years. You know, like you said it was a lot of work. You didn't fully convey how much we were talking about. Like I was like, I'll change a dirty diaper.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
Yes, you will. Multiple times at four o'clock in the morning after they peed on the bed, which includes you. And now you're soaking wet too. Are you going to take a shower? By the way, you have to get up in two hours to go on a flight or something with those kids.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
And there's a lot of stuff like that, man. There's a lot of stuff like that with kids.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
No. But I'm also really glad. There's a reason that evolution has made it impossible for someone to understand just how much of a pain in the ass it is to have kids. You know, because this is, I swear, like science. You know how women don't remember how much childbirth hurt? Have you heard about this? That's for sure evolved because the women who were like, damn, that was terrible.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
They only had one kid. The women who were like, you know, the miracle of birth. Yeah, I remember it being uncomfortable. They had like eight kids, right? And a bunch of them survived. So we have evolved to not really know just how much this, how brutal this is. So I am glad that It's impossible for me to tell you how much having kids is gonna change your life.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
It's impossible for me to convey it in a way that you would fully understand it. And that's good, because if I did, you might make a different decision. What I do say to people who are on the fence about having kids is I say, if you're on the fence, you probably should not do it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
And the reason is because it changes everything about your life, your career, the amount of free time you have, the amount of sleep you get. It ages you prematurely for sure. It stresses out your relationship in a lot of ways. It limits a lot of the things you can do, a lot of the things you can accomplish. I think the trade is fair. But I was like, I definitely want kids.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
And my wife was like, I definitely want kids. And then we had two kids and we're like, we definitely would have more, but it's a little bit late in the game. I'm 44, she's 38. And it's like, oh, let's quit while we're ahead. That was a conversation I was having with your friend downstairs earlier.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
So- As you earn more, you realize, oh, okay, I have more years of runway. So right now, the way that this, in fact, I have the app on my phone. It's called Compounding Calculator or something. I should show you. But I've calculated that if I stopped working right now, I could live on a pretty damn good monthly draw in perpetuity and still leave money to my kids.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
If you're on the fence though, or you're like, I don't really want to have kids, but I feel like I'll regret it if I don't. I'm like, don't do it. Do not do it because of FOMO. That's the worst reason to have kids, fear of missing out and thinking, oh, what if I regret it later? I don't know if that's setting you up for success.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
And I would ask those people, when you were younger... were you sure you wanted kids or not? Because I think for a lot of those people who regret not having kids, they probably thought, I definitely want kids, but now's not the right time. But there's a lot of those people who probably don't necessarily regret not having kids.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
And they were like, I don't know, maybe I'll have kids if I meet the right person. Maybe I won't. I don't know. Those people probably are like, oh, well, I'm 45 and I don't have kids. Guess it's not happening for me. Not sure how much I care. Anyway, I'm going to fly to Italy for two weeks. You know, let me know how the Wiggles concert was.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
And I'm like flipping double birds as they fly off into the sunset, right? While I'm holding a poopy diaper in my pocket. So that's what I would ask those people. Because I think if you're thinking I have all the time in the world to have kids, you're wrong about that for sure. Biology says otherwise. But if you don't really care, I would say don't have them. That's my personal opinion.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
Now, leave room for your opinion on that to change. If you're like my cousin's like, I don't know if I'll have kids. I'm leaning towards no. I'm like, bro, you're 26? Calm down. In 10 years, you might have a different opinion. They're open to that. But if you're 37 and you're like, eh, I don't know, I'm leaning towards no, it's an adult decision.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
You're a grown-ass man or woman and you made that decision, that's probably qualified. You are qualified.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
Oh, God, I should know this right off the bat. I have been married for six years. Nice. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
Four years.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
Yeah. Let me think. Yeah. I think for me, I was unaware of how my programming as an only child comes into play in my relationship. So my wife has an older brother, but me as an only child, I was used to kind of like only thinking about myself. It's really hard to break that habit.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
In my opinion, I'm not like super selfish or anything like that, but it's really hard to think, what does this other person want in this relationship? And that sounds dumb to say. It sounds silly out loud. Of course, you have to think about the other person in a relationship.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
It's not like I never think about the things my wife wants, but it's not a habit to be like, what are we going to do as a pair? And we really take time and we're like, what do we want to do this year? Our mutual friend Noah Kagan was like, plan out your year in January. We did that and it was awesome.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
I was like, okay, we're going to probably be able to take one or two international trips, one with the kids, one without. Where are we going to go? When do we think we want to do that? Okay, Taiwan with the kids, Spain without. Great. What do we want to do in the business? Five things is a lot. How about picking two? Okay, cool. We pick those two things. Those two things get done.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
And then you review it at the end of the year and you're like, we did all this. This is pretty cool. And we decided on it in January because what I found is if you just float through the year, at the end of the year, one of you is going – well, we didn't do this thing with the business and that's disappointing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
And the other person's going, well, I didn't get to do this thing and that's disappointing. And you realize you totally could have done that. You just didn't plan it for it. And if you let that stack up over years, what you end up with is, wham, my relationship and kids have stagnated my business. And the other person's going, we never do anything fun. That's not good.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
That resentment builds over time. That's not good. So I would say, shockingly, planning out your business in the beginning of the year and adding the personal stuff in there with your partner is a really good idea because then you're at least aware, you have a little bit of a roadmap and you've both bought into it. So that's been helpful.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
It's actually the same amount of money that I happen to live on right now, minus like the cost of doing business and stuff like that. So that's a really good place to be in. You are... Quite possibly also there. You just haven't run the numbers. I just never run the numbers, yeah. So it's scary.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
You're like, how's November? It's like April.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
So we used to do everything together before kids. It was like, oh, I'm going to London. Great. All right, let's do this. Here's all the stuff we want to do. Here's all the people. And she would have been in here like doing what your friend does with the cameras and stuff like that. And they, okay, I'm recording. She's like doing producer. And it was stuff like that. Now...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
she's at home because we have two kids and she's like, they're not getting like, you get these text messages when you wake up, like they're not eating, they're not sleeping. FML. And then it's like, how's it going? And then, oh, fine. They fell asleep. And you're like, thank God. Right. You just don't know what you're waking up to. So we really do have to block this stuff off.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
Before it was like, yeah, we just go everywhere together. Now it's like, all right, I'm arranging childcare. Luckily, my parents live across the street. Her parents live 15 minutes away. There's an aunt that lives really close. We have a nanny that helps during the day. So we have a lot of help.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
And we can ask those people like, all right, we're going to be gone for five days and we can go to Spain or something like that. That stuff now, though, has to be planned in advance. What you guys have now, your calendar fills up. I think, though, if it meant a lot to her to do, I really want to go to the running of the bulls and it's next week. You could figure that out.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
That's not the case with kids necessarily. It's like, well, they're in school. What are you going to do? Let grandma and grandpa screw up their diet and sleep and take them to school. Like, how's that going to work? Can't take them with you. They got school.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
So you really do have to plan more and you have to be open to not always getting your way, which is weird because you're like not getting my way. I'm the boss. I'm the one who earned all the money and blah, blah, blah. And then you're like seeding to a two-year-old. Yeah. What kind of BS is this? Who made you in charge? The answer is you. And then you're really kicking yourself.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
Like I gave birth to you and now you're dictating my whole life because they want Cocomelon and they want it now.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
It's funny you mentioned that because I was thinking that's one of the major advantages. I look at childcare and my wife and I go, how do people who can't afford this do it? And the answer is they run themselves ragged. Having money allows you to find quality childcare. Like one of the nannies we have is a nurse. Like she's a nurse from Mexico. So- We pay her really well.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
What if I run out of money? But I've seen videos where you talk about financial stuff. And unless you are just recklessly spending, you are probably fine. And you should run those numbers. Like, okay, if I do this for three years, I'll have this. And then if I need to withdraw, oh, I can withdraw $40,000 a month until I'm 94. Yeah. You won't need that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
And another person that works with us is Jen's aunt, my wife's aunt. She is family and she's in a position to help us and we pay her too. But then I see like our line item for that and I go, holy cow, that is... insane. The other thing we're able to do is buy healthy food that may be prepared by us or prepared by someone else. A lot of families that I know, they can't do that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
Healthy food in America is expensive. And pink slime fast food junk is cheap. So you can afford to feed your kids good stuff. Not that they freaking want it, but you can afford to... Feed them good stuff if you want. You can afford to take care of yourself. I have a personal trainer that I work with to keep me in good physical shape, which helps me stay in good mental and emotional shape.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
My wife also works out. That stuff is one of those where you go, I'm privileged to have this and I'm lucky and you couldn't do it without money. But it's a luxury. It's not impossible to do it yourself. But I'm not going to sit here and be like, you can do it. I've got a personal trainer and a nanny, but you can totally do it. Just work out on your own and take care of it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
Like, that's just ridiculous. You know, I would never tell two parents don't have those things or a single mom or whatever that they should have the same stress level and diet or whatever as me. I fully realize how lucky and privileged that we are to be in the position to do that. But otherwise, your money can only get you so far. Sure, super rich people probably outsource raising their kids.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
How well adjusted are those kids? You hear these horror stories, man. I've got friends who work with very wealthy people. And one of the stories this guy told me was awful. So he works at a really bougie school. A kid, God knows how this happened. It's a boarding school. God knows how this happened.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
The kid fell out of a window and landed on a railing and he had to go to the hospital and he was in the ICU for two months because he like, I think he like smashed his rib. Something happened with his liver and he had his spleen removed and all this stuff.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
No one visited this kid in the hospital except for an au pair, which is basically a nanny, that came after a month of him being in the hospital. His parents were traveling. They weren't even working. They were just on like a long extended trip to Italy or something. And they didn't fly home to see their kid. And it makes you think, who raised this kid?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
And the answer is probably the nanny that came to visit. That is so sad. So you see these rich, spoiled kids that have everything that they want and like crazy money, and you would never trade your life with theirs. Like you would never do it. You'd have to have had a hard lot in life to want to trade with one of those kids.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
Yeah, yeah. So rich and happy people, I think, again, to our earlier conversation, have this – they figured out their values early. Like, I want to be able to spend more time with my family. So they use their $100 million windfall – to make sure that they can live close to their kid's school. They go to a really badass school so they move closer to that school even though it's in a ritzy area.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
Or they use it to take months of time off because they hire extra help at work or they hire a COO that works with them and then they can set up the ability to go away for the summer and do things remotely or whatever it is. Or they retire their spouse. with the money. These don't even have to be super wealthy people. There was a time when my wife had a separate job. She was an accountant.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
Kids are expensive, but they are not that expensive.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
And I remember I wanted to go to New York City for four days over a weekend. And she goes, I can't, I've already taken all my PTO for the year and I can't take any time off right now. And I remember thinking, I did not work this hard to ask your boss, who's like 10 years younger than me, if you can have time off so we can go do something. So I was like, I'm hiring you for my business.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
And that was like the beginning of it. I mean, her career ended like a week after that. And then she was like, this is amazing. And now the reality of actually having to work with me has set in. Yeah. Too late now. But that kind of thing is a luxury, right? To work with your spouse and not have, because corporate America, it's like, oh, well, we do well and my husband wants to go. They don't care.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
Sorry, it's tax season. You're going to be working 60 hours a week. This is the Jordan Harbinger Show. It's me with Ali Abdaal. We'll be right back. This episode is sponsored in part by The Defender. We all have those big goals that seem just out of reach, right? But the truth is that's what keeps us moving forward. For the people who embrace challenges and explore their way, there's The Defender.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
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1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
Definitely. And part of the reason is there's all this stuff to be done at home and you can't really hire it out. Like, yeah, you can hire a housekeeper, but someone's got to manage all the stuff that happens with a house. You see really wealthy people and they're often like, oh my God, there's so much to do. There is so much to do.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
Someone's got to figure out, even if it's just stuff that we would look at as trivial, who's managing the renovation on the gym that you're building in your backyard or something, right? But somebody's got to do that. You're not hiring somebody to do that. That's ridiculous. And if you're hiring somebody to do that, who's managing that person?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
So two people working with limited power over their schedules, now they do less with each other. There's less family time. There's less time to bond with each other just as a couple. There's a massive to-do list of stuff from someone's fixing that squeaky door in the bedroom and the others. When are we going to take all that crap to the donation place? And how do we get rid of that rug?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
It's heavy. I need your help doing that. That stuff adds up and it's like cognitive bandwidth that just gets taken. And also, I think there's probably something to be said for it. When you have dual income, it's because you need it most of the time. Not always, but most of the time. Or you're both career-oriented. So what happens if two busy doctors are in a relationship?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
Even if they work at the same hospital, how often are you seeing each other? Can you coordinate your time off? Are you able to relax when you do get time off? There's all kinds of stuff like that. If one person is working, the other person can sort of say, my wife told me, she's like, let's take July off. I was like, it's impossible. She's like, we can do it. It's possible.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
So since she manages my schedule, she arranged me to interview a bunch of people before then. I still have to record ads and stuff like that, but it's very light lift. That's really hard to do when both of you have jobs where you are not the boss.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
So you have to have your values clarified really well. This is going to sound probably, again, simplistic, but if you get a lot of money, I've seen friends of mine who sell their company for like $100 million. And I'm like, what are you going to do with it? That's real FU money. And then one guy will say, there's huge differences, right? One guy was like, I'm going to get a yacht.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
And if both of you run companies, maybe that stress levels are, I'd love to see data on like two people, each one runs their own company and they're both sort of equally busy. Two people who are professionals, they don't run their own companies. They're really busy. Two people, one of them works, the other one works in the home, out of the home.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
Like I'd love to see the different varying bits of data on that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
It totally is. And I couldn't agree more. You reinvest that freedom. That's a great way to put it. You reinvest that freedom in your kids. I say no to so many things now that I've had kids and I don't feel bad. One of my agents is like, when are you going to write a book? You could have written two by now because it's been like years and years.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
And I'm like, I don't want to because every hour that I spend writing a book, is an hour spent away from the family. And of course, agents are like, no, no, no, we're going to hire a ghostwriter. You won't have to do anything. Really? I've heard that bald-faced lie before. You won't have to do anything, except for the five years of promotion that comes after the book is published.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
I'm like, no, I'll write one when my kids are older. They're like, you can write one when your kids are older, and you can write one right now. And I'm like, look, I realize you want a house in Nantucket, but I am not going to take on a project that I don't want to do right now
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
And they'll say something like, you're missing out on like a million dollars or whatever, for example, and you have to make this calculation. Would that million dollars change my life? Not really. Okay, what would the time investment do to my life? No thank you, right? Because you might be able to get that extra million dollars, but then what? Now you have to work till 7 p.m.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
every day instead of 5 p.m. Well, those two hours belong to your kids. You're stealing them from your infant children for money that you don't need, that when you die, you will leave them. Do you think they really care about that?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
Right. Yeah. It's like once you start running the numbers, you start to go, if I don't write this book, I'm going to leave them with this when I'm old and gray.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
That looks like a lot. But if they get this, are they going to be happy? Yes. If they get this, are they going to be happier? Not really. Would they trade that amount of money for an extra year with their dad? Of course they would, unless you have absolutely no relationship with them because you were writing books all the time or whatever, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
I'm going to buy a place in Marbella, Spain. These are different people. I'm going to buy this. I'm going to get that. Other people are like, oh, I don't know. I don't really need anything. You don't need anything? Well, I'll probably go on a trip with my wife. Okay, you should definitely do that. One of those people is probably a little bit more satisfied with their life than the other, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
Like if you have a well, it's just, the math starts to work out to the point where you go, I really don't want to do this. Now, I'm not trying to be judgy for the dad who's like, I have to work 60 hours a week. I want to put my kids through school. I'm not saying that that person is doing a bad job parenting.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
You are doing a bad job parenting if you make $3 million a year and you want to make 3.5 and so you spend no time with your kids. then you're a bad parent. You're making a bad choice.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
I agree. Yeah, I agree. I think you probably, look, I'm taking a guess only based on videos I've seen from you and stuff, but I think you could probably afford any lifestyle you want in any city you want. But then you're digging into the retirement runway that we talked about earlier, potentially.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
But once you run the numbers, you might be like, oh, actually, I can do this, this, this, this, and this all in central London, and I can still retire with X number of gajillion dollars that I leave my kids, and it's all good. You've really got to run the numbers. But yeah, you might also want to live at the seaside of...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
and live in a warm climate and work less and have a healthy food chef or whatever it is because the cost of living is much lower in Portugal or whatever. So there is that. Yeah, I agree. Having kids changes you. Anyone should bet on that. Thinking you're going to maintain whatever sort of trajectory and lifestyle you're on once you have kids, it doesn't matter if you're a billionaire or not.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
Once you have kids, something changes inside you. It doesn't matter what you have on the outside. So you have to be ready for that. I think it's wise that you're planning for that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
Everything I have now revolves around kids, right? So I would say anything you think you're gonna do after you have kids, That doesn't involve kids. Do it now instead. Because my wife and I were thinking, we're going to live in different places and we're going to go travel and do this. And we did a lot of that before kids. We thought we would continue doing that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
And I've got another friend who is also selling his company for like over $100 million, and he lives part-time in Spain, and he's very healthy about what he's going to do with this. His primary concern right now is raising his daughters in a way that they don't end up being totally ruined by that amount of money. And I'm like, that's a really good thought.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
But it turns out you really can't do that when you have little kids. It's hard. It's very hard. And when you have family infrastructure, that shit is priceless. Those people are not going to go with you to Spain for three months over the summer. You might think that that's a great opportunity. They don't feel like doing that. You need the help. You're not doing that. That plan is gone.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
So do all that stuff before kids, but also plan, be realistic about your ability to have kids. I would also, this is probably TMI or whatever, two in the weeds, I would get everything tested, if you know what I'm saying. Because what you don't want is to be like, oh, well, I'm a man. I can have kids all the way up to X age.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
And my wife, future wife, whatever it is, she's this way and we're going to be like, you want to know whether you can do it. And if you need to freeze things or start doing hormone stuff, or if it's not going to happen, maybe you find out early and you realize that you can plan totally different.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
That's a very good idea. Blood work.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
And whatever else goes into a cup. Whatever else works. Yeah. Yeah, exactly.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
Jizz in a cup is always a good place to end a podcast. You might have to bleep that out.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
You're about to hear a preview of The Jordan Harbinger Show with a former FBI agent and how he gets people to reveal the truth.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
We want the best out of life. We want the best business deals. We want the best personal relationships that we can get. A lot of that information that we need to get that best deal is often hidden. With elicitation, people don't realize that you're using elicitation techniques on them.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
You're just setting up a psychological environment that predisposes them to want to tell you information they wouldn't otherwise tell you. Typically, elicitation doesn't use questions. If you ask me a direct question, I'm thinking, what does he want? How's this information going to be used? Is it going to be used against me? Why is he saying this? What's his motivation?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
And then, of course, I'm going to come out with my sunshine answer and give you something that I think you want to hear. There's a human predisposition to correct others. If I want to get information from you, I will just give you what we call a presumptive statement. In other words, it's either a false statement or a true statement. But you're going to corroborate, say, yes, that's true.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
Or you're going to say, no, that's not true. It's this. We take our students after four hours of instruction in the morning, we take them typically to a public mall, and we will assign them targets randomly throughout the mall. And we'll tell our students, see that person over there?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
Go get their date of birth, go get their social security number, go get their PIN numbers for their computer and their bank accounts. And the students can do that within three to five minutes of meeting a stranger. If I can get some stranger to like me within five or ten minutes, the brain automatically ascribes all the rights and privileges of a friendship that took maybe years to develop.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
For more on how you can use elicitation techniques used by the FBI to negotiate a pay raise, check out episode 467 with Jack Schaefer on The Jordan Harbinger Show. All things we discussed in this episode of the show will be linked on the website at jordanharbinger.com. Advertisers, deals, discounts, and ways to support the show all at jordanharbinger.com slash deals.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
Most people are just fantasizing about how many cars they're gonna get with this or something. So if you have your values set up straight, lifestyle creep doesn't really have to be a thing. I know a lot of super wealthy people and they have like car collections and stuff. And Jen and I are like, wow, look at all that stuff that guy has. And she goes, yeah, but would you want that?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
Please consider supporting those who support the show. Also, our newsletter, We Bit Wiser. You all are loving this. I love the feedback. I love the replies I get. The idea behind We Bit Wiser is something specific and practical that'll give you an immediate impact on your decisions, your psychology, and your relationships. And it's like a two-minute read, if that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
We try to make it real digestible. Nobody wants to read a bunch of stuff in there. You already get enough email, right? We want the signal-to-noise ratio to be really high here. If you haven't signed up yet, I invite you to come check it out. It is a great companion to the show. JordanHarbinger.com slash news is where you can find it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
Don't forget about 6-Minute Networking as well over at 6minutenetworking.com. I'm at Jordan Harbinger on Twitter and Instagram. You can also connect with me on LinkedIn. And this show is created in association with Podcast One. My team is Jen Harbinger, Jace Sanderson, Robert Fogerty, Ian Baird, and Gabriel Mizrahi. Remember... We rise by lifting others.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
The fee for the show is you share it with friends when you find something useful or interesting. The greatest compliment you can give us is really to share the show with those you care about. So if you know somebody who's interested in happiness, lifestyle, values, the things we discussed on this episode, definitely share this one with them.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
In the meantime, I hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn. And we'll see you next time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
And I go, no, actually, I would not want that. That is not, I don't even have, I share a car with my wife, for God's sake. Why would I want a car collection? I don't even drive. I let her drive all the time. What am I going to do with the car collection? And so my value would be more like freedom, right? Oh, what would I do with a hundred million bucks?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
I'd probably not change my lifestyle much at all. And how do I know that? Because I went from one area to another in terms of income and I didn't really, I order more DoorDash, but that's because I have kids. I worry less about retirement because I've got that money in the bank earning interest. I did not buy another house for the summer. I do not have a car collection. I did not buy a boat.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
I bought nicer lighting that I don't know how to set up. I got to get one of these. But like- That is because I had my values set up straight. The problem is once you add money and you don't have those walls built to bounce off of, you just go all over the place trying to make yourself happy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
Welcome to the show. I'm Jordan Harbinger. On the Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the stories, secrets, and skills of the world's most fascinating people and turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
If you figure that out when you're not dealing with 100 million bucks, it's not going to change that much when you do. You know what I'm saying? So you see these guys that get really, really rich and they're not happy. So they keep trying to buy it and it doesn't work. That's how you end up with a car collection and a yacht collection and a house collection.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
You know what's interesting also is you see these guys, they're just prisoners of the crap that they own. I know this guy is probably close to or actually a billionaire. I haven't asked because that's a rude question. And he was telling me about some stressful thing he was dealing with about his house.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
And I was like, wait, how can you say, you said your house is being redone, but where do you live now? And he goes, oh no, this is one of my other houses. And I go, oh, okay. Well, you know, how many houses do you have? And he's like 15. How do you live in 15 houses? I was like, do you rent them out? He's like, no.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
So you're stressing out over a house that you will never live in, that no one lives in. And he's like, yeah, it's kind of silly when you put it like that. Yeah, silly is an understatement. This guy's worth almost a billion dollars or actually a billion dollars. He spent like 20 hours a week talking about this stupid property, either on the phone, dealing with it, thinking about it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
Just visit JordanHarbinger.com slash start or search for us in your Spotify app to get started. Today, this is part two, a conversation between me and Ali Abdaal on happiness and lifestyle and things like that. If you haven't heard part one, obviously go back and check out part one, and then part two will make a whole lot more sense. All right, here we go. Part two with me and Ali Abdaal.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
What a fricking waste of life. Like sell that shit, man. Are you crazy? Get rid of that right now. Sell it now. At a loss and be done with it. It's the dumbest thing I've ever heard. This guy, 15 houses. Are you crazy? Because I was like, oh, is it for investments? No, they're not even investments, man. He just owns properties because he liked the way that they looked.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
Never even goes to these things. It's the stupidest thing I can think of to spend your time and money on.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
You kind of mentioned this in a way in your book, a friend of mine, I said something like, oh man, you know, you've got this all figured out, blah, blah, blah. This is so great. It must be so great to have all this money. And he goes, well, you've got it all figured out too. You're doing fine. And I was like, what do you mean? He's like, you have two kids. You've told me earlier, you were happy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
You have your own house. You like what you do. You basically are winning on like every level. And I was like, oh, that's really cool to hear from a guy who's like a shitload of money. And he's like, yeah. And he goes, what would you do with $100 million if I gave it to you right now? And I was like, oh, I'd just put it in the bank and earn interest on that. And he's like, why?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
And I said, oh, because then I would be able to safely retire at any time. And he goes, I bet you could safely retire right now. That was what got me running the numbers. And I was like, oh. And then I realized I don't need to win the fricking Powerball lottery to feel safe. And then that was a massive awakening for me, right? He's like, no, really, what would you do?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
And I was like, I would hire a healthy food chef And he goes, is it impossible for you to get healthy food? And I was like, no, there's a freaking Whole Foods three blocks. I could literally walk there. He's like, so you don't really need a healthy food chef to live or be in your house. You could even buy take DoorDash healthy meals from like a vegan restaurant or whatever flavor you want.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
And I'm like, that's true. All these things you think you would get with that money. you pretty much don't need that at all. And you can get it in a different way. It's so ridiculous. Like if you just keep asking why, the answer is always like safety.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
I could not agree more. And I really think humans do this thing, right? Where we say, once I get this, I'll be happy. And then, you know, that that's wrong because you listen to podcasts like this one, but then you do it subconsciously anyways. Yeah. And you have to constantly, at least I have to constantly catch myself doing that. Like, why are you doing this?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
Oh, because if I had this, then, oh, then I think I'd be happy. But then what I would really do is compare myself to the other person who has more. So you realize that you're on this hedonic treadmill, this hamster wheel, and you realize you can get off at any time. And For me, I have to constantly remind myself that I can get off at any time. My wife is like, why are you working late?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
Well, because I want to finish this thing. What if you just finished it tomorrow? That's a valid, can't argue that logic, right? Like cannot argue that logic. And I find myself watching cartoons with my kids and I'm like, this is so much better than reviewing that document that I will finish tomorrow, maybe.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
Yeah, that's what Sundays are for. Meanwhile, you and me are like fighting the urge to zero inbox. And it's like, what are you doing, man?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
It's Sunday somewhere. That's not how time works, but whatever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
Coming soon, Tuesday snippets.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
That's hilarious.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
I, yeah, I think that's totally fine. And how many people have emailed you furiously complaining that they, their Sunday snippets came up?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
That is cute.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
I do.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
Oh man. Um, It changes your life in mostly good ways. Parenting is a really sensitive subject for a lot of people. There's a lot of experts on it. But the problem is you don't know what kind of kids you're going to get. And people think, and maybe they're right, maybe I'm wrong. People think that they create their kids and by giving birth to them, yeah, sure.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
But that's kind of, the rest of it is a dice roll. And there's a lot of, oh, if you take your kids traveling early, they'll get used to it. And that didn't happen for a lot of people. Oh, if you tell your kids this, they'll get used to this. And you'll get, and this will be your favorite. You'll get advice from people who aren't parents.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
And that was like with my son, he eats when he wants to and he doesn't when he doesn't. And we tried everything, forcing him and all that stuff and shaming him and all this horrible crap. And he would gag at the sight of food. And we realized like, oh, that's not good. But then you let him screw around for 45 minutes and finish playing. And he goes, I'm hungry.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
And then he just houses whatever you put in front of him. He's obviously not faking a gag reflex. He's four. Meanwhile, we've got, I don't want to out anyone. People used to, people who come over to our house often will say, I wasn't allowed to do that when I was younger. So what you're saying is just don't allow my four-year-old to eat when he wants to or not eat when he doesn't want to.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1096: Ali Abdaal | The Hidden Economics of Creative Success Part Two
Good luck with that when you have your own kids, person who knows nothing about children. So- You can't come into having children with certain types of expectations. You know, you really get what you get in a lot of ways. And I think your ability to craft your kids in your own image is not as great as people think.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
Coming up next on The Jordan Harbinger Show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
Interesting.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
Some people have it worse.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
Yeah. That's a weird thing to say to someone.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
They're pushing those buttons. You just go like, that's a horrible thing to say to someone.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
So there's that weird switch moment, which I guess you only see in hindsight, where you go, oh, this was no longer fun. Oh, shucks.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
Sure. Since this episode is about the tragic murder of someone's family member, I'm just going to say, I'm just going to cut to the ad break. We'll be right back. Thank you. Thank you. A major medical network fast-tracks a generative AI system to streamline patient logistics and gain a competitive edge.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
But here's the thing, when you rush AI without fully understanding the risks, things can go sideways fast. Ambulances get rerouted, patients get delayed, systems are overwhelmed, and in this case, it could have cost lives. The Cybersecurity Tapes is a podcast that I enjoy. It dramatizes these high-stakes scenarios.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
And for those who don't know, it's about a really heavy subject that we'll get into. But I'm laughing about some anecdote. And then I'm like tearing up. And I'm like, oh, my God, what if this is my life? And you think about your own kids or your own siblings. And then you're laughing again. Is he genuinely concerned about me? Or does he think I'm like having a mental illness situation?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
based on real cybersecurity failures while also breaking down what went wrong and how to avoid it. Check out episode seven of the cybersecurity tapes and see just how wrong AI can go when the pressure to keep up overtakes the need to play it smart. This episode is sponsored in part by design.com.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
All right, if you're starting a business or even just thinking about it, let me tell you about design.com. It is an amazing set of tools that makes creating a professional-looking logo super easy. All you have to do is type in your business name and industry, and in seconds, it generates thousands of custom logo options for you to choose from.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
And these aren't generic kind of meh designs, and it's not that thing where like people in Uzbekistan, no offense, create 8,000 different designs that just kind of look like the Uzbekistan flag. but with your logo somewhere or whatever. These are handcrafted by top designers from around the world.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
And once you find a logo that you like, you can tweak it, change the font, colors, layout until it's perfect, then download everything you need to make your business look polished and ready to roll. And design.com is even more powerful than that. You can generate templates for social media posts, ads, business cards, even websites and way more.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
If you already have a logo, you can upload it and instantly get access to thousands of design templates that actually match your brand's look and color scheme. So the tool saves you a ton of time. It lets you focus on growing your business instead of getting stuck in the weeds with marketing materials. They've got a 4.8 star Trustpilot rating. So design.com is legit amazing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
It's run by a friend of mine. I know a lot of you always say like, oh, you always say that. It's always run by some friend of yours. It strains credibility. What can I say? I got a lot of friends. I'm a popular guy. Okay, we know that part's not true. But anyway, I've known Alec for a while. The company's been around for a long time. They really do care about their customers.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
Try it for free at design.com slash Jordan. I'll see you next time. You can find the course, again, all free, I don't need your credit card or anything like that, over at sixminutenetworking.com. All right, now back to Kelsey Grammer. There's a writer from, I guess it was Cheers, Dan O'Shannon? That's not right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
So he said something like, and this is from Wikipedia, so God knows if this is accurate, but he would ooze into the studio his life all out of sorts. Jimmy, I guess maybe a director, would say, and he would snap into Frasier and expound in this very erudite dialogue and be pitch perfect. And then Jimmy would yell, cut.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
And he would ooze back into Kelsey, glaze over eyes, half asleep, going through whatever he was going through. It was the most amazing transformation I've ever seen, which is a weird way to end that particular paragraph. But I think that it really shows, yeah, you are on. And that probably made it harder for people to go, hey, man, maybe take it easy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
event on the airplane.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
It's a tough one. My former producer, one of the things he said was, I've smoked and I've done cocaine. Smoking's harder to quit, but cocaine is right behind it. And he's like, one is decidedly more fun than the other. Not to glorify it or anything, but there's a reason people do it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
Yeah, he's like, how long is this flight from SFO to New York City again? That's long enough. Seven hours. Tell me about getting kicked out, or sorry, removed from Juilliard.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
How does fame complicate recovery? It's hard enough when you're just a lawyer working your day job, but when people are like, oh, is that Kelsey Graham over there? Get a picture. I guess back then it wasn't get out your phone and take a picture, so you had that going for you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
That's a good point.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
Yeah, that's probably one of the worst ways I can think of to find... Other people tell you that millions of people have seen this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
Not exactly a common name either.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
So he was crazy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
The breaking news was the machine that's supposed to record has the tape flapping around like this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
Oh, man.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
Do you think that Hollywood has become more or less forgiving of personal flaws than when you started your career?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
especially if it's just an accusation, because you find out seemingly quite often later, oh, I'm not totally sure, or this didn't happen, or the person's counter shoes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
I will admit that, like most people, my gut instinct is to go, oh, my God, I knew it. The guy. Wait. And then I go, no, I didn't know anything. First of all, I know nothing about this person. It's different when it happens to somebody, you know, and you go, I can't believe he would do that. And then you go, wait. I can't believe he would do that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
But then you're tempted to go, maybe I'm just a bad judge of character. Who am I to know? I don't know everything everyone's done in their life. I must have misjudged him. And then you're in this battle. And then if you find out three months later that it was completely fabricated and he was being extorted for money, you're like, oh, gosh, now I feel like a jerk for even giving it any credit.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
AI is going to make everything worse and better at the same time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
Isn't that amazing? And I go, how do you know?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
Doesn't it make you feel old? Like, I'll be online and I'll go, wow, that's impressive. And people on Reddit or whatever will go, that's AI. And I go, okay, I'm 45. How do you know? And they go, the lighting is too perfect. Or like, look at the hands. And I go... They look like hands. No, they don't. That finger is bent in a weird way. That's like nobody would hold naturally.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
And you go, yeah, you know what? You're right. So now I'm looking at hands. But by the time you figure that out, AI is like, got to make the hands better. Got to make the lighting worse. So it's just like this rat race between the human brain, which mine is just done. Mine goes, that's a photo.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
That's an interesting perspective. Yeah, that's a good point.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
I like that one. I had to learn stuff manually.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
You know that's in the snow uphill both ways. That's that version for you're in my generation. I had to go to school to learn how to do things. Okay, whatever, man. Whatever, dad. I learned how to do this because I plugged my brain into the Matrix. Whatever. I'm curious. You said that Karen's murder sent you into this spiral, but it also gave your career a structure. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
I wonder when, did performing become some kind of therapy or was it a way in some ways to avoid healing?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
I would imagine that's such a tenuous time in someone's life, right? Because you're with another person and I went to law school, right? So it's like this person that I'm with is going to be a lawyer and this is what our life is going to look like. And once he graduates, he's going to probably work in Manhattan or LA. And then it's like, oh, he's going to work at Target over the summer.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
That's an interesting way to look at it for sure. Yeah, that makes sense. The broader your life experience, for better or for worse, the more connected you can be to different emotions or whatever situations. What's a lie people told you about grief or that you thought you knew about grief that you believed for too long?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
I literally wrote, I wonder if he's going to say that because that is something I think a lot of people find out is not necessary. Just ain't true.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
They don't think, oh, my dad's such a legend. A legendary screw up. What percentage is it like, oh, my dad's pretty awesome. And what percentage of it is like, he won't stop quoting Shakespeare at dinner. I'm not inviting any friends.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
It's funny to think about. All dads think, I'm going to be the cool dad because I have this cool life and career, and then it's never true. I'm so uncool.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
Spongebob.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
There's nothing wrong with that. But when does he get back into the whole promising career that's going to make me a lot of money thing?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
Oh, man. I can relate. Yeah, my son is five and he's, you're so cool. And I'm like, oh, soak it up because you're not going to believe that. God bless you because it's not happening forever. All my friends who have older kids are like, just no, seriously, take a mental snapshot of this because you will never hear that. Oh, yeah. Three years.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
You spent decades as an actor from Frasier Crane to intense dramas, Broadway musicals. At what point did you feel like, I'm successful, genuinely? Oh, yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
I can imagine. But do you think you would have believed or internalized that 10 years ago if somebody said it? Or would you think this guy's buttering me up?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
Did that feeling match up with what you imagined being successful would feel like?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
Were you allowed to keep that? That's not a secret? It's been announced.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
Yeah, could have led with that. Right.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
Fishing boat is very funny because the only guy I know who's done that is my second cousin. And he's like, yeah, my roommate in Alaska, we were crab catching. He slept with a gun under his pillow. And I'm like, on a boat? Who's going to get him on a boat? You never know. You never know.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
Oh, like a cameo like Stan Lee used to do?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
It's so funny. That is a great character for you as well because it's like this sort of like super tough guy, but then his hobby is reading books. He's intellectual. He's my guy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
Exactly. Yeah. That's super cool. I am. I'm excited for that. Kelsey and I are going to take a quick cocaine break. We'll be right back. I've got homes.com as a sponsor for this episode. Homes.com knows when it comes to home shopping, it's never just about the house or the condo. It's about the homes. And what makes a home is more than just the house or property. It's the location.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
It's the neighborhood. If you've got kids, it's also schools, nearby parks, transportation options. That's why homes.com goes above and beyond to bring home shoppers the in-depth information they need to find the right home. It's so hard not to say home every single time. And when I say in-depth information, I'm talking deep.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
Each listing features comprehensive information about the neighborhood, complete with a video guide. They also have details about local schools with test scores, state rankings, student-teacher ratio. They even have an agent directory with the sales history of each agent. So when it comes to finding a home, not just a house, this is everything you need to know, all in one place, homes.com.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
We've done your homework. This episode is sponsored in part by Airbnb. Just got back from my fourth trip to Taiwan and it was a blast. As soon as we landed, Jen and I hand the kids off to the grandparents like a hot potato, head straight to a local cafe to get some work done because we do work on vacation.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
Anyway, we're sitting there typing away, feeling very international power couple, special cafe energy, laptops out, coffee flowing, and we're packing up to leave and the guy goes, excuse me, are you Jen and Jordan Harbinger? And listen, I'm not going to lie, that felt pretty darn cool. Minor celebrity moment unlocked. Shout out to Daniel T. It was awesome meeting you. We had a great chat.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
Honestly, it's one of my favorite parts of traveling, meeting sharp, interesting people who somehow still recognize us, even disheveled after 13 hours on a plane. And while we're out there living our best D-list celebrity spotted life abroad, it hit me, our home could have been making money the whole time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
Clearly, that guy had so many enemies. He was like, you never know.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
If you've got a place sitting empty while you're traveling, you could be picking up some extra cash by hosting on Airbnb. Find out more at airbnb.com slash host.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
Yeah, exactly. There's an interesting bit where they teach you in Juilliard, I think, how to connect with your emotions. And they had you think of your grandfather who had passed away when you were 12. And you said you use this throughout the rest of your career. Is that as simple as it sounds? You just think of somebody that is no longer there?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
I am more than happy to surface codes for you. It is that important that you support those who support the show. Now, for the rest of my conversation with Kelsey Grammer. Most actors struggle to hit any breakout role. I mean, that's the name of the game, right? You made a few characters, but namely one, Dr. Frasier Crane, that spans generations. Again, not to put the dinosaur label back on you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
Welcome to the show. I'm Jordan Harbinger. On The Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the stories, secrets, and skills of the world's most fascinating people and turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
No, it's okay. What did you do differently from others in your field, you think, to make that happen? Or is that kind of a luck function?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
Interesting. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
Those are great brand ambassadors for Christianity. Absolutely.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
These guys are like on another level. What's the difference between playing a character people merely like and a character people want to watch for literally decades?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
Oh, that's in every movie.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
When younger actors come to you for advice, what's the thing that maybe they don't expect you to say, but that they need to hear?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
Even in the podcasting industry. Of course.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
That's a funny visual. Just Casey Grammer out there with a sledgehammer quoting Shakespeare and C.S. Lewis. And the guys are like... Turn the jackhammer up louder. I'm sick of listening to this guy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
Yeah, one way or another, I suppose. You've been very open about your political views, support for Donald Trump. I wonder, how do you navigate public perception in an industry that often leans differently? But it seems like that's a minefield in Hollywood. It's like, oh, you're the guy who's on the other side of the aisle.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
I cherry-picked this, so forgive me, but in a 2016 interview with The Guardian, you said, the person I admire most is Vladimir Putin because he's so comfortably who he is. So that may have aged like milk, and I'm wondering what you think now.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
It's funny you should say that. I was just going to say, Kelsey Grammer is Vladimir Putin. I can see it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
It just said, because he's so comfortably who he is.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
Yeah, that's the famous. What is his thing?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
I definitely agree with that. That's a really good point. And I think you're onto something.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
It is a giant mess that if we had three more hours, we could certainly dive in.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
You said every interaction, every person who we interact with and meet and talk to is working with us together on a soul level, working toward a higher intention. Each person is a pathway to our highest good. What do you mean by that? And is this podcast perhaps the exception?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
That must have been a badass feeling at the time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
No. Maybe not. What do you want most people to remember you for, both as an actor and as a person?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
I wonder, did you find more of that when you had kids? Because you have seven kids.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
What's with the eye drops in the refrigerator, by the way?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
Yeah? It sounds awesome. Try it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
It just sounds like a... When you wrote about that, I was like, this sounds glorious. Can't even find the word.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
In the morning, especially, you wake up and you're like, oh, you're wiping those little crusty things. And you're just like, ding. It's like, you just got to be like the first sip of coffee.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
For your eyeballs.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
Yeah. I can't, I love it. I love that idea. Cool. Kelsey Grammer, thank you very much. Thanks, man. Wonderful. Thank you so much. All things Kelsey Grammer will be in the show notes on the website at jordanharbinger.com. Advertisers, deals, discounts, ways to support the show, all at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. Please consider supporting those who support the show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
Also, our newsletter, We Bit Wiser. You guys are loving this. You're loving reading it. I get a lot of feedback on it. I like writing it. The idea is to give you something specific and practical that'll have an immediate impact on your decisions, your psychology, your relationships. in under two minutes. And hey, if you haven't signed up yet, I invite you to come check it out.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
It's a great companion to the show. JordanHarbinger.com slash news is where you can find it. Don't forget about Six Minute Networking as well over at SixMinuteNetworking.com. I'm at Jordan Harbinger on Twitter and Instagram. You can also connect with me on LinkedIn where the same people, some of the same people are. This show is created in association with Podcast One.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
My team is Jen Harbinger, Jace Sanderson, Robert Fogarty, Tata Sidlowskis, Ian Baird, and Gabriel Mizrahi. Remember, we rise by lifting others. The fee for the show is you share it with friends when you find something useful or interesting. And the greatest compliment you can give us is to share the show with those you care about.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
So if you know somebody who's a big Kelsey Grammer fan, loves this Hollywood type stuff, or is interested in a conversation that's very candid about grief, share this episode with them. And in the meantime, I hope you apply what you hear on this show so you can live what you learn. And we'll see you next time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
I may have more follow-ups on that later, because as a parent, it's one of those things where you go... Why did I do this to myself? Like, no, get me wrong. I love my kids, but there was this part of my heart that was like bulletproof. And now it's just open to the exposed air.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
Our mission is to help you become a better informed, more critical thinker through long-form conversations with a variety of amazing folks, from spies to CEOs, athletes, authors, thinkers, performers, even the occasional mafia enforcer, neuroscientist, or war correspondent. If you're new to the show or you want to tell your friends about the show, I suggest our episode starter packs,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
But it's wonderful and terrible at the same time. It's like falling asleep with your mouth open. You wake up and you go. It's not good. No. Kelsey, in your memoir, you recount these just harrowing details of your sister Karen's final moments. It's heartbreaking and it's deeply personal. And I wonder why you chose now to revisit this painful chapter in your life.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
It's like psychic kind of stuff?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
That's one of those like throw stuff at the wall and see what sticks. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
Yeah, wow.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
Can you tell us what happened to her, to Karen?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
These are collections of our favorite episodes on topics like persuasion and negotiation, psychology, geopolitics, disinformation, China, North Korea, crime and cults, and more. That'll help new listeners get a taste of everything we do here on the show. Just visit jordanharbinger.com slash start or search for us in your Spotify app to get started.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
But as a grown man, even still, I'm sure it is. But it's got to be intellectually, you know, well, of course, I couldn't be with her 24-7 and protect her 24-7. But it doesn't really absolve you of the one time that, you know, I would imagine you spend 50 years going, well, I should have gone over there just over and over. A million things. Yeah, a million things.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
What happened to the killer?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
I mean, these guys are just monsters. I know you're a man of faith. What do you make of this evil that is clearly real? I mean, you'd like to think like, oh, people have reasons or there's like, it's so rare or this is, you want to make a reason for it because it's so senseless.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
Today on the show, Hollywood legend Kelsey Grammer of Cheers and Frasier Renown. We have a refreshingly real conversation about his career and struggles, including substance abuse on the set and off. We explore how he prepares for roles, handles rejection and career setbacks. We also dove in pretty deep on the tragic murder of his sister in the aftermath of that formative life experience.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
It's kind of scary to think about it that way. It is, I know.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
Yeah. Which I love. That's going to be the clip. Christ is not a pussy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
I hate to ask this question, but I think it's probably on a lot of people's minds. Imagine you're haunted by what her final moments were like, but isn't this somehow unfair? Because you have this wonderful person who you love and remember so much.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
You remember 18-ish years of how wonderful and beautiful and fun they were, and then it's punctuated and possibly overshadowed by this horrible thing that was not done by them but was done to them. And it just seems unfair. That's one of the main things you remember about this person. Their victimhood overshadows their life in some way.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
And it's probably somewhat of a struggle to cherish their life and not linger on the loss.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
And that seems like such a struggle, of course. You built a life on commanding the room, your voice, presence, your name, everything. It seems like it would be tough to handle those moments where none of that works on maybe your own demons. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
Grief, acting, career longevity, and a whole lot more. I really enjoyed this conversation. I think you will as well. Now, here we go with Kelsey Grammer. I'm excited about this. I read the whole book on the airplane. Thank you. And it's emotionally not a light read, as you know. And my seatmate was like, are you okay, man? Because you're narrating this book.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1157: Kelsey Grammer | Channeling Grief into Artistic Authenticity
You've described years of addiction and some self-destruction as a kind of punishment. Do you think you were trying to erase the grief or maybe even preserve it in some way?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
And it was summer, so the river wasn't frozen. But we were driving around in this boat and you could see the North Korean guards on the shore. And I remember the captain of the boat was kind of alarmed and people were taking photos. And I said, what's going on? And one of the Chinese guys was like, oh, usually the guards are in the tower or they don't come out.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
But now they came out to look at the boat. So this guy was snapping photos with a telescopic lens. And then you hear the boat captain go something. And then I was like, what's that? And he's like, oh, they don't want us to take photos. But the guy was like, screw it. Everybody was just like, screw it. I'm going to take photos anyway.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
The guard on the shore raises his rifle and aims it directly at the boat and is angry. And then the captain over the loudspeaker is screaming in Chinese and turns the boat around. And that was the end of the tour.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
However, when I got back, I read that a few months or years prior, some Chinese fishermen had been fishing in the river. Their engine died and they drifted to the North Korean side. And when they got out, they were just summarily executed by the border guards. They just got shot. It wasn't like, oh, let's push your boat out. Let's call the other guy. No, they just shot him like on the beach.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
And we're like, hey, come pick up the bodies of these guys who tried to get into North Korea.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
No. Second deadliest catch is now the one with crabs. The deadliest one is the one where you get executed by North Korean border guards for setting foot on the beach because your boat is disabled. Yeah. So Dandong, no, it's not happening. It's just a bed of spies, espionage and human trafficking, basically.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
I think this is fascinating, and you'll be able to tell my enthusiasm during the episode itself, and I hope that you share that with us. Here we go with Sean Williams. We've been trying to have this conversation for quite some time. Your Underworld podcast, you guys do so many amazing episodes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
Tell me more about that, because I've heard things like the North Koreans get caught smuggling heroin to Australia in boats.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
Well, it's like Liberia also, right? Panama, Liberia, those flags of convenience. I've done a few shows on flags of convenience. And for those who are interested, go listen to those episodes. But the summary is you basically, when you have a ship...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
and it's American, you go, oh, I'm subject to American law, and then you go, nah, and you buy a flag of convenience from Liberia, and suddenly you're under, you have to follow Liberian law, which says, do whatever you want, bro, just whatever, give us $10,000 a year, and you can have slaves on your ship, and we'll never inspect it, basically.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
But there's no incentives to close it, right? I remember learning this. Who's going to close it? The people who make millions of dollars a year for their countries? No.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
The boat owners who are like, huh, I can be subject to the laws of Denmark where I have to pay fair wages and repair the ship or the laws of Liberia where I can keep human captives on here and force them to fish for me for years and then kill them. Like, all right, I'll choose the one that allows me to make money and has no ethics. And so there's no incentive to change that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
Because even if every government in the free world was like, you can't do that. Well, the boat's in international waters. What are you going to do about that? You're going to change that law too?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
Let he who's not into meth cast the first stone. Exactly. Wait, can I?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
We had your compadre Danny Gold on a long time ago as well, and you and I share this, can we call it a passion for North Korea? Is that a thing? Yeah, we can say that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
So tell us about the North Korean meth problem. Then we'll wrap up the slave labor and human trafficking stuff and go into Bureau 39.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
Yeah, I did a show about the Wa.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
Episode 966, Patrick Wynn, Wa State. It's basically when a drug cartel becomes a country.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
Yeah, he went there, wrote a book about it. He's basically just homeboys with a bunch of wah people who are famous for putting heads on spikes from outsiders, which is kind of a thing that I didn't think happened anymore.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
Yeah, I think it's if you're welcome, you're fine. If you show up unannounced, you're getting your head put on a spike.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
It's healthy. I know that you covered some pretty interesting topics about North Korea. We talked about meth, which we'll get to a little bit later in the show. But I want to talk about the forced labor and the way that North Korea generates revenue, because I think this is that old cliche is follow the money. Right.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
I remember one time when I was there, we asked our guide about marijuana because we saw some growing just randomly. It grows everywhere. And I said, do people smoke it? And he's like, some people do, but I don't know anyone that does. But he told us a lot of people will chew it or something like that. And it sounded like he didn't really know.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
We asked him about meth and he said that it wasn't a problem, but kids did it sometimes. And I was like, that sure sounds like a problem. It was, if you ask an adult who doesn't really know a lot or is trying to conceal how bad things are, if kids do marijuana, like, oh, only those hippie kids do that. And it's okay, but we're talking about meth.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
So the fact that any kids that do it is a little bit alarming.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
And so when you look at North Korea, people are like, how is this place still around today? What's going on with it? How come they're causing trouble internationally? What's the deal? It really does all come down to the money. And a lot of people who watch North Korea casually read the news about North Korea. Once you realize that North Korea is essentially not
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
The fact that diplomats are self-funded in North Korea, like if you're a North Korean diplomat, they're not like, here's all the money you need to run your embassy. It's for many countries, they just have to figure out how to survive there.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
If you're the North Korean ambassador to Sierra Leone, you're essentially in charge of running organized crime rackets so that you can run the embassy and then send proceeds back to the Kim family. And if you can't do that, I assume they recall you and put somebody else in place who's just maybe more enterprising. because the idea is you're generating revenue.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
They don't really probably care that much. I mean, diplomatic relations for the Kim family is what are you bringing to the table? How much money are you generating for North Korea? It doesn't matter if it's legal or not. And so the legal stuff would be like, hey, we're going to have guest workers come over here and build an airport and clear a jungle and do that. That's going to be brutal.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
And the illegal stuff is, oh, and also we're going to sell people or run guns from here through there or run drugs through the country to another country.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
Whatever. But you know what, though? I get it because, sure, state security is monitoring all embassies. but they're maybe not able to figure out exactly what's going on inside because it's not like they can get a warrant to go in there.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
So yes, state security might be monitoring them, but if they start arresting random small-time drug dealers that pop out, they're gonna figure out that they're under surveillance and maybe do something about it. So essentially, if you go in there and you buy a kilo of cocaine or heroin,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
The government has to decide whether or not they really care about that enough to potentially disclose sources and methods in how they catch you. And if it's a place with rule of law, they have to say, we have a wiretap on the North Korean embassy and here's them talking with you about this. And they're not going to do that because they want real intelligence.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
So what they're going to try to do is catch you randomly coming out with it. But that's going to eventually add up and be too much for a coincidence. And if you're not selling the drugs in that country, right, if you're going through Sierra Leone, but you're only selling your drugs in Ivory Coast or something, are they going to do anything about it?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
Are they going to be like, look, the guy doesn't sell the stuff here. Screw it. He's bringing money back. He's greasing the palms of certain people high up in the government. Whatever. What do we care?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
I think that's probably true. And also, oh, they're making a bunch of money from a backpacker hostel. And they said, hey, if we ever close this place down, let's just sell guns and drugs to neo-Nazi gangs. All right, let's keep the hostel open. And if they start selling guns and drugs to the neo-Nazi gang, we'll crack down on all of their operations.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
But until then, I feel like having cheap bunk beds and some cheap beer is probably relatively harmless. I'm just trying to get in the head. A friend of mine, Charles Rue, again, also an episode of the show. He mentioned that he was repatriated from China because his dad was Chinese, also a drug dealer.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
He got repatriated to North Korea after escaping and they put him in a labor camp domestically because we're talking about working outside of North Korea and that generating revenue. But there's people inside North Korea, tremendous numbers of them. He was a kid. He was like 12 at the time or something or 15. I can't remember. And he worked in the mines like he worked in coal mines, basically.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
a quote-unquote real country in that it's more of a mafia that runs a country, it makes way more sense. Does that jibe with your understanding of the place?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
And he actually said it wasn't that bad. And he stayed after his punishment to continue working there. And he spent his money on alcohol and saved a little bit and then escaped to China again.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
Wow. Yeah. Yeah. He's a really interesting dude. I'm going to have him back on the show now that his English is better. But I wanted to highlight that because a lot of people think, oh, why escape from something and then go work in this other place? Or why volunteer to work abroad like this?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
And the truth is, it's actually better to be in a North Korean mind than it is to be maybe unemployed in North Korea because he was homeless before that. And it's better to be working abroad, welding with no glasses and no protective clothing than it is to be working in North Korea, where maybe you just don't even have food.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
Since I don't traffic in meth or stolen crypto, I'm stuck relying on you to support the amazing sponsors who support this show. We'll be right back. This episode is sponsored in part by IQ Bar. IQ Mix is a zero sugar drink mix from IQ Bar that hydrates, boosts your mood, and promotes mental clarity.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
Anybody who knows me knows I'm borderline obsessive about staying hydrated, but let's be honest, plain water gets real old, real fast, especially when you're out rucking seven miles in the heat with a 60 pound pack on your back. At that point, water's just not enough to put Humpty Dumpty back together again. That's why I've been loving IQ Mix from IQ Bar.
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1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
It is a zero sugar drink mix that packs three times the electrolytes of your average sports drink without all the weird junk, no sugar, no gluten, no soy, no GMOs, why would you put soy in electrolytes? It's even vegan, it's kosher, so if you're an Orthodox Jewish extreme athlete, you can still drink it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
My go-to flavor is piña colada, but I'm just imagining like a really sweat-soaked yarmulke, or one of those Russian fur hats, but you're running an ultramarathon. Anyway, this is about IQ Mix. Sorry. My go-to flavor is piña colada, but passion fruit and raspberry lemonade are also great. They've got seven flavors in total. There's not a dud in the bunch, but IQ Mix is not just about hydration.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
It's about brain fuel, too. It's loaded with magnesium L3 and 8, which I take separately as well, and lion's mane, which I know is trending right now. I'm not the only fan. IQ Mix has over 20,000 five-star reviews.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
This episode is also sponsored in part by BetterHelp. You know, it's wild how much the conversation around mental health has just changed just in the past decade or so. It used to be this taboo thing. Oh, you're in therapy? What's wrong with you? Now it's more like, wait, you're not in therapy? You're just raw dog reality, just like that? And I think that shift is huge.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
I mean, BetterHelp just did this big state of stigma report for Mental Health Awareness Month. They surveyed over 16,000 people in 23 countries. And here's what stood out. 75% of people say it's wise to get support when you're struggling, but only 27% of Americans are actually in therapy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
And the thing is, when people put off getting help, it doesn't just impact them, it affects their relationships, their work, their families, it really ripples out. So breaking that stigma, it's not just good for individuals, it's better for everyone. I've definitely benefited from BetterHelp. It's helpful having an outside perspective. Therapy is not just about crisis or trauma.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
It's about growth, self-awareness, just being a better human. BetterHelp's got over 35,000 therapists, and they've already helped more than 5 million people worldwide. The whole thing is online, super convenient, and if your first therapist isn't the right fit, switch anytime.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
If you're wondering how I managed to book all these great authors, thinkers, and creators every week, it is because of my network. And I'm teaching you how to build your network for free over at 6minutenetworking.com. Some of you are probably not booking for a podcast, but let's say, hypothetically, you're a meth trafficker from North Korea.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
You're going to love this course because it inspires other people to build a relationship with you. And it does it all in a super easy, non-cringe, down-to-earth way. No awkward strategies or cheesy tactics.
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1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
Just practical exercises that'll make you a better connector, a better colleague, a better friend, a better peer, and maybe even a better money launderer, but I can't really guarantee you that. Just six minutes a day is all it takes, and many of the guests on the show subscribe and contribute to the course. So come on and join us. You'll be in smart company where you belong.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
You can find the course, again, it's all free at sixminutenetworking.com. Now, back to Sean Williams. The slavery element or the forced labor element inside North Korea is so widespread. I read in a piece that I think you wrote, some farms and factories don't pay wages or provide food to the workers.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
And it says, during implementation of short-term economic plans, factories and farms increase workers' hours and ask workers for contributions of grain and money to purchase supplies for renovations and repairs. So basically, you have to work there and you don't get paid.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
Straight up and down.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
Yeah. Not that compelling when you phrase it like that. But sure. On one of my trips to North Caribbean, there's so many people working in the fields. And our guide told us that every year they have to stop going to school for a couple of months and they go and help the farmers harvest food. which is nuts.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
And you're working for free for a couple of months in the fields because it's just so labor intensive and they don't have machinery to do it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
These guys are bastards. I wouldn't trade my life for theirs, I'll tell you that. There's no way they're not under constant chronic stress. Yeah, you can see it on the kite. He looks like a guy who's got some things on his mind. He was 27 a few years ago, and now he's 67 by the look of it. He is just aging terribly.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
Ironically, my guide in North Korea, she said that she loved working in the fields because you get to meet new people. And... You almost never actually get to do that in North Korea because you go to school with the same people, then you go to college.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
But if you go to the college that she went to, which is like a foreign language university, it's basically the same privileged cadre of people that you've known your whole life from other schools in Pyongyang. There's maybe a few new people, but that's kind of it. And then, so when you go work in the fields, they just sign you geographically. So you just meet all these new people.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
And she's like, so many girls that she knows met their boyfriends in while working in the fields because otherwise you're just with the same people you grew up with. And you know how it is when you're dating. You're tired of those people, right? You've seen those people grow up. It's like, eh.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
Then you meet some new guy and he's like working with his shirt off outside and you're just like, woo, it's hot out here. She loved it. She said everybody loved it and they would play music at night and stuff. It sounds fun until you realize that you're actually a slave for the Kim family working on a farm.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
So to put a bow on this forced labor thing, they work 12 to 16 hours a day, sometimes 20 hours a day. They're allowed two days off per month, and they work in a wide range of industries and hazardous conditions. Apparel, construction, footwear manufacturing, hospitality, information technology services, logging, the IT services thing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
I want to put an asterisk by that and find out more because that doesn't make a ton of sense to me. Yeah, they're not working for Airbnb.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
Yeah. Well, like what IT services are you providing when you're a forced laborer? That screams dodgy to me. Logging, medical, pharmaceuticals. Also, I don't know. I assume they're packaging medications, maybe restaurants.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
seafood processing, textiles, and shipbuilding, the stuff we were talking about in Poland. NGOs report that the government manages these workers as a matter of state policy. This is from an NGO report. They're under close, constant surveillance by government security agents. They live in shared dormitories, poor living conditions, obviously no freedom of movement, freedom of communication.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
Their passports are confiscated. And if they complain or attempt to complain to outsized parties or escape, their families are punished inside North Korea. And their salaries, of course, are appropriated and deposited into accounts controlled by the government of North Korea. If they're a shipbuilder, the average pay, I think, was 90 euros per month.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
They cover your food and your living conditions are terrible, but they take all of your money except for 90 euros per month, which is actually a lot. That's why people take these jobs if they're allowed to choose, because it's actually way better than working inside North Korea.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
Yeah, exactly. It's estimated that the regime earns up to a billion dollars a year from this because they're all over Africa, Middle East, things like that, and apparently Europe. And women are trafficked as well. I'll let you imagine what happens there. They're sold as wives many times. And that's horrific. And this is illegal in China. So the kids they have, what happens to the kids?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
You have any idea? Because if you have kids with your illegal North Korean wife who doesn't exist on paper, is your kid Chinese or are they stateless?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
So tell us about Bureau 39. We've touched on some of these money making activities, but Bureau 39 is the organization in charge of this whole thing. So this is not just like accidentally these people are earning money for the regime. This is a very conscious process. It is one of the top priorities, if not the top priority of the Kim family.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
Yeah, it doesn't, right? Like communism, we're all equal. And the guy's like, by the way, I'm God, just to start. And it's okay.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
Yeah, let's talk about that in a second. By the way, if you're interested in more on the arms trade with North Korea, episode 527, we had this guy, my friend Ulrich Larsen, they made a movie called The Mole. You've heard of this, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
So this guy, Ulrich, he is a retired chef. And he basically got really bored and infiltrated the North Korean Friendship Association, which is basically like unemployed losers and old people who are really lonely all across the world who have these meetings to talk about how great North Korea is. But it's the height of pathetic.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
Anyway, he stays in there for like a decade or some crazy amount of time. going to these meetings and it comes up with an idea to earn money for the regime and that it gets run up the flagpole and they end up meeting these arms traffickers in Beijing. And it's an absolutely batshit crazy story with Ulrich and another guest on the show, Mr. James, plays Mr. James in the movie.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
And it's just, it's fascinating. It's one of the coolest documentaries I've ever seen. It's basically a civilian-run sting operation that showed that North Korea was willing to sell arms to anyone, especially if they were going to get to, you know, whatever, Syria or Africa. They just don't care. So Bureau 39, they get the money back to DPRK, to North Korea through diplomatic channels.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
Are they literally carrying duffel bags full of money through the airport and just having them not be inspected because they're diplomats? Is that how this works?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
It's a Bangladesh bank heist. I remember learning about this, but I don't understand how it worked.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
Yeah. But it was incredibly successful. That guy got fired out of a cannon. So you mean to tell me we lost $900 million because you don't know how to spell Bangladesh? I was typing really fast. Where's the anti-aircraft gun and the dogs? Exactly. Yeah, you wouldn't want to be that guy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
No, that's a bad Monday. Wow. But I don't know a lot about the inner workings of this type of thing. But isn't this all digital when you're talking about bank wires for this amount of money? So can't you go, oh, yeah, we wired a bunch of money to North Korea? No, we're undoing that. That's ridiculous. Any money from North Korea is not valid. This came from Bangladesh. This is ridiculous.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
You're not getting it. It's not like they had a truck full of money going across the border. So I don't get why you can't undo something like that. It's not cryptocurrency. It's not in the blockchain.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
Speaking of methamphetamine and money laundering, how about a word from our sponsors? We'll be right back. This episode is sponsored in part by NordVPN. If you're online without a VPN, you're kind of walking around the internet with your fly down, and, you know, some of you are into that, but most of us aren't.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
I've been using NordVPN for years, and in today's world, not having one just is not an option anymore. Whether we're traveling in Europe, working from random cafes, even in China where you can't access a lot of things, NordVPN has been the go-to for staying connected and protected.
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1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
Sketchy airport Wi-Fi, hotel networks, coffee shops, Nord's kept our data locked down through all of it, and it's not just about shady hackers anymore. Your own internet provider, they can sell your browsing data to whoever's paying, and there's a lot of people paying. With NordVPN, that's just off the table. But here's the fun part. You can also switch your virtual location in seconds.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
So when I want to watch a show or a sports event that's not available in the US, boom, switch to the UK, Australia, wherever's showing it's like digital teleportation for your content. Another tip is you can save money on flights and hotel bookings. That'll pay for the whole dang VPN because some of these sites, they price things based off your IP address. So yeah,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
If you're searching from Silicon Valley, California, congrats, you get a higher price than some schmucky schmuck like me over in Michigan packing his parents' house up. Yeah, that's not fair, is it? Well, I guess maybe it is, but if you have a VPN, you can beat them at their own game. And Nord just isn't secure, it is fast. There's no buffering and there's no lag.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
This episode is also sponsored by Shopify. Once you know, you know. If a store is not running on Shopify, I'm kind of 90% out the door. I'm not here to solve a jigsaw puzzle to buy a stinking armband or whatever. And here's the thing, Shopify is not just making shopping better, it's making starting your own business way less painful too.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
So whether you're trying to build the next big brand or just finally launch that side hustle you keep talking about, Shopify hands you the keys. Templates ready to roll, AI tools to speed you up, marketing tools baked right in, so easy to get your store off the ground. So if you're ready to sell, do us all a favor and sell on Shopify.
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1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
I've got homes.com as a sponsor for this episode. Homes.com knows when it comes to home shopping, it's never just about the house or the condo. It's about the homes. And what makes a home is more than just the house or property. It's the location. It's the neighborhood. If you've got kids, it's also schools, nearby parks, transportation options.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
That's why homes.com goes above and beyond to bring home shoppers the in-depth information they need to find the right home. It's so hard not to say home every single time. And when I say in-depth information, I'm talking deep. Each listing features comprehensive information about the neighborhood, complete with a video guide.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
They also have details about local schools with test scores, state rankings, student-teacher ratio. They even have an agent directory with the sales history of each agent. So when it comes to finding a home, not just a house, this is everything you need to know all in one place, homes.com. We've done your homework.
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1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
If you like this episode of the show, I invite you to do what other smart and considerate listeners do. Take a moment and support the amazing sponsors who make the show possible. All of the deals, discount codes, and ways to support the show are searchable and clickable over at jordanharbinger.com slash deals.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
If you can't remember the name of a sponsor or you can't find the code, feel free to email us over here, jordan at jordanharbinger.com. We are happy to surface codes for you. It is that important that you support those who support the show. Now for the rest of my conversation with Sean Williams.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
I know that North Korea has something like 1,600 hackers, which might not sound like a lot, but is a lot since they're all working with each other. I mean, this is not like the United States has 10,000 hackers, but it's kids in their mom's basement who are like, dude, I totally took down Pornhub for five minutes. It's not that kind of hacker.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
These are people who sit in office buildings and run heists for the regime. And wasn't there a crypto heist recently where they stole like a billion dollars or more? Like a crazy huge crypto heist recently.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
This is like March 2025. Yeah. North Korean hackers cash out hundreds of millions, stole 1.5 billion from something called Bybit, which I've never heard of because I don't keep my money in exchanges, which is because they get hacked by North Korea. Yeah. Wow, record-breaking $1.5 billion crypto heist, unrecoverable funds. They've converted at least $300 million of that into cash.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
Yep, the criminals known as the Lazarus Group swiped the huge haul of digital tokens in a hack on crypto exchange Bybit in February. It's been a cat-and-mouse game to track and block hackers from moving the crypto into usable cash, which is a losing proposition, of course. The hacking team is working nearly 24 hours a day, funneling the money into the regime's military development, most likely.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
Interesting. Every minute matters for the hackers who are trying to confuse the money trail, and they are extremely sophisticated in what they are doing. This is on the BBC, so we can link to this article as needed.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
Yeah, it says they're working 20 hours a day, and I'm like, how do you stay up for... Oh, no, never mind. I got it. I got it. 20% of the money has gone dark, and multiple people are sharing rewards for identifying the money. So essentially, they've crowdsourced tracking a lot of this as well. That's so blockchain, isn't it? being like, hey, everybody, track this money.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
And it looks like they're funneling it through really shady exchanges a little bit at a time. This is so interesting. God, this is fascinating. Yeah. Oh, my God. Oh, and here's a wanted by the FBI. They identified someone in the Lazarus group. This guy looks so North Korean. He's just dressed like... Yeah, he's a North Korean guy. Right on the nose, man. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
That's really interesting. The problem here is hacking is a fungible skill set, right? If you're really that good that you can change a digital wallet address inside a company that really cares a lot about security, like Bybit or any crypto exchange, you can certainly take down the power system in Boston, which hasn't updated its crap and uses Windows 95 or something on most of its other systems.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
and doesn't have any sort of updated infrastructure, security's an afterthought because it's expensive. That's gonna be taking candy from a baby if you can do something sophisticated like steal $600 million from a crypto exchange.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
Yeah, it's really terrifying. And the only upside is the Kim family really has no real incentive so far to do something truly horrible to the U.S. because what they don't want is for the U.S. to do something truly horrible back. Like we're sanctioning them right now, all this. But what they're afraid of is a real effort to take down North Korea. Yes, they have nukes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
Welcome to the show. I'm Jordan Harbinger. On The Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the stories, secrets, and skills of the world's most fascinating people and turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
They can hold us off for a while. But I'm going to go ahead and guess there's a lot more that we could do to the Kim family specifically. He's not looking well. Him and a lot of his family members could suddenly die tomorrow. And I know that the Chinese, this sounds way more heavy duty and cool than it is, but I'll say it anyway. I have an inside source who deals with
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
Negotiations between China and North Korea, stuff like that. China is so sick of dealing with the North Koreans shit that it's not even funny. Yes, they have them as a buffer state so there's not a refugee crisis on the Chinese border from North Korea, but they are beyond sick. Instability is bad for business. And China is all about business.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
And so when North Korea's like, we're gonna nuke you, China's like, shut up, man. We're trying to sell cheap shit to the whole planet. Can you not? And Kim's like, but I need food and money. And China's like, god damn. shut up already, we'll figure this out. You don't need to spout off and piss off everybody who's got missiles, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
So they're super sick of these guys and doing something truly horrible. China's kind of like, you're putting us between a rock and a hard place, right? And so they're sick of this crap too. So that's the upside. The downside is that it could all change in a second. If the Kim family feels truly threatened by something, they could do something truly horrible because they have nothing to lose.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
They certainly don't care if their country gets attacked. If they're already going down, screw it. Burn it all to the ground. That's where these guys are going to be.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
North Korea sends their special forces, shock troops or whatever. I know there's Chinese troops getting caught in Ukraine. And I'm saying this just based on what I know about China and no inside information. I'm no expert by any means. But I don't think that if you pick up a Chinese guy in Ukraine that it was sent by Xi Jinping secretly. I think it's a guy who went...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
Man, my job really sucks over here in rural Hunan province. I am going to walk into this recruiting office that my friend told me about, and I'm going to go to Ukraine and I'm going to make $37,000, which is five times what I make here on this farm. And I'm going to come home and buy stuff for my family. And then they get sent to the front and they get blown up or captured.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
And they're like, whoops, that didn't work out how I planned. I really don't think China is sending handfuls of Chinese.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
They don't need the money. It's a bad look for China all around. I just really don't see that being a state-sanctioned thing. If China decides to help Russia and Ukraine, everyone is going to know because they're going to have massive shipments of tanks and armaments and 100,000 troops or something shoring up the back lines and the supply lines and logistics in Ukraine.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
It's not going to be 50 guys or five guys or whatever they've caught so far. It's just not going to be that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
One thing I wanted to ask about was the forced labor that we see in China from North Koreans. Are Chinese factories outsourcing this stuff to North Korea? Because if that's the case, you know how Nike will go to China, inspect the factories and then tell us like, hey, these are all above board. It's fine. We inspected the factory.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
I'm wondering if China doesn't outsource some labor to North Korea, because what I might consider doing if I was a shady Chinese factory owner.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
OK, let's say we lay down the law and sacrificed a bunch of goodwill to get them to not do that with North Koreans. They're just going to have Burmese people do it instead or Cambodians. Right. It's not sort of a unique thing. Forced labor exists where there's a market for it and there's always going to be a market for it in China.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
Yes, in Poland, they found them, I think, welding ships or something like that or doing some kind of welding thing. And I remember watching this. This guy is welding and he has no eye protection and no protection at all. Like he's not even wearing anything but like gloves, I think, and a shirt. like a regular shirt, and he's welding inside this enclosed space, no breathing apparatus, nothing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
You're right. There's this strange tradition, if I can say that, among China, the nation of, and I'm not even blaming them for this. I think it was like essentially just a consequence of their history. But you see all these people come from China pre-Mao because they're poor and they settle in San Francisco and they settle in, I don't know, whatever, Australia and all these other places.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
and there's this massive diaspora. And then Mao comes, and all these people leave, and they go to Taiwan, and they go to America, and they go to Canada. Increases the diaspora again a hundredfold. And then now, oh man, this place is pretty rough. I want to get my capital out of here. So it increases the diaspora, and the money from China again in the West.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
And then they go, hey, we got to get all these drugs and crime out of here. So they push them into Southeast Asia and all over the rest of Asia. And so there's this massive Chinese that's fled or left or been exiled. And it's just like a consequence of all the crazy crap that keeps happening there. And people leave so they can do business elsewhere, whether it's legal or not.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
It's just a fascinating way because there are Chinese people literally everywhere. It's in part because they fled for better, greener pastures, or they were going to get prosecuted at home. So now they're doing whatever they're doing. overseas. And every wave of that has had massive amounts of organized crime.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
It pales in comparison, I would imagine, to the amount of legitimately talented immigrants that end up leaving China and coming to places like the United States. I always try to clarify that because I don't want people to think, oh, he hates China and he hates Chinese people. My family's literally Chinese. So I'm not doing that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
The biggest victim of anything that's ever happened in China, Mao, pre-Mao, post-Mao, it's always the Chinese people. They're the biggest victims of all this, as well as the people that end up taking the most flack. So I try to be as fair as I can about that. Yeah. On that note, let's talk about Chinese money laundering. Here we go.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
So tell me about this. This is called flying money, right? Feiqian.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
Where did this come from?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
He just has on like a pair of crappy sunglasses. This man is going blind, getting burned, and inhaling all of that, whatever that gas is from welding, and there was this Polish lady who was the labor agent, and they filmed her secretly, and she was just like, I don't care. It's illegal. Screw it. And they're like, yeah, is this going to be a problem? And she's like, no one's going to find out.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
Huh. Interesting. You'd think that the state would have an interest in knowing where and who has money, especially a state like China, which is authoritarian. Even the United States wants to know, hey, where you got your money? All right. We just want to know where it is. That's all. We'll just make sure you're paying taxes. That kind of thing. They want you to declare your cryptocurrency.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
They want you to declare that you have money hidden under the mattress. They don't care that it's under the mattress. They just want to know that you have it. You'd think China would be like that. And I'm sure they are. But I think part of the problem is, man, have you ever tried to transfer money from a Chinese bank to another bank?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
It's definitely illegal. They basically had her on camera being like, this is 100% illegal. We just don't care. And it's organized crime. It was shameless. She wasn't sugarcoating it. She wasn't like, no, this is all above board and totally fine. And they're not from there. It was just like, yeah, these are slaves.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
I will tell you, I don't know how fast Feichen is. I'm going to guess it's basically instant. You better bring a sack lunch if you go to a Chinese bank and you want to do a complicated transaction that's international, especially. And you also better hope that it's under $50,000 per year that you are transferring, because if you want to transfer $400,000 out of China, good luck.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
You can wait eight years and do it the legal way, or you can probably do it in a day or less because there's capital flight restrictions.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
The best gig in China would be the person who handles these transfers. And we can do this one of two ways. You can do it through me, or you can do it through my brother, who I happen to have his phone right next to me. And I can set it up right now, and you can do it in this Feichen system.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
Because to clarify what I was saying before, $50,000 a year, I think it's one of the capital flight restrictions in China. So This is a real case study. Somebody I know sold a house somewhere in Beijing. And I don't know, it was probably 400 grand or more. Who knows? Beijing, a house you've owned since the 90s, could be worth a lot. So that house gets sold.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
You have all this money in a Chinese bank account, hundreds of thousands of dollars. You can transfer $50,000 a year. What you can also do is call your friends who aren't transferring money back to another country and you can say, hey, if I give you $51,000, can you transfer 50 of it to my friend in Canada?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
And you do that with five of your closest friends, suddenly you've got all your money and your friends are very thankful because you just paid for their entire Christmas season or whatever with the little commission that they got. But you have to trust them because they can also go, thanks for the money, I'm not transferring this, sucker. So you have to really trust these people to do that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
But there's whole networks of people that do that essentially for a living. If you can earn an extra grand a year doing this, these people don't want that gravy train to stop. And they certainly don't want to get kneecapped by Chinese gangsters either. So they're going to do it that way. And that is very common. Fei Chen makes perfect sense, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
If I've got to do a bunch of transactions like that, I don't want to have to count on 300 different people to do it. I just want to get it done. But are drug cartels not using this? It seems like they would be using this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
Canada, I did a show on this a zillion years ago, but basically like real estate, Canada is bought up with a lot of Chinese funds that have been transferred and then they take fentanyl money locally and then that's the money that they use to buy the real estate. It's not necessarily the Chinese people who buy the house who are selling the fentanyl. It's just that gangs who have fentanyl money
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
they move it into real estate by using the Feichen system. This reporter in Canada uncovered that. So that's one of the reasons why there's so much money off the books. And they literally will walk into a laundromat and there'll be like $400,000, $500,000 on the floor of this laundromat.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
Our mission is to help you become a better informed, more critical thinker through long-form conversations with a variety of amazing folks, from spies to CEOs, athletes, authors, thinkers, performers, even the occasional former jihadi, gold smuggler, Russian spy, or special operator.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
I saw that and I couldn't believe it. It's like a symbol of how screwed LA is.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
It's like a skeleton of a skyscraper that, yeah, is just covered in graffiti. And you're like, wait a minute, they're just not working on that. That's something out of North Korea, an unfinished skyscraper that's just a concrete hulk.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
Yeah. It's so gross. And I'm like, can we do something about this? For God's sake. It's just the blight is ridiculous.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
But then China's like, well, cool, we're not going to stop the fentanyl thing because no skin off our nose. And if you're going to have a bunch of dead people and drug cartels and violence, like, good, we want that. The US State Department estimates something like 154 billion in illicit funds a year passed through China. It's probably more than that now. That estimate is a couple years old.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
154 billion. So that's a fraction of it. China launderers have emerged as the number one underwriter of drug trafficking in the Western Hemisphere. So that means they're not doing the trafficking themselves. They're laundering the money from drug trafficking. It says the Chinese government is at least tacitly supporting the laundering activity. It's hard to say, though, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
Is it state sanctioned? Because China is actually corrupt in general. A lot of people don't realize that. It doesn't necessarily seem like that, but it is, especially at the higher levels. So you get crackdowns on things, but it doesn't really matter. It becomes really hard to separate official state policy from just generalized criminal activity when it comes to things like that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
That's right. I asked my federal prosecutor buddy, I said, is this illegal? And I basically explained Fei Chen, and he's like, huh, no money's actually moving. And I said, okay, you're a federal prosecutor. How do we go after these people if we're working together? And he goes... I would look for weird declarations violations where it's like, hey, you're technically importing over $10,000.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
Even if you're not actually bringing the money in, you're technically doing it. It's constructive. And he's like, but would a judge really believe that? It's not the same thing. And then he said, we'd probably actually go after not even the individual clients or even the drug cartels who are doing this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
unless we can find them and we can prove that they know they're laundering money, then it's money laundering. But if it's just like a Chinese kid who's going to college in Vancouver and he's buying a $3 million apartment and his family sent him the down payment and the mortgage payments via Feichan, it's not really money laundering unless you could prove that guy and his family knew
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
that this was laundered money, which they wouldn't know because the Chinese gangs now, hey, launder some of our fentanyl money. Here it is. They're just saying, here's how your parents send you money. The only real thing that they can do is go after these little technical things. And of course, my friend said the best case scenario off the top of his head
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
Yeah, he's a human with a butthole that is working overtime or whatever they said in the movie.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
was going after the literal Chinese restaurant or laundromat where they're holding the money and saying, you are dealing in a financial service without a license. So we're shutting you down. But like, that's not a crime where everybody involved goes to prison for 15 years. Exactly. That's like a don't do it again.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
You're on probation and you're getting a 90 day jail suspended sentence and blah, blah, blah. And then the person's like, cool, my cousin's doing this now out of his garage.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Even if you got money couriers in Canada and the US, you're busting a kid who's 18 and an engineering student. He's got a duffel bag full of $50,000. And he says, my friend's uncle's cousin told me to go pick this up and drop it off at a restaurant. What are you charging that guy with? Being a dumbass, that's it. You got nothing, man. And then you go after that person.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
Yeah, this is money from my family in China and I needed somebody to drop it off at the restaurant because I'm really busy and I trust this kid. I wanted an excuse to give him 500 bucks. Okay, there's just no crime here that you can prove without a ton of work and no ROI.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
By the way, the episode I did about this was episode 677, Sam Cooper about the real estate and the Chinese Fei Chen and the fentanyl cash. That was episode 677. We'll link to that in the show notes as well. Sean, thank you so much, man. North Korea, Chinese money laundering, meth, just a typical Tuesday here on the Jordan Harbinger show, I guess.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
You're about to hear a preview of the Jordan Harbinger show with a retired chef that somehow infiltrated the illicit North Korean arms trade.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
For more on how Ulrich the Mole, a Danish chef and family man, wound up working undercover in North Korea to expose its illicit arms trade, check out episode 527 of The Jordan Harbinger Show. I forgot to mention during the show that North Korea armed Syria with chemical weapons and knowledge, which Assad ended up using against his own people.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
That was, of course, also to generate revenue for the regime. They also use false flagships. I talked about this with Ian Urbina on the show a while ago. They essentially use false flag ships to do sanction busting oil trade. So they'll have a ship that is, let's say, from Iran go and drop anchor somewhere off the coast in international waters.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
They'll pump the oil from that ship into a North Korean ship after turning off transponders and trying to sort of disguise what they're doing. And then the North Korean ship heads back to North Korea. New York Times did a really interesting piece about this a year or two ago. We'll try to link it in the show notes. They show the ships. They show satellites of them doing it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
They show how they figured out what they were doing. It's really interesting. A little bit in the weeds on oil and sanctions busting, but if you're a nerd on this stuff like I am, you're in the right place. All things Sean Williams will be in the show notes at jordanharbinger.com. Advertisers, deals, discount codes, ways to support the show, all at jordanharbinger.com slash deals.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
This show is created in association with Podcast One. My team is Jen Harbinger, Jace Sanderson, Robert Fogerty, Ian Baird, and Gabriel Mizrahi. Remember, we rise by lifting others. The fee for the show is you share it with friends when you find something useful or interesting. The greatest compliment you can give us is to share the show with those you care about.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
If you know somebody who's interested in crime, drug smuggling, gun smuggling, arms dealing, North Korea, definitely share this episode with them. In the meantime, I hope you apply what you hear on the show. That sounds a little weird for an episode about drug trafficking and money laundering, but y'all know what I mean. So you can live what you learn or not. And we'll see you next time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
How does that fall under the diplomatic rules? I know you can do pretty much anything out of an embassy, but running a business that's open to the public seems like one thing that might not totally qualify for
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
And if you're new to the show or you're looking for a handy way to tell your friends about the show, I suggest our episode starter packs. These are collections of our favorite episodes on topics like persuasion and negotiation, psychology and geopolitics, disinformation, China, North Korea, crime and cults, and more. That'll help new listeners get a taste of everything we do here on the show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
I'm curious about that because when I was in Dandong, first of all, I didn't know that there were like 100,000 North Korean workers in China and like 80,000 in Dandong. I didn't know that. I mean, now I assume that every Korean person I met in Dandong was actually from North Korea, which is probably a safe-ish assumption.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
We went to one of those, I forget what they're called, but it's the floor is heated and you like lay down in this sauna and you hang out. And I remember... a lot of guys in there were Korean. They were, like, Chinese Koreans, and there was a girl who was very pretty and young who was talking with us, and the guys that she was with were old enough to be her dad, and they were just laying around.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
And I remember thinking, like, wow, there's so many Chinese Koreans, but now I'm like, were they Chinese Koreans, or are these, like... North Korean dudes that work in this area or are somehow allowed by the regime because they were really unfriendly. That could be anything. That doesn't mean anything.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
But the restaurant we went to, the women there were really interested in me and my friend because we showed them photos of our trip to North Korea that my friend had on his iPad. He's a photographer. So he had like really good photos of North Korea that they had also probably never seen.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
something taken on a Sony, whatever, DSLR camera, they'd probably never seen a photo of North Korea like that, or very rarely, right? They had these crappy phones that barely took photos at the time. This is like 2011 or something like that. So we were showing them the photos and they were hanging out and talking with us and stuff like that. And these Chinese tourists came in and I thought,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
oh okay now it's their turn to get the treatment that we're getting and it wasn't like that the women were really like all hanging around me and my friend my friend has tattoos from head to toe so he was also a really interesting looking guy for them and they kept touching him and lifting up his shirt and stuff And we were just having a good time. And we went there two days in a row.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
And then one of the women was like, oh, do you guys live here? And my friend was like, no, we're just tourists. And he goes, but you should come out with us and we should go eat at a different restaurant here in China and like hang out and you can see more photos. I'll bring more photos and stuff like that. And the girls were like, leave this place and go with you?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
And my friend was like, yeah, sure. Why not? We can just figure it out. Do you have a night off tomorrow? And they were like, hold on. And the manager came over and I was like, I think we're going to get in trouble slash kicked out. The manager was like, you want to take the girls out of the restaurant? And we're like, not right now, but maybe tomorrow or the next day.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
And he was like, huh, I'll think about it and I'll talk to you after the meal. And I remember thinking like, I want to be really clear that we are not purchasing these women.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
I don't understand what's going on. And then as we left, the girls were like pushing each other out the door jokingly and like laughing and saying stuff in Korean to my friend, especially who was like really flirting with them. And the boss guy came down and he's sorry, it's not possible. And we were like, yeah, we understand. Okay, bye.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
Just visit jordanharbinger.com slash starts or search for us in your Spotify app to get started. Today on the show, journalist Sean Williams and I rap about North Korea, how they generate revenue for the regime using illegal operations such as human trafficking, drug trafficking, cryptocurrency heists. They're really big on those these days.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
And I remember the girls were disappointed when he told them, because I think that was news to them too. I think they thought like, oh, our time's going to get purchased and we're going to go out on a date. And then after we got back to the hotel, my friend was like, that would have been so fun. And I was like, I'm pretty sure that was on the table and we just didn't say the right things.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
We didn't flash cash to like rent these women, but I don't want to do that. And he's like, yeah, me neither. That's really weird. But it seemed like they weren't allowed to leave. They also, oh, by the way, they told us they lived upstairs, which I thought was extra creepy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
Right? One of the women had said something, and again, could be lost in the translation, but she had said something like, I've never been out of this building since I've been to China. And I was like outside in the restaurant, and she's like, no, I've never been anywhere but here. And I was like, am I understanding her? And I think she'd never left the building.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
Dandong, China, if the river's frozen, you could walk to North Korea. Now there's a fence. But before, there wasn't a fence. And you could just walk there. This place was so bizarre, man. I gotta tell you, like, there's all these coffee shops. Now every place has Wi-Fi. But back then, I was like, I need Wi-Fi to do stuff.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
So I'd go to the coffee shop that had Wi-Fi, and I remember sitting in a place and they had a blonde, white girl working the register. And I thought, oh, that's cool. She works abroad. And then my friend's like, what is this music? And I was like, Oh yeah, it's all like, Jesus is the savior, blah, blah, blah, blah. Every song is like super Jesus-y, huh?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
So I went up to the girl and I go, what's up with the religious music? Is this like a religious establishment? She's like, no, we're all Mormon. And I am like, who's all? And she's like, everyone that works here and a bunch of these cafes, we're all Mormon. And I was like, so are you on mission? She's like, nope, we live here. And I was like, what on earth is going on?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
And then I noticed that there were a ton of people in the back of this place, and they weren't all white, but they were mostly Asian. I don't know if they were doing Bible study or what, but people would also come in and they would go back there and they'd be like, oh, hi, Angela, or whatever, and they would walk in the back.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
And I just thought, okay, something else is going on here because this building is huge. They obviously have the whole building, but only the front is this coffee shop, literally the front. So I told my buddy, I was like, something is going on here. He's like, I know, I just can't figure out what it is. So we went back the next day and we started asking her like, so what's up?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
You guys have the whole building? And she would not answer a single freaking question. Years later, I get back home and I'm talking about North Korean refugee smuggling with some people from this NGO. And they told me,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
Almost certainly what's going on there is these Mormons are smuggling refugees from North Korea and North Koreans have instructions to look for a certain sign and they're like, walk in and there's a white person there. Because this place was open late AF too, by the way. It was open to like one o'clock in the morning, which is weird for a Mormon coffee shop.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
And don't Mormons also not drink coffee? So I was just like, what is going on? So I think what they did was they had these coffee shops. By the way, they were all right on the river. They were on the street next to the river.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
We also dip into Chinese money laundering, drug cartels, and more. I talk a lot during this episode because China, North Korea, money laundering seem to be a nice... The Venn diagram of those passions and interests overlap quite a bit for me personally. So yeah, don't email me whining about how much I'm talking during this episode.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
I think they have these people cross the river, run to that place, say a code word or whatever it is, run to the back and get hidden from any authorities that might be pursuing them. and then they get smuggled through South Korea because this woman had no time for our bullshit. She was just like, take your coffee, sit over there, shut up, don't ask me any more questions, basically.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
And all of it was off. Every single bit of it was off. And it was only when I finally started talking to people who smuggle refugees through China and into South Korea that there's safe houses everywhere, and a lot of them are run by Mormons and other religious people who essentially have a calling to risk a lot of
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
Because if you get arrested doing this in China, I can't imagine they're like, ah, it's fine. Here's your fine or here's your flight home. I think they probably put you in prison even if you're a cute blonde 18-year-old girl.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1154: Sean Williams | The North Korea-China-Drug Cartel Connection
No. So me and my friend were creeped out by Dandong, man. We were uber creeped out. And we'd already been to North Korea a couple of times. That was the time. And I'll shut up now at some point here and let you talk during your interview. But that was the time I also went on a boat tour of North Korea from Dandong. And I didn't speak Chinese at the time. But you're driving around in this boat.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
This episode is sponsored in part by Vital Proteins. Let's face it, your body changes as you get older. As we get older, our bodies don't bounce back like they used to, of course, but there are simple ways we can help support our hair, skin, nails, joints, and bones. All it takes is a daily serving of Vital Proteins Collagen Peptides.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
Welcome to the show. I'm Jordan Harbinger. On The Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the stories, secrets, and skills of the world's most fascinating people and turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
Our mission is to help you become a better informed, more critical thinker through long-form conversations with a variety of amazing folks, from spies to CEOs, athletes, authors, thinkers, performers, even the occasional Hollywood filmmaker, legendary actor, or Emmy-nominated comedian. If you're new to the show or you want to tell your friends about the show, I suggest our episode starter packs.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
If you told me that was happening in fairgrounds in Gaza or Ukraine, I would say, well, that makes sense. It's a war zone. But when it's rural United States, we need to go sleep in our car at the fairground because we need medical care and it's going to be in the horse stall. But they brushed all the crap out and put a blanket down. So it's fine.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
That's just like we are living in the third world unless you have a ton of money. And I'd love to hear about some of the shocking practices that you witnessed that the public might never expect. I've experienced a little bit of this. For example, I have two small kids. When we were looking into giving birth at the hospital for my wife, of course,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
we looked into midwives and doulas and stuff like that to make it a little bit easier. And they were like, hey, you're super healthy, you're young, you're low risk, you should give birth at home. And I was like, look, we are not this kind of hippie.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
And they said, nah, here are the statistics of complications in hospitals and here's the experience and they're gonna rush you out of the room, they're gonna rush you into the room first, they're gonna induce you even if you're not ready, then they're gonna rush you out because they want another person to go in that room literally a few hours later or the next day or the next night.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
That's their profit motive. But if you're at home and you start having labor pains at 11 p.m., well, just wait until the baby's ready. And so we literally just paid the midwife, doctor, and doula to have the birth at home. We told the hospital, which was close by, to be on standby in case anything happened. It took a couple days, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
But meanwhile, if we'd went there, it's like, well, they induce you. Then they've got to do a C-section because the baby's not actually ready. These kinds of little things that give the hospital more profit result in massive operations suffering expense for the patient.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
That was just one, but I am quite sure that there are lots more that maybe the average Joe who's having a couple of kids doesn't actually experience.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
These are collections of our favorite episodes on topics like persuasion and negotiation, psychology and geopolitics, disinformation, China, North Korea, crime and cults and more. That'll help new listeners get a taste of everything we do here on the show. Just visit jordanharbinger.com slash start or search for us in your Spotify app to get started.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
Dr. Jordan here. You are going to die when you hear about the great deals on the fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back. This episode is sponsored in part by Dell and Nvidia. AI is everywhere now, from your inbox to your car, even how your coffee gets made, and businesses, they are scrambling to keep up.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
So if you're not integrating AI into your systems, you're falling behind, or at least that's kind of the fear. Healthcare is no exception. In episode seven of the Cybersecurity Tapes, a major medical network fast-tracks a generative AI system to streamline patient logistics and gain a competitive edge.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
But here's the thing, when you rush AI without fully understanding the risks, things can go sideways fast. ambulances are rerouted, patients are delayed, systems are overwhelmed. And in this case, it could have cost lives. The Cybersecurity Tapes is a podcast that I really enjoy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
It dramatizes these high stakes scenarios based on real cybersecurity failures while also breaking down what went wrong and how to avoid it. So check out episode seven of the Cybersecurity Tapes and see just how wrong AI can go when the pressure to keep up overtakes the need to play it smart. This episode is sponsored in part by design.com.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
All right, if you're starting a business or even just thinking about it, let me tell you about design.com. It is an amazing set of tools that makes creating a professional-looking logo super easy. All you have to do is type in your business name and industry, and in seconds, it generates thousands of custom logo options for you to choose from.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
And these aren't generic kind of meh designs, and it's not that thing where like people in Uzbekistan, no offense, create 8,000 different designs that just kind of look like the Uzbekistan flag, but with your logo somewhere. or whatever. These are handcrafted by top designers from around the world.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
Collagen is the structural protein that keeps everything in your body feeling smooth, strong, and supported. But after your 30s, your natural levels start to drop, which is why you might notice some creaky joints.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
All right, today on the show, Wendell Potter, a former healthcare executive turned whistleblower, essentially. He's the former head of corporate communications at Cigna. I don't think that exists anymore. It's Humana or something now. Wendell's job was spin, namely to convince the public, that's us, that the U.S. had the best healthcare system in the world. Not true.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
And once you find a logo that you like, you can tweak it, change the font, colors, layout until it's perfect, then download everything you need to make your business look polished and ready to roll. And design.com is even more powerful than that. You can generate templates for social media posts, ads, business cards, even websites and way more.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
If you already have a logo, you can upload it and instantly get access to thousands of design templates that actually match your brand's look and color scheme. So the tool saves you a ton of time. It lets you focus on growing your business instead of getting stuck in the weeds with marketing materials. They've got a 4.8 star Trustpilot rating. So design.com is legit amazing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
It's run by a friend of mine. I know a lot of you always say like, oh, you always say that. It's always run by some friend of yours. It strains credibility. What can I say? I got a lot of friends. I'm a popular guy. Okay, we know that part's not true. But anyway, I've known Alec for a while. The company's been around for a long time. They really do care about their customers.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
Try it for free at design.com slash Jordan. If you're wondering how I manage to book all these amazing folks every single week, it is because of my network, the circle of people I know, like, and trust. You're probably not booking for a podcast, but it doesn't matter. You need it in your personal life. You need it in your professional life.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
And we know from relationship science that those who live longer and happier have a strong network, that circle of people around them that cares for them and that you can care for yourself. This course, Six Minute Networking, teaches you how to build that and how to maintain it in a few minutes a day. It is not cringy. It's not sort of mechanical stuff.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
It's quite fast, just some tips and tricks I've learned over the past couple decades, and many of the guests on the show subscribe and contribute to the course. Come on and join us. You'll be in smart company where you belong. You can find the course, again, for free. No tricky, weird stuff. I don't need your credit card information, for example. You can find the course at sixminutenetworking.com.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
All right, back to Wendell Potter. There's some tales in the book that are just wild. One example, I think, was reinsurers, which are essentially insurance companies of insurance companies, I guess. They're trying to cancel people's insurance by trying to find things that people didn't disclose. And the example, and tell me if I made this up or if this is in the book.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
But the example was, we won't pay to treat your cancer, essentially, because you never disclosed that you had heartburn in the past, which no one is going to disclose that. Nobody's going to necessarily remember that. Maybe they went to the doctor about it once five years ago because it got really bad, but then, you know, it's gone.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
And then you get cancer, and it's like, oh, well, you didn't say that you had this, so it's a preexisting. I mean, this stuff is insane. This is absolutely crazy. There's also this concept purging. Tell us how this works.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
That insurance companies were needed and universal coverage was bad for us somehow. Today, we'll explore why his conscience finally broke, how and why he left his job to speak out about all this. We'll also uncover some healthcare horror stories, learn how the insurance system really works, well, it actually works against us and for the shareholders, surprise, surprise.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
Yeah, the whole employers paying for your health care thing never made any sense to me. So if I'm unemployed, now I don't have health care. Also, it seems like that's when I might need it the most. Or maybe I'm unemployed because I'm sick. I mean, none of this makes any sense. And then, of course, my employer's like, gosh, how can I do this the cheapest way possible?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
that's not going to result in good health care for anybody who's there unless you're in the C-suite and they have to say, hey, we've got the best health care in town, so come work for us. If you're bagging groceries at Target, they're just going to go, either we don't offer this at all for your level, or yeah, you've got what's below bronze plan, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
If you go to the doctor and you're going to pay for the first $50,000 of expenses out of pocket, and if you get hit by a car, we'll cover 10% of it. I mean, it's just going to be crap. None of this makes sense. And developed nations the world over all have nationalized health care. And I'm not one of those people who's like the government should control everything. I'm the opposite.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
But man, even underdeveloped countries have nationalized health care in some way. And we could have two tiers. You want to pay out the nose? Fine. You can have a little better care. But like, why are people just having no care whatsoever? The results are similar.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
When I was in that emergency room in Hawaii, I can almost promise you by just by looking around that I was the only person who paid a bill after that. I don't want to be rude about it, but the people who were in there, these were not people who had $4,000. I think I might have been the only sober person in the ER that day.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
There was a guy who didn't even know where he was, and it wasn't because he was old and senile. It's because he had consumed whatever he had consumed for a long time. He had a swollen leg as a result, probably fell. It's just one of those things. So we're paying for this anyways. We're just paying for it in the most inefficient, ridiculous manner possible. I was looking at some history in Germany.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
Otto von Bismarck, who was, let's say, what, 100 plus years ago? He wanted nationalized health care because he said, hey, the backbone of a strong working class is going to make Germany strong. No country can be strong whose citizens are sick and weak and poor. This is over 100 years ago. This guy was like, hey, man, I think we should look at this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
And we still haven't managed to even eke out a semblance of this. It's insane to me.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
We'll learn how that works from the inside, and we'll learn how healthcare insurance companies manipulate public opinion, politics, and even the media to get us to vote against our own interests. All right, here we go with Wendell Potter. So it's hard to know where to begin with something like this, but essentially you're a healthcare slash insurance company whistleblower.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
It doesn't make sense. You want to attract talent, feed them lunch and put a gym in the place. Don't say, oh, by the way, we're going to pay for your kidney transplant should you ever need one. I do not want to rely on my job at LinkedIn or, who knows, at Ford. So I remember one of the other insane examples of refusing to pay for something to cut costs.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
There was a girl, she was deaf, I believe, and had needed cochlear implants. And they said, she's got one already. So you're going to let her walk around with one ear that hears? Are you insane? Who's the person in the meeting that's, I have an idea. That person is a psychopath. You really almost have to be a psychopath to go, this person needs a kidney transplant. Both kidneys?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
Because I heard you can survive with just one. You can survive with just one. All right, then deny. Who is that person?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
I'm not justifying it, but this is one reason why the CEO of UnitedHealth got killed by Luigi Mangione. Because how much was that guy getting paid? It was like tens of millions of dollars.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
Is that an accurate descriptor?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
Yeah, I heard also, and look, I'm not trying to slander a dead guy here, but it looks like he manipulated some share buybacks, which is where you use company money to buy back shares to raise the share value, and ended up backdating something, and he made a ton of money off those options. And I think he may have even gotten sued by the investors or something and had to give back some money.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
There was some controversy there, too. But for me, it's just... This dude took a bullet in the back of the head or whatever it was because he basically just died for money. That's really all it was in many ways.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
And that means that he was not spending that time figuring out how to give better healthcare. He was sitting around screwing around with Google Sheets or Microsoft Excel or whatever it is to figure out how he could maximize his compensation. These guys, they're not working for us in any way at all. They're working for themselves. They're working for the shareholders. This job should not exist.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
should not exist at all. I'm not saying nobody has to run a company. What I'm saying is that he should be figuring out how to make healthcare cheaper, how to negotiate bigger. Look, $500 million is a lot of cochlear implants for little kids who need them, right? But he would rather, I don't know, put a shiny hood ornament on his boat or whatever. It's just disgusting.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
Honestly, that's why I think so many people were behind this guy, Luigi, like, look, murder is bad, but man, how many deaths is this guy responsible for with all his shenanigans and screwing around? Look, I'm not saying he deserves to die, but I can completely understand why somebody killed somebody like this and why there's going to be more of this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
So tell us what you did at the companies that you worked at. So what was the job? What did it entail?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
How about we just get out of your life without paying the claim, meet you halfway? No. There you go. That's right. Yeah, if you die early, okay.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
I've got a couple of friends. One of them, he had a tumor on his leg and it started growing. And I don't remember all the details, but it was like, hey, this isn't right. Oh, yeah, we'll do a test. Oh, you know what? This test says we need to do another test. Great, let's do it. Yeah, it's going to take three or four months. What do you mean? Back and forth.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
And finally, she said, look, this thing is continuing to grow. We're documenting everything. I've got all my calls recorded. I've got all my emails saved. I got all my letters saved. If he dies, I'm going to the media. And they were like, oh, look, you can take that test on Monday. Wow, that's cancer. We better shoot radiation at that thing. Done. He's fine.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
That really makes me think the squeaky wheel gets the grease in managed health care. So glad you said that. Does this mean if I get a denial someplace, I need to go on this podcast and just basically shit talk an insurance company? Because I will do that if I have to.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
And they often will reverse the denial. That's so interesting and also really crappy at the same time because what this is showing, and by the way, this girl, I think her name was Nataline. So they didn't approve it. And then they gave the liver to somebody else because Signe was sitting on their ass for so long that she didn't get the liver in time. And so reversing that denial, that's great.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
Good for you, Jordan, with a huge podcast. What about for people who don't do media for a living and have success internationally with a giant footprint? oh, well, you're just out of luck. My kids get to live and yours are screwed because you're an engineer somewhere. That hardly seems fair.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
And what it also shows is they'll reverse the denial because they know it's bullshit and they know it's unfair. And they go, wow, this makes us look like the assholes that we actually are.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
We should probably say that this was an administrative error and turn it around, but this is an exception to the rule and we can afford to do it only because, wow, are people pissed off at us and that's gonna reflect poorly in the stock price or we're gonna have to spend a lot of time fighting it in the media or it's gonna come up in another interview when our CEO is interviewed by Squawk Box or whatever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
If that's what has to get done, it's even worse because it's like, yeah, we're doing bad stuff, We hope that we can cover it up, but when it does leak out, we'll just make it look like an accident and then go right back to doing the exact same thing to everybody else who couldn't get their name in the paper.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
It's the way it is. Tell me about the lobbying and the politics. What is AstroTurfing? What are you creating here with these sort of front groups to be against policies you don't like if you're an insurance company?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
I remember hearing that Obamacare was going to have death panels and there'd be people that would decide whether you live or died. And then I remember hearing people in Congress say, there's going to be death panels. They're going to decide who lives or dies. And ironically slash diabolically, The healthcare companies have these pretty much already, and that's the problem.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
They would actually be going away in many ways under Obamacare or the ACA, but healthcare companies were like, oh, what are people afraid of? Some random person 2,500 miles away deciding whether you can live or die? Yeah, we already have that. Let's just say that's what... they're going to do if you vote for this thing, it's going to make us less money. And it's like, all right, great.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
Dust off the logo from the bullshit thing we did in the 90s or whatever sicko came out in the early aughts. It's really gross how much lobbying and politics influences decisions made by Congress, but also health care insurers.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
I noted in the book, you mentioned an acquaintance of mine, Mark Garagos, who was trying to sue Cigna, and he was unable to do so because there's a law that basically says you can't sue health care companies that and states can't protect consumers against them.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
Tell us how this incentives kind of work because it almost looked like the incentive was insurance companies decide if they want to pay and it's actually better if you just die and then they don't have to. Or am I misreading that?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
It was in Adeline's family. He was involved in that case. That does not surprise me. I was going to say, it's really sick and twisted in that an insurance company can say, hey, we didn't pay for your treatment and then you died. But you would have to prove that you died from that thing that we didn't pay to cure. And if you can't prove that... It's not our fault.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
And not only can you not sue us, you paid us premiums and then we denied your coverage. So we actually made out pretty well not paying for your cancer coverage. Now you got to prove that you died from that cancer. Well, it says here you died from cardiac arrest and sepsis. Maybe the cancer caused that, but can you prove that? No, you can't. So go fly a kite. That's what it sounds like.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
Sorry, we can't get you that critical liver transplant, but rest easy because I can get you some deals and discounts on the fine products and services that support this show. How about a mattress or something? We'll be right back. That has really got to change. BetterHelp makes it easy to get started. It's fully online. It's affordable. It matches you with one of 30,000 licensed therapists.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
And if the fit's not right, and that's happened to me before too, switch anytime, no extra cost. Over 5 million people have used it. Jen and I, my parents have used it. It's helped so many navigate through life transitions, difficult times. So if you've been thinking about it, even just a little, go ahead and check it out.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
The world's a better place when we're all a little more tuned in, especially to ourselves, a little more supported, and a lot less afraid to ask for help.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
This episode is also sponsored by Shopify. You ever try to buy something online and wonder why it's so dang hard to give them your money? There's a clunky checkout, you gotta make an account or something, you log in, you gotta enter your password. What was the password? Reset the thing. It's a mess.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
It's a unique bit of visibility, right? Because if you just worked in the claims department, you'd have this siloed view. If you just worked in some other department, you'd have a siloed view. But this was... all right, here's what we're doing, but here's what we need to say what we're doing, or here's how we need to spin this and say what this means.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
For real, this happened to me recently where I thought to myself, it's too bad this company's not using Shopify because I don't have half the afternoon to deal with this. When it's smooth, that is Shopify working in the background. That purple shop pay button lets you buy without even thinking. Shopify, baby. Once you know, you know.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
If a store isn't running on Shopify, I'm already 90% out the door. I'm not here to solve a freaking puzzle and verify that I'm not a robot to buy a t-shirt, folks. And here's the thing. Shopify is not just making shopping better. It's making starting your own business way less painful, too.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
Whether you're trying to build the next big brand or just finally launch that side hustle you keep talking about, Shopify hands you the keys. Templates ready to roll. AI tools to speed you up. Marketing tools baked right in. So easy to get your store off the ground. So if you're ready to sell, do us all a favor. Sell on Shopify.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
I've got homes.com as a sponsor for this episode. Homes.com knows when it comes to home shopping, it's never just about the house or the condo. It's about the homes. And what makes a home is more than just the house or property. It's the location. It's the neighborhood. If you've got kids, it's also schools, nearby parks, transportation options.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
If you like this episode of the show, I invite you to do what smart and considerate listeners do, which is take a moment and support our amazing sponsors. They make this show possible. All of the deals, discount codes, and ways to support the podcast are searchable and clickable over at jordanharbinger.com slash deals.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
If you can't remember the name of a sponsor or you can't find the code, email us jordan at jordanharbinger.com. We're happy to surface codes for you because it's that important that you support those who support the show. Now for the rest of my conversation with Wendell Potter. It sounds like big tobacco all over again. These front groups that you'd created, it's interesting, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
We're raising this, and this cost is gonna be higher. How do we make this sound not just like it's greed? We have to say something else. And so you did have a front row seat to all that. And some of the corporate spin examples that you gave in the book, and if people buy the book, please use the links in the show notes. It helps support the show. Some of the examples you gave was,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
Your industry, your former industry, I should say, completely lacks credibility. So you really need these front groups to message for you because nobody freaking trusts you anymore. It's interesting how these companies sort of whip up what sounds like mostly kind of older peoples. If you tell my parents that their healthcare is going to suffer in some way, they're going to be really upset about it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
They're the ones who actually call their congressmen when something is wrong. I'm like, wow, people do that? I thought that was just something that you hear on the internet.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
right pharma insurance politics tobacco that's what y'all have in common is nobody trusts you so you have to be like organization for a more secure america secure for what well we're talking about the shareholders but nobody has to know that we mean secure and and it sounds like something you should vote for okay it's like when you look at a the ballot and it's fair education america and it's like this group is just a bunch of old people who want to pay less taxes no
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
How is that fair? What are you talking about? It's just a bunch of crap. I'm a little bit fired up because it's really making me angry just reviewing all this stuff all over again, these charm offensives, and you get a shady talk show host like Rush Limbaugh who did untold damage and you just have them parrot your bullshit for you for money.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
What about the polls and survey data? You mentioned this in the book. Essentially, they select certain people in a certain way and get the results that they want. Tell me how this works.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
The first one that really stood out was that the USA has the best healthcare system in the world, and as somebody who's lived in Europe, I'm always wondering how that's possible. I mean, look, maybe for certain super high-end cancer care or something like that, sure, but if you just have a cold or you want to go to the doctor or you have an infection, I had an infection.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
It is gross. And I can see why you had a crisis of conscience when it comes to this. Do you think Americans are finally reaching a breaking point with the health care system? Because it seems like we should have a long time ago. But here we are still same old crap.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
I do. Can we draw a straight line between the insurance industry and the rising cost of healthcare? Because I think we've been hinting at that, but people are probably wondering, wait a minute, how come this insurance company that puts profits first, how come they're making the actual cost of things higher? They don't set the prices or do they? I mean, how do those things connect?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
I'll spare people the details, but I went to the ER in Hawaii. I was there for seven hours, and it cost me $4,000.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
They gave me an antibiotic and an ultrasound. The ultrasound, by the way, was like 50 bucks or something. And then the doctor examining it was $2,000. And then the sitting in the emergency room was $2,000. So it was like this weird thing where walking in was two grand and the care was either, oh, that's totally reasonable and in fact cheaper than I thought.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
And who do you know who takes unnecessary cancer drugs? It just doesn't happen. That's insane. What advice would you have for somebody who's trapped in, let's say, medical debt and feels like, hey, the system is stacked against me? You mentioned appeals and stuff like that before. Is that where you start?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
What a waste of their time. Imagine you're a surgeon and you got to spend three hours a week writing a letter saying, no, really, I need to take this person's infected kidney out immediately. As a doctor, you've got to be sitting there looking at your computer going, how did I end up having to do this? This is insane.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
I don't even know what you would call it, but my parents have this and a lot of my friends have this where you have your insurance and you have your doctor, but then you pay like a yearly membership almost to your doctor and your doctor goes, all right, I'm basically dropping everybody who doesn't pay for this membership.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
So you're paying $1,500 a month for your insurance or whatever it costs, but then you're paying, I don't know, five grand a year or four grand a year to be on the list of the people whose phone calls get answered by the doctor. I don't totally get what it is, but the way the doctors have justified it, because I originally was annoyed. I was like, what the hell are you doing?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
What do you mean you're going to charge my parents more? He goes, I'm not getting paid half the time by Medicaid or the insurance company. I'll give your parents the medicine they need. And then I go to bill it and they're like, well, actually, we're going to give you 40% of this because of reasons. And so he just gets screwed. And he's like, you know what?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
I'm only going to take people that have good insurance and I'm only going to take people who pay this and that's going to offset all of the nonsense and then I have some stability in my income and I'm not basically loaning the government or the insurance company my money, which I understand. I wouldn't want to be a doctor like that either, dealing with that nonsense.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
And then also simultaneously, how on earth is this that expensive? because he looked at the report and went, yeah, that looks fine. That was two grand, but the guy actually doing the ultrasound was somehow 60 bucks or whatever it was. It's just, it's totally nonsensical. And the tablet I took was $3. That's reasonable. But then the prescription writing was like 400. None of it made sense.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
If you could dismantle one part of the current system, what would it be and why? I know there's a lot of rot, but you got one thing in mind that you'd target first?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
You're like a reverse lobbyist. Do you ever run into the other lobbyists that you used to work with and like, oh, crap, Wendell Potter's here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
Yeah. Oh, boss, isn't that the guy whose picture is on the dartboard in our office? Yes, it is. That's him. What would you say to current health care insurance executives who are feeling conflicted about their work? They're listening to this podcast because their daughter made them promise they would listen. And now they're in their car in the parking lot crying or hopefully.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
What do we say to these people who are thinking like they knew they've known and this is the wake up call that they can't overlook? I hope they will.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
Yeah, that's interesting. Of course, after Luigi's little incident there, they took their pictures off the website, which I get it. They were scared. And I remember thinking, you should be scared. You're kind of responsible in part for a lot of deaths. You're just sitting there in your Nantucket house being like, oh, I hope this never catches up with me. Now it's not so clear cut.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
Sure, get bodyguards. That's not going to help. What you need is a more fair system. It sounds like you think there's hope for a more equitable health care system in the US. We're not too far gone. Is that accurate?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
What do you think needs to finally happen for Americans to have access to affordable health care? I mean, it sounds like you think the government has to basically make this happen, because the companies aren't going to self-organize and do this themselves. That's for damn sure.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
Wendell Potter, thank you so much for coming on the show today. I know you're on the road in Washington scaring lobbyists. So I appreciate you taking a little bit of time out from that to come talk to us.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
Yeah, you got it. Thank you very much. You're about to hear a preview of the Jordan Harbinger show about a guy who went from Nigerian royalty to the rugged streets of the Bronx. Remy Adelaike's life was thrown into chaos after a corrupt government stripped his family of their legacy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
Dive deep into his captivating journey from being surrounded by drugs and drive-bys to his inspiring pursuit to become a U.S. Navy SEAL, even though he didn't know how to swim.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
But that's not all. Remy's fight is far from over as he confronts the dark underworld of human trafficking and illegal organ harvesting. To uncover what drives the man who refuses to be defeated, check out episode 868 of The Jordan Harbinger Show. All things Wendell Potter will be in the show notes at JordanHarbinger.com.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
Advertisers, deals, discount codes, ways to support the show, all at JordanHarbinger.com slash deals. Please consider supporting those who support the show. Also, our newsletter, We Bit Wiser, is practical. It's a two-minute read every Wednesday-ish. It'll have an immediate impact on your decisions, your psychology, and your relationships.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
And if you haven't signed up yet, I invite you to come check it out. It's a really good companion to the show. JordanHarbinger.com slash news is where you can find it. Don't forget about 6-Minute Networking as well over at 6minutenetworking.com. I'm at Jordan Harbinger on both Twitter and Instagram. You can also connect with me on LinkedIn.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
And this show, it's created in association with Podcast One. My team is Jen Harbinger, Jace Sanderson, Robert Fogerty, Ian Baird, and Gabriel Mizrahi. Remember, we rise by lifting others. The fee for the show is you share it with friends when you find something useful or interesting. The greatest compliment you can give us is to share the show with those you care about.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
If you know somebody who's interested in the healthcare system or might find a conversation like this interesting, definitely share this episode with them. In the meantime, I hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn. And on this one, I hope you never have to apply what you heard on this show. But in the off chance that you do need it, I hope this comes in handy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
It was ridiculous. I called to find out why it was so expensive. And even the people in the billing department, they were like, I don't know. I don't even know what these notes are or anything. And I was like, can't you tell me what this thing is? Because it says something like rec div, you know, $2,000. And I Google it and it's, this could be anything.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
And we'll see you next time. This episode is sponsored in part by What Was That Like podcast. Have you ever wondered how it feels to watch your house burn down, be attacked by an alligator, or learn that your spouse hired someone to kill you? What Was That Like is the podcast for you, if you're that person. Not the person who got hired to be killed, but the person who wondered, more thankfully.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
Real people come on every episode to explain the unbelievable situations they've been through. I think it's a funny concept for a show. I kind of wish I thought of it because I always get crazy stories from people. Not everything turns into a Jordan Harbinger episode. But What Was That Like?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
is hosted by my friend, Scott Johnson, who's naturally curious and gives his guests the opportunity to share. how they've really felt during some of their most surreal experiences, what they did in the morning before an earthquake, what song was playing as a gunman entered, what is their stomach growling as they hid. Guests share everything they remember about their crazy, crazy experiences.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
So if you want to hear some disturbing slash inspiring firsthand stories about the thoughts that go through your head while surviving a kidnapping or winning the price is right. What was that like is the podcast you've been looking for. Every story is thoroughly researched and fact-checked so you know even the most unreal stories are actually someone's reality.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
Listen to What Was That Like wherever you get your podcasts.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
And the guy's, yeah, it could be all these different things. That just means somebody looked at something or whatever. And then I said, fine, I want to take eight years to pay this off because I'm offended by how much it costs. And he goes, sir, You gotta be reasonable. And I was like, I have to be reasonable? You just charged me $4,000 for somebody to look at my ball sack.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
I'm like, no, I am being reasonable. I'm just being as reasonable as I freaking can right now, man. I'm losing my mind. Yeah, you did have a unique position, man. Essentially like an undercover investigative journalist who spent, what, 20 years on assignment? That's pretty unusual.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
Yeah, I can see that. So they did pay you pretty well. Why'd you stop doing the job? What was the breaking point that made you leave what I can only assume is a decent six-figure health insurance job with some stability?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
That just seems like a fundamental conflict of interest, right? We have companies that want to be profitable, but also have to pay for cancer treatment for people that are dying. And they can either choose to put the money in the profit or they can choose to pay for the person's liver transplant or whatever it is. And it just seems like that should be not legal.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
And look, I'm as capitalist as anybody out there. I used to work on Wall Street, but this is one area where I go, hey, you know what? Maybe like we don't try to profit off of kids who have leukemia.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
Yeah, look, I got that giant ER bill and what they said next time was, oh, next time make an appointment. And I was like, the doctor told me to go to the ER if this gets infected, it was a post-surgical thing. So you basically, you told me to do it this way. And they were like, sure. I'm just thinking it's also, by the way, kind of your fault it got infected.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
I had surgery at this place and the instruments weren't clean enough or something. I don't know. I mean, is this really my fault? It's not like I didn't take a shower for a week. This is not entirely on me. All right. Looking back, do you think working in this industry fundamentally changed you?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
Because some of the campaigns you ran, the fear mongering stuff, which we'll talk about in a second, it seems like that would just eventually get under your skin.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
Coming up next on the Jordan Harbinger Show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
Yeah, I think a lot of people would like to hear what that wake-up call actually was. Because it seems like up until that point, You're thinking of people as, what, numbers? Because otherwise, how do you sleep at night at this point in your career, right? Yeah. That begs another question. How do insurance companies justify policies that deny care to patients who desperately need it?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
What's going on when it's like, this girl has leukemia, but it's like, how do they make that policy?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1151: Wendell Potter | Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans
So tell me about this wake-up call that you had, this horror story that finally made you, I don't know, lose enough sleep to quit. Is that how it happened?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1112: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Two
You know who won't beat you with a lead pipe for accidentally bumping into them at a bar? The amazing sponsors that support this show. We'll be right back. I know I've said it once. Well, I've said it many times. In fact, I'm going to shill it again. Six Minute Networking. It is a networking course. Networking is a dirty word. It's not exactly what we're talking about here.
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1112: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Two
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1112: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Two
So come on and join us. You'll be in smart company where you belong and you can find the course always free at sixminutenetworking.com. I don't need your credit card number. I'm not going to charge you any money, nothing like that. Sixminutenetworking.com is where you can find it. All right, back to Jay Dobbins. You mentioned that real cops don't do drugs unless our lives depend on it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1112: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Two
What's up with that rule? It seems like it would be really easy to just do a couple lines of blow here and there, like lawyers do it. That's not exactly an advanced kind of thing. Why the prohibition on this?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1112: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Two
And if you go to the convenience store or any of the bars nearby, they're in there and you can say like, oh, Hell's Angels, wow, are you from New York? No, I actually am from California. I just drove here over the past couple of weeks. Wow, how long does that take? Now we do it in five days, but it's exhausting.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1112: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Two
I suppose there's also a world in which you say, and then what happened? Are you sure about that? Because you were high out of your mind on methamphetamine during that entire evening. And we know that because you're talking 120 words per minute on the tapes and we have you on video doing it. That's probably not a good look either.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1112: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Two
Yeah, depends on the crime. But yeah, it's a tougher argument for sure. Your kid calls at one point while you're in a meeting with the gang. How do you deal with something like that? I'm surprised you answer that. I guess maybe you didn't have caller ID on your cell phone at that time or you're not sure. It seems like a call you might want to put to voicemail.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1112: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Two
You're small talking with them about something they did, but you're not like, so did you bring meth with you? Like you don't say anything like that. And they're perfectly friendly. They don't kick you out of the bar or push you off the bar. Well, it's almost confusing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1112: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Two
You said, when you become a Hells Angel, everything else about you is now moot. They have a rule book that makes the Division I football playbook look like a pamphlet on buying a jacuzzi. I'm so curious what kind of rules there are. We mentioned never passing a full patches front wheel or something when you're driving, but what kind of other rules are there?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1112: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Two
I know there's rules about girlfriends and wives and things like that. Maybe you can give us some examples of the rules, especially if they're weird.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1112: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Two
What are some of the weirdest rules that almost don't make any sense until you think about it or until you explain it?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1112: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Two
Yikes. Yeah. You're assuming a higher status that you didn't earn if you do something like that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1112: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Two
Well, that's how you deal with Nazis anyway. But yeah, I suppose they they seem like they were a little bit more sympathetic to some of the shady.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1112: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Two
Yeah. That makes sense. Are there Jewish Hells Angels, or is it mostly an atheist kind of organization or Christian organization?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1112: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Two
Probably not coming up a lot in the meetings. Hey, it's Hanukkah. I can't ride this week.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1112: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Two
Yeah, I don't even know if it's the underbelly. It's right on the front. But as much as there's excitement and danger and catching these bad guys, it's the really depressing part in the underbelly of this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1112: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Two
You mentioned some of the women that hang around, and I'm going to paraphrase, but you say they'd been road hard and put away wet, so to speak, and some of them were attractive and other ones looked like a snowy mud flap in March or something like that. The life hasn't been kind to them.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1112: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Two
You said there's little kids around who had the same name as your son, and this kid wanted to show you his new toy, and it was like a used tire. And you just think, damn, this kid's life around all these degenerates just sucks.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1112: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Two
I'm not going to let this little girl get cleaned up. It's so depressing that anybody lives like that, especially children. That's got to be tough to see.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1112: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Two
Yeah, you mentioned you said something along the lines of an undercover constantly trades his ethics for the greater good of the case. And I think the example was you wanted to arrest all these degenerates who are doing drugs around their kids and they weren't feeding their kids.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1112: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Two
But if I don't arrest them, I can maybe arrest the people who are running these guys in charge of these guys or arrest all of them or more of them. What other kind of tradeoffs do you have to make in this line of work?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1112: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Two
That is horrifying, especially as a parent. You had to just be like, man, that kid was dealt a crappy hand of cards to have those parents.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1112: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Two
The best case scenario is they get taken away from the parents when they go to prison or die or something and they end up in a better home. Even if they are a certified genius with influences like that, they're just going to misuse that intelligence and end up in prison or something like that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1112: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Two
If you're wearing dirty onesie pajamas with your bomb-dealing parents, you're probably not in school, right? No one's paying attention to your education. It's just, what a mess. It's just, oh, that is so sad.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1112: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Two
Yeah, that's where the lawyers come in and they go, we're going to argue this way. And the prosecutor says, we're going to argue the other way. Although you mentioned in the book something interesting that I'd never heard before, which is often undercover police or law enforcement, they end up sympathizing with the gangs or they even form their own motorcycle clubs like cops.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1112: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Two
You know what's better than meth smuggled cross country and the sweaty assless chaps of a criminal biker gang? The fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back. All the deals, discount codes, and ways to support the show are searchable and clickable at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. Always appreciate it when you support the sponsors.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1112: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Two
We don't get money from direct sales, but when you use our codes, companies see that people are responding to the ad. They're more likely to continue their partnerships with us. That's how it works. To double win, you get a great deal. You help keep the show thriving. Thank you for supporting those who make the show possible. Now, for the rest of my conversation with Jay Dobbins. Thank you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1112: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Two
having a motorcycle club or gang or something. What's that all about? What's going on there?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1112: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Two
Thank you. Thank you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1112: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Two
Thank you. Thank you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1112: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Two
Welcome to the show. I'm Jordan Harbinger. astronaut, national security advisor, or Russian chess grandmaster. If you're new to the show or you want to tell your friends about it, and of course I appreciate it when you do, I suggest our episode starter packs.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1112: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Two
I would love to have you back on. We barely talked about the actual Hells Angels undercover operation. I have a ton of notes. I would love to have you back on at some point.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1112: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Two
Thank you. You're about to hear a preview of the Jordan Harbinger show with former mafia underboss Sammy the Bull Gravano.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1112: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Two
To hear more about how Sammy rose in the ranks to become one of the most notorious gangsters of all time, check out episode 587 and 588 of The Jordan Harbinger Show. Wow, this undercover stuff never ceases to amaze me. I wonder if I had done something like this when I was younger. I definitely do not have the stones for it. Now, once you have kids, man, you just can't be doing this stuff.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1112: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Two
Although he did it with kids. I don't know. He's definitely built different. I'll tell you that. There's definitely a follow-up show happening. I've got them on the books for a round two. There's much more in my notes about biker gangs and the Hells Angels undercover operation and the other operations that he was on.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1112: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Two
Right. So that appeals to a certain type of person who then is maybe willing to defend that, I guess, with their life. It doesn't seem worth it to me, but I'm also not the target market for that sort of thing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1112: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Two
More undercover ATF agents going into biker gangs with Ken Croke, if you haven't heard that episode yet. That's episode 673. That was one of, and still is, one of our most popular episodes of the show, and it's one of the ones that you listeners are constantly surfacing to me. Episode 673 with Ken Croke. Similar to this one, a lot of good stories.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1112: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Two
Ken's just a great speaker as well, so definitely check that episode out if you haven't done so yet. All things Jay Dobbins will be in the show notes on the website. Advertisers, deals, discount codes, and ways to support this show, all at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. Please consider supporting those who make the show possible. Our newsletter, it's called We Bit Wiser.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1112: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Two
It's out every Wednesday. It's a two-minute read. The idea is to give you something specific and practical that'll have an immediate impact on your decisions, your psychology, your relationships. And if you haven't signed up yet, I invite you to come check it out. jordanharbinger.com slash news is where you can find it. Six Minute Networking over at sixminutenetworking.com.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1112: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Two
I'm at Jordan Harbinger on both Twitter and Instagram. You can also connect with me on LinkedIn. This show is created in association with Podcast One. My team is Jen Harbinger, Jace Sanderson, Robert Fogerty, Ian Baird, and Gabriel Mizrahi. We rise by lifting others. The fee for the show is you share it with friends when you find something useful or interesting.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1112: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Two
The greatest compliment you can give us is to share the show with those you care about. If you know somebody who's interested in undercover work, the ATF, the Hells Angels, or just criminal activity in general, distance yourself from that person. No, share this episode with them. In the meantime, I hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1112: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Two
And we'll see you next time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1112: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Two
And then you get the Sons of Anarchy, and it's clearly about them slash all motorcycle clubs. They were consultants for them on the show to make it look more realistic. And people are obsessed with that. That show ended years ago. People still talk about it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1112: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Two
If you're infiltrating them, don't they try to do the same thing? I mean, look, they don't have an undercover program, but, you know, like their guy's cousin works for the FBI. Are they not? Hey, you got to tell us if you see anything about our club. They must be. Surely they're doing that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1112: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Two
Yeah. I got a friend who is Canadian, and he was working for the RCMP, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, doing something like processing wiretap transcripts. And then one day his boss was like, Hey, you are on some of our surveillance because your childhood best friend, his dad is a hell's angel or whatever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1112: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Two
And you are fired, obviously, because you are the one who is processing the wiretaps of your friend's dad and his associates. planning crimes. We cannot trust you with this information anymore. But had he actually been a bad actor instead of a kid with a summer job, he could have probably just said, hey, I can't associate with you guys. They're going to catch you on surveillance.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1112: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Two
I know you're on surveillance because I'm reading the transcripts. Here's what they say. Here's what they know. Here's what they don't know. Surely they get lucky like that or deliberately put people in those positions.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1112: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Two
Yikes, that sounds leaky. It's crazy that cops can come from gangs. It doesn't make a ton of sense. I assume there's a policy about that now, but who knows?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1112: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Two
He's probably gonna be a really good street cop because he knows what's going on.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1112: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Two
These are collections of our favorite episodes on topics like persuasion and negotiation, psychology, geopolitics, disinformation, China, North Korea, crime and cults, and more. It'll help new listeners get a taste of everything we do here on the show. Just visit jordanharbinger.com slash start or search for us in your Spotify app to get started. Today, part two with Jay Dobbins.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1112: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Two
Yeah, it's a question of loyalty. That's a tough thing to test for. A lot of my friends from law school who wanted to join the FBI, they couldn't do it because they'd smoked weed in college. And I was just thinking, you're going to try to catch the biggest criminals in the country or terrorists.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1112: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Two
But this guy who's like certified genius is disqualified because he rolled up a bunch of joints freshman year. Who are you going to hire who's going to understand the mindset of a criminal when you can't even get a pothead past the screening?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1112: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Two
You said it's important to build trust or at least the illusion of trust. Tell me about how you do it, but tell me what you mean by illusion as well.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1112: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Two
So some motivations are stronger than others, right? If one guy's like, you're going to go to prison for life for trafficking in weapons and violent crime, that's a pretty strong motivation to help you. But if it's just ego validation, they could maybe get that elsewhere, like by betraying you to the gang.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1112: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Two
You mentioned riding the motorcycles with these guys is really hard to do. You're not just learning how to ride a motorcycle. You're going really fast and you're in this tight formation. Tell me a little bit about that because there's rules in the formation too, right? You're not just riding on the highway like a normal cycle.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1112: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Two
If you haven't heard part one, definitely go check that out. We're going undercover in the Hells Angels, a fascinating episode so far. All right, let's jump back into it with Jay Dobbins. You mentioned in the book that a small number of outlaw bikers have a lot of influence over the more restrained guys.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1112: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Two
Yeah, that's terrifying. And you're not allowed to pass. There's a couple of rules, right? You're not allowed to pass someone's front wheel. How does that work?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1112: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Two
Jeez. That would be as scary or scarier than dealing with all these people and engaging in undercover work in the first place.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1112: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Two
They're terrible. It's messy. Yeah, it's messy. It's just a meat crayon, even if you have protective gear on. And that's if you don't smash yourself into something.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1112: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Two
There's career criminals that do nothing but drugs and crime, and they have a lot of influence over the other guys who maybe have functional lives outside the gang. And that drives a lot of the violence and crime. And my very limited experience with... say Hell's Angels in New York City, there's a headquarters there.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1112: Jay Dobyns | Undercover with the Hells Angels Part Two
First impressions you talk about a lot in the book as well. Super important, especially for undercover. How do you make a strong first impression specifically in the criminal underworld? You mentioned never take your guns off for anyone or there's things like that. But tell us about this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
That's fascinating. But that would be hard to test. Good luck finding a kid that hasn't heard music, although I guess feral children haven't heard music, haven't heard a language. Or deaf children who suddenly have their hearing restored. That makes sense. Duh. Cochlear implant or something. That makes way more sense and is way less sad. The opposite.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
The cochlear implant thing is actually like a miraculous piece of technology. Do you know how they work? Because I'm always mystified at how this thing on the outside of your head just tells your brain what you're hearing. It's like a fake ear. It's just amazing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
I see. So it's better than not being able to hear at all because you can hear the car honking or the people talking to you, which is life-changing, but you're not suddenly going to be able to hear like you or I through these earbuds. getting a cochlear implant with today's technology. Right.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
Yeah, okay, that makes sense, because I was just like, you just put wires in the brain, and the brain goes, ah, I know what to do with these. I mean, that to me is still amazing, frankly. Now, back to language learning. I speak several foreign languages, none of which I learned as a child. I learned them all after the age of 17, I think. German, Spanish, Serbian, Mandarin Chinese, and an English.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
I think that stuff is just so fascinating. We as humans, we kind of know music does something because we feel it, right? When I play music in the gym, I feel like my workouts are a little bit better, a little bit more fun. When I play music when I'm hiking, I'm less tired for some reason. But no one until recently maybe has really thought about why this happens.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
And... Ni hao ma. Yes, hao ma. So the language thing is, it drives me nuts because I can hear my accent, especially in German, where I'm the most fluent, and there's almost kind of nothing I can do about it. I'm very good at imitating voices, I'm very good at imitating accents, doing video game voice characters. I just can't get every single nuanced syllable in a German word
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
unless I practice each one over and over and over and over again. And then when I say them fast in different combinations, it just falls apart. But then there'll be a kid who had a German nanny growing up and is taking German in college, and I'm like, oh, you bastard. You sound better than me, even though your vocabulary is a tenth of mine. And so there's definitely something to that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
I've been studying Mandarin for about a dozen years, I can read and write, and one of my friends said, no matter how long you study this, people will be able to tell that you're not Chinese. And I had to laugh because I'm pretty sure it's not merely the language proficiency that's going to give me away as somebody who's not Chinese. But it's just, yeah, you're right.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
There's this sort of impossible... barrier that you just can't cross. My son can speak Mandarin really well. My daughter can understand Mandarin really, really well, Spanish as well. And they will have a much easier time, I think, becoming fluent and possibly accent-free in those languages just because we've started them so early. I grew up in Michigan.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
Nobody spoke a foreign language in my house or near me anywhere, pretty much. Maybe some Arabic or something like that and Persian, but not in my home. It's amazing, though, that your brain can still learn it, but it just can't mimic it perfectly, which it's almost like the physical control that your brain has over your ability to speak. It degrades somehow or cuts off somehow.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
That's the part I don't totally understand because I can still dream in German. I can still think of things completely in German. I can still construct grammatically perfect German sentences. I just can't say the damn words in the way that Germans do.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
Yeah, they always say Canada, but yeah, it's basically...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
And you really do a good deep dive in the book on this. The book starts with this concept of, I think you called it fusion, where your awareness changes when listening to music. Can you explain this for me? I've never heard of this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
Yeah, that's such a bummer. But it makes perfect sense, right? Because the child's brain doesn't know where it is in the environment, as you mentioned. Doesn't know what it's going to need. Right. So it says, okay, maybe I need really sharp hearing because that's what we're doing here. I need to learn this language. I need to be able to decipher this kind of communication.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
And I suppose that makes sense why young kids who are born into traumatic or unstable environments suffer so much throughout their lives, right? Because they essentially...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
prune a lot of neurons that they probably would have needed to, I don't know, go to college and be a successful doctor, but they retain a lot of qualities that keep them safe or alive in an environment where people are doing drugs or there's violence around them or they don't get food regularly or something like that. What ages does that sort of stop happening, do we know?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
Did you tell me this already? It's variable, but say 10 to 14. Okay, so similar to the whole language thing as well. discounts on the fine products and services that support this show. Music to my ears. We'll be right back. This episode is sponsored in part by NordVPN. If you're online without a VPN, you're exposing yourself and not in the fun way. We've been using NordVPN for years.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
And in today's world, VPNs are not optional anymore. Every time we travel, whether it was China, Europe, wherever, Nord has actually been a total lifesaver. In China, it actually just kept us connected and protected when basically nothing else worked. Airports, sketchy cafe, Wi-Fi. It's not just hackers you need to worry about.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
Your own internet provider could be selling your browsing data to whoever is paying. I mean, they are doing that. Plus, Nord's got the extra perks. You can switch your virtual location in seconds, which means unlocking sporting events, TV shows, movies you can't even get here. Friends have used it for dating to turn on Tinder in other countries. That's a creative use of that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
You can even save money by booking flights in hotels, too, because airlines and booking sites use dynamic pricing based on IP address. I gotta figure that one out. Nor it is fast, no buffering, no lag. On top of that, the threat protection feature blocks malware, phishing attempts, all the garbage you don't even see coming before it hits your devices.
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1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
All of this for about the price of a fancy coffee each month. And you can protect up to 10 devices, phones, laptops, tablets, your whole digital life locked down.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
This episode is also sponsored by IQ Bar, something I literally just ate. IQ Mix is a zero-sugar drink mix from IQ Bar that hydrates, boosts your mood, and promotes mental clarity. Anyone who knows me knows staying hydrated, kind of a thing. Really boring thing to have, but whatever. Not as boring as plain water.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
And when you're out there rucking seven miles in the hot sun with a 60-pound pack strapped to your back, yes, that's a flex. Just drinking water isn't enough to put you back together. That's where IQ Mix from IQ Bar comes in. It's a zero sugar drink mix loaded with three times the electrolytes of your average sports drink. It's what plants crave.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
None of the junk, no sugar, no gluten, no soy, no GMOs. It's even vegan and kosher for those of you keeping score. My go-to flavor is piña colada, but they've also got passion fruit, lemon, lime, peach, mango, pink lemonade, raspberry lemonade. All of those are actually quite good. But IQ Mix is not just about tasting better. It's about performing better.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
It's packed with magnesium L3 and 8, which I take a ton of. Lion's Mane, so you get clean energy, real mental clarity without hammering down four coffees. That's my usual method, if I'm 100% honest. No surprise, they've got over 20,000 five-star reviews.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
If you're wondering how I managed to book all these great authors, thinkers, researchers, scientists, creators every single week, it is because of my network, the circle of people I know, like, and trust. I'm teaching you how to build the same thing for yourself over at 6minutenetworking.com. This is a course. It's a free course. It's not a schmoozy course. There's no upsells in the course.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
It won't make you or other people cringe when you use the tactics. It's very practical. A few minutes a day is all it takes. Many of the guests on the show subscribe and contribute to this course. So come on and join us. You'll be in smart company where you belong. You can find it, again, it's free, no tricky stuff, sixminutenetworking.com. All right, back to Daniel Levitin.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
I'd love to talk about music and pain relief because the pain relieving effect of music is fascinating. You touched on this earlier, but if we're listening to music and it can help with pain, can it help with not just workout pain, the burn in the muscle? I just had back surgery, now I'm on OxyContin. Do I need less OxyContin if I'm playing some good jams?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
Is there an addiction treatment angle for people who are hooked on things like opioids? Can we use music and addiction programs to help this? Or is it just that by the time you're addicted to Oxycontin, what the body produces is not going to ever be enough?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
I know that shamans and medicine people throughout history, throughout the ages, have used music as part of ceremonies, as part of healing. Did you manage to research that at all? I mean, it seems like an obvious connection. They obviously knew music did something back then, and maybe some of it was just to show how serious the ceremony was.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
But from what I've heard from friends, when you do something like psychedelics or some sort of medicine journey, there's a lot of music and drums and banging and things that go along with some of these ceremonies, and they're there for a reason.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
That's really good news and very fascinating. I do want to separate the sound healing from what we're talking about right now. I want to separate music and therapy from nonsense pseudoscience, like this bowl produces a frequency that will shrink your tumor.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
They're waving the hand in front of the face. For people who aren't watching, they're waving the hand off to the side in a circular motion.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
Yeah. We've talked about the DMN, the default mode network on the show before. This is why I come up with great ideas in the shower mode. Is that right? Exactly right. Yeah. But why do we want to enter that state besides coming up with great ideas in the shower? You mentioned that it's a restorative time for the brain.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
I also don't have a problem with going to a Tibetan sound bath with a group of friends after we went on a hike. We did this recently. I was in Laos, and it was like, oh, this person's going to play the bull. It was relaxing. I slept well afterwards. Might have slept well anyway because I hiked all day, but it doesn't matter.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
The only beef I have with this stuff is where people go, you don't need harmful drugs to that's Western medicine or you don't need big pharma to pump you full of chemotherapy. You just need to listen to this sound and it will help you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
That is where this stuff gets dangerous when people stop looking for real health cures or get confused between what is actually effective medicine for a thing that can kill them or hurt them. That's where I sort of have to draw the line. I'm not trying to rain on people's parade because they have a brass bowl in their living room that has a little thing that they like to do in the evening.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
That's harmless. It's a fun hobby. Go for it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
Did he have a really bad prognosis? Because I swear I read somewhere that he had a very treatable cancer initially, and it just spread because he didn't do anything real to treat it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
Yes. Air quotes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
Dangerous. Tell me about music and memories. I find that I will listen to a song and immediately be transported back. to a time where, I don't know, maybe that song was popular when I lived in Germany, or maybe it was popular when I went to my high school prom or something like that. And you get those feelings come back. They come rushing back.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
That's why so many couples have a song, things like that. Is music generally anchored somehow to memories?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
Welcome to the show. I'm Jordan Harbinger. even the occasional mafia enforcer, Fortune 500 CEO, or Hollywood filmmaker. And if you're new to the show or you're looking for a way to tell your friends about it, and of course I always appreciate it when you do that, I suggest our episode starter packs. It's a great place to begin.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
I loved it. We used to play it in college and go cruise around in the car and meet girls. Does it also function for bad things? Can you hear a song and you're like, oh, this is when my parents got divorced. This song was on the radio.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
Yeah, one of my earlier memories that I'll never forget because I'd never seen anything like this. A friend's dad was driving us to lacrosse practice. This is sometime in the early 90s. And we were stopped at a red light and the cars behind us started to honk. And my friend was like, dad, go. And he froze and he goes, you guys hear that? And we were like, yeah, the horns.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
He goes, no, you guys hear that? He had been in Vietnam and he got so triggered by this helicopter that was quite loud and it was low. So it was really extra loud and he just froze and he forgot where he was. Seemingly, he didn't know anything about what was going on in that particular moment. I emailed my friend about this and I said, do you remember that?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
And he goes, that definitely checks out as something that would have happened with my dad. So that was really disturbing. Well, of course.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
Yeah, that was one of those things where I just remember looking at my friend and being like, what the hell, dude? And he was just like, I don't know, whatever. And I remember his mom drove us the next time and we were like, what was that about? And she's like, oh... Yeah, something about Vietnam and it happens. It's very rare. But he never drove us to the cross practice again.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
I have a feeling when I told my parents, they were probably like, look, they're not letting my kid in the car with you. I mean, I feel bad for him. Obviously, this is something that affected him deeply. But I just found that to be so strange. And it makes sense that the trauma and that sound are linked. I hope he's in a better place now because helicopters are everywhere.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
All right, if music can do all of this, can help us recall good memories, bad memories, help us calm down, help us get amped up, if music can do all that, why doesn't Spotify take my heart rate and physiological stress levels from my Apple Watch or my Oura Ring and suggest something to calm me down or to help my workout get better? I feel like Daniel Ek needs to get on this. They will.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
Seems like AI could actually just make music that it knows I will like in that moment. Probably could. Yeah, that'll be interesting. I think it's quite fascinating that music therapy is not only effective because, let's say, it's pleasurable, it actually is doing something in the brain. You mentioned the immune system in the book. You mentioned that music discovery can affect our immune system.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
What's going on with music discovery in our immune system? Why would we even evolve something like that, that ability?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
So there is something to Mark Zuckerberg wearing the same clothes every day so he doesn't have to make a decision in the morning, or do you think that's hyped up?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
I mean, music is ancient. I suppose it makes some sense. It just is sort of mystifying to me why we would integrate that music so thoroughly into our brains. I just don't understand. And I suppose maybe we never will. I've heard people who stutter normally don't always stutter when singing. What's going on here?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
It seems like a miracle. My mom was a speech therapist. I know teaching people how to... manage a stutter is very tricky. It doesn't always stick. It's easier when they're kids, going back to what we discussed earlier in the show. So this seems like a really good insight into how to get around something like that or manage something like that. What about Tourette's?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
You mentioned this in the book as well. There's a similar effect here as well.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
That's incredible. So it must feel so good for somebody who is... constantly suffering from these tics to play music and sing as much as possible. Yeah, it does. Man, that Tourette's stuff is fascinating. What many of you may not know is that I also have Tourette's, but it doesn't happen when I'm podcasting. How weird is that? F***ing s***! F***ing f***! Balls! We'll be right back.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
This episode is sponsored in part by Northwest Registered Agent. Northwest has been helping people launch and grow businesses for nearly 30 years. If you want to build your business and protect your privacy at the same time, this is the move.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
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1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
This episode is also sponsored by Notion. Ever feel like you're spending more time managing email than actually getting work done? We've been using Notion for years to keep our production calendar organized and now Notion Mail is saving us a ton of time and helping me focus on what actually matters.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
Like a lot of you, I kind of live in my inbox sometimes responding to questions, scheduling interviews, chasing down opportunities, but email management... Hasn't really changed in decades. It's tedious, cluttered, constantly pulling you off task. Notion Mail fixes that. You tell it what's important. It automatically sorts and labels your emails as they come in. I love the custom views feature.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
You can split your inbox by topic, urgency, sender, whatever keeps you locked in and distraction-free. And for the repetitive stuff like intros, thank yous, scheduling links, Notion Mail has one-click snippets that make flying through emails ridiculously fast. And...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
Since it's fully integrated with Notion, everything, your notes, your docs, your calendar, finally works together just the way it should.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
This episode is sponsored in part by Airbnb. I gotta give a shout out to Brian McDonald, who listened to the show and absolutely hooked me up in Vietnam recently. Brian runs A Taste of Hanoi, and I had this layover in Hanoi, and he's like, I got you, set me up with one of his guides for a motorbike food tour in Hanoi, which was awesome.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
Now, if you've never been in the back of a motorbike in Vietnam, it's something, man. You're weaving through scooters and traffic like a video game where you can actually die, and then all of a sudden, we're inside someone's house, literally inside. We rode the motorbike. I'll tell you, the guide pulls you to what looks like an alley.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
But it turns into a hallway and then he turns around, grins and goes, okay, put your hands on my shoulders, duck your head down, pull your knees all the way in. The next thing I know, we're riding through someone's living room, not even kidding, like actually someone's living room to get to this little courtyard kitchen where this auntie is making pho that'll just ruin your life.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
No, if I will ever taste as good and Vietnamese egg coffee upstairs on the balcony. I don't even know how to describe it. It's like tiramisu and espresso had a beautiful caffeinated baby, short trip, chaotic, absolutely incredible. And I can't wait to go back and bring Jen next time because I know she's going to love it. And next time we'll put our place on Airbnb to help fund the adventure.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
Oh, gosh, I remember this study. It's like if the judge is hungry, you're in trouble, man.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
You can too. Airbnb makes it super practical, it doesn't take a lot of effort, you set it up before you leave, and then boom, your house is earning money while you're on vacation and making memories. Your home might be worth more than you think. Find out how much at Airbnb.com slash host.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
If you liked this episode of the show, I invite you to do what other smart and considerate listeners do, which is take a moment and support the amazing sponsors who make the show possible. All of the deals, discount codes, and ways to support the show are searchable and clickable over at jordanharbinger.com slash deals.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
If you can't remember the name of a sponsor, you can't find the code, go ahead and email me. I'm happy to surface codes for you. It is that important that you support those who support the show. Now for the rest of my conversation with Daniel Levitin. What about MS, multiple sclerosis in music? I've got friends who've had this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
It's something that scared a lot of us because we were all getting older and some of my friends just suddenly had symptoms of this. Can you describe what this is and what it does to your body?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
It's very scary. I've read some research that this comes from the same virus that causes mononucleosis, which I had that in college. Epstein-Barr virus, yes. So I think I got it from like, I don't know, going abroad and kissing girls in bars or something in Panama. Who knows? They called it the kissing disease. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
Yeah, that is just really scary. Why do some people get this and other people don't? Do you know?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
It can be a little bit scary for those of us that are up in our 40s and stuff happening to our friends. And it just it starts to get real. You mentioned with the stuttering and the Tourette's. that there's almost like an alternative pathway in the brain for some of these things. I think a decade ago or so, we talked about paradoxical kinesia.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
So how an old grandma can fly into action and maybe move super fast in an emergency or how someone can lift a car off of their baby if it's trapped under the car. Is this the same kind of thing? How does this work?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
I can just imagine, Your Honor, I'd like to submit this croissant for you to eat before we proceed here. Because my client really wants to stay out of prison. And you're not you when you're hungry. It's like a Snickers commercial.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
Wow, all because they evolve separately at different times, different ways, so it's just redundant. But hey, it works out for somebody who has... A little bit of brain damage, right? Because they can use that other system to communicate in ways that the other system is now damaged.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
Exactly. Do you like grapes or do you want an apple? I brought a few different items here for you to choose from. Yeah, that's really scary because, of course, you don't necessarily realize... That were in that state. I assume these Israeli judges weren't thinking like, I'm a real bastard before lunch, so that guy's in trouble. They probably just thought, oh, this is how the day goes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
So is that why if someone has a stroke similar to a gunshot wound to the head, they can maybe sing what they need or sing communication and something along those lines as opposed to speaking if they can't speak anymore?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
I'm trying to imagine what that is. I'd like pork loin. Does he have to finish the whole thing or is it just like one line?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
Because the butcher could be like, I got it. I see you every Tuesday. I know already.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
We're laughing at somebody who had a stroke. We are terrible people. Now, I'm not laughing at that person. Well, he laughs about it, too. Of course. I would hope so. Look, he can communicate after a stroke. It's amazing. There's nothing more awesome than that. What about music instead of or in addition to drugs? I mentioned the painkilling thing earlier, but what about conditions like dementia?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
There's drugs for this. Do they work well? I don't really know. I don't think they're curals or even highly effective at this point. Are people working with music on this or is it just in the research phase?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
I assume unless you're paying attention, you have somebody studying your decisions. You're not necessarily paying attention to your emotional state. You think you're in the same emotional state while you're at work until you go home.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
Actually, Charan Ranganath. Oh, he was on. Yeah, he was on recently. That was episode 1002. So it was actually June 2024. Yeah, super interesting guy. I will never not be fascinated by it because it's almost like this superpower that humans have that works in all these funny, mysterious ways. And now we're finding it interacts with music.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
That must feel like a massive relief in some ways to somebody like that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
That's good to know. It seems like that stuff should be on play from wake up until bedtime in any care home instead of some of the depressing silence, frankly, or loud ass TV that you hear in those places. What about music and sex? How can that help asking for a friend?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
Yes, that is a little bit scary, especially the coffee thing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
I love the idea that we can utilize music for things like this. What about depression? So many people suffer from this, whether it's severe or minor. Can you share some insights into how music interacts with our brain to ideally alleviate symptoms of depression at some level? Is that a thing?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
If I were to jury-rig this on my own, right, oh, I'm feeling down, I probably would just say, all right, Spotify, happy music, and then I would just be annoyed that this happy music was playing while I felt like crap. So it makes sense. You almost need to start from a point where the music is relating to me on my level. Yeah, that does make a lot of sense.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
How can someone incorporate music into their daily life as a form of maybe self-care for mental health? Do you just wake up and assess your mood and play music according to that mood? Is that helpful at all?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
I see. So this isn't something where you're incapacitated and this music will break you out of it. It's maybe something that'll just make you feel better.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
Before you forget to make it. Yeah, exactly. All jokes aside. But yeah, before you can't make it, this is all, man, this is amazing. What about lo-fi beats? Are you familiar with this? Of course you are. There's a whole channel lo-fi girl, right? When you're studying or something, you put this on. This has just gained massive popularity for studying and focusing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
Is there something in the structure of this that makes it effective or is it just happened to be trendy?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
Exactly. In many ways, of course, we all think we're above average, but it must in some ways be kind of nice to see the world in this completely black and white way where you go, it's not complicated. Just do this really obvious thing that I came up with because I don't understand any of the nuances to what's going on in front of me at all.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
Okay. I just wondered if the simplicity of lo-fi music maybe allowed the brain to enter some kind of flow state more easily. I don't know. Stabbing in the dark. Some people claim that lo-fi music enhances memory and learning. Also no evidence for this yet?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
Are there scenarios where certain types of music might hinder rather than help learning or focus? Is it, hey, we don't know if lo-fi music helps you focus, but we do know that heavy metal sure doesn't or something like that. Is there anything that's anti-focus, anti-learning, or is that not a thing?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
I see. That's funny. I never thought about that. I think for me, I would listen to lo-fi beats when I'm trying to focus on something, but what it does is it blocks out the a-holes talking in the library that are distracting me. So that might be the only use of it, but honestly, a good pair of noise-canceling headphones or something where I couldn't hear anything is probably actually better.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
This is all amazing stuff. Music can heal you, can help you in some ways, help you get rid of pain, help you get laid. Excellent. What about bad or even evil uses of music? Is there music being used for the dark side at all? Speaking to James Earl Jones.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
It seems like, yes, your life won't work out the way that you probably want it to. But day to day, your existence is probably a hell of a lot easier. I don't know. That's a paradox. I'm always finding myself caught in. Back to music, though, according to your work, it can reduce pain. It can enhance focus, pump you up in the gym. You mentioned Parkinson's patients use it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
Wasn't it Van Halen or was it Metallica?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
Yeah, that's right. I remember reading about this and it's funny, man. He's in there. He can't wash his hands, can't sleep. And he's finally, he's just, I can't take it with the guy with the leather bodysuit. Just I'll go to prison for the rest of my life.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
Or the guy with the Bluetooth speaker on the subway. They know who they are.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
They're doing this on purpose, right? This is an attention thing. What do you make of that? I know you're way off topic, but those people, they have to know I'm the most annoying person here. I don't know.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
There's a special place in hell for people who decide to ruin environments for everyone else. It's got to be an attention thing. I would love to hear people's theories. If you're a person who does this or used to do this, please email me and tell me why you did that. I got to know. It's got to be an attention thing. I can't think of any other reason.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
Yeah, possibly. Yeah, some sort of disorder, I suppose. Where do you see the future of music therapy and neuroscience heading in the next decade with this stuff?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
Interesting. Yeah, that would be... Your Spotify price has gone up to $1,100 a month because insurance is paying for it. Oh, and you can only access these five playlists. Sorry. Anyway, that's a whole different podcast, I suppose, on the future of the American healthcare system. Thank you so much for coming on to discuss this. I just find it so amazing what the brain can do.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
Tell me about that, because Parkinson's, Alzheimer's, a lot of this stuff. I have aging parents. I'm also not getting any younger. That stuff freaks me out. It sneaks up on you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
I love the fact that music... interfaces with our minds in such a primal way. And I think people, by the way, who love music as much as you do are going to get a lot more out of the book because I will admit a lot of the stuff in the book was like terminology, music stuff.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
Of course, I understood what you were saying, but a lot of the finer points probably went over my head as somebody who doesn't play a musical instrument and is not as much of a music fan as you. I recommend reading the book for people who like music and for people who don't care about it per se, but I think people who especially love music are really going to love the book as well.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
I think you did a great job with it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
But yeah, thank you once again for coming back on the show. Thank you, Jordan. Good to see you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
What did Victor find in the darkness where even light cannot reach? To find out, listen to episode 1089 of The Jordan Harbinger Show. By the way, if you are really into music, folks, this book is probably even more enjoyable than it was for me. I definitely also enjoyed it, but there's a lot of music terms and concepts that went over my head.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
And I think if you're really a music fan, you're going to love this book along with the science that's in it. All things Daniel Levitin will be in the show notes at jordanharbinger.com. Advertisers, deals, discount codes, ways to support the show, all at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. Please consider supporting those who support the show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
Also, our newsletter, We Bit Wiser, comes out every Wednesday-ish, has something practical, something that'll have an immediate impact on your decisions, your psychology, your relationships in under two minutes. And if you haven't signed up yet, I invite you to come check it out. It's a great companion to the show. JordanHarbinger.com slash news is where you can find it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
And don't forget about Six Minute Networking as well over at SixMinuteNetworking.com. I'm at Jordan Harbinger on Twitter and Instagram. You can also connect with me on LinkedIn. In this show, it's created in association with Podcast One. My team is Jen Harbinger, Jace Sanderson, Robert Fogerty, Ian Baird, and Gabriel Mizrahi. Remember, we rise by lifting others.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
The fee for the show is you share it with friends and you find something useful or interesting. The greatest compliment you can give us is to share the show with those you care about. So if you know somebody who's interested in music, interested in the science of music or alternative healing type stuff, maybe share this episode with them.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
In the meantime, I hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn, and we'll see you next time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
Yeah. Then just the tick, tick, tick. For those who don't know, the metronome is what? Essentially a pendulum that makes a ticking sound? Yep. Do the Parkinson's patients walk faster if you play music with a faster BPM?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
So I wonder if each runner would have their track that is... Probably at the exact max they can go. Maybe it warms up a little at the beginning. I don't know anything about running, but I assume they start sprinting as fast as they can. But as their brain and everything gets synced up, they can probably pick up speed a little bit during the sprint. I really don't know. That's fascinating.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
These are collections of our favorite episodes on topics like persuasion and negotiation, psychology, geopolitics, disinformation, China, North Korea, crime and cults, and more. That'll help new listeners get a taste of everything we do here on the show. Just visit jordanharbinger.com slash start or search for us in your Spotify app to get started. Today we're talking about music.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
I actually never noticed that those people were wearing AirPods or earbuds at all. I guess during training they are. Oh, I see. So during a match, they're not doing this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
Yes, it always happens. Someone's going to write in and say, hey, I ran in the Olympics and I was not allowed to wear AirPods or something like that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
I just assume people train with music because it's more fun to train when you're listening to music than it is to spend an hour in dead silence while you're sweating in the sun. It's a tool that I don't know I'm using.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
I love that. And what I find fascinating about this is some people are going, well, what kind of music? And I assume, let's say, the Parkinson's patients... They could probably listen to anything because they're syncing up their steps, but I assume older people want to listen to, I don't know, Elvis or something like that. Younger people want to listen to different things like Taylor Swift.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
Whenever I go to the gym with friends, it's always one guy brings a Bluetooth speaker, and I'm like, God, do I have to listen to what you're listening to? Because he gets stoked for it, and I put my noise-canceling headphones in, and I have to turn the volume up because I want slightly different music. So I guess my question is... This has to be music that we choose that we like, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
It can't just be there is music in general playing and it all has the same effect on everyone. The person who loves Elvis is probably going to have a better effect than the person who likes EDM but is subjected to Elvis. Is that accurate?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
What was that? Is that the baby thing where it's like, you got to play this to your baby and they come out smarter? Is that what you're talking about? Yeah, that's not true. But what do babies hear in the womb?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
Hey, normally I'm not that interested in this topic, but as we will learn today, music is not just for jamming and relaxing. It can actually help your immune system. It can trigger memory, even in people with impaired memory or diseases. It can treat other diseases like PTSD and a whole lot more. Daniel Levitin has been on the show before.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
That is shocking, I suppose, just because... The idea that the baby would internalize that, remember that at some level from being just in utero, when they can only hear the underwater version, now they're hearing the higher fidelity version.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
It's quite amazing because the time and the brain development and the fact that it would have sounded totally different, they still had a preference for that same track as Crazy, actually. Really impressive. Brains are impressive.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
And that's one of the reasons why we do so many shows about the brain is the more I learn about the brain, the more I'm just like, OK, we were designed by aliens or something. This is just too incredible. Is there a cutoff for learning in neuroplasticity for kids? I know this is not directly on topic.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
The whole language thing, like if you don't learn it when you're a kid, you're never going to learn it and all that stuff.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1147: Daniel J. Levitin | The Science Behind Music as Medicine
He has a knack for picking super interesting science topics and then just doing a killer job communicating his research on the show. If you love music, you'll love this episode. If you love science, you'll love this episode. And if you love science and music, well, you do the math. Here we go with Daniel Levitin. I read the whole book, by the way, really enjoyed it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
This episode is sponsored in part by Vital Proteins. I want to tell you about Vital Proteins Collagen Peptides. That's a mouthful. It's a daily supplement that supports your hair, skin, nails, bones, and joints all in one in one simple step each day. Collagen makes up about a third of the protein in our bodies, but as we hit our 30s, it unfortunately starts to decline.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
We're talking about drones and drone warfare, electronic warfare, jamming, intelligence sharing. Should we stop intelligence sharing? Did we stop intelligence sharing? Should we stop supplying weapons? Did we stop supplying weapons? All these confusing news items that seem to change every five minutes. We do a little update on that and what that means for the Ukraine conflict.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
First of all, what do they do slash how do they work in brief?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
Huh. OK, so China either doesn't care that we know that, because if you know that, then the CIA knows that military intelligence knows that. So either China doesn't care or the United States doesn't care also, because couldn't we maybe do something about that if we really wanted to or not? I don't know what's going on here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
That is scary because if they're thinking we're going to supply these and the U.S. can't do anything about it. Or they can, and we don't care about that. That is a scary scenario. But it seems almost more likely that there's got to be some aligned incentives. Like, all right, they found out about this, but what we're telling them is here's how many we're sending.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
We also discuss whether Europe should arm up, how they can arm up, can they arm up at all, and what it will mean for the future of this conflict. Thanks for coming back on, man. I had a slight lull in the angry emails about your episode, so I decided to have you come back on the show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
Just enough to keep Russia bleeding out, not enough to make a big difference. I mean, am I a conspiracy theorist talking like this?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
I see. But doesn't this go along with the idea, the point you just made, that China doesn't want Russia to collapse completely and the U.S. also doesn't want Russia to collapse completely. So it's almost like we have to allow China to help keep them in the game, at least for a while.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
I suppose it's speculative, so we should probably just move on. I just thought I'd throw that out there because it seems like a logical conclusion based on the stuff that you just told me. Tell me about the drones. I keep seeing drone footage on Reddit where I live these days because I don't sleep anymore because I have small kids, but...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
There's a lot of videos where drones are going around on the battlefield. Some are really graphic and horrific and all that. But some of them are just kind of interesting where it's like a wired drone is driving up to a vehicle. And for me, being an RC car enthusiast, along with my five-year-old son, that seems weird. I would never drive a wired RC car. So I asked you about this via text.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
Why are they using wires? And you said they're fiber optic, so they can't be jammed. It's almost like we play records here because our Spotify is not working. So we have vinyl now. It's like going back to analog almost. I know fiber optic, not really analog, but my point stands. Going wired seems like a weird step back somehow.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
Yeah, you might be the number one in terms of frequency. Not in terms of quality. In terms of frequency guest on the show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
So this is like cat and mouse with the signals and the frequencies. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
Holy smokes. I want to know what that spool looks like. That's got to just be enormous.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
Now allow me to drone on about the fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back. This episode is sponsored in part by CookUnity. I've tried pretty much every meal delivery service out there. CookUnity really stands out. What's cool is that every meal is chef-crafted, and I'm not just saying that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
You can actually see the chef's profile, their background, where they've worked, and they've got something for whatever you're aiming for. High protein, which is me, keto, gluten-free, even meals built around GLP-1 goals, if that's something you've got going on. Everything shows up fresh, not frozen. Heat it up. You're eating restaurant-quality meals in minutes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
It's funny because fans are like, you do a good job of distilling a lot of stuff. I watch all his videos, but it's good because you have a conversation, you go a little deeper, and you recap everything. And then other people are like, this guy has his head up his ass, and I hate everything that he says. But usually those people are like, they also send me crazy unhinged messages.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
What surprised me the most, though, is how good everything tastes. Like, the other night I had this herb-crusted chicken breast from Chef Eddie Benhamu. I'm sorry, I probably butchered that. But anyway, it took five minutes, no cleanup, and the variety is massive. You can browse by chef, you can browse by protein, cuisine, whatever you're feeling that week.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
There's always something new, so you're not stuck in that sad meal prep loop eating the same three things every day. Plus, everything's made with seasonal ingredients and humanely raised meats, so you know it's got the quality behind it. And if you're trying to eat better without the hassle, CookUnity is definitely worth checking out.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
This episode is also sponsored by Indeed. You know what's funny? I remember trying to hire somebody to keep the show running behind the scenes and it got so frustrating, I ended up hiring my wife, Jen. And that worked out, but it really drove home how crucial hiring the right person is. If I'd had Indeed back then, it probably would have saved me a ton of time and stress.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
Instead of tossing your job post out there and just praying that somebody decent sees it, Indeed's sponsored jobs puts you right at the top, front and center for the right people, and it works. Sponsored jobs get 45% more applications than regular posts, which is huge when you're trying to move fast. That's what I love about Indeed.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
It speeds up the whole process by getting your post in front of quality candidates fast. Plus, you only pay for results, no subscriptions, no contracts. And just to give you a sense of how fast this thing works, while I've been talking, 23 hires have already happened on Indeed worldwide. So yeah, if you're sitting there realizing you need to hire somebody yesterday, don't waste time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
If you're wondering how I managed to book all these great authors, thinkers, and creators, and Ryan McBeth every single week, it's because of my network. And I'm teaching you how to build your network for free over at 6minutenetworking.com. I know networking is cringy. People hate it. It makes you look like a D-bag. I am not talking about that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
I'm talking about non-cringe, down-to-earth, non-awkward strategies, practical stuff that'll make you a better connector, a better peer, a better colleague in a few minutes a day. And many of the guests on our show already subscribe and contribute to the course. So come on and join us. You'll be in smart company where you belong. You can find the course at 6minutenetworking.com.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
All right, now back to Ryan McBeth. Jeez, how much of this is automated? Isn't AI but no wire the next thing? You can jam whatever you want. The thing's not remote control anymore.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
stuff at the same time. So that is not a point in their favor. It's interesting. Look, there's reasonable people on all sides of most conflicts. There's like reasoned arguments, for example, why Russia felt threatened and like invaded Ukraine. And it's not like horrific genocide supporting comments. It's just Russian empire is going to expand. It's just a little bit like real politic.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
Just getting closer to Skynet with Terminators every single... Actually, how long is the evolution? Okay, we're going to come up with this. Oh, actually, they can jam that. All right, we're going to come up with this. Now they're jamming that. They'll come up with the wired version. Now we have the AI version. What is that cycle like?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
That's already here. I see. So maybe it's using like laser or something like that that's hard to jam. So they're using radio.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
Yeah, that's really interesting. That's a good metaphor to explain this. Does it make sense to jump into the intelligence sharing thing? Because that seemed like a huge problem when we were like, hey, let's no longer share intelligence. First of all, what is Ukraine using U.S. intelligence for? Targeting?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
But the ones who are like, no, Ukraine is Nazis and they were forced into it by NATO expansion. Those people are never calm and reasoned in their emails. They're always just angry and screaming.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
So did we stop that, or did we go back on that, and now we're sharing again, too?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
Okay, good. Because it seems a little unconscionable to be like, we're going to let tons more of your people die by not sharing this information.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
Yeah, I definitely had a hard time trying to explain that to people who are asking me. And I was like, God, I got to text Ryan and find out what the logic is here, man. What is going on?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
And I wonder if you have any thoughts about why that is, because you can talk Arab-Israeli conflict and each side can have a well-reasoned kind of calm argument about why they're right or why this is going on and happening the way it is. But with the Russia-Ukraine conflict, there's people who fall in the middle. But the people who are really pro-Putin, they can't just be pro-Putin.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
Yeah, interesting. Now, Europe can't step into the gap. You mentioned that we have, what is it, 20 times more satellites or something?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
Right. Yeah. And Europe has 19, not 13, which your percentage is off by a decimal. I'm not too worried about that. I just mean that they can't basically go, fine, stop sharing intelligence. We've got it covered. The UK and France can't say, we got the whole area covered. Don't worry about it. That's not something that can happen. What about with weapons?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
I know we supply a lot of shells to Ukraine and things like that. I know Europe's big thing is we need to scale this up, and they're saying we're going to spend billions of dollars on this. Can this even be done, or is it just, all right, we're going to start building factories, but they're looking at each other like, right, guys? Is it going to happen? Is it possible?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
They have to spit scream in your face about it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
I see. So that explains the social media stuff for sure. But it doesn't really explain the email sent to me that's 17 pages long. Because that person is probably not getting paid. Because that's a really bad use of time, considering I just look at the AI summary at the top and delete it immediately. I read the first five you sent me, pal. You're not getting me again.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
They're just people that have sucked down... So much Kremlin propaganda that they're basically repeating Kremlin talking points. And again, I'm not saying anybody who has a Russian slant to their bias on this war is doing that. But there's certain people in my inbox where I just go, the only place I've seen this claim is RT or the only place I've heard this claim is the Russian foreign minister.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
And when I'm dead, the next guy, he might start listening to you. What's the joke about Europe? They are going to have a meeting to talk about when they might start having the meetings needed to implement this particular plan. I mean, it's just completely ridiculous. They just had no incentive to actually do anything.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
Now they do. I don't love that, but I like the idea that Europe has to arm up. And look, people are going to get angry when I say that. It's safer this way, don't you think? I don't like that they can't rely on the U.S. That sort of is embarrassing. But I do like that they eventually, hopefully, won't have to.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
Because if something really serious does go down and Europe cannot defend itself, that's really terrifying for everybody, is it not?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
Even now? You mean as a matter of principle, they should scale up and pay their way for defense so that they can?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
That's right. But we have defense resources and Canada has very little. I don't want to crap on Canada. It's good people. It's a good place. I understand they need to spend more on defense. I just don't want people to think I'm picking on Canada. I'm from Michigan. I'm basically a Canadian with shitty health care. I grew up north of parts of Canada, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
As many people from Michigan are fond of saying. And I grew up drinking in Windsor with a bunch of nice Canadians who I would not like to see going up in a fiery inferno as a result of some sort of issue. And their economy as well. I'd like to see that stay strong. I love our previous relationship we had with Canada.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
But tell me more about Europe being able to defend itself, because right now it almost looks like Poland is the military superpower in Europe, which is weird.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
They don't have a choice now, but yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
Because she's probably in the reserves. Oh, so you meet women in the military. That's not what I thought you were going to say.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
Just add a serving to your coffee, smoothie, even water. It doesn't even taste like anything, so it blends right in. The key is consistency. Making it a daily habit is how you see the benefits.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
So clearly you're just looking at everything they have to say. And there's other stuff that's like demonstrably not true. Russia only did this because of this. And actually they started in 2014 and this didn't even happen until 2016. So explain that. That's what I don't really get. That's just like a purely brainwashed kind of person. I guess I answered my own question. They're just fanatical.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
They're not mining the border with Lithuania or Estonia, I assume. They're mining the border with Belarus and Russia.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
Yeah, they're useful in war, unfortunately. Now allow me to share some intelligence regarding the fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back. This episode is sponsored in part by Rocket Money. You ever sign up for something, totally forget about it, and then realize months later you've been paying for it the whole time? Yes, been there.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
Apparently 85% of people have at least one subscription that they're paying for but not actually using, which means most of us are just basically throwing money away each month. That's why I started using Rocket Money. Rocket Money is a personal finance app that helps find and cancel your unwanted subscriptions, monitors your spending, helps you lower your bills so you can grow your savings.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
I've got homes.com as a sponsor for this episode. Homes.com knows when it comes to home shopping, it's never just about the house or the condo. It's about the homes. And what makes a home is more than just the house or property. It's the location. It's the neighborhood. If you've got kids, it's also schools, nearby parks, transportation options.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
Many of you don't seem to know or might not know, have no reason to know. But when you use our promo code, it really does help support the show. We don't get a percentage of the thing that you buy, but it lets the company that sells it knows that people are hearing the ad on the show. They're much more likely to renew their ad campaign with us. So if you're signing up, please do use our codes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
They're all at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. It's a win-win. You get a discount. You help keep the show going strong. Thank you so much for your support. Now for the rest of my conversation with Ryan McBeth. This is really something.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
So Poland, military superpower, I use that in air quotes because they don't have nukes and stuff like that, and they probably don't have as large of an air force or nuclear submarines like Britain and France do. How many troops do Britain and France have? Look, the British Empire is no more. This is no longer a massive landing force a la World War II. Britain's just kind of chilling.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
They make good weapons, but I don't know how much they have in terms of personnel.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
Oh, yeah, because they still had it when I was an exchange student there. But you could also choose to like work in a hospital or an old folks home. And most of my friends did. In fact, I didn't know anybody in the former East Germany who went to the actual army. You just didn't do that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
I'm sure, yeah. Whenever I explored Eastern Europe, even well into the late 90s, the early aughts, those people in Romania, Poland, they did not like Russia. It wasn't Russian people. They were scared of Russia. And I remember thinking, oh... Legacy from your past. You guys were under the Soviet thumb. You had secret police. I totally understand why you were oppressed. East Germany was the same.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
There's all these tales. If you ever see a Russian driving, get out of the road because they're drunk. They'll run you over. There's no repercussions. That's kind of what you learned growing up in the former East Germany. Older people would tell me this, right? Because they were occupied and they were treated like they were occupied. Not like they were a friendly country.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
They were treated like they were under a hostile occupation, which is interesting because West Germany was a completely different situation with the Allies, at least in the 80s and the 70s. By then, it was generations. The former Eastern Bloc never really forgot how much of a threat Russia was.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
And of course, Estonia and Latvia, Lithuania and these countries have been for the last 20 plus years getting cyber attacked nonstop by Russia. They kind of never put their guard down because they never really even had a chance to. Maybe there was a period of 10 years where Russia wasn't screwing with them, but maybe not even that long.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
That's kind of a cool place to specialize going into the 21st century here. Very interesting. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
Yeah. Interesting. Lithuania recently found out that those are also in part my family history. So I have a renewed interest in that whole area. Man, there's so many fascinating things to talk about with this conflict. And I know I might be trivializing a little bit because I seem really hyped up and interested in it. And it is a war, which is really disgusting and sad.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
I guess I'm trying to just take a different spin on it because it's happening regardless of whether or not I act sad about it on this podcast, right? We're all upset about the fact that there's a war anywhere of this scale and elsewhere in the world. It's just scarier, I think, because of the threat from Russia. Now, tell me what you think about this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
A lot of people go, I don't get why Europe is so worried, why people in the United States are so worried. Putin couldn't even take down Ukraine. It's been three years. They barely had a developed military. What makes anyone think they're then going to also go into NATO, Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia and Poland? That's insane. They'll get their asses kicked. Putin is not that dumb.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
What do you think about that counterargument?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
I see. So Russia could protect itself from a land invasion, essentially?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
That's the counter, though. I find that argument a little bit medium persuasive. It's not weak, but it's also, OK, that made sense before we had airplanes, before we had drones, before we had massive warships that could come on land from anywhere that you have coastline. You had to march people through the mountains. And so Hannibal went over the mountains with elephants or something like that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
Yeah. Sorry. Expand their empire. Actually, both of these things are true. There's a whole list of things I could have said there. That's interesting and insightful. I hadn't thought about the guy who's just disaffected and is like, why am I single, lonely? My boss is probably going to fire me. How do they get to dot, dot, dot?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
Surprise. That's not how it is anymore. That seems like 18th century military thinking. I don't really find it totally persuasive.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
How do we know that Russia thinks like that? Has Putin straight up said, hey, we need to go and take these areas because we'll be safer that way? I know like the queen of the czar or something said it 300 years ago, but what about now?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
What about the NATO expansion argument? You want to poke some holes in that? Because people say, well, yeah, we expanded NATO all the way up to their border. Of course, they push back on this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
I was just going to say, yeah. And then they tried to move nukes there. And we were like, no way, man.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
And I know that I'm not arguing for this, just so people are clear. But how is Russia invading Ukraine not similar or analogous in some way to nuclear missiles being put into Cuba? And the U.S. is like, fine, we are going to blockade the island with the Navy and possibly sink yours.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
But Serbia has entered the chat, right? And they're not buying it because they got bombed by NATO.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
Yeah, I understand that. I just I'm mentioning that because, of course, Serbs and other people go, well, NATO's defensive until it's not in which NATO bombing Serbia wasn't justified. That's a whole different podcast. Of course, they were trying to kill all the Albanians, but those people, they weren't NATO members. NATO just went, hey, we're going to do this humanitarian thing and bomb Belgrade.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
As of battalion, Ukraine are Nazis and they deserve to be part of Russia and Putin this. There's got to be some sort of disaffection there because it doesn't make sense otherwise. Who the hell has the time is my first kind of gripe with this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
So it's a little bit like they're not offensive, but it could be. They can edge towards that, and who's to say that it's not eventually going to end up that way? Because the conspiracy geopolitics circles online would have you go, actually, the U.S. pushed Ukraine into this fight, hoping that Russia would pick a fight with Ukraine slash eventually NATO, and that would be all she wrote.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
I don't necessarily subscribe to that, but... It's not totally insane that NATO could be used offensively.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
I feel like I'm lawyering you, so forgive me here. But OK, so NATO, it's not an offensive alliance. Surely Russia knows this. And so that sort of pushes back on the idea that they need to take over the Baltic states, Poland and Ukraine in order to defend themselves against the invasion that can't actually happen. Surely they know that it's not possible.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
So why would they bother taking these places over at immense cost?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
Of course not. No, that's a good point. I'm also understanding that us saying NATO is not an offensive alliance and they're like, hey, what's the source? And we just say, trust me, bro, that's also not very compelling for them.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
Ah, I see. That's really interesting and something that nobody has brought up, right? Because everybody's just saying, hey, they're ground down to a nub with no sign of stopping. They're not going into the Baltic states. They're not going into Poland. And what you're saying is, don't be so sure. Because they're attrited, they need to rebuild some vehicles and munitions and things like that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
But now they're much more of a capable and flexible force than they were before. When they invaded Ukraine and were rolling the dice, just going, ah, they're too weak to invade these little Baltic states. It's like, OK, so are you willing to bet all of those people's lives on that? Because if so, then go ahead. But if not, then you might want to put some landmines on the border or whatever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
I know we're closing in on time. I do have one last question. Speaking of invading Russia, Kursk. So the Ukrainians ran in there, took a bunch of territory, were supposed to get pushed out or never get there. And they're still there, but they're getting pushed out slowly. What do we make of this? Why is this important? Why does this matter?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
And so why does that matter? I mean, look, not asking because I want to trivialize the deaths that are going on again. It's tough to be as sensitive as I need to be in this episode. But what is going on there? Why don't they just leave entirely and bring their troops back? What purpose does it serve for them to be there now?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
That is a funny metaphor slash analogy. And I hadn't really thought about that. I just find the whole thing quite fascinating. Anyway, this is not why I brought you back on. That sort of... Ended up accidentally being how we started the show here. But I do want an update on Ukraine because we just stopped sending them weapons, supposedly. Is that real?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
I wanted to know what you think of this latest ceasefire or the prospects of a ceasefire in Ukraine, because you hear that we're willing to do something as the United States, but only if they give up mineral resources. And that seems OK. Maybe they're going to stop blowing up energy facilities in each other's countries or the Black Sea, something like this. But a lot of it seems to be changing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
And a lot of it seems to also be like something for nothing or unenforceable or no real plan.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
So do we just think that there's not going to be a real ceasefire? Do we think Russia will agree to one, build up their artillery, build a few hundred more vehicles and then just continue?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
Even I'm at the point where I'm like, which news is actually real and which is just something I read on Reddit that was written by The Sun, the Daily Mail that is just made up because they want clicks. It's getting harder now to even discern what's fake and not even just fake news, but something that the U.S. government changed their minds 24 hours later.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
I believe. Imagine being from Fiji and you get plucked and put in Ukraine. That would be the coldest you've ever been in your whole life by a factor of 100. That's a deployment you don't want if you're a soldier from Fiji plopped into Ukraine in the winter.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
Lebanon and Egypt, not as cold as Ukraine in the eastern Ukraine in the winter. Absolutely correct. I was curious about this because I know it seems like Russia could just agree to something and break it. And if there's no one there to enforce it, we're just back to square one, especially if Ukraine's military is degraded and not rebuilt in Russia, rapidly rebuild.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
The incentives are all misaligned. There's no point in them maintaining a ceasefire if they have a better chance to take over more of Ukraine later on.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
Yeah, I think that's what everyone's afraid of. Before I finally let you go, I'm curious about an update here in Syria, because I know one of the last episodes, which is our Out of the Loop about Syria, you and I both were kind of like, all right, we are cautiously optimistic about HTS...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
And it's like, oh, I didn't catch the backtrack on this. So are we not sending weapons to Ukraine anymore?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
this Islamist group taking over and were worried that they could turn into kind of like a sectarian conflict, a little bit of shades of ISIS, shades of Al Qaeda, but so far so good. And now when I look at news clips, I see Alawites being rounded up and shot and people getting killed all over the place. And it's a little bit confusing as to who is doing that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
And is that the government or is that rogue people taking out revenge? What's going on in Syria now with this?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
And also, let's say that my ethnic group was in charge of the country. I didn't do that. I just go to school. I just go to college or I just raise my kids. Like, yes, maybe there's some privileges like people of my ethnicity get better jobs. But again, it's not my fault. I didn't put Assad in power.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
We don't know. Yeah, it could have changed by now.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
Huh. We'll have to do another out of the loop on that when there are more developments. Ryan McBeth, thank you so much, man, for coming back on the show for the sixth time. Always a pleasure, Jordan.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
You're about to hear a preview of the Jordan Harbinger Show with geopolitics analyst Peter Zion.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
For more about how globalization and our way of life will change dramatically in the coming decade, check out Episode 781 of The Jordan Harbinger Show. All things Ryan McBeth will be in the show notes at jordanharbinger.com. Advertisers, deals, discount codes, ways to support the show, all at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. Please consider supporting those who support the show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
Also, our newsletter, We Bit Wiser. The idea is to give you something specific and practical that'll have an immediate impact on your decisions and your psychology, your relationships. In under two minutes, it's sent out almost every Wednesday. If you haven't signed up yet, I invite you to come check it out. It is a great companion to the show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
jordanharbinger.com slash news is where you can find it. Don't forget about 6-Minute Networking as well over at 6minutenetworking.com. I'm at Jordan Harbinger on Twitter and Instagram. This show is created in association with Podcast One. My team is Jen Harbinger, Jace Sanderson, Robert Fogerty, Ian Baird, and Gabriel Mizrahi. Remember, we rise by lifting others.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
Welcome to the show. I'm Jordan Harbinger. On The Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the stories, secrets, and skills of the world's most fascinating people and turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you. Our mission is to help you become a better informed, more critical thinker through long-form conversations with a variety of amazing folks
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
That's so much sooner than I thought. They're running out of armored vehicles. But haven't we been hearing about this since two days into the war? Maybe five days, whatever. I'm giving you a hard time because people have been writing about how Russia's out of ammunition since like week two. And now we're on year three.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
That's a small number. I thought you were going to add a zero or two to that. That's crazy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
So other Soviet states ostensibly have nuclear weapons, or did Kazakhstan say, hey, we'll give these back?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
from spies to CEOs, athletes, authors, thinkers, performers, even the occasional neuroscientist, astronaut, hacker, or real-life pirate. And if you're new to the show or you want to tell your friends about the show, I suggest our episode starter packs.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
I guess my question is, people online, they say things like, oh, don't worry, you can't launch a nuclear weapon if you don't have these codes and stuff like that, so it doesn't really matter.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
But for me, I'm thinking, if you have the missile in your warehouse, in your country or your territory that you can control, how long does it take to take the top off the rocket or whatever, find the computer that detonates the thing, rip that thing out, and put your own version of it in there? Yes, it requires some specialized knowledge, but...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
theoretically, you can pay somebody to do that or figure out how to do that if you have the warhead in your possession.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
Wow. These people have never seen a angle grinder, I guess.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
He just sort of went for a joyride and he had a nuclear weapon on board?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
That's mildly terrifying. I mean, we had so many close calls with this thing. Like, what's the story with the Russian guy? They saw the launch and he's like, this doesn't look right. And he didn't launch. And it turned out to be like a reflection. And it almost ended the entire world. You know what I'm talking about?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
These are collections of our favorite episodes on topics like persuasion and negotiation, psychology and geopolitics, disinformation, China, North Korea, crime and cults, and more. To help new listeners get a taste of everything we do here on the show, just visit jordanharbinger.com start or search for us in your Spotify app to get started. Today, a little update on the Ukraine war.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
They would launch all their stuff if they were trying to take us out, not just three missiles. It doesn't make any sense. Basically didn't sit right with it. It's like a Malcolm Gladwell blink moment where he's, I can't 100% put my finger on everything, but one of the reasons is this, there's something else that doesn't sit right here. Yeah, and he just didn't launch.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
Yeah. So close call, along with dude joyriding out in an Air Force jet with a nuclear bomb attached to the thing. Okay. So we're worried about Russia collapsing because the country of Russia, not the former Soviet satellite states, but the country of Russia, we're worried that that's going to devolve into what regional sort of warlordism, feudalism, I guess is the right word.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
And then why is it the US's responsibility to go and clean up these warheads? And how would we do that? Why can't Europe do this? Or is it just because... they don't know what the heck they're doing when it comes to this. And we would just automatically end up on the hook.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
I think I call Iran and just say, do you have a billion dollars in untraceable U.S. currency that you can give to me right now? Because I have a warhead with your name on it and you could disassemble the thing and threaten everybody with it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
Okay, so I've already sold it. Yeah, it was me. What are you going to do? You're already trying to kill me anyways, probably. I don't have the nuke. Your problem is not solved if you just drone strike my house. Yeah, I don't know, man. Yeah, I think we'd probably do that anyway, just out of pure spite. I hope so. Don't sell those nukes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
It's terrible. I mean, as someone whose family is originally from Ukraine, I mean, you know, way back slash Russian Empire, they got some history there. But the idea that we don't want Russia to fall is sort of interesting, right? Because it's like we need a controlled dissent. Isn't China kind of also in the same boat? Probably also because of the nuclear weapons.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
But two, if Russia is continually busy in Ukraine, they can't really push back on China dictating harsh, low oil prices. And hey, we might just start pushing your borders a little bit. But hey, you need us for Ukraine. So maybe you're going to pick your battles. Isn't this kind of their best case scenario?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1134: Ukraine 2025 | Out of the Loop
Russia's being ground down to a nub in the West and they're in the East buying cheap oil and pushing their luck a little bit.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
Who knows, whatever, certain firewalls or there's enough negative reviews online about how it's a scam, etc. They just close it down and they make a new one with new branding, a new URL. And that's the rug pull where even people who are in the middle of the scam who might think it's working, they just can't log in because it's gone. And that's the end of that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
Kongo und Rwanda kämpfen tatsächlich über die Kontrolle von Mineral-Ressourcen mit der Hilfe von Russland, USA und anderen fremden privaten Militärunternehmen. Das ist aber ein unglaublich neuer Level von Konflikt. Every time I talk to you guys, it's a weird time over there. And yes, there's time zone stuff, but I just get the idea that your city Phnom Penh in Cambodia is just 24 hour operation.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
I was just going to say the counter to this that people are screaming at their iPhone right now is why should we pay our tax money to help fund to free Filipino trafficking victims or Ugandan trafficking victims trafficked by Chinese gangsters? Why should the US tax dollar go to that? And the answer is because they're targeting Americans with this and it costs more in losses that way.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
Slave Labor and Call Centers? No, thank you. Slave Labor making the fine products and services that support this show? Now that's something I can get behind. We'll be right back. Vielen Dank. Mit Tonal 2 haben sie es noch mehr verbessert. Das adaptive Gewicht geht jetzt bis zu 250 Kilo und ändert sich in einem Kilo-Inkrement. Also ist es ständig lernen und dich challenge.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
Es ist, als hätte man einen persönlichen Trainer auf der Wand gebaut. Und die neue Smart View Kamera gibt dir real-time Feedback auf dein Format. Was ich wirklich liebe, ist, wie Tonal dir sagt, welches Gewicht du benutzt hast. Es trägt deinen Prozess, weiß sogar, wenn deine Muskeln anfangen zu schmerzen. Dann ändert es automatisch das Gewicht mitten im Set, was ziemlich cool ist.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
Right now, Tonal is offering our listeners $200 off your Tonal purchase with Promo Code Jordan. That's tonal.com and use Promo Code Jordan for $200 off your purchase. That's T-O-N-A-L.com, Promo Code Jordan for $200 off.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
This episode is also sponsored by SimpliSafe. So, we had a break in a couple months ago while we were home. Yeah, nothing like waking up to find out somebody snooping around your house uninvited and banging in your window. So the whole neighborhood was on edge. We were on edge, obviously. Naturally, our very sweet and suddenly very organized neighbors jumped into action.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
Next thing you know, we got an official Neighborhood Watch. There's a Neighborhood Watch sign-up now. There's a group chat. I even attended the Neighborhood Watch meeting, which included very passionate retirees grilling a young, very patient cop with questions like, what's the legal protocol for tackling porch pirates? Es ist wie eine kleine Stadt-Sitcom.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
If you're wondering how I manage to book all these great authors, thinkers, creators, investigative journalists every single week, it's because of my network, the circle of people I know, like and trust. And of course, Lindsay and Nathan, they rely on these types of skills to do their job. And we're teaching you how to build your network for free over at 6minutenetworking.com.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
All right, now back to Nathan Paul Southern and Lindsay Kennedy. Es ist interessant, die Nordkorea zu erwähnen, weil ich immer gedacht habe, wie kommt es, dass Nordkorea nicht in diesem Bereich ist, weil es viel Druck auf Kambodschuhe gibt, es gibt Druck auf Myanmar, die Türen sind in den Zelttauern eingegangen.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
Nordkorea kann einfach ihre eigene Infrastruktur bauen, ihre eigene Internetinfrastruktur nutzen. Oder chinesische Internet-Infrastruktur. Und niemand könnte da immer rein gehen und Leute retten, Leute pressen, darüber schreiben. Du kannst nicht neben dem Skamzentrum leben.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
Ich meine, sie könnten eine besondere Wirtschaftszone schaffen, 100 Skamzentren bauen und hunderts von Millionen Dollar pro Jahr für das Regime generieren. Ich fühle mich schlecht, ihnen diese Idee zu geben, aber ich bin sicher, sie haben es bereits. Und es klingt, als wären sie bereits auf dem Weg.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
24-hour bar sounds like it could be a dangerous place, not just for you as somebody who likes to drink a little bit, but for the type of clientele that a 24-hour bar attracts, sounds like it could go from the backpacker all the way up to, who's at a bar at 7 o'clock in the morning? That's basically the question.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
Also finanzieren wir organisierte Kriminelle, aber wir finanzieren auch Staaten, die mit Waffen und Kriegen andere Länder in der Region oder sogar in den Vereinigten Staaten threaten wollen. Ja. Das ist wild.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
This is quite wildly off what we had planned to talk about, but so interesting.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
It does. I love it. I'm here for it. That's one reason why I love you guys on the show. You did try to segue before. I didn't bite on it, but I have one last question before we do transition to Congo and Rwanda, which is... If the Yakuza, the Russian Mob and the Chinese Triads, probably among others, are all in the same industry, in the same area, do they have conflicts with one another?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
Because traditionally, it seems like those guys wouldn't all want to hang out and then do business in the same place.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
Also, die taiwanische Regierung wird nicht von China und der chinesischen Regierung erkannt. Und natürlich ist Taiwan, abhängig von ihren Verhältnissen im Moment, meistens nicht mit Beijing gesprochen. Also kann die taiwanische Mafia wachsen und wachsen. Und wenn Let's say Cambodia says, hey, we've got this problem with the Taiwanese mafia.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
They can tell Taiwan, but Taiwan's not going to turn around and tell China. China's not going to turn around and share with Taiwan. So basically, these groups have this information black hole or this giant firewall, and they can just take advantage of that by operating with impunity.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
Wow, es ist wie eine Proxy-organisierte Kriminelle. Das ist wirklich interessant. Mann, wir können über das für Stunden reden. Ich erinnere mich an das Kings Romans Casino. Wir haben über das vor langer Zeit gesprochen und ich habe ein Video gemacht über Wildlandtraffik, in dem das Casino ein Cameo gemacht hat.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
Unser Gast in Episode 545, Rachel Neuer, sie war dort unter Koffer und hat gesehen, dass Leute, ich weiß nicht, wie Bärpausen und Pangolins und so, an Kings Romans Casino bestanden. Ich kann mir nicht vorstellen, all das umzusetzen. All right, let's transition to the DRC, so Congo and Rwanda.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
And Lindsay, you mentioned that these are connected because the conflict in the Congo slash Rwanda is creating more refugees and some of those refugees end up getting trafficked to scam centers in Cambodia or wherever, Burma, Myanmar, whatever. So let's start from the top because we haven't covered Congo at all on this show or really Rwanda on this show yet. What is the latest with this?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
That's interesting. That's good to hear. Because you think, oh, hey, there's a pedophile here. It's not in our country. Yeah, he's holding one of our passports, but what are we going to do? But they were just kind of like, oh, this is making us look bad. Let's arrest this guy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
Because I know that those two countries, they sort of border each other. Rwanda has invaded Congo a couple of times. I don't actually know why. What's the overview of this?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
Lassen Sie mich Sie einen Moment pausieren. Also, die Flüchtlinge, die nach den USA gehen, werden nach Rwanda gesendet, um zu prüfen?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
Let me stop you for a second, because I don't think people know what Coltan is or necessarily about this history. So for people who are not as familiar with the Rwandan genocide. So tell us briefly what that is. And then M23, this militia, decides to pursue the perpetrators of this into the Congo. But that's not exactly what worked out.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
Ihr seid in der Sache. Der Grund, warum das relevant ist, ist, dass ihr nicht nur sagt, oh, ich habe ein Buch über das oder ich habe das recherchiert. Deine Nachbarn sind literally die Menschen, die ihr betreut, was sich, ich würde sagen, ein bisschen unangenehm fühlt.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
Now celebrate the fact that you're not imprisoned in a North Korean scam call center run by Chinese triads by treating yourself to some of the fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back. Das war's für heute. Bis zum nächsten Mal. Flykid ist natürlich gegründet in der Navy Seal-Recherche, Bro.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
Und es wurde ursprünglich für Kriegspiloten und Athleten ausgestattet, um die Inflammation, die Flugzeugen verursachen, zu kämpfen. Ich war ein massiver Skeptiker und ich war tatsächlich wirklich überrascht, als ich darüber nachgefragt habe und es gekostet wurde. Und es waren nur Vitamine und ich habe für einen Ausgleich gefragt. Und hier ist meine Freundesfirma.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
Und dann ist er so, halt es und probiere es. Und ich habe es probiert und bin so, ah, hier ist euer Geld, weil es so gut funktioniert hat. Flykit uses AI to time everything from light exposure to meals, all tailored to your specific travel itinerary. And I became an immediate lifelong fan after that. Now I use it on every trip that involves more than a couple time zones.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
So if you're tired of losing precious days of your life to jet lag, you gotta check out Flykit. It's got everything you need in one small organized packet. And the app walks you through every step of the way.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
Try it out on your next trip and hit me up. I really want to know what you think.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
I want to know if it works for everyone as well. I think it's amazing and it's just a must have. I've got homes.com as a sponsor for this episode. Homes.com knows when it comes to home shopping, it's never just about the house or the condo, it's about the homes. And what makes a home is more than just the house or property, it's the location, it's the neighborhood.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
Ravero könnte die Sache sein, die endlich dir deine Energie und dein Leben hilft.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
If you're planning to sign up for something, please use our codes. They're all available at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. It is a win-win. You get an awesome deal and you help keep the show going strong. We really appreciate your support. Now, back to Out of the Loop.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
Apple and Tesla can buy, I mean, I'm not just throwing shade on them, companies like Apple and Tesla can go and say, look, we got conflict-free minerals, they're from Rwanda, but really it's mined by slave kids in the DRC that are being forced by the M23 militia to deliver this stuff or whatever and mine it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
Ja, Episode 807 von diesem Show mit Siddharth Kara, wenn du einen tiefen Anruf auf das Blut der Kongo in unseren Leben nimmst.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
The minute that the UK said... They stopped taking new territory. Wow.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
Wait, did you say Eastern European mercenary base? Yeah, exactly. What outfit is this? Is this like Wagner or something else?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
Du sprichst von der französischen Außen-Legion, richtig?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
Welcome to the show. I'm Jordan Harbinger. On the Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the stories, secrets and skills of the world's most fascinating people and turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you. Vielen Dank. Heute ein Out-of-the-Loop-Episode mit unseren Freunden Nathan Paul Southern und Lindsey Kennedy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
Wie viele Leute glaubst du, sind in den Gebäuden, die dir nahe sind? Weil ich weiß, dass du letztes Mal auf dem Show warst. Wir haben die Skamzentren besprochen, weil ich versuchte, hinter den Pig Butchering Skam zu kommen und wie es funktioniert. Und du hättest gesagt, hey, übrigens, viele dieser Leute sind in sie getriggert, in sie verabschiedet. Es ist interessant.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
Das ist das, was ich sagen wollte. Ich bin kein Typ der sagt, dass alles zurückgeht zum Kolonialismus, aber das ist fast ein neuer Kolonialismus, wo du eine rwandesische-gebackte Invasion hast, die von den Vereinigten Königsländern gefördert wird, ob die Vereinigten Königsländer das tun wollten oder nicht. Es klingt so, als ob sie das getan hätten.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
Und dann die USA vielleicht Blackwater oder was auch immer es heißt, Academy, was auch immer es ist, ich weiß nicht, was der Name ist, diese Woche.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
Eric Prinz' FSG, private military contractors, to go into the Congo to protect these mines alongside the Chinese, who are going to then exploit the crap out of these resources in exchange for maybe pushing back the not Russians or sometimes Russians, but sometimes French Foreign Legion, but sometimes... Whatever private military contractor is floating around in there.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
Jetzt sehe ich, dass das fast gemeinsame Wissen ist. Leute sagen, oh, du weißt, dass diese Leute in sie verabschiedet sind.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
So it's almost like a proxy colonialist war in the making to get these elements so that we can make AI chips, basically.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
Bevor du mir das vor ein paar Jahren gesagt hast, habe ich es noch nie gehört, ich konnte es nirgendwo finden, also war es fast so, als hättest du das alles kaputt gemacht und jetzt sagt jeder, hey, diese Leute sind verabredet, sie sind Opfer, du siehst ein paar Schrecken, aber ich bin interessiert, wie viele Leute du denkst, die in einem Skamzentrum arbeiten, wo du lebst, wenn du es schätzt.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
Klar, weil es eine große US-Familie ist. Ja, ich bin mir sicher, als sie es den Chinesen geschrieben haben, haben sie wahrscheinlich BYD und andere chinesische Firmen erwähnt. Wow.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
Oh, ich verstehe. Ja, es gibt keine, so wie, freie unsere Leute. Es ist, hey, willst du einige dieser Mineralien? Kämpfe mit diesen anderen Leuten, die unsere Mineralien brauchen. Oh ja, da sind auch Leute da, aber egal. Ja, genau.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
It is absolutely just corporate oligarchy level colonialism. It's crazy. We are now no better or soon to be no better than Wagner in Africa, just killing people, taking over gold mines and shipping the gold back to Russia for sale to fund the war in Ukraine. I mean, this is like the same thing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
And I'm not a conspiracy guy or one of these sort of, oh, my gosh, the next step is this crazy World War Three. But what's
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
almost certainly going to happen is some sort of conflict with china and that conflict is going to involve a lot of ai and drone warfare and those types of things are going to require the resources in these areas so we're going to have to then pay these same companies and people trillions whatever of dollars over a certain period of time to fight each other not only for those resources but so that the nation states themselves that these people are from can control more of them so it's
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
literally like a chess piece or at least one of the board of chess being played that will lead up to whatever conflict we have with China. It's so wild to think about that this oligarch game is going to essentially be a part of World War III if it happens.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
They are going to have the contracts and they're going to have the resources. We really don't have a choice. What are we going to do? Say we decided we don't need rechargeable batteries anymore. We don't have a choice anymore.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
A little bit, but it's actually what's happening. Yeah, I was just going to say something like it does sound like we're nuts. And if you're new to the show, you're like, oh, God, this Jordan guy, he's off the deep end, man. I thought this guy was reasonable. Look at all this crap that he's letting these people spot on the show. But you're right. It's like this is actually what is happening now.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
Die Plattform, die wir vor Shopify verwendet haben, hat regelmäßig Updates gebraucht, die teilweise dazu geführt haben, dass der Shop nicht funktioniert hat.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
This is not weird speculation. This is the current status.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
Das ist, viele Menschen teilen diese Sicht. Vielen Dank, dass Sie wieder auf dem Show zurückkommen. Das ist faszinierend. Es hat definitiv mehrere Runden gedauert, von dem, was wir vorhin geplant hatten, zu sprechen. Aber ich finde das immer super interessant. Und ich weiß, dass Sie das live machen. Die Leute sind wahrscheinlich so, wo ist das denn her? Lindsay ist in einem dunklen Käfig irgendwo.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
Und Sie sind nahe einem Traffik-Hub an einem 24-Stunden-Bar, der sich auf jeder Stunde jetzt öffnet. Mit sehenswürdig viel Traffik und Kunden. Ich hoffe, es ist 1 Uhr. So, if you ever want to go to a place where your insomnia is not a problem, Phnom Penh seems like the place to go, because you just walk outside at 3am and everything is open.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
Yeah, jet lag, doesn't matter. Just work from 11pm or whatever until 5 o'clock in the morning and it's no different. It's just a little bit darker outside. Thanks so much, guys, for doing this. I know it's a weird time. Cheers, Jordan. Thanks, man.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
Hier ist eine Vorstellung mit dem 26. Nationalen Sicherheitsanwalt, General H.R. McMaster, über die größten Threaten der Vereinigten Staaten.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
Glaubst du, dass unsere Dividenden gerade im Land eine der größten Threaten unserer nationalen Sicherheit sind?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
It's a real tragedy. All things Nathan and Lindsay will be in the show notes at jordanharbinger.com. Advertisers, Deals, Discount Codes, Ways to support the show, all at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. Please consider supporting those who support the show. Also our newsletter, We Bit Wiser.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
The idea behind it is to give you something specific, practical, something that will have an immediate impact on your decisions, your psychology, your relationships, in under two minutes, every Wednesday, every-ish Wednesday. And if you haven't signed up yet, I invite you to come check it out. It is a great companion to the show. jordanharbinger.com slash news is where you can find it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
Vielen Dank. If you know somebody who's interested in scam call centers, organized crime, mineral trafficking, African conflicts, I know that's quite a bit there. We did go through a lot today. Definitely share this episode with them. In the meantime, I hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn. And we'll see you next time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
Really? Oh my God, that's a metropolis of just crime.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
Sie waren vor ein paar Jahren auf dem Weg, die Scam-Call-Centers zu öffnen und wie viele von ihnen tatsächlich von Menschen-Traffikern und Slaven-Labor verwendet werden. Also all diese Scam-Calls, Scam-Texte, die Sie bekommen, sind oft von Leuten, die gegen ihre Willen gehalten werden.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
Ja, guck, das klingt wie eine ziemlich schmerzhafte Leben. Zum Beispiel für die Leute, die einen Deep Dive auf diesem Episode 833 mit euch wollen, wo wir darüber gesprochen haben, wie die Cyber-Slaverie und wie es alles funktioniert auf einem Deep Dive-Level. Also, diese Gangster tricken Menschen im Grunde genommen dazu, in diesen Scams zu arbeiten.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
Sie sagen, es gibt einen Technikjob in Thailand oder so etwas. Die Gangster leben dort. Es scheint eine ziemlich schmerzhafte Existenz, oder? Weil, ja, du bist kein Cyberschläger, aber du arbeitest immer noch in diesem Gefängnis-Casino. And what you look forward to is going and getting drunk at night and then waking up and doing it all over again.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
I mean, those people are also not living a great life if their only outlet is talking to journalists about how they rob people. No offense.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
Und heute machen wir ein Update auf die Cyber-Slavery-Ding, Menschen, die in diese Scam-Call-Centers verhaftet werden. Also die Verbindung zwischen Cyberslaverie, Nordkorea, Yakuza, Triads und anderen organisierten Kriminellengruppen, sowie Scam-Call-Zentren, plus ein Update, was in Rwanda und Kongo passiert. Überraschend ist, dass sie tatsächlich in manchen Fällen verbunden sind.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1145: Rwanda 2025 | Out of the Loop
Ja, natürlich. So, by the way, the rug pull for people who don't really understand what this is. This is where they create a fake crypto platform. They trick you into putting your money in. They make it look like your money is growing, but you can't really take your money out. And then eventually, when enough people are onto them or the site starts getting blocked by...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
This episode is sponsored in part by Vital Proteins. Let's face it, your body changes as you get older. As we get older, our bodies don't bounce back like they used to, of course, but there are simple ways we can help support our hair, skin, nails, joints, and bones. All it takes is a daily serving of Vital Proteins Collagen Peptides.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
If you're wondering how I managed to book all these great authors, thinkers, and creators every single week, it is because of my network, the circle of people I know, like, and trust. I'm teaching you how to build your network for free over at 6minutenetworking.com. It's non-cringy. It's down to earth, not cheesy. It's not going to make you look bad or feel bad or make you feel gross or shmarmy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
Takes six minutes a day. Actually, it takes less than that, but five-minute networking was taken. Many of the guests on the show subscribe and contribute to the course, so come on and join us. You'll be in smart company where you belong. You can find the course at sixminutenetworking.com. Now, back to Skeptical Sunday. I remember when my wife was pregnant.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
Well, both times they were doing ultrasounds and our doctor slash midwife. I think she was both. She said that they wanted to do them fast and only when needed, because the sound of an ultrasound in the womb is like standing next to a subway train, except as a baby. So it's massively noisy and loud and maybe not good for you. And she's like, yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
And if you're new to the show or you want to tell your friends about the show, I suggest our episode starter packs. These are collections of our favorite episodes on persuasion, negotiation, psychology, disinformation, cyber warfare, crime and cults, and more. It'll help new listeners get a taste of everything we do here on the show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
It's not that bad, but it's also probably really annoying, and it's just kind of a funny thing to think of, like, you're just blasting your unborn baby with sound waves, and you're like, oh, look, it's a girl. So you think it's the cutest thing, and she's like, holy smokes, this massively loud noise right in my barely developed ears.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
That's right. Yeah, that's right. If you're not coming out, we're going to blast this ultrasound in there. Do these practitioners, do they take precautions or are we kind of doomed to have a generation of kids with scrambled brains because their aunt came over with a sound bowl and didn't leave for three months?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
That's true. Yeah. If you couldn't see the ultrasound result for yourself, it would seem like quackery. But yeah. To be fair, though, if you're looking at an ultrasound screen, the photo quality on that thing is terrible. Enhanced ones that we paid for because we're suckers, they're just not that great. I'll stick to my iPhone 15 XL Pro Magnum or whatever this thing is called. Right.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
Same, but Android over here, buddy. Oh, those take photos? Yeah, they update the firmware. So anecdotal evidence aside, is there any other harm that can be caused by sound?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
Just visit jordanharbinger.com slash start or search for us in your Spotify app to get started. Sound healing is one of those things that sounds too good to be true. Can listening to certain frequencies cure depression, anxiety, insomnia, and more? Is there a hidden, untapped wellspring of potential just a tuning fork away?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, I randomly saw a documentary about this on YouTube, the kind of thing I would never press play on, by the way. And I watched it, and there was a lot of interesting theories, like, oh, it might be this bridge that gets wind going under it that's vibrating. One of the final theories that looked really interesting was oil pipelines that have high-pressure
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
petroleum, whatever, going through them. And those vibrate at a certain frequency. And when you sort of place these on the map, they're around in Taos, New Mexico. But I can't remember. I think they ran into a problem because near Bristol, there wasn't that or it wasn't the same thing. They just kind of never really got to the bottom of it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
It seems like the most annoying thing, though, if you can hear that. I would move immediately.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
Yes, there was a podcast about this, and I think it was called something about Havana syndrome.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
That would be super scary because you just think Putin and the FSB is frying your brain with something like a microwave. So do we know the cause of that one? Last I saw, they were not quite sure.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
That would be really frustrating. And you'd like to think that government workers, especially some of these CIA agents and stuff like that, are not the type to imagine that they're having symptoms and all that. And to have everyone tell you that you're imagining a symptom when you're actually having it would also be infuriating and drive me somewhat crazy, literally.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
Or is this all new age mysticism enjoying a surge in popularity off the wave of skepticism about institutional medicine in a post-COVID world? Best-selling author Maddox joins me today. You hit the list. Congratulations. Joins me today to discuss sound healing and whether or not it's sound. Yeah, congrats on the book. I
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
That's right. Yeah, that's what it sounds like. It's like if someone complains about this, we don't really want to pay for it. So just tell them that it's all in their head and laugh at them and they'll leave. It's just really sad. This reminds me a little bit of the sound weapons they use against protesters or they mount them on ships. Have you seen this?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
These massive it's kind of like a satellite dish looking thing and they can aim it at another boat. And it's just this really super annoying sonic weapon that keeps you from getting close.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
Yes, the bug? Zero stars. Worst bug ever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
Now I think I've heard of this before, but that's incredible.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
It finally pays to be old. Yeah, it does. I'm sure curious if people can hear this. If young people can hear this, older people can't. Even anecdotally, I'm curious if this works on this podcast. What about all the hype I've heard about ASMR? First of all, I'm not even sure what that stands for. Do you know? And does it have anything to do with sound healing?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, these are the type of videos of people clicking their nails on microphones and whispering things into your ear or dropping marbles down a track into a bunch of trucks. My kids like those, actually.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
Collagen is the structural protein that keeps everything in your body feeling smooth, strong, and supported. But after your 30s, your natural levels start to drop, which is why you might notice some creaky joints.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, so we have that in common. I actually hate most of these. The marbles going into the trucks thing, fine, whatever, I'm just watching it, but the whole, like, whispering into the microphone and tapping things, it's the audio version of somebody using sandpaper on my nipples, really. I know some people love it, though. Some people pay for that. I know some people really like that sound.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
Is there a reason why it works for some people and not other people?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
I see. So it sounds like what you're saying is kindness from a loved one is like sandpaper on my nipples. Got it. Okay. Do people listen to this stuff? I guess they do because these videos are super popular and some of them get banned off of YouTube because they think it's porn, which I feel bad for the girl who creates those because she is pretty, but it's definitely not porn.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
You can see somebody at YouTube being like, this is making me feel kind of funny, like Garth from Wayne's World. And they're just like, I'm going to say that this is obscene because I don't understand it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
Wow. The Super Bowl is about as mainstream as you can get. So if they're doing ASMR during the Super Bowl, even back then, wow.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, I never really thought about how listening to Johnny Cash on a road trip would cure my chronic back pain that I don't have, though.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
So someone made ASMR of that. It doesn't seem relaxing at all. But again, I don't get ASMR in the least. Maybe I'm missing something, but the whole thing, it goes right over my head slash again, I can't deal with it. It makes me itchy, like you said.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
What about these sounds or frequencies that I can listen to that supposedly put my brain into a focused state or something along those lines? What are they called? Binaural beats? Are those related to sound healing? Can you tell me about that?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
So what is a sound healing practitioner? Because it sounds like something you just tell people you are one day.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, it sounds kind of slight. That's interesting. Not terribly useful if the benefit is only at that sort of good. I can remember the eighth word kind of, but only for 20 minutes. I mean, I don't know, just not super used. Any idea how they landed on 40 hertz as the chosen frequency? It seems like one of those things you could test for years and not find the right one.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
Okay, but I can feel a butt coming because this is not used at all and it's been 30 years?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
That is awful. I'm all for the placebo effect, of course. I use it myself. But at some point, you're just lying to people, and it could hurt them in the long run if they're not getting real treatment for the thing that they have a problem with.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, I see the comment here. 741 hertz cleanses toxins. So whenever anybody says cleanses toxins and they're not talking about your kidneys, which actually cleanse toxins and they do a pretty damn good job of it, you should run, not walk away from that nonsense. You know what feels better than sandpaper on your nipples? Supporting the fine products and services that support this show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
We'll be right back. Thank you for listening to and supporting the show. It is your support of our sponsors that keeps us going, keeps me flush with sound bowls from Etsy. All of the deals, discount codes, and ways to support the show are all in one place, jordanharbinger.com slash deals. Thank you for supporting those who support the show. Now for the rest of Skeptical Sunday. But why do this?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
To what end? That's what I always wonder. Aren't these big corporations, aren't they also run by people who are themselves presumably getting cancer and dying at the same rates as the general population? So the logic of big pharma, big companies, whatever, is hiding this technology that all just falls apart pretty quickly under scrutiny.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
So it sounds like the research on sound healing spans the gamut of evidence-based science all the way to random mysticism. How can people tell the difference? It would be great to have some rules of thumb to lean on here, if we can find some.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
Toxins and infections. Wow, what a frequency. I had a recent operation that got infected. I won't give too many details because I have before and it's gross, but I could have used some 741 on my gonads back then for sure. Jeez. So what a frequency that is.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
So this, again, is something only they think they can provide. And that, by the way, folks, is a classic hallmark of pseudoscience. It's like, I'm the only one who knows how to do this. Or the people who have decided that this works are the ones that can do it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
All joking aside, it does seem like a form of magical thinking, which can literally kill people in a medical context. Exactly.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
Are there any examples of people actually believing this stuff and foregoing medical treatment in lieu of alternative medicine? That's what I'm really afraid of when it comes to this type of thing. I actually had a buddy who got cancer. And he's very much a, like, make your own sunscreen guy. And, you know, I don't eat this and only eat that and positive thinking.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
And he told all of us, I'm going to beat cancer naturally. And a bunch of our other friends who he trusted who'd had cancer called him and were like, Look, we know that you love granola and sound healing and meditation and all that. But Steve Jobs died because he did the same thing. And he was a billionaire and all the money in the world. Don't screw around with this kind of cancer.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
I had the same thing. Almost died. Get chemo. So he finally listened to those people and he's still alive. But a lot of people don't have that in their life. Right. So I'm afraid of that when it comes to this type of thing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
They think they can also provide health care because they found some sort of secret that regular science and medicine doesn't want you to know. I assume there's also a money component? Correct.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
You know, one thing I never understood about the Steve Jobs thing... For Apple, right, him and the team, they invent the iPhone, and it's this innovation that changes everything. If you have a problem that's been solved by a bunch of other people, why are you trying to innovate when your life is on the line? You don't need to do that. That's just ego, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
I'm gonna do this in a way that nobody else has ever done. Do I care how I get rid of my cancer? Not really, as long as it works. So I'm going to go with what they say is probably going to work, especially when they're like, hey, lucky you, you have the kind we can just cut out and you take a few drugs and then we check on you in six months. Congratulations. You're like, no, no, no, no.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
I'm going to roll the dice repeatedly. That just never added up for me. I just never understood that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
I forget what this is called. There's an academic term for it, and it's something like epistemological trespassing. Of course, an academic thought of this, and it's a complicated term. But it basically, it's what you said. It's when you have a double PhD and a law degree, and you're the CEO of a multinational corporation, and then someone's like, Hey, what should we do about immigration?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
You're like, I'm a genius and I can solve this problem. And it's like, you, sir, have no idea what you're talking about. You're a great lawyer. You're a great doctor. You're a great engineer, whatever it is. Why are you opining on this? And it's because you think you're a freaking genius in one area.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
So it just translates over to this other area because you've read some articles and it just happens to not be true. But it's really hard to see that when you are in that position, I guess.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
You don't? So to wrap up, it sounds like there might be something to sound healing, but it's important not to overstate its effects and forego real, legitimate medical treatment.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
Ah, this pun is going to kill me, but that sounds good to me. Yep. You can't help yourself. No lies detected. Man, I do love a good sound bowl, though. You ever heard one of those things? They are relaxing. It's true.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
I was in Vietnam on one of those boats in Ha Long Bay where you kind of like eat yourself into a coma and do sea kayaking. And every night they had a sound bath in the spa and we would all lay on the floor. And at first I was like, this is the dumbest thing ever. But I passed out every single time within a few minutes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
So what's the deal? Do these vibrations, do they do anything? Or is it another upsell at my local spa next to the cucumber water?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
Yes, I was really tired from being active all day and probably sleeping too little. But There's something about that bowl just blasting out. It's better than white noise. It really is. I just passed out immediately. So I don't have a sound bowl in my house, but it seems like that's as close to woo as I'm going to get is admitting that this is relaxing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
Thank you so much, Maddox, for coming on and doing this. I know you're in the middle of some serious fire. Thank you for putting yourself in mortal danger to do this episode of Skeptical Sunday. You got it. I would miss it for the world. You're about to hear a preview of The Jordan Harbinger Show about how sanctions work and whether or not they're effective.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
To learn how the U.S. wields its financial power against terrorists, rogue states, and global crime syndicates, check out episode 863 on The Jordan Harbinger Show with Juan Zarate. Thank you all for listening. Topic suggestions for future episodes of Skeptical Sunday, come to me, Jordan, at jordanharbinger.com. Show notes at jordanharbinger.com.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
Advertisers, deals, discounts, and ways to support the show, all at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. I'm at Jordan Harbinger on both Twitter and Instagram. You can also connect with me on LinkedIn. Maddox is at RealMaddox on threads and Instagram. Of course, we'll link to that in the show notes as well. This show is created in association with Podcast One.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
My team is Jen Harbinger, Jace Sanderson, Robert Fogarty, Ian Baird, and Gabriel Mizrahi. Our advice and opinions are our own, and I'm a lawyer, but I'm not your lawyer, so do your own research before implementing anything you hear on the show. We may get a few things wrong here and there, especially on Skeptical Sunday. If you think we really dropped the ball on something, let us know.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
We're usually pretty receptive to that. Y'all know how to reach me, jordan at jordanharbinger.com. I expect to hear from many people who bought bowls off of Etsy and swear by them. And that's fine. That's fine. I'm here for it. Remember, we rise by lifting others. Share the show with those you love.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
And if you found the episode useful, please share it with somebody else who could use a good dose of the skepticism and knowledge we doled out today. In the meantime, I hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn. And we'll see you next time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
Look, easy enough, man. But couldn't anything that reduces stress help just as much? People say chocolate does it. They say sex does it. I wouldn't know. Spending time at the beach, even just reading a book with a cup of tea, it sounds like meditation with extra steps.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
So this is like me with my trainer. I need them to work out harder and to push me and to make sure I'm not lollygagging. But even on days when I'm just stretching... I kind of know damn well I'm never going to do that unless they make me do it and I pay them for the privilege, even though I'm kind of good at willpower stuff, just not going to put that extra gear into my own workout.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
Sure, that's a big assumption. But that's besides the point, I suppose. Maybe I shouldn't out myself here. I do find some creepy stuff like that kind of relaxing. Are you a fan of Huey Lewis in the news, by the way? Anyway, it sounds like there might be something to sound healing, even if it's something you can get from other things.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
Okay, so it's like the Avengers Infinity Gauntlet, but for relaxation.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
If that's crazy, I actually didn't know where we got helium from. And I was shocked to find that there's plenty on the sun. And then we just kind of decided we could make it here on Earth. That's a whole interesting, nerdy rabbit hole I went down. I have noticed, actually, that a lot of pseudoscience isn't really content with just saying what it is.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
They very often mix in mysticism and junk science. They'll say something like, well, something, something, quantum entanglement, something, something, chakras. I guess it adds legitimacy in their eyes. Although, of course, when people are even the least bit skeptical, this, of course, backfires immediately.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
But then I kind of see this as screening in the right marks for people being dishonest about what they're providing. Because the more ridiculous claims people are willing to eat up, the more likely they are to buy more, I don't know, crystals, gems, sound healing CDs, if they still sell those MLM vitamins or whatever from that practitioner. Just because it all goes in one ear and out the other.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
And they're like, I'm convinced. Shut up and take my money. Not that all sound healers do this. I have seen some say, look, I make a calming sound with this bowl and it relaxes you. And to be honest, I'm fine with that. Anyway, before I speak too soon, if it's not too late for that already, what do the elements have to do with sound healing? Is there any connection there at all?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, we've done episodes on Chinese medicine before as well. And it's worth noting that many of the same folks during the same time period who believed in the balance or imbalance of elements or whatever, they also believed in bloodletting and burning witches and human sacrifice and things like that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
So it's weird that we've kind of imported that and been like, this isn't ridiculous, but the other stuff clearly is because it results in the death, the immediate death or whatever of the person who's undergoing the treatment.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
Welcome to Skeptical Sunday. I'm your host, Jordan Harbinger. Today I'm here with Skeptical Sunday co-host, author, and cultural critic, Maddox. Just Maddox, no last name or anything.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
I remember learning about that in probably elementary school where they would find some hook thing and they're like, what's this for? And it's like, oh, the Undertaker used that to go up your nose into your brain and scrape all that useless crap out and throw it away and mummified you or whatever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
Although as silly as the cooling unit for the heart thing might sound to us modern know-it-alls, imagining the brain as a cooling unit, not totally ridiculous in my opinion. It looks like a complicated set of radiator pipes. And it's in our head where surely they'd maybe observed, I suppose, that we humans lose a lot of our heat via our heads.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
So if you come from the idea that the heart did all the thinking, I can see why they figured the brain was just dead weight in the afterlife. You mentioned they rely a lot on ancient wisdom. Is there an appeal to ancients fallacy? I know there's an appeal to nature. It sort of sounds like the same thing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
On the Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the stories, secrets, and skills of the world's most fascinating people and turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you. And our mission is to help you become a better informed, more critical thinker. During the week, we have long-form conversations with a variety of amazing folks, from spies to CEOs,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
I've had people on this show say things like, everything is energy, right? And I'm like, stop right there. What are you talking about? They're like, well, Einstein said that. And I think she was talking about the vibe you get from another person. I'm like, I'm pretty sure that's not what Einstein was talking about.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
He's talking about like photons or something, you know, something that you can measure. And anyway, is it ethical to misquote scientists and frame them in a way to support your spiritual beliefs? I'm going to go with no. Right.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
To what end, though? Is this a wild Hail Mary at implying that what you're selling is legit? Because Einstein maybe talked about the principle in a letter to Max Born in 1944 that you claim to be harnessing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
Look, we can't be so unique that our individual cells are unidentifiable. So if people want to lay down and listen to some gongs, more power to them. I've done it. I kind of like it. It is relaxing. I guess it seems harmless, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
Alright, I was wondering about that, because if sounds can be healing, then theoretically it stands to reason that sounds can be destructive as well.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
Okay, understandable. And now that's going to be in my head for the rest of the day. Thank you very much.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
athletes, authors, thinkers, and performers. On Sundays, though, we do Skeptical Sunday, where a rotating guest co-host and I break down a topic you may have never thought about and debunk common misconceptions about that topic. Topics such as sovereign citizens, e-commerce scams, diet supplements, the lottery, Reiki healing, GMOs, banned food, chemtrails, energy drinks, and more.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
The jury is still out on that one. I heard, by the way, do you remember Manuel Noriega, the sort of drug trafficking general from Panama? Anyway, when they went in to get him, I want to say he holed up in the Vatican embassy and the Marines decided they weren't obviously going to storm the Vatican embassy. That's a massive breach of international protocol.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
So what they did is they set up massive speakers. And they blasted heavy metal until he came out. And it took like four days because, of course, how long can you not sleep to heavy metal? And the way they got that idea was they were strategizing about how to get him out.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
And I guess one of the commanders could hear the Marines blasting this really annoying ass heavy metal music from across the barracks. And they were like, wait a minute. What if we just take that and put it right outside the Vatican and just blast that day and night? And so they did that. It was just because some dude was listening to his own music.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
They came up with this plan and this idea and it actually worked.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
That's badass. Yeah. I'm also thinking, yo, you couldn't make earplugs out of a Kleenex or something? I mean, it must have been super loud.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
Me too. It's also like, oh, I'd rather go to federal prison in Miami for the rest of my life than listen to another night of, I don't know, Metallica or whatever it was.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
Yikes. So is that because of all the chainsaws? Why are forest workers dealing with noise? I'm guessing just they're cutting down trees. Is that what's going on?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1108: Sound Healing | Skeptical Sunday
That sounds like some of the side effects of listening to this very podcast. You know, the sweetest sound to me is money hitting my bank account. So please support the fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
This episode is sponsored in part by What Was That Like podcast. Have you ever wondered how it feels to watch your house burn down, be attacked by an alligator, or learn that your spouse hired someone to kill you? What Was That Like is the podcast for you, if you're that person. Not the person who got hired to be killed, but the person who wondered, more thankfully.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
I've tested it on multiple time zone busting trips and it works every single time. Flykit is of course rooted in Navy SEAL, research, bro. And it was initially designed for fighter pilots and athletes to combat the inflammation that flying causes. I was a massive skeptic and I actually was like really annoyed when I found out about this and paid for it. And it was just vitamins.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
And I asked for a refund. And here's my friend's company. And then he's like, just keep it and try it. And I tried it and I ended up being like, ah, here's your money because it worked so well. Flykit uses AI to time everything from light exposure to meals, all tailored to your specific travel itinerary. And I became an immediate lifelong fan after that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
Try it out on your next trip and hit me up. I really want to know what you think. I want to know if it works for everyone as well. I think it's amazing and it's just a must have. This episode is also sponsored by Caldera Lab. Let's be real, most guys, Gabriel aside, skincare routine is just splash water on my face and hope for the best. I mean, that's kind of what I do.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
But it's been a bit dry and flaky and I realized maybe I need a little maintenance. Maybe I'm not 25 anymore. Thank goodness for Caldera Lab. This is skincare made for us, which is guys who want to look better without needing a 12-step nighttime routine. I'm not trying to pull an American Psycho skincare routine here. I want something simple, effective, and designed to actually work.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
My favorite is something called the Base Layer. It's their daily moisturizer. The consistency is perfect. It's not greasy. It's not sticky. None of that, like, why do I feel like I put mayo on my face feeling? It absorbs fast. It feels clean. They also have The Good, which is their award-winning serum loaded with botanicals, which sounds very fancy. Antioxidants in there.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
That helps protect your skin from all the daily stress. Sun, lack of sleep, general chaos. And the eye serum is a lifesaver for those mornings when you look more exhausted than you feel. A little hangover, maybe you're up with the baby all night.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
And if you're new to the show or you want to tell your friends about the show, I suggest our episode starter packs. These are collections of our favorite episodes on persuasion and negotiation, psychology, disinformation, crime and cults, and more. It'll help new listeners get a taste of everything we do here on the show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
So if you're ready to step up your face game without turning into a skincare influencer, check out Caldera Lab and definitely grab at least that base layer to start.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
Skincare doesn't have to be complicated, but it should be good. Upgrade your routine with Caldera Lab and see the difference for yourself. Go to calderalab.com slash Jordan and use Jordan at checkout for 20% off your first order.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
If you're wondering how I managed to book all these great authors, thinkers, and creators every week, it's because of my network. And I'm teaching you how to build your network for free over at 6minutenetworking.com. I know you're probably thinking, I don't book podcast guests. I get it. But this is about improving your relationship building skills, and it is decidedly non-cringe.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
and down to earth. Very not awkward or cheesy. It's just practical exercises that'll make you a better connector, a better colleague, a better friend, and a better peer. And six minutes a day is really all it takes. And many, many of the guests on the show subscribe and contribute to the course. So come on and join us. You'll be in smart company where you belong.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
You can find the course at sixminutenetworking.com. All right, now back to Skeptical Sunday. It is crazy to think that intelligent, educated people could come to these conclusions without acknowledging that a lack of education, lack of being healthy and access to food, access to education, whatever, is a big contributing factor.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
Oh, that one's easier. Bowling. So I'm a genius and I should have been at least a lieutenant general or whatever. Is that where this is going? That's exactly what we're saying here. All right.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
Just visit jordanharbinger.com slash start or search for us in your Spotify app to get started. For decades, IQ tests have been used to judge people's intelligence. These scores were often used when considering job applicants or determining educational placement. And to this day, many of us still assume that somebody with a high IQ is smart and likely to succeed in life.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
No, that's true. Right. Of course, especially there's tons of people who grew up in a place where bowling is not a sport that people play or you couldn't afford to bowl. And maybe you never heard of Edgar Allan Poe because you had a third grade education. I mean, the only reason I know that one is because I think my mom read me Poe stuff when I was a kid in the Raven sounds very Poe somehow.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
But I also just guessed really at the end of the day.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
It's like a fluke that we would have gotten those questions correct.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
So we're talking about some, what do you call it, like culturally relevant questions on the test that don't make sense if you're not from that culture? Right.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
So those are like the ones you see when you're scrolling through social media, like, hey, if you can count the number of blocks in this, you're a genius. Or if you can figure this puzzle out, you'd need to join Mensa. Oh, man, that is some of the best clickbait out there. It is because who doesn't want to think of themselves as smart? Maybe I'm secretly a genius and nobody ever knew.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, no kidding. Wow. Well, it's pretty nerve wracking to think about that. I mean, what if I take an IQ test? or many tests, and it just turns out I'm not as smart as I think I am, I don't know if I could handle it. This is the psychological equivalent of getting out a ruler in college and being like, let me measure my wang. It's gonna be totally above average.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
Just, you don't wanna answer this question, folks. You don't. Trust tape, voice of experience.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
No. When we really could have doubled down on our insecurity about that, that information wasn't available, thank God. Yeah. That's true. No, sometimes less is more, folks, and I'm talking about information.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
I guess I'll consider myself the exception. You do seem to be doing pretty well for yourself, Michael. You made it onto this podcast. You got that going for you. I guess your score is pretty low then, Jordan. The bar for hiring, yes. My IQ, classified information so far. Actually, truth be told, I'm not sure if I even know my IQ score. I have no clue. Do you know yours?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, I'm sweating thinking about that. I mean, that's a life or death situation. Am I going to be organizing ammo crates that go out by plane or am I going to be getting shelled?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
It's reminding me of the movie Divergent. They take a test and it determines what faction they're going to be in. Basically one test determines what their whole life is going to be.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
I doubt any test would tell me that you should host a podcast. We did these tests when I was in high school, I think, and the questions were so dumb. It would be like, do you enjoy organizing different kinds of paper? Do you enjoy stamping images or words into metal? It's like, how would I know? And then they're like, oh, just answer to the best of your ability.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
And I remember the teachers telling us that. And I just filled it out fast because, I don't know, maybe stamping things into metal would be interesting. I don't know. Next question. And then we get this report back that's like, jobs you might be cut out for. Machine metal stamper. Machine press. And it just made no sense.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
How is a kid who's never done something going to say, yeah, stamping something into metal might be cool. And they're like, aha, career idea for you. Stamping things into metal. It was the absolute dumbest thing I've ever seen in my life. So these tests can't be that far from that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
Real people come on every episode to explain the unbelievable situations they've been through. I think it's a funny concept for a show. I kind of wish I'd thought of it because I always get crazy stories from people. Not everything turns into a Jordan Harbinger episode. But What Was That Like?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah. We know where you're going to end up, Regina. Yeah. They didn't need a test. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
Fair. Yeah, I guess they did not need a test to know where you were going, and the test couldn't tell me where I was going. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah. So that just sounds like it could be plain old racism, but I don't know enough about it to say for sure.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
The army does like digging stuff. That sounds like a dumb pun, but that was not what I meant there. But yeah, especially trenches is where most of the people who took these Yerkes tests ended up. So that brings us to the 30s. OK, World War One, post-World War One, whatever. So social Darwinism and eugenics are in vogue now.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
rudimentary IQ tests, I guess they were back then, are being used as a tool to justify these concepts. Now, I'm going to imagine that after World War II and all the atrocities committed by the Nazis and stuff, did that whole idea fall off a little bit, I hope?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
Okay, I thought you might bring that book up. Yeah, because I've heard of this and I know it's controversial. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, it might. To be honest, I'm not sure that any of this goes to show anyone anything, which is why I have you, Michael Regilio, our resident skeptic, or one of them here to help unpack IQ tests. So what are they? How did they come about? And most importantly, should we take them seriously at all?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah. 2025 me says, duh. But I'm guessing that was maybe even also controversial back then.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, I'm guessing the criticisms were largely the same, that the study didn't take into account poverty, poor schools, health inequality. Some people might think, oh, those are weak, the poverty argument, but poor schools, health inequality. And when we say health inequality, we're talking about bad nutrition and like lead paint chips in the house, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
Environmental factors. So I know some kids grow up with books and computers, and I know I'm harping on this, but other kids grow up with lead paint chips. That was a big thing in Detroit. When I was growing up, it was like all those old houses down there that had kids in them. All you need to do is eat a couple lead paint chips as a kid and you're in trouble or the dust from it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
So even in talking about the genetic aspects of intelligence, our environment also plays a part, which totally makes sense.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah. Okay. So once again, paint chips and weird gasoline fumes or highway stuff, if you live near a highway, probably.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
and brain development. Because I think a lot of people are like, being poor doesn't make you have a lower IQ. The UV thing actually explains a lot, too. I might be getting dumber, but I have a sick tan right now.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
So that sounds like its own episode entirely. I didn't know the race thing was kind of not necessary.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
That sounds like a smart way of saying that if a test says somebody is intelligent, they're more likely to believe that the test is accurate. Color me surprised. And it's just like being good at chess.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
This is really interesting because before you would think, okay... People who lean right are going to be like, not everything is racism. And I get that. Maybe there's something to that. But then the people on the left are like, what do you mean race doesn't exist? If you said that to a college kid right now, depending on the college, I suppose, you would get an earful.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
So it's the horseshoe theory, right? It's like... These groups might actually agree for completely different reasons.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, that would make for an awkward dinner. But you know what? When I hear that, I got to say that's what people are talking about when they're like snowflakes can't handle that. Like she had to leave the dinner. She got all upset and couldn't handle that particular line of argument. I don't know.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
Meanwhile, an overwhelming number of racist organizations probably agree with the bell curve and the findings of Jensen and all that stuff. So how do we square that?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
Well, it seems like the more things change, the more they stay the same, I suppose. I want to jump back to the IQ stuff before we get too far off the reservation, which also sounds racist now that I say it out loud. Save me.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
So no more questions like, with which hand do you hold a caviar spoon? Or what does it mean for a dressage horse to piaffe?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
So if you're a skeptic of IQ scores, maybe you have a low IQ. Yeah, I see where you're going with this. I might also be in that camp. So it's not the veiled insult you think it is. I might just be throwing myself in the same bucket. But I do wonder, is there even a gold standard, so to speak, IQ test anyway?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
Sounds Star Wars-y. Yeah, it's, oh yeah, this new Jedi has crystallized intelligence. Only Master Yoda has crystallized intelligence, Jordan. I would like to take the crystallized intelligence test. I feel like I might want to take all these tests, actually, just for shits and gigs.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
I mean, if I take a bunch of different IQ tests and consistently get around the same score... Then that might, in fact, tell you something. Okay. Plus, if I score super high, then I'll be inducted into some kind of secret society, ostensibly.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
I've heard of Mensa, and it's actually the opposite of a secret society because people who are in it often cannot shut the actual fuck up about being a member of Mensa. So they're not secretly controlling the world. That's maybe disappointing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
All based on IQ tests. That's right. Like the Wexler or the Stanford Benet 5. So there are a few places out there that still value IQ scores on specific IQ tests. In fact, it seems like they hold them in pretty high regard.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
We love skepticism, but I've got to tell you, I'm feeling as though I like the idea that in some way we can measure a person's intelligence, even if it's not totally accurate.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
You don't need an IQ test to tell you that you're a genius for taking advantage of the deals and discounts on the fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back. This episode is sponsored in part by Hiya Health. If you've got kids, you know the vitamin aisle is a disaster. Most kids' vitamins are basically glorified candy. We're talking five grams of sugar.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
There's artificial junk in there. There's weird dyes that are probably banned in other countries. And our kids love them because they're basically eating gummy candy. And that's why we made the switch to Hiya. It's a chewable vitamin, zero sugar, no gummy nonsense. Still tastes good. Even our picky eater kids are into it. Hiya nailed the packaging as well.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
And I'm remembering that Seinfeld episode where George was going to take one and he gets Elaine to do it for him.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
This episode is also sponsored by SimpliSafe. A few months ago, something happened. I still can't believe I'm saying out loud. Our home was broken into while we were home. I was in bed. Jen was reading a bedtime story in the next room to the kids. It's easy to think stuff like this happens to other people. I mean, we're other people. We live in a safe neighborhood. We're careful.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
But that night, three masked intruders kicked through the glass door of the room that I was in. We'd think they'd been watching our house, they noticed a car leaving our driveway, saw the lights were off, figured the house was empty. No, we just go to bed ridiculously early because we're old and we have kids. Thankfully, though, we have SimpliSafe.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
Head to simplisafe.com slash Jordan to get 50% off a new system with professional monitoring, plus your first month free. That's simplisafe.com slash Jordan. There's no safe like SimpliSafe.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
This episode is also sponsored in part by Progressive. You ever find yourself playing the budgeting game, shift a little money here, shift a little over there, kind of just hope it all works out? Well, with the Name Your Price tool from Progressive, you can be a better budgeter and potentially lower your insurance bill too.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
You tell Progressive what you want to pay for car insurance, they'll help you find options within your budget. Try it today at Progressive.com. Progressive Casualty Insurance Company & Affiliates. Price and coverage match limited by state law. Not available in all states. Thank you so much for listening to and supporting the show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
All of the deals and discounts and ways to support the podcast are searchable and clickable over at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. You can also email us if you can't find the code. It is that important that you support those who support the show. Now for the rest of Skeptical Sunday.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
I mean, if there's no way to determine intelligence, at least to a degree, then there's no way to find out if somebody is getting smarter. So doesn't that take the whole idea of education and kind of throw it out the window in a way?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
But then again, intelligence is a concept, really. So how can you nail it down to a series of questions?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
All right, so what if we assume, for argument's sake, that IQ scores, or at least modern ones, are a valid way of measuring people's intelligence? What does the data that we've accumulated over the years tell us, if anything? Are there trends? Are there takeaways? I'm almost afraid to hear the answer, speaking of idiocracy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
So you're saying the guy who came up with the term IQ was himself a skeptic of the idea that IQ alone measures intelligence? Is that right? Bingo.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
Meaning people, generally speaking, are getting smarter? Great.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, that seems super important, but it also seems like exponential growth like that kind of needs an explanation of some sort. What's going on here? You nailed it, actually. It does.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
So what is it? I'm guessing nutrition, as we've discussed, has to be one of the factors.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
Smaller family size might play as well. I don't know. But kids get more attention from parents. They get more resources, maybe. Check out the IQ on Jordan. That's right. I am an only child, so it all makes sense.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
Because you figured if anybody was getting dumber, it was Americans?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, like nutrition, cleaner food, smaller family sizes, yada, yada. This makes sense. I feel bad. I'm taking potshots at Americans, but the data showed the Scandinavians suck at Norway. But it makes sense. My dad was a one of eight kids and Ukrainian immigrant. The parenting was different. They lived in a small house. There wasn't a whole lot of let me focus on helping Don with his homework.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
You know, it's like, no, I just I'm trying to make sure nobody dies in my watch the end.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
Jeez. Yeah. So the family size thing does matter. Okay. And like I said, cleaner food and blah, blah, blah. Exactly.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
Let's just say we're trying to assess if a person's cognitive abilities are declining. I mean, don't we need to test for that kind of stuff?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
is hosted by my friend Scott Johnson, who's naturally curious and gives his guests the opportunity to share how they've really felt during some of their most surreal experiences. What they did in the morning before an earthquake, what song was playing as a gunman entered, was their stomach growling as they hid? Guests share everything they remember about their crazy, crazy experiences.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
Or standardized testing. Isn't that what George W. Bush's No Child Left Behind was all about? Not the paste eating, but...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
which is definitely a factor. If I kept looking at piles of blocks and got really good at figuring out how many there were or practice pattern recognition, I might do exceedingly well on a specific IQ test. That's actually how I ended up doing decent on the LSAT, which is a test you take before you apply to law schools. But I would study old exams and stuff like that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
And I knew that what I was studying would be on the test. I literally only took old exam questions, took a bunch of old practice tests, And then if I had trouble with something, I'd look it up in the book or whatever. So I could be a full blown moron, but just be really good at specific tasks. Like your friend who took the same IQ test a dozen times and looked up all the answers or whatever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
It doesn't tell you their intelligence. It just tells you if they learned how to take the test.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
Oh, this is going to be one of those things that sounds harsh, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
And for educational purposes, that can be helpful. Like when teachers see which subjects a student is having trouble with and focus extra attention there, I guess.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, this has me thinking about all that. Well, that's a good sign. Yeah. We've really only been talking about human intelligence as it relates to IQ tests. I actually, this is probably beyond the scope or whatever, I'm wondering how all this applies to something like AI.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
Do we know that? Is that even possible to measure?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
And I'm going to imagine that it aced the test, yeah?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
Really? So it learned that because, in fact, I'm going to try it right now if I can. So I just tried it right now real quick, and it asked me which Sebastian I'm referring to because it could be a lot of different people. So it still doesn't know that the obvious answer is Sebastian because that's a man.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
And I mean, I guess there are technical ways that Sebastian could have children that are his, even though he's not the father directly, I guess. This should be like an easy one that unless you're thinking of these crazy exceptions, ChatGPT should say, it's probably Sebastian. However, it could be a myriad of other people because of these various scenarios. But yeah, you're right.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
It's not quite there. So this is a riddle that if I had to think about it, it would just be so obvious, I'd like to think. I don't know. Maybe I don't want to take all those IQ tests.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
I can count blocks, Michael. I can count blocks. All right. It sounds like the Wexler test is a pretty prolific one. Is there like a short list of IQ tests?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah. Yikes. Yeah, that is harsh. Imagine getting that call like, I'm pleased to inform you that your son is merely an imbecile and not an idiot as previously suspected. Good day.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
So if I score low on all those tests, don't take it to heart for some reason?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
I see. So just because chat GPT scores high on an IQ test, it doesn't necessarily mean robots are going to take over the world, at least not tomorrow.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
So this leaves me with a kind of win-win scenario here when I'm out there taking IQ tests, getting my scores. If I score high, I can lean into all the data and support for IQ tests and what they mean.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
And if I score low on the IQ test, then I can lean into all the healthy skepticism of them and say that it just doesn't necessarily mean anything because I've got crystallized or some kind of other intelligence.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
And even if IQ scores don't tell us everything, it sounds like there's still some value in trying to understand how our minds work, right? And tests can show us where somebody might need help, where they might excel. It's not about labeling people as smart or dumb or feeble-minded, imbecilic, whatever, but rather about identifying areas to improve or maybe even tap into.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
He might not be dumb. He might not even be an imbecile or an idiot for that matter. I know him. So I just feel bad that I said it on a podcast.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
At the end of the day, it sounds like IQ scores are not going to tell the whole story of someone's life, whether it's overcoming obstacles, gaining skills through experience, or developing other kinds of intelligence. There's a lot more to human potential than any one test could capture.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
An IQ test or any test for that matter shouldn't tell us what profession we need to be in or how the rest of our life is going to look. It certainly doesn't tell us that one type of person is inherently smarter than the other.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
Now, one little note, there is a correlation between IQ and making better decisions long term, especially for health, long term lifestyle, mortality. As expected, people with higher IQ tend to make better decisions in certain areas. Now, we didn't do a deep dive into this on the episode, but I just thought that was worth noting.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
And it's not completely uncorrelated with decisions you would expect, you know, quote unquote, smart people to make. Intelligence seems like a rich and diverse concept, and we just can't let one number dictate our self-worth or limit our potential. That's what I'm telling myself right now, anyway.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, maybe. Or maybe not, but I'm really considering it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
It's funny that those are technical terms because, of course, that meaning is all lost. So what were these determinations even based upon?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
I think I'll stick with that one for now. Doing okay. Maybe I don't need to get out the ruler, so to speak. Smart move. Thanks, everyone, for listening. Topic suggestions for future episodes of Skeptical Sunday. To me, Jordan at JordanHarbinger.com. Show notes on the website. Advertisers, deals, discounts, and ways to support the show, all at JordanHarbinger.com slash deals.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
I'm at Jordan Harbinger on Twitter or Instagram. Michael Regilio is over at Michael Regilio on Instagram. Tour dates are up now as well. We'll link to that in the show notes because nobody can spell Regilio. This show is created in association with Podcast One. People with high IQs might be able to spell Regilio. I don't know. We'll see. This show is created in association with Podcast One.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
My team is Jen Harbinger, Jace Sanderson, Tata Sidlowskis, Robert Fogerty, Ian Baird, and Gabriel Mizrahi. Our advice and opinions are our own, and I am a lawyer, but I am not your lawyer. Do your own research before implementing anything you hear on the show. And remember, we rise by lifting others. Share the show with those you love.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
If you found the episode useful, please share it with somebody else who could use a good dose of the skepticism and knowledge that we doled out today. In the meantime... I hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn, and we'll see you next time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
Oh, God. OK, well, I shouldn't laugh. I hope I could pass that section. Who knows what's in there?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
So they were like, if he eats the chocolate with the wrapper on, he's an idiot. Why is that so funny? In grade school, I did know a kid who would eat a candy bar with the wrapper on just as a gag. And I suppose I feel a little bit better about myself. Hey, we all called him by the technically correct term. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
And basic, of course, now has already been co-opted. Okay, so tell me about the other sections of the test. I suppose it gets harder from unwrap the candy before you eat it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
Wow, I can feel my brain trying to work that one out, and I'm not sure how good I would do at something like that either.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
So this is where we get the IQ scores we've come to know today?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
So if you want to hear some disturbing slash inspiring firsthand stories about the thoughts that go through your head while surviving a kidnapping or winning the Price is Right, What Was That Like? is the podcast you've been looking for. Every story is thoroughly researched and fact-checked so you know even the most unreal stories are actually someone's reality. Listen to What Was That Like?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
So the tests, they hypothetically work, which I guess is good because people use these to determine so much about someone. So it sounds like it works to give you a score that makes some sense. I don't know.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
Okay, as we've already established, a person's IQ score could really impact their life. It's starting to feel a little bit like Brave New World. They got the alphas and the betas.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
That's really on the nose there. I guess it makes sense that the Army would be looking into this kind of thing. They always want to figure out how to get big groups of people put into buckets, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
You know, you gotta wonder, Aldous Huxley, Brave New World was like 1932. I wonder if he knew about this and took that from this. You gotta wonder. Gotta wonder. Yeah. But okay, so they made everyone take this. It's crazy that there was people who didn't speak English in the U.S. Army during World War I. That's just... That's kind of mind-blowing to me.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
But I guess maybe even now there's people whose English is not super good in the Army. Yeah. Huh. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
Gosh, we're going to get an email about this. There was something I remember hearing where people from the Philippines especially, and I'm sure it's other countries too, you could join the U.S. Army and basically after you got out, however many years, you would get U.S. citizenship. which is kind of a cool deal.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
But yeah, I guess in the Philippines, they speak English, but I don't know if the deal's open to like anyone from anywhere. That would be an interesting question. Something I should have looked up before and something I'll look up after the show. Okay, so if they had everyone take this test before World War I or during World War I, that is a lot of data to work with.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
wherever you get your podcasts. Welcome to Skeptical Sunday. I'm your host, Jordan Harbinger. Today I'm here with Skeptical Sunday co-host Michael Regilio. On the Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the stories, secrets, and skills of the world's most fascinating people and turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, should we also maybe take our moment to remind everyone what eugenics was? I don't think everybody knows what that is.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
By the way, eugenics, it does sound like a supplement marketed towards guys my age when they're having problems urinating or getting it up. Basically, anything to do with the equipment, you're going to sell a pill. Middle age is amazing. But yeah, eugenics sounds like a multi-level marketing scam.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
So the idea that certain populations of lesser people should be prohibited from reproducing That's some very dangerous stuff. Man, there's a thought exercise here. What if we don't stop the people from reproducing, but we encourage people to reproduce who are really smart and have achieved a lot? Even that is fraught. Yeah, there's no good way to do that, huh?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
In 10 years, it's going to be a documentary, which is that's the worst part.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
Wow. Yeah, that's intense. So if we had to get rid of the feeble minded folks in 2025, there'd be almost nobody left.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
And this was all legal in America at the time. That's crazy. How did this not make it to the Supreme Court or whatever?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
Our mission is to help you become a better informed, more critical thinker. And during the week, We have long-form conversations with a variety of amazing folks from spies to CEOs, athletes, authors, thinkers, and performers.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
That aged like milk. Yeah. Oh, man. Yeah. That's rough.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah. Hey, it's not just you who are thinking about sterilizing. Your parents should have been sterilized and their parents should have been sterilized. Yikes. Wow. And that's coming from the Supreme Court of the United States. How dignified.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
I'm going to go with Nazis. You got it. Nazis. Man, you're on shaky ground when you've got Nazis quoting you. I mean, it's not necessarily your fault if you've got Nazis quoting you, but there's a reason that Nazis are quoting you. That's all I'm saying.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
On Sundays, though, it's Skeptical Sunday, where a rotating guest co-host and I break down a topic you may have never thought about and debunk common misconceptions about that topic. Topics such as why tipping makes no sense, sovereign citizens, diet supplements, the lottery, ear candling, self-help cults, and more.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
Hey, imbeciles, even you can figure out how to use the deals and discounts on the fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back. This episode is also sponsored in part by Flykit. If you travel internationally a lot, jet lag is basically the enemy. We got back from China and Taiwan a couple of days ago and the kids are a disaster.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1159: IQ Tests | Skeptical Sunday
At least for me, I follow Flykit and it makes a huge difference each time. Flykit is an algorithm-based scheduling tailored to your trip details. It tells you when to eat, when to sleep and how long and when to take the supplements that you'll receive in the mail. It's like having a personal travel health assistant in your pocket.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
This episode is sponsored in part by Vital Proteins. I want to tell you about Vital Proteins Collagen Peptides. That's a mouthful. It's a daily supplement that supports your hair, skin, nails, bones, and joints all in one in one simple step each day. Collagen makes up about a third of the protein in our bodies, but as we hit our 30s, it unfortunately starts to decline.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
Really? So there's sober people out there that are like getting a kimchi hangover. I love kimchi, by the way, and it's hilarious slash sad that can also give you a hangover. This is what we should have studied. How much kimchi do you need to eat before you get a hangover? Because I bet it's a lot.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
Oh, that's funny. They would have been like, oh, man, these berries are craft, man. They're so good.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, this one's made by a hipster in Brooklyn who cuts his own trees down and makes his own wood stoves. Those people wouldn't have lasted long. And I think most of us would have been fine with that. All right, so congeners and hops. I did not know about these. What about sulfites? I've heard this word before. I heard they're behind some hangover headaches.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
And I've got friends up in Silicon Valley here. They're like, I only drink sulfite-free wines. You can't drink any sulfites. I don't even know what sulfites are.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
Just visit jordanharbinger.com slash start or search for us in your Spotify app to get started. Now, today, are you still feeling the aftershocks of last night's generous pour of bubbly? Did you wake up feeling like you snacked on cotton all night? You're not alone. As common as hangovers are, there's so much we don't know about them.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
So sadly, it sounds like wine might not be as healthy as they market it. I remember like, oh, this is loaded with antioxidants. There's resveratrol in here and the red wine. There's health benefits. Look how long French people live, even though they smoke or whatever. You hear that all the time, especially...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
I want to feel like in the early aughts, that's when they were like, wine's healthy for you somehow. Tim Ferriss, I'm drinking only red wine in my veins.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
Well, sort of depressing for some people, for sure. I know some folks really love to fall back on the alleged benefits of drinking red wine, especially, I will say for whiskey drinkers, of which I am one, we're never like, no, it's good for you. We're like, yeah, it's killing you. And then the guy next to you is smoking a cigar. So you're just like, okay, the gloves are off.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
This is a vice session. But in the moment, it feels so good. Yeah, now we're gambling. But aside from avoiding sulfites, are there other things we can do to fend off a hangover?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
Wait a minute. So I can justify drinking nicer booze because it's an investment and not getting a hangover? Okay, you're gonna have to explain that. It sounds like a pain for my wallet, but why would top shelf booze be any better than the bottle of Mohawk sitting on the bottom shelf that fits conveniently in your pocket? Ask me how I know that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, that was one of those things where I remember looking at the bottom shelf and being like, $3? Holy smokes. What is that? And I remember the guy at the store being like, you don't want that, man. You don't want that. He's like, that's what guys who are sleeping outside come in and buy. And sure enough, he was correct.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
I went in that store many times, and that was like the stuff that you buy when you're desperate. But the stuff on the top shelf, which is now, of course, locked, or behind the little plastic thing, that's the stuff that's 80 bucks for a bottle of vodka or more. Hibiki is in there and all the Japanese whiskey. So I guess literally top shelf is better. I just thought it was marketing, branding.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
For as long as humans have been drinking, and it's been a long time, we've been battling hangovers. And for just as long, we've been chasing the elusive hangover cure. From vitamin B to greasy food to pickle juice, people swear by all sorts of remedies. But are any of them actually a cure for the hangover? This is Skeptical Sunday.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
Okay. So painkillers and alcohol in my liver. Yes. An investment in health. So alcohol, congeners, sulfites, there's no escape from some hangover symptoms the next day. You're getting the trifecta slash the multifecta, if that's a word, probably.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
I never really knew about the blood sugar, blood pressure thing that you mentioned before. I just figured it was all dehydration and my brain was dehydrated or something. That's what I thought this was until literally right now.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
I've experienced that. I think we all have. And it's like the world is conspiring against you. Your bodies are punishing you for your decisions the next day, and it's not fun. But I thought that's why I just need to drink Gatorade or something like that. And there goes my hangover.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
Oh, I just figured I was peeing a lot because I was drinking a lot. Turns out that vasopressin, instead of telling my kidneys, hey man, don't constantly pee, we might need that. It's like, nah, do whatever you want, man. I'm taking the night off. Yeah, okay, now that makes sense. So dehydration is dangerous even when not from alcohol. I think everybody knows that one.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
We're diving into the haziness of hangovers and whether hangover cures are miracles or just myths. Joining me is writer and researcher Jessica Wynn. So, Jessica, we have a mystery on our hands because people swear by all sorts of hangover cures from taking a shower to drinking some coffee to eating a certain kind of soup. Are you hungover right now by any chance?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
On the other hand, I'm a slow learner. It's really just spent way too many times being like, I'm going to puke now and then start over. So Acetaldehyde, that's the villain in The Hangover Story primarily?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
Discomfort. OK, well, I've seen into the pits of hell, but I guess we can call it discomfort.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
So our livers are not great multitaskers. I can relate. Liver, you are not alone. I never knew this, though. Again, the blood sugar thing is a totally new thing for me.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
You know what feels good coming out of both ends? The money you'll save on the fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back. This episode is sponsored in part by Shopify. Ever wonder what makes some brands absolutely take off while others just don't? Sure, a great product and smart marketing helps, but the real secret sauce is what's happening behind the scenes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
So if you're serious about growing your business, your commerce platform, better be ready to sell wherever your customers are. On your website, in your store, in their feed, and everywhere in between. And the secret's out. Businesses that sell more, sell on Shopify.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
This episode is also sponsored by BetterHelp. You ever just feel stuck, like you're overthinking, you're second-guessing, you're maybe just completely burnt out, and no matter how many podcasts you listen to, even this one, you can't quite figure it out on your own?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, we have all been there, and the truth is nobody, not even the most successful entrepreneurs, world-class athletes, even your super put-together friend, figures out everything solo. That's where therapy comes in. It's not about fixing anything. It's about having a support system that actually helps you move forward. With BetterHelp, therapy is convenient. It's online.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
If you've been thinking about therapy, BetterHelp makes it easy to start. Don't just take it from me. Check out some of their thousands of five-star reviews if you're curious.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
Don't forget about our newsletter, We Bit Wiser. Every Wednesday, something practical that'll end up in your inbox. It's a two-minute read. It's something that you can apply right away that'll affect your psychology, the way you connect with other people. And if you want to keep up with the wisdom from our thousand-plus episodes, this is a great companion to the show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
JordanHarbinger.com slash news is where you can find it. All right, back to Skeptical Sunday. Hangovers are confusing. So for me, it's like, do I need sleep? Do I need medical attention? Should I lay in bed in the fetal position? Do I lay on the bathroom floor? Alcohol is so intense and I never quite know what to do with it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
And I remember even in college, it was like, if someone's drunk, make sure you lay them on their side. And I was like, how is this allowed where you might just die?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
As I get older, the hangovers last longer. It used to be drink all night, wake up, go to the gym back in my early 20s. Now it's one drink at 5 p.m. the rest of the weekend. I'm a little bit slow. I can go for a walk or two, but that's about it. Yeah, drinking's a younger man's game. It certainly is. And I'm a little disappointed that you didn't come fully prepared for this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
I have definitely woken up feeling terrible from a drink-induced sleep. It's the worst, especially when you wake up at 2 a.m. and you're like, I'm ready for the day, but I might still be drunk. It just feels like you didn't sleep at all.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
This all checks out. It's all starting to sound like one giant biological middle finger. But some people never seem to suffer from a hangover at all, which I'm angry at those people. You're on the air.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
That works? It does. Wet socks. Got me on that. I think the flank steak actually might make some sense. I don't know. The whole blood sugar thing. Who knows?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
I was going to say I'm so jealous, but then I was like, oh, good. And now I feel bad because they're still going to have all the negative effects of alcohol, but they don't get the wake up call like someone like me who goes, oh, I need to stop doing this to my body. They're like, I don't feel anything. I can keep drinking forever. And it makes sense.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
That's why I've got buddies that can just drink like fish and they never complain. And they're 45, 50 years old. And I'm over here praying for a miracle after two and a half beers. OK, what about the whole beer before liquor? Never been sicker thing. Is there any truth to that?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
So I always assumed that booze before beer, liquor before beer, you're in the clear. I thought that was because... Let's say I start drinking booze and then I'm like, oh, I better stop. And then I drink beer. Now I'm drinking less alcohol and more water much more slowly because the beer is much larger. You know, you're drinking a four ounce shot, then you're drinking a 20 ounce beer.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
It takes you like an hour. That said, I tested this repeatedly in my 20s and I was never in the clear, like ever, never happened.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
I did slam an entire bottle of Jägermeister right before we hit record. So I just wanted to be in the zone.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
Oh, God. Even the smell of that now I can't deal with. All right. No magic tricks. But is there any science behind all the remedies that people swear by? Because there's a lot of stuff out there.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah. All jokes aside, you know, when you run out of booze and you're like looking through your cabinets back in the day, of course, and you find that bottle of Jägermeister and you're like, we should just drink this thing. This thing where you're supposed to have one after you eat.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
Let's split the bottle between the three of us, even though we are already three sheets to the wind and it's two o'clock in the morning. And that is, if only I had better judgment when I was drunk. I think that's the problem many of us have. How do you get through a news cycle without alcohol these days? That's the real question.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
Alcohol, like you said, is literal poison. We wonder why we feel like garbage the next day, even with the gamble of hangovers. Alcohol is just a huge part of culture and socializing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
You don't have to declare this. There's a tax on it. I'm just telling you this is a terrible idea. You do not want to bring this back. So what's the basis of thinking that smelly foods will cure a hangover? Is it the smell or...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
Oh, that can't be literal. Is that actual rabbit poop tea?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
That's what this reminds me of. Oh, that is vile. I don't know how I would have survived in those days between the saloon brawls and the quick draw duels because you stepped on someone's foot or whatever and chugging rabbit shit tea. It's just such a disgusting place. What about drinking a cup of coffee for crying out loud? They had coffee back then. Come on, man.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
And now, while I go brew a steaming, fragrant pot of rabbit shit tea, I'll leave you with this word from our sponsors. We'll be right back. This episode is sponsored in part by Airbnb. Airbnb can make that a reality. Hosting on Airbnb is an easy way to earn extra income without taking on a second job, and now, with Airbnb's co-host network, it's even simpler.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
Whether you're saving for your dream getaway or you're just looking for financial flexibility, Airbnb makes it easy to turn your space into extra income. Find a co-host at Airbnb.com slash host. I've got homes.com as a sponsor for this episode. Homes.com knows when it comes to home shopping, it's never just about the house or the condo. It's about the homes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
And what makes a home is more than just the house or property. It's the location. It's the neighborhood. If you've got kids, it's also schools, nearby parks, transportation options. That's why homes.com goes above and beyond to bring home shoppers the in-depth information they need to find the right home. It's so hard not to say home every single time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
So when it comes to finding a home, not just a house, this is everything you need to know, all in one place, homes.com. We've done your homework. Thank you for listening and supporting the show. It is your support of our sponsors that keeps us going. All of the deals, discount codes and ways to support the show are all in one place, searchable and clickable over at jordanharbinger.com slash deals.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
The AI chatbot can help you as well. Please consider supporting those who support the show. Now for the rest of Skeptical Sunday. I thought the rule was when you're drunk, you're not supposed to drink coffee. So you're not even supposed to drink it the next morning for the hangover. I suppose that's good to know because usually when I was hungover in the past, I would just load up on caffeine.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
So does drinking more alcohol help with a hangover? Because I've heard, you know, the whole hair of the dog recommendation, like, oh, have a beer in the morning and then it'll be better.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah. I suppose drinking a beer at seven o'clock in the morning should raise flags. Okay. Is that where the phrase comes from? Because I thought it was from like a Led Zeppelin song or something, but it's that much older. It's an old expression.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
Okay, it almost makes sense. If I just keep drinking, I'll feel better. So ultimately, the only surefire remedy for a hangover is by drinking in moderation? That doesn't sound right to me now that I've said it out loud.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
Man, that's harsh and quite rich coming from a trio of universities that all rejected me immediately.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
Ouch. Yeah, the truth does sting. Rejection hangover.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
But studies have come out about the health benefits of a drink a day or the supposed good that moderate drinking can do for your body or for your health. I kind of mentioned that earlier, right? Like French people live so long because of the wine.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
Oh, geez. I feel like I've been confused when hungover because I'm like, I didn't even drink that much to warrant this hell. I've also felt like I should have been hungover on days and I'm not. And it's like, wait a minute, I had seven drinks last night and I'm fine. But a few weeks before I had two beers and I just can't function the next day. It's all over the place.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
I know a lot of people who swear by Gatorade or they drink coconut water. Are drinks like that doing anything or are we just throwing money at the problem slash drinking expensive water?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, I really want there to be a magic elixir, but I guess that's just what comforts a lot of us. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
So what about popping Advil and Tylenol? Do the painkillers do anything or is it just like that gets rid of your headache, which is the worst for some people?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, so I've probably had a few that I don't remember, thankfully. But I remember one time I went to my buddy's wedding. We drove from Michigan to D.C. So I was already tired, a little dehydrated, right? That's far. Yeah. And we go to the wedding and we walked into the wrong wedding, which is kind of funny. And then we left promptly. Anyway, we made it to the reception.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
Liver damage is really scary. So hangovers are not just painful. It sounds like they're actually dangerous or an indication of it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
Okay, so there's not a 12-step hangover cure, but effectiveness aside, what are the most common and traditional hangover cures?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
OK, but I see a ton of ads for all kinds of hangover cures and I see them on shelves at gas stations and 7-Eleven. Did those do anything? What are those about?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, it's Nobel Prize territory, I suppose.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, I have people that swear by these too in the past. There are many of these alternative remedies marketed for hangovers. If you go to a 7-Eleven, there's probably a whole shelf with just different types of anti-hangover nonsense.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
And we're drinking and then suddenly it's over. And I'm like, wow, that was so fast that everything is over. And he's like, don't worry, we're going to go to the bar in the hotel and finish and hang out. So we went to the bar in the hotel and I remember dancing and having a lot of fun and throwing down my credit card, which I just left at the bar. I never went to go get it again.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
I see. So instead of buying a tablet of Tylenol, I'm getting like a hot pink bottle, red contents, sugar flavored Tylenol packed into a 12 ounce beverage instead of just for three dollars or five dollars.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
Yes. So who profits off the cures, the diners and the dive bars and the people marketing these things or what?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
You know, I was hoping that drinking was going to go the way of cigarettes where young kids now, they vape instead. And they were like, I would never touch a cigarette. I was kind of hoping that they're all like, yeah, I just take edible weed in low doses instead of getting blackout drunk and not knowing where I am. I was hoping there was some sort of shift.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
Actually, weed is a lot healthier and better.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
None of this stuff is healthy, but there's no way I didn't cause long-term damage to my brain and body drinking as much as I did in my 20s. And it was so dumb, and I didn't even like it. I was just doing it because a lot of people were doing it. Anyway, so drinking's not going anywhere. Hangover cures aren't going anywhere. There's so many homegrown, unusual, cultural cures.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
I bought into the pickle juice thing at one point. What's going on with the pickle juice thing? What's that about?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
Yes, I did it in Europe. That's right.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
That's right. Yes, that's big in the Midwest.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
I see. I don't know about a whole jar of pickle juice. How big is the jar? When I did the pickleback, I want to say it was a shot of whatever it was and then a shot of pickle juice, which I thought was a funny thing to be serving at a bar.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, you market it as a cure. Yeah, sure. Exactly. Why not?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
And the thing is, my friends had driven me there. They left a little bit earlier than And I was like, I'll remember where the car is parked and I'll just walk back to the car, not realizing, hey, the car's not going to be there, dummy. My friends left. I need to take a taxi back to their house. But that was way too advanced thinking for me.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
also accompanied with several hours of rest so if you just rested without the peppermint pickle smoothie you'd feel better too peppermint pickle that made me feel a little bit sick not gonna lie that's disgusting here drink this it's for your hangover it smells gross oh then you better drink it fast that's a hangover cure no yeah what a great show So are there less stomach churning remedies?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
Okay, well, that's obviously a wives tale. I'm curious to hear from our Puerto Rican listeners. Is that a thing you've heard of? Because that seems like a thing that maybe would have died out with this generation. That is so bizarre. I don't think an armpit lemon is going to do the trick. I guess it's a pleasant scent at the bar.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
Sunburned tourists marinating in a tropical climate while drinking probably could use a little bit of a lemony glow up. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
The Puerto Ricans are like, oh, I already did mine at home, but you should definitely put this lemon under your armpit, you stanky ass Ohioan. You reek.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, that's insane. Poor frogs. And also, that sounds like something that could make you way sicker than a hangover. I know. Yeah, I put a dead frog in there.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
Just humans trying to outsmart a nasty habit that we should probably quit doing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
So I walked to the parking structure at the end of the night and it's full of cars. And I find what I think is my friend's car. And of course, it's not my friend's car. And I go, oh, they're not here. I should just wait for them. So I didn't want them to run me over. I didn't want anybody else to run me over. So my idea was to get up onto the hood or the trunk or whatever of that car and lay down.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, I've heard of this only in the context of you eat something really bad and then it's in your stomach and you should take it and then you're supposed to vomit. It's not like, oh, there's something in my body and blood. I'm going to take this. You eat something that you know is bad and you take it and then you puke up the whole shebang.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, kind of. And it's supposed to absorb stuff, but then you're supposed to get rid of it, not just digest it. A lot of these cures, they sound worse than the hangover. Can you sweat it out by exercising? That used to be one of my strategies. As I mentioned, drink all night, go to the gym.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
Okay. So I'm going to go ahead and guess saunas are also not something you should maybe do.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah. Going for a swim or whatever. So can we get hungover from other things? Is there a such thing as a weed hangover, for example?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
That's funny because it sounds like many of the things we try to use to cure hangovers actually just cause hangovers.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
Good. I should probably wean them off the goods.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, that's the spirit. So the medical answer here is pretty boring. Drink water and don't fall for consuming weird substances.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
So that way they would see me when they were done and they would go, hey, Jordan, wake up. We're going to go home. So I lay down on the car. Again, the whole garage is full of cars because it's some hotel parking garage or something like that. And then in the morning I wake up and I go, oh, I'm still on a car. Wait a minute. That wasn't a good idea.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
Solid advice. So bottom line, folks, hangovers suck. There's no miracle cure. You just have to face the music on that Spotify playlist. Deal with your life choices and remember that this too shall pass. Or you'll eventually crawl to the next bad decision with a little extra help from your friends in the alcohol industry.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
Look, in all seriousness, talk to a healthcare professional if regular hangovers affect your quality of life, your personal relationships, your performance at school or work, because the whole I might be an alcoholic thing is real serious, and if you can nip it in the bud early, that is much better than living a decade or more with this. Treatment for problems with alcohol is widely available.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
I don't really drink that much anymore. All the jokes aside from this episode, I'm like a one drink per month kind of guy at this rate. And usually it's like, I'm going to have an old fashioned with my lunch for someone's birthday. And I never look back and think, oh, I wish I drank more. If anything, drinking as much as I did in my twenties and thirties is one of my biggest regrets.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
So I highly recommend people get off the sauce the earlier, the better. Thank you, Jessica, for distilling this wisdom and officially ruining any hope all of us had of an actual hangover cure. And yeah, maybe we should all just stop drinking. Yeah, I'll drink to that. Cheers. Thank you all for listening. Topic suggestions and feedback direct to me, jordan at jordanharbinger.com.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
Show notes on the website, advertisers, deals, discounts, and ways to support the show, all at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. I'm also at jordanharbinger on Twitter and Instagram. You can also connect with me on LinkedIn. You can find Jessica on her multiple sub stacks. One is between the lines and the other one is where shadows linger, which sounds pretty ominous.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
We'll link to both of those in the show notes. And remember, we rise by lifting others. Share the show with those you love. If you found the episode useful, please share it with somebody else who could use a good dose of the skepticism and knowledge that we doled out today. Maybe somebody who thinks they got a hangover cure, they might need to hear this one.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
In the meantime, I hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn. And we'll see you next time. You're about to hear a preview of The Jordan Harbinger Show about how hormonal birth control can affect a woman's personality and even influence who they pick as a partner.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
And I look around and the entire garage is empty except for the car that I'm on. What? Which only to me means someone came out and was like, oh, hell no. There's a guy on my car and went back into that hotel or whatever you needed to do. Got a ride from a friend. I'm lucky I didn't get woken up by the cops.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
To hear more from Dr. Sarah Hill about the problems with taking birth control, check out episode 280 of The Jordan Harbinger Show. This episode is sponsored in part by What Was That Like podcast. Have you ever wondered how it feels to watch your house burn down, be attacked by an alligator, or learn that your spouse hired someone to kill you?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
What Was That Like is the podcast for you, if you're that person. Not the person who got hired to be killed, but the person who wondered, more thankfully. Real people come on every episode to explain the unbelievable situations they've been through. I think it's a funny concept for a show. I kind of wish I'd thought of it because I always get crazy stories from people.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
Not everything turns into a Jordan Harbinger episode. But What Was That Like? is hosted by my friend Scott Johnson, who's naturally curious and gives his guests the opportunity to share how they've really felt during some of their most surreal experiences. What they did in the morning before an earthquake, what song was playing as a gunman entered, was their stomach growling as they hid?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
Guests share everything they remember about their crazy, crazy experiences. So if you want to hear some disturbing slash inspiring firsthand stories about the thoughts that go through your head while surviving a kidnapping or winning the Price is Right, What Was That Like? is the podcast you've been looking for.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
Every story is thoroughly researched and fact-checked so you know even the most unreal stories are actually someone's reality. Listen to What Was That Like? wherever you get your podcasts.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
And I look around and I call my friend and he goes, where are you? And I go, I'm outside. He goes, outside where? And I was like, just generally outside. Yeah. Okay, when you find the house, come on in. Here's the address. I'll text it to you again. I'm going back to sleep. So after that, I was like, this is not healthy. This is a bad idea. Look, this is, again, it's in my 20s.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
This is a long time hence. That was one of the major wake-up calls for me. I remember telling people, like, it's a funny story, and people just going, yo, man, you need to stop drinking. And I was like, maybe you're right. So the worst hangovers involve a promise to never drink again until the next time, of course. Yeah. Yeah, always, always.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
So it's obvious to me when I'm hungover, but are there clinical symptoms? I have headaches, but there's a lot more going on.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
Welcome to Skeptical Sunday. I'm your host, Jordan Harbinger. Today, I'm here with Skeptical Sunday co-host, Jessica Wynn. On the Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the stories, secrets, and skills of the world's most fascinating people and turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, some hangovers are way more manageable than others. It's definitely unpredictable, but why are we doing this to ourselves? Any idea?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
Somewhere where watering holes are, yes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
So that's interesting. They go, hey, there's a lot of fresh water over there. And everyone's like, ah, don't be such a loser. Come to this one. This is the one that has booze in it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
That's really funny. Like, hey, we need to drink water to survive and maybe get a little bit of a buzz. Maybe just a little bit. We can always drink more water. There's water everywhere, man. Chill. Humans love to drink. I didn't realize this is literally one of the oldest human and animal traditions.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
So is there a science behind hangovers? Is there a technical definition? Somebody studied this. Lots of people.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
Our mission is to help you become a better informed, more critical thinker. And during the week, we have long-form conversations with a variety of incredible people from spies to CEOs, athletes, authors, thinkers, and performers.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
But why do we feel like death warmed over the day after a few drinks? I get that it's from drinking, but what is happening in our bodies?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
So cavemen were hungover too, I guess. We have that in common with our ancestors. That must have been a tough day after a rotten fruit binge because you don't have Netflix back then. It's like, oh, you still want to eat today? Well, you better get your ass up.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
At least it's nice and cool in there. I guess you got that going for you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, but why after all this time does it still make us feel so horrible? You'd think we would have evolved like all the people that got hangovers from drinking, they stopped drinking so they died. I don't get it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
On Sundays, though, it's Skeptical Sunday, where a rotating guest co-host and I break down a topic you may have never thought about and debunk common misconceptions about that topic. Topics such as why tipping makes no sense, circumcision, chemtrails, recycling, astrology, acupuncture, Reiki healing, ear candling, crystal healing, and more.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
I can't help but wonder if in my 20s there was an app to help you drink a certain amount. I would have used it and it would have been all OK. But maybe I'm lucky that I had to count on myself to moderate. Failed ridiculously. And now I don't really drink at all. But here's the other thing. I don't get hungover every time that I drink, in the past even.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
Like I said, it used to be get up after drinking all night in your 20s and just go to the gym. And you're fine. You probably reek, but whatever. You feel fine.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
What other components? So there's other things in booze other than alcohol that make us hungover?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
What are congeners? I know what sugars and additives might be, but congeners is a new one for me.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
I see. So one, that's why I feel like I'm dying after a whiskey binge, but two, that's why all these... Russians and like Yugoslav people are like, you have to drink this. It will not make you hungover. And the truth is like it makes you hungover, but you can drink a gallon of it because there's no congeners because they made it in their bathtub or something. Yeah, got it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1131: Hangover Cures | Skeptical Sunday
And if you're new to the show or you're looking for a way to tell your friends about it, I suggest our episode starter packs. These are collections of our favorite episodes on persuasion and negotiation, psychology and disinformation, crime and cults, and more. It'll help new listeners get a taste of everything we do here on the show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
So it's not because you're convinced that the public schools are going to transform your kid into like liberal transgender communist ham ass supporter or something like that. You have actual kind of other reasons for distrusting them.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
Our mission is to help you become a better informed, more critical thinker. During the week, we have long-form conversations with a variety of amazing folks, from spies to CEOs, athletes, authors, thinkers and performers. On Sundays, though...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
If you haven't signed up yet for our newsletter, We Bit Wiser, it comes out every Wednesday. It's a little gem from us to you. Something practical, something you can use and apply in your daily life that will affect your psychology and your relationships. And it usually comes from one of our thousand plus episodes here of the show. Again, you can sign up at jordanharbinger.com slash news.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
And we'd love to see you there. It's a great companion to the show. All right, now back to Skeptical Sunday. Also ich möchte klar sein, und ich weiß nicht, was deine Meinung ist, vielleicht werde ich nicht fragen, aber ich denke nicht, dass Schulen Kinder gay machen oder so etwas. Ich benutze das als Beispiel. Ich auch nicht. Ja, genau.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
We do Skeptical Sunday, where a rotating guest co-host and I break down a topic you may have never thought about and debunk common misconceptions about that topic. Topics like why the Olympics are kind of a sham, why tipping makes no sense, acupuncture, astrology, recycling, diet pills, energy drinks and more.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
That's true. Few people are solving differences at work through fist fights. I'm sure there's an exception.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
Looking back, I've only gotten in fights in school and my job as a bouncer where I was completely in the line of fire for things like physical violence with drunk people at clubs after hours.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
Ja, und Bars, die voll von Riff-Raff sind, wo ich in Downtown Detroit gearbeitet habe. Du gehst in einen Kampf einmal im Jahr oder so in der Kinderhochschule und dann vielleicht, wenn du am niederen Ende der Skala bist, wirst du in einen Locker in der Hochschule geschossen.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
Das ist nicht wirklich passiert in meiner Schule, aber ich weiß, dass Menschen, naja, ich sollte das nicht sagen, das ist nicht bei mir passiert. At my school. It very possibly happened to other people and I just don't know about it. But you're right. Once you get into college, if somebody beats you up, they're getting arrested, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, it's a thing that most people stop doing. And maybe if you're on a sports team, they haze you. But I don't think that's quite the same thing. But yeah, you have an issue with government schools being run by the government. You have an issue with the government doing literally anything. So that does color these episodes that we do together.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
But I want to say, if I wanted to get the same viewpoint that I always get, I would just do these episodes myself. Yeah, continue.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
And if you're new to the show or you're looking for a handy way to tell your friends about it, I suggest our episode starter packs. These are a great place to begin. There are collections of our favorite episodes on persuasion, negotiation, psychology, disinformation, cyber warfare, crime and cults and more to help new listeners get a taste of everything we do here on the show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
Ich glaube, Lehrer sind unbezahlt. Ich glaube, öffentliche Schulen sind super unterfunded. Und ich weiß, dass viele Lehrer sehr wichtig sind. Und die meisten von ihnen tun das Beste, was sie können. Zumindest diejenigen, die ich auf dem Show höre, tun das Beste, was sie können. Mit 30 Kindern, die sie nicht hören wollen. Kein Budget.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
Und sie spenden oft ihr eigenes Geld, damit sie Arbeitsmarker in der Klasse haben, um Dinge zu tun. Und... I think the decisions that have turned public schools into the mess they seem to be were made largely by legislators and some administrators and very rarely by hardworking teachers who are busting their butts to teach a room full of kids who throw chairs at them all day.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
I think you might disagree, but that's where I stand on this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
So damning and unusual silence from Nick on that one. But let's stick to the hard facts. How many people are actually doing this? It seems like there are way more now than there were back in our days, kids. But that's all I got.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
Do you think that's fair, though, yanking your kids out of public school because their teacher is a Democrat, or am I misunderstanding you?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
Just visit jordanharbinger.com slash start or search for us in your Spotify app to get started. Heute auf dem Show, Homeschooling. Vorher das Domain von schrecklichen Kulten oder super religiösen Leuten.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
Okay, there's a reference that I have not heard in a minute. Wow.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
Can they just do that though? How does it work? Can you just yank your kids out of school for whatever reason?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
So are you personally in favor of the free-for-all homeschooling laws or lack of laws? Yes, absolutely. So can I ask why? Shouldn't there be some standards?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
You've convinced me I'm pulling the kids out tomorrow. Yeah, no. They go to a weirdo private school where they make mud pies and learn Chinese and the classrooms are like these little trailers where they sit on the floor and roll around and do stuff and maybe they sit there for a little bit and then they go outside and spray each other with water or something.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
Homeschooling ist über die letzten paar Jahrzehnte viel mehr mainstream geworden, besonders als öffentliche Schulung, nämlich hier in den Vereinigten Staaten, eine ziemlich schlechte Rappung bekommen hat. Ich weiß, dass viele Leute an diesem Thema starke Opinionen haben, also bin ich hier mit professionell starker Opinion-Haver Nick Pell, um uns auf Homeschooling zu schulen.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
It's funny because they're wearing these uniforms, but they're filthy and we're like, so do you change them? And they're like, no, it's okay for kids to be dirty. And I'm like, yeah, that's a really good point. Who cares?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
I feel like you're judging me for having my kids in any kind of school at all.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, I think that's a really good point. If you know that you are not educated enough to do it, send your kid to government school. If you know that you're going to explode at your kid and want to strangle them and they're going to be scared the whole time, send your kid to government school.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
And if you don't have time because you're at work all day, you don't really have a choice, send your kid to government school. But I think put me in the not patient enough column for sure. Alright, so I think you've raised some fair objections to public schools, but what about private schools? My kids, they don't go to a public school. They go to a private school.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
And it wasn't because we're fancy pants or whatever. I didn't want 35 kids in a classroom. I thought that was a recipe for disaster.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
Kannst du kurz erklären, was das ist, für Leute, die es nicht wissen? Nicht jeder ist auf der Freizeit auf dem riesigen logistischen und bürokratischen Mess, das ist, eine Schule für deine Kinder zu finden, die du tatsächlich magst. Und ich weiß, Montessori ist eine große Sache. Ich habe es sogar über und über gehört, aber ich weiß nicht genau, was das ist.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
So tell me about homeschooling, man, because when we were kids, it was really only the weird family at the end of the block who did this. And then you found out when they ended up on the news or whatever, that they had 19 kids that you never saw and they went to church in somebody's basement or whatever. So how did this all start?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
Exactly. No, Jaden asks me questions like that. He's like, how do I see things? And you realize you're either going to make it up or you're going to watch a YouTube video about it. And then you think, I probably shouldn't just make it up. So I've learned, sometimes I'm like, am I teaching him or is he teaching me? He's asking these like fundamental questions about light.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
Like, why is there a rainbow when the sun comes through the window in the bathroom? And it's because the shower door is like bending light into different waves and reflecting it off the toilet. And I could not explain that. I realized I had no idea.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
What else is out there besides Montessori schools? I know there's, what is it, Waldorf-Method?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
What? That does not sound ideal. What do I know? I can't really do math and I'm 44, but not learning how to read until you're 8, that doesn't sound right.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
Wie funktioniert das Mixed-Age-Ding? Das klingt wie ein Zimmer, eine Schule, ein kleines Haus in der Prairie. Und tatsächlich, das ist einer von denen, wo ich jetzt denke, ich wette, das funktioniert wirklich gut, weil es klein ist und die älteren Kinder helfen den jüngeren Kindern. Ich weiß nicht.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
What about cost, private school versus homeschool? I have no idea how much homeschooling costs, and unfortunately I do know how much private school costs.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
Savings like that each year. Let's just say I'm starting to feel the Holy Spirit myself up in here. I might find Jesus and retire a decade early with savings like that. That is significant. You could basically pay for my entire kids' education with a couple of years of private school. That's massive.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
Jahrhundert stattgefunden wurden. Also damals waren viele Menschen nicht überhaupt gebildet. Das ist, wenn du über einen alten, berühmten Figuren liest, und es ist so, dass sie um neun Jahre alt aus der Schule gelaufen sind, um Holz im Hintergrund zu schneiden. Und du denkst dir, oh Gott. Und dann ist es wie Abraham Lincoln.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, it seems like maybe because Alaska, the nearest school, is 13 miles away in three foot deep snow, surrounded by wildlife that wants to kill and eat you, but... You know, it's a great use of all the money you're saving on private school fees. Something from the fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
Thank you for listening to and supporting the show. It is your support of our advertisers that keeps the lights on around here. All the deals, discount codes and ways to support the show are searchable and clickable over at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. Now for the rest of Skeptical Sunday. Let me play devil's advocate here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
What about parents that are homeschooling their kids, but they're just making like no effort to actually educate them other than because they can't or they just don't actually care?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
You mean researching the subject, just not child torture. Just to be clear, everyone. Hey, yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
Oh, das ist so schrecklich. Das ist so schrecklich.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
grad students who study these things these days because he just had a passion for knowledge and like a lot of people before television and the internet his hobby was reading and not doom scrolling instagram for hours at a time yeah but what about modern homeschooling because that's obviously a different thing than growing up in an area that like maybe didn't have a school at all and most people dropped out in third grade it's different that's like my mom taught us all about science and she doesn't believe in anything and dinosaurs are fake
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
Und ich glaube, du glaubst, dass diese 400 Kinder wertvoll sind.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
Also zu Ihrem Punkt, wir haben bereits ein System, das die Kinder verhindern sollte, wenn sie verabschiedet werden, während sie heimgeschult werden. Aber das System fehlt. Also die Antwort ist, verbessere das System. Mach nicht ein viel mehr invasives System, das auch vielleicht nicht wirklich funktioniert. Okay, also gehen wir von diesem anerkannten grünen Thema weiter.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
We heard why you wanted to homeschool your kid, but are there statistics on why other people do it? Because I'm guessing motivations are wildly different, ranging from we only want to teach religion at home to the government schools around me are really bad or dangerous or whatever. There's got to be a lot of reasons why people do this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
Und ich denke, all diese sind perfekte und legitime Gründe, dein Kind nach Hause zu schulen. Ich wundere mich, ob das nur die Erhöhung des verrückten Schulschutzes seit 2007 ist. Das ist, was es mir klingt.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
Ich spekuliere natürlich, weil ich denke, oh ja, Gangs und Schulen und Bullying und vielleicht ist das Teil davon, aber ich wundere mich, ob es auch, hey, ich weiß es nicht, du gehst zur Schule mit einem Bunch von... People and the parents might be insane or have guns around all over and the kids are maladjusted and not being paid attention to. That scares me and Jen too.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
We're worried about that kind of thing. I think a lot of parents are worried about that kind of thing. And we thought about homeschooling them because of that and then we realized that we couldn't do it, most likely.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
I also vaguely remember my high school educational environment being a mixture of, how do I put this, fashion show, battle royale style wrestling match and sleep deprivation competition, if you will, all in one. All that still doesn't mean that compared to us public school scrubs, the homeschooled kids are actually getting a good education though.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
But I just remember not being able to focus much on school because it was like... Yeah, I did research the outcomes and I think the outcomes matter.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
So this is probably a dumb question, but why do you assume that homeschooled parents are more engaged? By definition they have to be, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
Das geht wahrscheinlich auch für öffentliche Kinder. Kinder, die mehr sozial sind, haben bessere soziale Fähigkeiten. Große Überraschung. Okay, und was ist mit dem Nachwuchs? Mehr das langfristige Ergebnis des Homeschooling.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, I'm curious about trades. I'm surprised to hear they're less likely to go to college, given what you said earlier about parental engagement and all that. What's the deal with math performance, do you think?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
I don't even remember what trig is. It sounds like something to do with shapes. Triangles. Triangles, got it, okay. I remember liking that one, but I hopped out at pre-cal or whatever it's called. What other outcome-based data do we have?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
20.000 Euro pro Jahr mehr, was ich als beeindruckend und bedeutend finde. Das ist interessant. Also sind sie weniger möglich, nach der Schule zu gehen, aber sie sind mehr möglich, eine bedeutende Menge mehr Geld zu verdienen als die Anzahl. Das macht mich fast so, als ob ein paar von ihnen in die Verhandlungen gehen und Jobs bekommen, die tatsächlich existieren oder so etwas. Ich bin gespannt.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
Es gibt wahrscheinlich nicht genug Daten darüber, aber das ist ziemlich kompensierend.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
Ja, schau, du kannst wahrscheinlich eine signifikante Menge Geld dafür machen. Einen zusätzlichen 20.000 Euro pro Jahr zu verdienen, ist eigentlich nicht so hart, wenn du die sogenannten Produktionsebenen besitzt. Du bist derjenige, der die Karten verdient. Und das ist ziemlich kompelling.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
Es ist nicht kompelling genug, um mich mit meinen Regretten den ganzen Tag zu beschäftigen, aber es ist kompelling.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, I'll tell you, man, if I had started school an hour later, which I was able to do my junior year because I was able to shuffle classes around, if I'd started school an hour later and actually gotten adequate sleep, there was a couple of guys that disrupted the entire class in any class they were in. Like, they would be spitting on people.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
And I remember complaining and being like, can we get rid of that guy? He's the only guy in class that's yelling and spitting and playing music and being a jerk. And they're like, trust me, we have tried to get rid of this kid for his entire high school career. There's a reason he's a sixth year senior.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
Really, like to be away from that, it would have been an extra 10 to 15 percent of mental bandwidth for everybody who had to be within 10 feet of that idiot. So say that people want to evaluate homeschooling. How do they go about that?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
For what it's worth, I think you've been pretty fair about this, other than the teacher thing, which I disagree with. Especially given that I know you have really strong opinions about homeschool and an obvious, in case anyone hasn't noticed, libertarian lean. So I appreciate you coming through on this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
I know. I'm trying to avoid getting a bunch of hate mail, but thanks for reminding everybody to warm that keyboard up after this episode.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
Thanks for the education today, Nick. And thanks to you all for listening. Topic suggestions for future episodes of Skeptical Sunday to Jordan at jordanharbinger.com. Hate mail to that same address. Show notes on the website at jordanharbinger.com. Advertisers, deals, discounts and ways to support the show all at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. I'm at jordanharbinger on Twitter and Instagram.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
You can also connect with me on LinkedIn. This show is created in association with Podcast One. My team is Jen Harbinger, Jace Sanderson, Robert Fogarty, Ian Baird and Gabriel Mizrahi. Our advice and opinions are our own and I'm a lawyer but not your lawyer. Do your own research before implementing anything you hear on the show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
Also, we may get a few things wrong here and there, especially on Skeptical Sunday. If you think we really dropped the ball on something, definitely let us know. Y'all know how to reach me. Remember, we rise by lifting others. Share the show with those you love.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
And if you found the episode useful, please share it with somebody else who could use a good dose of the skepticism and knowledge we doled out today. In the meantime, I hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn. And we'll see you next time. Untertitelung des ZDF, 2020
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
What was so compelling about the idea of teaching your own kids? Because the idea of keeping my kids home from school all day and trying to get them to sit still and listen to me, it's one of my worst nightmares. I don't know how I could possibly do that. A lot of parents say that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
For more with Terry Crews, check out Episode 830 of The Jordan Harbinger Show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
I can get behind that. They definitely crush your spirit and curiosity. That's called first grade, right? That was the idea, almost, behind that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
And it was in the 80s when things really changed. So back then, maybe you actually needed to know how to teach your kids. It seems like a good idea. What changed in the 80s?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
Ich glaube, wir haben Evangelikalen im Publikum. Ich bin eigentlich interessiert, ihre Gedanken darüber zu hören, besonders wenn sie nach Hause geholt wurden. Und auch um klar zu sein, wir blamen nicht Evangelikalen für den Start eines seltsamen Hochschulkultes, oder?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, I know you are one of those people with super strong opinions about homeschooling since, as you said, you were a homeschooled dad for a while for your own son. And I have to say, again, to be clear, I admire people who do this. As I implied earlier, I really don't think I have the patience for it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
I know that's a separate point, but okay, if you want to teach your kids that evolution doesn't exist, look, I disagree with you on that and I think you should teach science, but I'm also sort of in awe of the fact that you can get your kid to sit still to listen to that. And also that you care enough to do that. It's such a heavy lift.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
Ich habe dich schon lange kennengelernt und es sah ein bisschen aus, wie du es tun kannst. Ich fühle mich, als hätte ich lernen können, wie man es tut, aber es klingt einfach furchtbar. I think it's awesome that your son is so interested in those subjects. My son thinks science means blowing things up because he watches YouTube, but he's not wrong.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
That is definitely one of the funnest parts of science. And maybe you can tell by my use of the word funnest that I was not homeschooled.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
Ungewöhnlich. Es ist nicht ungewöhnlich. Nein, es ist nicht. Meine Mutter war eine öffentliche Lehrerin in Michigan. Wir hatten große Klassenräume. Sie hat mir gesagt, dass ihre Freunde, die noch arbeiten, noch größere Klassenräume hatten. Ich lebe in Kalifornien. Ich stelle meine Kinder in die Schule. Eine der ersten Dinge, die wir fragen, ist, wie viele Kinder in der Klassenräume sind.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
Es kann von 20 bis 35 sein, je nach der Schule für öffentliche Schulen. Und das ist unglaublich groß für einen oder sogar zwei Lehrer. Und es gibt viele Lehrer, die schon in den Show geschrieben haben, die wirklich verletzt sind. Und sie sagen Dinge wie, sie geben zehn Kinder in meinen Klassenraum. Zehn Kinder! Und es ist wie, oh mein Gott, das ist ein ganzer Klassenraum.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
Und ich habe einfach genug Zeit, wie ich gesagt habe, mit zwei meiner eigenen, oder sogar mit einem. Jaden zu sitzen und zu lesen ist schwer. Zwei oder drei Wörter zu lesen. Also kann ich nicht mal 30 oder mehr vorstellen, die natürlich auch denken, dass sie mich nicht hören müssen, weil ich nicht ihr Vater bin.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, man, that makes sense. Like I said, Jaden's got like a five-minute attention span. I don't even really think it's five minutes. I think it's five adult minutes, but I think in reality it's more like 30 to 60 seconds at a time. And then he wants to like spin around once or lay on the floor and get back up or do something else for a minute.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
And he's five years old, but when I'm patient with him, which is not my strong suit, he can read, he can do the thing. But he needs to run around the table or like jump off the couch and land in a pillow and then do the next word. It's just the thing. He can't do that in a classroom. So we're a little bit nervous about how school is going to go for him.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
Das ist, warum wir damals, in unserem Tag, morgens um die dumme Uhr aufgetreten waren, um für die Schule bereit zu werden, etwas zu essen, das nach Pizza riecht, um 10.30 Uhr. Und um 2 Uhr waren wir fertig. Aber damals war es, rauszuholen und die Felder zu helfen oder was auch immer. Und Hey, I get it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
It sounds like it sucks from the kids' perspective, but other than it sucks, what's really wrong with that?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
Welcome to Skeptical Sunday. I'm your host, Jordan Harbinger. Today I'm here with Skeptical Sunday co-host, writer and researcher Nick Pell. On the Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the stories, secrets and skills of the world's most fascinating people and turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
Er liest Bücher für 5. Jährige zu Hause. Das klingt wirklich interessant. Also sie haben ihn mit null Kontext zu lesen. Und schau, ich bin kein Lehrer, aber das klingt nicht so, wie es die Leute lesen. Und ich kann sympathisieren. Ich studiere Chinesisch, richtig? Also muss ich Flashcards machen, um die Wörter schneller zu lernen. Und ich lese auch Dinge in Chinesisch.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
Aber wenn ich Flashcards mache, Man, I miss a lot of those words because there's no context. So if it looks like something else, I just end up guessing between those two and I get it wrong sometimes. The Chinese symbolic equivalent of could versus cloud. If you say he looked up and he saw a could in the sky, you would know that you read it wrong and you would say cloud to yourself.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1119: Home Schooling | Skeptical Sunday
With a flashcard, it's isolated and you don't get that. So you're right, it's not a natural way to read or learn. And I'm actually quite surprised that a teacher did that because... I'm kind of going, what am I missing, where that's not obviously the wrong way to test this particular thing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
Oh, yeah. And then you lose more hair and you stress more because you're going bald and you're losing more hair in the shower. I've actually personally, when business would be like really bad, I've had some periods where I was so stressed, my hair was falling out in clumps.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
Not like you pull it and there's a big bald spot, but you're just like, oh, normally when I shower, there's 10 hairs on the ground. Now there's 50 hairs. And it's my morning shower and then my evening shower for the gym. And it's, oh, God, it's really terrifying because you just think there's no going back. Luckily, that stress stopped.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
And I guess my hair grew back because I still have all my hair or at least most of it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
So what happens on average at age 50? Do we know?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
Except for... I have one stray eyebrow hair... And this thing, the antigen phase is considerably longer, possibly infinite. Jen, she'll be like, oh, hold on, I gotta get this thing. And she'll pluck this sucker, and of course I wanna see it. But if she let this thing go, it would interfere with my eating. This thing goes inches long, and it's just amazing and gross.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
And it's one of those things where I'm like, okay, when we're both 80, you're not gonna be able to see that, and I'm not gonna be able to see that, and our grandkids are gonna be like, holy crap, grandpa's got an eyebrow that's wrapped around his whole head twice.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
Kind of like me. That's a dark turn. For a guy that just witnessed the first antigen phase joke in history, I mean, we should be excited about that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
So the issue stems from testosterone, as in the male hormone. That's why Hippocrates maybe noticed eunuchs, aka guys with no testicles, all kept their hair. Once castrated, I guess a guy would, has no testosterone. Well, that can't be right.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, that makes sense. It's been a minute, but that seems obvious now. So why is it that younger men who have more testosterone, right? Their stuff's healthy. They got those 900 counts or whatever. Why do they have more hair? Shouldn't it be less? And why, if women have testosterone... don't they also experience hair loss at similar rates as men? And I know that's two questions, but
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
No, I actually have to go into the office and prove that I'm me because otherwise it's just too unbelievable that Jordan Harbinger would get a ski pass in California where he lives.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
So here's where I assume you're going to tell us about all the drugs on the market that deal with DHT and whatnot.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
I haven't, but that sounds super painful. Needles in general, but microneedling just sounds like there's a lot of needles happening.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
Okay, unnecessary jab at acupuncture, although we've done our Skeptical Sunday on that as well. What is microneedling, though, exactly? I mean, it sounds like a zillion small needles. Am I close?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
Obvious question. Does it hurt because a roller device with tons of small needles on it? Sounds like it hurts quite a bit, actually.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
I suppose that makes sense. The idea of doing that to myself, though, is making me feel a little bit sick. Are there any, I don't like herbal treatments that are doing anything?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
DHT, which causes hair loss. And that's why before people right now, they're like warming up their emails like, testosterone doesn't just randomly convert, there's an enzyme. We know, we just, we didn't want to have to draw hexagons all over the script for this episode and explain it. But we're taking some serious shortcuts.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
It reminds me, do you ever see Starship Troopers, that movie?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, I mean, a million years ago, right? But it reminds me of when they were getting a tattoo of their unit, when there's the montage of them bonding and having fun and going out and getting wasted and stuff. Instead of going to a tattoo place, they just hold their arm in front of these lasers that burn the tattoo into their skin, and they're like, yeah, because they're hammered.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
But it does feel right for a 21st century treatment. It would be weird... If the key to hair loss turned out to be opium and donkey hooves, that would be the surprise.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
No way. How is that possible? Everybody's been drinking coffee for, what, centuries? And tea before that for a thousand years? If caffeine cured baldness, there would just be no baldness. Except for Mormons. They're blonde and have that thick hair, but they abstain from caffeine. Those guys would all be bald.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah. Okay. I always thought it was caffeine. Hot drinks. That's a kind of a weird prohibition. I understood the caffeine because it gives you a mood lift and maybe that was the logic. But now we just don't want you to have warm stuff. Kind of a little bit more abstracted. We could get into Mormons another day. No, no, no. I'm trying to be respectful.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
They know how I feel about spiritual belief, but they're still welcome to listen to the show and learn about hair loss. Absolutely. Don't worry, Mormons. God bless.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
Hair loss is no joke. It can lead to serious depression and baldness, for that matter.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
Wow. So are people rubbing coffee on their heads, which I guess is brown like some people's hair. And also not as bad as horse teeth and pigeon poop, but comes in slightly behind opium in terms of the fun factor.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
Ooh, I'm glad you told us it's a caffeine cream. I get some emails from people that I'm like, we did not advise you to do that on Feedback Friday. That's the whole do your own research before applying anything you hear on the show. And people are like, of course I will, because I don't want a dozen emails from people who dump scalding hot black coffee on their head as a result of this episode.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
And they're like, yeah, it also promotes blood flow and it has caffeine. People have done some insane stuff as a result of the advice here. So I am highlighting that it's likely a prescription caffeine cream that is for applying to your head. What about the biggest dog on the balding block, which is Rogaine? And not to be confused with Spotify's most popular podcaster.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
Wow. Okay. So it started as ulcer medication, switched to a blood pressure medication, then switched to hair loss medicine. So they just sort of, it seems like they just tripped and stumbled into the hair game.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
Oh man, that's a hell of a catchphrase. Minoxidil, grow hair and breasts, and also maybe completely lose interest in sex and life altogether. That's horrible.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
Actually, I thought that was something else, but I have heard of that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
Wait, you're saying these girls grew penises? Tell me what you mean right now, Michael Regiglio. This is so bizarre.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
Right. OK. Oh, my God. I have no idea what this has to do with people growing hair. But I think everyone's on the same page when I say we absolutely are going down this rabbit hole right now. People growing a penis spontaneously is way more interesting than anything else we could have planned for this show. So can we do that? That's this is so weird.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
Hair is important, I guess, to both men and women, as long as it's in the right place.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
Hey ladies, did you grow a penis at age 12? If not, console yourself with the fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back. This episode is sponsored in part by Flykit. If you travel internationally, you know how brutal jet lag can be. It used to wipe me out for days, sometimes even weeks after a trip, and as I get older, it kind of seems longer.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
Until I found Flykit, which is an amazing, really, truly, like kind of a miracle product. I've used it on countless trips. And I've heard from many of you who've tried it as well, saying how much it helped you beat jet lag and actually enjoy your time overseas. So this isn't just like a pill you take, all right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
It's a smart algorithm-based system that creates personalized schedules tailored to your trip. It tells you when to eat, when to sleep, when to take supplements, makes it feel like you've got a personal travel assistant in your pocket. And again, not a random product.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
FlyKit is backed by research originally designed for Navy SEALs and fighter pilots to combat the inflammation and exhaustion from flying. And I know you're thinking like, oh yeah, sure, Navy SEALs. Now, this is my friend's company. I've used this product for half a decade now. Every time I fly across at least like two, three time zones, the AI, well, of course, AI, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
It times everything perfectly from your light exposure to your meals, all customized to you and your travel itinerary. So if you're tired of losing days to jet lag on your trip and when you get home, give FlyKit a try. It's compact. It's organized. The app walks you through every step. The whole process is super easy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
Head over to Flykit.com. That's Flykit with two Ts and use promo code Jordan to get 15% off your first order. That's Flykit, F-L-Y-K-I-T-T.com, promo code Jordan. Try it out on your next trip and seriously, let us know how it works for you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
So the majority of our hair is not on our head, which I guess makes sense, surface area and all that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
This episode is also sponsored by Progressive. Let's face it, sometimes multitasking can be overwhelming. Like when your favorite podcast is playing, the person next to you is talking, your car fan is blasting, all while you're trying to find the perfect parking spot. But then again, sometimes multitasking is easy, like quoting with Progressive Insurance.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
Then you'll see Progressive's direct rate and their tool provide options from other companies all lined up and ready to compare, so it's simple to choose the rate and coverage you like. Press play on comparing auto rates. Quote at Progressive.com to join the over 28 million drivers who trust Progressive. Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and Affiliates.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
Comparison rates not available in all states or situations. Prices vary based on how you buy. This episode is also sponsored by Factor. Jen started ordering Factor meals a few months ago and it's been absolutely fantastic. She's juggling work, the kids, you name it, and Factor makes it easy to have delicious, healthy meals ready in just a few minutes, even when the in-laws come over.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
So yes, even my picky parents, there's something for everyone. They're actually impressed. And I have to say I am as well. I love the taste and the nutrition is actually there. I'm like the crap my parents usually eat. Jen loves that Factor tastes all the hassle out of mealtime. So there's no shopping. There's no prep. There's no cleanup. The meals are chef prepared and dietician approved.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
There are 35 options, 35 every week to pick from. So there's always something new to try. Plus extras like smoothies and pressed juices, which I kind of thought were going to be whack, but they're actually really good. It's perfect for feeding everybody without lifting a finger, and the meals, like I said, are super good. They're actually good, unlike a lot of these food delivery kind of services.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
I'm actually hooked as well. Factor's protein-packed meals were awesome for staying on track with my macros. I dieted, as you all know, a few months ago, and this is what I ate primarily. There's options like truffle butter filet mignon, garlic herb roasted barramundi, really next-level stuff that you usually don't get delivered to your house.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
Factor's cheaper than takeout, but the meals are just as good as something you would actually get at a restaurant. And since they're fresh, never frozen, you can actually trust the quality.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
Head to factormeals.com slash 50Jordan and use code 50Jordan to get 50% off your first box plus free shipping. That's code 50Jordan at factormeals.com slash 50Jordan to get 50% off your first box plus free shipping while your subscription is active.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
Thank you for listening to and supporting the show. It is your support of our sponsors that keeps the lights on around here. All the deals, discount codes, and ways to support the show are over on the website at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. Now, for the rest of Skeptical Sunday. So, OK, it's a genetic condition because I'm thinking, how have I never heard of this if it's so common?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
But this is starting to make some sense because Dominican Republic is on an island. And is Salinas also an island? I don't know. It's a small village. So what's the condition? Do we know anything? What's going on here?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
Our mission is to help you become a better informed, more critical thinker. During the week, we have long-form conversations with a variety of amazing folks, from spies to CEOs, athletes, authors, thinkers, performers.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
This is flat out incredible. So at birth, they're believed to be girls. It's not like some sort of weird superstitious thing. They look like maybe every other girl. They're raised as girls, and then it's like, oh, Miguel is actually a boy. Let's have a party. Yeah. Wow.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
That opens up a whole host of new questions, and we still haven't even discussed how this has anything to do with hair loss or finasteride. Oh, my gosh.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, I don't need to learn about guavidosis to understand that. Gay conversion has been an intellectually bankrupt idea for a long time. And this whole thing with the enzymes and stuff has profound implications for people that are transgender or all this stuff that we're just now beginning to fully understand. But you haven't told me how this has anything to do with finasteride.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
Wait, Finasteride is for hair growth, not enlarged prostates, or is it for both?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, it would be hard to miss those things. Hair regrowth products, they're having a moment right now, a big one. They're advertising targets more than just middle-aged dudes now, too. I remember as a kid, even, was this in the 90s, I guess, reciting the Rogaine commercial. That was in middle school. That was early 90s.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
I mean, that all sounds pretty good, but does it make you spontaneously, well, I guess if it makes you grow a penis, most guys would be fine with that. I don't know if women maybe should take this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
That all sounds pretty bad. Man, they never tell you to appreciate your side effect-free head of hair when you're young, do they? No, they don't.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
Hair is so important that we're going to risk erectile dysfunction, suicidal ideation. We're going to rub poop and opium on our scalp, stab ourselves in the head thousands of times to grow it or keep it. Yep. So that's vanity product number one. You were also going to tell us about collagen drinks, which just can't, sounds fake to me, and always has.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
It sounds cool, but it also kind of sounds like, oh, rhino horn makes your wee-wee work better. It's a little bit too much of a direct connection for me, but what exactly is collagen?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
So I assume our bodies make it. Why do I need to eat it, for example?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
Although I'm sure smoking sun and sipping booze deplete collagen, I'm guessing time is 90% of it or whatever the real factor at play here. There's just no amount of sobriety in the shade that's going to keep you from looking old.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
And where does all the collagen come from that we're gulping? Because it's going to be something gross for sure.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
Ooh, yeah, you did find a way to make this gross, too. However, it almost had to be, right? So, bravo. Before I imbibe cow-chicken-pish-fig juice, let me ask, does it actually work? Because if it does, I'll suffer through it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
All right, sounds great. Get them animals in the blender.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
OK, I've heard whey protein like protein made from egg whey. Basically, the stuff you see meatheads like me drinking on the regular is better for building muscle than collagen. And I will say, like the study shows that consuming protein helps with muscle growth. OK, that's not new.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, I'm doing okay in the battle to hold the hairline, but, like, all guys, I'm curious about the technology just in case I need it someday, which seems kind of inevitable.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, that's okay. We always have our jars of porcupine hair and pigeon crap for that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
Well, yeah, Hollywood. I mean, tans are out and spray tans are in and you see older folks that go to the beach every day and they look like they've smoked their whole life, even if they're super healthy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
I have noticed this and I thought, oh, is it the lighting? But it's like veneers plus teeth whitening plus makeup plus the lighting. And I have noticed some insanely white teeth out there, not just on TV as of late, especially when I go to L.A. for meetings. I'm like, what is with everyone's teeth? Just you got to wear sunglasses and look at these people smile.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
Back then, though, just having teeth at all was probably a sign of beauty and wealth. I mean, didn't people lose their teeth when they were like 20?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
Oh, this is, it's so weird. I did not expect this episode to be the grossest episode ever of Skeptical Sunday. I thought for sure it would be like circumcision or something like that. How did you make this grosser than the plastic surgery episode? It's really impressive.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
They washed their clothes in it. Oh, this is so far off the topic of teeth whitening, but tell me more.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
So everybody had a pot to piss in. Seems equitable. That's got to be where that expression comes from, for sure. Maybe not. Never mind.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
Oh my gosh. I barely trust my barber to cut my hair, but I can think of two things wrong with using a file and acid to whiten teeth. My gosh, that is, they made mistakes with that that just ended horribly.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
And the terrible side effects are... None. Really? Really. Wow.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, I almost wonder if the computer is making that worse, but they have to know. Gosh, her lips swelled up. It must have been the donkey hooves or whatever. But those giant white newscaster teeth always remind me of that movie Something About Mary. I was trying to think of the name of the movie.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
What about that bald spot? Are you going to do something about that?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
Thanks, Michael. And thank you for listening. Topic suggestions for future episodes of Skeptical Sunday to me, Jordan at jordanharbinger.com. Show notes on the website as well at jordanharbinger.com. Advertisers, deals, discounts, and ways to support the show, all at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. I'm at Jordan Harbinger on Twitter and Instagram. You can also connect with me on LinkedIn.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
You can find Michael Regilio at Michael Regilio on Instagram. Tour dates are up now as well. We'll link to that in the show notes because nobody can spell Regilio. This show is created in association with Podcast One. My team is Jen Harbinger, Jace Sanderson, Robert Fogarty, Ian Baird, Millie Ocampo, and Gabriel Mizrahi.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
Our advice and opinions are our own, and I'm a lawyer, but I'm not your lawyer, certainly not a doctor. So do your own research before implementing anything you hear on the show, especially when it involves putting something in or on your body. Also, we may get a few things wrong here and there, especially on Skeptical Sunday, because these topics are so involved.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
If you think we've really dropped the ball on something, definitely let us know. We're usually pretty receptive to that, and y'all know how to reach me, jordan at jordanharbinger.com. Remember, we rise by lifting others.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
Share the show with those you love, and if you found the episode useful, please share it with somebody else who could use a good dose of the skepticism and knowledge that we doled out today. In the meantime, I hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn, and we'll see you next time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
If you're looking for another episode of the Jordan Harbinger Show to sink your teeth into, here's a trailer for another episode that I think you might enjoy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
A thousand of you are going, oh, that's not a lot. That's a lot of people.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
So it's like you feel a draft, but also lasers. I mean, look, it's not that weird, but sitting alone in the row in front of your friends at the movies, that is weird.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
For more with A.J. Jacobs and his fascinating journey to thank everyone involved in his cup of morning coffee and an inside look at just how complex the supply chain of our lives really is, check out episode 174 of The Jordan Harbinger Show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
Welcome to Skeptical Sunday. I'm your host, Jordan Harbinger. Today I'm here with Skeptical Sunday co-host Michael Regilio. On the Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the stories, secrets, and skills of the world's most fascinating people and turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
On Sundays, though, we do Skeptical Sunday, where a rotating guest co-host and I break down a topic you may never have thought about and debunk common misconceptions about that topic. Topics such as why tipping makes no sense, circumcision, ear candling, crystal healing, diet pills, internet porn, and more.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
Even without doing research, though, I know that's not how it works.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
Wow. So this is like a personal episode for you. And I know that subliminal advertising is on the list, too. I'm wondering if maybe you should have researched that first, since these ads, they sure seem to have messed you up a little bit. But here we are.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
Ooh, dog paws and donkey hooves. I'm curious why they thought that would work.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
First, and spices. Second, once you got pigeon poop rubbed on your head, no one is thinking about your hair. That must have smelled horrendous and looked worse.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
And if you're new to the show or you're looking for a handy way to tell your friends about the show, Anyway, I suggest our episode starter packs. These are collections of our favorite episodes on persuasion, negotiation, psychology, disinformation, cyber warfare, crime and cults, and more.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
Wait, what, you mean the men who had their testicles cut off? That's some Game of Thrones stuff right there. Those guys never go bald, which is funny, because isn't the guy in Game of Thrones totally bald, the eunuch?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
Oh, I don't know. There's a lot of castration in that series, so I'd have to go back.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
I'm guessing no one ever decided to go with Hippocrates and just snip snip because they want to go bald. Seems like a bad trade.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
And I'm guessing that also did not work.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
I love that the Romans actually spent time, what, chiseling that into stone? A poem making fun of bald people? They're like, this needs to withstand the test of time. Make sure this one lasts.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
Man, Rome is a tough room. I'm actually more impressed that the poems rhyme in English. How did that happen?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
It's a hard look to pull off. First of all, you can spot one a mile away. No, no, no.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
It'll help new listeners get a taste of everything we do here on the show, or at least be intimidating enough to scare them away from the show. Just visit jordanharbinger.com slash start or search for us in your Spotify app to get started. Vanity. As kids, we're taught it's both bad to be vain and that we should look good.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
I'm thinking of a former president or that movie Kingpin where the guy's comb-over flops the other way while he's bowling. It's just hanging out like a platter. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
Oh, that's gross. Ground-up mice is gross. Yeah, it didn't work. Well, that's, yeah, no surprise there either. Ugh.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
In his case, a laurel wreath. Oh, I forgot about that. No, but seriously, ground-up mice? Why? What's the logic on that?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
Oh, gosh. More mice. What am I missing here? I mean, mice are hairy. Is that kind of where the logic begins and ends or what? I'm not sure, man.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, I mean, those are biodegradable. And of all the crazy things you've said on this show, and that list, by the way, is impressive, this one is actually kind of interesting. Time to invest in a wreath farm? Not just yet. Keep me in the loop. California agriculture is having a moment.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
That can't hurt, right? If you've got the blood flow going, you're washing yourself once a year or whatever the standard was in 1889. Come on.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
I've always heard that it's something like, oh, your grandfather on your mother's side, and if that guy's bald, you're in trouble. Is there truth to that at all?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
Vanity products like hair loss treatments, collagen drinks, teeth whitening products, they fill the shelves, they make billions of dollars. The fact is, it's good to look good. Today, skeptic, comedian, and guy feebly attempting to age with grace, Michael Regilio, is here to reflect on vanity products.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, to be fair, I've seen some modern examples of hair transplants that absolutely look unnatural. And I think we've all seen that. There's a few famous people with those bad 80s hair transplants, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
Ah, I'm surprised nobody ever tried sewing dead mice to the top of someone's head. I mean, when did that die out?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
You know what's better than sewing dead mice carcasses to your bald head? The fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back. This episode is sponsored in part by SimpliSafe. It's easy to forgo home security and think, what are the odds? But what if something did happen? Keeping your family and home safe is just too important to leave it up to chance.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
We trust SimpliSafe to handle it. It's the system we use and highly recommend it. Here's the thing about old school security systems. They wait until somebody's already inside your home to take action. And by then, obviously, it's too late. That's where SimpliSafe changes the game. Their active guard outdoor protection is next level. It doesn't just monitor your home.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
It actively stops intruders before they even get close to getting in. So if somebody's lurking around, they're acting shady, SimpliSafe's agents see it happening in real time. They talk to the person directly. They light up the spotlights. They can even call the police if they need to. It's like having a security team watching out for you 24-7.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
What I also love about SimpliSafe is how easy and affordable it is. There are no long-term contracts, no cancellation fees. It's just peace of mind for around a buck a day. For that price, it's a no-brainer. And this is your last chance to get SimpliSafe's top-notch security at the lowest prices they'll offer all year.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
SimpliSafe is extending its massive Black Friday deal for our listeners. So this week only, you can take 50% off any new system with a select professional monitoring plan. This is your last chance to claim their best offer of the year. Head to simplisafe.com slash Jordan to claim your discount and make sure your home is safe this season. Don't wait. This offer won't last long.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
Keep your home, your family, and your peace of mind protected with SimpliSafe. There's no safe like SimpliSafe.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
This episode is also sponsored by BetterHelp. You know what makes the holidays special? Those warm, cozy moments at home, the smell of pumpkin pie baking, the joy of sipping hot cocoa with the kids, that sense of togetherness. But there's another way to bring a little extra comfort and peace into your life, no matter what time of year it is. Therapy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
Therapy can be a powerful way to care for yourself and show up for the people you love.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
Find comfort this December with BetterHelp. Visit betterhelp.com slash Jordan today to get 10% off your first month. That's betterhelp.com slash Jordan.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
If you're wondering how I managed to book all these great authors, thinkers, and creators every single week, it's because of my network, the circle of people that I know, like, and trust. And I'm teaching you how to build yours for free over at sixminutenetworking.com. I know like networking is a kind of a cringey word.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
I don't know how recognizable I am, and yet, yes, I feel a little bit of pressure to look good. I was actually unable to upload a photo for my ski pass because the selfie I took was, quote, a photo of a celebrity, end quote, according to the website. So that felt pretty good. That's amazing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
This course is down to earth, not awkward, not gonna make you look bad, not gonna make other people feel bad. It's just gonna make you a better colleague, a better friend, a better peer. Six minutes a day is all it takes, and many of the guests on the show subscribe and contribute to this course. So come on and join us. You'll be in smart company where you belong.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1094: Vanity Products | Skeptical Sunday
You can find the course again for free over at sixminutenetworking.com. Now, back to Skeptical Sunday. Now I know last time during the cannabis episode, people were like, there's too many puns. I'm just gonna say roots of hair loss, I'm gonna let that one slide.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
Growing up in the 80s and 90s, I was told that cannabis was the devil's weed. One should avoid it at all costs. Kids were dared to just say no. We were scared with over-the-top ads. Today, some say cannabis is a cure-all from everything from anxiety to chronic pain. So what is the truth?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
No need to nag your folks to jot down their memories. No Story Lost lays out the red carpet. They handle everything. interviewing them with a professional writer. They write really well. They edit it really well. They organize family photos and they bind everything into a gorgeous hardcover book. They don't just like sort of print it off. It's customized with your color scheme of choice.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
Watching my mom pour over her life story, her eyes wide, big smile on her face. reliving all those precious moments. She actually said, I'm excited to read this. Who knew I was so interesting? I mean, really, this is priceless. She even joked that she likes herself even more now that she's read it. And I really just, she meant it. It was amazing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
And the best part is no story lost can create a book in just three months. This is not a heavy lift, especially for your loved one. They're so confident you'll adore it that they back it up with a solid guarantee that you fall in love with the book or they make it right or give you your money back. How was that for top-notch service?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
This episode is also sponsored by Shopify. You know, when you think about these brands that are absolutely crushing it, like Aloe, Allbirds, Skims, you probably picture the cool branding and the marketing. But the real secret sauce, it's the business behind the business that makes buying easy. And for millions of brands, that business is Shopify. Nobody does selling better than Shopify, period.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
And bottom line, if you're serious about growing your business, your platform's got to sell where your customers are, on your website, in your feed, in person, wherever. And businesses that sell more sell on Shopify. Simple as that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
Let me share a little behind the scenes info that you might not know. Using our promo code, it doesn't just get you a discount. It really does help support the show. I know you're not totally ignorant of that, but we don't earn a commission from the sales. A lot of people think we do that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
But when companies see that people are responding to the ad, that sponsor is more likely to continue their partnership with us. So if you decide to sign up for something, please use our code. It's Jordan a lot of the time, but not always. Definitely check the deals page. It is a double win. You get a great deal. You help keep the show thriving. And thank you for the support.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
Are the alarmists right in their belief that cannabis is the downfall of humanity or are the herbalists of today onto something when they push the medical flower? Comedian Michael Regilio is here to give us the straight dope on weed and let us know if it's a medical miracle or the hype is just smoke and mirrors.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
So in truth, it's kind of a funny movie, right? With teenagers, they take a single puff off a joint and immediately murder their whole family. So they run into oncoming traffic, they jump out the window, and perhaps worst of all, they listen to jazz music.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
DuPont, who makes a lot of products in my garage. You remember the Stain Master carpet ad that was all over TV in the 80s? You couldn't get away from it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
Really? Why did Ford consider cannabis the best raw material? I've never thought about it like a thing you could make things out of.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
So let me guess. Ford was not homeboys with the DuPonts or Anslinger and had a different opinion about all this stuff. Right.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
I did not know that. I didn't know he just looted and plundered. I thought he just had a really nice house that he built into a castle and now we can get tickets and go see it. That's really tacky.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
Great is doing a lot of heavy lifting in this particular film.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
Hi, Jordan. Hi, Jordan. Ah, I see what you did there. And we're going to be easy on the puns, as I promised in the top of the show. But no, I'm a busy man with a lot to do, so I am not high in this particular moment. And like I said, I've been told never to touch this stuff, so...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
So the Treasury Department basically went to war with weed over private money. So these guys had investments and they were like, let's use government power to protect them. Exactly.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
So big business is just looking at the bottom line, which candidly, that is reefer madness more than anything else that we've spoken about so far. That's ridiculous. I had no idea, but I guess I shouldn't be surprised.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, for the last 150 years almost as well, which is, I don't even want to go down the rabbit hole of thinking about how different things would have been. Instead of oil rigs spilling in the Gulf, we would just have massive amounts of with weed being grown and then turned into fuel and then used for other... Wow. The course of history would have been changed by this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
We wouldn't have needed as much plastic because we would have hemp plastic vehicles. Wow. It's almost depressing to think about how different things would have been.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
So we would possibly not even have the same sort of climate issue as we have now. OK, so besides Ford, was there other opposition to criminalizing cannabis? Yes, of course.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
What do those guys know? The American Medical Association? Never heard of it. Was it a bunch of doctors?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
Sorry, Sam. It would seem you have started a tradition since then as well. Yeah, a big tradition.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, but what about listening to jazz music? Did they get to the bottom of that one finally, or what?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
You got to love that a politician who stands to make a boatload of money off of demonizing something can just take a report from the Academy of Medicine and be like. Now, I don't like that science. So I'm just going to say it's not scientific because I no one's going to say anything. And I also have this very loud microphone publisher guy who's going to say whatever I want him to say.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
And they just trash this. At least Hearst wasn't against cannabis for racist reasons, just pure greed. I'm not actually sure that's better, but these guys are terrible, objectively.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
Was it the laws that were making cannabis popular? Because it seems like this just caught fire on its own because it's fun.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
Right. And that sure makes things unnecessarily difficult because now these people aren't just sort of minor offenders that can be rehabilitated. They're like scary junkies.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
Yes, I remember that ad with the very serious guy who says, this is your brain, holds up an egg and then cracks it in the pan and then says, any questions like, oh, man, this guy, he means business. But they didn't say cannabis, man. They said drugs.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
He was prolific with the crap he did wrong. I got to say, I got to hand it to him. Just one thing after the other.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
Ah, yes, I feel like we need a dun-dun-dun. Hold on. This has been decidedly non-cheesy, the episode. So I wanted to add something like that in there. All right. So he knew what was right and he did the opposite just for political gain, which is classic politician move right there.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
This guy said that on record. Yeah. Holy moly. That is so blatant. That is nuts. I'm shocked. And I didn't think I would be shocked by anything coming out of the Nixon administration. But that is just as black and white as it gets. We wanted to make being black illegal, but we knew we couldn't get away with it. So we decided to just associate them with drugs and then arrest people. That is crazy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
God, that is messed up. Next level messed up. Okay, I used to work in Detroit and I worked with a lot of these people who are in a group called Nation of Islam and they really don't like white people and they really, really don't like Jews. And it was a weird relationship because I didn't understand that. And I was just like a normal, nice person to them.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
And they were also quite nice to me because I was a kid. I was like 18, 17. And they would explain these crazy conspiracy theories to me. They were like, we know you're not a part of it, but do you know that the CIA drops crack in a black neighborhood? It would be like one thing after the other that was just kookier than the next thing. And this is one of the things that they had said.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
And they were just not making this one up. This one was real. I remember them telling me a lot about this alongside the how bad Jews and white people were. But this definitely adds a layer of color and credibility over those conversations. Yikes. Wow.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
I am legitimately angry about this. This is horrible. I wonder if you add up how many people are in prison just for cannabis, if it's like thousands of years of human lives that we're just paying to incarcerate. It's crazy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
My God. Okay, so I'm looking at something right now. There's a huge page on this called Last Prisoner Project. They're trying to get people not locked up for marijuana because it's such a wasteful thing. And I can't read the whole page while we're doing the show, but there's more than 40,000 people locked up at any given time in the U.S. And they say, we don't know.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
It's more than that, but we don't know by how much. Like, it could be 100,000, and they're just not sure. because it's really hard to get down to brass tacks on this. But imagine 40,000 people are in prison, and each one of those people cost us like $30,000 to $40,000. I mean, it's just hundreds of millions or even billions of dollars spent incarcerating these people over decades.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
And our mission is to help you become a better informed, more critical thinker, especially here on Skeptical Sunday. During the week, we have long form conversations with a variety of amazing folks from spies to CEOs, athletes, authors, thinkers, and performers. On Sundays, though, today, whichever day you're listening, it's Skeptical Sunday.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
And all the lives we're in, and of course those people's earning potential. I mean, it's just disgusting. Okay, so I've gone from sad to angry to even more angry.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
And everyone's in jail for marijuana or weed or cannabis or whatever we're calling it for consistency's sake.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
What a turnaround for California. No surprise, I guess, California turned nice and blue from, what was it, 1913 when they made it illegal to 1996? Yeah. And now it's turning nice and green. Yes, nice and green.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
Okay, so this might seem a little late in the show for this, but I have to do it. What is cannabis? Everybody knows in a broad sense what it is, but what makes a person high is probably what I should be asking.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
It sounds like we're getting all Sam Harris over here, but OK, let's see what you got. OK, maybe it's more.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
I feel like I've heard about that maybe in a biology class or a dispensary or something. What is the endocannabinoid system? It's like a human body anatomy thing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
I remember I had my tonsils out as an adult and they were like, we're going to give you codeine. And I'm like, I think I've heard of this. Doesn't Tylenol have this? They're like, some Tylenol. And they're like, it's a controlled substance. And I was excited. And also like, they take it real serious. They give you a special pad to go and get it from the pharmacy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
If you listen to podcasts and you haven't heard about CBD, I'm envious that you haven't heard 10,000 commercials for CBD. I won't run them on my show, but I hear them all the time. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
You know what brings euphoria without inducing psychosis? The fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back. This episode is also sponsored in part by NordVPN. but it was fast and smooth sailing the whole trip. And NordVPN isn't just about dodging digital roadblocks. It protects everything.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
You can use one NordVPN account on up to 10 devices. So we had it running on the phones, the laptops, the tablets. Bottom line, if you travel, if you work online, if you stream shows, you even just want to not get hacked at a coffee shop, NordVPN is a no-brainer.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
If you like this episode of the show, I invite you to do what other smart and considerate listeners do, which is take a moment, support our amazing sponsors. I told you how all that works before. All the deals, discount codes, and ways to support the show are searchable and clickable over at jordanharbinger.com slash deals.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
If you can't remember the name of a sponsor, you can't find the code, feel free to email me jordan at jordanharbinger.com. It is that important that you support those who support the show. Maybe it's just in California or maybe I'm being targeted by CBD ads because I'm in California. I don't know. There's a corner coffee shop here downtown.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
You can order a freaking latte with CBD at the coffee shop. And there's pet CBD that's for sale, I believe, at the same place. It's just everywhere.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
I was like, really? There's a lot in here. And they're like, yeah. And if you need a refill, we can refill it. And I'm like, how long am I going to be out? Because this is quite a bit. And they're like, oh, yeah, you're going to be under for like three weeks. I never touched the stuff because it scared me a little. And also, I guess I have a high pain tolerance. This is like a terrible sore throat.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
Oh, man. Yeah, cannabis for when you want to get high and you don't have a second to spare. But also, that's probably why I don't like smoking it, because one, I use my voice. Smoking things isn't a good idea. But two, it does not make me feel good. It hits me like a hammer. It's like I just had five scotch and sodas and it's just all at once.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, that sounds about right. It's interesting you said head high. What kind of other high is there?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
Ah, relief from the leaf. I've heard that before. So these are your options. You either get talkative and possibly really annoying, or you turn into a couch potato.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
But my doctor who took my tonsils out said it was worse than having kids. I would say just having seen my wife recover from having kids. That is definitely not true for me or wasn't true for me. Maybe my mouth just healed fast, but I just thought it was hilarious. The absolute gasoline can of codeine that they gave me to recover from this operation.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
To be honest, for years, I thought that people who said, oh man, you don't like weed? It gives you crippling anxiety? Oh, you're smoking the wrong stuff, man. I really thought those were just hippies who could not wrap their mind around the idea that this wasn't for everyone.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
That me panicking and trying to call my mom about homework I forgot to do in the seventh grade and telling her about how high I was was not a good idea at the time. But maybe they were onto something. I just really didn't think it was scientific. I thought they were just dorks. Weed dorks.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
Okay, so it's not your father's pot because I never have a mild reaction to it unless I have an edible that's one milligram and I'm just like, I'm slightly relaxed now. It's been a long, long, long, long time. But if somebody passes me a J and I try it, I'm just like, I have to go home now and curl up in the fetal position. Not fun. Yeah, I think we've all been there before.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
So not your father's pot, like I said, right? It's different now.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
So I suppose now is a good time to ask, what is CBD actually? I know it's sold everywhere. It's everywhere. We talked about that. But what is the actual compound?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
So you said many believe. Does that mean that there's no solid evidence to back up these claims? Is the science kind of new? What's going on here?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
It seems like with the number of people using legal cannabis, the government should just make it easier to study. Who cares? We need to learn more about this stuff. It's not like people aren't going to use it if it's illegal, for crying out loud.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
And it sounds like I could have sold this stuff and the penalties would have been okay. Could have maybe added a couple thousand dollars to my top line revenue that year, but I ended up dumping it down the sink.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, you write really bad poetry. Got it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
I gotta say, a show fan sent me a bunch of supposedly CBD-only gummies that were really mega-dosed, and I took one because a show fan sent it to me, and it was all wrapped nicely. It was from a real company. I thought CBD's mostly a scam, but this is a mega-dose. We'll see what happens. This thing knocked me the hell out, man.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
I kept them for sleep aids, and it is like I can be over-caffeinated or anxious or whatever, and I eat half of one of these things, and it absolutely puts me down. Maybe it's not just CBD in there because it is made in California, so it's not synthetic or whatever, but holy moly. Anyway, those pain relieving and sleep inducing benefits, that's all good stuff in my estimation.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
You got a sore neck, you can't sleep, you got back pain, take some CBD, especially if you're like 60 years old. What do you got to lose at that point, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
Got it. Chronic use twice a week sounds pretty tame compared to a lot of the stoners I know. I mean, the guys back in college who were doing this stuff, it was wake and bake all the way through the day. It was twice before lunch.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
Stoner voice is a real thing? I mean, you hear it on Scooby-Doo, but it's a real thing? All over the... Come on, man. We all know what I'm talking about. That's an actual medical condition? I'm very surprised. I thought that was just like de rigueur stoner and they were leaning into it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
Wow. Funny and interesting, but not exactly life-changing negative effects. You just sound dumb and checked out. You do.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
Welcome to Skeptical Sunday. I'm your host, Jordan Harbinger. Today I'm here with Skeptical Sunday co-host, comedian Michael Rogelio. On the Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the stories, secrets, and skills of the world's most fascinating people and turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life. and those around you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, I don't know what to tell you about that. I guess if you have a really bad headache one day, just eat a quarter of it and see if it still works. We probably shouldn't be talking about this podcast at all. But anyway, yeah, all the fun stuff is on schedule one. Even back in the days of just say no, it seemed ridiculous that marijuana was grouped up with that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
That is insane. I know women out there who think it's harmless or maybe even good for their baby or they do edibles instead of smoking, which is, I don't know why they think that's okay, but yeah, that's really bad.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, but that's obviously when young men try cannabis. Is it just men or is it men and women? It's got to be young men and women.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
Psychosis. Yikes, that is terrible. I've heard about that, but you never know what's hype and what's not. But yeah, that's not good.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
Ooh, so it sounds like reefer madness in those instances is real. Do experts understand why that's the case? That's really scary. Schizophrenia is no joke at all.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
Yikes. So basically, say no to drugs at least until your prefrontal cortex fully forms.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
Cannabis has always just had a bad rap.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
In moderation, I suppose. And that is good because adults are going to be smoking for the foreseeable future as weed becomes more and more legal. All right, so here is something that I've wondered about. Is there a sobriety test for cannabis? Is there going to be a weed breathalyzer?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
I have to imagine those taxes have the potential to do a lot of good. When you go to a dispensary and you buy legal marijuana, it's like 25 percent tax on what you buy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
That is the promise of legal cannabis, though, right? The tax revenue. Love that tax revenue from drugs is going into drug prevention programs. That is some delicious bureaucratic irony right there.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
Not that surprising since it started with false pretenses and racist motivations, which I didn't even realize. And I think no one's going to argue the war on drugs has been a success. That's for sure.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
Okay. All right. I'm going to let you get away with one last poll, which started at the top. We're not going to be punny. You got one. That was good. You smoked it. Thank you so much for listening.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
Topic suggestions for future episodes of Skeptical Sunday to jordan at jordanharbinger.com, show notes on the website, transcripts in the show notes, advertisers, deals, discount codes, and ways to support the show, all at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. I'm at Jordan Harbinger on both Twitter and Instagram. You can also connect with me on LinkedIn.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, easy on the academic jargon there. It's an audience of laymen. But wow, what is that, like almost 5,000 years of cannabis? Pretty impressive. Wow.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
I'm doing a lot more posting on LinkedIn as well. You can find Michael Regilio at Michael Regilio on Instagram. Tour dates are up now there as well, and it will be linked in the show notes because as always, nobody can spell Regilio. Thank you. We may get a few things wrong here and there, especially on Skeptical Sunday. So if you think we really dropped the ball, definitely let us know.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
We're usually pretty receptive to that. Y'all know how to reach me, jordan at jordanharbinger.com. Remember, we rise by lifting others. Share the show with those you love. And if you found this episode useful, please share it with somebody else who could use a good dose of the skepticism and knowledge that we doled out today.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
In the meantime, I hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn. And we'll see you next time. Want to master the art of communication? Charles Duhigg, author of Super Communicators, reveals key strategies for enhancing your connections and conversations in this enlightening podcast episode.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
Learn how to categorize conversations, improve active listening, and overcome communication barriers to build stronger relationships. Tune in and transform your interactions into meaningful connections on episode 963 of The Jordan Harbinger Show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
This is where a rotating guest co-host and I break down a topic you may have never thought about and debunk common misconceptions about that topic. Such as acupuncture, astrology, recycling, toothpaste, crystal healing, diet pills, energy drinks, weddings, the death industry, and more.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
God needing to get high is a little strange. Is Shiva the one with all of the hands? Because I feel like that would probably come in handy when rolling a joint.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
Bang definitely sounds like a dodgy energy drink you get at a truck stop.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
I'm hoping they used it on the patient. The patients used it for surgery. Exactly.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
That's a pretty silly point, because if your surgeon was drinking Jack Daniels during the surgery, would you still consider it? No, I don't even want that guy texting while performing surgery.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
Is it OK for Muslims to smoke pot or is it OK? Drugs are haram and alcohol is kind of the only thing we have around. So we're going to name that one. But I'm curious if it's OK or not. I've never heard that before.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
And if you're new to the show or you want to tell your friends about the show, we've got some starter packs, which are collections of our favorite episodes on persuasion, negotiation, psychology, disinformation, cyber warfare, crime, and cults, and more. That'll help new listeners get a taste of everything we do here on the show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
I'm pretty sure it's Sayyad Mohammed Saadeq Hosseini Rouhani.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
So for people who don't know what halal is, it's basically Muslim kosher. And for people who don't know what kosher is, it just basically means the religious law says it's OK to eat or consume or use. So with supervisions, basically an imam has to watch you tripping. It's interesting that it's psychedelics, too. I wouldn't expect that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah. Yeah. Because I forgot about that part for a sec. I don't know if we can group those things together. Maybe that's what we're trying to do. I don't know.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
Just visit jordanharbinger.com slash start or search for us in your Spotify app to get started. Now, you're probably going, cannabis. I swear I saw this in the feed earlier. This is our second attempt. We were still finding our feet with Skeptical Sunday. That was when we did round one of cannabis.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
Besides, you'd think if you're trying to subjugate a population like the Brits were doing in India, you'd be fine if they were stoned all the time and lounging around and shoveling snacks into their mouth and just like philosophizing about dumb things like you do in your dorm room in college instead of, I don't know, marching on your colonial forces, wanting human rights and all that stuff.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
It really was a free for all. I know there was cocaine in the cola around then, maybe in heroin and cough syrup. So maybe tightening restrictions on narcotics wasn't that out of line at the time. It's not like they only picked on cannabis.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah. The Statue of Liberty says, send me your poor and you're tired. But it does not say anything about people actually being nice to them when they get here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
Yes, and it's probably in French. I always find it almost comical that Irish and Italians, who you could never tell apart now in New York, right? We're like, you're one of them. And it's like, really? You guys could be brothers for all I can tell. One guy's slightly more pasty than the next. One guy lives in Hell's Kitchen and the other guy lives three blocks south. And it's, you're the enemy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
At the time, we'd only done a handful of these things, and I wanted to redo this one since it was downloaded so many times. I got a lot of feedback about it, positive, negative. Great episode, too corny, all this stuff. We got put on blast from listener emails, and that's how we learn and get better. So round two is... With cannabis, here we go.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
It's just so dumb. It was so ridiculous.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
I guess if they couldn't outlaw Mexicans, and you know they probably wanted to try back then, they could take away their fun. And I wonder how things would have been different if Mexicans had called it, like, freedom flowers instead. Fleeing to America to enjoy their freedom flowers that they brought. Yes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
So he had a problem with cannabis because he didn't like Mexicans also? Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
end quote yeah make sure we know that those are not your words so it does bear out marijuana makes you not racist and cool and sexy which candidly sounds like an argument for marijuana which i assume was not this guy's intent here i don't know do you think podcasters count as entertainers asking for a friend
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1142: Cannabis Redux | Skeptical Sunday
This episode is sponsored in part by No Story Lost. Ever thought of turning your parents' or loved ones' incredible stories into a stunning coffee table book? Meet No Story Lost. This is not a run-of-the-mill DIY project. We tried it out for my mom, and I have to say, I am blown away. And I don't say that about many things. This is like the Rolls Royce of a personal storybook creation.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
Yes, everyone, rest easy knowing that DNA bombs or whatever that can wipe out entire population groups might be in your future.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, everybody loves to find out about their ancestry. Maybe almost everyone. There's definitely some exceptions to this rule, for sure. Yeah, like racists who find out that they're not quite as white as they thought they were. Oh, yeah. But that's rich, though. Everyone, straight into my veins with that one. Yeah, but it is fun.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
And I have to ask, have you done it? I have. I've done, I won't say the name because when they get hacked, I don't want people looking for my DNA or whatever, but I've done one of those or a few of those. I also hired somebody else to trace my family way back. And you get messages on the website sometimes where it's like, I think we're related. And I'll tell my mom and she's like, don't reply.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
They're probably nuts, just like everybody else on our side of the family. And we did find out that my grandfather on my dad's side basically had a secret family before he had my dad's family. But I guess back then when you got divorced, you just never talked to that family ever again and pretended they didn't exist. That was what you did. Wow.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
Do you know the show? I think I've seen it. It's like an airport lounge watch. Yes, they run DNA tests on celebrities and then reveal their true roots. And it's fun and surprisingly not trashy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
That must have caused a little bit of strife.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, I heard, as we mentioned earlier, that there are risks involved in having your DNA just out there in a database floating around waiting to be hacked or used by bad actors like Nicolas Cage.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, that makes me even more hesitant to take a test, although it's probably too late having done a couple of these already. So how secure is this data?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
When I think of how often my laptop says it's detected spyware, it just doesn't leave me with a lot of confidence.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
Oh, yeah, I did not think of that. So if both my parents took a test, they basically say, well, smash these together. There's Jordan.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
That's right. We did an episode with Paul Holes, one of the guys that caught him. And that's episode 725. And they basically, yeah, I think they found his brother or something like that. And he was a close match, but it couldn't have been him. And they were like, wait a minute, this person is so close. Who else could it be? It's got to be related to him.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
Oh, he's got a brother who's a police officer. And that was the Golden State Killer. Not exactly the poster child for genetic privacy rights, but it does illustrate the risk.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
Yep. It's in your genes and it's in your DNA. So I think we all have some sense of what our DNA and genes are, but why don't you break it down for us? I don't actually know the difference.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
Mitochondrial Eve sounds like a holiday for a very specific type of nerd.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
Wow, that is wild. So we all have the same great whatever grandmother. So the best history books really are written inside ourselves. How cool is that? Yep.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
Oh man, I guess calling somebody a Neanderthal is not the insult that we thought it was. It's got a kernel of truth. Right, exactly. You might just be being accurate if you call somebody that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
Or the world could come together and implement meaningful changes to stem the worst effects of climate change. Yeah, I'm kidding. That'll probably never happen, and we should probably be open to technology that solves parts of this for us.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
So tell us what CRISPR is again. I think a lot of people have heard of it. A lot of folks might not know what that is. It was a massive leap forward for humanity.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
I always find that so interesting. Many scientific discoveries are just made by accident. It doesn't happen as often in other fields. You know, a random accountant was not doing some dry cleaner's taxes and is like... Oh, look, I've invented cryptocurrency. So what was the happy accident that ended up with us getting the ability to edit DNA?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, I'm just telling you what I learned. So basically my infection can get an infection, which is crazy. Okay, so you said CRISPR is gene splicing. Tell us what that is exactly.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
I'm a lasagna hog. So palindromes are when it's the same when it reads the same backwards and forwards. A race car is the same backwards and forwards. And apparently so is go hang a salami. I'm a lasagna hog, which is you got to wonder how they figured that one out. That's almost as impressive as discovering the ability to edit genes while looking for something else.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
You. Yes, I've seen Jurassic Park. But I'm still mind-blown by all this. Cells are really small, and the idea that a cell can replicate itself is pretty wild. But the fact that each cell also holds the blueprint to make another entire me is just crazy. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
You know what comes with absolutely no ethical dilemmas? Supporting the fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back. Thank you all for listening and for supporting us. All of the deals, discount codes, and ways to support the show are all in one searchable and clickable place, jordanharbinger.com slash deals. Now, for the rest of Skeptical Sunday.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
This is fascinating because I always thought, oh, gene editing. It's like some machine that does a bunch of specific things. And I'm sure there's machinery involved. But really, this is a natural process. They're using a natural process to edit DNA, which is wild to me. Okay, so they're cutting out genes that are unwanted, replacing them with genes that are unwanted. And do you mean in humans?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
Yes, a classic Ethan Hawke and Uma Thurman. I love that movie.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, it's such a good movie. It's got a super cool aesthetic that I can't really describe because I don't know anything about movies, but it's sort of like, it's 1939, but it's also 100 years ahead in the future at the same time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
Okay, so no ethical dilemma there. And by the way, I'm so curious, how do you know if the DNA is in every cell in your body, how do you know which DNA you have to change to get it to work? There's got to be some sort of chain reaction. Oh, if we change one bit of DNA in some cells here, it just spreads and then you don't have this anymore.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
Our mission is to help you become a better informed, more critical thinker. And during the week, we have long-form conversations with a variety of amazing folks from spies to CEOs, athletes, authors, thinkers, and performers.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
I have no idea how long it takes to refresh all your blood cells. I know it's different for different types of cells and some never completely refresh like fat cells, but it makes sense that blood would be something where they can reasonably say, hey, by the way, your defective blood is going to be largely gone within a few weeks, months or whatever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
So basically because of rapid cell turnover, and again, I have no idea what I'm even talking about here, so let's continue.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
You'd think you'd notice if you lost 600,000 of pretty much anything, but no, I've never noticed this, generally.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
I'm guessing one issue in this case is that the person being altered has absolutely no say in the matter because they're not born yet. You nailed it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
That seems like an issue that requires a bunch more research before it should be done at all.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
Babies? Like the plural of babies? So more than one baby has been genetically edited by this guy in China?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, I can only imagine. Talk about opening Pandora's box. And see, I told you the Chinese were probably doing something with this. Ethics aside, I'm actually still dying to hear how this shakes out. And it's amazing, even if it is totally unethical from a medical, scientific, moral, whatever perspective.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
It definitely seems like a strange move. Rogue scientists, they don't exactly have a great reputation in history or even freaking fiction for that matter. You know, I'm something of a scientist myself.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
Aha. Okay, so 7th grade science class coming in handy here. DNA is obviously extra tiny if it's all curled up in the nucleus of the cell. Uh, actually, only kinda. Kinda sounds a little bit less scientific than we like to be on Skeptical Sunday, but I'm gonna roll with it. Okay, look.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
I feel like if people were like, wow, this is amazing, China would have been like, yeah, cool. Yeah, we did it. But since everybody was like, boo, they were like, oh, man, you're going to have to fall on the sword for this one, buddy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
So they arrested him, and then what? Is he still in prison? No, I think he's out. What about the kids he experimented on? How are they doing?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
Hopefully for the better. What's really gross and scary to me, and I really hope I'm wrong about this, there's kind of only one real foolproof way to test if a baby that is supposed to be resistant to HIV is actually resistant to HIV, and that is to try to infect them repeatedly and deliberately with HIV.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
And I really hope those babies in China are not being jabbed with HIV needles on a regular basis just to see if they get a horrible, potentially fatal disease.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, I think those super soldiers would first need working weapons, ammunition. And if they make them really smart, they might be like, I am not going to fight for this authoritarian nonsense regime. And in the case of North Korea, they need food. But yeah, see your point.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, 600,000 a day. And I do definitely remember Ethan Hawke furiously vacuuming his computer keyboard at the end of every workday and then opening a vial and sprinkling other skin cells on it so that they would find them.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, why is it always the scary tech in sci-fi movies that becomes reality, and we still don't freaking have hoverboards, man? Come on.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, so see, that's really scary. It reminds me of Minority Report with Tom Cruise, but instead of ESP, they're using DNA. And either way, they're using an acronym to oppress people.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
I agree. Hey, we talked about the kid who was exonerated in that first case of DNA evidence, but he was just the first of many. Lots and lots of innocent people have been freed from wrongful convictions from DNA evidence.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
Those are the real heroes of the podcast. I'm 0.4% Yakut, by the way. That's true.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
Okay, so that's obviously incredible, but I can't really wrap my head around it because the sun is super far away.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
Thank you all for listening. Topic suggestions for future episodes of Skeptical Sunday. Show notes on the website as well. Advertisers, deals, discounts, and ways to support the show, all at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. I'm at jordanharbinger on both Twitter and Instagram, or you can connect with me on LinkedIn. You can find Michael at Michael Regilio on Instagram.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
We'll put that in the show notes as well, because as always, nobody can spell Regilio. Comedy tour dates now up as well. This show is created in association with Podcast One. My team is Jen Harbinger, Jace Sanderson, Robert Fogerty, Ian Baird, and Gabriel Mizrahi. Our advice and opinions are our own. And I'm a lawyer, but I'm not your lawyer. And I'm no DNA geneticist expert of any kind.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
So do your own research before implementing things that you hear on the show. Also, we may get a few things wrong here and there, especially on Skeptical Sunday. So if you think we've really dropped the ball on something, let us know. We're usually pretty receptive to that. Y'all know how to reach me, jordan at jordanharbinger.com. Remember, we rise by lifting others.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
Share the show with those you love. And hey, if you found the episode useful, please share it with somebody else who could use a good dose of the skepticism and knowledge that we doled out here today. In the meantime, I hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn. And we'll see you next time. Are you intrigued by the mind of a psychopath?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
Join us on episode 879 to explore the fine line between psychopathy and genius and why being labeled a psychopath might not be the curse it seems.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
Discover the unexpected benefits of psychopathic traits, how they influence career choices, and take a revealing two-minute quiz on the episode to see where you stand. Episode 879 of The Jordan Harbinger Show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
So when was this all first discovered? When did people find out that we even had DNA?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
Welcome to Skeptical Sunday. I'm your host, Jordan Harbinger. Today I'm here with Skeptical Sunday co-host Michael Regilio. On the Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the stories, secrets, and skills of the world's most fascinating people and turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
On Sundays, though, we do Skeptical Sunday, where a rotating guest co-host and I break down a topic you may have never thought about and debunk common misconceptions about that topic. Topics such as fast fashion, weddings, the death industry, homeopathy, hypnosis, diet pills, and more.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
Ah, that's disgusting. Okay, so collecting used bandages from strangers in a hospital. This guy, he must have really loved science. Or used bandages.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
Oh, wow. Now I'm glad I didn't eat before this. Apologies to anybody who's listening to this during lunch right now as we talk about this dude's pus collection.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
Hold on. I thought I remembered that Watson and Crick discovered the double helix thing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
Right. They say history repeats itself. And I will say that whenever the question of why was this woman or these women overlooked, their accomplishments were overlooked. The answer is almost always because her work just didn't count until a dude came along and took credit for it, which is not cool. Yeah, look, let's not overlook Watson and Crick now.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
These were also good scientists doing good work. Anybody that watches crime shows or likes a good detective novel knows that the understanding of DNA has been an absolute game changer for solving crimes. Exactly.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
And if you're new to the show or you want to tell your friends about the show, I suggest our episode starter packs. These are collections of our favorite episodes on persuasion, negotiation, disinformation, psychology, cyber warfare, crime and cults, and more. That'll help new listeners get a taste of everything we do here on the show, or almost everything.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
Right, because there are only four blood types. You couldn't do any better than to say that there's a certain percent chance that somebody's the bad guy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
And this time, not just for exonerating, but I'm guessing also for convicting? Exactly.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
Based on the fact that you already said this first case both in a bad guy and exonerated an innocent person, I'm going to guess the DNA proved that this kid was not the murderer.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
You can tell this was the UK because I'm pretty sure in America the police can't just run around demanding everyone's DNA until they find the right guy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
Wow. OK, I'm glad they caught him. Right. But what a freaking moron. And his last name was Pitchfork, which is kind of on the nose for a villain.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
Just visit jordanharbinger.com slash start, or search for us in your Spotify app to get started. Today, DNA and genes are everywhere, both figuratively and literally. Get your mind out of the gutter, folks.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
I understand the ethical questions that come with DNA evidence, but on the whole, I mean, that kind of seems like a win, right? You're a violent offender, you put your DNA in a database, and then they find all the other people that you killed or attacked or whatever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
Yes, it sounds like Professor Jeffries should basically be getting royalty checks for every episode of Law & Order or NCIS or whatever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
I remember that that was a really big deal, and it really doesn't sound like that long ago, but again, as always, I'm old now.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
Okay, so it seems like a pretty good time to ask, what's the difference between DNA and genes?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
Okay, so stop me if this is derailing us too much, but what is cloning? I know I've heard of that when it comes to DNA.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
Not only are they the building blocks of every living thing, but they also hold the secrets to our ancestry, unlock the mysteries of unsolved crimes, and help doctors predict and treat potential health conditions. Even Maury Povich famously used DNA to determine if somebody is or is not the father.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
I mean, that sounds like cloning is pretty hard. You gotta hand it to them for not giving up, though. After 200 dead lambs, I might be like, hey, this is not working.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
Oh, yeah. I don't know how I feel about that. So can humans be cloned? That's the obvious next question here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
You know what's almost as tasty as a collection of pussy used bandages? The fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back. By the way, folks, our newsletter is getting a lot of really good feedback. It's a little gem from us to you every Wednesday, something that you can apply that's going to change your psychology, usually pretty practical stuff.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
You can sign up at JordanHarbinger.com slash news. A lot of good feedback on this. A lot of people are hitting reply, and you guys are very nice in those responses, and I appreciate that. Again, JordanHarbinger.com slash news. All right, back to Skeptical Sunday.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
All the hilarious dad jokes aside about how I could use a clone of myself, it does seem really dicey and hard to put that genie back in the bottle. But I kind of assume places like China are doing this, and in a way, actually, I hope they are, because I'm dying to know how this all plays out.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
To be fair, Michael, that does sound like the plot of a movie with a script that Nick Cage would say yes to. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
I haven't watched anything since my kids were born other than Cocomelon.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, don't worry about it. It's a cartoon that repeats sing-songy stuff over and I don't want to talk about it. Yeah, look, Nick Cage basically just shrugs and says sure to every script that slides across his desk. That's, I'm convinced.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1105: DNA | Skeptical Sunday
But as technology advances, we're now capable of manipulating DNA, raising profound questions about what it means to be human. Are we on the brink of a beautiful new age or stepping into a dystopian sci-fi nightmare? To help us navigate this microscopic landscape, skeptic Michael Rogelio is here to help us unravel the double helix of ethical dilemmas and excitement around DNA. Hey, Jordan.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
Okay, so this was a thing that I hadn't really given a lot of thought to when I first asked you to start researching this for me, like you said. So, yuck. I don't know how to react to that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
The fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back. Bis zum nächsten Mal. Bis zum nächsten Mal.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
And yes, it can trigger panic attacks and other emotional disturbances in people who are sensitive to that. So if you're one of those people who might find this difficult slash impossible to listen to, or you got young ones around, maybe skip this episode for now. All right. I got a really disturbing email a few days ago and it had me a little bit nervous.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
Thank you so much for listening to and supporting the show. It is your support of our sponsors that keeps the lights on around here. All the deals, discount codes and ways to support this podcast are all in one place. JordanHarbinger.com slash deals. You can also search for any sponsor using the AI chatbot on the website as well. Please consider supporting those who support the show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
Now, back to Skeptical Sunday. How are people getting that incriminating material, sexually incriminating whatever material of minors then? If they're not getting all the stuff I make off the dark web... Okay, so let me explain this. For those who don't know, catfishing is when you pretend to be someone online that you're not for the sake of seducing or befriending or scamming someone.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
So you might pretend that you're some hot bitch Babelicious 25-Jähriger, ja, ich habe Babelicious gesagt, wenn in der Realität du nur ein 44-Jähriger bist, der den Podcast macht. Und es war lustig an der Zeit, als ich in der Hochschule war, war ich auf AOL, richtig? Du würdest DM'en oder was auch immer, du sendest instant Messungen zu Mädchen deiner Art, die du in deinem Bereich finden könntest.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
Manchmal war da ein Typ, der immer seine Fotos rausgab und ich dachte mir, wow, dieser Typ ist ein Modell. Es war ein Bild von einem Typ, der ein Modell war, klar. Er war jung, aber er war ein Surfmodell oder so. Also war meine Freundin Jessica wirklich interessiert in diesem Typ. Und sie war so, möchtest du mich mit ihm treffen, weil ich ihn nicht kenne.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
Also war es nahe meiner Arbeit, dieses Filmtheater. Und sie sagt, okay, er ist hier. Wenn ich nicht zurückkomme und in 10 Minuten sage, dass es sicher ist, was auch immer, ich kann mich nicht genau erinnern, was es war. Sie rennt zurück und sie sagt, es gibt einen alten Mann da draußen. Er hat gesagt, oh, sorry, ich bin nicht Drew.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
Und dann hat er mir 20 Dollar gefordert, um ihn in den Auto zu sehen. Das ist, was passiert. Also dieser Junge war im Grunde Highschool-Jährige, um in die Parkingstruktur zu kommen und dann zu sagen, hey, sorry, ich habe dich gedupft, aber ich gebe dir 20 Dollar, wenn du mich siehst.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
Und ich bin so, wir haben darüber gelacht, aber 2020 Hindsight, wir sollten absolut in die Polizei gegangen sein, weil dieser Kerl war ein Sexverurteilter.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
It said that it had all kinds of evidence that I was a gross sexual pervert. Guilty. Pictures of me rubbing one out, so to speak. Even pictures of me and my wife in bed. Now, that would be bad enough. Aber die E-Mail hat auch gesagt, dass wenn ich nicht etwas ernsthaftes Geld verkaufe, in der Form von untraceable, oder eigentlich super traceable, Bitcoin, Kryptowährung.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
So for anybody who needs a quick refresher, those were two super high-profile child abductions that took place, I think both were in the 80s. They were both in the early 80s. Adam Walsh was like 81 and Johnny Gosch was 83. So everyone our age remembers those because they were all over the TV and parents essentially used these as... Nicht Parabels, weil sie wahr waren, aber Warnzeichen.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
Sie würden es benutzen, um uns über Stranger Danger zu warnen. Und John Walsh, Adams Vater, der Name könnte familiar sein, weil er, glaube ich, Amerika's Most Wanted startete. In Teilen wegen dieses. Ich weiß nicht, die ganze Hintergrundgeschichte.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
This is a totally different world in the 70s and early 80s in terms of child safety. I remember we had, in the county where I grew up in Michigan, we had the Oakland County Child Killer. I mean, that's just scary, even saying it out loud again. And I'm pretty sure they caught that guy. But you're right, there was a lot of just...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
Somebody went missing and it wasn't because their stepdad or their parents took them. It was a total stranger and it was really freaking scary.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
That's it right there, you know? Yeah, it's absolutely true that if you commit some horrific sex crime against a child that you've abducted, you're not going to leave them alive to tell the tale. Yuck. That makes sense.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
Leute denken, es ist untraceable. Es ist die am meisten traceable Sache jemals. Es heißt die Blockchain, Leute. Sie werden all diese geheimen Informationen lecken. Sie werden es öffentlich machen. Glücklicherweise für mich, ich wusste, dass das ein Scam war, weil ich all diese Art von Scams in der Vergangenheit gehört habe. Viele Leute kennen es natürlich nicht besser.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
It didn't even used to be a story. You say non-custodial parents. This is like, I get a divorce, my wife ends up with the kids, and I'm like, I don't like that outcome, so I just go and grab the kids when they're at school, and I say, I've got the kids now, and I fly to Saudi Arabia.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
Denken Sie, dass Leute das in großen Nummern tun?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
And then it's game on. Kids don't just get grabbed in broad daylight anymore. It's super safe to be a kid outside now. But, yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
Weißt du, wo deine Kinder sind? Das ist lustig. Hast du das je gesehen? Das ist lustig. Weißt du, wo deine Kinder sind?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
Sie verlieren viel Geld, nicht zu erwähnen viel Schlaf, auf diesen Sexstorchen-Skams. Und in manchen Fällen können Menschen sogar sexuell verletzt werden von ihren Sexstorchenisten. Schlimmstens, viele Male sind Sexstorchenisten, das ist ein schwieriges Wort zu sagen, für mehrere Gründe, tatsächlich Kinder zu targetieren. Und danach etwas, das viel wertvoller ist als nur Geld.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
If I came home too late, they were like, where did you go? Oh, I biked all the way down to three towns over and went to an arcade where drug dealers hang out. And they were like, oh, okay. Try to come home a little bit earlier because it's dark and cars can't see you. Nobody was like, you're going to get abducted. No.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
Okay, also was sind einige der anderen Gründe, weshalb Kinder jetzt sicherer sind, außer Helikopter-Parenting?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
Ich wollte, dass er sich bewusst ist von Priesterabsturz. Ich bin überrascht, dass die Kirche hatte.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
Mittlerweile ist das Kind nur im Mittelpunkt einer Kleidung. Erinnerst du dich daran, als du ein Kind warst? Ja, das war lustig. Ich kann die 80er-Jahre-Karpelle auf meinen Händen fühlen, die ich gerade gesprochen habe, aber meine Mutter ging mit Angst ballistisch. Sie würde bei der Zeit, als ich rauskam, vibrieren. Meine arme Mutter.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
Ich habe wahrscheinlich eine Jahrhunderte von ihrer Leben verpasst, so dumme Scheiße wie das. Jesus.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
Also wie behältst du dich und deine Kinder sicher? Und haben wir zu weit gegangen in unserem Wunsch, Kinder zu schützen, dass wir sie tatsächlich verletzen, anstatt sie zu helfen? Nun, es ist ein dreckiges Job und es ist eine Schande, dass jemand es macht. Hier, um mich zu helfen, alle ein bisschen sicherer auf der Internet zu halten, ist Schreiter und Forscher Nick Pell.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
What do the statistics say about kids and online safety? Because I'm guessing that even online exploitation and abuse is rare, just in sort of absolute terms.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
Do you think they're all legitimate? All those reports are somebody called to report something.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
I get how kids could overreact or misunderstand something, especially when they're just self-reporting in a poll or whatever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
Also Nick, hast du jemals diese E-Mails gesehen? Ich fühle mich, dass sie diese Tage super üblich sind.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
Und das ist besonders wahr, wenn du über private Messungen sprichst. Guck, ich stimme dazu. Gründer mit guten Intentionen fliegen nicht in deine Kinder-DMS, weil sie darüber sprechen wollen, etwas in guter Glauben zu sagen. Und das ist das Ding.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
Ich will hier nicht zu viel überlegen, aber was sind die negativen Auswirkungen von Kindern, die zu vorsichtig sind bei Strangers?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
Does that really happen, though, or is that just some old person, like, we used to drink from the garden hose? It sounds like one of those talking points.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
No one wants to think about some weirdo watching you in your home, no matter what you're up to, no matter what you're doing. That's right. Like sleeping with your wife, being with your girlfriend, that's obviously disturbing. But it's kind of disturbing no matter what is going on, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
Remember about the woman who's getting charged for letting her 10-year-old walk to the park alone? That one was, that's one still baffling. The kid in Georgia who walked to the park alone. And it was like a mile away. And the mom is, she went to jail. Or at least there's a mugshot. Yeah, crazy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
And that's where the real danger lies. That's right, folks. Save that sextortion Bitcoin so you can support the fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back. Bis zum nächsten Mal. Bis zum nächsten Mal. Therapy isn't just for crisis moments, by the way. It is about building resilience, setting boundaries, which many of us need to do, and becoming your best self.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
I mean, even if you're just sitting there reading the New Testament like I always do every weeknight, you don't want some creepy weirdo using your home electronics to spy on you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
With 30,000 plus therapists and 5 million people helped, BetterHelp makes getting support simple, flexible, and stress-free. So if you've been considering it, and I recommend that you do consider it at least, this is your sign to start. Your well-being is worth it. Visit betterhelp.com slash jordan to get 10% off your first month. That's betterhelp.com slash jordan.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
I've got homes.com as a sponsor for this episode. Homes.com knows when it comes to home shopping, it's never just about the house or the condo. It's about the homes. Und was ein Zuhause macht, ist mehr als nur das Haus oder das Gebäude. Es ist die Location, es ist die Nachbarschaft. Wenn du Kinder hast, sind es auch Schulen, naheby Parks, Transportoptionen.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
Das ist, warum Homes.com über und über geht, um den Homeshoppers die in-depth Informationen zu bringen, die sie brauchen, um das richtige Zuhause zu finden. Es ist so schwer, nicht immer zu sagen, Zuhause. Und wenn ich in-depth Informationen sehe, rede ich deep. Each listing features comprehensive information about the neighborhood, complete with a video guide.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
They also have details about local schools with test scores, state rankings, student-teacher ratio. They even have an agent directory with the sales history of each agent. So when it comes to finding a home, not just a house, this is everything you need to know, all in one place, homes.com. We've done your homework.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
If you're wondering how I managed to book all these great authors, thinkers and creators every single week, it is because of my network, the circle of people I know, like and trust. I'm teaching you how to build your network for free over at 6minutenetworking.com. I know that networking just sounds like a gross, cringy word. This course is super easy, very decidedly non-cringe and down to earth.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
It's not awkward. It's just very practical exercises that will make you a better connector, a better colleague, a better friend and a better peer. In 4 to 6 minutes a day, 5-minute networking was taken. That's all it takes. Now for the rest of Skeptical Sunday. Okay, so this seems like a good segue back into the sextortion of kids topic.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
So walk us through what it's like when the sextortion scheme drops on a kid.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
I think that's the key difference. A lot of kids are just not getting the level of supervision that they need when they're staring at the box and the parents are sitting next to them reading. They have no idea what's going on.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
Great. Alright. Thanks for coming on Skeptical Sunday. I'll see you next time. I wish it were that simple. Obviously, there's a lot more to this because...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
Okay. Guck, vielleicht ist das eine Rezepte für einen Desaster. Dein Kind gibt Geheimnisse jemandem online und sie kennen nicht wirklich die Person, oder sie kennen die Person kaum, oder sie denken, sie kennen die Person, aber es ist eine andere Person.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
A lot of show fans know I used to help the police catch pedos on America AOL way back in the 90s. And I will spare everyone that story. But the Internet and Predators are kind of an iconic duo. Keep walking us through how these creepy weirdos target kids. What's the groomer thing that you mentioned?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
Aber wie geht es von, oh, du magst Fortnite auch, zu geben mir Geld?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, I would 100% have been hooked by this when I was in high school. And I don't know how much I've changed, I gotta be honest. When I was a teenager, I had zero self-control. Now I have a layer of self-control over kind of the same brain, unfortunately.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
Now you're like the same as every band idol that girls love and have posters of on their wall. But okay. Yeah. Fish in a barrel.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
Ja, Mann. Jugendliche sind so unbequem in ihrer eigenen Haut, wie in deiner vorherigen Geschichte. Sobald der Predator das erste Bild hat, ist das alles, was sie brauchen. Du brauchst nicht eine Bank von 20, um ein Kind zu bekommen, das vulnerable und overexposit ist. Genau, weil der Punkt ist,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
Is the predator really going to do anything, though? I mean, you mentioned the whole blasting the picture out to the entire school. What are the chances that a perp is actually going to do that?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
So what can people do to educate their kids about this? Because now that we're all terrified, what do we do with our kids? They're not going to believe anything we tell them, theoretically.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
What if the kid has already been a victim of a scam? What do you do then? Because I've heard people commit suicide over stuff like this. It's horrible. I've actually seen cases, I think it was in Michigan, where these two kids that were scamming other kids and sextorting them, I think they were like Nigerian immigrants or something like that,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
They went to prison for at least a decade and change because they were actually encouraging their victims to kill themselves. And one of the kids actually did that. So it's not just, oh, they got the kids nudes and then the kids stole mom's credit card. This can have just absolutely horrifically terrible consequences.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
Das ist eine seltsame Gruppe zu arbeiten, Mann. Verrückte.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, it seems like, just file this web form and we'll call you. It's like, we want some people to have a place to report things so they feel better, but that's all that is. I would not have very high confidence in the FBI finding whatever dude in Kyrgyzstan Es scheint nicht, dass sie für diese Kriminellen gehen werden.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
Das trägt mit Dingen aus, die ich auf diesem Show gelernt habe. Die meisten Pädophilen verurteilen nie, weil sie wissen, dass es schrecklich ist und sie es nicht vorstellen können, es jemand anderem zu tun. Die Verurteilten, das hat mich überrascht. Wir hatten ein ganzes Video über Pädophilie, das war ganz bemerkenswert und gruselig. Schaut es euch in den Back-Katalog an.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
Eine der Dinge, die ich über dieses ganze Thema faszinierend fand, war, wie ich gesagt habe, wenn du ein Pädophil bist, bist du wahrscheinlich nicht ein Verurteilter, weil du weißt, dass es schrecklich ist. Aber die Menschen, die sich verurteilen, sind oft nicht wirklich Pädophilien. Sie sind nicht wirklich betroffen mit Kindern. Sie wollten nur, dass sie sich verletzen.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
Someone and children are accessible and defenseless. So a lot of people who are sex offenders against kids, they're not actually even really pedophiles. They're just sicko psychopaths that wanted to hurt somebody and children were an easy target, which is somehow even more screwed up. These people are the worst.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, I can see how a lot of teenagers would just ignore the stuff about proper security, but then would eventually remember like, oh yeah, dad said that if I ever got tricked into doing this, that it's not my fault and that he'd have my back. And it's embarrassing, but I remember him saying this and kind of have to get into that. You have to have that little seed planted in their brain.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
I thought I was going to live forever when I was about 15 years old.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, that's scary. 64% of victims report that threats get worse with greater compliance. I think the thinking, too, is that it's probably not super hard to get kids to share images of themselves, because It's so normal these days to sext your boyfriend or your girlfriend or even somebody that you're just flirting with these days on various social media apps.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
I've seen stats about how pervasive this is. It's just a little scary.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
Für alle Kinder, die zu diesem Thema hören, die in diesem Weg verletzt werden, müssen Sie diesen Podcast jetzt ausmachen und einen vertrauten Älteren sprechen. Vielleicht fühlen Sie sich nicht zufrieden, mit Ihren Eltern darüber zu sprechen, was passiert, also sprechen Sie mit einem Lehrer. Du würdest diesen Art von SEO-Eingabe lieben. Das ist richtig.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
That's right. It's a Chinese hacker who has all the goods. So put it back in your pants, your iPod that is, and make sure you take note of what we discussed today. So while this is all pretty grim material, I actually really appreciate you, Nick, for digging through. This is kind of a dirty one.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
So, you educated us here and I know you had to sift through all that, so I really, I do appreciate that. Thanks everyone for listening. Topic suggestions for future episodes of Skeptical Sunday to jordan at jordanharbinger.com, show notes at jordanharbinger.com, advertisers, deals, discounts and ways to support the show, all at jordanharbinger.com slash deals.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
I'm at jordanharbinger on Twitter and Instagram. You can also connect with me on LinkedIn. This show is created in association with Podcast One. My team is Jen Harbinger, Jace Sanderson, Robert Fogarty, Ian Baird and Gabriel Mizrahi. Our advice and opinions are our own. And yes, I am a lawyer, but I am not your lawyer. Do your own research before implementing anything you hear on the show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
Remember, we rise by lifting others. Share the show with those you love. And if you found this episode useful, please share it with somebody else who could use a good dose of the skepticism and knowledge that we doled out today. In the meantime, I hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn. And we'll see you next time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
Ihr hört jetzt eine Vorlesung des Jordan-Harbinger-Shows mit Amanda Katarzy, die in einem Kult geboren wurde und später Sex und Arbeit verbreitet hat.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
Welcome to Skeptical Sunday. I'm your host, Jordan Harbinger. Today I'm here with Skeptical Sunday co-host, writer and researcher Nick Pell. On the Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the stories, secrets and skills of the world's most fascinating people and turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
Is that math correct? I genuinely have no idea and I'm not getting out my phone.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
To hear how she escaped her dire situation, check out Episode 631 of The Jordan Harbinger Show. Untertitelung. BR 2018 Das ist, wenn du bemerkst, dass Dinge nicht so gut funktionieren, wie sie früher waren. Deine Beine, dein Körper, vielleicht sogar dein Haar. Vital Proteins steigt ein, um diese Bereiche unterstützt zu halten, damit du aktiv sein kannst und was du liebst.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
Vital Proteins ist die Nummer 1 Kollagen-Peptid-Brand in den USA, damit sie wissen, was sie tun. Es ist super einfach zu nehmen, einfach eine Tasse zu deiner Kaffee, Smoothie, sogar Wasser zu geben. Es riecht nicht einmal wie etwas, also blendet es sofort ein. Die Schlüssel ist Konsistenz. Machen es ein tägliches Habit, ist, wie du die Vorteile siehst.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
Yes. So regardless, your point is that's a lot of money for not a lot of time, effort or risk on the part of the scammer, right? They just shoot this stuff out there and if one person responds, they've made a good hourly rate messing around with this crap.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
Sure, especially if you live in a developing country where that money goes really far. And, of course, you have zero morals about how you make your money in the first place. I suppose that's true. But how many people are actually falling for this? I wonder. Are there hard statistics on how often this is actually working?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, not that all boomers are idiots, but some boomers are. And they fall for stuff like this. And also millennials like you. So how do you know they were Russian? I'm a Gen Xer. Okay, whatever. Close enough. We're on the line. We're on the line, but I'm mad lazy and don't care about my work. Oh good, that's always a good quality in someone who works for this show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
Our mission is to help you become a better informed, more critical thinker and during the week, We have long-form conversations with a variety of incredible people, from spies to CEOs, athletes, authors, thinkers and performers.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
How do you know the scammers were Russian? They're always Russian. Okay, I can't really argue with that logic. Okay, this is one of those, the views of Nick Pell are not endorsed by the Jordan Harbinger show. Anyway, did you report that? I did the first time. What do you mean the first time? This happened more than once? This happened twice in one week. Wow.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
Okay, definitely let's talk about how you feel about that, because that's a kick in each nut.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, I get that. Once you send somebody 500 bucks for this, the scammer's not like, oh, thanks, buddy, guess I gotta find a new victim and running away. They're just gonna keep juicing you until you give up or you run out of money or whatever, especially if they're basically safe and sound halfway around the world and you've proven yourself to be a sucker who will send that money.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
On Sundays, though, we do Skeptical Sunday, where a rotating guest co-host and I break down a topic you may have never thought about and debunk common misconceptions on that topic. Topics such as recycling, chemtrails, banned foods, GMOs, toothpaste, crystal healing, diet pills, energy drinks and more.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
Gibt es noch etwas anderes? Ich habe heute einige Fishing-E-Mails bekommen, die mich für meine Krypto-Passphrase fragen, um meinen Account zu verweisen, natürlich. Gibt es noch etwas anderes? MetaMask-Support, Mann, sie wollen immer deine Seed-Phrase. Das ist richtig, sie wollen immer die Geheimphrase, die du niemandem geben sollst. Gibt es noch etwas anderes, was Leute tun können?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
Ich meine, ich weiß, ja, klick nicht auf die Links, schick diese Leute Geld, aber okay, was noch?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
So I would suggest that you put Krebs on security on your radar. That's a good one. For those unaware, this is a security website that monitors a lot of emerging exploits and scams. And it's good to keep on your radar so that you can keep yourself and your family safe.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
And I want to admit right now, I've fallen for weird Internet scams, not ones that require you to be greedy or say that they have nude pictures of me. Just some of this stuff is incredibly complex. We joke about, oh, you're a boomer and you're out of touch. Anybody, even the most savvy folks can fall for this stuff.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
I know scam researchers that have fallen for scams, so you just gotta have your wits about it. Yeah, it's crazy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
For sure. The last thing that anyone getting into this needs to do is become super paranoid and have their life grind to a halt. That's one of the unfortunate side effects of getting scammed. Some people get a little bit too conservative.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
And if you're new to the show or you want to tell your friends about the show, and I always appreciate it when you do that, I suggest our episode starter packs. These are collections of our favorite episodes on persuasion, negotiation, psychology, disinformation, crime and cults and more. It'll help new listeners get a taste of everything we do here on the show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
Oh, I have seen this. So I got a scam email without photos, and I shared it on an episode of this show on Feedback Friday. And a bunch of listeners were like, oh, I think I got the same email, but it had photos of the outside of their home. Because again, we're back to being freaked out about the very idea that somebody can see where you live.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
If they send me photos of me in my house, now I'm scared. But this is like a photo of my garage. Okay. That's not too scary.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, the front door taken from a moving vehicle and the last four digits of your phone number, exactly.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
Und wenn sie die Beweise nicht zeigen, ist es, weil es keine gibt. Es existiert nicht. Er sitzt im Auto und er öffnet den Mittelpunkt und es gibt schwarze und weiße Fotos von dir da drin, küsst jemanden. Aber es ist ein totales Verständnis, weil diese Person dich geküsst hat und blablabla. Das ist jeder Film, oder? Das ist jeder Szene. In that movie.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
Just visit jordanharbinger.com slash start or search for us in your Spotify app to get started. Today we're going to be discussing a pretty gross topic, the sexual exploitation of adults and children. We wanted to put that up front because all kidding about triggering and stuff aside, we know that this is a very emotional topic for a lot of people.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
So I feel like there's this big panic going around. Actually, that was maybe just the Tetris movie, but that was the last time I saw that scene. There's a Tetris movie? Yeah, oh, it's actually pretty good. It's the story of how Tetris got to the United States out of the Soviet Union.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
There's like KGB intrigue, which is probably hyperbolic nonsense for the movie only, but they show how the guy kept going back and forth and how they invented these different parts of the game. It's actually shockingly good for a movie that's about an 80s video game. I really enjoyed it. That's our unsolicited recommendation here on Skeptical Sunday. Watch the Tetris movie.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1128: Sextortion | Skeptical Sunday
So I feel like there's this big panic going around about all of this sextortion, the scams, they've got my nudes. I'm kind of at a loss for why, because so far it sounds like what you've got is dark web data brokers selling people's information, some extremely gullible people falling for it. Hey!
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Oh my god, he like hides them. I'm just trying to throw everybody under the bus now. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
That is a good point. Fizz and caffeine. Okay. You know what's actually fit for human consumption? The fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
These are collections of our favorite episodes on persuasion, negotiation, psychology, disinformation, cyber warfare, crime and cults and more. It'll help new listeners get a taste of everything we do here on the show. Just visit jordanharbinger.com or search for us in your Spotify app to get started. Heute, Fritos, Figs, French Fries, Foie Gras und Fondue.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Wenn Sie sich fragen, wie ich alle die tollen Autoren, Denker und Kreatoren auf dem Show jede Woche beobachten konnte, ist es wegen meiner Netzwerke, dem Kreis von Leuten, die ich kenne, liebe und vertraue. Und ich lehre Ihnen, wie Sie Ihre eigene Netzwerke gratis bauen, für persönliche Dinge, für Geschäftsstoff, das ist wirklich egal. 6minutenetworking.com ist, wo Sie es finden können.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Back to Skeptical Sunday. Fake Foods are more than just additives, right? There's a lot of actually just totally fake stuff. Or like the bulk of it's fake.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Oh, ich erinnere mich an das. Oh, wieder so gut und enttäuschend. Warum? Ja, was ist mit dem Nozzle? Es war wahrscheinlich so wie ein Squirtgun-Method mit dem du es auf deinen Hotdog eröffnest.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Ja, wie 1% war 100% echte Parmesan. Ich bin nicht überrascht. Der Tipp ist, es ist in einer Schale und es muss nicht in den Refrigerator gehen. Man könnte nicht 100% Parmesan erwarten. Woodpulp jedoch, wie wurde das sogar erlaubt? Oder war das, weshalb sie in die Gefängnis gingen?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Hey, some living organisms can actually eat this without dying. So technically, and the judge is like, okay, I'll see it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Die Linie zwischen dem, was das echte Essen ist und dem, was das falsche Essen ist, ist ein bisschen blöd. Was konsumieren wir bei jeder Mahlzeit? Wie können wir das verbreitete Web von Ingredienzen und Intentionen und Konsequenzen der Essen, die wir essen, von lab-gegrown Mehl zu artificiellen Geschmacken, wie können falsche Essen unsere Gesundheit, Umwelt, Gesellschaft beeinflussen?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Ah, so if they had labeled it Wood Pulp Parmesan, then there would have been no problem selling this stuff to everybody. Oh, that's so disappointing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, oh, you get the fancy Wood Pulp Parm.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
I want to try that mahogany parm. Gross. The fact that the government is okay with giving people fake food, to me, is crazy. What regulations are there? I feel like I'm going to regret asking, because you're going to be like, none, but surely at least some barriers exist here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Right, yeah. If it kills you in a few decades, that's on you for eating too much of it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Oh no, not economically motivated adulteration. How are you so sure that we've all eaten sawdust cheese or whatever? How do we know that?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Wir sind unberichtet über das Essen, das wir essen, und die Labels und Marketing-Schemen machen das Essen immer schwieriger. Schriftsteller Jessica Wynne kommt zu mir für eine Feast von Wissen und Skepsis über falsche Füße. Okay, guten Appetit, alle.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
The French don't care, but they're buying horse and know they know it's horse. I've heard it's popular in France. I'm not just picking on the French. I've heard horse means popular there. I still want to know what I'm buying. Yikes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
I can't believe that's a real thing. It sounds like something that dorky executives at agricultural companies call themselves. Like, yeah, drinks with the agro-mafia tonight? Alright, I'm in. 7pm.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
By the way, if it was really in Italy, it was Operation Mamma Mia, right? They have to say it like Mario. And not only did they just name it the most cliche thing you could possibly name an Italian law enforcement operation. But they still found a way to throw shade on the Spanish and Greeks.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
It's not that you were exporting olive oil, it's that you were exporting the low quality adulterated Spanish and Greek stuff, which we all know is not as good as the stuff we make here. And you're making us look bad.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
So my surf and turf is tilapia slash horse cooked in cheap oil supplied by the mob. I must have missed that scene in Goodfellas.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
No, that means I'll probably never even had real saffron, the humanity. I know. I've seen fake honey. Jen and I, when we went to Australia a zillion years ago, she picked this scammer out at a market down there because...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Jen used to be a beekeeper and this guy was like, I have pineapple flavored honey, I have strawberry flavored honey and my bees, they only feed on this one monocrop and Jen was like, yeah, that's just not even possible. You mean to tell me you have a giant greenhouse full of one crop And then you could taste it and it was like really strawberry, like candy, really pineapple, like candy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
And the consistency and the thing that it was almost totally clear. And Jen's like, you know, the honey we pull out of the hives at our house is like dark brown and has stuff in it, like little particles. Real honey almost looks a bit dirty. And it tastes like honey that's a mix of all kinds of different plants and things like that. This is definitely just corn syrup with flavoring in it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
And yeah, if that guy was doing it at a farmer's market in Australia, then it's likely not just in that one isolated incident being sold to the public.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Nein, sie war einfach so, dass sie nichts kaufen soll, weil meine Eltern so gut sind. Und sie war so, dass sie nichts kaufen soll. Es ist Fake. Und sie war so, okay. Und später war ich so, was redest du darüber? Sie war so, er ist ein Kon-Artist. Also hat sie es erklärt. Es hat Sinn gemacht.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Und sie hat gesagt, du weißt, das kleine Bär-Honey, das du bei der Grocery-Store kaufst, das du auf deinem Cereal oder in deinem Tee nimmst. Oh, sicher. Das ist im Grunde nur Korn-Sirup.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
That's labeled as, it says honey, but it's not, it's like 2% or 0% honey.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
That's interesting. I grind my own beans because I do be fancy like that, but this is alarming. And you know what? It makes sense because I've noticed... dass gegründeter Kaffee wirklich teuer ist. Und ich dachte, aber ich grinde es selbst. Warum ist es teurer, wenn ich einen extra Schritt habe? Und der Grund ist, weil ich Kaffeebeeren bekomme und das sind 5% Kaffeebeeren und dann fricking Twigs.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, that's true. The middle aisles, that's where all the good stuff is. That's where the Pop-Tarts are. But let's be clear, when we say fake foods, I'm not talking about decorative fruit or plastic for a drawing. And I'm not even talking about something that might just be frozen. What are we talking about when we say fake foods?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Ja, keine Ahnung. Wow. Also es macht mich wundern, ob ich irgendwas echt esse? Komm schon, alles ist fake.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Ah, Fleisch-Alternativen. Ja, in der Bay Area ist super populär. Ich hatte einen pflanzlichen Kaffee-Sandwich, der genau wie Kaffee am letzten Tag riecht. Ich denke, einer von Jens' Cousins arbeitet bei einer dieser pflanzlichen Fleisch-Kompanien. Aber sie schlagen mich nicht als gesund.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Denn ist nicht all diese verpackte Zwiebeln-Stuffe mit, wiederum, Additiven oder Ölen, die in sie gepackt sind, um sie alle zusammenzutragen?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
And just sort of LARP slash pretended that fake food was also healthy because it wasn't meat while tripling the price.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
I feel like the cheese sticks we buy our kids are probably legit because I found one behind the bed the other day and it was hard as a rock. And I was like, oh, that seems to me like what real cheese might do when left out, just dehydrate and be really hard. Okay, my friend, I don't want to out the guy, he bought a McDonald's hamburger.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Let's just say it ended up in his car for a long period of time. And we were going on a road trip and we were cleaning out his car and we found it. And it looked basically like the day he bought it. And it was months old.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Leghemoglobin really sounds like hemoglobin, which I know is in the blood, and I don't want to be like, it sounds the same, so it must be the same thing. It's plant blood. Oh my gosh, that's so bizarre. Wood pulp is safe for human consumption too. So I'm not sure I'm all in with impossible, because it's not impossible that this stuff is slowly killing you if you eat a lot of it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
And there's a lot of additives in leghemoglobin, plant blood, I don't know, maybe not as natural.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Are we going down the wrong path in terms of finding a solution for this stuff? Because it seems confusing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Okay, so anything with the word artificial is probably a giveaway?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
What about lab-grown meat as opposed to fake meat? This is meat that's grown. That's actually real meat, right? It's just not from slaughtered animals. Do you know anything about this?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, TBD on lab-grown meats. I'm curious about it because something is weird slash gross about eating vat-grown meat, but admittedly Ja, ja, ja.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Because everything is just in a bucket.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
So from a cruelty standpoint, it's better because you're not killing the animal. But I didn't realize they were still using the same drugs and everything in that kind of stuff. That sort of defeats the purpose for a lot of us.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Our food sounds high-tech. Molecular milk, I don't even know what that is, but it sounds like something. Milk from the future.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
You know what's not grown in a vat with a boatload of antibiotics? The fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
So do we need alternatives to the alternatives? Because I don't know, it seems like the alternatives have just as many problems so far.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
But those apples might even grow in a wasteful way. It's like almonds. Oh, they're so good for you. They're sucking all the water out of California. It seems like we want our foods to have a positive environmental impact as well, or at least a not super negative environmental impact.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
I feel like we did a Skeptical Sunday on almonds and they take a ton of water to grow. But maybe that's just what trees need to grow.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
They're wasting water. Give your water to us so we can waste it on cows.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
I can't remember if that was a Skeptical Sunday or something a guest said on the show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
I know people with allergies turn to these products as well. So there's some health benefit there. If you swell up when you drink milk, maybe you drink almond milk instead.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
But the environmental impact concerns, that has to be weighed with the fact that we got to eat, right? Look, I'm all for the environment, but I'm not going to like only eat sprouts that I grow in my house because I don't want to have an impact on the environment.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
I have heard a lot about palm oil. I think that was also one of those cause du jour when I was in college. Palm oil is terrible. Stop using it. It was just in every snack food. There's a lot of negativity around the environmental impact of that stuff. It's like it's ruining the developing world because that's all they're growing or whatever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
So humans are the only species that process their foods.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
For those who don't know, food deserts are communities with no convenient options for fresh foods, right? So if you only have a liquor store nearby, you're probably not gonna have a produce section with a bunch of different choices and a fresh meat section or whatever it is. It's just gonna be like, all right, here's some packaged stuff that you can heat in your microwave.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, it really doesn't. I know people that live Out of the Dollar General basically, near their house. And it's just tragic. You can imagine what's available there.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
So her philanthropy is terrific, but more than one store needs to be accessible to get 40 million people out of food deserts. If food equity is all about access, it seems like the solution would be in community gardens and local farming and not a supermarket. But I know I'm asking for farms to crop up in the middle of downtown Detroit, which makes absolutely no sense.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Convenience though, right? It's not convenient to grow your own food. It's easier just to be like, screw it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Fake Food is going to be so cheap in the near future, but is it all just going to be totally bereft of nutrition?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Sounds like we're all part of a really gross experiment, whether we like it or not. Maybe it's always been like that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Ja, für mich, Mann, regelreiche Reisen in den Landwirtschaftsmarkt, das ist so schrecklich.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Yep, trust me, we go every weekend. It's not the majority of the stuff that I eat. Just some random things that we like from there. So we come home with like mushrooms and some eggs or whatever and some fruit. That's it. It's not like we buy everything from that place.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Ich habe nicht darüber nachgedacht. Wir sind die einzige Spezies, die kocht. Es gibt keine Küchen-Show von Animal Kingdom. Wir haben immer Gemüse gekocht, glaube ich, solange wir Fleisch auf den Feuer gelegt haben. Ich habe es nicht so nachgedacht. Was ist die Unterschiede heute? Weil es natürlich schlimmer wird.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
It seems hopeless, but what could we do to fight corporate influence on our diet? I don't have Nestle Lobby in cash. Yeah, I mean...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
I think it's funny that's where they draw the line. You can't put that tiger on the front. The sugar-coated flakes, no problem. The tiger on the front, no sir.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, it is. So now there's just really small logos on things.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Thank you, Jessica. This has been a barfer of a skeptical Sunday, especially the vat meat was really yucky.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Thank you all for listening. Topic suggestions for future episodes of Skeptical Sunday to jordan at jordanharbinger.com. Show notes on the website. Advertisers, deals, discounts and ways to support the show. All at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. I'm at jordanharbinger on Twitter and Instagram. You can also connect with me on LinkedIn. You can find Jessica on her sub stack Between the Lines.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Link to that in the show notes as well. This show is created in association with Podcast One. My team is Jen Harbinger, Jace Sanderson, Robert Fogarty, Ian Baird and Gabriel Mizrahi. Our advice and opinions are our own. And I'm a lawyer, but I'm not your lawyer. I'm certainly not a nutritionist or anything like that. So do your own research before implementing anything you hear on the show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
In the meantime, I hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn. And we'll see you next time. Du wirst ein Vorlesung des Jordan Harbinger Show hören, mit einem Schmerzpsychologen, der Menschen hilft, chronische Schmerzen zu behandeln, wenn alles andere verfehlt ist.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
To hear more from Dr. Rachel Zoffness about how pain works in the body and brain, check out Episode 661 of The Jordan Harbinger Show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Interesting that just chopping an apple is enough processing to change our body's digestion.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Okay, so what is ultra-processing compared to processing?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Denken Sie an die Ingredient-Liste auf den Füßen in meiner Küche. Ich fühle mich, als ob vieles ultraverpackt ist, für sicher. Ja.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Das ist fast wie das Tricken unseres Gehirns, vom Geräusch davon.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
I know this is connected to why we've seen a rise in obesity, because obesity isn't just from inactivity, but research indicates obesity is more from the food we are eating.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Okay, so if that orange flavor has little to no nutrition, your brain tells you, hey, you gotta eat more of this because there's barely any vitamin C in here. We're not detecting any vitamin C. This, I assume, works out well for food companies who just want you to eat as much as possible. So it's a great business plan, but sounds like a really bad health plan.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Willkommen bei Skeptical Sunday. Ich bin euer Host, Jordan Harbinger. Heute bin ich hier mit Skeptical Sunday-Co-Host, Schriftstellerin und Forscherin Jessica Wynn.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Ich weiß, dass viele dieser Commodity-Crops auf der Höhe für Farmanimale gegründet werden. Also warum sind sie in meinem Essen auch?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Es ist witzig, dass ich als Mensch denke, oh, mein gebliebenes Essen geht in einen Trophäen und dann essen es die Pferde. Mittlerweile essen wir alle das gleiche. Das ist tatsächlich das gebliebene Pferdessen, das in mein Essen geht, richtig? Es ist wie, oh, wir brauchen nicht dieses Palmöl und dieses andere Soja und Korn. Mach ein Serien aus diesem. Gib es Jordan und seinen Kindern.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Du machst es klingen, als ob Additiven eine magische Potion sind. Also was sind diese mysteriösen Additiven, die Pfeffer rekonstruieren und sie in etwas ressemblerndes Essen verändern?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Auf der Jordan Harbinger Show decoden wir die Geschichten, Geheimnisse und Fähigkeiten der weltweit faszinierendsten Menschen und verändern ihre Wissen in praktische Hinweise, die Sie nutzen können, um euren eigenen Leben und die, die sich um Sie herum befinden, zu beeinflussen. Unsere Mission ist es, Sie zu werden, ein besser informierter, kritischer Denker.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, for some reason. Okay, so it sounds like it's the Wild West when you see artificial flavor as an ingredient, which is concerning. So what do the additives do? I don't get how nobody cares if those exist and are thrown into everything.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Mmm, spicy chip red. Are these affecting our health aside from packing on the pounds? Not that being super overweight isn't the most primary health concern of our entire nation right now, but do they do anything else besides make us fat?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
I remember when we were kids, it was like red dye number four and then it was like, oh my God, now you can't use that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, and it was causing, I don't even know what, but it was definitely bad for you. I know some of this stuff is supposed to be bad for our guts as well. Something we, maybe in the last 10 years, people started caring about, but didn't even realize was a thing back when we were growing up.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Und während der Woche haben wir langfristige Gespräche mit einer Vielfalt von fantastischen Leuten, von Spielen zu CEOs, Athleten, Autoren, Denkern und Performern. Auf Sonntagen machen wir Skeptical Sunday, wo ein rotierender Gast, Co-Host und ich einen Thema unterbrechen, den ihr vielleicht noch nie überlegt habt und gemeinsame Missverständnisse überdenken.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
No, continue buying this crap, but then also buy the one with probiotics and drink this kombucha to replenish the gut bacteria that you've murdered or starved by eating all this other stuff. So it's like everything has additives. Does this include artificial sweeteners? Because I feel like those must be doing some good, eliminating tons of sugar from our diet.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Okay, but some of that is correlation versus causation, right? We can't say, hey, by the way, artificial sweeteners, and then everyone got fat. It's like, well, okay, a lot of things have changed. I got a friend, he drinks 20 diet sodas a day, so he can brag about being sugar-free. Doesn't seem that good for him. There was a guy in my law school.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
This guy would show up to the library with a 12-pack of Diet Coke, those long ones that fit in the fridge, and he would just open the top, and then he would slam a can, open another one, drink that can, open another one. By lunchtime, that thing was empty. He would go eat, come back with a fresh 12-pack. So this dude was drinking two dozen Diet Cokes per day, every day.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Untertitelung des ZDF für funk, 2017 Untertitelung des ZDF für funk, 2017
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1116: Fake Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Themen wie, warum Expirationsdaten Nonsens sind, Astrologie, Akupunktur, E-Commerce-Skams, Diät-Supplements, die Lotterie, Eierkandeln und mehr. Und wenn ihr neu zu dem Show oder ihr wollt euren Freunden über den Show erzählen, I suggest our episode starter packs.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
Are they giving him a shot, like an intramuscular shot in the glute by force? Yes. This is like something we would expect to see in a movie about a dystopian insane asylum or whatever based on the Soviet Union. This is actually way worse than I've imagined.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
What? That is so pervy and wrong, not to mention totally illegal. So how do these places get away with this kind of abuse? Like, I'm guessing the kids can't tell anyone or no one believes them. There's no phones or no evidence. What's going on here?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
So these kids are really trapped in there. It seems like there's nothing they can do. I mean, any way you slice it, they're trapped in this place.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
That can't be healthy for any human, let alone a developing brain and body. Can I ask why they put you on that medication? I don't really understand. Were you just like, they decided you were better off drugged up and quiet?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
This is so weird. It sounds like they just decided you'd be easier to deal with if you were zonked out on drugs.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
So is this kind of pray the gay away, but with copious amounts of antipsychotic drugs, forced labor and what sounds like worse drugs? If you're spending three and a half years away from your family in these teen prison camps, if I can call them that, are you also going to school? Because you could go to school during that time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
Okay, well, that's not education. If they're just making you digest material through brute force, it's more like indoctrination. I suppose it depends on what they're teaching you, but not being able to pee for 12 hours is a special kind of hell, and I don't think I could function in that environment.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
A cult. So like robes and chanting level cults? Or are we talking more like religious fundamentalism stuff?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
That sounds like a nightmare. I don't understand the point of that. I think a guest on the show, her dad was in it and so she was raised in it. So these types of cults helped kick off these youth programs. That doesn't bode well.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
It's like if you told me that a kid's camp was founded by Scientology or something like, OK, maybe they have fun kite making activities or whatever, but I don't think I would run and sign up for that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
So this kind of sounds like kidnapping. Is it that dramatic? That's crazy, honestly.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah. So do people just tell you're a horrible person for three hours? Like, what is it?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
That's not therapy. No, it's definitely not. Again, I'm no professional. I have enough experience with therapy to know that's not therapy. Wow.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
This is bananas. So like I said, I know somebody who was in that cult and eventually left, but she might have left out a few details about how crazy it was. And I guess I can't really blame her because I don't know if I'd be broadcasting that I grew up like that either.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah. So what's the origin of those if it's not the culty thing from Synanon? And why outdoorsy stuff? Because it sounded like a medium security prison meets Boy Scout jamboree when he told me about it, except for the food deprivation part. That was weird.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
90 bucks. That's a bargain for a potential disaster. I suppose this gets worse.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
I'm trying to wrap my mind around this, right? Because this is, and we'll get into this, but I've had this happen to friends of mine too. Who comes to you in the middle of the night? Do they just take you out of your bed? I'm imagining them kind of like rolling you up in your bed sheets and carting you off in a van.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
Are they punishing kids in the wilderness? What is it that they're doing? Because I've been camping. It's fun. I'm assuming they're not doing that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah. Oh, man. So these are the precursors of today's wilderness therapy, air quotes, therapy programs.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
So when there's money and there's no oversight, there's going to be abuse. It's kind of like the prison system, even though seemingly there's way more oversight in the prison system than there is in this. I feel like that's a running theme on the show when I talk about this kind of stuff. Are there other types of programs? We've had the wilderness one.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
I've heard of a zillion of these programs, but I never really connected them all in my mind together into what you're calling the troubled teen industry. I just figured they were all separate, different things.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, forcing youth to cuddle, that's so icky. I don't need more context on that one. That's just like grooming stuff.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
You know you've crossed a line when people are comparing your school to a POW camp in North Korea. Yeah. You don't want that. But I'm assuming this is not the end of things.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
what the hell this is like straight out of a horror movie this really is kind of like pow camp north korea style stuff like we're going to interrogate you until you say that you're guilty and then we're going to give you like a show trial except they're showing your parents a fake confession not to mention it doesn't even sound close to what somebody who if they really are going through a tough time already it doesn't sound like this is what they actually need to succeed slash recover from substance abuse issues or anything else you're just making the whole thing worse clearly
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
So this is insane, but I gotta ask, what is the hard way? Yeah, they told me that that way involved handcuffs. All right. So is this legal? I should know this, but I'm asking you because this is your industry. How did I not know that this was really going on in the world?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
First of all, it sounds like it's definitely a systemic issue then. But now that I think about it, I also, I know some people who have had their teens admitted to, I think, similar-ish residential placement, and they swear by this experience. Surely you've come across people who report positive outcomes, whether that be the kids or their parents.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
Because like I said, my friend from high school, he loved his outdoor program. I don't know if it was immediate, but I remember him being like, you should all do it. And he said it was great for him. And he wasn't like trolling us. He was like pretty honest. He wasn't that kind of guy. He was pretty bullish on the whole thing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
Of course, that kind of goes without saying, right? People have no recourse, they can't communicate. It just seems like a recipe for disaster and a completely inappropriate situation for kids or anyone, really, to be in. But I've done work in prisons, maximum security prisons, and even people in a maximum security prison can communicate with folks outside regularly.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
Like I've had friends that this happened to in the 90s and I thought like they were lying about it because it definitely sounds illegal. You can't just have someone kidnapped even if they're your kid. Can you?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
They can get help, they can file complaints, and they can get assistance at some level. And I know former prisoners are gonna be like, dude, it's terrible in there. But they're literally in a maximum security prison. They can still make phone calls, right? They can still talk to their lawyer, et cetera. Kids especially need support systems to develop and thrive.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
So this is crazy to have them in an environment that has less communication than Sing Sing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, it's like you're just ripping a plant out of the soil and then you put it somewhere else expecting it to thrive, but there's no roots.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, it's like a bad software update that just messes with their brain development.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
You're listening to The Jordan Harbinger Show. We'll be right back. So basically, if a teenager or young person goes through something rough and they're met with a drill sergeant instead of a caregiver, you're saying it messes up their brain and their ability to perform and deal with stress in the future.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
So what kind of long-term effects can this lead to? Because I've done a ton of work around stress on this show, and it can basically just kill you early and make your life awful.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
This might be self-explanatory, but is that a category? What are adverse childhood experiences? I assume that's a clinical term of some kind.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
And our mission is to help you become a better informed, more critical thinker, During the week, we have long-form interviews with a variety of amazing folks, from spies to CEOs, athletes, authors, thinkers, performers.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, that's awful. I, of course, feel for any kid dealing with trauma. And now that I'm a parent, man, whenever I see adults that have gone off the rails, you see someone outside or you see someone like just really their life is not in order or they're in prison. I always just I wonder what happened to them as kids that might have led them to where they are now.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
It's interesting that you bring this up because, you know, as I hinted towards the top of the show, I'd had friends who'd gone through some sort of weird experiences, but there was a buddy of mine who vanished for a year. Maybe it was slightly less. This is a kind of a troublemaking kid that I didn't want to hang out with too much because he always had like bad ideas.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
So it sounds like the troubled teen programs are promising treatment that they don't deliver to the kids and the parents, but they're also increasing kids' trauma, right? So they're making the whole thing worse and the kids come out worse than they were when they went in. Is that fair to say?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
So even when the industry isn't directly killing kids, it's basically setting up a slow-motion train wreck for their future health, which is... beyond messed up. I'm curious, though, of course, the depression and suicide stuff, that makes sense.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
But how is somebody more likely to get something like what was it like lung disease or hepatitis as an adult from going through a traumatic experience in childhood? That part I don't quite understand.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
Okay, yeah, so that makes sense. This is all like downstream effects.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
And then he came back and he said, yeah, I just went to boarding school. And it just didn't add up because who goes to boarding school for one year and then comes back to their public school and says that it was a good experience? Like, if it's terrible, you come back after a year. If it's great, it all seemed weird to me.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
Wait, so you got into a car crash and you just didn't go to the doctor?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
That is absolutely unbelievable. I mean, the fact that you were in such a serious car accident, your car rolled, your hand smashed the windshield, you're like bleeding. And your first instinct was, oh, I don't want to be seen as dramatic by these people who are abusing me in this program. It just shows how deeply ingrained that fear was.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
And the program owner being proud of you for pushing through, it's heartbreaking and kind of psycho as well. So thank you for sharing that. It's got to be tough to relive that even now. And it's so sad that children are being conditioned this way. It makes me wonder just how many kids are being put through this $23 billion in public funding alone. So who knows the scope of the industry?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
It's a massive scale. Actually, do we know how many people end up in these programs on a yearly basis?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
And another friend of mine who was not actually a bad kid but was lost in life, he did some nature program where the story was that they left him in the woods alone with a box of crackers, and it was multiple weeks of this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, that's a lot more than I expected. I can't believe we don't hear more about this, honestly. Can we stop this? It seems like a senator or two would make this a pet cause and just blow it up and start passing legislation or something.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, it is amazing what a little celebrity spotlight can do. I didn't have Paris Hilton becomes child advocate on my bingo card the 2020s at all, but good for her.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
You know, I remember that because I'm from Michigan originally and I remember reading about this and it was just like, wait, he threw a sandwich. So why were people leaning on him? I think he was suffocated, right? Because they were just pushing him into the floor and he couldn't breathe. And that was the end of it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
So did you manage to make an impact? Because it seems like this is long overdue.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
Yikes. Wow. Transparent title. Okay, good. We're seeing progress. It seems like these efforts are creating change or potentially creating change, which is really great because this is disgusting what we're talking about today.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, impressive. 90 programs. So tell me more about your organization, Unsilenced. What are you doing? Obviously, you're going to D.C. and advocating, but like, what else are you doing?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, I had no idea that any of this was going on. And of course, I just sort of assumed like, oh, you go through the program and then you go back to your family and you live your normal life. I didn't realize people end up like on the street after this because their life is destroyed. Just horrible to think that this has been happening for decades, really right under our noses.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
And like, I'm pretty upset that my tax dollars are going to this because it's just offensive. And disgusting. So thank you for coming on the show today, sharing your personal experience, especially. I think it's great you've turned that experience, that horrible experience, into fuel to help protect others. Thank you for having me. This show is created in association with Podcast One.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
My team is Jen Harbinger, Jace Sanderson, Robert Fogerty, Ian Baird, and Gabriel Mizrahi. Our advice and opinions are our own. And I'm a lawyer, but I'm not your lawyer. Do your own research before implementing things you hear on the show. Also, we may get a few things wrong here and there, especially on Skeptical Sunday. If you think we really dropped the ball, let us know.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
I'm also curious which show fans are hearing this and have been through one of these programs. I'm curious about your experience. Jordan at jordanharbinger.com. Remember, we rise by lifting others. Share the show with those you love. And if you found the episode useful, please share it with somebody else who could use a good dose of the skepticism and knowledge that we doled out today.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
In the meantime, I hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn. And we'll see you next time. You're about to hear a preview of the Jordan Harbinger show with Amanda Katarzy, who was raised in a cult and later sex and labor trafficked.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
Now that I think about it, I'm like, how did he get food? Because he ate the whole box of crackers on the first night. That's what we were laughing about. But then I'm like, it's not funny when you're in the woods with no food.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
To hear how she escaped her dire situation, check out episode 631 of The Jordan Harbinger Show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah. When I read that, when I was creating the intro for this episode, I was like, OK, this is a daunting name. And it seems like those words shouldn't go together. Like there shouldn't be an industry around troubled teens anymore.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
On Sundays, though, we do Skeptical Sunday, where a rotating guest co-host and I break down a topic you might have never thought about and debunk common misconceptions about that topic, such as why the Olympics are kind of a sham, why tipping makes no sense, acupuncture, astrology, recycling, chemtrails, banned foods, and more.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
Oh, gosh. So parents basically just decide something is wrong with their kid, whatever they're upset about at the time. My son is gay and I don't like it. And then they just send them to one of these places.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
I spent three and a half years in two programs. Even as an adult, that's a long time. But when you're a teenager... That's an eternity. That's honestly most of these so-called disorders that people have when they go into these. I mean, it sounds like variations of every normal teenage experience. You're smoking pot. Is that all you did? Seems like you weren't that bad.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
Sure, there are outliers, but being sent to what basically amounts to a penal colony slash gulag because you're smoking pot or you're gay or whatever is horrific, actually.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, look, this tracks with my teenage years and probably everyone listening. Who didn't... Look, I don't have any tattoos or anything where I was like, yeah, mom's gonna hate it, right? But who didn't get a piercing and try to keep it a secret? Or who didn't get some ho jeans or something? I mean, you know, and hide them from their parents. Come on, man. Uh, I...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
Welcome to Skeptical Sunday. I'm your host, Jordan Harbinger. Today I'm here with Skeptical Sunday co-host, survivor and advocate Meg Applegate. On the Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the stories, secrets, and skills of the world's most fascinating people and turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
I think I've done many pretty crappy things as a teenager. I definitely put my parents through the ringer. Maybe I was also gulag material at certain points growing up. I don't know. So how did these programs pull in the families? Because maybe I'm just lucky my parents didn't know about this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
Like I said, I was a pill and worse at times, but my parents never slapped me off to the wilderness or a prison camp.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
And if you're new to the show or you're looking for a handy way to tell your friends about the show... I suggest our episode starter packs. These are collections of our favorite episodes on persuasion, negotiation, psychology, disinformation, crime and cults and more. That'll help new listeners get a taste of everything we do here on this show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
It sounds like it's like reefer madness. She's smoking the reefer. She's going to drive her car off of a bridge. Exactly. Ridiculous. So basically, these companies say, is your kid not the little angel she was when she was 10? Don't worry, we'll whip her back into shape. And then it sounds like these kids spend these important formative years of adolescence in
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
eating leafs on crackers in the desert instead of working through their issues with a therapist or just like straight up having a normal life and outgrowing this nonsense.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
So they're claiming to provide therapy and slash a petting zoo or whatever from the sound of it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
So I'm no professional in this area, but it definitely doesn't sound like that's what therapy is supposed to be used for.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, I would imagine, first of all, it's hard enough to open up on a therapist's couch. It's probably even harder if you're strapped to the couch with leather straps or whatever. So rather than receiving true psychotherapy, it sounds like these kids come out with, at best, a skewed understanding of what therapy even looks like. And this actually jibes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
I get letters from people for our Feedback Friday segments, and they're like, This horrible thing happened and I'll write back, oh, you should definitely be in therapy about this and yada yada. And they're like, oh, I'm never gonna do therapy. I've had some bad experiences. And of course I'm like, what do you mean? How bad can a therapist be? And it's usually some variation of this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
My parents sent me to a thing and it turned out to be a cult or whatever. And it's like, oh, well, okay, now I get why you don't wanna go lay on somebody else's couch and get back right into that situation.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
Just visit JordanHarbinger.com slash start or search for us in your Spotify app to get started. Today, every parent knows that raising teenagers can be a wild rollercoaster ride. From mood swings to rebellion, navigating the teenage years can be challenging. I'm not quite there yet, and I don't know, should I be looking forward to that?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
I have more questions than answers from that list, but I definitely wanna hear more about attack therapy, but I'm gonna do it later in the show, because I don't wanna get tripped up here. This is horrible, because it sounds like not only are these places turning regular teenage angst into something that requires drastic intervention, they're also offering what sounds just like
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
phony BS interventions for real issues. And then they're marketing it to struggling parents who don't really know what else to do, which is like con, but also like a very predatory one against families and kids and parents all at the same time. This is very evil in many ways.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
So it's not just parents paying for this. I just assumed this was like upper middle class parents being like, please raise my kid for me because I messed it up. Here's $8,000. Nope.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
$23 billion. So this is a huge industry. This is not a tiny little like there's three of these things in the United States kind of thing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
So with $23 billion, they could probably afford to send kids through real, actual therapy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
Wow, that's a stupid amount of taxpayer dollars that goes to villainizing seemingly pretty normal kids. I guess I can't say I'm super surprised either.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
It sounds like most for-profit industries that we hear about, like those trade colleges where it's like, hey, you can get a loan at 80% per year and you can go get a degree that actually isn't gonna work for nursing anywhere in North America, but we're gonna advertise on TV. Exactly.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
But what happens when the challenges of adolescence make parents feel like they need to find outside help? Enter the Troubled Teen Industry, a complex web of programs and facilities that claim to help troubled teens and their families survive. But are these programs the solution, or do they create even more problems?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
So how do they advertise and market this stuff in the first place? Send your kids starving for attention and connection to sunny Death Valley, where we'll make sure his soul is nourished with all the sand ponies and parasites he can handle. Like, how do you rope the family into this? Don't they have Google?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
Oh, so this is like which Avenger are you quiz on Facebook, but instead it decides your kid needs to go to a labor camp. That's absurd.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
Wow. So this is just completely rigged. It's not like a real assessment at all. It's just one of those marketing quizzes that the answer happens to be the product that we sell, regardless of what dots you've clicked on the test. Color me shocked that the front page of a marketing website doesn't have a proper therapeutic assessment.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
But still, the level of callous disregard for the welfare of the kids that they're enrolling is a little bit baffling and seems like a class action lawsuit or 10 waiting to happen.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
You're listening to The Jordan Harbinger Show. We'll be right back. Also, I wanted to plug our newsletter, We Bit Wiser. The idea here is to give you something specific, something practical that'll have an immediate impact on your decisions, your psychology, and your relationships in under two minutes a week. It's every Wednesday. It's called We Bit Wiser.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
And if you haven't signed up yet, I invite you to come check it out. It is a great companion to the show. JordanHarbinger.com slash news is where you can find it. Now, back to Skeptical Sunday. I think my buddies, well, one of my, the boarding school, air quotes, that guy was gone for a year, I think. But my other friend, it was like, it may be a month or two. I don't even know.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
It's like they're selling a mattress. Do you prefer a firm sleep? Do you get warm at night? It's like they're selling a mattress instead of locking children up for money.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
So speaking of psychological trauma, and there's no joke pivot here, but what exactly goes on in these programs? Your list of abuse that you'd suffered was pretty horrible, but how do these things run?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1091: Troubled Teen Industry | Skeptical Sunday
Today, we're transporting ourselves to the troubled teen industry with survivor, advocate, and mother to her own teenager, Meg Applegate. Meg is the CEO of Unsilenced, which is a nonprofit organization that aims to help stop institutional child abuse by empowering self-advocates to create lasting social change. Meg, thanks for joining me. This is quite a topic we're going to deal with here today.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
This episode is sponsored in part by Vital Proteins. If you wanna support your skin, hair, nails, joints, and bones without adding another complicated step to your routine, check out Vital Proteins Collagen Peptides. Collagen is like the glue that holds everything together in your body. It's a big deal.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
I don't think it's a huge shock to anybody listening to this that the average American doesn't have a very healthy diet. We're kind of famous for that, even abroad. I'm friends with a lot of foreigners who come to America for the first time, especially people from like the former Eastern Bloc. And one of the first things they say is, wow, there's a lot of flags everywhere.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
The roads and the cars are really big, but the people are insanely fat. I remember my brother Florian, I call him my brother, the kid I lived with when I was an exchange student in Germany. He came to the United States. He's probably like 17 or 18. He came to the United States and we started off in Texas. And he was just like, we get it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
You're in America because every road is lined with American flags and people have like flags on the truck and paint job with a flag on it. And he was just like, what is going on? They do not do that in Germany because of World War II and for other reasons. They're not nationalists.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
And it made me realize how nationalists we are, especially in Texas and the southern states, how patriotic everyone is. But then we went to the shopping mall and he was like, oh my God, how does that person function on a daily basis? And he saw a lot of these people riding those little scooters around and he's like, oh, why are so many people on those scooters?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
They get really fat when they're on those because they're not walking around. And I'm like, no, no, no, it's the other way around. That person has eaten so much barbecue or whatever it is that they like can't move. He couldn't wrap his mind around this. I apologize because it sounds like I'm fat shaming. I'm really not.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
But I think we can all agree that there's a lot of people that are overweight in the United States, especially in the South and in Michigan, where I'm from. And you just do not see that in most other countries, especially Europe.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
You know what'll get those bowels moving though, Nick? The fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back. Let me share a little behind the scenes info that you might not know. Using our promo code, it doesn't just get you a discount. It really does help support the show. I know you're not totally ignorant of that, but we don't earn a commission from the sales.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
A lot of people think we do that. But when companies see that people are responding to the ad, that sponsor is more likely to continue their partnership with us. So if you decide to sign up for something, please use our code. It's Jordan a lot of the time, but not always. Definitely check the deals page. It is a double win. You get a great deal. You help keep the show thriving.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
And thank you for the support. All right, back to Skeptical Sunday. Okay, so this is probably a totally different Skeptical Sunday in itself, but I've heard about the seed oil thing. And so seed oils are what stuff like sunflower oil, canola oil. I don't even know what that is because canola is not a thing, right? Vegetable oil, basically anything, but there's a couple exceptions.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
Olive oil and what, coconut oil? So it's a whole thing, right? What's the logic? It's that in nature, you'd never get this much of that seed in one place unless you were just like... OCD collecting those particular seeds and squeezing them. It's just not a natural amount of that oil that you could get in your system. So we're not evolved to deal with it. Is that the logic there?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
These are collections of some of our favorite episodes on persuasion, negotiation, psychology, disinformation, cyber warfare, crime and cults, and more. It'll help new listeners get a taste of all the weird stuff that we cover here on the show. Just visit jordanharbinger.com slash start or search for us in your Spotify app to get started.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
Yikes. I probably eat so much of these. So what is the reasoning behind the seed oil thing? I had my swing and a miss at the guess that it was just you're getting too much of one thing that you normally wouldn't get. But what's the other reason?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
But once we hit our 30s, our natural supply starts to dip, and yeah, you might start feeling a little creaky. Notice your skin and hair just aren't what they used to be. Daily collagen supplementation can help with skin, joints, hair, nails. Vital Proteins is the number one collagen peptides brand in the US, so they know what they're doing. It's super easy to take.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
I met a well-regarded cancer specialist at a party. This is years ago. And he was like, hey, you're going to hear more about this in the next few years. Stop using vegetable oil. I think it's one of the main causes of cancer. And he also, now that you mention it, he did say it screws up your endocrine system. And it kind of went over my head at the time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
But he told me this is the kind of thing that causes certain kinds of cancers. And this is like a... prize-winning, super well-known international cancer specialist, endocrinologist type of guy. So he wasn't just on the fad diet train early. He had his own research was a part of this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
So yeah, it's freaked me out, but I guess not enough because I'm still freaking mainlining sesame oil in my Chinese food or whatever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
Because it uses avocado oil instead or something like that? Yep. I think we do that too, but we're bougie. We're bougie Silicon Valley dorks. I let my wife handle that shit.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
Good. Not going to do it. Maybe I accidentally did something right for my health. Awesome.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
Are there any specific benefits to paleo then, or is it just, here's any alternative to the standard American diet and it's better because the standard American diet is literally the worst?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
Today, millions of Americans are trying to lose weight and get their diets under control, and anecdotally, I've seen a lot more people eating healthier over the last 10 years, and that's great. But a lot of people are also losing weight through fad diets. And what do I mean by fad diets? Basically, anything that catches a lot of traction on the back of a gimmick.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
So the bar is frozen pizza and fast food and cheap frozen meat five times, whatever, seven days a week. And they're sort of measuring whether or not some diet is better. And the answer is pretty much always yes, because the bar is so low.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
Okay, so that all sounds good. What is then the downside of paleo? Because we mentioned that if you're getting rid of all carbs or something like that, which is not what you do on paleo, like you can get kidney stones, but paleo itself, it's got to have some sort of shortcoming.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
Okay, explain what macros are just briefly for our listeners who are not, you know, obsessive about weightlifting and meal prep like you are. I, in fact, as of the last couple of years, had to learn what macros are because I wanted to lose 30 to 40 pounds of fat. And it turns out you can't do that unless you count calories in food and macros are how you do that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, riboflavin sounds like a fake thing, but it turns out it's a vitamin. That's some bad branding.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
I know this is probably not right, but I'm going to say it anyway. Carbs are the enemy, right? That seems to be the consensus around a lot of stuff these days. We did a whole episode on fat-free foods and a lot of people are like, is this an advertisement for the paleo or keto diet? And it Wasn't supposed to be, but we fell into the carbs are the enemy idea.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
Why not severely restrict your carbohydrate intake?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
So today, we're not going to be talking about things like veganism or vegetarianism here, because they've been around forever. They're more like lifestyles than they are diets, per se, and there's a lot more to them than just a gimmick. But basically, if
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
A single banana each day and you're blowing out your carb allowance. Look, I'm no dietician. My opinion's not worth anything, but I'm going to go ahead and say that you can eat a banana every day and not be in horrible shape.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
Like what? Because playing all coy about are bananas bad for you aside, this one has me going, are you insane? You're just not going to eat carbs ever again? I always wonder how these people make it through even one week of doing this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
To hit the other main question, for those who might have forgotten, ketosis is when your body starts to burn fat for energy instead of carbs because there's no carbs in your system. Do people lose weight on this? Because it seems like if you're not eating carbs, you have to, right? I mean, you're going to lose weight.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, that's the thing I always think when people tell me that they go on one of these diets. Like, okay, you stopped eating bread and you were eating three sandwiches every day and bread and butter when you were hungry and crackers when you were snacking. So yeah, no kidding, you lost weight. You cut 500 calories or 700 calories out of your diet. Of course, that's how it works.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
all of a sudden, in a period of a couple years or even months sometimes, depending on the internet, tons of people have become convinced that there's one perfect way to lose weight and eat, and they start evangelizing it to anybody who will listen as the absolute secret to health. You're looking at a fad diet. Here to help me digest some of this is underground seed oil dealer, Nick Pell.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, yeah. So a show fan, and I hope she's listening because she's very sweet, but a show fan made some keto snacks. This is a few years ago, and I tried them. And look, they weren't bad, but not something that I would normally munch on. It was essentially a cube of fat and protein in a wrapper. So think little chunks of kind of like butter that were chocolate flavored. And
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
Again, not really my thing, but a buddy of mine is crossing Antarctica on foot, which nobody has ever done. Some people have claimed they've done it, but I guess they're lying or something.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
Anyway, I pointed him towards these because he was saying one of his biggest problems is he needs to bring tens of thousands or even more calories with him, mostly protein and fat, and he has to carry it on his person, basically. He's basically pulling a sled like a dog. So my fat ass at a desk in Cupertino does not have that concern.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
Obviously, you're not going to eat a tub of mayonnaise or whatever every day for the rest of your life.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, that was dinner for you when you were vegan, eh?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, I've got a couple of vegan buddies who are like, oh, I'm in Alabama right now. And the only vegan thing I can find at this hour, 10 p.m., whatever, is Skittles. So I had that for dinner. And I'm like, I think you might be missing the point about veganism, bro. I'm no expert, but I don't think you're supposed to do that to yourself.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
I don't know, man. I fact-checked a lot of this episode as much as I could, and I fact-checked my Skittles thing, and it turns out they stopped using the dye that was made from crushed-up insects, which, gross, that exists. Like, I didn't realize food dyes were made from crushed-up insects. That's really vile. And also there's some gelatin that they stopped using in like 2009.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
Anyway, let's not split hairs. Apparently sometimes Skittles are vegan, but yeah, like maybe break the diet if you want to make sure that you're not just eating Skittles for dinner three nights a week when you're on your road trip. All right. How about this? Is gluten the enemy? Because I know a ton of people who now won't eat bread because they call themselves gluten sensitive.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
What's going on, Nick? It's hot. Yeah, in Arizona. Hey, you remembered this time. Yeah, I gotta admit, the bit was not doing well with test audiences. So this is another one that you came to me with, and I was instantly into it because I live in Silicon Valley, for those who don't know, in California. A lot of people are into fad diets.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
Is that even a real thing? I know some people have real diseases or whatever, but now it seems like every third person in L.A. has it. Color me skeptical.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
I don't want to gaslight people who have sensitivity to stuff, but I am curious why you're skeptical of it because I hate saying this because, again, people have health problems. I'm not saying that you, listener, do not have this issue, but I think a lot of people are maybe hamming it up a little bit or being overly paranoid.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, I think that's fair, but possibly inaccurate. Look, it confirms my bias, so I'm fine with it. But again, I want to be careful not to gaslight people who are like, no, I went on an elimination diet and turns out that gluten was the thing that made me feel depressed all day. I suppose we're not talking about those people. I'll be super clear.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, I think a lot of people's weird diets are based on something they watched on Instagram or TikTok a few days ago and also vague feelings of unease. Oh, inflammation. So I stopped drinking milk and eating dairy because of inflammation. Do you have blood work to that effect? Or you just wanted a nap after you ate 17 different types of cheese?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
Okay, I think I can relate to that, but I'm not sure it's inflammation.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah. A lot of this stuff is about people overcorrecting poor dietary choices with dietary choices that might come in with problems of their own, like with keto and the kidney issues it presents. Maybe don't stop eating carbs entirely, but maybe also don't eat three giant bowls of pasta and breadsticks and all this other stuff for lunch every single day after you hit Taco Bell.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
Maybe not as many as they were when I lived in LA, but it's ridiculous out there. I'm always meeting people who are shilling keto, paleo, carnivore, intermittent fasting, what have you. Carnivore's the latest one. I'm sure we'll cover that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
Like, yeah, Americans love to do this. I feel like this is like maybe a human thing, but also kind of an American thing. I'm going to swing the pendulum so far in the other direction it hits the edge of the box.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
Right, it's hard for them to monetize and spend on marketing to say, here's a real sort of sensible diet. It's much better to be like, here's the one weird thing that's going viral that I invented where you only drink celery juice every day. And that's a real one, by the way. Celery juice every morning. I'm like, what are you talking about?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, scientists hate him. He only drinks celery juice and there's no nutrition in there. So he's losing weight. Who knew? Not to sound all Jerry Seinfeld here, but what's the deal with inflammation? Because again, I hear that word everywhere. I'm of course worried that I have it, which worries probably causing me inflammation. Ha ha ha ha ha.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
So is this a term that's just totally unrelated to food that people are trying to make about food?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
So where does the idea come from in the first place? Because it seems to have crept up in the last few years. Now everything causes inflammation from forgetting to brush your teeth or floss at night to drinking a glass of milk or whatever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, that bears repeating because the bar is so low that anything that isn't just eat whatever you want, like fast food and processed stuff, anything is going to be better than that. What about this whole detox thing, which again, probably also another Skeptical Sunday. And I kind of get it. It's not a specific fad diet, but it seems like it falls into the same basket of stuff.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
I think so. Maybe not after my trip to the country of Georgia for that Russian wedding a while back. I used to have a functioning liver. Time will tell if that's still the case.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
But isn't there a serious issue with environmental toxins and toxins from your diet building up in your body somehow? Is that a thing?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
And now for a word from our sponsors, fewer carbs than a banana. We'll be right back. If you like this episode of the show, I invite you to do what other smart and considerate listeners do, which is take a moment, support our amazing sponsors. I told you how all that works before.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
All the deals, discount codes, and ways to support the show are searchable and clickable over at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. If you can't remember the name of a sponsor, you can't find the code, feel free to email me jordan at jordanharbinger.com. It is that important that you support those who support the show. Now for the rest of Skeptical Sunday.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
I think we might have touched on this in other Skeptical Sunday episodes in the past, but can you kind of explain why? Because I know if you get like mercury poisoning or some sort of severe thing, you have to take stuff to get heavy metals out of your system. But that's if you worked at Chernobyl, right? It's not like I went biking on a road and inhaled some brake dust.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
So now I need to go on this thing for a week.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
Oh, God, you'd have to cut off an arm to do that. Which of these diets do you have experience with directly? Did you ever try one of these? I did carnivore for a month, actually. So this is the one, as people might guess, this is the one where basically all you can eat is steak and eggs or is organ meat one of the main things? That's one of the main things with carnivore.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
Well, now we're never getting sponsored by Dr. Quack's special woo-woo or a detoxing powder. Thanks a lot. Okay, so this creates problems of its own. What are the potential problems of taking these kinds of supplements? Because I think a lot of people go, yeah, it costs money, but better safe than sorry. What's the harm?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, I usually make the joke that like a lot of supplements have Chinese sawdust in them. And that came from a real thing. One of my buddies is a mushroom supplier, and he does a lot of business with China. And he has a lab test everything because he does business with China. And he says there's a lot of stuff where they literally they will grind up mushrooms.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
But he's like, why are these so much cheaper than the other ones? And he's found literal samples where half of it is definitely just sawdust that's been colored with something to look like the other mushroom bits, which is Pretty horrifying because you're eating those. He's grinding them up and putting them in other supplements that people are eating.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
So are any of these supplements actually regulated? How does that work?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, some of that Chinese sawdust is certainly tasty, but I would rather get what's on the label, ideally, especially when I'm paying like $92 for some giant jug of protein.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
reasonable surety that you're eating healthy but yeah you should research everything that you eat and put in your body read reviews make sure the stuff is at least mostly made in a civilized country i guess that you should say i almost said the united states not to confuse us with a civilized country or anything All right. So moving on, let's talk about intermittent fasting.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, look, it sounds like that could get incredibly boring, but I could also probably get behind that as I love all of that stuff. I did eat steak and eggs every day for a month, but, well, I also ate other stuff because I wanted to poop more than once a week.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
I know we touched on that at the top of the show. This is a big thing over here in California. It's been recommended to me hundreds of times by various people. Tons of people I know are doing it and have been for a decade or whatever. This is very much a thing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
Oddly specific, but okay. So for those not in the know, intermittent fasting, and correct me if I'm wrong here, Nick, is where you only eat between, for example, 12 p.m. and 8 p.m. or some variation of that. You have this small eight-hour food window, and you just don't eat outside of that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
A feeding window sounds like something I need to install immediately.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
That all sounds actually pretty amazing considering that otherwise it's such a flexible diet. How accurate is that stuff? Because that's incredible.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
I see. Yes, I have heard that. And yes, that is where my mind went. So the eight hour window is just, you're only going to get so hungry in that eight hour window. So you're only going to eat so much and therefore your calories are restricted.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
Whereas, yes, when people recommend it to me, they're like, during that 16 hour fast, you have weak cells that could become cancer or dying off or something. And it's like, fasting does increase autophagy, which means cells that essentially kill other cells, weaker cells, or kill themselves when they are not fed. So it's not just about calorie restriction. More human trials are needed.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
I tried to find some good data on this. It was really hard. This is something that somebody who's up on the latest cutting-edge science might be able to talk about, but really, there's no good data on what this actually does. A lot of people are speculating on what it does. It prevents cancer, but there's not so much data that actually backs that up. Not yet, anyway.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
There's a lot of people that stop eating for like a week at a time or three days at a time for the same thing, right? Because fasting does X, Y, Z. And I'm actually quite curious about this. So are there any kind of, air quotes, magical benefits from intermittent fasting? Or is that just kind of BS?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, to serving to your coffee, smoothie, even water. It doesn't taste like anything, so it just blends right in.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
So you must have loved carnivore then because it's really easy to just buy a bunch of meat from a butcher and cook it up and eat it. Why did you come off that?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
Is that kind of how all these diets work? It really seems like it always just comes down to calorie restriction, which is what I learned when I was dieting myself.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
So that does seem to be a common theme with a lot of these fad diets. But if it works, then so what? Are we on the same page with that?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
What do you mean by that? I think that's pretty much exactly what people want to do when they go on a diet.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
Oh, so you didn't see it as like a be all end all of human health. Oh, so and so recommended it. So I got to do this. That's what the Instagram shills are saying about this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
I suppose that makes sense. So at the end of the day, are you saying that people shouldn't do any of these fad diets? It doesn't seem like you're really coming down on it like that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
You make it sound so simple. By the way, I love the suggestion of not only talking to your doctor, but talking to a dietician, because what I've noticed is that dieticians know way more about this than a lot of doctors do. And I feel like I've even fact-checked health episodes on this show with doctors and then found out that, ooh, I really should have fact-checked this with an actual dietician.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
So get both if you're thinking about doing something like this. So again, you make it sound so simple, but if it's so simple, why does America have this obesity epidemic that seems to be getting worse?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
Yes, I can certainly relate to that. When I was doing my sort of dieting, losing fat thing, I really had to look at food more as fuel and not just, like you said, oh, I'm bored and I'm watching a movie, so I want to eat this giant bag of whatever. That just doesn't work.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
And once you change that programming in your brain, which is of course easier said than done, but massively life changing, you don't really wanna go back. Like I don't find myself craving an entire bag of Fritos unless something is going wrong with my week, right? It's not actually hunger, and I think that's an important realization.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
Thanks, Nick, for joining us today and feeding us everything we need to know about the latest and greatest fad diets on the market today. I think the real important point here is no matter which fad diet sort of crops up after this that we didn't cover on the show, it's almost certainly going to be also about calorie restriction, but with extra steps.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
That's just kind of the takeaway today is that it's always, always, always about calorie restriction. It's just that stuff is hidden under some kind of gimmick. So be on the lookout for that. Thanks everyone for listening. Topic suggestions for future episodes of Skeptical Sunday to Jordan at jordanharbinger.com. Show notes on the website, of course.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
Advertisers, deals, discounts, ways to support the show, searchable and clickable over at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. I'm at Jordan Harbinger on Twitter and Instagram. You can also connect with me on LinkedIn. This show is created in association with Podcast One. My team is Jen Harbinger, Jace Sanderson, Robert Fogerty, Ian Baird, and Gabriel Mizrahi.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, it's so gross, but I gotta say, what a time saver, man. But yeah, that could not be good for us at all. That was always deeply concerning to me, and it was kind of like, yeah, I think I saw in Oprah that you're supposed to go more often.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
Our advice and opinions are our own, and I'm a lawyer, but I'm not your lawyer, and I'm certainly not a dietician, as you probably have gleaned from other episodes of this show. So do your own research before implementing anything that you hear on this show, ideally with somebody who knows what they are actually talking about.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
Also, we may get a few things wrong here and there, especially on Skeptical Sunday. If you think we really dropped the ball on something, let us know. We're usually pretty receptive. Y'all know how to reach me, jordan at jordanharbinger.com. Remember, we rise by lifting others. Share the show with those you love.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
And if you found the episode useful, please share it with somebody else who could use a good dose of the skepticism that we doled out today. In the meantime, I hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn. And we'll see you next time. The deepest parts of our oceans remain a mystery, with 75% still unexplored.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
You're about to hear a preview with Victor Vescovo, the first person to reach the deepest points of all five oceans, built and piloted a submarine that defied crushing pressures, revealing a world few have ever seen.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
Get 20% off by going to vitalproteins.com and enter promo code Jordan at checkout. These statements have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. This product is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
What did Victor find in the darkness where even light cannot reach? To find out, listen to episode 1089 of The Jordan Harbinger Show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
Look, I agree. A man needs his thinking time. I do some of my best work on the pot. I know a lot of folks out there can relate.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, we're gonna dig deeper into intermittent fasting later. I think it's cool that you liked it more or less. For me, I was hungry in the morning and it was driving me nuts and my workouts were sucking. And my trainer later told me something that I think probably gonna cover later in the show, which is there's no real secret to when you eat. And so I ditched that real fast.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, that is super fair and totally worth saying. I do see this a lot where it's, oh, it's easy for you to say you don't live in a food desert. And I don't. So fair enough. But you can get plenty of healthy stuff at Walmart. And I think a lot of people use it as an excuse to just eat super processed junky food. It's like healthy food is expensive. It costs more to
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
but it's not necessarily out of reach for most people. And I know I'm going to get a ton of negative email for saying that, but I think it's become a little bit of a crutch slash excuse. And I don't know, that's disempowering. It's not good.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
Again, super fair. So let's dive down a bit into the whole fad diet thing. I've always been curious about carnivore, keto, caveman, paleo, whatever diets, especially from the days when I was super into CrossFit and it seemed like absolutely everyone was into this stuff. Now, I was never like a cultist when it came to it, but it worked out in a CrossFit box. And so everybody was like,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
I don't know, eating raw livers or whatever before the workout and doing paleo and I don't know, pooping once a week, like we said before.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
I know there's a little asterisk by this kind of because satiety is like this complex topic. Because if you eat a giant bowl of pasta, you're going to feel full. It's just maybe that feeling won't last. And so whenever we do nutrition topics, people always write it and they're like, you're wrong about this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
And it's like we're painting with broad strokes because we're trying to get to fad diet stuff, not because we're trying to paint a complete picture of how carbohydrates work. operate in the brain or whatever. Okay, so I hope people can kind of understand that. Okay, so with keto and these other diets, keto, caveman, whatever it is, do you not eat any carbs at all?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
You severely restrict your carbohydrate intake. It's like, we'll get into the numbers later. So isn't that supposed to be bad for your kidneys, maybe other parts of you? Because my ex-girlfriend's father, back in college, he was on Atkins, and his doctor was like, yeah, you need to get off that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
You're losing weight, but your kidneys, there was some blood marker where they were like, you cannot not eat carbs. You're going to get kidney stones or worse.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
So basically, yeah, the train my ex-girlfriend's dad was on. That's a big yikes from me, man. You know, that sounds awful. First of all, kidney stones, aren't those supposed to be brutal on you?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, isn't that supposed to be like the most painful thing a man can do? I think it's our version of childbirth and every woman right now with kids is like, how dare you? But apparently it's almost as painful as childbirth. But of course, how would I know? My wife gave birth in the bathtub with no anesthetic or no medicine. She's obviously way tougher than me.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
I guess what I'm saying is I'm due for a kidney stone or two at some point just to even the scales.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
Bringing a tear to my eye to even think about. So what else is out there in terms of fad diets? I know the sort of no-carb thing is always top of mind.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, I never really thought about that. But cavemen surely would have eaten bugs and grubs and worms and things like that. And I don't remember seeing that in my mail order paleo meals that I was on a couple of years ago.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
Is that even true? First of all, they almost certainly used fire to cook meat.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
Welcome to Skeptical Sunday. I'm your host, Jordan Harbinger. Today I'm here with Skeptical Sunday co-host, writer, and researcher, Nick Pell. On the Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the stories, secrets, and skills of the world's most fascinating people and turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
Okay. So there's not cookbooks sitting around from Grug the Caveman with a recipe for cave stew, but there's got to be some kind of insight into what people ate back then. Don't we find grave sites or I was going to say archaeological, but maybe if we're talking about cavemen, that's not the right word. But we find grave sites, right? There's flowers next to them.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
Are there any ways that we can tell what those people ate?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
That's interesting. You don't think of broccoli and cauliflower as new. They're not new if they're 4,000 years old, but... I don't know, I just assumed every plant out there has been around for a million years, which I guess is not true.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
Don't get me wrong, I, of course, long to live in a world where broccoli doesn't even exist, but I also like electricity and running water and basic sanitation, so maybe not if I have to make that trade. But okay, so what if the caveman diet that people have now is not totally accurate and Does it help people to lose weight? Is it healthy-ish?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
Because that's the crux of the issue, not whether or not it's an accurate representation of a Stone Age person's actual diet. That part doesn't matter, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
Our mission is to help you become a better informed, more critical thinker, Thank you. topics such as acupuncture, astrology, recycling, sovereign citizens, circumcision, why tipping makes no sense, energy drinks, diet pills, and more. And if you're new to the show or you want to tell your friends about the show, our episode starter packs are a great place to do that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
By the way, Erewhon, it's a bougie supermarket in, what, Santa Monica or L.A. where you can get wheatgrass.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1139: Fad Diets | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah. You can get those. 20 bucks now. I remember somebody bought me like a wheatgrass shot from there and I was like, people are drinking this on purpose. This tastes like actual, yeah, I don't even want to go into it, but that's where you can get like a $10 green smoothie that's the size of a shot. And if you don't go in there in yoga pants, it's like, what are you doing?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1102: College vs. Trades | Skeptical Sunday
Get 20% off by going to vitalproteins.com and enter promo code Jordan at checkout. These statements have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. This product is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
The Banana Mesker sounds like a fruit salad my kids would make. So what happened? This is going to be dark and I'm going to regret that joke, aren't I?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
Anyway, forced into sex work. Wow, the UFC were banana pimps. That is gross. That is gross. Despicable.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
Our mission is to help you become a better informed, more critical thinker. And during the week we have long form conversations with a variety of amazing folks from spies to CEOs, athletes, authors, thinkers and performers.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
Oh yeah, the original gig workers, that's messed up.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
Wow, bananas over human rights. That sounds like a recipe for disaster.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
Auf Sonntagen ist es Skeptical Sunday, wo ein rotierender Gäste-Co-Host und ich einen Thema unterbrechen, den Sie vielleicht noch nie gedacht haben, und gemeinsame Missverständnisse über diesen Thema entdecken. Themen wie Chemtrails, gebannte Füße, GMOs, Toothpaste, Kristallheilung, Eierkandlung, Diät-Supplemente, die Lotterie und mehr.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
Oh, everyone just gather in one place because we want to talk to you and then murder everyone. Well, did people actually die? I assume they did if they were being shot at.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
Just pause for a second and think about how much shooting you have to do to kill 3,000 people. There's no way that happened in like a 90-second panic shooting. That's no way. They sat there and shot people for probably hours. That's really grim. Wow, and they left a body in the village. That's so psychopathic. It's poetic with the body in the place, but that is so psycho.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
You know who doesn't murder their own workers by the thousands? The amazing sponsors that support this show. We'll be right back. Vielen Dank. Bis zum nächsten Mal.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
This episode is also sponsored by Naked Wines. Do you actually know what you're doing in the wine aisle or are you actually just grabbing the bottle with the coolest label and hoping for the best? Because that was definitely me until I let Naked Wines take over. It's 2025. Why are we still buying wine like it's 2005?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
Now, back to Skeptical Sunday. This is never-ending banana drama. But okay, wait. This guy was so into bananas, he was known as THE Banana Man. He sounds like a really crappy movie villain. Like, whatever knock-off Batman-Comic has the Banana Man.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
Besuche nur jordanharbinger.com oder suche uns in deiner Spotify-App, um anfangen zu können. Heute stehlen wir die Lager zurück auf eines der populärsten Früchte auf der Welt, die Bananen. Von Smoothies zu Flambés, Bananen sind überall, aber wie viel wissen wir wirklich über sie? Sind sie ethisch? Sind sie nachhaltig? Können sie von Chemikalien frei sein?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
So it sounds like he learned from the industry standards. It's weird. It's like banana colonialism.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
What is up with the names in this episode? Nobody has a real freaking name. Minor Cooper Keith, Lee Christmas and Sam the Banana Man. By the way, which sounds like a record you'd find when you're cleaning out your grandmother's attic. So this guy was a mercenary for bananas. How did that work out?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
So just to be clear, we're talking about a corporate coup against a democratically elected government for bananas. This is wild.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
Swallow those bananas whole. So the US essentially bought out UFC's competition. Smart move. Also getting the government to do it? Okay. So what did Sam end up with?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
Wait a minute. That actually worked? Times were certainly different back then. I can't tell if this guy is a genius or completely out of his tree. Imagine storming into a board meeting and be like, no, I run Tesla now. Sorry. I just I demand it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
Und welchen Einfluss haben sie auf das Umfeld? Well, hold on to your bowls of fruit, because today we're going deep into the sweet and mushy and surprisingly complex secrets of our slender yellow friends. Joining me today is writer and researcher Jessica Wynn. Jess, welcome to the show. Are you ready to go B-A-N-A-N-A-S? I think that's how it goes. That's how you spell bananas, correct?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
Wait, what, so the CIA gets involved in a banana dispute?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
Just another play in the banana chess game, I suppose.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
I guess it worked well in Honduras and Guatemala for the UFC at least. I want to pause for a second again and appreciate that a private company armed up and went after a country. Can you imagine if Tesla assembled some special forces commandos, like retired military guys, whatever, and took over an island in the Caribbean or whatever? This is just on another level of crazy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
Also, wo kommt der Bananen-Käfer uns als nächstes hin?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
Okay, I know we're oversimplifying this, but the Bay of Pigs invasion was at least partly about bananas?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
But the Bay of Pigs invasion was a massive historical failure. So I guess this is where things go wrong for banana companies.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
Wow, slow down. Okay, UFC's Banana Empire nearly brought about nuclear war. And all of this is rooted in freaking bananas. It's intense. People are eating this many bananas? Is it worth the trouble? We're overestimating just how important bananas are to my daily life. The fact that we all went up in a nuclear holocaust nearly as a result of these things.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
I can't believe that Bananas, they've literally shaped geopolitics. I had no idea. I feel bad about having sunscreen called Banana Boat now, guilt by association. Gotta raid my medicine cabinet.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
Don't tell me bananas are bad for you because I got a whole bowl of these things sitting here and they're going to be brown in 20 minutes or whatever, however long they last.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
That for sure exists. I'm going to have to Google that. But if I'm walking into a store named after a political crisis, I want a very detailed explanation of their supply chain. It's 2025. We can't be messing with it. What is a banana republic actually? What does that mean?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
Disrespectful possibly, but finally someone with a real name. R.I.P. Maybe he slipped on appeal.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
Natürlich. Wow. Also wenn etwas Bananen ist, dann bedeutet das all die Schmerzen und Verrücktheit, die Bananen verursacht haben. Ich dachte, es war nur eine dumme Ausprägung, die wir in diesem Episodem überwiesen haben.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
Ja. Also hat Bananagate zu einem echten Veränderung in der Industrie geführt? Natürlich nicht.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, the banana industry is such a bully. I really had no idea.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
I suppose that's a plus. Anything with labor has human rights issues. Chocolate, coffee, basically if there's a skeptical Sunday about it and it's a food or something that you eat, it's because there's slaves involved. So yeah, I guess I should not be surprised that there's a high human cost to my breakfast banana.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
Because nothing says forget all of our atrocities like a new label on the same rotten fruit, especially one that's a dancing banana lady, if memory serves.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
But wait, am I crazy? Chiquita was around before the 90s. I remember seeing it as a kid, even a little kid watching Sesame Street or something like that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
We also have to make it sexist, but sex sells, right? So here we are.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
I have seen that one. We'll link it in the show notes. It is racist as hell. Yes. That's about all.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, and people are going, oh, I don't really get it. When you watch this, you'll get it. Again, we'll link to it in the show notes. It's a minute or so long. Just the cartoon image of the cannibal is pretty horrible by today's standards.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
Oh Gott, das ist Tone-Deaf-Marketing. Das ist wie wenn Volkswagen gesagt hätte, erinnere dich, als wir in Konzentrations-Kampfen diese Autos bauen mussten. Das gleiche Niveau der Verarbeitungskraft ist noch immer in unseren Händen. Ich dachte, wir sprechen über das nicht mehr, Leute.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
Also, die UFC verwendet diese tropische Fantasie, um Bananen zu verkaufen, während sie nur den Fakt, dass sie korrupte Massmörderer waren. Und das, hat das funktioniert?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
So Bananas in Colombia have a bit of a toxic relationship from the sound of it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
In Bananaland though, this is just business as usual from the sound of it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
Eine Banane war früher mein Lieblings-Pre-Werk-Snack. Aber warte, also eine Art Banane, eine Spezies, das klingt seltsam. Weil haben wir nicht hunderts von verschiedenen Arten von Äpfeln und Orangen, zum Beispiel?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
Rebranding won't cover up literal murders, I suppose. Okay, so these investigations, did they lead to stopping anything? I'm afraid to ask.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, and you said charged them for crimes, so I'm guessing they're just like, yeah, I guess I won't go to Colombia, I'll just stay in my house in Nantucket and retire. And it's like, okay, as long as you don't go down there, you're fine. So let me recap.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
We've got a billion dollar banana empire backed by violence slash murder, rebranding with a cartoon mascot to hide a century of abuse, and they just skate by with some fines that go to the US government and not the people who got pushed off their land so that they could grow bananas.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
Geez, that is a slap on the wrist for a massive corporation like this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
You've never actually set foot in a supermarket, have you?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
You know who won't force your wife and daughter into a banana job? The amazing sponsors that make this show possible. We'll be right back. Bis zum nächsten Mal. They've got the number one checkout on the planet and with ShopPay conversions jump by up to 50%.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
And as somebody who probably shops online more than I should admit, trust me, it makes life a lot easier for customers too.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
Hier ist das Ding. Untertitelung des ZDF, 2020 Bis zum nächsten Mal. Vielen Dank. Untertitelung des ZDF, 2020 Thank you so much for listening to and supporting the show. All of the deals, discount codes and ways to support this podcast are all searchable and clickable over on the website at jordanharbinger.com slash deals.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
I suppose that's a bonus, because we eat, what, millions of bananas every year?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
You can also search for any sponsor using the AI chatbot on the website as well. Please consider supporting those who support us. Now for the rest of Skeptical Sunday. Hey, don't bring me into this. I just like eating bananas. I don't want them to come from child slavery.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
Ja, zumindest arbeitet er den Nachtschiff. Ja.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
So they're not native to the US. They seem very tropical.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
It was only a matter of time. Okay, so they're at risk of extinction? Is that how this works? And I'm over here worried about how quickly they turn brown. I'm looking at these bananas now. I swear they're browner than they were when we started the show. Probably.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
Ich habe die kleinen Bananen gesehen. Ich glaube, du müsstest alle Füttermaschinen, die Verpackungsmaschinen und die Versorgungsmaschinen wiederhelfen, wenn du etwas wie das wechselst. Ja, es ist eine Erleichterung, dass wir eine neue Variante herstellen können. Aber was ist der Extinction Fungus, der die Cavendish tötet? Ist das etwas Interessantes, das wir entdecken?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
Wir töten Bananen und ihre Landwirte, und wir haben nur dieses kleine Fenster, wo sie perfekt grün sind? Was für eine Welt, Mann.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
Love a good crop dust. That's how I met my wife. Go on.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
And if you're a worker who's probably lacking proper safety equipment, PPE, no shower is going to help you get that stuff off you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
Wow. Not even close, first of all. Not even remotely the same thing. Is that a really long fig in your pocket? Yeah. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
Yikes, that's awful for the workers. It can't be good for the earth either. I know some of these things, they try to make them safe or whatever. I just never quite buy it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, DDT. I feel like we were talking about that in middle school and then it was like, oh, it's not a thing anymore, so don't worry.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
Of course they do. Yeah, that's the main thing. And we probably water the bananas with water contaminated by other crops.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
Was ist mit organischem Kaufen? Ist es eine magische Bananen-Plantation, ohne all diese Bananen-Horror und Pestizide und Verbrechen? Ich weiß nicht mal, was es bedeutet, ein organisches Bananen zu sein.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
So I basically pay more for fancier chemicals. Jesus. Is there any positivity from buying either fair trade bananas or is that a feel good term too?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, I can imagine opening up a box of squishy brown bananas after however many days it took to get to America or Europe from my boat. Yeah, yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
So, what's the solution? Just buy from small farmer-owned cooperatives or something like that? How do you find that?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
Seriously? You don't have banana coins? Loser. I guess if you sold them to buy Trump coins, then maybe you've made some money.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
I hate that for crypto, I hate it for bananas and I hate it for Laos. Wow.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
I don't know about a banana facial. Okay, I'm done. But what are the recommendations for eating bananas that I can feel good about?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
It's a tough life for bananas. They gotta battle fungal pathogens, military coups. They're used in condom demonstrations in middle schools around the world, as far as I know. And they gotta compete with avocados and eggplants for social media clout.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
Anything phallic, really? The eggplant emoji, anyone? Come on. Why would you use that if not for what you use it for?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
And it's funny when someone slips, if you're four.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
I suppose so. And there you have it, folks. Who knew bananas were living such a complicated life? They got more going on than I do. So next time you peel your morning banana, remember there's a whole lot more than just potassium in there. Thank you all for listening. Topic suggestions for future episodes of Skeptical Sunday. Shownotes at jordanharbinger.com as well on the website.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
Philadelphia Bananas. Das hat einen schönen Ring.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
Advertisers, Deals, Discounts and ways to support the show, all at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. I'm at jordanharbinger on Twitter and Instagram. You can also connect with me on LinkedIn. You can find Jessica on her Substack, Between the Lines. We'll link to that in the show notes as well.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
We can link to both. Look at the show notes. This show is created in association with Podcast One. My team is Jen Harbinger, Jace Sanderson, Robert Fogarty, Ian Baird and Gabriel Mizrahi. Our advice and opinions are our own and I'm a lawyer, but I'm not your lawyer. Do your own research before implementing anything you hear on the show. Remember, we rise by lifting others.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
Share the show with those you love and if you found the episode useful, please share it with somebody else who could use a good dose of the skepticism and knowledge we doled out today. In the meantime, I hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn and we'll see you next time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
In Part 1 delft Adam in die hochwertige Welt von Konterterrorismus und Covert-Operationen, die die persönlichen und ethischen Komplexitäten des Kampfes gegen Terrorismus von innen der Schatten zeigen.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
Tune in to uncover his unique journey and critical insights only he can provide on episode 978 of The Jordan Harbinger Show. Untertitelung des ZDF für funk, 2017 Das ist, wenn du bemerkst, dass Dinge nicht so gut funktionieren, wie sie früher waren. Deine Beine, dein Körper, vielleicht sogar dein Haar.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
Vital Proteins steigt ein, um diese Bereiche unterstützt zu halten, damit du aktiv sein kannst und was du liebst. Vital Proteins ist die Nummer 1 Kollagen-Peptid-Brand in den USA, damit sie wissen, was sie tun. Es ist super einfach zu nehmen, einfach eine Tasse zu deiner Kaffee, Smoothie, sogar Wasser zu geben. Es schmeckt nicht so gut, also blendet es sofort ein. Das Ziel ist Konsistenz.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
Es ist ein täglicher Habit, wie du die Vorteile siehst.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
Ich werde es einfach so lassen, dass die Boston Fruit Company in Florida gegründet wurde. Okay, also Chiquita kam von einigen Ostküsten-Bananen?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
Wie hat die UFC, können wir sie UFC nennen, oder wird es sich mit der Kämpfer-Liga verwirklichen?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
Nothing says great idea like wandering cluelessly into the jungle and being like, let's just transform this landscape. So how did that go?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, I've been to Costa Rica in the modern age and that untouched jungle is crazy. It must have been wild.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
Oh, he went bananas. Yes. Okay. And folks, yeah, we planned over to use this joke throughout the rest of the show. You can count on that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, right now I can only transport one banana at a time. Yeah, I guess you can't sell your passengers to the highest bidder at the port. You could no longer do that in 1890 anyway. Gosh, yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
Also, ich weiß nicht, nur das zu hören, es klingt wirklich so, als ob der Präsident seine Tochter verkauft hat, um diesem Jungen seine Schuld zu bezahlen. Aber wir haben keine Details und das wird ein helles Tangent sein, aber das ist wirklich, was das klingt. Okay, gut. If you can just forget I owe you a few million dollars, you can have my daughter. That's what that sounds like.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
Maybe that was par for the course back then. Anyway, 5,000 dead workers is a bushel of bodies, but again also probably par for the course back then in a big construction project like this railroad through the jungle.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
Capitalism, baby. Corner the market, control the infrastructure, rake in the profits. We even still to this day say own the rails. And it's obviously a railroad metaphor or hat tip to the railroad itself.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
These banana tycoons turned a casual fruit snack into a money printer in record time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
Banana Boys. So they weren't just rich, they were marketing geniuses, which is cool. Who knew bananas had PR campaigns? So weird.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
Bananas saving us from scurvy, but killing the planet at the same time. I guess it probably is easier to just burn a section of rainforest and plant stuff. They're still doing that down there.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
So they're agreeing to build roads for the people that just also happen to be great for moving truckloads of bananas to their trains or whatever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, can you have one without the other? The lines blurry when profit is involved. Of course you can do both, but it sounds like this was one thing painted over as the other.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
Welcome to Skeptical Sunday. I'm your host, Jordan Harbinger. Today I'm here with Skeptical Sunday co-host, writer and researcher Jessica Wynn. On the Jordan Harbinger Show we decode the stories, secrets and skills of the world's most fascinating people and turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1125: Bananas | Skeptical Sunday
That is insane. Sounds like a scam, frankly, not a business.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
These criminals are not exactly Michelin star material. Joining me to take a bite out of food crime is writer and researcher Jessica Wynn.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Okay, first of all, people are buying wine on eBay. I guess that makes sense.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Wait, why bother counterfeiting balsamic vinegar? This is one of those discussion threads that leads to me realizing I've never actually had real balsamic vinegar. So my balsamic vinegar that I get with my Greek salad or whatever, that's not real? That's so dumb somehow.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Clearly you're fluent in Italian. Again, but this really sounds like an Italian problem, but this isn't just rooted in Italian products, is it? Can we blame the Italians for everything? Can we get away with that? I can get behind that strategy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
I am a little skeptical about this Skeptical Sunday. As a man who goes out to eat a lot, we might be actually asking questions I don't really want the answers to.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Okay. So the whole world, basically. Yes. You left out Antarctica. Fine. Whatever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
So were the tomatoes real? That's the important question here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
The deliciousness involved with the ecstasy tomatoes. Can you imagine, like, this pasta's so good. Yeah. This is the most amazing tomato sauce I've ever had in my life. Feel my hair. Yeah, yeah, just high off of your face on MDMA. Okay, but the scale and sophistication of this whole operation, it really is nuts. They move from phony olive oil labels to ecstasy-laced tomatoes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
How do you stop something like this? Because it seems like it starts from the source or it's getting adultered at the source, right? It's not just like somebody opens up the tomato cans and shove these things in here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, I suppose it's heartbreaking for anybody living a kosher or halal lifestyle. I'd be pretty pissed to get to the pearly gates and find out that global food corporations or the mafia scammed me out of heaven. That surely God must make exceptions, but I don't know.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah. You know what's actually fit for human consumption? The fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back. Also, I wanted to plug our newsletter, We Bit Wiser. The idea here is to give you something specific, something practical that'll have an immediate impact on your decisions, your psychology, and your relationships in under two minutes a week. It's every Wednesday.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
It's called We Bit Wiser. And if you haven't signed up yet, I invite you to come check it out. It is a great companion to the show. JordanHarbinger.com slash news is where you can find it. Now, back to Skeptical Sunday. Okay, so it's not just about the taste, it's about ethics, although that's a distant second for me. Yeah, fine.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Sorry you got pig meat in your beef thing, but I'm more pissed that I didn't get MDMA tomato sauce.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Oh, man. So the honey in my tea might be more gate than honey. That's funny, though. They had an undercover agent working at a honey company. That just seems like your tax dollars at work right there, I guess.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
And lying to yourself, I guess. I like to think that I pay enough attention that I'm not getting scammed by my food, but I don't know. Here we go.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Chloramethanol sounds scary. It even sounds scary.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
So white honey is priced high because it's raw, right? It comes right from the beehive. I'm surprised people can't tell. But I guess if you've never seen real honey.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Ah, the teddy bear bottles look so cute, though.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
If your favorite cheese turns out to be a plastic imitation and your wine is a cheap knockoff, what's the real risk here? Beyond disappointment, of course.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
I was at first was chuckling like a harmful substances like corn syrup, which is in everything. So whatever. But you're right. Allergic reactions must be a huge problem. I didn't really think about that. All right. I love a good seafood dish. I know a lot of people have allergies to shellfish and other seafood, and they have to be careful to stay away from that stuff.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
I know that some sushi is also more expensive than others, but I can't really tell what's what once it's on my plate. So is there counterfeit fish I've got to worry about, too?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
I'm never ordering toothfish. That sounds dangerous and disgusting. Yes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
If they just called it Arctic cod, I'd still buy it. But I guess you're right. Chilean sea bass does sound fancy. This also makes me wonder if I've ever eaten real bass.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
OK, get graphic here because I just ate that maybe yesterday.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
I was going to say my stomach hurts a little bit, but I've yet to experience any leakage from anything.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, like a horror movie villain. What do I think I'm eating when I eat Escalar and get oily poops?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
I've heard of nitrates. What is injecting nitrates do in fish?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
You just can't tell because I use my senses to see is this fresh, is this good? And they're just tricking me. Yuck.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Brown tuna loins. That sounds like a Reddit username. It's an Instagram handle.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
It's not an intelligence agency, really. It's like an international police force. You know, they're not assassinating spies.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Man, tuna gate. What a huge waste of food, though, unless it's not supposed to be eaten. But 131 tons of fish and they obviously they threw it out.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
So does not red sushi grade fish have more integrity? Like I could just maybe stick to yellowtail or something.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
I don't like any of this, by the way. For the record, this whole episode is disgusting.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
When I was in high school, I bought a bag of pot that turned out to be straight up oregano.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Wow. So 100 percent. So you're OK. No sushi, no tuna, no snapper, even if you want it because you can't get it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Or whatever they're passing off as scallops.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
So the moral of the story must be to buy the whole fish and then read the labels and cut it yourself, which I am not doing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
I don't know. Don't be ridiculous.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Is that a metaphor or are you trying to mess with my coffee, Jessica? Because people can't function without it. We buy it, we brew it, we drink it. I'm not ready to give up coffee over here, even if it is wood chips or whatever you're about to tell me.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Okay, that's good to know. Whole beans it is. I've been grinding my own stuff for a while. It's insane that they put toasted paper in there. But I guess we're talking about the mafia or some affiliated group, right? So they don't care.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, it was definitely not the high I was looking for. I smelled great, though. My friend smelled great, though.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Our mission is to help you become a better informed, more critical thinker. And during the week, we have long-form conversations with a variety of amazing folks from spies to CEOs, athletes, authors, thinkers, and performers.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
This is really wild. Coffee criminals, man. They need to be drinking prison coffee. Glass shards. That just is horrifying.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Kentucky caviar? Okay, first of all, that sounds like a euphemism for something else. Like Rocky Mountain oysters, which I think are bull testicles?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Caviar coming from Kentucky. First of all, gross, but I'm sure I've eaten that and thought it was scallops or whatever. Caviar coming from Kentucky is like finding out your favorite French wine is from Cleveland.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Counterfeit or not, caviar is not really my thing at all. I'm a I guess I'm a caveman. I think it's gross. Maybe I need to expand my palate. I know you think milk is gross and I love it. And a majority of people consume it every day. Can we trust that the milk is real or we know? Not really.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, so did the oregano, from what I heard. Man, the trials of experimental youth and prohibition.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, they put a chemical in there, right, or something?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Yikes. I drink so much milk. I'm probably like 10% plastic by now. Plus, I feed it to my kids. Maybe more juice for the kids then.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Oh, here we go. Damn it. Why did we choose to do this episode? Everyone hates us right now. I hate myself for doing this episode. Ignorance is bliss.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
I just got to take care of some mild anal leakage. We'll be right back. It doesn't have to look expensive, though, to make me question what I'm buying. Meat is just covered in plastic on a tray at the store, and I guess I sometimes wonder what I'm really looking at.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Oh, you had to phrase it that way. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
School lunches have prepared us all for this. But in the real world, anything meat fraud sounds pretty alarming. By the way, I don't think we can say fake meat. That's a successfully marketed multi-billion dollar product now. And some vegans love it. You know, what are they made out of? Like plant seed stuff? Chemicals. That's a whole different Skeptical Sunday, by the way, I think we have to do.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
What kind of meat fraud are we talking about here?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
The threat of fox meat makes me wish I had a close relationship with a butcher. And horse meat as beef sounds a little bit like something out of a dystopian novel.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Absolutely. So how did we end up in this mess where our food is so easily manipulated?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
So everybody was just eating horse meat.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
It sounds like food fraud is so widespread. This is practically a punchline.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
How was there not widespread panic or is eating horse just not really that bad? Did some cultures do it and they don't care?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
That is high stakes horse steak. It's just that easy to transform horse meat into beef by the magic of a label maker. This is kind of ridiculous. There's no safeguards at all.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
It's unreal how so much counterfeit food crosses borders. There's almost a near certainty that I've eaten horse lasagna then or something like that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
So we're putting a lot of trust in countries whose regulations we don't know and hoping that they enforce them. The point is we're such trusting eaters.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, chromatography sounds like something from a spy movie right on theme here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
No, unless it's something I have in my fridge or my pantry. OK, fine. I'll bring it back. But if it's like, hey, you've been eating this for years. Hey, by the way, this was horse the whole time. OK, what should I do about that now? What do I do now? It's like living in a modern day Upton Sinclair novel.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Okay, so basically the bigger the market and the more valuable the product is, the more likely it is to be faked. It's unsettling to think that so much of our food might be compromised by greed, but hashtag capitalism, I suppose. So who's involved in this dark trade?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Yes. That same person is complaining about binders in their vitamins or something. It's like you just bought blue dyed Dorito dusted cupcakes that have been frozen and reheat whatever. And you're just don't worry about binders, homeboy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Yes, they're fat-free. It's amazing how easily we can be fooled, even when we're paying attention. We're just buying counterfeit products. It just seems a bit hopeless. It's down to the juice and the milk.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
No clue. Look, I grew up middle class. Why would I know that? I don't even know what it looks like.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
I've always been a little sus of a lot of those spices like saffron. Vanilla, too, is another one. That's another big one, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
It's like we're living in a spice-themed sci-fi novel.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
So it's a constant battle between the counterfeiters and those trying to stop them. How do we even handle such an overwhelming problem? You just have to grow your own food? I'm not doing that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Authorities and whistleblowers play a crucial role in tackling these fraudulent practices. But what a tough job. And we can't really rely on that. I mean, you got to go undercover at the honey factory.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
And consumers, we just sit tight over here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, that's a topic for another show, I suppose. The system that we have is clearly struggling to keep up with the scale and sophistication of fraudsters. But for the industry, counterfeiting busts, that's got to disrupt the market. And there's got to be big financial implications when you're throwing out 120 tons of tuna or whatever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
That's another thing that must sound better in Italian.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Welcome to Skeptical Sunday. I'm your host, Jordan Harbinger. Today, I'm here with Skeptical Sunday co-host, writer, and researcher, Jessica Wynn. On the Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the stories, secrets, and skills of the world's most fascinating people and turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
On Sundays, though, it's Skeptical Sunday, where a rotating guest co-host and I break down a topic that you might have never thought about and debunk common misconceptions about that topic. Topics such as why the Olympics are kind of a sham, why tipping makes no sense, astrology, recycling, chemtrails, hypnosis, and one of my recent favorites, internet porn.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
OK, you got my attention. Mafia networks. Now it's getting interesting. How did the mafia even get their hands into our food? I thought they were kind of in the drug trafficking business or something a little more serious sounding.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Jeez, I'm just giving up on extra virginity, regular virginity from here out for this guy. So can we expect things to improve?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
So do the methods. Yes, exactly. God damn it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
It almost seems like encouragement for criminals, given the scale and the complexity of counterfeit food. Is it really all we can do to just read the labels and hope that the label is accurate? Because I could read the ingredients, but if the mafia printed the label, OK, back to square one.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
So if it's too red, it's fake. And if it's brown, it's real. But then it's probably bad. So, yeah, that's where we're at now.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Thanks, Jessica, for serving up the facts about counterfeit foods. Really disgusting. Gonna head out for some sushi, followed by a full afternoon of anal leakage. Thanks everyone for listening. Topic suggestions for future episodes to me, Jordan at jordanharbinger.com. Show notes at jordanharbinger.com.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Advertisers, deals, discounts, ways to support the show, all at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. I'm at Jordan Harbinger on both Twitter and Instagram. You can also connect with me on LinkedIn. Jessica Wynn is on her sub stack Between the Lines. We'll link to that in the show notes as well. This show is created in association with Podcast One.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
My team is Jen Harbinger, Jace Sanderson, Robert Fogarty, Ian Baird, and Gabriel Mizrahi. Our advice and opinions are our own, and I am a lawyer, but I'm not your lawyer, so do your own research before implementing anything you hear on this show. Remember, we rise by lifting others.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Share the show with those you love, and if you found the episode useful, please share it with somebody else who could use a good dose of the skepticism and knowledge we doled out today. And if one of your friends or family is suffering from mysterious anal leakage, maybe they're the person that needs to hear this one.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
In the meantime, I hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn, and we'll see you next time. Imagine facing a rare incurable disease and finding out that AI could repurpose an FDA-approved drug as a potential cure. That's the breakthrough achieved by Dr. David Fagenbaum and the mission of his company.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Tune into episode 1005 of The Jordan Harbinger Show to explore how existing medications are bringing new hope to those confronting elusive illnesses.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Agro-mafia. Sounds like something out of Goodfellas. I never thought that pasta and racketeering were a combination.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
So this starts at the farms and goes all the way to the plates.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
So this is so bizarre. So let me get this straight. While we're enjoying our Chianti or olive oil, the mafia, the actual real life Italian mafias, they're just raking in profits from the very food that we are eating.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Is it that widespread? This isn't just a bunch of shady characters sneaking into farmers markets.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
OK, I'm going to sound like a jerk, but it sounds like an Italian problem that they have to just deal with.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
If you're new to the show or you're looking for a way to tell your friends about the show, I suggest our episode starter packs. These are collections of our favorite episodes on persuasion, negotiation, psychology, disinformation, crime and cults and more. That'll help new listeners get a taste of everything we do here on the show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
What do you mean when crops are destroyed? What do you mean by that?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
I got it. So literally when crops are destroyed by the weather, there's just a shortage of stuff. So they fill the gap. Is that the idea?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
So it's not this is so weird. It's not some Scorsese movie plot. It's happening right now, possibly even in California. Is it just specific crops or is it products like olives and grapes? Because those are the ones I've heard about.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
A million. So this is like a heist movie, but way more boring because it's olive oil. It's a real bummer for anybody trying to buy genuine Italian olive oil. And you see that it is expensive. How do we tell if we're even getting the real deal? I don't know how to test olive oil.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Just visit JordanHarbinger.com slash start or search for us in your Spotify app to get started. Today we unwrap a topic that is not so appetizing, counterfeit food. From the most basic products to the most luxurious ingredients, it seems like pretty much anything can be counterfeited. That's right, even your perfectly aged artisanal cheese is not safe.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, it sounds like a good excuse for a trip to Italy. But what about other products? I'm guessing it's not just olive oil that's being counterfeited because it seems like such easy money. Surely there's other vectors. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Why is that? You know what? It sounds like an episode of Paw Patrol. That's why it's funny. I've heard you can think you're getting a fine cheese, but it's like plastic or cornstarch or whatever mixed in there. Is that true?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
OK, so wood chips in my cheese. That's like saying this burger is 100 percent beef and finding out it's a beef flavored tree branch.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Oh, there's a joke in there somewhere. I got to add that to my Tinder profile. So consumers were basically getting sawdust with their spaghetti. To be fair, the brand we're probably talking about, that stuff does look like sawdust. If we already know about this fraud, why is it still going on? You'd think that somebody would put a stop to wood in my cheese.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
I've got all those in my kitchen, just like everyone listening to this right now. Honey, maple syrup, cinnamon, wine. And yes, I've heard about wine fraud. We actually did an episode on that. I kind of want to do more because that is a huge and deep topic.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
It might just be a cleverly disguised hunk of cheese-flavored plastic, and I'm not really exaggerating here. And that fancy, high-priced bottle of wine you're sipping on, it could be nothing more than grape juice with just a splash of regret. So grab your napkins, because we're about to dig into the murky world of counterfeit food, where the stakes are high and the steaks are not even real beef.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, this seems almost inevitable, especially when all these blind taste tests, they show that even all you see those where the experts are like, oh, this is so great. And it's always the cheap stuff and they can't tell. They really can't tell the difference. It's all nonsense.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
So if you are a collector, maybe make sure you know how many teas are in Lafitte.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
I'm sure I've bought some watered down drinks in my day.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1088: Counterfeit Foods | Skeptical Sunday
going to notice probably so it's like counterfeit art or wine if nobody's the wiser counterfeiters just laugh all the way to the bank and they might just never get caught because who's even pulling the alarm on this yeah i mean absolutely and the consumer too if they don't know and if they get enjoyment and i mean when these high-end luxury collectors of fine foods and libations get scammed i know i'm an a-hole but it's a little hard to have empathy sometimes
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
No, you're absolutely right. And the gassing of people didn't come until a little bit later. In January of 2011, there was a fruit vendor in Tunisia who got his produce confiscated by the police because he couldn't afford a license or the policeman's bribe. So then he lights himself on fire. And this was the beginning of Arab Spring. Now, this is where you saw Libya fall.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
This is where you saw Mubarak in Egypt fall. And protests in Syria start and people start demanding reforms. They demand the end of the state of emergency, which has been in place in one form or another since like 1963. Syrian security forces, they respond with violence. And Bashar blames outsiders for the protests. So we all immediately established sanctions against the Assad regime.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
I think it was in April of 2011. And the EU imposed the travel ban. Even Canada imposed the sanctions on Assad. The nicest people on earth. The U.S. proposed U.N. sanctions. And Russia, which has been an ally in Syria, and also they're on the Security Council, they vetoed that resolution every single time. Sure. So now you've got mass demonstrations.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
And pretty soon, armed militants start rising up and the country starts heading down the path to civil war. You have some army units defect and they pop up on the side of the rebels. Now, in the middle of this absolute mess, this organization called ISIS starts to appear. In Syria, if you think of a map of Syria, think of the boot chicken McNugget. All right.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
Take that boot chicken McNugget and turn it at 45 degrees with the boot part facing up.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
So at the top right of that boot is the intersection or the border with Iraq. And so now you have this group called ISIS forming in northern Iraq and northwestern Syria. And that whole area, it's a very strange area. It's a very lawless area. It's always been that way. And usually those areas have had a strong man in charge. There'll be rebel groups pop up in those areas.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
There's not a lot to do, not a lot of major cities, not a lot of industry. And so they manufacture rebellion and revolutions. So that's where a lot of revolutions and a lot of bandits and these ne'er-do-wells, they hang out in that area because it's hard to get to. And there's not a lot of industry there. So people don't really care.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
Yes. And by now, Russia is kind of looking at the ISIS conflict. This is in 2015. And they're like, all right, you know what? We can go into Syria and we can farm XP. By fighting ISIS. Okay. Seriously, that's literally what they're doing. They send aircraft, they send special forces, they send Wagner. The mercenary group Wagner, for people who don't know. The mercenary group Wagner, correct.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
And they start fighting ISIS and sometimes fighting the rebels as well. But the whole idea here is that if you're a Russian and you want to learn how to be a JTAC, like a Joint Terminal Air Controller, call in bombs onto bad guys, you have essentially a big live fire range. in northwestern Syria when you want to fight ISIS.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
So it's a way literally to farm XP, to get your special forces and get your terminal air controllers trained on how to drop bombs. It also allows your pilots to get training as well. During this fighting, the major fighting was around the Syrian city of Aleppo. This city is a major city. It's a major trade route. The M4 and M5 highways run through Aleppo.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
And it became like the focus of a lot of fighting between the rebels and the Assad government. And so the battle over Aleppo essentially rages from 2012 until 2016. And it basically turns Aleppo into an Arab Stalingrad. And Assad started indiscriminately bombing. Now, he bombed to the point where they essentially kind of ran out of bombs. I don't know if you've heard of the term barrel bomb.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
That's the helicopter bomb, right? Yeah, they would take 55-gallon drums, stop them with explosives, push them out the door of the helicopter, and now it's a bomb. They're not very surgical. They would push these out into civilian areas or onto what they thought were rebel forces. And with Russian help, they started to take back the city of Aleppo. This is essentially Russian close air support.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
And by 2016, government forces are in control of Aleppo and ISIS starts to collapse. By April of 2017, that's actually when we start seeing the use of chemical weapons, specifically in rebel-controlled towns. And actually, in one case, Assad used sarin gas against this one town, and the Russians found out what he did, and they thought, we have to destroy any evidence of this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
So Russia actually bombed the hospital. Oh, gosh. Wow. Okay. That's where people were going to be treated.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
Which it's a very Russian way of doing things, because if you take a lung sample, you're still going to find scarring. But when there's no lungs, can't argue that logic. Jeez. It is a very Russian way of doing things. So since roughly 2022, the lines between the rebels and the Assad forces have been mostly stable. Now we should talk about the rebels and the pro-Assad people.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
On the pro-Assad side, of course, you have Russia, right? Russia, they need that warm water port. It's a great way to refuel their ships when they're in the Mediterranean. It's a way to get supplies in when they're in the Mediterranean. It's also part of the land bridge to Africa. So Russia can make a refueling stop in Syria before they head on to some of their interests in Africa. Now, Iran.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
They supported Syria and Assad as well, mainly because they needed Syria to exist because Syria was a road that went from Iran through northern Iraq, through Syria, and directly across the border into Lebanon. So that's how weapons got to Hezbollah in Lebanon.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
And the IRGC, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, they use the war, again, to farm XP, to train on how to fight these bad guys and to train their militias on fighting bad guys. Hezbollah. was a big supporter of Assad as well. And I think they had about roughly 2,000, roughly a brigade of honest to God, genuine, honest to God special forces.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
These are genuine operators, Hezbollah special forces that were fighting in Syria on the side of Assad. Because again, it was a way to train so that when they fought Israel, they would have all the training they needed.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
Yeah, I have not heard that, but I would not be surprised. When you're a soldier, this is a training opportunity. Go do what you're told to do. And I've said before, Hezbollah is the varsity team. Hamas, they're JV. Hezbollah is the varsity team. They are genuine, honest-to-God soldiers with training programs, with pay, with benefits. So if they're told to go, you go. That's right.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
And you get a free pager when you sign up. You get a free pager and you sign up. Now, on the other side of that, the anti-Assad forces, you essentially have three different groups. All right. You have the Islamist groups. And HTS or Hayat Tahrir al-Shal, which basically means like the Organization for the Liberation of the Levant or Levant Liberation Committee.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
HTS, which is the organization that's ruling Syria right now, that was one of the Islamist group factions. And they were an offshoot of al-Qaeda and then they backed away from al-Qaeda. In fact, they even arrested al-Qaeda members.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
It's not. Although we can get to the fact that they don't seem to be as bad as we thought they were going to be. Okay. Good news-ish. There is another group called al-Din, which is essentially like the guardians of the religious organization. They're another offshoot of al-Qaeda, although those guys consider ISIS heretics. So like they mainly fought ISIS, but they also fought Assad.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
So that's one faction of your Islamist groups. You have another anti-Assad faction, which are Kurdish groups. And for the most part, the US supported these Kurdish groups. Now, Kurds are Muslims as well. You had the SDF, which is the Syrian Democratic Forces. It's the main U.S. ally. It's probably the largest group fighting. It had about 100,000 or so fighters.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
Unfortunately, this particular group is tied to another group called the PKK, which is a Kurdish militant movement that's in southern Turkey and northern Iraq. And Turkey considers them terrorists. So the SDF was fighting against Assad, but sometimes it would also fight against Islamic forces, and sometimes it would fight against Turkish forces.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
And there was another unit called the YPG, or People's Protection Unit, which was like a component of the SDF as well. Those guys mainly fought the Turks, though. Now, the third type of group that is anti-Assad are basically moderate opposition groups who just don't like Assad.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
So there is the Free Syrian Army, which is a bunch of rebel groups, including defectors from the government, so people in the army who switch sides. Then you have the Syrian National Army, which you might be hearing a little bit about, as they were essentially a Turkish-backed coalition that was operating mostly in northern Syria. but the Syrian National Army or SNA mainly fought the Kurds. Okay.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
So it is like Game of Thrones. Serious civil war.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
It wasn't nice. And everyone was fighting each other usually. And sometimes they would also fight Assad's forces. That kind of leads us to present day. And now that we're at present day, Hamas attacked Israel. Israel fought back, invaded Gaza. And then they turn around and they go north and they go after Hezbollah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
And so Hezbollah starts pulling their fighters out of Syria back into Lebanon to start fighting the Israelis. So now you are Bashar al-Assad and you have one very reliable, very experienced brigade of special forces that is suddenly gone out of the fight. And one of the other issues that you saw in Assad's army is that he didn't have a particularly good army.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
It was an army of conscripts, somewhat professional officers. But by this point, the Syrian pound, it's running at a rate of 15,000 Syrian pounds for one U.S. dollar. So their economy collapsed. It's really tough to purchase goods from outside of the country with that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
So you had some soldiers who were not getting paid very well, so they would actually pay a bribe to their commander to say, just mark on the list that I showed up, and then they would go work a civilian job or get their side hustle on. So you have these units that are essentially ghost units. You have people who aren't very well motivated to fight if they're even there at all.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
And since the army was so corrupt... You have officers taking payoffs. They're taking care of themselves, but they aren't necessarily watching the front lines. So that happens. And then those troops move back to Lebanon, the ones from Hezbollah. And then the third thing happens, and that's President Trump gets elected.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
So now if you are an organization and you want to take over Syria, you essentially have 50 or so days to take over all of Syria before a new U.S. regime comes into power and might change the dynamics on the ground because President Trump has always been a wild card. President Trump might fund the Kurdish forces more or he might remove funding from the Kurdish forces.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
And either of those things could change the outcome on the ground, because if you are a part of an Islamic rebel group, you might think, all right, if the Kurdish forces don't get any more funding, then we should try to attack Assad now to weaken Assad because the Kurds aren't going to have as many weapons.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
Or we could attack Assad and then turn north and attack the Kurds once we capture enough land as a buffer zone. Or if the Kurds do get more funding from the U.S., now you're going to have to compete with the Kurds because the Kurds are going to start taking land. So I believe what happened is that the Islamic forces thought, you know what?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
The peace treaty between Hezbollah and Israel has just been signed. That means that Hezbollah is not going to be back inside of Syria to cause trouble. We need to push as hard as we can to take Aleppo. And they did. If you take a look at the casualties that Assad's army sustained in defending Aleppo, it was essentially like maybe 200 dudes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
One of the reasons why you see armies collapse slowly and then really fast is that the average unit needs resupply every 36 hours or so. So who are the first soldiers who are going to leave? They're going to be the supply people. They're in the rear. They have access to things like radio or Internet or cell phone service. They have a way to charge their stuff.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
If you're in a foxhole, you probably don't have a way to charge your cell phone. And so these guys start hearing like, hey, HTS is attacking. And they start thinking like, you know what? I'm done. And so they leave. And then the guys at the front line, they haven't been resupplied in 36 hours. 36 hours turns into 40 hours and that turns into 48 hours. And now they go, you know what?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
We haven't eaten in two days. I'm leaving to go find food. And so that doesn't create a very defensible position, right? When people start leaving because they're looking for food. And as it just so happens, what is Aleppo the intersection of? Highway 4 and Highway 5. So now you have a straight shot down that highway right toward Damascus.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
Yeah, that's a fair comparison. Aleppo was a manufacturing hub, intellectual hub.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
Absolutely correct. They just kept moving. Took them about 10 days to finally secure the capital. Jeez, that is nuts.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
I actually don't recall seeing that. That's a little Baghdad Bob right there.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
Yeah, that's actually a pretty darn good question. Right now, it seems like the de facto leader of Syria is Hamid al-Jalani, who was the head of the HTS. HTS would nominally be in charge. Al-Jolani, kind of an interesting dude. Jolani actually means Golan. So Al-Jolani's family was originally from the Golan Heights of Syria. When Israel invaded during the 1967 war, his family fled.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
Eventually, they ended up in Saudi Arabia. So technically, Al-Jolani isn't even Syrian. He's from Saudi Arabia. I guess he's ethnically Syrian, but he was born in Saudi Arabia. So eventually, Al-Jalani returns to Syria and decides, I'm going to become a medical doctor. He does that for a while. When the U.S. invades Iraq, he decides that he's going to go on jihad.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
Nothing good, right? So he decides he's going to go jihad. And he joins al-Qaeda. He ends up in Iraq. And he starts fighting U.S. forces. Eventually, we capture him. And this was in 2006. And we held this guy until 2011. And he was released. And supposedly he might have joined ISIS, but maybe not. And then he swore off al-Qaeda. But he essentially, at that time when the U.S.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
invaded Iraq, Iraq was easy to get to. And it was like Woodstock. So if you were a dude who wanted to do jihad, who wanted to show in front of your friends, like, I'm a real man. I went and fought the Americans. You had two choices, right? You go to Iraq, you go to Afghanistan. Afghanistan's a one-way trip. Even the Afghans don't watch you there.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
From what I understand, there were Chechens who were ethnically Muslim Russians who tried to go to Afghanistan to teach the Taliban sniper tactics and the Taliban killed them. We don't want you here either. But if you go to Iraq to fight, it's a bus ride away. You get air conditioning, right? You get familiar food. You can fight.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
And then when you're done fighting, you go back to college and show all your friends, hey, I'm the man. It was like Woodstock. Iraq was like Woodstock for all the jihadists. Like everyone wanted to be there or at least wanted to say they were there. So this dude comes back and says, After a certain set of circumstances, he forms HTS. And they were kind of in with al-Qaeda.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
Then they kind of weren't anymore. In some cases, they fought ISIS. And then this guy starts fighting Syrian loyalists. And right now, it seems like he is in control of the country. And all of the things that people thought would go wrong haven't gone wrong yet and might not. This guy is still on the terror watch list. He was in an American prison for six years, wasn't roughly 2006, five years.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
Yeah, 2006, 2011. He was in an American prison. So he was on our radar screen. He was a known affiliate of al-Qaeda, which kind of puts you on the naughty list. But if you want to get technical, Nelson Mandela was a terrorist, and he was invited to the White House.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
Yeah, you're absolutely correct. When you think about it, there's still a lot to talk about because you can talk about what's going on with Iran, what's going on with Russia, and why this happened in the first place. Who were the winners and who were the losers?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
When Nelson Mandela was part of the African National Congress, the African National Congress was a communist organization that also believed in kinetic action. They tried the peaceful route. That didn't work. So he actually went and got trained in small arms and in search and tactics, I believe, in Cuba. So Nelson Mandela was a terrorist before he was the president of South Africa.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
In fact, I believe he was on America's terrorist watch list, I want to say, until 2008.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
So Mandela believed in violence at one point. So maybe Al-Jalani has given that up. Maybe he's not a terrorist anymore. I guess people can change when you look at Mandela. He was a terrorist. He became president of South Africa.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
Some of the things like Sharia law, it doesn't look like that has been implemented or that the HTS is interested in either factional infighting or they're interested in implementing Sharia law. That might come later. But right now, it seems like their main issue is getting the power back on. I've talked with people from Syria who said, honestly, I don't care if we're Islamic.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
I don't care if we're democratic. I just want the power back on for more than two hours.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
It's not. And one of the things Israel did, I understand why they did it. Israel bombed quite a few loyalist aircraft depots, supply depots. In a way, it's a shame they did that because if I was the U.S. government, I would be more than happy to hand the Syrian government some money and say, let's take these jets and get them over to Ukraine.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
They know how to use them, assuming those jets are in any condition to fly. Maybe they use them for parts. But he was a little annoyed that Israel did that because that is now free Syrian property. And I think Israel did it because the gloves have come off. They're not letting anything bad happen essentially ever again.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
But it seems like HDS, they haven't tried to fight the Kurds, which is good. Now, what's interesting is when you look at the major winners here, the biggest winner is Syria. But the second biggest winner is actually Turkey. Because Turkey kind of helped make this happen through funding militias, funding things like the Free Syrian Army, the Syrian National Army.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
So Turkey kind of made this happen. So Erdogan is like Littlefinger. In Game of Thrones, right? He has all of these pieces moving, all of these strings that he can pull. And with his funding, with his help, he managed to take a dictator down in Syria. And he might have a lot of influence over how the new government is formed.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
So supposedly they're not going to try to form a new government or write a new constitution for another three or four years. I believe the reason behind that is if they try to do that right now, there's going to be all these little factions and political parties that are going to try to gain power for power's sake.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
If they hold off for a couple of years and actually write their constitution correctly and get the services back on and figure out what people actually want out of government, then you might end up with a more stable government instead of a crazy constitution like Lebanon has, which always causes friction.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
So the major losers here are Russia. From what I understand, Russia evacuated some bases, but I believe they still have forces at one port and one airfield. Now, Russia is the major loser here. They may have actually evacuated a good number of troops and aircraft from that region. And that makes it very hard for Russia to refuel planes on the way to Africa or to refuel ships in the Mediterranean.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
You know, what's interesting about Bashar al-Assad is that he never really had much interest in doing this in the first place.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
It's bad for Russia in one way, but it's good in another because if you have a squadron of aircraft sitting in Syria, that's one less squadron that could fight in Ukraine. So in some ways, like one headache has gone away for Russia and they can just concentrate in Ukraine. Russia is definitely a loser. Now, any nation is allowed to make any sort of pact they want with another nation.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
One thing Syria could do was allow these Russian bases to stay, come up with a new lease agreement, and then they get hard currency for whatever the ruble is worth. They get hard currency, maybe oil from Russia in exchange for a lease. So that is one thing they could do. Another loser? Syria does have its own oil, but I can only imagine what the royal industry is like now.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
Syria was making $5 billion a year off Captagon because they could make it for a couple of pennies, sell it for 20 bucks a tablet. And a lot of Jihadist spiders were on this stuff. Supposedly, Hamas was on, might have been Captagon, might have been some other amphetamine when they actually attacked Israel on October 7th.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
Yeah, another major loser, Iran. Essentially, they've lost their way to get weapons over to Hezbollah. That's a big deal. And Iran, they didn't try to shore up the Assad regime after they saw it falling because they had bigger problems. They just got a bloody nose from Israel attacking them, either with the air-launched ballistic missiles, perhaps the F-35.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
We're still not sure if the F-35 was used in that attack on Iran a couple of months ago. So right now, Iran is looking at their air defenses and going, you know what? We can put money toward helping Hezbollah, or we could put money toward our own air defenses. Where do we want our money to go? It's probably not going to be Hezbollah. That was extremely embarrassing for Iran.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
Not only their air defenses, but also planetary mixers, which are essentially mixers for rocket fuel. That was one of Israel's major targets. So it's going to take at least a year or around to order more mixes, most likely from China and get those things installed. They're not going to be able to build any rockets for at least a year.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
Yeah, mostly smuggled across the border from Egypt. Some stolen, you know, for the most part, yes, from Iran. So what does it mean for the U.S.? The U.S. has always supported the Kurds. So I got to tell you, the scary part is I've often said this. If you think it sucks to be an enemy of the U.S., wait until you're an ally. I'm surprised the Kurds even talk to us anymore.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
That's correct. And so for the U.S., well, all right, we might give less money to the Kurds. We might see a stable Syria. There'll be fewer weapons traffic from Iran into Lebanon for Hezbollah use. So it's a net win for the U.S. But how Syria is going to play out is up in the air.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
We don't really know which direction they're going to go in, although it looks like they might be going into a moderate direction. But For the most part, the one thing that should concern us is what's going to happen to the Kurds because we have been supporting them. But with this new administration, I might say, OK, well, you got your free country.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
It seems like the rebel groups have pretty much stopped shooting at each other. This includes the Kurds. And that's a good thing. If these factions can just get along and form one democratic government, inshallah, that would be the best possible outcome.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
So this can turn into an episode of Dallas or if you watch like more recent TV, an episode of Yellowstone. So think of Yellowstone or even Game of Thrones, but set in Syria. So there is this guy, Hafez al-Assad. And Hafez al-Assad was the ruler of Syria. And he had two sons. The first son was being groomed to become the leader of Syria. And he was into cars and he got into a car wreck one day.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
I am a traveler. I've been to that area before. I have been to Israel. I have been to Iraq. But not as a tourist.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
Yeah, considering I have a job doing contracting for the government, I have to inform my security manager every time I travel. They probably won't like that one too much.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
I hope so. I really do. These people have suffered a lot. And I think that they want to create as close to a democracy as they can get in that region of the world.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
Absolutely. And thank you so much for having me on. I believe this is my fourth time. So the fifth time do I get a bathrobe like in Saturday Night Live?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
And his father told Bashar, you need to come home and you need to take over for when I die. Now, Bashar al-Assad, he grew up a quiet kid. He was interested in studying French and interested in medicine. Eventually, he went to university, got a degree in medicine. He did his National Army service as an army doctor. And then he went to London. And he became an ophthalmologist.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
He did his residency and I think it was called the Western Eye Hospital in London. And he was an ophthalmologist. Then one day he gets a call from his dad and says, hey, your brother is dead and I need you to come back and start learning the ropes. So like a good son, Bashar al-Assad comes back to Syria. And one of the first things he did was he joined the army again.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
And he was in charge of the Syrian occupation, later the withdrawal from Lebanon. And the other thing he did was he was known as a guy who fought corruption. As it just so happened, everybody who was corrupt was anyone who was opposed to Assad.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
No, you're absolutely correct. You could say that in a lot of ways, Lebanon was a puppet of Syria. Syria caused a lot of problems in Lebanon. Syria let Iran come in and help fund what eventually became Hezbollah. When the U.S. was in Lebanon back in the early 80s to try to fix Lebanon's problems and allow stabilization so Lebanon's government can recover during their civil war,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
Syria played a huge part in causing a lot of the trouble that we've seen in Lebanon. We're talking funding, we're talking weapons, we're talking training. And it didn't work out well for the U.S., especially the Marines who were in barracks. Essentially, the first time we had to deal with suicide bombing terrorism, a guy ran a gate with a truck and blew up and destroyed a Marine barracks.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
I think over 200 Marines were killed. This was in 82, I want to say, but Yeah, Syria has been kind of a thorn in the U.S. 's side in that region for a very long time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
Russia certainly didn't want that to happen. Right. There is a reason for that. Syria and Russia go back to the Cold War when the U.S. was on Israel's side. So Syria received a lot of funding from the Soviet Union, weapons, training, things like that. So there is this relationship going on. And Russia really needed an ally in the Middle East, especially with ports on the Mediterranean.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
Turkey kind of made this happen. Erdogan is like Littlefinger in Game of Thrones. He has all of these pieces moving, all of these strings that he can pull. And with his funding, with his help, he managed to take a dictator down in Syria.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
And Syria was an excellent place to do that. But I don't know whether Bashar al-Assad wanted to be dictator. He certainly rose to the occasion. One of the things that he did while in power was he created the Syrian Computer Club.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
First the LAN party. And Bashar al-Assad was the guy that essentially brought the Internet to Syria. And people thought, all right, this guy is going to be a reformer. Like we have someone who is on the side of the people. Now, I should say, we skipped over this part here, that Bashar al-Assad and his father, his family, there was what are called Alawites, which is like a sect of a Shia Islam.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
And one of the things they believe in is they drink alcohol.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
They have their own interpretation of things. And some people don't really consider Alawites to be Muslims. And Alawites are technically a minority, but they gained control through the Ba'ath Party. And they also gained control because they would take the other minorities, the Druze, the Christians, and stick with them and support them against the Shia Muslims that were inside of Syria.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
So you're using all these smaller factions to try to gain power and try to remain in power inside of Syria.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
The Ba'ath Party is kind of like this communist or really more like a socialist Arab awakening organization. So there is a Ba'ath Party in Syria. There's a Ba'ath Party in Iraq. You could say it's two branches of the same ideals. What's really interesting is that Bashar al-Assad, when he became president, it was after his father died, which was in June of 2000. And there was a slight problem.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
Their constitution, the Syrian constitution, said you can only become president if you're 40 years of age or older. So the legislature lowered the age for serving as president from 40 to 34, which just happened to be Bashar's age.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
Imagine that. And he became president in July of 2000 with 97% of the vote. Wow.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
Yeah, you can say it like that. Absolutely. OK. Now, when he actually took power, there were a lot of people who thought like, all right, this guy brought us the Internet. And this thing called Damascus Spring started, which is kind of led by artists and intellectuals. And they started demanding reforms. And they had some pretty good feelings about this new president.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
Bashar al-Assad created a state of emergency, started throwing people into prison. Oof. And he also started to enforce the strict licensing of guns. Usually when the government starts doing that, it's not necessarily championing gun control for safety. Right. It's so that they can stay in power. And then 9-11 happened. And Bashar al-Assad was actually sort of like a U.S. ally during this time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
Syria actually helped fight al-Qaeda. They worked closely with the CIA. I'm sure you've heard of the extraordinary rendition.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
And so he put a bag over his head. You could take him to Guantanamo, but as soon as you do that, they have rights. But if you take him to a Syrian prison, those guys will do anything to get a confession or intel out of those guys.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
In Syria, there is no such thing as a nice Syrian prison. In fact, when the revolution, now we're skipping ahead a couple of years, but when this 10-day offensive happened that resulted in the fall of Syria, there were people who believed that some of Assad's prisons actually had secret rooms inside of them where prisoners were super duper locked away.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
And they actually brought in the White Helmets, which was an organization that that would help people out in Aleppo who had been trapped under rubble. They brought those guys in to try to search the prison for secret entrances where there might be secret prisons inside.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1099: Syria | Out of the Loop
And you can just imagine if this was the case, I don't believe they actually found any secret areas of these prisons, but you can just imagine dying from hunger or thirst in a free Syria.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
This episode is sponsored in part by Vital Proteins. If you wanna support your skin, hair, nails, joints, and bones without adding another complicated step to your routine, check out Vital Proteins Collagen Peptides. Collagen is like the glue that holds everything together in your body. It's a big deal.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
On Sundays, though, it's Skeptical Sunday, where a rotating guest co-host and I break down a topic you may have never thought about and debunk common misconceptions about that topic, such as why expiration dates on food and medicine are nonsense, acupuncture, astrology, chemtrails, GMOs, toothpaste, diet pills, energy drinks, and more.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
Clarify what you mean when you say that you think that slavery is normal. I'm trying to avoid the inevitable hate in the comments. You're normalizing slavery. I know what you mean, but let's really put a fine point on it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, you mentioned time, but also place, because I have questions about that that are coming up soon. Spoiler alert, there's still a lot of slavery going on. Okay, this ancient slavery, the widespread slavery of the ancient world, how does that lead to the transatlantic slave trade and slavery in America? I'm not asking you to draw like a straight line.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
No, there's not a straight line between Rome 300 BC and Atlanta 1810. Where does American slavery come from in brief and how is it different?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
In what ways? What makes the African slave trade or the transatlantic slave trade different or unique?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
And if you're new to the show or you want to tell your friends about the show, and I love it when you do that, I suggest our episode starter packs. These are collections of our favorite episodes on persuasion, negotiation, psychology, disinformation, crime and cults, and more. That'll help new listeners get a taste of everything we do here on the show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
Didn't the Romans also do that? My history is so weak, but didn't they conquer places like Gaul and they just haul all the Gauls back as slaves?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
Can you tell me what Gauls are? Clearly this place doesn't exist anymore. What is this place now? Where do these people live?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
But once we hit our 30s, our natural supply starts to dip, and yeah, you might start feeling a little creaky. Notice your skin and hair just aren't what they used to be. Daily collagen supplementation can help with skin, joints, hair, nails. Vital Proteins is the number one collagen peptides brand in the US, so they know what they're doing. It's super easy to take.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
Sure. You just go, I'm going to go pick you some berries. I'll be right back. And you just never... Yeah, that's it. You know the land. You're not going back to that nonsense. What about the Irish? I know some people claim the Irish were slaves. I heard about that a lot when I lived in New York. There's the whole thing there.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
And then other people get really mad when you even suggest that white people were also enslaved because it was not the same thing. The Irish thing is complicated.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
God, that's such a long time. The seven years is still a long-ass time to be a slave, especially, I don't know what years this was, but didn't people die when they were 35 back then or something?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
Just visit jordanharbinger.com slash start or search for us in your Spotify app to get started. It's impossible to talk about American history without talking about slavery. The transatlantic slave trade is one of the most brutal episodes in American history, and the resulting American Civil War is one of the bloodiest wars in human history.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
I know it's different for different races or ethnicities, too. I was talking to my friend George Raveling, and when he was born, I think the life expectancy for an African-American man was like 43 or something crazy. But that was different because they had no access to health care, et cetera, et cetera. Yeah. But OK, seven years still a long ass time to be a slave, regardless of how long you live.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
Their lives are absolutely terrible. Yeah, the distinction is important. There's a significant difference between being treated like a rental car for seven years and being owned, potentially sold away from your family, having your children sold off, which I can't even imagine as a parent. It's like the most painful thing I can think of. And yeah, that distinction has to be made at some level.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
Okay, but wasn't it based on realistic stuff? I feel like we're veering dangerously close to, hey, not all slave owners were bad or something like that. I don't know if that's the take we want.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
It's horrific, but it's almost like the Nazi thing in World War II. And it's not everyone in Germany was a Nazi. And you just have to wrap your mind around this horrible thing and how like seemingly normal people can do it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
Unfortunately, however, American slavery is just one episode in a long and very disgusting story that runs from the dawn of time until today. So we wanted to take some time and give a more balanced, longer-term view of slavery than just one centered on slavery in America, though that's definitely part of the story. Now, I'll warn you in advance, this one is kind of icky.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, it is kind of a gross way to think about it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
What's weird is they justify the African slavery thing and they're like, oh, there's something whatever biblical or like they're a different color, so they're not human. And then you get these like whiter than anyone else, white as Irish people who like go out in the sun for three minutes and turn red. And it's like, OK, you need a different rationale for that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
And that is what I paid for their boat trip here so I can just tell them what to do for seven years. Is that kind of the idea?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
so bizarre but it just shows you the arbitrariness of all of these lines drawn in the sand like he's italian he's not white he's irish he's not white they're jews they're not white and then you put a bunch of jews and irish and italians in a room and you can't tell who's who no matter what especially now it's like you just you have no freaking idea unless they start speaking italian you just don't know yeah dustin hoffman and al pacino look like they could be cousins
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
And these are like, right, this is without leaning into the stereotype. Okay, so, but once these people finish the seven years, then they're totally free? Is that the idea?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah. And now I slaved away getting you the following great deals on the fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back. Thank you for watching. Shopify makes starting your own business crazy simple too. Big names like Mattel and Gymshark use Shopify, but so do tons of the other small brands you stumble across at 1 a.m. scrolling through your phone when you can't sleep.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
Slavery everywhere is obviously icky. Slavery in America has ramifications even up to current day. So I'm asking everyone to please give us the benefit of the doubt here before you decide that we are, I don't know, horrible Nazis or whatever just for talking about this. I know, I just stepped right all over. Benefit of the doubt, folks.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
It's like having a full team backing you before you even make your first sale.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
This episode is also sponsored by Caldera Labs. I used to just steal Jen's skincare or just, you know, not bother. Bar soap, maybe a splash of water. That's why I got into Caldera Lab. It's skincare made for guys, not pink package, smells like flowers junk that you are sneakily borrowing. It is simple. It works. You don't have to pretend you know what toner is.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
None of that, why is my forehead reflecting light like a disco ball situation. So what I respect about Caldera Lab is they actually did the work. Years developing each product. Top cosmetic chemists involved. No cheap junk shoved into fancy packaging. It is non-comedogenic. I really don't even know what that means, but if it's important to you, it's that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
Cruelty free, plastic neutral, the real deal, not some Instagram brand that they whipped up in a weekend. Since I started using Caldera Lab, my skin's been smoother and healthier looking. People have noticed. That's all I'm saying.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
Here to help me unchain the topic is writer and researcher Nick Pell. All right. So I'm deliberately setting the bar real low so that the rest of the episode doesn't sound as bad. And we'll see if that strategy actually works out. Now, Nick, I came to you with this topic because I know you'd have some unique perspectives.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
Don't forget about our newsletter, We Bit Wiser. It's just about every Wednesday. It's a two-minute read, literally either that or less. Very practical, something that'll help you apply what you hear on the show. And you can reply to it and complain about random unrelated things like many of you have chosen to do. Or you can engage in a nice way.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
Either way, you can sign up at jordanharbinger.com slash news. Now, back to Skeptical Sunday. This is like one of those things where people go, hey, the labor camps weren't that bad. They weren't all being sent to the gas chambers. And you're like, do you hear yourself right now?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
These both sound awful, but I guess I don't know the difference between how these people were treated and the scale of each and all that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
It's like finding gold. Yikes. This is going to be or is, I would assume, a controversial issue, right? The role of other African tribes and the participation of them in the transatlantic slave trade. It was a sort of settled issue.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
I'm glad you said that because it almost seems like the kind of thing that, like, it's like an American History X kind of point where it's like, oh, you just bought the slaves from other black people, so it's not our problem. Like, it wasn't us. No, it was you, bro. I've heard this before. I was always curious about how true it was. or not. We have sources in the show notes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
People can evaluate that on their own. I'm sure we're going to get emails about this from history buffs and whatnot, and I welcome those. But isn't there some sort of moral culpability on the part of the people who are buying slaves, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
The Europeans, for example, in the drug trade, yeah, we blame the cartels, but I also blame the gangs that are shooting and snorting and selling and killing each other. I blame them too, and I blame the end user.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
So is it basically the same as the transatlantic slave trade, but in reverse? What's going on there?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
How are they different? And it's funny. It would be rich to hear them say they were enslaving white people from Sicily. Not that we consider those Italians whites, depending on what time we're having this conversation or if my uncle's in the room. It's just like exhausting. But OK, how are these different then? Is it the scale mostly?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
You want to make sure we're being fair to history, slavers too, like you said. Got it. Okay.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
Oh, I am afraid to even ask what that is. Tell me what that is.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
Oh, my God. So this is sadistic and disgusting. There's I can't imagine the point of that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
I feel like when I was in the Marine Corps Reserve in college, which is a thing I should probably talk more about at some point because people keep asking me about it. There's a song, right? And we mentioned Tripoli.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
And I remember being like, I got to look this up because Tripoli, as far as I know, is not in the United States. So what are we talking about here? And this has something to do with it, right? Tripoli is, I believe, in Libya. It is. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
ended the barbary slave trade america sicily and sweden they fought two wars against the barbary pirates sicily you never that's kind of like saying hilton head island fought a war with america defeated slave like what i guess it was separate back then
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
So this is a good pivot to the Civil War. I keep hearing like the Civil War wasn't actually fought over slavery. And I'm like, oh, my high school education is totally inaccurate and dumb now. I don't know anything. How accurate is that?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
Like it was fought over slavery, but not because we're such good people. We wanted slavery to end, but for some other reason. That's why I feel like you're going.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
Right. The hippie equivalent back in 1850 or whatever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, it becomes too costly, too difficult.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
Okay, this is going to need a little bit more unpacking for me. Once again, my high school education on this subject, I should qualify this. I did go to college and grad school. I don't only have a high school education for those who are new to the show, but I don't know. You're a lawyer with a high school education.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
Yes, we also have a high school education, but my history really does stop in high school in the 90s. This just has to be unpacked for me because I am not following how the American Civil War didn't end slavery in the United States. Didn't the Civil War end? And they were like, okay, no more of this. And then Jim Crow. That's all I know.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
But OK, forced labor is illegal in the United States, to be clear, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
Wow. I did not know that. I remember when I went to North Korea with this author, Neil Strauss, and he was like, we're talking about the labor camps that they have there. And we asked what the incarceration rate was of North Korea. And somebody somehow either knew it or found it. And it's 1%, which I think is about the same as the United States per capita.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
which is crazy because we're talking about North Korea. Now that's different because it's North Korea, but whatever. I guess my only quip here, one of my quips so far, I should say, is that they've been through the judicial system, regardless of what we all think about it or how the processes work. Warm up the angry emails now, folks. Now is the time. These processes are fallible.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
So when you say the default means of organizing labor, what exactly do you mean by that?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
There's corruption. I get it. But it's still not just like, hey, you get over here. You're a slave now.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
People profit off of this. Yeah, that's messed up now that you say it like that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
So is there another example? Yeah, the draft. Do we have the draft anymore? Do we do that? I'm old now. I don't remember. I registered for selective service when I turned 18. I must have done that. Wait, maybe I got bone spurs and flat feet. No, I was, again, I was in ROTC. I was in the Marine Corps Reserves, technically. Of course I registered for the draft. I remember that little card.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
And man, I don't think I know anybody who didn't do that. It was all anybody talked about when we got those things. How is the draft slavery, though? I don't want to get too far ahead of myself.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, I guess the argument that many would make, myself maybe included, is you owe some kind of service to the country during a time of emergency. Was that abused? Yeah. Vietnam, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
I've seen that. Yeah. You go to a bar and someone's like, hey, you look like you are old enough to go sit in a trench. And it's like, oh, this is the worst day of your life, man. So far.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
Right. I do see your point. I don't know if I agree in all cases, but that's not really what we're trying to explore here. Now let's hear about some of the fine products and services that support this show, none of which were made by slaves. Probably. Maybe. We'll be right back. This episode is sponsored in part by The Defender.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, to serving to your coffee, smoothie, even water. It doesn't taste like anything, so it just blends right in.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
No matter the topic, Mike asks the questions you'd want to ask, getting straight to the good stuff, and the conversations are always engaging, always insightful, guaranteed to leave you a little smarter than before. They've got thousands of five-star reviews, but do you even need that? I'm recommending it. You don't need other people's opinion, right, at this point, I would hope.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
Anyway, give it a listen. Just search for Something You Should Know wherever you get your podcasts. Look for the bright yellow light bulb and start listening to Something You Should Know. Now, for the rest of Skeptical Sunday.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
You hear about countries like North Korea, where the guys join the military for, I want to say, 10 years, and it's mandatory, but also they're not gearing up for war against the South of the United States. Supposedly they are, but when you go there, what you do is you see them working on farms for free. because it's just forced labor. And this is up for debate, I suppose.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
But it's also designed to make men closer to the states and the military than to their own families. Because if you're 18 and you go away until you're like 30, that's a long time. Many of those guys don't see their family ever during that period of time. It depends. So you might even be 10 miles away and never see them. That's kind of how that goes. But yeah, I don't know.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
I don't want to get too in the weeds on that, I think.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
That's, I think, typically what people mean when they talk about slavery, especially when they're coming from a Western or American perspective. So what's the other kind of slavery?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
I guess I have to agree. It is forced labor, but maybe war existential crisis to this day facing genocide. It's like the one situation where like maybe and again, I'm not saying this is my opinion because I have to think about it more. Maybe this is the one time where it's actually acceptable. But now I'm saying, hey, forced labor is acceptable if, you know, colon.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
I got to think about this a lot. This is like a philosophical thing I wasn't expecting to dip into. Service of the state, maybe it's different than being forced to, you know, farm potatoes for Monsanto someplace. As for prison labor, I can definitely see some people arguing that since you're convicted of a crime and society has to pay to house, feed, clothe you, etc.,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
that working in prison is just paying your debt to society. But that's another conversation. And also, you mentioned that there's profit happening off of this. Am I getting some rebate on that then? No, the private prison system is profiting off that. So that's definitely not fair, right? I heard about these fire brigades at this prison that I worked at in California where I did some volunteering.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
They have a fire brigade and the guys like it because they get to be outside all the time. And also it is optional. They're not forced to do it. But also they're doing like controlled burns and stuff. So they're helping the state of California. That might be a little bit different. But then are they paid? But then that money goes to the prison. And is that a private prison?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
I don't know how any of that works now that you mention it. Obviously, slavery still exists. In an underground sense, no matter what we think of prison labor or the draft, I kind of want to get back to like what everybody universally agrees is slavery. I know it's going on in North Africa.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, you're not joking. I looked this up a couple of weeks or months ago. when I was thinking about this topic for Skeptical Sunday. I've seen some insane photos of slave markets in Libya.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
It's worth a Google because it's really wild to see something like this happening in 2025 where it's being photographed and videotaped in 4K for the whole world to see on the internet and you just see like an Ethiopian woman bound and gagged in a room with a bunch of other people. It'll break your brain. And I guess people are being sold.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
I looked this up in Time magazine and the article is a few years old, but it was like 500 bucks. And that's before the last five years of inflation or whatever. And that's big money in a place with no functioning government. It's probably more than people make in a month. So it seems that slavery is it's still big business in many parts of the world. Do we know how big the business or industry is?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
After North Korea was Eritrea, just in case people were like, ah, I didn't hear it. So North Korea, Eritrea, Mauritania, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Tajikistan, and the UAE.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
Certainly about North Korea, I agree. They have a massive prison industrial complex whose job it is to basically slowly kill the incarcerated political prisoners and use them as labor. Also, I mentioned earlier the military. That's why it's not 1%, which I think is the percentage of population that's incarcerated.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
The military is all men, but they're not sitting there in a trench waiting for the South to invade. They're freaking picking rice and stuff, and they're pulling plows and teams of men because they don't have enough animals. Assuming that the number is true, how does it compare to the percentage population? of the U.S. population that was enslaved when slavery was at its peak.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
How does that number for these enslaved states compare to the percentage of the U.S. population that was enslaved when we had peak slavery?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
I see. So you can't be sold or traded or your kids traded or whatever, but otherwise it's very similar to slavery. Sounds almost like the same thing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
Okay, still, those are staggeringly high numbers. Okay, so to your earlier point, what if we count the draft during World War II or Vietnam or whatever, and then we add in prison labor? So we take sort of the widest view of what you sort of said might be considered slavery. Do we have more or fewer slaves than we did in 1790?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
I just figured they didn't even exist. Okay, it's a fool's errand to try and make these comparisons. Who has the most slaves in the world today? Total number, India, 11 million. Wow. So how does India get the gold here? Obviously, that's a lot of people. What does Indian slavery look like typically?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
For people who are wondering about the begging, that's like what Slumdog Millionaire, when they burned the kid's eye with a spoon or something and then they made him go out on the street and beg because it's like, oh, he's blind. So I've done episodes on some of this kind of stuff.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
Bruce Lattebue, episode 976, he talks about kids working in carpet or brick factories in, I think, Bangladesh or India or both in Pakistan under just horrific conditions. And then those people have kids and they just keep the kids there. And basically, you can never work the debt off. That's the whole idea. Who else is on the worst offenders list for slavery?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
So this is obviously all quite horrible. It's an interesting distinction because when we think about slavery, the whole not getting paid part of it, it's not even remotely the most disturbing aspect of slavery, right? The wages are really low or like non-existent. Yeah, that's not what we're worried about here, folks.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
Eritrea, you're supposed to go to the military for three years. Numerous people who have escaped and they're like, yeah, I was in the military for 14 years. They just don't let you go. And you're not doing anything military. You're just working in a mine or in a plantation growing some food. And they just say, oh, three years is up. Oh, you're not going home. We need you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
And that's just kind of how it works. That's slavery. They give you a badge or something. It doesn't make it not slavery. It is a little odd how they're able to count conscripted military slaves in Eritrea, but not in other countries. But I really think the distinction is because they are exclusively using them as essentially slaves there.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah. Looks like we read the same article. Yeah, exactly. I think most people who are aware of what's going on in the world, they're aware that slavery exists in some form today, but they tend to not be aware of just how widespread it is. You're talking about Cambodian call centers where they trick people who live in Thailand to go live there and they're stuck in Burma or whatever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
You get the people in the military, you get the people in Africa, you get the people in prison. So how many people total are enslaved around the planet today? Do we know?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
Look, the population of California is something like 40 million. So if we think there are 40 million slaves on the planet, that's go to California. Imagine every single person there is a slave. That's absolutely incredibly huge number, especially because isn't California like the world's fifth largest economy or whatever it is?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
It's just like that's an insane amount of economic value held in slaves. All right. So now I see why you wanted to split slavery into multiple parts here, because this is it's not so clean cut, really.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
Right. Yeah, that's what I'm getting at. Yeah. I'm more worried about my kids are being sold for me and I'm getting physically abused or worse constantly on a daily basis and living in fear. So when you say the slavery is the main way labor is organized throughout history, why is that? Is it just because it's cheap or free? I mean, maybe it's a dumb question.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
Jeez, yeah. It sounds like there's a lot more than we normally think of, because really I was thinking people in chains, the end. And this all sounds like slavery to me. We also did that show. I mentioned the Cambodia Burma call centers. Many of those calls received here in the United States and elsewhere are run by people who cannot escape. That was episode 833, by the way.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
And there was actually recently a giant rescue of a bunch of these people due to pressure. So that's a huge relief. But there's so many of these places and, in fact, entire cities where there are just thousands of slaves working. Anyway, what do you think about the numbers? You seem to think they're inflated. You mentioned that. I'm curious as to why.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
Obscure ref, bro. It's not. You just slept through high school English. That is true. I remember my mom reading The Uncle Tom's Cabin when I was a kid. Odd choice, but yeah, clearly I don't remember it anyway.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
I don't get behind that. If I'm having brunch with you, you're not a slave somewhere. You might feel like it sometimes, but no. You're drinking a $38 mimosa, dude. Yeah, no. Why do you think that slavery still exists in the 21st century? Haven't we moved past that as a species? We have machines now. That's what I don't really understand.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
And I know this is going to take a dark turn because I'm like, what can humans do that machines can't do? Come on already. And the answers that pop into your head are pretty gross. Ooh, yeah, they are.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
But like you said, we don't live in the road or whatever novel. So why are there still 40 or 50 million slaves in the world today when we have machinery that doesn't run away? I don't know. Just the only thing I can think of is really gross sexual slavery and stuff.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
Because we don't need human muscle as an energy source anymore. So people who are not just despicable are going to go, oh, there's other ways that we can do this more efficient ways, more powerful ways. I mean, I'd love to say, oh, you have a very grim view of humanity, but I don't know if I disagree with what you're saying either.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, I've got a buddy. It comes from a wealthy Indian family, lives in America, served in the U.S. military. He told me he doesn't like to visit home as much because they have people that work in their house that are mistreated by the rest of his family and he just can't be around it. And I've asked for examples.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
It's not like horrific, but it's definitely like, wow, I would never treat anyone that way. And it's, yeah, watching your sister do it is not fun. Yeah. So what can people do if they want to help end slavery worldwide or at least be part of seeing some of these enslaved people freed? Is there anything that we can do from the luxury of the Western world here?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
I've spoken about that with Bruce Latteby, who I mentioned earlier. He will buy child slaves to rescue them. And I said, aren't you just creating a secondary market? And he's like, yeah, but we're also rescuing these particular people. And then we try to work with law enforcement to make sure they can't. And it's just like such a losing battle, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
Because you either leave those people there working enslaved or you buy them and they're like, all right, cool. I'm going to take this money and buy some more slaves. And it's like, damn it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
Now, it sounds ridiculous, but there are people who are wondering how to do just that and had many offers like, sponsor this child, and it's like, okay, I gotta look at the organization, and many of them are legit, but many of them, who knows where your money's actually going or what's really happening. Anyway, fascinating subject. I hope we've freed some people's minds on this subject.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
Thanks again to Nick for helping us dig into this admittedly somewhat depressing and distressing topic. Nick, this kind of stuff seems to be your specialty, man. That's why I'm Reddit's favorite. Thanks for listening.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
Topic suggestions and all of your angry emails now to jordan at jordanharbinger.com, show notes at jordanharbinger.com, advertisers, discounts, deals, ways to support the show, and people to complain to about why we covered this topic, all on one convenient page, jordanharbinger.com slash deals. I'm at jordanharbinger on Twitter and Instagram. You can also connect with me on LinkedIn.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
This show is created in association with Podcast One. My team is Jen Harbinger, Jace Sanderson, Robert Fogarty, Ian Baird, and Gabriel Mizrahi. Our advice and opinions are our own, and I'm a lawyer, but I'm not your lawyer. Do your own research before implementing anything you hear on the show. And remember, we rise by lifting others. Share the show with those you love.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
If you found the episode useful, please share it with somebody else who could use a good dose of the skepticism and knowledge that we doled out today. In the meantime, I hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn. And we'll see you next time. This episode is sponsored in part by What Was That Like podcast.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
Have you ever wondered how it feels to watch your house burn down, be attacked by an alligator, or learn that your spouse hired someone to kill you? What Was That Like is the podcast for you, if you're that person. Not the person who got hired to be killed, but the person who wondered, more thankfully. Real people come on every episode to explain the unbelievable situations they've been through.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
I see. Okay, and before people want me to do a Skeptical Sunday on magic rocks, we're talking about nuclear power, right? You're just being facetious. Yes. Funny. Yes. The whole time you're describing this, I'm thinking of the Hebrew slaves and the Ten Commandments building the pyramids, and they're just... carrying all those giant- Moses! Yes, exactly, right.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
I think it's a funny concept for a show. I kind of wish I'd thought of it because I always get crazy stories from people. Not everything turns into a Jordan Harbinger episode. But What Was That Like? is hosted by my friend, Scott Johnson, who's naturally curious and gives his guests the opportunity to share how they've really felt during some of their most surreal experiences.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
What they did in the morning before an earthquake, what song was playing as a gunman entered, was their stomach growling as they hid? Guests share everything they remember about their crazy, crazy experiences.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
So if you want to hear some disturbing slash inspiring firsthand stories about the thoughts that go through your head while surviving a kidnapping or winning the price is right, What Was That Like? is the podcast you've been looking for. Every story is thoroughly researched and fact-checked so you know even the most unreal stories are actually someone's reality. Listen to What Was That Like?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
And apparently, somebody's going to correct me on this or affirm me on this, but apparently Jews never actually built the pyramids, but whatever. Despite what it might say in the Bible, the Jews were maybe never really in ancient Egypt building the pyramids at all. Kind of a disappointment.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
A lot of my Jewish friends are pretty proud of their ancestors' hand in building one of the wonders of the world, myself included. Although, man, as a Jew, I can't imagine, even if they tried, they'd be like, these people complain way too much. Get rid of them. We need somebody else. I can't listen to this anymore.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, go get the aliens. I can't listen to this guy complain anymore. He's driving me crazy. They're driving me nuts. Yeah, I mean, a bunch of those ancient wonders were built by slave labor, probably most of them. Kind of a downer, takes a bit of shine off of things.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
But you're right, if it's the default way of doing something and it's really grand, it probably wasn't a passion project of the leader to do himself in his spare time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, they're canceled. The pyramids, Parthenon, the Acropolis, all canceled. Sorry, folks.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
Yes. Okay. So for those playing at home, those are the guys with the oars rowing the big boats, right? Is that what that is?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, I did a show a long time ago. Actually, it wasn't that long ago. Episode 807, Siddharth Kara, about how the blood of the Congo powers our lives. And essentially what he's talking about is how these kids and adults, of course, mine for chemicals like cobalt, coltan in mines. And it's like they're using mercury as well, so the health ramifications are horrific.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
And they're in these swampy, disgusting environments, dying like flies, getting all kinds of sicknesses. And it's basically modern-day slavery, although I think they make 10 cents a day or something like that. I don't know if that even counts. They basically have no other choice. They either starve to death or you do that. And sometimes gangs are enforcing it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, this sounds absolutely nightmarish. I don't even want to do mining if I'm getting paid for it and have a union and OSHA and everything. It still sounds horrible. And maybe that's unique to me. I'm sure there's miners that listen to this, but I'm like, I'm not going in that little shaft and sitting down there all day. That seems terrifying.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, I guess if you were giving me the choice between dying on a cross and dying in a salt mine, I might actually pick the salt mine, at least at first. I don't know. So was mining the main use of slaves in ancient Rome? I guess I thought it was gladiator combat.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, lack of upward mobility, not really on my bingo card for reasons slavery is bad. Oh, I've been toiling away in this mercury mine, but one day I'm going to be a manager. I don't know. In some cases, was there a way to work your way up the corporate slavery ladder in other places or other slavery organizations?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
Welcome to Skeptical Sunday. I'm your host, Jordan Harbinger. Today, I'm here with Skeptical Sunday co-host, writer, and researcher, Nick Pell. On the Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the stories, secrets, and skills of the world's most fascinating people and turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
One of those jobs is definitely shittier than the other.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
Really? Wow. Okay. And you think your holidays are awkward? Imagine your family actually bought you from a slaver, used to beat you and work you until you somehow earned your freedom. I might skip that Thanksgiving. I don't care how good the green bean casserole is. I'm leaving the manor. It just seems hard to believe like, oh, he's a member of the family now.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
We're going to totally treat you in a different, more respectful way. What do I know? But it just sounds like it's a tall one.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
Our mission is to help you become a better informed, more critical thinker. And during the week, we have long-form conversations with a variety of amazing folks, from spies to CEOs, athletes, authors, thinkers, and performers,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1149: Slavery | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah. Interesting. So you get beat too bad and you can sue. And then what you become someone else's slave instead. I mean, it hardly seems like justice and this is just Rome. What about other cultures and civilizations? Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
Thank you for listening to and supporting the show. Your support of our sponsors keeps us going. All the links, deals, and discount codes are in one place, jordanharbinger.com slash deals. You can also ask the AI chatbot for promo codes. Please consider supporting those who support the show. Now, back to Skeptical Sunday. What is the justification? Is any reasoning given to justify any of this?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
Like you mentioned that one of the bagua has specific colors like blue, the number's four, all that stuff. So the question is, why those? What is there to distinguish any of this from a set of just completely arbitrary, made-up assertions?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, no, I mean, it seems fair, but whenever people are like, fake Professor Dave thinks the Earth is round, I'm like, well, you can't really say anything about that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah. And I mentioned before that qi is life energy or something, but maybe I should have asked, what is qi exactly? Because I don't know what it is. I've heard that it's a life energy because that's what they told me in martial arts, but even they didn't know anything about this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
I feel like we're about to dive into a physics lesson here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, I feel like that word is used really loosely at times. For a long time, for years, it was actually banned on my show because it had become almost meaningless. If you were talking about, and even now, if you're talking about energy on my show, it doesn't happen as much as it used to.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
It has to be like electricity or something that you learned about in your science class, in your physics class in high school. It can't be when somebody goes, everything is energy, right? And just uses that to explain some random thing. I don't allow that. It's become totally meaningless as a word. The meaninglessness is by design.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
So charlatans, practitioners of woo, whatever, they can sell us something, claim that it's got something to do with energy, whatever, and you're not supposed to have follow-up questions. You're just like too tired to argue with them at that point or whatever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
Right, yeah, you could be talking to, I don't know, Galileo, and you'd be like, nope, sorry, no, I made up my mind. Anyway. On the Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the stories, secrets, and skills of the world's most fascinating people and turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
I'm going way back to middle school, seventh grade science class here, but aren't there different forms of energy? I remember kinetic energy was the energy of motion. Potential energy was the energy of potential motion. I don't even know. And then heat, is that separate or is that also kinetic? I don't even know because the molecules are moving separately.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
This is all coming back to me now. And you mentioned those thermal systems. Now I'm understanding why my insulated cup works, right? Because in between these metal walls, there's a vacuum and there's less molecules. So it's hard for the heat to get into my cold drink and vice versa, I guess. Now that all makes sense. Okay, so temperature is really measuring exactly that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
Heat is not a substance or something like that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
Okay, so I guess what we're saying is that when certain people use the word energy, what they are describing is not energy at all.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
But then some people use the word that way, but they don't realize they're using it that way, the metaphorical way. And I think that's where the confusion begins. They either don't realize or they're doing it on purpose.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
By the way, I know Galileo is the sun not going around the earth guy. Don't email me. Who did figure out the earth was round? Do we even know?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
Also positive or negative energy, which I guess that's not a real thing, right? That would be the same issue.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
Not like good or bad is what I'm trying to say.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
I see. That is confusing, especially if you're trying to confuse people with it. It's pretty easy to do just given that going like they wouldn't call it. It reminds me of when somebody was talking about essential oils and the person was like, why do you think they call them essential? It's because you need them. And it was like, no, that it's because it's the essence of something.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
And it's like, no, essential. Like it's essential that you have gas in your car. If you don't buy them, you die. I'm like, that's not what they mean. So we're sitting there arguing over semantics. And then I realized I'm just I might as well ram my head through the wall because I'm going to get further that way than arguing semantics with this person.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
But it's not really the word energy either or not just the word energy. I hear people use words like frequency, vibration all the time. And I would imagine that applies here even with feng shui.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
So maybe people should email me because clearly I don't know who I'm talking about or have any idea. Anyway, our mission is to help you become a better informed, more critical thinker, Like I should be, apparently, about heliocentrism. During the week, we have long-form conversations with a variety of amazing folks. Spies, CEOs, athletes, authors, thinkers, performers.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
And vibration, same bucket as frequency, wavelength, whatever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
Speaking of fortune and prosperity, mine will be increased if you support the fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back. This episode is also sponsored in part by Taylor Brands. You wouldn't believe how many people ask me, Jordan, you're a lawyer, how do I set up an LLC? And until now, I didn't have a simple go-to recommendation, but I finally do. Taylor Brands.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
On Sundays, though, we do Skeptical Sunday, where a rotating guest co-host and I, we break down a topic you may have never thought about and debunk common misconceptions about that topic. Topics such as Flat Earth, for example, circumcision, the Olympics being kind of a sham, chemtrails, banned foods, GMOs, internet porn, and more.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
So when it comes to finding a home, not just a house, this is everything you need to know all in one place. Homes.com. We've done your homework. Thanks again for listening to the show. All the deals, all the sponsors and promo codes at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. Now for the rest of Skeptical Sunday. So it sounds like a major problem here is that these words are not well understood.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
And maybe some people, they started using them metaphorically, maybe to refer to something aesthetically or to convey something subjective. But then other people took that and tried to turn it into something literal in a way that doesn't make sense if you know anything about science. And that's where all this mystical stuff comes from.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
What is it exactly that allows us to assign it as an art form? I know this sounds a little bit philosophical. Can we be clear about what art really is? Is that a thing we can do in less than five hours?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
As opposed to what other type of criteria?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
Okay. So what would be an example of each of those things, just so we can be clear? And I realize I'm probably beating this to death, but I think it's important to be clear about things that would be art and things that would be not art.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
So for no other reason, then that's what seems aesthetically pleasing to you. That's right. Okay, so I guess the reason this is important, because people are like, Jesus, let it go already.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
The reason this is important is that people can take the subjectivity of an art like interior design and all the aesthetic choices that have to be made and paint some mysticism upon it to try to make it seem practical or aligned with some kind of universal truth where it just isn't.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
And if you're new to the show or you want to tell your friends about the show, we've got some starter packs, which are collections of top episodes organized by topic. So you can find out what your friend or your grandma or your dad or whatever wants to listen to and spood feed him that one. Topics like psychology, persuasion, influence, China, North Korea, crime, cults, and more.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah. Yeah, we talked about that on our longer podcast episode a couple of years ago.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, science denial. Right. Okay, if a plant is supposed to make you feel energized, and you stand in a room first with the plant, and then without the plant, how is one gauging the feeling of being energized? And how are we accounting for the placebo effect, which is obviously present with anything like this?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
It sounds like you're reading my inbox every Monday morning. Every time we do one of these, people are like, excuse me. Even well-meaning people, not just people who are pissed off that I've skewered acupuncture for them, but we did the astrology episode. It aired a while ago, and the next day, people were like, you know what? People do study astrology. I'm like, well, not scientists.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
And then other people were like, look, here's your horoscope. Dead on, if I do say so. I know you a little bit through the podcast. This is dead on. I'm like, you could show this to anyone, and it's dead on.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
80%, right. Some people might be like, oh, actually, I'm not organized and I don't like money. Okay, fine. They don't like money. I guess I... I hate sex, actually. Yeah, it's terrible. Look, there's still 90% accurate horoscope. Come on, what do you want? All right, so what about mirrors? I would imagine that has a thing. I see those all over Chinatown.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
I've asked about that and the answer was feng shui. And that was, again, not allowed to have follow-up questions. Something about evil spirits.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
Just visit jordanharbinger.com slash start or search for us in your Spotify app to get started. Now today, we're going to look at feng shui or feng shui or however people mispronounce it. I think it's feng shui. That's just the dialect of Mandarin that I've been studying. No big deal.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
Mirrors are water. Why water specifically?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
I mean, that might be a good idea for other reasons. But yeah, make sure your mirror is childproof. Good point. Because if I'm taller than the majority of people in a given area, do they have to move the mirrors for me? Or am I just sorry, buddy, you're the foreigner. We're not moving our mirrors for you. Right. Everyone hates your house. Yeah. Like, thanks for putting the mirror above my head.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
I'm drowning in negative energy, pal. I agree. It is vague and it's inconsistent. What would you say to an interior decorator who incorporates feng shui in their practice? Is it pointless? Is it harmful? Or does it just end up with you having a Chinese aesthetic?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, I think a lot of this is sort of backwards rationalization. And some things just seem obvious. Keeping entryways free of clutter. Okay, fine. Any good decorator is intuitively going to know that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
Humblebrag, which is an ancient Chinese practice, not humblebragging, but feng shui, or some might say an art form. Others mistakenly say it's science. It's not. We'll talk about that today. It's regarding the arrangement of objects in the home or other areas, gardens, streets.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
It's like a selling point. Like I'm a feng shui certified master. I remember seeing a show a long time ago, like 20 years ago now, where they hired, I don't know, half a dozen feng shui decorators and said, decorate this room according to the principles of feng shui. And that, of course, each one did a vastly and completely different job of decorating that room.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
Everything was positioned differently. All of the colors, the whole thing was different, which sort of proves that it's not really science, right? Because if it's science and each of these people is following those principles, they end up like with 99% accuracy, they're going to have pretty much the same design.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah. People can go back and listen to the astrology episode. Lastly, I've read that the concept of luck is a big part of this. How does luck tie in here? I know that Chinese people generally like they're just obsessed with luck, lucky, everything, restaurants. And it's a common character in old Chinese writing. You see it everywhere.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
Plus there's the fortune cookie. That's not really related, maybe.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
And to help us with this analysis today is your favorite debunker of pseudoscience and mine, Dave Farina of the YouTube channel Professor Dave Explains. Dave, thanks for joining us again today.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
True, yeah. And by the way, those were invented in San Francisco, in Chinatown. Is that a fact? Yeah, it is. I was surprised by that. I thought, oh, this is an ancient Chinese thing. I wonder how they made these 500 years ago. And the tour guide on the walking tour was like, actually, they're made right here. We're about to walk in there.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
And the people that invented that were like the grandparents or great grandparents of this woman who's sitting right here right now making these in this place. Claim to fame. Yeah. And they just sit there and make those. And I thought, wow. So it's as American as it is Chinese, more so. It's just San Francisco, Chinatown, born and bred. A gimmick. A gimmick. 100% a gimmick. Yes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
congratulations you invented the worst dessert of all time yeah where if you're not careful you bite into a piece of paper with nonsense written on it yes so my parents by the way they went to chinatown with a bunch of their friends and they accidentally bought like a bag of the dirty fortune cookies oh and they gave them out at a party by mistake which was hilariously embarrassing for the host of the party
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
dirty like you're gonna get herpes or like what no sorry they're like dirty sexual fortunes inside these fortune cookies yeah oh i thought you just meant like the cookie itself is gonna give you herpes oh no no i meant the fortune is soon you're gonna get herpes from all the sex that you do Probably something along those lines.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
They were opening them and they're, you know, my parents are 80 years old now. This happened probably 20 years ago, but they're still of the generation where they probably don't talk about that stuff at parties.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, there's probably a little bit of I never. I think they also were laughing because they're not totally devoid of a sense of humor, but it's a funny mistake to make. Sure. And you can't tell those middle of folder cookies from the other one. So I don't know if they bought the bag because it was mislabeled or they just weren't reading the label. At least they had that classic taste.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
So let's start with the very basics. What is feng shui? And I know you're going to say feng shui. It's fine. How is it different?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
Yes, they did have that classic chalk taste, manila folder chalk taste. So where does luck enter with feng shui or is it a separate concept?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
It sort of begins to sound like horoscopes in a way. It's just that the fortune, it's self-assigned instead of being assigned by constellations. It's assigned by you making your room look a certain way.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
You flip-flop on the feng shui. Sure, I do. The irony is not lost here in that it is something that is fully malleable. How is it different, though, from just interior decorating? How come if I hire somebody who is a master of feng shui, I'm not just hiring an interior decorator, for lack of a better term?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
A big pit of mysticism. That's how I feel about modern society sometimes, at least when I go on the internet. At any rate, thank you for helping us elucidate some of the details of feng shui here on Skeptical Sunday. I appreciate it, man. My pleasure. You're about to hear a preview of the Jordan Harbinger Show with geopolitics analyst Peter Zion.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
For more about how globalization and our way of life will change dramatically in the coming decade, check out episode 781 of The Jordan Harbinger Show. Thanks, everyone, for listening. Topic suggestions for future episodes of Skeptical Sunday to Jordan at JordanHarbinger.com. Show notes at JordanHarbinger.com. Transcripts in the show notes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
Advertisers, deals, discounts, and ways to support the show all at JordanHarbinger.com slash deals. I'm at Jordan Harbinger on both, well, X and Instagram. It sounds so dumb saying that, doesn't it? Yeah. Instead of Twitter. I'm on Twitter, Instagram X, whatever you want to call it. Or connect with me on LinkedIn where people aren't going to argue about QAnon crap in public. Dave Farina.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
You can find Dave at Professor Dave Explains on YouTube. This show is created in association with Podcast One. My team is Jen Harbinger, Jace Sanderson, Robert Fogarty, Ian Baird, Emilio Campo, and Gabriel Mizrahi. Our advice and opinions are our own. I'm a lawyer, but I'm not your lawyer. Do your own research before implementing anything you hear on the show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
God forbid your chi should be blocked. Am I right? And remember, we rise by lifting others. Share the show with those you love. And if you found the episode useful, please share it with somebody else who could use a good dose of the skepticism we doled out here today. So maybe somebody is worried about the way their room is arranged. Maybe they're worried about that chi flowing through the house.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
In the meantime, I hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn. And we'll see you next time. Thank you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, I get that this idea of some kind of oneness with the universe is actually behind a lot of different flavors of mysticism, right? You take the yin-yang symbol and concept and you're like, oh, karate, martial arts, whatever, has to be that way. Food now has to be that way. Feng shui has to be that way. It's the way of the universe.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
But then it's just selectively applied where people make up a new system for it. Why do you think that is?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
That sounds pretty on the nose and a bit reminiscent of our astrology conversation in a way wanting to be intertwined with the cosmos and all that jazz.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
So let's dig into the specifics with feng shui. When somebody acts as a practitioner of this art or whatever you call it, what are they doing? What are they prescribing?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
Hmm. So far, I'm lugging around my office. So far, so good. Okay, that doesn't sound too crazy. I'll admit I can't immediately say why I sort of agree with that, but I think of any bedroom I've ever had, and it kind of describes where the bed should go and did go most of the time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
Maybe everything about feng shui can be justified logically in that sort of way. Or am I getting ahead of myself?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah, that took an abrupt sharp turn for the kooky. I should have probably just waited until I heard the word energy map.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
So there's an energy map or whatever of some sort that you would just place on top of the floor like a blueprint kind of deal?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
Yikes. Okay, it's already complicated. And these correlate with specific sections of the map and therefore specific parts of the room. So is there like a career part of the room where the desk is and whatever? Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah. While we're making shit up completely, yeah, you can make the grid round now. Whatever, man. Yeah, it's fine. Did the check clear? Yes. Another objection that immediately comes to mind is that if you were to superimpose this map over the whole house, but then also over an individual room, aren't you necessarily and inevitably going to get conflicting results?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
Yeah. I'm sure that if you practice this, you have reasons why certain things switch and work and don't work. But I just hear the mystics in the back of my head in modern times shouting about quantum mechanics or whatever. Like it's different when you're looking from this perspective than this perspective. It's like, OK.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
Sure. I mean, that makes no sense to me without any context, but it makes as much sense as feng shui in the first place. You can't argue that logic as long as we're just making up our own rules as we go. Let's get that third principle and then we can start to dissect some of this stuff. What's that last principle that you mentioned?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
Can you give me an example of how you would do that?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
It's funny to me because when I think of rejuvenation, I don't think I would go straight to earth. I'd probably think of water first. It rehydrates you, keeps you alive. You could shower with it. I don't know if I'm thinking like lay on the dirt.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
And as far as these primal elements, and I put that in air quotes because those aren't real elements, I guess they're design elements. I don't know. This is a very old concept. It seems like all ancient civilizations had some version of this because they didn't know what molecules were, atoms or anything.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
Right. I can imagine a bedroom full of earth tones and rocky sculptures. And so that could be warm and peaceful.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
Speaking of chi, you'll have chi out the wazoo if you purchase one of the fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back. This episode is sponsored in part by Shopify. Ever try to buy something online and immediately know the company is not using Shopify? That happened to me just yesterday. I was trying to check out. The process was so clunky.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
I literally told Jen, this company is definitely not on Shopify because when a business does use Shopify, you can tell. It's fast. It's seamless. It doesn't make you jump through 87 hoops just to give them your money. And that's the not so secret secret. Nobody does selling better than Shopify. They've got the number one checkout on the planet, and with shop pay, conversions can jump by up to 50%.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
Welcome to Skeptical Sunday. I'm your host, Jordan Harbinger. Today I'm here with Skeptical Sunday co-host, Professor Dave Farina. You get so much crap for that online, by the way, Dave. Your professor name. I mean, you had to see that coming, though, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
That means fewer abandoned carts, way more cha-ching moments for business owners. If you're serious about growing your business, your commerce platform, better be ready to sell wherever your customers are, on your website, in-store, social feeds, anywhere they're scrolling, because businesses that sell more, they sell on Shopify.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
So whether you're launching your first product or you're scaling up, Shopify makes it ridiculously easy to sell, convert, and grow. And as somebody who buys a lot online, probably more than I should admit, I can tell you firsthand, it makes life easier for customers too.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
This episode is also sponsored by Rocket Money. You ever sign up for something, totally forget about it, and realize like 10 months later you've been paying for it this whole time? Yes, we've all been there. Apparently 85% of people have at least one subscription they are paying for, but not even using, which means most of us are throwing money away every single month
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
That's why I started using Rocket Money. Rocket Money is a personal finance app that helps find and cancel your unwanted subscriptions, monitors your spending, helps lower your bills so you can grow your savings. It pulls together all your subscriptions into one place so you can finally see exactly where your money is going. They make it stupid easy to cancel the ones you don't need anymore.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1122: Feng Shui | Skeptical Sunday
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1110: Can True Love Last In Shadow of Dad's Dark Past? | Feedback Friday
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1110: Can True Love Last In Shadow of Dad's Dark Past? | Feedback Friday
Get 20% off by going to vitalproteins.com and enter promo code Jordan at checkout. These statements have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. This product is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1110: Can True Love Last In Shadow of Dad's Dark Past? | Feedback Friday
Do you vent constantly? Do you find yourself changing the stories? Do you find that wherever you go, there's always something that's wrong or happening? Do you find yourself believing the other shoe will always drop? That no matter how good things are, something bad is going to happen? Do you find yourself crisis hopping? If you're in it, you will have no idea that that's what you're doing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1110: Can True Love Last In Shadow of Dad's Dark Past? | Feedback Friday
And it takes a lot of time for those addicted to drama to recognize, to even be aware of the pattern that's happening. Our primal needs as a kid is to be seen and heard, to feel safe. And so you will go to whatever extremes, intensity, shouting is needed to pierce through the chaos of a family household to be seen and heard, even if it's burning down the house.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1110: Can True Love Last In Shadow of Dad's Dark Past? | Feedback Friday
A wave of an emotion, it lasts 30 to 90 seconds. Anything after that is the story we're feeding to maintain it. We're trying to keep that emotion active. We're feeding off the emotion as opposed to processing or metabolizing it. We're not letting it go. Because there's some belief system if we let it go, we'll be victims. If we let it go, we won't be safe.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1110: Can True Love Last In Shadow of Dad's Dark Past? | Feedback Friday
Whatever it is why we won't let go of the emotion. Even a small trauma can feel like death because we feel helpless. And if we don't have the resilience capacity to know that someone will help us, there are tools out there to help us. If we don't inherently know that, it feels like we're going to drown. In that moment, it feels like death.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
How do I partner without losing myself? Should I just go all in on myself and accept that I might be lonely sometimes? Yeah, this is universal, right? Exactly. It's very universal stuff. Well said. So her circumstances are unique. A trans woman living in rural Asia, highly enterprising, who also works in a brothel part time or something.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Yeah. Yeah, with these beliefs about people and these beliefs about herself, yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
I've never met anyone like this, that's for sure. So, okay, here's where I'm a little bit stuck. She's saying, this is how I am. I'm detached. I value my freedom above all else. I'm always running a cost-benefit analysis on people. I hate the rituals of dating. I'm self-sufficient. I'm not capable of loving someone just for who they are.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Yeah, right. But she's not asking us, are these qualities I can work on? Should I work on them? How do I work on them? The rigidity she's describing, we're also seeing that in this letter.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
We talked about infiltrating street gangs, working undercover, the damage these gangs do to communities. There was just so much to talk about. We made it into a two-parter. Truly amazing story here. On Fridays, though, we take listener letters, offer advice, play way-too-niche soundbites, and randomly pronounce words like, we're Dame Judi Dench. How cool of a title is that, by the way? Dame. DJ D.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Yeah, I guess what I'm trying to figure out is, if she believes her personality is fixed, which, by the way, I believe she believes that, and I believe she has some good reasons for believing, but if that's her stance, how can we actually help here? She already knows that having this lens is incompatible with intimacy, or at least it makes it very difficult.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
We don't need to help her see that, she's already got that, but... If there isn't some openness to changing, then she's already kind of answered a lot of these questions.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
And also, at least prepare to be hyper-independent as you age and embrace solitude if giving these things up isn't doable.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Yeah, I also wonder how her gender and her transition figure into that. She's like, I don't want to change fundamentally for someone else. And I'm wondering if she felt like she had to do that up until she transitioned. And so defending her right to be authentically her, maybe that's extra important to her.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
That's a good point. Okay, so maybe it's just who she is. But I still want to acknowledge that her gender identity stuff probably informs a lot of this in ways that we might not fully understand. I mean, I find it fascinating. But anyway, to your point, this isn't as simple as my identity will always be on the line no matter what.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
There's always something about how she shows up in relationship that's also playing a big role. I do wonder what would happen if she went into a relationship going, okay, I'm going to try to be available to this person without losing myself along the way. I'm going to speak up if something's bothering me.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
I'm going to maintain a lot of my schedule, my routines, my interests, and see what it's like to be with somebody and still be myself.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Yeah. I mean, I was going to say, which again is super interesting because she sounds quite courageous, kind of a tough cookie. I'm getting that impression.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Right. A way of coping with how exposed she feels to other people, etc.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
There might slash must be some trauma in her past. Otherwise, it wouldn't feel so urgent to protect herself in this way. And it wouldn't feel so, I don't know, fatal to really let someone in and potentially lower the walls.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
DJ D. Love it. By the way, Gabe, thanks for letting me crash at your place again this week. Oh, yeah, of course.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
No, I hear you. But when those qualities are turned up to 11, you know, they get in the way of the things that you say you want.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Exactly. When they generally move you away from other people instead of appropriately close to them. That's when it's time to go. OK, there might be something for me to look at here. And I can't help but see that in the whole sort of brothel side puzzle.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Obviously, I'm going to tread lightly here because, A, I don't know the ins and outs of that world and how it works and what it's like, especially in her country or in any country for that matter. B, I'm about to use an intense word here. I don't know if I mean it clinically, but there's something vaguely sociopathic about the way she describes her work at the brothel.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
I'm not saying she's a sociopath. I'm just saying it's like kind of clinical.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
You know it, man. Another 10 out of 10. I noticed you quarantined your cache of kidney beans on the right side of the fridge so I could fit in two dozen organs in there.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
I mean, that's quite a sentence.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
And again, I really appreciate how open she's being with us.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
But I mean, it's a little disturbing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
But is that really intimacy treating these men who she's not into at all? Let's remember treating them like toys, literally like an ATM so she can fund her Robin Hood account or whatever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Exactly. And that's what I'm kind of getting at here. This side hustle is obviously playing a certain role for her and generates extra income. My sense is that it's allowing her to like micro dose intimacy, big air quotes around the word intimacy there in a way that probably feels controlled or controllable.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
And it's allowing her to exercise this sociopathic part of her personality in a socially acceptable way. Because a brothel, that's an environment where using people and being used and playing with power and exchanging money and all that stuff, that's all welcome there. All of that is recognized. It's part of the game, so it's okay.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
I'm sure it is, but it only kind of begs the question, what's fun about it? Where does the need to enjoy that kind of power come from?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
I think so. And again, I'm using the term sociopathic generically off-label, as it were. I'm in no position to diagnose anybody with anything like that. I'm not saying that she has a true personality disorder at all. She might, but she might also not. And either way, as you were saying a moment ago, underneath whatever label you use, there are almost certainly some core wounds.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Sorry I couldn't join you for hot yoga this time. I did something weird to my arm, as you know, and I didn't want to push it. Yeah, I know. You were in delicate shape, you little delicate flower. I get it. A snowflake. I interviewed Ed Helms this week from the office, from The Hangover. And when I went to shake his hand, I froze in midair and I just went, and he was like, oh, that's not good.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
She did say she went to therapy and learned a lot there, but an intellectual understanding of your personality, that's different from a healing process, right? For sure. I'm curious to know if they got into this stuff in a real way, her childhood, her life experiences, her transition, what happened in her marriage. There's just so much to dig into here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Yeah, but also like, wow, good plan. That worked out for you. So she had an escape hatch the whole time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
And reclaimed her freedom. So yeah, money is a really, it's really important to her here. It symbolizes freedom and whatnot, probably.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Actually, she said it could devastate her business, which tells me she's willing to put a lot of stuff at risk in order to keep enjoying this part of her life.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Damn. Yeah. Like I have this whole private universe no one will ever know about. And the more I can cling to that, the less people can get in and the lower the risk of losing who I am. Exactly. And you know what? I get that. I think we all have those parts of our personality that we tuck away. And sometimes they're shameful and sometimes they're comforting because they're ours. So I can relate.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
But this isn't just, you know, I don't know, weird thoughts or painful experiences she hasn't opened up about. This is a whole part of her life that is apparently incompatible with other parts of her life, including potentially the one thing that she says she wants, which is a real partner. So, wow. OK, a lot to talk about here. I hope that gives you a few ways into this process.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
These binds are in between freedom and intimacy, between autonomy and connection, between solitude and partnership. They're not ones we're solving here on a podcast, even this one. But we can only invite you to get more curious about what's underneath those conflicts and encourage you to seek out people and experiences like therapy that will allow you to unpack them. But I will say this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Your core beliefs that it's a dog-eat-dog world out there, that people are going to take something precious from you, they do sound like projections of your deepest fears. Like you said, letting my guard down feels like a risky emotional investment with potentially little to no return. The world out there, it's never just the world.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
It's also how we see the world and how we see the world is determined by our lenses on it. And those lenses are informed by our values and our cultures and most importantly, our individual histories.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
So the possibility of our lives, whether we can have all the things we want, that largely depends on taking a good look at those lenses, unpacking those histories and being willing to step into very raw and potentially painful territory with other people. For some people like you, that can be prohibitively scary. And I just I have a lot of compassion for that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
But until you risk doing that, you probably won't get to experience the joy of trying things a new way, the joy of evolving. which is the only way I know of resolving these conflicts. Thanks for sharing so much of yourself with us. It's really nice to get to know you, spend some time with you here. I hope you keep going and good luck.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
And now I'm going to share my little toys with you, the deals and discounts on the fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back. This episode is sponsored in part by Delete Me. Delete Me makes it easy, quick, and safe to remove your personal data online at a time when surveillance and data breaches are common enough to make everyone vulnerable.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Something that's become way too common, your personal info floating around online, addresses, phone numbers, even family members' names is all out there. That's where Delete Me comes in. They make it easy, quick, and safe to get your personal data removed from hundreds of data broker sites. Think of it as protecting your digital footprint. I always talk about not being a low-hanging fruit.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
But yeah, it was funny. Gabe, I hope you don't mind. I'm about to tell everybody this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Make it a lot harder to find people and exploit your private details. It's a smart move in this digital world. As somebody with an active online presence, privacy is really important to me. Knowing that my information is out there is a constant low-level anxiety, and that's why I use Delete Me. It is super fast and easy to get set up.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Take control of your data and keep your private life private by signing up for Delete Me, now at a special discount for our listeners. Get 20% off your Delete Me plan when you go to joindeleteme.com slash Jordan and use promo code Jordan at checkout. The only way to get 20% off is to go to joindeleteme.com slash Jordan and enter code Jordan at checkout.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
That's joindeleteme.com slash Jordan, code Jordan.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
This episode is also sponsored by Oura Ring. so I don't have to charge it every stinking day. It's wild how much insight I get on such a tiny device. Jen and I and a bunch of our friends have the Oura Ring, too. It's fun to compare scores, and it makes you more intentional about your sleep, health, and a whole lot more. There's a reason you're seeing people with one on.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Why not? So Wednesday night, and I really wish you didn't just describe it that way, but I guess that's what it was. So Gabe and I are in the living room. We're doing some show prep and I can't even lift my right arm. I'm like, oh my God, I tore my rotator cuff or I separated it or whatever. He's like, ah. You want me to work on it for you? I'm like anything at all.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
It works, and you'll actually want to wear it. So if you're ready to stop guessing and start knowing, give Oura the finger. Learn more at OuraRing.com slash Jordan. That's O-U-R-A Ring.com slash Jordan. Thank you for listening and supporting the show. It is your support of our sponsors that keeps the lights on around here, especially since I squandered all of my money in that investment scam.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
To learn more and get links to all the great discounts you hear on the show so you can support the podcast, you can visit jordanharbinger.com slash deals. They're all up there. Please consider supporting those who support the show. All right, back to Feedback Friday.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
And then she was asking us, I think, why Bob ended things so abruptly and whether she should tell her boyfriend what happened.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Right, right. And if I recall, we were like, eh, maybe take a B because there might be a few motivations in wanting to reach out and it might not be necessary slash appropriate. Yes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Wow. Okay. Sounds like you guys are putting in the work and doing things differently this time. That's really encouraging.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Cause it's actually just hurting doing normal stuff, which is not good. So Gabe starts giving me some sort of like brutal shiatsu level massage. There's knuckles and thumbs deep in the back of my shoulder. And after 10 minutes, I swear my arm was like 60% better. I couldn't believe it. Yeah, dude.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Way worse. Way, way worse. Oh man, that is a small world in the worst way.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Yeah, I bet he didn't. Oh, I don't know why I didn't tell you about the girl that I was thinking about leaving you for and had an emotional affair with at work. Must have slipped my mind.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
But that's what you get for being nice. You should have been a terrible bitch and then they wouldn't have put you together. Wow, those two don't get along at all. Honestly, this is bananas. How does life do this stuff to us, man?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Oh my God. And meanwhile, she's just sitting there like, so your boyfriend and I were kind of in love and he almost broke up with you for me. This is so stressful. I'm getting secondhand sweats.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
OK, that's an interesting take on what happened. I'm not sure that I totally agree. I mean, I get it. You got involved with her boyfriend. Things got messy. You had a hand in this, but you didn't allow Bob to disrespect her. He was there, too. Right. Mimi was his partner. He chose to get involved with you as well. I appreciate that you're taking accountability.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
You want to be a kind person, but let's be accurate here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Oh man, she's really beating herself up. That was a tough paragraph to hear.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Yeah, double shout-out to Victor, to Padre, because I also ate one of those bomb-ass grapefruits from his garden, so he's killing the citrus game, Vic. He really is. But, hey, at one point, we're going over a consult or something, and I'm sitting at the dining table, your dining table, on my laptop, and Gabe's standing behind me working on my shoulder. We just lock eyes in the mirror like...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Oh, you did? Okay, let's hear it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Oh, I like that. A doozerang? I thought you'd like that. Or like, yeah, it's the second beat of the conundrum. That's too complicated, though. I like doozerang better, actually. I do, but I like that one, too.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
cute that's all i got wow anyway we've hit our weekly limit on stupid ass puns so let's try and well sort of hit the limit let's try and catch this doozerang and yeet it back to where it belongs and just pray it doesn't come back honestly this is kind of a tough one i'm a little bit at a loss here gabe she didn't ask for any of this it was all in the rearview mirror and now she's backed into kind of an awkward corner so let me tackle the easy one first
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
I'm not sure you can have a totally chill work life when you're panicked every day that Mimi found out and she's about to confront you and you're trying to read her facial expression before you say hello. I think that sort of Damocles might always be hanging over your head as long as you guys work together. But a couple of things to keep in mind that might ease your stress.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
The first thing is Bob clearly has not told her yet. He never mentioned you. So I think there's a decent chance that he will never tell her. I don't see why in God's name he would ever tell her. I'm not saying you're completely out of the woods, and it doesn't mean that hiding this from her is the right thing to do.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
But the longer she works there and doesn't find out, the more confident you can be that your secret is safe, I would imagine.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
That is true. And thanks for punching a huge hole in my main argument. Sorry. I'm trying to reassure this poor woman and you're coming up with a wrecking ball.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Okay. Well, now that that fell apart, the other thing to keep in mind is if she ever did find out, you don't know exactly how she'd react. You're imagining the worst case scenario that she'd blame you for not telling her that she'd feel totally betrayed, which I get. And I think she might. I mean, you're her friend, but I think Bob would really get the brunt of this. He's her boyfriend.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
He's the one who got involved with you. And yeah, she might have some choice words for you. She might be angry and hurt. You guys might have to talk about that, but who knows? Maybe she'd see the difficult position you were put in here through no fault of your, well, through mostly no fault of your own and forgive you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Maybe she wouldn't be that mad when she learns this is a brief flirtation that didn't escalate to anything physical. And it, you know, it was in the past or she's going to be freaking mad and it'll be a little rough, but it won't be the end of the world. And you guys will either work through it somehow or stay away from each other and just be professionals.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Exactly. You just don't know how this will go. So I would keep an eye on the tendency to imagine the absolute worst case scenario with no evidence. I mean, I can relate. That is my favorite hobby. But I don't think you need to necessarily do that now. You said that you're not going to tell Mimi anything about Bob. It's not your place. Your mind is made up there. I think that's probably right.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
I do think he definitely has more of a responsibility to tell her, especially given that your emotional situationship with Bob never really blossomed into a full-fledged affair, which would change the equation for me a little bit. But let's be clear. If you've decided that the right thing is definitely to not tell Mimi, then you're also choosing to stay in this awkward position.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
in which case it really is on you to make peace with that, except that some difficult conversations might result down the line and forgive yourself preemptively. It sucks, but you gotta be willing to live with the consequences, which again, are largely not your fault at this point.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
It just burst out laughing like this is the gayest thing that we've ever done But I don't care cuz my shoulders killing me one of our most ridiculous moments, but also very special I feel yes somehow even more ridiculous than bar the Hot bar.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Now, that might not stop you from hating yourself, but it might help you not to feel like such a POS for staying quiet. And that's another thing. You said you're lying to Mimi, I get it, you're lying by omission, but given the circumstances here, I think that's a different category of lie. If she came to you like, did you have an emotional thing with Bob and hang out with his kids?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
And you were like, what? No, that's a lie. That's a bald face lie. What you're doing here is just not sharing a story that you feel is primarily not yours to share. I'm not saying it's not dicey, but I don't think these two things are equivalent. So in my view, you are way less of a monster than you maybe feel right now. But Gabe, I don't know. Now I'm going to stress her out again.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
What happens when Mimi brings Bob and or their kids to some work event? And the kids are like, hey, I remember you. You and daddy took us to the aquarium that day.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
No, flush yourself down the toilet, more like.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
I mean, another solution is just to pull back and be less close with Mimi. And she might wonder why, but you don't have to tell her, and then at least you're not being a hypocrite. Also an option.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Yeah, but if that were the case, then it might be because he had this emotional affair with our friend.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Or he might be the kind of guy who might have emotional affairs with a number of people because he's not really committed to his relationship with Mimi or he needs validation or he's got an ego issue or he's insecure. I mean, I don't know. Maybe she deserves to know. I don't know.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Yeah, well, okay, it's a little confusing. It's very confusing. I'm not sure. Can we toss the doozerang back and just say we tried? Is that fair?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
that's right i think what her letter might actually be about is learning how to surrender to an objectively bizarre and crappy situation that she has little control over and as we talk about all the time learning how to tolerate the difficult feelings that might get stirred up by all this stuff come into light a lot of life is just that knowing you weren't entirely right you weren't entirely wrong but you did your best and you were exposed but that being exposed is not fatal but you only learn that by going through a situation like this and finding out that you can survive
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
and then taking the lesson and applying it forward so you don't end up in a similar situation again. Worst case scenario, Mimi hates you, maybe word travels around the office, maybe. In the meantime, keep breathing, stay true to your values, keep checking in with yourself about what feels right.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
You always know deep down what you gotta do, and I know you'll handle it the right way, or at least the least bad way. And good luck. You could reach us Friday at JordanHarbinger.com. Please keep your emails concise. Try to use descriptive subject lines. That makes our job a whole lot easier.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
If you can't seem to give up on a paranoid cocaine addict accusing you of cheating, your friend's love of restaurant menus is ruining your relationship, or you're launching a coup against an entitled family member who's compromised your family's thriving business, whatever's got you staying up at night lately, hit us up Friday at JordanHarbinger.com.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Yeah, we do have to have a working relation. No, there's no HR department to complain to.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
We're here to help, and we keep every email anonymous. By the way, our newsletter is just a huge hit with you all. I love writing it. It's a lot of fun to see your feedback. It's delivered most Wednesdays. It's a two minute read, a lot of wisdom from our episodes that you can apply to your life. I invite you all to come check it out. You can sign up at jordanharbinger.com slash news.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
All right, what's next?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Yeah. Thanks for the happy ending. No, I'm kidding. Thanks for the massage and a place to lay my head. Couldn't help but notice there was no gift on my pillow this time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Yeah, good question. It's a tough one, man. A lot of uncertainty here. We're hearing from a lot of federal employees these days who are in your shoes with Doge and all that, and they're all asking similar questions. I'm sorry you're going through it. I know the stress must be doing a number on you, but you're also in a better position than most, and this could work out well.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
We wanted to run all this by an expert, so we reached out to Justin Schnitzer, managing partner of Federal Law, a law firm specializing in federal employment cases. And the first thing Justin wanted you to know was that you're probably in a high priority area of the government, so there's a strong chance you're unlikely to get cut.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
In his view, it seems like the government needs people like you for national infrastructure.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Obviously, all of these are on a case-by-case basis, especially right now, so it's hard to know who's likely to get cut, but people working for power plants, nurses, doctors, folks like that, in Justin's experience, these are people who are probably not getting cut because, well, it would cause serious outrage. And the public needs these people in a real sense, not some theoretical sense.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
We're talking about, you know, keeping the lights on, heating people's homes, keeping cities functioning, staffing hospitals. No guarantees at all, of course, but that's something to consider. Now, in terms of the legal stuff, one thing Justin said to keep in mind is that unions are still challenging whether the administration has the authority to offer these resignation programs at all.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
to put people on paid leave for that amount of time and encourage them to go work while still getting paid. Now, Justin said he doesn't know what the courts will decide there. Apparently, Congress probates the money for certain functions, and generally it hasn't been appropriated to put people on long-term leave.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
A little disappointing. Not complaining. Just noticing. I'm Platinum Elite at Shea Gaby. Least you could do, bottle of champagne for me to ignore on the bedside table.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Justin also said there are limits to how much administrative leave they could even give someone, and that's covered by statutory and regulatory provisions. The other thing Justin would encourage you to think about is whether this resignation package includes any waivers.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
For example, the agencies might say, we're offering you this deal, but you have to relinquish your right to pursue legal actions against the government in exchange for continued pay and benefits. So if you have any potential lawsuits you're thinking of bringing, discrimination, failure to accommodate you because of a disability, stuff like that, you might have to waive any of those rights.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
You didn't mention that in your letter, but it's something to think about. But for people who think they're going to be imminently terminated and need a few months of reprieve, Justin said that it might be worth hedging their bets. It really depends on what area of the government you're in, how you think the terminations are coming for you, if you have any rights you'd be giving away.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Welcome to Feedback Friday. I'm your host, Jordan Harbinger. As always, I'm here with Feedback Friday producer, the co-captain keeping an eye on the skies while we put this aircraft of life drama on dues control, Gabriel Mizrahi. Nice. Are we free to walk about the cabin now?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Gross, yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Justin's feeling is if you're in a position where you're not going to sue and you don't have outstanding complaints, accepting a package could very well be a good idea.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Honestly, I would sit down with your wife, talk this out loud in detail, write down all the variables here, salary, type of work, location, stability, adventure, risk, opportunity, all of them, and factor in the stuff Justin just shared with you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Then I would rank them in order of importance, talk through all the upsides and the downsides of each path, get clear on which benefits you want the most, which costs you can live with. And then, yeah, you got to make a calculated decision while also listening to your gut I promise, if you do that, you can't go wrong. Doesn't mean sticking around or moving to New York won't be challenging.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Just saying, maybe you're getting a little too comfortable. That's all. Speaking of flamboyance... A lot of you have been writing me lately saying you've been enjoying the stories we tell on Feedback Friday, and some of you have asked me, how can I learn how to tell good stories as well?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
They'll each serve up their own unique costs, I'm sure. But I actually find that comforting in a weird way because if you're going to pay a price either way and if you're going to enjoy certain benefits either way, then you're a lot freer. There's no perfect decision. There's only a decision that reflects your interests and needs at this moment based on the information that you have.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
100%, I think a lot of times people focus on the external stuff when they're trying to make the right decision, but the internal stuff is just as important, maybe even more important, because so much of life is not about what happens, it's about how you react to it, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
So salary and pension and location and risk, yeah, all that matters, of course, but cultivating the right mindset, the right spirit, which includes getting comfortable with this uncertainty and learning to go with the flow to some degree, that's a superpower in situations like this. I'm sorry you're facing all this, but I also know that these crises often reveal hidden opportunities.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
So keep looking for those and trust that life might be putting you on an even better path, whichever way you decide to go. And good luck. Big thanks to Justin for his experience and wisdom here. You can learn more about Justin and his work at FedElaw.com. He practices nationwide for federal employees, and it looks like he's achieved some pretty great outcomes for his clients.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Speaking of keeping the lights on, your support of our sponsors is what does that for us. So stick around. We'll be right back. This episode is sponsored in part by Shopify. Shopify is the commerce platform powering millions of businesses from massive names you know, like Mattel and Gymshark, to brands that are just starting to get off the ground.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
And so I thought I'd share a few thoughts about this, kind of one of my favorite topics, because being a good storyteller just in a very simple, everyday kind of way Even if you're not doing it professionally, you're not going to go to the moth or whatever. It's just a great skill to have. And I'm always trying to hone it a little bit every week.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
If I was starting something today, I would want them in my corner from day one. They've got hundreds of ready-to-use templates so you can build a good-looking online store that matches your brand. They even have AI tools to help you write product descriptions and headlines, even enhance your product photos. You wanna get the word out?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Shopify makes it easy to create email and social media campaigns. They also help with everything from managing inventory to international shipping and handling returns. So if you're ready to sell seriously, then you're ready for Shopify. They've got the expertise to help you navigate the chaos.
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Turn your big business idea into with Shopify on your side. Sign up for your $1 per month trial and start selling today at Shopify.com slash Jordan. Go to Shopify.com slash Jordan. Shopify.com slash Jordan.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
This episode is also sponsored by NordVPN. NordVPN has your back, protecting you wherever you are. They've also got this threat protection feature that shields you from viruses, malware, annoying phishing sites. Another cool trick is NordVPN can potentially save you money by switching your virtual location. You might find cheaper prices on flights and hotels.
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1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Jen and I travel a lot for work and fun, and we use NordVPN on all of our devices, whether we're in China, Paris, London. It is premium cybersecurity for literally the price of a cup of coffee each month. One account works on up to 10 devices. So for the peace of mind alone, it's a no brainer.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
To get the best discount off your NordVPN plan, go to nordvpn.com slash Jordan Harbinger. Our link will also give you four extra months on the two-year plan. There's no risk with Nord's 30-day money-back guarantee. The link is in the podcast episode description box.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
This episode is sponsored in part by The Defender. You ever meet somebody and instantly know they've been places, that calm and chaos, I've driven through a storm and found the sunrise kind of energy? That's The Defender in vehicle form. It's not just a car, it's a statement. And nod to the ones who don't wait around for life to hand them an adventure, they go and get it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
The Defender's ready when you are. To learn more, visit DestinationDefenderUSA.com. If you liked this episode of Feedback Friday and you find our advice valuable, I invite you to do what other smart and considerate listeners do, which is take a moment and support our amazing sponsors.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
All of the deals, discount codes, and ways to support the podcast are searchable and clickable over at JordanHarbinger.com slash deals. If that doesn't work, email us, Jordan at JordanHarbinger.com. We are happy to dig up codes for you. Thank you for supporting those who support the show. It really does keep us going and it makes it possible to continue creating these episodes week after week.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
So obviously you need to have moments that are worthy of a story in order to tell a good one, but they don't need to be magical. Right. I also think most people, they just don't realize how much of what happens to them every day is kind of story worthy or at least every week. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Okay, back to Feedback Friday. All right, time for the recommendation of the week. I am addicted to LitVilla. Of course you are. My recommendation of this week is Wayfinders. So Wayfinders is a travel group, essentially, for entrepreneurs and business owners. A travel group is kind of a, it's not quite all we do. We have meetings and mastermind-y type stuff, and we do travel to amazing places.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
You probably heard me mention some of these wild trips that I've been on in the past. Bhutan, the Amazon jungle, Peru, Laos, Morocco. This year, I'm heading to Patagonia. People have asked me before, you know, what makes you go to these places? Wayfinders, I said mastermind before. This is not a typical annoying mastermind group. It's not a corporate retreat.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
It's more like hitting control-alt-delete on your life in some ways. You're trekking across the Himalayas. You meditate with monks in Bhutan if you're into that, tracing incense routes through the Arabian Desert. But you're doing it with a small, very highly curated group of founders and creators and big thinkers. There's no touristy buses. There's no sort of surface-level networking stuff.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Real people, real conversations. I mean, you talk more with these people on these trips because you're hiking up a mountain than you would talk to your friends and family over the course of a year, mostly. It's a really good, deep connection. It's been awesome to be a part of it. Gabe, you know how this is. You and I went to North Korea together.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Wayfinders would not take us to North Korea, which is probably the right decision, but trips like that, they just bond people in a way that a cocktail mixer or conference could just never do. There's just something very cool that happens when you step away from the noise. You get off the grid.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
You get out in nature, away from meetings and inboxes, and you're just talking to other interesting people. Every time I come back from one of these, I feel clear and grounded and reset and excited for life. So if that speaks to you a little bit, go check them out. way-finders.com. Submit an application. It's a process. I have no idea how the curation works at all.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
But if you're a business owner or entrepreneur, I highly recommend doing it. Everybody there is just an awesome person. And I've made some lifelong friends in the group.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Because maybe we're not always paying attention in the right way, or maybe we haven't found a way of talking about life that makes things story worthy, which is part of the magic of being able to spin a good yarn. I mean, I know people who can captivate me with the story about going to the dry cleaners or whatever, or getting their shoulder jabbed with a thumb.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Oh, yeah. I did see something on Instagram and I was like, okay, mental note to roast Gabe mercilessly for this later.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Yeah, it sounds like it. Was it fun, though? I mean, what is what's the deal?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
I can see them being the opposite of me, but you are also there.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
And I know people who have hiked Mount Everest or done crazy, exciting things, and they just put me to sleep in a few seconds when they're trying to recount something. So yes, It definitely helps if weird or crazy stuff happens to you, if you're the kind of person who tends to get into funny situations, but it's not necessary.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
This is my worst nightmare, by the way, drowning in a cave underwater.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Yes. Hate, hate. Same here. This is, oh, I'm getting a little, I feel itchy thinking about having to do this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Yeah, we had to do some of this on the Wayfinders trip that I just talked about. Nothing like this. I mean, they're sharing circles and stuff like that. And it's a little challenging for me sometimes, and it takes me a couple days to open up or whatever. But it actually ended up being really cool. If you're in a group that's cool with people you trust, it can be great.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
It really is. You know, I have to say, you ever see somebody go into the, have we talked about this? They go into the lavatory wearing their socks and you're just like, you disgusting bastard.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
But yeah, the hula hoop dance thing, that's on another level.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
That's very stressful. And I find that people can get very performative because you have an audience then.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
And for me, what makes something story worthy is all the little details. The details are everything. So that's the first big step in my view, just paying attention to those details. Could it be the way the cashier at the store looked? Could it be the weird way your neighbor said, have a good one when you pass them in the hall this morning? Could it be the way that you felt when you were on a date?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
That's the right attitude since you already, you know, wasted your money on that bullshit.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Yeah. Just nice. Just show your work at least get some points for that. Just long enough. So people don't think you're being a dick. I can relate. Yes. And then in your head, you're like 10 more seconds. Now, five more. Now I'm just, I'm done. I'm done. Exactly.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Yeah, I would have. I mean, well, what am I saying? I never would have gone to day one. But yeah, I get it. I get not wanting to come back for day two.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Could it be the way the office smelled when your colleague Todd microwaved salmon in the break room? You get the idea. The more minute and bizarre kind of the better the details are. The other thing, most memorable moments, most good details, even if we clock them, they're lost because we forget to capture them. So...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Again, literally a nightmare. I got to say, this is a really nice antidote to all your woo woo hippy dippy stuff on the show. I would have thought you'd take to this kind of thing like a duck to water. Honestly, I thought you'd be like, oh, I had the most refreshing experience. I got to interpretive dance my way through some stuff I was working on.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
But I also feel like you're describing your order at Cafe Gratitude, if people know this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
So Cafe Gratitude, for all those who don't live in L.A., which is most of you, it's this kind of like, Gabe, is it fair to say, bougie vegan restaurant where all the dishes are named, and I quote, I am something. So you'll, instead of saying like, I'll have the seitan fake egg white omelet, you say, I am abundant. I am humble. And I want the, I mean, I am green juice or whatever it is. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Yeah. Yeah. It's so cringy. And so the food's pretty good and the ambience is pretty dope. And that's why you put up with the dumb names, but it is, yeah. Cringe is exactly what it is.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
I do, where the waitress is like, tells you to basically meditate on something. The place is so extra. The waiter, server, I should say, comes to your table. They're like, the question of the day is, what are you manifesting?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
I'm creating an appetite, Luna. Now, let me order the abundant bowl and get on with my life. And can I have some coffee? Do you still have coffee here? Or is it going to be made out of like a random milk?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
In my opinion, most people, and remember, I used to teach clients this all the time for 11 years or whatever. Most people have more great stories than they realize. They just don't have the practice of observing the world around them and they're not in the habit of documenting the stuff life throws at them.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
That waiter's getting a 20% tip just for skipping that BS. The question of the day, no, you're just hungry? Okay, yeah, cool, man. What you want?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Of course, that is the least surprising thing I've ever heard about cafe gratitude. So people, people are walking through the void. They're healing their generational trauma and you're slowly unlacing your shoelaces or what?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
A rose just for like maximum embarrassment.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
There's also something about being handed a red rose as a man. I know I have antiquated gender ideals or whatever, but I can't explain why. It's just vaguely humiliating somehow. I don't know. I get that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Well, also, didn't the definitely not gay fascist Indian guy hand some flowers to the super openly gay ballerina on the date that they actually. You didn't have any problem with the flowers. No, he had no problem with it. Maybe we should learn something from him. That was a few months ago on Feedback Friday, for those of you who don't catch the reference.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Okay, so if you're an actor, though, you would have loved this workshop, which is why this stuff happens in LA.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Right. I know what you mean. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Yeah. I know exactly what you mean. Some people's emotions are very close to the surface, right? I am not one of those people. Surprise, surprise. I don't think you are either, especially. You know, you're in touch with your feelings. You're vulnerable a lot of the time, but you're not one of those people who's like, watch me cry about my withholding dad in public. I need to release.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Just by keeping it real short, there was one guy in a very early class that I taught in like 2007 and he told me, I don't have any stories. And I said, why not? And he said, I just got back to the United States And I don't have anything that I'm doing here, really. I'm between jobs. I said, what was your old job? He said, I used to drive a fuel tanker in Iraq and Afghanistan in the military.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
I feel like you're pretty judicious about who you share that stuff with.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Yeah, but that's part of my beef with programs like this. The barometer isn't always value or growth or authenticity. It's, did you say the super crazy thing loud enough or go on about the horrible thing long enough?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Whenever I've had to do stuff like this, I've noticed that as long as you use a certain kind of language and you commit hard enough, you get validation from the other participants and the facilitators. And it creates this social pressure to have a similar experience.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Yeah, I get it. You don't want to write the whole thing off from the start.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
I am available? That is, oh man.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
But it is in line with the things I was thinking about saying that are off brand for this podcast.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Sure.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
And I was like, didn't you ever get attacked or anything like that? And he's like, oh, yeah, all the time. They shoot rocket propelled grenades. So this is a guy who used to get shot at with driving a truck full of fuel. He used to have rocket propelled grenades shot at him in a war zone. In a war zone. And he was like, I don't have anything interesting to talk about. That to me was ridiculous.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
I mean, those are fair questions, but everything you're describing sounds patently ridiculous. I would have almost certainly walked out halfway through day one like, oh, lunch break. See you guys on Monday.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
I get that. But I don't know, man, that's not the conclusion I draw from all this. It just sounds like you didn't vibe with this particular group or curriculum and these exercises.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
I mean, my threshold for this stuff is way lower than yours, but I just don't see how any of this is that valuable other than pushing people outside their comfort zones, which I mean, cool, you're uncomfortable, but that doesn't mean you've healed your mother wound or your ancestors trauma or anything like you could go for a long run that's outside your comfort zone and you're outside your comfort zone there to vomiting on the side of the Santa Monica Pier.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
I'm with you, man. Forced vulnerability, not really a good method for getting people to truly open up. That's been my experience anyway. And it's often misused by like culty self-help groups.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Hey, but I get why it's awkward to stay connected to that in a setting like this, because you can easily be that guy who seems like an a-hole when they invite you up to do your thing and you're like, pass.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Sure. Okay. Both can be true, I suppose.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Another guy told us he had nothing interesting to talk about. And his hobby turned out to be flying his own plane over the coastal areas of Florida and looking for Cubans that were floating in on rafts and reporting them so that they could get rescued. Because a lot of these people are coming in on like tires. And he was a Cuban guy. And he was like, I want these people to not drown.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
No, it's great. Otherwise, I would be like, Jace, cut this entire thing. But no, the vulnerability notes. It's true. I mean, it patently ridiculous and undeniably cringy. But yeah, it's great stuff. I also think what you said is important. Struggling in one context that doesn't necessarily mean much. It's important not to draw too many conclusions about yourself based on one experience.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
You felt like a cynical shutdown monster that weekend or whatever. But we both know that that's not who you are. In another setting, another weekend, different exercises, different Gabe. And I see that with myself all the time. And it doesn't mean I'm not making progress or open new things or whatever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
But for the record, I will bring this up from time to time and I will be roasting you for this for a while.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Go back and check out the Teagan Broadwater episodes if you haven't done so yet. The best things that have happened in my life and business have come through my network, the circle of people I know, like, and trust. I'm teaching you how to do the same thing for yourself in our six-minute networking course. It's 100% free. It is not gross. It is not schmoozy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
You can find it on the Thinkific platform at sixminutenetworking.com. These drills take a few minutes a day. I wish I knew this stuff 20 years ago. Dig that well before you get thirsty, folks. Build relationships before you need them. You can find it at sixminutenetworking.com.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Show notes and transcripts on the website, advertisers, deals, discounts, ways to support the show, all at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. I'm at jordanharbinger on both Twitter and Instagram. You can also connect with me on LinkedIn. Gabe's on Instagram, Gabriel Mizrahi, or on Twitter at Gabe Mizrahi. This show is created in association with Podcast One.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
My team is Jen Harbinger, Jace Sanderson, Robert Fogarty, Ian Baird, Tata Sidlowskis, and of course, Gabriel Mizrahi. Our advice and opinions are our own. And I am a lawyer, but I'm not your lawyer. Do your own research before implementing anything you hear on the show. And remember, we rise by lifting others. Share the show with those you love.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
And if you found this episode useful, please share it with somebody else who could use the advice we gave here today. In the meantime, I hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn. And we'll see you next time. You're about to hear a preview of The Jordan Harbinger Show about how sanctions work and whether or not they're effective.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
So I look for people that are in danger and I report it to these boat teams that go and get them. And I'm like, you don't think you have stories? These are some of the most interesting things that I've heard. I remember it 15, 20 years later.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
To learn how the U.S. wields its financial power against terrorists, rogue states, and global crime syndicates, check out episode 863 on The Jordan Harbinger Show with Juan Zarate.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Yes, that's what it is. So most people really do have some. I recommend writing down the funniest or most interesting thing that happens to you each day, even if it's kind of a stretch or if it's easier with an audience, text your best friend whenever something unusual happens and try to describe exactly what went down. Then paste it into your notes app or whatever you got.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Did I say lavatory? The lavatory? That seems like how I used to talk.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
And yes, most days are relatively uneventful. But over time, these small notes add up. And in a year or two, you could easily have five, ten genuinely entertaining stories to share. Plus, you'll be training your brain to pay attention to what happens in a new way. And that'll just give you more and more fodder. After that, it's kind of all about practice.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
You just tell little stories to people here and there over and over. Get comfortable talking about life in that way. Watch their reactions. See what gets a laugh. See what makes them lean in. See what makes them tune out. Iron out the kinks.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
hone your material figure out which stories do well in which settings it's a skill and like any skill you get better at it the more that you do it and like I said a moment ago if you can get even 20% better at telling stories even if you're not trying to be a stand up comedian or a writer or a corporate trainer something like that this is a real kind of game changer in many ways the best sales people I know are storytellers the best daters I know are storytellers and actually I kind of think the happiest people I know are storytellers
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
It's maybe a weird claim, but storytelling, look, it's not just a career. It's a way of appreciating life, reflecting it back to people, influencing them if the situation calls for it. But mostly it's just about being playful and having fun. And that is really available to all of us. So give it a go and see what happens. Oh, and one more thing before we kick off. Housekeeping thing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
We're retiring the AI chatbot on the website. Unfortunately, the company we were working with to build and manage the chatbot is pivoting. They're no longer supporting the chatbots. It's a bummer. I like that thing. I know you guys did too. Maybe we'll get another one. That's just what's happening.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
So if you want to dig up an old episode, a few easy ways you can do that are you go to Google, you type in site colon jordanharbinger.com, then the keywords you're looking for, like Feedback Friday, rubber mallet, hit and run, or whatever, and then that'll tell Google to crawl just our website. and it should turn up the episode. You can use third-party AI, of course.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
I think there's a few of those now. Or if you try all of that, you really can't find something, you can always email us or the Feedback Friday inbox directly. We'll try to find it for you. But it is a huge help when you try for yourself first, just with the volume of email that we get. And ditto for sponsor codes. Email me directly. I'll find ones you can't find on jordanharbinger.com slash deals.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
This podcast is really the Queen's English is the only acceptable vernacular. Vernacular.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
All right. What's the first thing out of the mailbag?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Oh man, I'd be so pissed if my spouse of 12 years lost our entire life savings in a scam. That really hurts. A lot of people don't realize that financial infidelity is a thing, and it can be just as painful as sexual infidelity or emotional infidelity.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Is it not Machiavellian?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Interesting. I am an ENTJ, but sometimes it also says I'm an INTJ too, depending on how much coffee I've had, which is sort of part of the reason I think the test is questionable. But the fact that she identifies with these qualities is good to know. So, okay, trans lesbian. I'm just making sure I'm tracking this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
On the Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the stories, secrets, and skills of the world's most fascinating people and turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you. Our mission is to help you become a better informed, more critical thinker.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
That means she was a man and she transitioned to being a woman and she dates or whatever women, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Wow, okay. Well, I appreciate your candor. It's good to know yourself this well, I think. We'll get into all this, I'm sure.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Wow, fascinating. The toys thing is a little dark, though. That's fascinating, though.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Hey, during the week, we have long-form conversations with a variety of amazing folks, organized crime figures, scientists, military folks, journalists, jihadis, you name it. This week, we had Tegan Broadwater, author of Life in the Fishbowl, He's a former undercover cop who infiltrated one of America's most notorious crip organizations.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1162: Calculating Courtesan Craves Close Connection | Feedback Friday
Wow, quite a story. She's painted such a vivid and fascinating portrait of herself. I got to say, she's really owning these personality traits, some of which are definitely challenging. And she's asking some really good questions. It's interesting, Gabe, these questions, they're ones that everybody asks, right? Or at least tons of people. Totally. Am I going to find someone?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
This episode is sponsored in part by Vital Proteins. I want to tell you about Vital Proteins Collagen Peptides. That's a mouthful. It's a daily supplement that supports your hair, skin, nails, bones, and joints all in one in one simple step each day. Collagen makes up about a third of the protein in our bodies, but as we hit our 30s, it unfortunately starts to decline.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
Yeah. Oh, I can see the kids are just like, no, we're not doing this. Great question. This is something, by the way, that every professional has to worry about at some point. How to balance honesty with politics, basically. Those two are always going to be in tension. This is always a tricky dance, but I do have some thoughts on this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
First of all, just to build on what I said a moment ago, you are an absolute rock star, my friend. What you've brought to your new job, how you've invested in yourself, in other people, built relationships, it's remarkable. And to do that in your early 60s when a lot of people are just checking out, you're checking in, I love it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
You're literally a case study for reinventing yourself later in life and all of that sixminutenetworking.com stuff, so kudos to you. The other benefit of doing all that is you're building up capital at this place. A colleague who shows up the way you are is in a much better position to give feedback and for that feedback to be taken well.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
So there's a world where offering some thoughts on these course materials might not jeopardize you as much as you think, So let's talk about a few ways that you can say some hard things without it backfiring.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
The first thing I want you to know is the fact that you're approaching all of this in a spirit of genuine love for your students, a genuine concern for the quality of education you're providing them, that is fantastic. it's very pure, it's extremely moving, it's impossible to argue with, that's gonna make a huge difference in how people hear this feedback. They're gonna be infected by that spirit.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
So part of your job is staying emotionally connected to that purpose and communicating that purpose to other people if slash when you have these chats. The other benefit of framing things in this way is it shifts the conversation from one of criticism to one of solutions. If you approach these conversations from that place, not from a place of, oh, these course materials, they suck. I know better.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
You're failing our students. But from a place of, look, I want to serve our students as well as possible. I take great pride in the education we offer. Here are a few ways we can do that better. You have a good shot of getting these colleagues on board. This is where you do have to be a little political. You gotta be thoughtful about how you frame things.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
I would not say, guys, these course materials you created, they are terrible. Our students hate them. They're totally lost. We need to fix them or people are gonna hate us. I don't even know what the hell you're trying to say in these attachments. I'd say something like, listen, guys, I love what you've done with the course materials. You allowed me to walk into this job with a great foundation.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
I am grateful for that. I have noticed a few sticking points and gaps in the materials that are making the course hard for my students. I've been playing with some solutions that seem to be working. I'd love to share them with you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
Maybe we can talk about building them into the materials so the curriculum can just get better and better because I'm sure we all agree that our goal is to make English as accessible as possible for our students. We all want them to succeed. Something like that. Just a little grace, sensitivity, acknowledgement. They really do go a long way in making the medicine go down smoother.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
Before we begin, something I've been thinking about lately, a lot of great opportunities get wasted chasing the idea of slightly better ones. For example, would your career be more successful if you had taken that other job or you'd moved to a different city? Maybe, I think about this a lot actually just for myself.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
And Gabe, I think when you design a course and it kind of sucks, you know that it sucks and you're like, okay, this needs work, but I'm done with it for now. So if somebody comes in and goes, I'd like to fill in the gaps, usually, unless you're an egomaniac, you probably would be like, oh, thank you. Because we threw this together. We didn't have that much time. We didn't have that many resources.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
We always meant to come back to it. And here we are.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
Exactly. It's not just performative. It's meaningful. But look, I can't tell you for sure when exactly you should have this conversation. There's so many variables at play here. The personalities of the people involved, the rules and customs of your college, its hiring practices, your relationships, your reputation.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
There's a world where maybe you don't speak up about the course materials until they give you a full-time offer, okay? or you don't go all the way until you get the offer. You give your feedback in smaller chunks and see how it goes. Keep making these informal adjustments on your own.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
And then when you get hired full-time and you have a little bit more security and deeper relationships, then you give your big pitch. You're gonna have to read the tea leaves and listen to your gut there. You know better than we do. But here's what I know for sure.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
When you deliver tough feedback to people, when you give them total honesty, but you do it in a spirit of genuine love and excitement, which you clearly are, These conversations are rarely as risky as they seem.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
They can still be daunting, but the chances that they're gonna blow up in your face are much lower, and if they do blow up in your face, it's usually because the people you're giving the feedback to are not willing to take it in, they can't meet you in that same spirit, which is always a possibility, but then kindness, respectfulness, graciousness, how well you communicate your why, all of that can even transform poor reactions over time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
So I hope that gives you some new approaches here. Ultimately, I have a feeling your new colleagues will be grateful for the feedback because who wouldn't want a coworker like you? You're giving them a massive gift with these changes to the materials as long as you position them in the right way. They're lucky to have you. Your students are lucky to have you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
You're exactly the kind of person who should be in education and I thank you for it. And again, just a brilliant case study of how effective and productive and courageous a person can be a little bit later in life. You're an inspiration, my friend. Good luck. You can reach us Friday at jordanharbinger.com. Please keep your emails concise.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
Try to use a descriptive subject line that makes our job a lot easier. If there's an unstable, violent person targeting you and your family, you're trying to track down an ancient family member who's been hidden away, or you're wondering how to support a grandiose spouse's dreams, whatever's got you staying up at night lately, hit us up Friday at jordanharbinger.com.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
but the job you have now will definitely suffer if you don't give it 100% of your focus and your effort. Would you be 10% happier or more in some other relationship other than the one that you're in, whether it's our friendship, whatever it is?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
We're here to help, and we keep every email anonymous. Speaking of help, our newsletter, We Bit Wiser, is something that's bite-sized and practical every week, most Wednesdays. If you want to keep up with the wisdom from our thousand-plus episodes and apply it to your life, I invite you to come check it out. You can sign up at jordanharbinger.com slash news. All right, what's next?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
Maybe, who knows, but you're definitely gonna be unhappy in your relationships if you spend all of your time wondering what else is out there or lamenting something that you've lost in the past, assuming that the relationship you're in right now is a good one, of course. The easiest way to end up worse off
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
That's when you might notice things aren't working quite like they used to. Your joints, your skin, maybe even your hair. Vital Proteins steps in to help keep those areas supported so you can stay active and keep doing what you love. Vital Proteins is the number one collagen peptide brand in the U.S., so they know what they're doing. It's super easy to take.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
Okay, interesting. So first of all, I hear you that you would be a good steward of your grandma's house, you'd continue the family legacy, you could really use the help. All fair. I hear that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
I'm also just wrapping my head around the fact that you're basically talking about circumventing your whole family, including presumably your own parents and apparently your cousins and trying to become the beneficiary of this inheritance. which is delicate, to put it lightly. Play this out. Say you manage to talk to your grandma. She engages with you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
She decides that, yes, you should get the house. And then at some point, she dies. Then you inherit the house. And the rest of the family finds out that she listed you as the beneficiary in her will without telling anyone else. Even if she tells them in advance, although it doesn't sound like that's her style, then that drama plays out while she is still alive.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
Either way, that's going to raise eyebrows, probably ruffle feathers, all the things, because her kids, who again, include your own parents, they would be the obvious beneficiaries of any assets. And knowing what I know about how contentious these inheritances can be when they're not done properly, I just don't see this going well whatsoever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
Look, this was a little bit different in my family, right? Gabe, my parents, they grew up in Detroit. My grandma had eight kids. And by the time my grandma was a little bit senile going to nursing homes and stuff like that, it was my dad and her sisters who lived in Michigan. And everybody who lived far away or was a little bit too old, they were just kind of like, you handle it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
And my dad and my aunt handled it. And when she passed away, my dad was like, okay, I'm going to sell the house and split it among everyone. And they were like, cool. But it was worth like two grand. It was really, it's in Detroit, for God's sake. I don't even know if they have electricity and water in that neighborhood now. So this was like a hot potato.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
This sounds like the opposite kind of situation where unless everybody gets along really well, it's going to be hard enough even for the kids to deal with it, let alone like, why did she give this to one grandkid? There's no scenario in which this turns out without pissing everyone off.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
is to obsess over the paths that you didn't take instead of making the most of the one that you did. Every moment spent longing for a life you didn't choose is time that you're not putting into the life that you actually have. And that's not to say that you can't want other things or you can't change your life or whatever. Of course you can. You should in many cases. But...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
Also, did they not grow up in that house? So they're just not going to have any say over their childhood home.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
Yeah. Look, for me personally, if I had a couple of brothers and my parents were like, we're leaving you the house. I would be like, you guys handle this? Yeah, I'm established. Maybe one of them needs the money more. Maybe they still live in Michigan and I live in California. That doesn't seem to be the case here, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
She's not saying everybody lives in Oklahoma and this is still in Michigan and I'm the only one here. That's not what's going on here. Anyway, the responsible way to do this, the respectful way to do this is to make this a family conversation. You've got to get your parents and their siblings together. Don't try and get your parents to fight for this, to advocate for you here, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
You got to get the other grandkids. You got to put everyone on one email thread, something. And then you talk about the house. You say that you love it. You want it to stay in the family. You'd be honored to restore it and be the steward of the family legacy. And you're curious to know if her children know whether grandma has a will, has her affairs in order.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
And if so, who is set to inherit the house, what their plans for it are, whether they'd be open to a conversation about you being involved in some way, whether that means helping with the renovations or becoming a co-owner down the road or buying it outright. And if they don't know what the Will situation is, why and what are they doing about that?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
Or if everyone's open to it, talking to grandma about potentially leaving it to you, although I would not lead with that idea because I think it would be way too self-serving and obvious.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
What you want is to start a conversation about making sure that grandma's affairs are all in order because that's the right thing to do regardless, which look, even that's a delicate conversation because your aunts and uncles might be like, why are you so interested? What's with you and the house? Really, this is primarily between your grandma and her kids.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
I know you said they'd probably support you in taking ownership of the house, but you don't know that for sure I'm afraid that's probably a little naive. I don't know anybody who doesn't want to inherit an asset that is rightfully theirs, even if it's a bit of a headache and they're just going to sell it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
So actually, there's a precursor to this conversation where you just ask your parents or a few of your aunts and uncles, hey, I know grandma doesn't really like to talk about this stuff. but she mentioned that she's not sure how long she's gonna be around. And I just wanted to make sure, are you guys on top of the estate stuff? Do you guys have a lawyer? Is there a plan for the house?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
And just find out first. And look, Gabriel, tell me what you think here. I'm a fan of the parable where you say something like, I'm only asking because a friend of a friend, their grandmother died and she didn't have a will and it was this big mess and it was in court and it was really expensive. I just thought, does grandma have a will? I've never heard anything about it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
It's not really any of my business, but I'm just curious. You don't have to have a real friend of a friend. I like to illustrate the consequences. For me, I can say, hey, as an attorney here, I'm thinking with my lawyer brain, does your mom have an estate that's all set? Because a lot of people wait till the last minute and you don't want to do that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
If you're not a lawyer, it's harder to do that because she might not have a will and she's not telling anybody or she's not handling her estate properly and she's like, ah, it's not my problem. I'm going to be dead. I know a lot of people like that too.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
And it's just creating a massive headache and a potential battle for her kids when she goes, which is not cool and is a terrible situation and can do serious damage inside families. So I would casually ask your parents what the deal is. If they're like, yeah, she has that all squared away. We just don't know the details. Then at least you can rest easy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
The house won't fall into probate or whatever. And you might also know that getting the house is just not an option. And if they're like, no, we have no idea if she has a will. It's funny you mentioned that. We just all talked about that. We're all concerned. Mom's making it really hard. She's probably putting it off.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
When you want your life to be radically different from what it is, especially when you're not taking actions to create that life, you're just fantasizing or you're pining for something different, that's when you can easily miss the great people and situations and opportunities that are in front of you right now. Which these usually become better when you embrace them and when you nurture them.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
Then you have much more license to say, okay, yeah, I'm really concerned about that because this could turn into a huge mess. You guys need to sort this out. It's time to talk to grandma, hire a lawyer, make sure the house is in the will and all that. And I'm happy to help if you'd like.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
What I'm getting at is, there's a much more important conversation to be had here, and getting your grandma to give you the house, not a kosher move to make, not right now. I'm actually a little surprised that you're thinking of doing this, given that you said that the last thing you wanna do is cause a rift in your family. I'm not accusing you of being a bad person or an a-hole here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
I think it's naivete, maybe. But I promise you that secretly scheming to get her to leave you the house, that is almost definitely going to cause a rift. It's going to cause problems for you. It's going to cause problems for your parents, most likely.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
And now look, if you guys have a conversation as a family about this, and your parents and your aunts and your uncles are all like, yeah, I don't want the house. Oh my God. We'll sell it and we'll each get $20,000 because it is Michigan. Although again, this seems unlikely, but if they're somehow all cool with you inheriting it, that's a different story.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
Then it's all in the up and up, although it doesn't really solve the problem of your cousins, the other grandkids. They might want a piece of the house too. So I appreciate that you'd be a great steward of the family legacy. I get that you have the time and the resources to restore it. I know it's tempting because you're the only grandchild who's in the area. You don't have a house of your own yet.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
But unfortunately, that is not enough to justify this strategy. My advice really is to focus on empowering your parents and their siblings to plan ahead as much as possible. That's responsible. That's appropriate. It does benefit you, too, indirectly.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
If there's a conversation to be had about playing a bigger role in the house, you can have it then, but you're going to have to be much more thoughtful about the rules and the optics here. Gabe, I know he said, oh, I could probably buy it, but then I would have less money to restore it. If it's your family, ask them for a really cush payment plan.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
Hey, I don't have enough money to buy it and restore it. I'd love to restore it and then pay you guys each $1,000 a year. They might not care, but you can't do it in some sort of shady backroom way.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
Yeah, it's fascinating. And some of it might come from grandma who never talks about anything. She raised all these kids who might also not talk about anything important.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
Yeah, you know, you're right. This sort of let's not face this head on seems to run in the family somehow, which is normal. I'm getting the sense this really is the family way. And the problem with that is when nobody's talking openly, there's all this secrecy that a tactic like this, it might feel like fair game or the easiest way to handle it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
But he might just be dealing with the same avoidances as grandma. And it's going to blow up later. That's the problem always. So go talk to your family. Encourage them to get on top of this estate stuff. Gently push them to have the important conversations they need to have with your grandma. That's the right thing to do. That's your role here for now. Good luck. And hey, I hope you get the house.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
And it's funny because I see this playing out in my own life. I have the kids jumping around me and I'm like, I really need time to do this other thing. And I'm thinking, I got my kids hanging out. We're eating together. They're throwing food at each other, jumping around on some mattress that I just unwrapped in the hallway. This is really great. This is where I'm supposed to be right now.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
But I hope you do it in the right way. And if open, genuine communication doesn't work, you can always bribe your family with the fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back. Thank you. Thank you. Every morning, they break down the top three stories in like 15 minutes or less, just what's happening and why it matters. I listen to Up First during breakfast.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
By the time I'm done, I feel more or less caught up. They cover everything, politics, business, international stuff, without making it feel like you're just drowning in bad news. And the hosts are straightforward, but they keep it human. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
Not wishing I was in Lake Tahoe snowboarding because I'll be in Lake Tahoe snowboarding and then I'll be missing my kids. So that sort of on the macro scale is what I'm talking about here. And again, change is possible. Choices do definitely matter. But so does commitment. And I really think that commitment wins in the end by a long shot. All right. As always, we've got some fun ones.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
We've got some doozies. I cannot wait to dive in. Gabe, what is the first thing out of the mailbag?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
That's funny.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
Look, I get it. I really do. I'm not minimizing any of that. I understand he needs some time, although let's also remember it's been five years of this. Five years doesn't sound like that long of a time. But then I realize I have a five year old kid and I'm like, man, He can do math, for God's sake. But to me, threatening to take your own life if somebody leaves you, it's just so extreme.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
It's so revealing of a problem that is ultimately hers. I just can't imagine sticking around. Maybe I'm an a-hole.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
Dicey. By the way, we didn't even touch on the other detail about the business they ran together. Oh, yeah. How it was losing money. She's like, no, you never say die. Terrible idea, by the way. The whole never give up in business is some of the worst advice you can get or give. That led to them losing money, of course. I hear that and I'm like, okay.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
Here's a woman who's very defiant, very headstrong, very committed to sticking with something that isn't working, probably possibly watches too many YouTube videos from Gary Vaynerchuk. But this compromised them in the process. And it's kind of ironic because she was so committed to the business, but she doesn't seem to be committed to her life.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
You'd think somebody who's suicidal would have been different to the business, but she's very invested there and seemingly not nearly as invested in, I don't know, taking care of herself to the point where she could survive a divorce, literally.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
Hang on one second. You know what's funny about this is I was thinking, oh man, it signed into our dad's iCloud account. She better be really careful that her dad doesn't notice what apps and things that she has downloaded on this other phone. Meanwhile, she's like, well. I went into the purchase history that my dad probably doesn't even know existed.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
Yeah, which explains why she'd rather lose money than admit that something they created is not working.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
Might be a metaphor for their entire marriage.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
Just add a serving to your coffee, smoothie, even water. It doesn't even taste like anything, so it blends right in. The key is consistency. Making it a daily habit is how you see the benefits.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
I could totally see that because in a way that business thing is a footnote compared to all the suicidality, but it's all connected. And you're right, how she relates to the business, how she feels the business is a reflection of her. That's got to mirror how she feels about a lot of the other parts of her life, including our friend here. I hope that gives you some new angles here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
Obviously, I don't think this marriage is healthy or sustainable, but that doesn't necessarily mean it's game over. But if there's a way forward, you're both gonna have to have some very real conversations. Your wife is gonna have to confront these parts of herself. You're gonna have to stop cramping around her to avoid them.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
The one big upside to giving it a go, you'll know for sure whether you guys are willing to do that. And if you're not, then maybe you'll feel more secure in your decision to leave. But I'm afraid that's where this is heading regardless. And that's where you really need to be willing to live with the consequences and remember which ones you're responsible for and which ones you're not.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
Sending you, your wife, and your kids a big hug and wishing you all the best. All right, now for the recommendation of the week.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
And I see that he's been installing dating apps and then failing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
That's so funny. Somehow.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
Yeah. She's like, it's a trap phone. Who's trapped now?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
You know, I've got a, on my Todoist app that I use for all my to-dos, once a week I send genuine appreciation to someone because it's easy to forget to do this. But I'll just write a random friend and I'll be like, hey man, three years ago you gave me this idea to count calories and weigh my food and it has changed my entire life and here's how.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
And it's just wanted you to know like that random text changed the entire direction of my body and mind forever. And people are like, whoa, dude, thank you for sharing. I was just feeling sorry for myself. Or I was just driving to the gym. This made my day. It's really cool to do that. And it's not just to get the reaction out of people.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
Oh.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
It's actually just I think it strengthens the relationship, period. And I second everything you said. It's kind of straight out of sixminutenetworking.com. And I agree this works best when you're not explicitly trying to cultivate a relationship in the first place.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
But I find that doing this kind of thing, of course, it often does cultivate or strengthen the relationship because it's such a nice way to to kick things off or remind somebody of the impact they've had on you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
I think I said this on the show recently, a lot of people, especially young people, they write to me and they're like, I'm 18 or I'm 20, 25, whatever, I'm just starting out, I wanna meet this amazing author, I wanna meet this senior person at my company who gave this great talk, whatever it is, I have nothing to offer them, so I don't know where to start, I'm just gonna not say anything.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
And I'm always like, hey, dude, that is enough. Your gratitude is enough. A five-sentence email telling them why you responded to what they said or did, that is enough. And if you can tell them what you did with what they put out specifically, how you put it into action, what results it led to, even better, because that's really what makes these notes pop. But I'm with you, Gabe.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
It's not about pushing for any specific outcome. You have to hit pause on the part of your brain that's hoping for something more. But the cool thing is, when you keep your intentions pure, people tend to respond to that the best. Whereas a request for career advice wrapped in a compliment, that kind of dilutes the message and it can be self-serving. There's an author named Brad Meltzer.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
He's a friend of mine. And the reason he's a friend of mine, I read something that he put out and I was like, oh, this is really good. And I told my agent this. And she's like, oh yeah, I love his stuff too. And she told another agent who told Brad Meltzer and Brad Meltzer reached out to me and was like, hey, we should chat. And I said, okay.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
And I can't remember exactly what the business reason was, but it doesn't matter. He sent me a ton of his books. And then recently we caught up again. He's going to come on the show because he just gave a great speech and it's got a great message that I wanted to share with everybody. Now we're just buddies. It's really funny how that worked.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
And it was all because I reached out to somebody to say, hey, I really like this guy's work and I know he's famous and doesn't care, but I'd love to just get that message over to him. Look, I'm a big fan of this one. I had to soapbox for a moment about how this connects to everything in the sixminutenetworking.com courses, and this is useful at every age, at every stage.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
I still do it myself, like I said, but it's especially useful for people who are just starting out or starting over, and this stuff is totally free. I don't just mean the course, the idea of reaching out to somebody and telling them how they've impacted you. That is free. It only costs you a little bit of time, and the return on that investment could be huge.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
Look, we can assume a lot of men watch porn on their phone. But when it's favorited, the names are right there in the favorites list. And she's like, what does this mean? And it's, oh, gosh. Oh, wow. And you know she clicked on one and was like, oh, that's what that is. Oh, my God.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
Also, folks, the subreddit for our show, if you want to jump into discussions with other listeners about specific episodes, if there's an episode you like, there's something you don't like, you're confused about, a lot of cool, fun conversations happening over there, you can find it at reddit.com if you are a Redditor over in the Jordan Harbinger subreddit. Okay, what's next?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
Actually, not liking this podcast is one of the single best reasons to end any relationship. You have three kids with somebody, total intimacy, undying romance. You never fight. They cook you breakfast in bed every day, but they don't like this show. Just I would say end it now.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
I'm loving this so far, clearly because I'm a narcissist, but seriously, just to say, if you heard our Dr. Romany episodes, our Feedback Friday episodes about narcissism, and you were like, oh man, that sounds like me sometimes, you're probably not a capital N pathological narcissist. Those people, 95% of the time, they literally can't even begin to confront that quality in themselves.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
But we all contain narcissistic traits to some degree, even if we don't have the clinical disorder. So if you were able to see that more clearly because of the show, fantastic. I love it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
Wow. Paid down $105,000 so far. Bravo.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
Yeah, a lot of ramen noodles in that house.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
Amazing. It can. Not everyone gets there, though, sadly. But yeah, all trauma, even difficult trauma, it's always a window into something profound. Yeah. We've talked about the concept of post-traumatic growth before. Not everyone has the courage or the tools to explore that, but the opportunity is always there, which is remarkable. Amazing you were able to make this transformation.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
Man, this is such a great letter.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
As long as it's this podcast, fine.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
I can tell that's a Gabe sign off. What a letter, though. This is very inspiring. As per usual with stories like this, I don't have a ton to add. I'm just very grateful that you shared all this with us, with everyone listening. And I'm honored that we could play a role in ruining your life. I'm giving you another shot at life, whatever, bit of both.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
Actually, that's what stands out the most to me about your story, how you had to lose something really important to you in order to evolve. Obviously, my mind went to my sort of trauma, if you can call it that. It seems a little silly to use that word for it. But my big show reset in 2018, how painful that was having to start over. But I came to the exact same conclusion that you did.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
It really was the best thing that ever happened to me. But if you'd asked me back then, hey, do you want this? I would have been like, hell no. Keep things exactly the way they are. It's going to be impossible to recover from this. Even though things were far from perfect back then, I desperately needed to make some changes. It's funny. We're such... conservative creatures as human beings.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
We don't want to expend any more energy than is absolutely necessary to get where we want or what we want, and we try to organize our lives to create as much stability as possible. Even if the status quo is super dysfunctional, like where you found yourself in 2022, which is actually not that long ago, man, a couple years ago, oftentimes something external has to come along to force us to wake up
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
a partner leaving, a job falling apart, an illness, whatever it is. And yeah, that can be awful. It's very stressful. It's very unpleasant. It brings up a lot of anger and fear and grief. But what your letter captures so beautifully is it also creates space. It shakes the etch-a-sketch. It creates new room for us to reconnect with ourselves, to try new things, to form new relationships.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
It shocks us into waking up. Right. Most of the time, myself included, we're on autopilot. We have to lose something. Some big disruption has to happen for us to sit up and go, oh, yeah, okay, I'm alive. I'm living my life. How am I living my life? Am I making the most of my life? And then the other big thing that loss does, of course, is it forces us to confront some difficult truths.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
Although, I gotta say, that's not the case for everyone. It's far from guaranteed. Some personalities, especially narcissistic personalities, they tend to respond to big losses like this by digging in harder, growing more resentful, doubling down on the story that they're right and everyone else is wrong and they're the victim and the world's out to get them and blah, blah, blah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
which is another reason that I doubt you are a pathological or clinical narcissist. But like I said, we all have narcissistic traits, and those traits, they're often defenses against the very feelings that you had to confront after the breakup, especially the shame. The shame of having to admit, man, I am not healthy. I am not stable. I am not taking care of myself.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
I did not treat my partner well. I have some stuff to work through. That's intense. And that can be wounding. So where a narcissist would go, screw you for leaving. You're not on my team. You're too needy. All you want for me is to listen to the podcast you listen to. Nobody gets me.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
You said, essentially, I have a lot of feelings about this, and one of them is that I might be wasting my life or going down the wrong path. Let me give this thing a listen. And look where that got you. Being able to tolerate the tension of those feelings got you. It opened up a whole new process, a whole new worldview, a whole new set of opportunities.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
It's really extraordinary, just that willingness to be wrong, to bear shame, to take another person's opinion seriously. It is extraordinary. So I really commend you for that. You're a case study in how to surrender to loss, how to make meaning out of grief, how to use these crises to grow rather than to shrink or stay stagnant. And I'm very touched that we've been part of that process with you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
So to answer your question, finally, how to reach out to more men to help them, I think you're already doing the most important thing, which is sharing your story. It's a powerful one, and the beauty of it is it shows that you're actually living these values that you talk about. You're not just talking about growth and healing and all that. You're in this process.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
You're embracing these ideas and putting them into action. So I would say keep sharing your story one-on-one for sure, and maybe in larger venues if you feel moved to do that. This show is one of them. You could post this in a few subreddits around personal growth or relationships or breakups or something like that. You can start a conversation. You could publish it as a blog or a newsletter.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
You could go tell it at storytelling shows in your town. They have those all over the world. Maybe work up to a moth style event or a TEDx or whatever, if that's interesting to you. But my feeling is, look, if you really want to help people grow the way you have, wonderful. If that's truly your calling, you'll find it reflected back to you when you talk about what you went through.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
So that is a Dark Jordan idea, like where your head's at in terms of, I feel seen. But I'd never pitch that for somebody who hasn't done something truly horrible. And before you tell me that abuse is horrible, I know. So far, though, this guy is just secretly watching porn and possibly slash probably cheating.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
And that would be a good signal that you should be more proactive in sharing this stuff. But you also don't necessarily need to go out looking for people to save. I'm not saying it's your intention. It's just a pitfall of teaching. It has the potential to be a little crusadery, maybe a little pushy. I know how to help you. Let me work on you. I'm not sure that's what you want.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
Exactly. What are you, a podcaster for God's sake?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
Yeah, exactly. Room to talk over here, Gabe, Mr. Advice Column. But you know what? You did say that we're a couple of Lydia's today. You're right, though. You generally want to pull more than push. And again, if you are being called to help people in a more formal way, like some kind of coaching, and you want to formalize that role, hey, go for it. I'm not saying you can't.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
But I think this stuff needs to unfold organically on its own to some degree for it to be truly meaningful. If you find yourself working very hard to find people to help, I think that's usually a sign that you're trying to achieve something else. And what that thing is, I'll let you figure that out.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
It's a pitfall that I think all people in the self-development world have to confront at some point. And it's not all bad, but it is something to keep an eye on. I can't help but notice that a lot of people who are in the mix of something and solving a bunch of problems in their life, they get three steps into a hundred steps and they're like, I want to be a coach. It's sort of,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
solidifies their identity as somebody who's like an action taker and doing something about it. It's like you don't have to become a professional yoga instructor in order to go to a yoga class, but a ton of people want to do that with coaching. And I don't totally understand why. It happened in the dating world when I was working in the dating world.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
people would sign up for a bootcamp and like on day two, what does it take to be an instructor? Why are you even thinking about that right now? We're trying to iron out the yellow belt stuff here, pal. I get it though. It's just something to keep an eye on, like I said, and your motivations, your ways of connecting with people, the spirit in which you meet them,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
Those have to be very pure, always, but especially early on. And look, I appreciate the question. I love that you want to be of service. I'm extremely moved that your story has inspired other people to grow. All of that is incredible. Those are signs that you have something important to offer.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
And it really is a testament to the remarkable transformation that you've been through, the man you've become, and I'm very proud of you for that. I can tell you are too, as you should be. So thank you for clicking on that link that your ex sent you when you were definitely not going through her text so that you could respond to something that was months old.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
I'm going to go through all these and find something mean that you said. He was actually hunting for those podcast links. All right, fine. I'll listen to Jordan Harbinger and maybe she'll come back to me.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
Not okay by any means, but not, in my opinion, bad enough to ruin his life over, in my view. Not bad enough to deprive your niece of a father. And you don't know him to be physically abusive, so let's maybe not play the ice card just yet.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
That's right. Text every girl right now dating anybody. Text this to your man. Tell him that if you don't listen to this, it's over. That's what I need right now. Actually, man or woman, do that to your partner right now. That's the mark of a healthy relationship that you can lay down an ultimatum out of nowhere in the middle of any Sunday, any weekend when everything else is fine.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
Do you love me or not? Here's the link. If you do, you listen to this podcast. And you support our sponsors too, right? As a massive thank you for changing your whole life. I kid. Keep up the great work. We are super pumped for you. Thank you for being a part of our show, fam. And everybody, go back and check out our episodes with Scott Payne and our Skeptical Sunday on Hangover Cures.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
If you haven't done so yet, show notes and transcripts over at jordanharbinger.com. Advertisers, discounts, ways to support the show, all at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. I'm at jordanharbinger on Twitter and Instagram. You can also connect with us on LinkedIn. You can find Gabe on Instagram at Gabriel Mizrahi or on Twitter at Gabe Mizrahi. This show is created in association with Podcast One.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
My team is Jen Harbinger, Jace Sanderson, Robert Fogarty, Ian Baird, Tata Sidlowskis, and of course, Gabriel Mizrahi. Our advice and opinions are our own, and I am a lawyer. I'm not your lawyer. Do your own research before implementing things you hear on the show. Remember, we rise by lifting others. Share the show with those you love.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
If you found the episode useful, please share it with somebody else who could use the advice we gave here today. In the meantime, I hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn, and we'll see you next time. Are you addicted to drama? Check out this preview of The Jordan Harbinger Show with psychologist Dr. Scott Lyons.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
Learn to recognize and heal from drama addiction on episode 836 with Dr. Scott Lyons on The Jordan Harbinger Show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
Oh, man, what a mess. I'm very sorry that you and your niece are in this position. Knowing more about your brother-in-law than your sister does, that's super uncomfortable. It puts you in a tough spot. But I'm especially sorry for your niece. She should not know this much about her parents' private lives.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
I feel terrible she's sitting on this information that she's caught in the middle at her age. It's got to be very weird and confusing for her, and I'm sure that's doing a number on her. In addition to watching her parents argue, hearing her dad speak poorly about her mom, this is all very sad.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
even if he isn't physically abusive, the fact that she's afraid he might go there, just that fear is pretty upsetting. It does make me wonder if she's seen him get physical before or maybe behave in a way that suggests he's capable of that or who knows, maybe she's just scared and imagining the worst and he's relatively harmless.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
Either way, your sister's gonna find out about all of this one way or another and it shouldn't fall to her daughter to break the news to her. You're the adult here, you're her sibling, you're her friend, so I'm afraid that it makes it your responsibility to break the news to her.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
Welcome to Feedback Friday. I'm your host, Jordan Harbinger. As always, I'm here with my Feedback Friday producer, the guy who, you knew this was coming back, the guy who's Kalulu in my Dalulu, Gabriel Mizrahi.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
And if you could use some help in delivering the news, having another close family member there, a mutual friend, that's also an option. But I would not tell her with your niece. She just should not play any part in this conversation. She's still a child. The greatest gift you could give her is to let her stay one as much as is possible at this point.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
Although I understand she's the one who found out, so she's going to be involved to some degree. They're obviously going to talk about it, but it doesn't mean she should be the one to tell her mom that dad is cheating on her and watching porn and this is the kind of porn he's into and all that stuff. That's just totally inappropriate.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
Agreed. So that's what I would do. And then you have to let your sister decide how she wants to handle this. She might leave him. She might decide to stay with him and work on things. That's up to them. I think you have to give her space to handle this however she wants to, support her in whatever way she feels she needs. But look...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
If this escalates, if your brother-in-law does turn out to be physically abusive, for example, then I would consider calling the police or calling CPS, of course. And if that means he might get deported, well, maybe that's a risk people take when they break the law. But that's a very different calculation from calling ICE on him before he's done something truly dangerous.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
That just seems unnecessary and unfair. I'm very sorry that things have played out this way. It is super awkward and sad, but this is what's happening. And your niece is gonna have to find her own way of healing from this childhood, her own stance on her parents.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
On the Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the stories, secrets, and skills of the world's most fascinating people and turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you. We'll see you next time. Turns out the KKK is still around, which kind of surprised me, among other things.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
The best thing you can do, besides protecting her from this tough conversation, is staying close with her, being a safe person for her to talk to, supporting her, helping her make sense of all this and enjoy her last few years of childhood.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
I'm sure her relationship with you is going to be one of those things that allows her to survive this tough chapter and hopefully grow into a happy, healthy, well-adjusted adult. Sending you all a big hug and wishing you all the best. Man. Now, I want you to use your trap phone to creep on the pornographically good deals on the fine products and services that support this show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
We'll be right back. Thank you. Think self-driving cars, AI that codes itself, robots, laser-powered internet, even wildfire prediction technology. But it's not just the tech. It's about the people, the mindset, and the crazy journey of taking an idea from this is never going to work to holy crap, it actually works.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
Astro Teller sits down with the thinkers and creators behind these projects to tackle big questions like how we make clean energy a reality, how tech can save the planet. What I love about the show is it's not just about the hype. It's about real stories, real failures, and the resilience it takes to build something groundbreaking.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
If you're the kind of person who loves hearing how impossible ideas become real, the moonshot podcast is 100% for you. Just premiered on March 10th with new episodes every week. Find it wherever you get your podcasts. This episode is also sponsored by Bear Mattress. It's easy to assume a mattress is just a mattress until we got a Bear Mattress.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
I did not realize how much of a difference quality mattress makes until this one showed up. Not to sound dramatic, but this is hands down the nicest mattress that I've ever laid on. I've been sleeping on beds for, I think, 45 years, more or less. Bear really nailed it. They're award-winning. They're made right here in the U.S.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
with certified clean materials, and they back it with a limited lifetime warranty, plus free shipping anywhere in the U.S., We started by taking their sleep quiz, which is super quick, super easy. It matched us with the Bear Elite Hybrid, which sounds very fancy. And it is. It turns out it's exactly what we needed. Jen and I are both side sleepers. I kind of, well, I'm kind of all over the place.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
The pressure relief is just chef's kiss. And the setup couldn't be easier. They deliver it vacuum sealed right to your door. You roll it out and you'll see the quality. And here's the thing. Bear gives you 120 nights to try it out. So if you're not sleeping like a newborn by then, they'll pick it up. No hassle. Full refund.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
Thank you for listening and supporting the show. All the deals, discount codes, and ways to support the podcast are searchable and clickable on the deals page, jordanharbinger.com slash deals. Now, back to Feedback Friday. Okay, what's next?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
Okay, I love this. Way to hustle and look for ways to be of value. This is exactly the spirit that makes people indispensable and gets them hired. You sound like an amazing employee. Also, congrats on being able to think straight in your early 60s. I'm 45 and some days I'm like, how does this microwave thing work? I don't get it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
Yeah. In my defense, this thing has 20 buttons and it has to come out of the wall first. It's really nuts. I want to be able to talk to it and tell it what to do instead of freaking programming it in Python or whatever. Okay.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
Yeah, exactly. Plus, I wouldn't be so lonely all the time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1133: Should Mum Be the Word When Dad's a Cheating Turd? | Feedback Friday
There's also gangs called Accelerationists, which just want the whole world to burn, which, you know, maybe they're winning. I don't know. We also had a Skeptical Sunday last Sunday on Hangover Cures. On Fridays, though, we share stories, take listener letters, offer advice, play obnoxious soundbites, and dole out presumptuous advice to you folks, like a couple of busybody Lydia's.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Your daughter is scared because the bad guys that she didn't see at all on camera and the police came. She's a little nervous. This would have been way worse if she's like, why are there two dead people in giant blood pools in our backyard slash bedroom? That would have been way worse, right? Because she would have seen or heard that. I mean, they have to take the bodies out.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Yeah, so for those of you who didn't sort of see this Instagram story that I threw of the broken window, the door wall, whatever those things are called, On Monday night, I was in my bedroom at 8 p.m. because it was a little jet-lagged, a little under the weather, as you can hear, I'm a little stuffed up. And so I decided to go to bed early.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
I mean, it would have been hard to hide that from the kids. So this is actually the best alternative, although I do, like most people I'm sure who've had a break in, fantasize that I should have just killed one or two of them. Spare me the emails about how these people might have fallen on hard times. I don't care. There's a lot of people who've fallen on hard times.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
They don't go breaking into other people's homes, especially while they're home. to rob them. So I actually do hope that they get lit up by the next person whose house they break into. And maybe the other two surviving guys in this crew will change their mind about how they make a living. I have zero sympathy for people like this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
They had no problem causing thousands of dollars in damage and scaring my kids. I don't even know what they would have done if they got in the house. I'm sure they would have at the very least trashed every room looking for valuables. and smashed things. And that would have been super violating. And my wife wouldn't have wanted to live here anymore because it wouldn't have felt safe.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
And the cleanup would have taken weeks or months to get everything cleaned up and replaced. So I really have zero sympathy for this kind of stuff. And the cops were like, I'm surprised you didn't go for the kill. And I'm like, you know, I do. They said that to you? Yeah. The female cop was like, I'm surprised you didn't kill one of them. I'm like, you know what?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
I'm actually a little bit surprised slash bummed. And the other cop was like, no, no, no, you did the right thing. You had the perfect reaction because I was a little bit bummed. I was like, man, I really should have lit one of these dudes up. He's like, no, because, you know, if they're in a gang, they're going to want revenge against this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
And like, this is the beginning of an ongoing feud between you and them. And he's like, what you did, which was scare the crap out of them, make them realize they don't know when you're home and when you're not, and then barricade your family safely. reaction.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
That's what she said. She was like, I'm surprised you didn't take at least one of them out. I was like, I did think about it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
It happens. This was the best outcome. Literally just pay a few grand to replace the door wall. And of course, we have way more lighting, way more motion sensors, way more locks, upgrades on a lot of different stuff. So we're a harder target. And we didn't have to learn this lesson by getting held at gunpoint or having our whole home trashed.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
What's scary is like I was robbed before in college. They broke in and stole a bunch of our stuff. And it was a quick sort of like, hey, let's take a watch, a cell phone, an Xbox. They left a lot of other stuff. And, you know, they took like a video camera. It was just kind of like, oh, that's a bummer. That sucks.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
This is different because this is your forever home, not some crappy basement $800 a month in Ann Arbor, Michigan apartment. $800 was exorbitant, right? $400 a month equivalent apartment in Ann Arbor that you're going to leave in a year or six months or whatever it is. Yeah. But the cops were, again, really cool.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
The kids were already being read to in the other room, another book, after I finished reading them my book. And I'm laying down, and I was looking at Reddit, as one does when passing out. It's funny, because I was looking at something stupid, right? And then I hear this...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
They were just like, you can email us anytime, call us anytime, even if you just want to vent. Let us know when you feel better. We care about you feeling at home or safe at home. And like, don't live in fear. These guys are, you know, not coming back. Take this cue, upgrade your security. I was like, are you guys real police?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Because everything I read about in the media, it really paints you guys in a completely different light.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
kid they were really really cool and really really professional and I just thought it was funny because first of all they're all in the house looking over at my phone playing the security video and one of the female cops she looks down and at my phone and then she looks down further and I realize I'm still in my underwear and I hand her the phone and I go I'm gonna put some pants on and she just starts laughing and all the cops start laughing and I assume the joke is oh he finally figured out that it's like hey dude you know you can get dressed and
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
You are in your own home, in your bedroom with your phone. What a scene. So I put my pants on and we're just sort of joking around. And one of the guys was like, I got to say, man, it's a really nice house. And I was like, I had nothing to do with the design. My brother-in-law and my wife designed it. And he goes, is that a gym back there?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
I didn't check the backyard, but it looks like you had a gym back there. I was like, Let me cut to the chase. You guys can use the gym at any time. Please come back any time and use the gym, preferably after the sun sets, because if these guys come back and there's cops working out of the gym, I'm never getting robbed again, ever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
What was funny is they're clearing the house with guns. Right. They're guns out. And one of them goes, that's a screen back there.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Is that crown molding? No, she goes, is that a screened in patio with those heat lamps? And the guy's like, check the hallway. And the other guy goes, oh, yeah. Oh, okay. Oh, this is a heavy door. Oh, is he a streamer? There's a lot of lighting. He must be a streamer. And they're like, check the hallway. Get back here. Then they're like, what's in that room over there?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
She goes, there's a backpack. There's a computer. There's a really nice desk in there. And that's it. The room's clear. Because I have this custom wooden audio desk for all of my stuff that a show fan made. And then they go in the bedroom and they go in the kid's toy room. And then they're walking through the master where the guy had broken in. And then he's like, what's back there?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
like a thud that was loud enough that something had hit the house, but it wasn't heavy, followed immediately by a real heavy thud that sounded like a frickin' tree hitting the window. And I got up and I was like, huh? And then I immediately thought, we don't have any trees. We have a fenced-in yard, so it's not like an animal ran into the wall. And if it did, it's got to be a big ass animal.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
And she goes, it's a hot tub on an elevated platform. And he goes, nice.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Exactly. It was quite funny. And they leave and they go, again, really nice, really nice house. Really, really nice home you got here. And I was just like, if anybody said that and it wasn't a police officer, you'd be a little bit like, okay. Did you break into my home an hour ago?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Oh, they were already there? Yeah, they're like, uh, park a block away. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
That's right. They were super cool, super professional. I was really impressed by that. And it does make you feel a lot better. And it makes, on the flip side, when you hear about people having bad experiences with the police, it makes you feel really bad for them because it would have felt horrible if they came and they were like, pfft. Yeah, someone broke in, huh? Looks like an inside job to me.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
You know, and you hear about that stuff online. You read about that stuff online where cops treat people like they're the criminal after they call them. If that happened, that would feel horrible. So since that did not happen, the opposite happened.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
It actually felt really good and really sort of you feel like the police have your back, which is probably the only thing that can make you feel comfortable again in a situation like this. So shout out to San Jose PD for their help. And I know it's hard to get these guys. You can't like buy police things. It doesn't, you're not allowed to do that directly. There's some sort of monetary thing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
So what I'm trying to do is get a bunch of the show sponsors to send the police stuff directly. I got to make sure that that's kosher, but basically they're getting a bunch of HVM and ketones and IQ bars. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Exactly, yeah. They get a lot of vitamins and minerals.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Yeah, look, the upside of this whole thing, one of the many upsides, is my SimpliSafe reads are going to be fire from now on because we did use those panic buttons. Oh, that's good. That was the initial way we triggered it because Jen's like, I can't find my phone. Her phone is white and it was on a white bed and it was dark. So she's like, I just can't find it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
So she went and hit the panic button. And that was what set off the alarm. Now, of course, we have way more sensors in the whole house because at first we just installed what they'd given us for free with the initial package. But now we have sensors on everything and we have double sensors on some of the bigger sort of entrances and exits. So it's Again, you know, you learn to harden the target.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
God, that's one of the grossest sort of, yeah, just those two words put together.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
It was a lot cheaper than even replacing the glass. So I implore all of you, you know, if you don't have a security system, it does work. It did call the cops. And if I weren't there to scare these guys away, the alarm, had it gone off, would have scared these guys away, I would imagine. Last but not least, thanks to everybody else who did send me messages and well wishes on Instagram.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
I posted a picture of the door. I'm actually going to post the video of the guys breaking into because it's interesting. People are just being super cool about it online. It's sort of repairing a lot of my faith in humanity after the break in as well. Of course, the police response did that, too.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
But everybody was like, oh, my God, I'm so glad you're safe and sending really nice notes or people I've never heard from are like, OK, I've been a lurker for 10 years, but I wanted to say thanks for the show. And I'm sorry that this happened to you. I wasn't really expecting that. I really posted that to tease the idea that I'm going to talk about it on the show like I am now.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
I mean, we're talking like this sounded like a Rottweiler hitting the glass. So I started screaming, get out of here. I'll fucking kill you. I just went psycho. Right. And I just went absolutely batshit crazy. And I barricaded the rest of the house from Jen and the kids. And I was like, call 911. And I still had my phone in my hand. Wait.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
And really the takeaway was harden the target beforehand. Get a security system. You know, simplisafe.com slash Jordan is a good place to start. Get glass break sensors. Make sure that your house is not like using crappy interior doorways if you do need to retreat inside the house. Get those solid core doors from Home Depot if you can find a sale. And just make sure you have a plan.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
You know, we really didn't have a good plan. A 10-minute discussion about where you should retreat, depending where you are in the house, would have gone a long way. Thankfully, we didn't need it. But had they tried to get into the rest of the house and Jen had, you know, a baby in one hand in the middle of the living room, that would have been not great.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
I would have personally felt better if she had retreated to the bathroom and locked the damn door. So there's other ways that you can handle this. And we just had never thought about it. And I recommend thinking about that stuff, too. So Harden the target, make sure you got the alarm system, make sure you got a strong interior door system, make sure you got a plan. That's really it. You know what?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
One other takeaway, and this is just for me personally, Like I said, I felt bad about not smoking one or two of those dudes because that's like my anger talking. But one of the things that the cop had said was, you know, it's fight, flight or freeze. And you fought and then you barricaded your house. You didn't hide under the blankets. I was like, no one does that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
He's like, uh, actually, a lot of people will hide under their blankets, which, of course, is not very effective. But again, if this is something you've done, according to Amanda Ripley, you can't feel ashamed of yourself because it's your natural reaction. I'm glad I didn't have that reaction, just me personally. On the other side of things, I said, oh man, I wish I'd gotten da-da-da.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
And the cop was like, actually, the way people get hurt, you have the appropriate amount of fight reaction, which was charge at these guys, which I didn't see, remember, scream at them, scare them away, and then barricade yourself and the family in a safe place. If you fight too hard, he's like, the way people get hurt is they run into their yard and they tackle one of these guys.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
And then the guy's like, oh, crap, now I got to pull out my knife and get away because I don't want to go to jail or get killed by the homeowner. So he's like, the way people get hurt is they fight too much, even when it's not necessary. So what you want to do is make sure they don't feel trapped.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
You want to scare them right back out the way they came so that they're not thinking, oh, I'm going to die in this guy's house. Bark, but maybe don't bite. Bark, but don't bite. Or punch him in the face, lay him out, and then you get out of the way and barricade yourself, and then he gets up and crawls out the window he just kicked in. That's the limit of it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Don't try and hold him down until the police come. That's how you get shot by their partner or stabbed. So, all right. What's the first thing out of the mailbag?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
God, what a mess. What a predictable mess.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
No, I didn't see anybody, but I knew I felt cold air come in and I saw the curtain fly up. But here's the thing. It was windy. And also, if a tree had hit the window, it would have pushed the curtain over. I'll tell you later what that ended up being. But so I barricaded the rest of the house and I'm holding the door shut. which is like this flimsy interior door with a little turn latch.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Wow, this is a wild story, man. Fascinating. Isn't it insane? First of all, I'm with you. I'm very sorry that your friend got involved with what sounds like a very troubled, very dangerous patient. I'm sorry for his troubles to some degree, too. And I'm sorry that she overlooked them or just didn't recognize how serious they were or would become.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Or maybe she totally did and just decided not to let that stop her. The abuse that she experienced, the blackmail, all of that must have been terrifying. And it sounds like your friend went through a nightmare and that's awful.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
And your friend chose to enter into a romantic relationship with this guy knowing that he was mentally ill, knowing that he struggled with addiction while she was married and not for the first time. knowing that that was wrong, knowing that it was a violation of her professional ethics and would get her fired and put her in a compromising position that that guy would have leverage over her.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
I mean, come on. As you know, physicians have a clear ethical obligation to avoid romantic relationships with patients. Healthy, unhealthy, stable, unstable, sober, off the wagon, doesn't matter, it's a no-go.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
The American Medical Association and most, if not all, state medical boards, they strictly prohibit relationships between doctors and patients because it exploits the power imbalance inherent in the physician-patient relationship.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
And engaging in a romantic relationship with a patient who has mental health challenges, that's particularly unethical because the patient's vulnerability increases the potential for exploitation or harm. And the power dynamic in the relationship is even more complicated. Now, there are some exceptions to this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Jen's like, I can't find my phone. And I'm like, well, I'm holding my phone with one hand, so call 911. So we call 911. It's a little infuriating because you're like, someone's breaking into the house. And the guy's like, okay, sir, where are you right now? And you're like, no, no, you're supposed to be alarmed also. You know, of course they're not right.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
The main one, of course, is if enough time has passed to dissolve the physician-patient relationship and any influence it might have had.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
But even then, the appropriateness of the relationship depends on the nature of the previous relationship, the amount of time that has passed, the patient's mental health, their capacity to give informed consent, none of which apply to your friend because she started seeing her patient while he was still her patient.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
So it makes sense that the medical board did an investigation, that her license was suspended, as it should be. These ethics, they are not just nice words. If you violate them, if somebody files a report, you can lose your whole career. Duh, that's the point. Gabe, this is reminding me of that letter we took from the listener whose psychiatrist hit on her a few months ago last year. Oh, yep.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Am I remembering this right? He lost his license too, or wasn't he sort of like, I'm going to retire now quickly?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
These doctors, man, I just don't understand how they make these decisions. Obviously, there's something wrong with them. Now look, your friend didn't know this guy would turn out to be so dangerous, so I have some, some compassion for her there. Once the abuse really began, I'm sure she was terrified and in over her head, and that's awful, but you're absolutely correct.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
She brazenly flouted her professional ethics in getting involved with this patient. She placed her own needs first. This is not her first affair. This is apparently a pattern for her. She had more power in the relationship at the start, and she actively chose to engage with him,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
And that decision could arguably be construed as taking advantage of a vulnerable patient, even if it ultimately turned out that he was the one taking advantage of her. Now, apparently, that's hard for her to take in. But that's not victim blaming. And actually calling that victim blaming, in my opinion, it's kind of an insult to actual victims.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
What you're saying is you experienced abuse from an unstable person. That was objectively horrifying. And you have my empathy and my sadness that this scary guy treated you this way. And you bear some responsibility, a great deal of the responsibility, I would argue, for getting involved with this guy in the first place.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
You knowingly entered into a relationship that was explicitly proscribed and clearly very risky. Right. Both of those things can be true. And both of those things are true.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
They're supposed to stay calm so that you calm down. But I'm just like, no, no, no. You kind of feel like, are you not taking me seriously? And of course it's just his training being like, of course I'm taking this seriously, man. I just don't want you to like lose your mind.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
I'm sorry. That's insane. She is a kook for coming to that conclusion. That's ridiculous.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
She's had like a dozen affairs or whatever it was from her partner of 15 years. It's always somebody else's fault. You got to support me. This person, she's also got whatever sort of mental health challenge going on with her. Dude, you're an unsupportive friend. After she literally told her, hey, I believe you 100% when you say you were afraid of this guy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
I'm upset by the thought that you felt trapped by a scary, abusive person for so long. You're an unprofessional practitioner. That's the one that gets me. Like, what are you talking about? What are you freaking talking about? She's the one who started banging her mentally ill patient. What on earth is wrong with you? Unprofessional.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Either way, this woman is isolating herself. If she can't even make room for the idea that she might have played a little bit of a role in all this, there's no real conversation to be had.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
No, look, it doesn't change the fact that she chose to sleep with a vulnerable, unstable patient. She screwed up massively, full stop. I mean, I don't know if I would be kind. If someone called me and was like, I painted myself into this corner, I'd be like, oh man, I'm really sorry that you're in that situation. You do realize this is 100% your fault, You're an idiot.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
I don't want to be friends with you anymore. You're toxic. Go away.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Right. I just don't want you to lose your mind even more than you already are. And I'm a little bit shaky, but I'm like... Well, I'll get into my reaction later. I'm a little bit shaky, but I'm also holding this door shut with a death grip, and I'm holding onto the phone, and I'm like, you know, I should have both hands free in case I need to punch somebody directly in the face.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
It must, right? I don't think his qualities just pop up out of the blue. She's got her dumb enabling partner with her, too, who's stuck with her through all infidelity. Like, geez, get away from these people.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Yeah, you're right.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Right. To say nothing of what else she might have been getting out of their relationship.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
I completely forgot about that part. OK, this this woman is cuckoo for Cocoa Puffs. Like, oh, yeah, I'm breaking all these rules. It's a real thrill. You're just going to gamble with your marriage and your career because you need a thrill. You are there is screws, multiple screws loose with you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Yeah, especially the first part. What I don't get is why is that so hard? I mean, this woman's story is literally a perfect example of how two things can be true. She chose to engage with a mentally ill patient and he did some awful things to her. Those are the facts. So, you know, why fight it?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Splitting. Okay, I've never heard of this. Tell me about this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
So I give the phone to Jen... And she's like, I don't know what happened. I heard two thumps. And then I heard my husband screaming and they're like, the police are on their way. And I'm like, I can feel the cold air blowing in under the door.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
It does sound like what's going on here. That's fascinating. I didn't realize that was a coping mechanism. Wait, didn't her friend accuse her of flattening her experience of the fear and abuse, whatever that means? She did say that, yeah. But isn't that exactly what she's doing by being so black or white about this?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Isn't splitting the way that you flatten her experience of herself so that it's more tolerable? That's...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
I mean, just lawyering up over here. If you're going to use therapy, speak, I'm going to use that lawyers. So once, once again, she's accusing our friend here of doing the very thing that she's doing. And our friend here isn't by the way, even doing that in my opinion. And meanwhile, she can't even make room for the idea that she might've played even some small role in this, which is ridiculous.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Cool projection, bro. That is fascinating. Yeah. Better help.com slash Jordan. Just saying. Jeez. Yeah. Nice plug.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
I know that the door is blasted open and it wasn't just, you know, my imagination because there's always the chance that like people heard something fall outside and they're just freaked out. Right. And I was like, no, I feel the window is broken. I can feel the cold air rushing into the house. So the police come in just minutes, single digit minutes, very quickly.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Yeah, dude, same. You have to take accountability for your piece of things, even when they're not entirely your fault. Although I still feel this woman largely brought this on herself, or at least was playing with fire. The rules are there for freaking reason. I think a lot of people have a skewed sense of what judgmental means or when it's warranted and when it's not warranted. First of all,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
expecting people, even people who love you, to not be judgmental at all. What is that? That's some kind of fantasy. We're all judgmental to some degree, some of us more than others. And yeah, it's generally more helpful to be less judgmental than more, fine.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
But I don't know if it's fair to expect a friend, and it's definitely not fair to expect a colleague in your profession, to not have any thoughts and feelings about something as important as professional ethics. Because also, not all judgments are wrong. Like you said, there is such a thing as helpful values, appropriate discernment.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
So when this friend turns around and goes, you're being judgmental, you're flattening my experience with your moralizing. Okay, that's a totally bogus argument. This woman deserves some judgment. She doesn't necessarily deserve cruelty. She doesn't necessarily deserve to be hated or whatever, but a fair reminder that she abandoned her good judgment and ethics is totally fair game.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
And like Gabe said, how you communicate all this to her, that obviously plays a big role in how she experiences your judgment. But a person who can't tolerate other people having a freaking opinion about whether she was right or wrong to sleep with a mentally ill patient under her care. I'm sorry, but that person is narcissistic and possibly delusional or just incredibly naive and annoying.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
So no, you're not being unfair here. You know, you're not being overly rigid, especially given how this woman has responded to you. If she'd gone, oh god, I'm really angry at you for not taking my side, I feel gross about how you view me, I feel like I was the victim, but I also chose to sleep with him, I'm embarrassed, I'm confused, I'm ashamed, that would be a different story.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
That would be a person making room for both realities, living with the tension of what happened to her, like Gabe said, but... As long as she is choosing to understand what happened to her through this lens, I'm afraid she's being unfair and rigid. And, you know, maybe that's not entirely her fault in the sense that God knows what happened in her life to make her this way.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
But as we talk about all the time, this is her responsibility to sort out and get her shit together. In my view, you're good to move on. I would not want to be friends with anybody like this. You should feel secure in your standards and your values. Look, I hope this woman finds her way into therapy, into more nuance, into better choices from here on out.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
But I don't see why you have to be around any of this crap in the meantime. I wouldn't touch this person with a 10-foot pole. And now, please support our sponsors so I can put a laser sight on my 9mm. We'll be right back. Thank you for watching.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
In these companies, they scoop up everything, your phone number, your email, your home address, even details about your family, and they don't just sell it to advertisers. Scammers, spammers, sketchy third parties can buy your info, too, because they don't give a crap who they sell this stuff to. This leads to identity theft, phishing attempts, a whole lot of unwanted contact.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
I mean, it seemed to me like four minutes or five minutes. And I think when we looked at the videotape, it was something like five or six minutes before they were at our door with the door open. They were like, get out of the house. So they came in, they looked in the door. They're like, sir, run over here as fast as you can. So I let go of the door and I sprint out the front of the house. And
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
That's why I use and recommend DeleteMe. It's a subscription service that removes your personal information from hundreds of data broker websites so you don't have to. You just tell them what you want gone, and their experts track it down and scrub it from the web automatically. And they don't just stop there.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Delete.me continues to regularly check and remove data so that it stays gone, because this is kind of like whack-a-mole. They even send you privacy reports so you can see exactly what they've found and erased, which I have to say is pretty satisfying.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
This episode is also sponsored by Redwood Outdoors. Ever thought about having your own personal wellness retreat at home? Most people don't realize how easy it is to set up a sauna or a cold plunge right in their backyard. But with Redwood Outdoors, you can turn that idea into reality without needing a fancy spa membership or a weekend getaway.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
And saunas, they are not just for elite athletes or biohackers. The benefits are for everyone. Whether you're looking to unwind after a hot day, loosen up sore muscles, improve your sleep, or you just carve out a little time to reset, it's the perfect escape. Imagine stepping into that soothing heat, closing your eyes, feeling all the stress of the day just melt away.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Plus, it's not just solo relaxation time. Saunas can be social too. Redwood Outdoors has options that fit anywhere from two to eight people. Not that I have eight friends or seven, but it's nice to have the option. A man can dream. It's a great way to connect, recharge, and invest in your long-term health and happiness. all without leaving home, which speaks to many of us, I assume.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Turn a corner of your backyard into your own personal sanctuary.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Thank you for listening to and supporting the show. Your support of our advertisers is going to replace that glass pane in my bedroom, hopefully. All of the deals, discount codes, and ways to support the show are all searchable and clickable over at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. Thank you for supporting those who support the show. Now, back to Feedback Friday. All right, what's next?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Uh, you know, that's interesting.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
It's hard to say that somebody would say that. I think it just becomes really obvious. There's people I know where I'm like, wow, your brother is really the favorite in the family. And it's like, I know. They'll buy him a car and a house and they're like, you need to get a job.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
I have to say, I'll just pause here and say the police were amazing. Not only was their response time amazing, but you know how, if you've ever had any dealings with the police, sometimes they treat you like you're the criminal, even though you're the one that called them. And you're like, no, no, no. Or they're treating you like you're stupid for calling or something like that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Welcome to Feedback Friday, I'm your host, Jordan Harbinger. As always, I'm here with Feedback Friday producer, helping me give birth to our two cents worth, Gabriel Mizrahi.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Honestly, it just sounds like a ramen place. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
That's right. I'll have the Kobayashi Maru. All right. Excellent choice, sir.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Yeah. There's the omakase and then there's the Kobayashi Maru.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
For special occasion. Look, I'm not a Star Trek guy, obviously, so I've never heard of it, but that's fitting, isn't it? Because this does sound like a no-win situation, and in a way, I guess these two families, they are designed to test her character, her emotional skills. So let's start by acknowledging just how difficult these parents must be.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
They were physically and emotionally abusive, which is terrible. They apparently pick favorites among their children, which I can't really wrap my head around as a parent. I don't know if they do this overtly or subtly, but either way, that's, yeah, it's super hurtful.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
It does, yeah. It's sort of one of those things where parents probably think it's okay in the moment, and then it just turns out to be a really bad idea. She's the oldest. It sounds like she became a surrogate mother and or father to her siblings, and she felt a responsibility to protect them, which means she probably lost out on having a real childhood of her own.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
And that comes with its own unique trauma. And then years later, all her parents are going to say, this is what really pisses me off. They were limited. That's just... Yeah. comically understated? Yeah, seriously. Good effort, guys. Well, we were limited. What a euphemism that makes me want to punch somebody in the face. Maybe you want to dig into that a little bit more, Mom and Dad. Can you try?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
And they were like, no, hide behind the car. They aim all these lights at the house and they're like, what is it? They fan out and they look around the outside of the house. And I know something happens because as soon as they get to the backyard, they radio. I don't hear what they say, but then I hear sirens immediately that are pretty close by.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Talk about not accepting a shred of responsibility.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Yeah. Maybe they have no idea the damage they caused. Yeah. I'm honestly not sure which is worse, but either way, that makes all of this harder. But I'm happy to hear that you've worked through some of these issues over time, that you've created a life that's peaceful and happy. That's a massive accomplishment. I'm sure it took a lot of time and a lot of work.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
And honestly, that's the greatest victory you could have over a family like this. Being healthy, being fulfilled, having a successful marriage. So you've already won. But I'm also hearing that there's still this wound here, which, you know, of course there is. And it's getting activated whenever you visit your family.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Which makes sense, and even more when you see your family being super nice to your husband. Honestly, that behavior is so odd. It makes me wonder if there's something big that we're just not getting here. Like, do they have some reason for treating your husband better? Is there some reason they prefer to go through him?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Yeah, she would have told us. Yeah, she would have said something, right? Unless she's trying to shape the narrative here. But given that everything her parents have done, I'm getting the sense that she's not the bad guy here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
I can only assume that your family finds it easier to be nice to your husband because your relationships with them are fraught because they probably become strained over the years and they just, it's easier to interact with this new guy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Right. I'm sure they each have their own traumas. The wounds always echo in every relationship in a family.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Right, so there's a lot going on in your family. Whereas your husband came into the picture long after that. He doesn't carry any of these old wounds, these patterns. So it might be easier for your family to be kind to him. And, you know, now that I think about it, being nice to him, maybe in some weird way, that's actually their way of being nice to you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Because their relationship with you isn't the greatest or because you guys struggle to express yourselves, I wonder if they might be giving your husband that kindness and hoping it somehow transfers to you. That's a charitable interpretation of what's happening. I might be totally wrong, but it could be in the mix. And all that said, I don't think any of this is cool.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
I completely understand why you find this hurtful.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Oof. On the Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the stories, secrets, and skills of the world's most fascinating people and turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you. And our mission is to help you become a better informed, more critical thinker.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
And then six more cars roll up and I'm like, oh, they found someone or something. So more cops show up, they aim all the lights and they start going, come out of the house with your hands up.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Yeah, that's nice. I'd be curious to see how they'd respond to that, if it would change anything. Maybe it would require something stronger. These siblings seem tough.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Right, so what can her husband really do about that? He might be able to change the surface behavior a little bit, but there's no guarantee that she won't still get injured.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
one seven five one and our street name you come out with your hands in the air obey all police commands at this point i'm like well the neighborhood sure as shit knows what's going on oh my god this is so intense it's intense it's like a grand theft auto mini you know side quest and i'm just like jeez and they're like stay behind the car stay behind the car because they're like you're just behind you're behind the car like continuing the we're behind a police car continuing to read the reddit
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
But I can see why her anger is being directed at him, because he's now the proximate cause of her pain. She's saying, help me, stand up for me, and he's going, hmm, okay, maybe, let's see. Or maybe he's just straight up saying no.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
But what you're saying is she might feel like he's hurting her or letting her down by not trying to rewrite her family dynamics, which, really, this pain is just her parents all over again, but located in him.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Right. Go straight to the source. If these parents can even hear that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Wow, yeah, because that's a very different person saying those things. It's also a very different person learning to heal this wound if her siblings brush this off, which I hope that doesn't happen, but it might. And then what?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
She might not be mad at her husband anymore, but she'll still have to make sense of this old pain, which, now that I think about it, is that another unconscious wish buried in this request to her husband? Is she... Maybe hoping that he'll stand up to her siblings, that all will be well, and then she won't have to be in touch with the pain at all?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
It's just something to consider, maybe another contour to all this. All right, I just want to point out one other thing about this letter, which is the symmetry between these two families. Yeah, that is fascinating. Let's talk about that. He also comes from a broken home. He won't visit his family without her. He says they treat him better when she's around.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Obviously, I find it interesting they both come from difficult families and they both struggle in different ways with their parents. I'm sure that's part of their bond. They have that shared experience there. But that's also part of why she's angry, because she stands up for her husband and he's not doing the same thing for her. So that gives her more ammunition, so to speak.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
But does that automatically mean that he should intervene in her family the way that she apparently does or is willing to do in his? Do these two families respond to messages like this in the same way? Maybe that is reasonable to expect, but also, maybe she's assuming that he'll have the exact same results when the dynamics are possibly totally different. It's just one last thing to consider.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Yeah, I'm looking at Hawaiian Tropic winners from 1983 zooming in on their faces to see what the makeup from Beautiful Women in the 80s looked like. That's actually what I was looking at in my bed. So imagine how jarring this was, right? I'm like, oh, women from the 80s. This is interesting. They look so much more real. Boom, boom. Okay, someone's trying to break into the house while I'm home.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Again, I'm very sorry that your family's treating you this way. It sucks. I hope you find a way to improve these dynamics if that's possible. And I also hope that you'll find the acceptance and courage to bear the grief of potentially discovering that you can't change the dynamics. Because that's possible too.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
And while I'm totally rooting for you, that might be the superpower that your family is here to teach you. Sending you and your husband a big hug and wishing you both the best. You can reach us Friday at jordanharbinger.com. Keep your emails concise. Use descriptive subject lines.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
If you're hiding a dark family secret from your partner, a narcissistic, gun-loving fascist that's hijacked your friend group, or you're locked in a never-ending custody battle with your psychotic ex, whatever's got you staying up at night lately, hit us up Friday at jordanharbinger.com. We're here to help, and we keep every email anonymous.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Oh, by the way, our newsletter, We Bit Wiser, it's a bite-sized gem. Every Wednesday, two-minute read, very practical. It's a great companion to the show. Come check it out, jordanharbinger.com slash news. All right, what's next?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Yeah, interesting question. So first of all, I can see why this big decision is bringing up all these big questions and probably some intense feelings, anxiety, fear, sadness, a lot of unknowns here. Unknowns are stressful and they're confusing. I know this can be overwhelming, especially because you have so little control here. In a way, you do have a big choice to make.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
So... So the more police come and then they're like, go, can you go somewhere else? Cause it's cold. I'm in my underwear by the way. And my kids are in their pajamas with no shoes on. So we go in my brother-in-law's house who happens to be right next door. And they're like, we'll call you on your phone when we need you and when it's safe.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Make the move to the new city or stay put. Although it sounds like in a way you've already made that choice. You want to stay. The real choice is how long to stay put. Do you leave now? Do you leave in a year or two? And you have some good reasons either way. Basically, the variables are money, morale, motivation, and job prospects in a year, 18 months, two years. Okay, fine. But here's the thing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
You can't predict the future. You don't have control over most of this. And most importantly, you're trying to game out scenarios without having access to all the information. What the economy is going to be like down the road, how your company is going to operate with fewer employees, how future you is going to feel in that new environment.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
You're trying to make a perfect decision amid a ton of uncertainty, which is impossible. So you're not wrong to be asking these questions. They're good questions. I'm just not sure that they're going to lead you to very helpful answers. So my take is this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Rather than try to make this decision perfectly now, I would start proactively working on all the things you'd want to have in place when you do make this decision. I'm talking about the nuts and bolts. Your relationships, warming up your connections, making new ones, getting a sense of what jobs are out there right now, putting feelers out, creating a good tribe for yourself, all of that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Your skills, your knowledge, your talent, getting clear on what you have to offer, filling in any gaps in your experience, learning how to tell that story, continuing to perform well at your job, paying attention to the signals that are telling you to either stay or leave, reading the tea leaves, and generally just creating as many opportunities as possible for yourself.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Because having a job offer in hand, that's concrete. That's real. Then you'd be in a position to go, do I take this offer now or do I stick it out another six months and get my severance? Or do I somehow push this offer by six months so I can enjoy both? Whatever that looks like.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
But trying to game out a hypothetical decision in a hypothetical future, that's only going to send you around and around in circles. And It's mostly pointless because there really isn't a decision to make. So the best advice I can give you is don't torture yourself with confusion. Don't drive yourself crazy with speculation.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
You need to channel that energy into investing in yourself, creating concrete opportunities for yourself. That's ultimately all that matters. And that's actually all you can control. And I promise, if you do that, the right decision will become obvious to you. You won't have to think about it so much. Whereas you can debate forever about something that doesn't really even exist.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Yeah, 80 or 90%, which is bananas. This is them trying to figure out how to just take down the entire company. I don't really understand what they're doing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
So we look at our cameras because we've got crazy, you know, we have multiple camera systems and multiple security systems. So we look at all the camera footage and we see like nine cops go through my whole house with their guns drawn and they're serious. They're like, Check the hallway. Check the closet. If anyone's in here, now is the time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Yeah, I don't get it. This is going to be one of those things where they find out later, like private equity actually acquired the company and they were going to fire everyone. And this is just an easier, cheaper way to not do that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Yeah. And good point, by the way, because like why torture yourself with sentimentality? Why worry about how you're going to stay motivated when your company is really just trying to get rid of everyone in clean house? That energy might be misplaced. I get it. All change hurts. But on that note, I would encourage you to become as friendly as possible with uncertainty.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
You strike me as a guy who likes to plan, who likes to control, who likes to know. I'm the same way, so I get it. But the older I get, the more I realize what a fool's errand that actually is. It's a little terrifying to accept, but we're in control of so little in life. And it's important to know when to control and when to just allow.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
But that's why it's so important to focus on the handful of things that you do control. Your body, your mind, your story, your relationships. And you have to do that not knowing exactly where they're going to take you and how those dots are going to connect up. But they always do. Trust that taking care of those things will take care of you. And I know you'll be great. Good luck.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
And now, some exhilarating deals that won't blow up your entire life. We'll be right back. I've got homes.com as a sponsor for this episode. Homes.com knows when it comes to home shopping, it's never just about the house or the condo. It's about the homes. And what makes a home is more than just the house or property. It's the location. It's the neighborhood.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
If you've got kids, it's also schools, nearby parks, transportation options. That's why homes.com goes above and beyond to bring home shoppers the in-depth information they need to find the right home. It's so hard not to say home every single time. And when I say in-depth information, I'm talking deep.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Each listing features comprehensive information about the neighborhood, complete with a video guide. They also have details about local schools with test scores, state rankings, student-teacher ratio. They even have an agent directory with the sales history of each agent. So when it comes to finding a home, not just a house, this is everything you need to know all in one place, homes.com.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Raise your hands in the air and signal to us where you are. I mean, it's pretty, like, they are like someone is probably or possibly in the house. Yeah, they're not like, oh, yeah, rock at the window. So they clear the whole house. And then they're like, do you have cameras? We see cameras. Can we look at the footage?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
We've done your homework. If you liked this episode of Feedback Friday and found our advice valuable, I invite you to do what other smart and considerate listeners do, which is take a moment and support our sponsors. All of the deals, discount codes, and ways to support the podcast are searchable and clickable at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. Our AI chatbot can surface codes for you.
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1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
And if that doesn't work, you can always email me, jordan at jordanharbinger.com. Happy to dig up codes for you because it is that important that you support those who support the show. Now, back to Feedback Friday. All right, now for the recommendation of the week. I am addicted to lit filler.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
No, no, no. Everything I've been watching recently has been about how to shoot targets in the dark.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Yeah, exactly. I'm watching like dudes with beards and tattoos talk about how to clear your house.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
So we look at the footage, and there's nothing at all at the time that the window broke. And we're just mystified. And they're like, well, okay. Maybe this window's defective and the wind blew it in. And the other cop's like, I don't think so. This didn't even break in the middle, which is where it would break most likely if the wind. So they're like kicking the glass.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
And then after that, she said, motherfucking cocksucker, fuck her.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Riveting I really deeply feel for somebody who has to deal with something like that like what you can't go to the mall and eat tacos with your friends because You might do something and then parents are calling security because you're doing this around their kids You're just like I have a disability. I can't help it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
It's yeah, it's terrible Imagine dating like I've got Tourette's and someone's like oh I have you know, whatever I've got a like a prosthetic leg and you go show up and you're like, okay I can't be around this person. Are you kidding? We're gonna get arrested
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
And you can talk about it in our subreddit over at the Jordan Harbinger subreddit. A lot of interesting conversations happening over there. If you're a Reddit user, we talk about episodes. We talk about random stuff that's recommended in the episodes. Go find it on Reddit. If you're a Redditor, it's the Jordan Harbinger subreddit.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
There's a huge pile of shattered glass in my house. They're like, there would be a rock in here somewhere. They're like, you didn't find anything. You didn't move anything. I'm like, no, I ran out after charging towards the window to scare whoever it was away. I ran left and barricaded the door. And they're like, huh. Could it be an animal?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
So I've been waiting for this for anybody who didn't catch that episode real quick. This is the guy that was I think it was in his 40s married to a woman, but they've been living separate lives for a while. And one day he gets some flirty messages from a pretty woman online. He does a reverse image search of her photo and he discovers that it actually belongs to a different woman entirely.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
And then he tracks down that woman, and she tells him that her ex-boyfriend used her pictures for this kind of thing in the past. And then he finds out that her ex-boyfriend, he realizes it's his, uh... wife's cousin's boyfriend. Right. Who he sees at family gatherings and stuff like that. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Yeah. And he's trying to figure out like, okay, is this guy trying to blackmail me? Is he trying to give my wife ammunition for a divorce or is he enjoying this? Is he flirting with me? Does he want to hook up? Like what's going on here?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Right. And our response was basically like, this is very bizarre, very confusing. Okay. It's kind of fun, but you got to be careful here because this could easily blow up in your face. More likely than not. Right.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Oh, for God's sake. What good was our advice then? Ah, man. Gabe, is this dude just trolling us?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Don't get me wrong, I am stupidly excited to hear what's about to happen, so maybe part of this is our fault, but alright, continue.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Okay. So the plan is blame it on the alcohol.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
During the week, we have long-form conversations with a variety of amazing folks from undercover agents, gold smugglers, money laundering experts, astronauts, and tech moguls to
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
And they're like, how would an animal get over this fence, though? Were your gates open at all? Did a big animal run in here? They're like, well, there's no fur, there's no blood. And then one of the officers, she goes, why don't we just back up the tape a little bit more in case we have the timing wrong?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Oh, so he was doing this to other people too, or just to our friend here and that's what she actually caught him doing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Oh man, this poor woman. She can't get away from this relationship. Like I broke up with him three years ago. Stop calling me.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Yeah, this guy's officially scaring me a little bit. So he was trying to tempt other men he knows personally to see if they're faithful because he considers himself a vigilante. There's something wrong with this guy, and I don't fully buy that story either.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
So I think this answers our friend here's question from his first letter about what this guy's up to. If what the catfisher said is true, which I suppose that's still an if, but if that's true, then he is trying to bust our friend here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
And sure enough, what we find is one of our security outdoor systems, which is like a totally separate hardwired thing, it's 11 minutes off the timer. The internal clock is 11 minutes off.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Right. You don't want to do a service to women and be of some sort of weird Instagram vigilante for no reason. It's also possible that he is getting off sexually on these messages, and that's harder to admit. Or it's a little bit of both. But the fact that he admitted to this game he's playing, I don't know. He just seems like a total weirdo.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Best case scenario, he's in the closet and this is his way of safely flirting with men. Worst case scenario, he's a manipulative creep who's, you know, just got one out for him. This just makes no sense.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Oh, God. This guy is the definition of doing it for the plot. I'm not even mad about it. Damn.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
We go back another 20 minutes and sure enough, what we find are three dudes who have clearly been to my house before because I have tricky gate latches that are like in weird places and they just without looking almost just do it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
I mean, you're not wrong. I still can't say I support this, but go off.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Oh yeah, we got it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Oh man. Well, that postscript really speaks volumes, doesn't it?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Yeah, I mean, the guy's hiding. He's stuck between two identities. I think we talked about that in the original segment. He isn't ready to own who he is, take some steps towards openly pursuing it. I'll refrain from rehashing that point, but honestly, it makes me, yeah, a little bit sad. And I'm afraid that it's making him vulnerable to an unknown quantity like this catfisher.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
So look, I'm over here eating my popcorn like everybody else listening right now. Thanks for keeping us in the loop. The predicament you're in is objectively entertaining. But I can't say that I share your view that this is a pretty great outcome. Not to beat a dead horse, but this guy, he's weird and squirrely and manipulative. And it's just not somebody I would want to get close to at all.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
I understand that he represents something meaningful to you. I get that he's allowing you to explore your sexuality in a way that feels safe right now. But I just don't know if continuing to engage with this guy or pushing things further is a wise decision. Yes, the risk to you is lower now. I guess you're right there. But in another way, it's higher because now you know a lot more about this guy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
They walk in, they go through both gates, they duck under this other floodlight, which turns on, but they just didn't care because they were already inside one of our gates. And they go around my house, around towards where my hot tub is, around my gym. And they try to break through these big sliding windows that I have in the back.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
You know he has a pattern of doing this kind of thing. You know he has a history of lying, going MIA, maintaining a secret life, compromising people he's involved with. There's a world where he's doing this for creepy and nefarious reasons, to entrap you into cheating, to possibly tell your wife what you're up to, even if he is also enjoying flirting with you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
So my question for you is, why do you still want to get involved with this guy? How is it worth it? Because he has nice biceps or whatever? Come on, man. I think you can tell how I feel about all this, but you got to answer these questions for yourself. Look, it's not that I don't understand your reasons for wanting to explore this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
In the last segment, we talked about how that's really the most important thing to come out of this whole experience, what it's showing you about yourself. I'm not judging your orientation or the thrill that you feel.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
I'm just really encouraging you to get more curious about where you are in your journey, how you're owning these parts of yourself, how you're managing your life overall, to get more curious about all that than you are about whether this particular dude should be your lover or whatever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Yeah, me too. Look, I commend him for knowing that about himself. I'm glad he thought that that was worth sharing with us, but he needs to take a much closer look at that quality. Because again, it might be making him very vulnerable here, or at least about to stumble into an embarrassing misunderstanding. That said, if you guys do meet up, you have to send us another update, obviously.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
It's Feedback Friday. We're not about to miss a killer dues cruise. But please be safe, be discerning, keep your guard up, think ahead, keep looking inward. There's still so much more for you to know about yourself and the hidden costs of this double life that you're leading. Don't forget to check out our episodes with Scott Payne, the FBI agent who infiltrated a criminal biker gang.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
and our Skeptical Sunday on homeschooling. If you haven't heard those yet, now's a great time to get them started. The best things that have happened in my life and business have come through my network, the circle of people I know, like, and trust. I'm teaching you how to build the same thing for yourself. The course is free.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
6minutenetworking.com is where you can find it over on the Thinkific platform. Their drills, their exercises, you can plow through the course. I wish I knew this stuff 20 years ago. It works whether you're young or old, employed or retired or a student. Dig the well before you get thirsty. Build those relationships before you need them. You can find them all at 6minutenetworking.com.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
But we have a screen that went down that they couldn't lift up without making a bunch of noise. What's really scary is they hide behind this box of toys that we have. And another guy hides behind the wall. And then one dude uses a glass breaker on my window and then donkey kicks it in. That's what I heard. The glass breaker that went thump. And then him donkey kicking the window.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Show notes and transcripts on the website, advertisers, discounts, ways to support the show, all at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. I'm at jordanharbinger on Twitter and Instagram. You can also connect with me on LinkedIn. Gabe's over on Instagram at Gabriel Mizrahi or on Twitter at Gabe Mizrahi. This show is created in association with Podcast One.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
My team is Jen Harbinger, Jace Sanderson, Robert Fogerty, Ian Baird, Tata Sidlowskis, and of course, Gabriel Mizrahi. Our advice and opinions are our own, and I am a lawyer, but I am not your lawyer. Do your own research before implementing anything you hear on the show. Remember, we rise by lifting others. Share the show with those you love.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
If you found the episode useful, please share it with somebody else who could use the advice we gave here today. In the meantime, I hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn, and we'll see you next time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
You're about to hear a preview of The Jordan Harbinger Show about some of the most controversial and misunderstood topics in sexuality, including what makes people gay and the differences between gay men and gay women.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
To hear more on the latest in sex research with leading clinical psychologist and sexologist Dr. James Cantor, check out episode 815 on The Jordan Harbinger Show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
And then these guys go to charge in my house to try to get the jump on us. But lo and behold, Psycho Jordan was right there going. And you can see them freeze like children and then bolt like they were not expecting anyone to be home or they were. And they just thought, oh, we're going to get the jump on this dude. Oh. And I happened to be right there.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
And I happen to have an immediately and very aggressive reaction. And they were like, OK, bye. Thank God. So they ran back out. Thank God. Yeah. So they ran out the way they came.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
This week we had Scott Payne, an FBI agent who infiltrated a biker gang as well as some other crazy, crazy, just actually insane people gangs that you would never want to be a part of if you were searching for a gang to be a part of. I don't know. It takes all kinds, I suppose.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
So we can see them on the cameras. Looking in our windows to see if people are home or if lights are on but these geniuses again Who have cased our house failed to realize that they were looking at blackout curtains? So they probably thought oh, it's pitch-black in there not realizing I'm looking at a curtain genius how you were out of town or yeah?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
So they probably saw our nanny pull out at a certain time And then we're like no one's home because I keep my car in the garage because I'm not an idiot You know why would I park my car there got it? So they saw some of our help come and go and And they probably were like, OK, this is what time they leave every night or whatever. And they don't come back till the next day. So disturbing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
It's super disturbing. Yeah. So the cops, it was funny because I felt kind of bad. I was like, oh, my gosh, you know, like we didn't have much of a plan. You know, my Jen, she did a good enough job, but also she's like running around the hall holding a baby. And I'm like, you need to lock yourself in the bathroom, not be running around in the living room in circles, you know.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
And to her credit, it's like, well, what else are you supposed to do? You're supposed to take care of the kids. She didn't know whether to run out the front door or stay in the house like I was telling her to do. And the answer is you stay in the house and barricade yourself in because if they're looking for you, they can just walk around your house and go find you standing in your front lawn.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
So that's no good. And she's like, I don't want to be trapped, though. So we have to kind of go through this whole thing. We're going to hire a security consultant and strengthen some of our doorways and stuff like that, because basically, once you're in the house, it's like you've got to kick through some crappy plywood painted doors to get into any other part of the house.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
And that's not going to be good if my kids and wife are in the bedroom or if like we end up in the guest room or something like we need some place where we can go. That's not just like a shoulder check away from the rest of the house. I was kind of bummed about how it all panned out. The cops missed them by like 30 seconds, too, by the way.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
They ran to our neighbor's house and then you can see them running back because they were like, oh, crap, the cops are coming this way and we're in the corner. So they just made it out. They just made it out. These guys like the cops are like this was planned, but these guys were not.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
I was really disappointed in my glass until I realized they use a glass breaker because this is triple pain tempered glass. And it really looks like this 140 pound skinny piece of shit just kicks it with his foot.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
his ghetto air force ones or whatever and but he used a glass breaker and as much as they had watched our house these guys were hardly professional i mean it looks like they play call of duty and they're like we're gonna charge in there the way they reacted when i was like hey i'll kill you they i mean these are like kids who got busted with their hand in the cookie jar these were not like we've got an exfil plan i mean they ran the wrong way towards the road and then ran back because the cops were coming it's like you guys are not
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
We also had a Skeptical Sunday on homeschooling, which many of you hated, and I can't say I totally disagree with why, and many of you loved. And it's really interesting because many of the people who hated it were educators, and many of the people who loved it were educators. So go back and listen to those two if you haven't done so yet.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Not top-tier talent. No, I mean, they're not sending their best, right? So it's like these guys were dumbasses. And the other thing that was funny was you can see on the camera where they walk because they're wearing these running shoes that have these reflective strips on them. And I'm like, you guys don't realize that you're actually extra visible at night?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
If you try to hide from the cops with these shoes on, you are visible from a block away with these bright-ass running shoes on, you morons.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
They found a nice house and they're like, we can rob this house and let's go check the gates or whatever. But these guys are not like stealing the Maltese Falcon or whatever. These guys are just dumb pricks that ordered some crap off of Amazon that breaks glass really.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
For me, no, because I'm mostly just angry. I've got a board over the window of where I am, but I call it my friend is love him or hate him. My friend is Elon Musk's head of security. And I was like, what do I need to do? And he's like, here's what we have. And he sent me some links to some pretty cool stuff like glass that's bulletproof that are like coatings you can put over existing windows.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
That's you can basically take a sledgehammer to it and the glass will shatter, but it won't break. You have a real hell of a time getting in. Of course, the problem is what happens if there's a fire and we need the firemen to get in? They now need to run the engine through the front door because they can't break the glass. Pick your poison, I guess. Yeah, it's pick your poison.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
So there's some issues there that we've got to figure out. I've got to call the fire department. They might be like, oh yeah, no, we jam a crowbar in there and we like rip it out and it's no problem. Don't worry. But I need to make sure because it's far more likely that we have some situation like that than we have the Purge 2.0 come to our house.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
It's happening more, the cops said, but also they said your house stands out in your neighborhood. So we bought a house in a nice, normal neighborhood and we tore it down because it was like a teardown. And we built another house there. There's a few nice houses. It's our house, my brother-in-law's house, the architect who designed our houses lives next door to both of us.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
And then there's two other nice houses on the street and everything else is from like 1950. They're normal houses. They're not gross. But it's like, oh, here's a two-story house that has a brand new whatever and a Tesla in the driveway. And the other houses are, you know, one-story ranches that have a, they look normal.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
On Fridays, though, we share stories, take listener letters, offer advice, play obnoxious soundbites, and marvel at the crazy-ish that life can throw our way.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
So if you're going to rob a house on that street, it's going to be ours because we got too much glass or my neighbors. So, of course, my neighbors are like, oh, crap, we are all in this area.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
Yeah, they are. They're taking notes. And it's good because the cops said they probably won't hit our house again, the same crew, because now they realize that they can't tell when we're home. And since I didn't hurt any of them, they have no reason to have like some sort of beef with me personally. That's comforting.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
This is what actually really pisses me off. I don't mind replacing the glass. I don't mind that I have to do security upgrades. I slept like a rock the next night, so it's obviously not really affecting me. My ordering sleep scores have been through the roof because I'm sleeping like a baby.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
They should break in at least once a month and reset my sleep score. Get your eight and a half hours out of it. That's right. The thing that really pisses me off is my daughter, who's three, keeps saying, why are there bad guys? Where are the bad guys? Are the bad guys still hiding? Are they in our house? So I'm really pissed off that these guys scared my daughter.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
And I've been conflicted because, of course, for me, I'm like, I really wish I'd smoked one or two of them and just let them bleed out of my lawn. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
No, that would have been, that would have been really scary because it triggers my anxiety. And this would have been like proof that it's all in your head, Jordan. Oh no. Someone's actually trying to break into your house. No, that would have been a terrible, what a nightmare. 16 cops in my house. And I'm like, no, I'm just really tired guys. I'm just really tired.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1121: Ethics Expire with Doctor's Desire | Feedback Friday
I always have eyes that look like this. It's totally normal. yeah so that pisses me off because my kids are scared but as my friend pointed out because I was like I really I should have gotten my strap and just lit the window up and I would have hit at least the guy that kicked in the window and came through oh my god that's so intense but as my friend pointed out
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Actually, quite a bit more, but it's like a three hour long show. We cut it down and uploaded it into our feed as well. On Fridays, though, we tell stories, take listener letters, offer advice and put Gabe in his proper place in the handsome boy hierarchy, I guess. That's right. But you know what, Gabe?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Again, such an interesting argument, because there is a world where he loses out in construction contracts because he didn't get a lap dance or whatever alongside Dave the Drill Operator or whatever. Dave the Drill.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
For sure. Hey, Mercedes, I'm Dave. They call me Dave the Drill Operator.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Yeah, as Mercedes puts her Derek hand on, anyway.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
This party though is so ridiculous. It reminds me, did I, I think I've told this on the show before. When I was working at this offshoot of Maxim, I went to this party that was for, there's a website called Seeking Arrangements, which I guess is like women who want to date older men and in exchange for dating them, you buy them handbags or something. So I went to cover this party.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Right. The LA vice squad showed up, raided the place, and I ended up chatting with them, and I ended up taking out one of the cops.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
And honestly, she was so interesting. She was also like 10 years older than me, and she looked like the kind of person who could and would beat me up. I didn't really... That was kind of the beginning and the end of it. But it was... That turned out to be a bunch of prostitutes that were also on the site to generate leads, and it was a whole thing. But... It really can get skeevy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
And I also went to that being like, oh, I'm just going to cover this party. And I could have easily gotten arrested. I mean, I don't know what Vice Squad does. They probably have the authority to arrest anybody who's even around that kind of stuff.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
As far as headshots are concerned, your headshots would put you, I hate to say it, slightly above me in the handsome boy hierarchy. I got to get your headshot guy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
So interesting. This is a bit of a conundrum, a construction conundrum. Yeah, let's drill down, shall we? Yes, let's. So like I said, yes, this type of thing is definitely real among men. I also feel like it's going away the more we as a culture talk about gender and power dynamics and what's appropriate at work and all that stuff, although clearly it hasn't gone away entirely.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Yeah, it sure seems like it. The industry your husband works in, it obviously plays by different rules. These male-dominated fields just haven't maybe evolved the same way that, say, the legal profession has. So, yes, there's probably a case to be made for having to attend events like this to rub elbows with the right people.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
We just, you're like, oh, you're giving your nightmare fuel. Can you not?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
I had to grab it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
All right, we're done.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
I just need a, you know what? I'm not going to finish that sentence. So this is a real thing. Your husband might have had some legit reasons for being there, even if it is objectively weird, just because I agree with you, it is weird. On the other hand, the other Derek hand, whenever I hear a guy tell me, oh, yeah, I went to this work thing at a strip club, made some good contacts.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
It's part of my job. I'm always like, is that really the only place you could have met them? The champagne room at Scores next to Howard Stern? Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Right, right. You can't join the Frisbee team or put 15 minutes a week in on LinkedIn. It's never been easier to meet people not with a stranger's butt in your face.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Handsome boy zero. Is that how that works?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Yeah, they just might not be very active on LinkedIn.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
I just think it's lame and weird, but it is possible. But then my take on this is what attitude are you attending this event with? What is your goal? Right. Are you going for an hour or two? Are you being super strategic and efficient about meeting the people you want to meet and then going home to your wife?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Are you hanging out for seven hours while the catering staff take off more and more items of clothing under the guise of networking? Because those are two very different things. And I feel like part of her anger is that he stayed as long as he did. He wasn't texting her regularly. Right. He just took his sweet ass time coming home after that, which to be fair, I mean, that is kind of sus.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
But once we hit our 30s, our natural supply starts to dip, and yeah, you might start feeling a little creaky. Notice your skin and hair just aren't what they used to be. Daily collagen supplementation can help with skin, joints, hair, nails. Vital Proteins is the number one collagen peptides brand in the US, so they know what they're doing. It's super easy to take.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Like 45 minutes later, his dots moving.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Yeah, she's not entirely wrong there, I think.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
You were scarred by the one strip club you ever went to in, where was that? Nepal or something?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Was that the name?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Yeah. Oh God.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Oh, I bet you made some good top tier human trafficker connections.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
So this is our last show of the year, and man, what a year it was. We're going to take a few questions like we always do, and then we'll do something a little different and share a few words about what 2024 meant to us. I also, full disclosure here, I took a pain pill because I am in some pain. Nothing to worry about, folks. I'm sure it'll be fine by the time you hear this and email me.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
are about and whether they're legit and most importantly what they mean to her husband specifically what is this guy getting out of them right you know it's funny you mentioned that i'm also not a strip club guy i used to work at one when i was a teenager as security of course you did yeah i think i've told this story before and i used to see like i went worked at an after hours one that was kind of like brothel-y and had underage women and then i remember my friend robin who was a dancer at one of them
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
her friend was on stage and a dude just whipped out a knife and cut her on the butt with a knife. Oh my God. It was horrible. After that, I was like, if I'm not getting paid a hundred dollars an hour to work here, I'm not coming here. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
I was literally 18 or 19 years old at this point, just not old enough to be around that kind of stuff. So yeah, she feels like he enjoyed it a little too much. And that felt like a violation. I get it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
For sure. But then he might have lied about it because he knew she'd never go for it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
I agree. So her other argument is, if these guys are married, what does that say about them? And are these the type of people you'd want to go into business with? And on that point, my feeling is, I'm actually not sure it's fair to hold him to this standard, whether he morally approves of these guys. People do business with people they don't like or respect all the time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
If I'm in this guy's industry, I'm just not sure if I give a crap if Dave blows half his paycheck at the White Unicorn every weekend. I care if his check clears, if he can introduce me to the construction company, whatever it is. It would be a different story if he were thinking of being business partners with some of these guys, maybe. Then the relationship is a lot deeper.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
The moral character and standards of the person you're getting involved with, they have real implications for you. There's also something to be said for seeing people in a situation like that, when they're drunk and they're doing something that's engaged in a vice, you get to see a version of people and, you know, you might decide that you don't like that about them.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
So it's educational either way.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Yeah, I've definitely been in business with people and then, you know, they get a little too drunk or they, you know, they go to some after hours place and I'm like, oh, you do cocaine. I didn't know that. This relationship has a hard boundary that I'm not going to cross because you do drugs and you put those in your body.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
As I'm sitting here on Oxycontin, you do drugs recreationally and something, something. But what if this is about just getting contracts, building a network in an industry where you might have to move in some skeezy spaces sometimes? I don't know if it's fair to judge your husband for not judging these other people. I also think that her husband is making some concessions here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Well, right. I mean, it's vasectomy pain, but you're supposed to be able to take Tylenol and everything's fine. That hasn't been the case for me.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
He's saying, hey, look, I can't promise these events won't happen again, but I'll always tell you if it happens, I won't keep it a secret.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
They need to get clear on what these events mean, what he's doing and not doing at them, why he's going, whether looking at naked women is in fact a violation or a form of cheating, which might be a conversation. Or maybe our friend here is very clear about what that means. And there's no wiggle room for her on this at all.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
I'm also curious about that double standard we talked about, the fact that he she says he would leave her if the tables were turned. What that means. How does that factor in?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Sure. I want to say it's a double standard, but I also feel like guys are wired differently and maybe there's a world where they can go to a weird party where the women are topless and it doesn't mean anything. And it's not taking them away from their wives at the end of the day. Again, not a party I'd want to go to, but a lot of men say that it's just, you know, entertainment and whatever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Maybe they're repressed.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Right. Yeah. And that's something else they need to talk about. So my take and look, I might be biased as a man. I'm very curious to know what other women listening think about this. So feel free to write in and we'll pass on other opinions to our friend here. But my take is you and your husband are both making some fair points.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
He might have some good reasons to attend dumb events like this, and he might be right about the way his industry works. And you might have some good reasons to be concerned that he seems to be enjoying these events just a little bit too much and some very fair reasons to feel hurt by the way he handled all this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
That's right. Basically, I took an OxyContin. I've never tried it before. I am a little nervous about what that might entail for the balance of Feedback Friday, and I took it about 10 minutes ago, so I guess we'll see what happens. I hate OxyContin. Really? Again, I've never tried it, so I don't know what to expect.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
If I were in your shoes, I'd want to better understand my husband's mindset and values around these types of events because I think those are ultimately what determine whether this kind of event is fair game. And I'd hold him to higher standards around honesty and communication if I were in his shoes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
I would want my wife to know what's in my head and what's in my heart, why it might be tough to talk about this stuff sometimes, and find a way to service my career without compromising my marriage.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
So there are some important conversations to be had here, and I can't tell you whether it ends with him continuing to go on certain terms or never going again or you back down or you hold firm, but I really do feel that this has less to do with the other men at this event and what happens there and more to do with how your husband conducts himself and how he lets you in on that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
and whether you trust him. And of course, just how many jumbo shrimp he destroys while he's there. But that goes without saying. So get to talking and good luck. All right. Now I'm going to take my top off and hand feed you some jumbo discounts on the fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back. This episode is sponsored in part by Delete Me.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
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1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
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1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
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1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
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1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
That's joindeleteme.com slash Jordan, code Jordan.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
This episode is also sponsored by Shopify. You know the big names, Heinz, Mattel, Allbirds. It's easy to assume their success is all about having incredible products, but the inside scoop is that it's not just what they sell, it's how they scale. And their secret sauce is Shopify. Shopify is not just a checkout tool. It's the growth engine for businesses of all sizes. Take ShopPay, for example.
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1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
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1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
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1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Thank you for listening and supporting the show. It is your support of our sponsors that keeps me flush with OxyContin. All of the deals, discount codes, and ways to support the show are all searchable and clickable over at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. Please consider supporting my drug habit. No, those who support the show. And now, back to Feedback Friday. All right.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Next up, Gabe, I do have to say, though, I really don't know if this stuff is doing anything like I said, everything still hurts. Oh, really? Yeah. I think that I took a really low dose. I'm in no danger of getting addicted to whatever this is because it is not doing anything and I'm not going to take more. It's not kicking in. Yeah. Interesting.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Maybe it did take the edge off and I just don't notice, which actually is the best use of this kind of stuff.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Yeah. It has loosened up my brain, but it has not loosened up whatever, you know, other. I'm just going to not finish that sentence.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Yeah, that's a tough sibling to have. But I'm confused. Tell mom and dad that Santa Claus isn't real? I mean, I think they know.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Okay, I see. And telling the sister that she's adopted, we don't know if that's true or not, but either way.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Yeah. What is this guy's problem?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
What is this kid's problem?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Aren't opiates supposed to make you euphoric? What the hell?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
This is so bizarre. And I'm struggling to decide if this guy is actually malicious or if he's just totally checked out and doesn't remember important things about his family. But I'm leaning towards the former, obviously.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Yeah, right. I'm kind of leaning toward the probability that he's just a misattuned weirdo. I don't know, man. It's hard for me to believe he'd actually want to harm and possibly kill his niece. But our friend here knows his brother way better than we do. So it makes me wonder if he's a legit sociopath or something. I mean, you don't get the allergy thing wrong twice.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Well, I guess we'll see what happens here. Before we kick off, though, super weird story to share with you guys. Someone tried to run Jen off the road more than once. And we think it has to do with our license plate that we previously had.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Well, look, if you add an address to send a gift and then it somehow got made the default, then other things that you order will go there. I've had that happen.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Maybe, but then also to coincidentally send two things that two different people in that family are allergic to.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Interesting. So he's maybe not the only person in the family who thinks that your brother's an a-hole, or at least that there's something off with this guy. That's actually good data to know.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Yeah, they seem to be giving this guy lots of latitude to be rude and an insensitive jerk while also acknowledging that he is kind of a problem.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
MC Gabey on the ones and twos now, ending 2024 strong, I see.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
You didn't even have to rail an oxy. Although I don't know. I mean, I did take it orally. And I think I need to be clear about that. So this is a tough one. First of all, I don't think you're wildly off base and being hurt and disappointed by your brother, especially given your history with him. He sounds like a tricky personality, to put it delicately.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Yeah. So years ago, and I mean, this is probably like seven plus years ago now, Jen was like, hey, should we get Elon fan as our license plate? Because we basically bought our vehicle with Tesla stock profits because we invested a little bit early in Tesla. And I was like, oh, that's really funny. Get it. And then as Elon became, you know, before he bought Twitter, everything was fine.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
And if the other stuff you said is true, if these signs of what sound a lot like narcissism are actually real, then he might in fact be dangerous, emotionally, possibly physically, especially if he's actually trying to hurt your daughter, which is so beyond the pale that frankly, I'm having, honestly, I'm having trouble believing that that could be real. But it is possible.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
I'm not doubting your account here. It's just so crappy that it's hard to swallow. Did he mean it? Yeah. Whether you're being too sensitive about all this, I don't know, because what's the barometer for too sensitive?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
If your brother hurts you in a variety of ways, throwing you under the bus for your whole life, not being very kind or thoughtful about your family, not listening to you, not being able to have a respectful conversation, blaming you for anything and everything, it's appropriate to some degree to be sensitive about that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
And I'm just not sure that there's a clear line where sensitive suddenly becomes too sensitive. You know, who gets to decide how hurtful an objectively hurtful sibling is, you know?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
That's true. So you probably won't be surprised when I say, no, you are not the a-hole here, given that everyone else loves your brother, because first of all, one has very little to do with the other. Even if your brother has some great qualities, how other people feel about him and your family, that doesn't have much bearing on what your unique relationship with him is like.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
I mean, I get why their opinion of him might give you pause, but there are freaking pillars of the community who are total monsters at home. The fact that their neighbors and customers like them doesn't automatically mean that they're wonderful human beings. I'm not saying your brother is a monster. I'm just saying that multiple things can be true. Different people can see him differently.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
More importantly, there's something about this question that makes me kind of sad. I guess for the reason Gabe just touched on, that it might be hard for you to own your true feelings about your brother when you're surrounded by family members who are kind of seduced by what sounds like his external success, which probably says a lot more about their values than it does about his,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
flawless personality.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
And then then he bought Twitter and it's like, OK, he's sort of talking too much in public.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
That's right. That really does seem to be one of the big themes of his story, which if he really investigates it, it might lead him to some really good insights. And not just about his brother, but also maybe about other areas of his life. Because this is one of those templates that we tend to take with us wherever we go.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
So on that note, I do think you have a few options for how to preserve the harmony in your family. And there are some good reasons to be a bit of a diplomat here, to not create unnecessary conflict while still protecting yourself. Because you and your brother are still tied together through this power of attorney over your parents, and it'll probably help to be on decent terms.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
We've heard some wild stories about this over the years. Things can get really ugly when siblings aren't talking and they're both responsible for their parents' care, especially when you're dealing with dementia.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
So, look, I totally get the desire to start a group text with the whole family and ask him to justify why he'd send your daughter Brazil nuts for Christmas when he saw you stab her with an EpiPen last year or whatever for being exposed to those same things. But that's not going to help anything. That's a good example of stirring the pot when you just don't have to.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Donald Trump. So it's very polarizing, especially here. So people are upset. Yeah. People are very polar. So people have like been giving her the finger honking, cutting her off in traffic, break checking her. Wow. And she's like, what's going on with the road rage these days? And then someone tried to run her actually off the road in a very aggressive way. Yeah. Really scared.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Right, he already struggles to have a real conversation with you one-on-one. That's not going to get better in a group chat.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Right. As opposed to yelling at him and giving him a piece of your mind and pointing to your whole childhood because you've already decided that he was, in fact, trying to hurt your niece, which, to be fair, you can't prove 100 percent.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
And the kids were in the car. So I was like, okay. So she's like, I'm going to the DMV right now. Yeah. Probably the right move. She should have gone to the police because we have dash cams.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Maybe. I mean, he just kind of sounds like a dickhead though.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
But am I? Maybe. Maybe I'm a dickhead for assuming that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Agreed. My gut is telling me that that's the move here. There are ways to protect yourself and your kids physically and emotionally without cutting off your brother completely or making a big scene out of it. And again, I say that partly because you have one huge practical reason to be on decent terms with a guy, which is your parents' care.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Why not? So she goes to AAA or the DMV or whatever it was, and she surrenders the plate. They're like, oh, why are you surrendering this great plate? It's really clever. And she's like, well, here's what happened. And they were like, oh my gosh. So they gave her a generic plate.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Once they're gone, things will be different and then you can reassess. But sometimes with difficult family members like this, the safety and peace you're looking for, it's really just about managing how much contact you have, the terms of that contact, and how much you allow them to dictate your feelings about yourself, especially given how unlikely it is that he's going to change.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
I hope that gives you a way forward, man. I'm sorry that you have this brother. I can only imagine how challenging that must be. But there's also an opportunity for you to grow here and build a strong relationship with yourself while also building some strong conflict muscles. And I feel like that's one big upside to this tough situation. Good luck. You can reach us Friday at jordanharbinger.com.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Keep your emails concise. Try to use descriptive subject lines. That does make our job a lot easier. If you're stuck working for an oversharing, narcissistic, holy water sprinkling mob boss wannabe who's keeping you in his orbit, you're addicted to shoplifting groceries, or you've been catfished only to turn around and catfish a catfisher, hit us up Friday at jordanharbinger.com.
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1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
We're here to help and we keep every email anonymous. All right, what's next?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Yeah, to serving to your coffee, smoothie, even water. It doesn't taste like anything, so it just blends right in.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Yeah, she's like a scientist and they're hooking her up with schleppy dudes or abusive guys, if memory serves.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
And they also said that somebody else came back that week and they had to do something and get a new plate because they had, their kid had had a terminal illness or some kind of crazy illness. And the Zuckerberg Foundation said, Ended up treating and I think putting their kid into remission. So they had all these Mark Zuckerberg stickers on their car and plate somehow.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Right. Because they didn't approve to say the least.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Oh, nice.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Wow. That is huge. I remember how much agony she was in about all this. When you come from a family like this, this is a big deal. She must have been so nervous doing this. My God.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Okay, pot, meat, kettle, my goodness.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
You know, this is interesting. It makes me wonder if she secretly feels differently and supports you or just doesn't have as strong of a position as your dad, but can't say that because your dad is a prick.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
And people were vandalizing the car. Oh, wow. So they took all that stuff off and changed their license plate. That's so crazy. You know, if you get that upset by the references to these people, your world is just way too small. Is that a fair thing to say, Gabriel? Because look, there's a lot of people that I don't love.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Fascinating. There's that theme again. This guy, he's an asshole. Plain and simple.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
I mean, there is such a thing as overreacting or taking things too personally. But I find it interesting that like eight times out of 10, when somebody accuses someone else of being too sensitive, it's usually because they're just they're being an ass. They're being objectively hurtful. And then they're like, oh, I don't want to apologize. So I have to turn this back on to them.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Wow. Massive round of applause slash respect for her doing this. I'm so proud of her. Her parents are black belt emotional manipulators and she got out of that orbit, that tractor beam. She escaped it and is following something that she knows will make her happy. And man, you think they're ignoring your situation now. Wait till you tell them you're getting married. Oh my gosh.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Are they going to come to the wedding? Just mentally prepare yourself, I think, for your dad to just like not want to go to your wedding, which is really sad and his loss. But it seems like he's really stubborn and just hell bent on being a complete asshole.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
If someone had a Vladimir Putin license plate, I wouldn't waste, I'd think they were an idiot, but I wouldn't waste any time running them off the road. If anything, I'd be like, wow, why did you choose to get that? That's a choice. If anything, I would be afraid that they are going to run me off. Right, yeah. Nice Bashar al-Assad license plate. Maybe I'll switch lanes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
this isn't over yet, right? When she says, hey, mom, I'm getting married, you and dad should come. And then it's, okay, I'll ask your dad. And the dad's like, no, we're not coming. And we're not going to let the family come because I got to get my way. It's just going to be a whole thing. Just mentally prepare yourself maybe for that a little bit. I'm sure she already has.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Get 20% off by going to vitalproteins.com and enter promo code Jordan at checkout. These statements have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. This product is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
I mean, I guess the best case scenario here is over time, the parents realize, oh, this is really happening. They're getting married or she's pregnant or whatever. And they maybe finally come around to maybe I should build a relationship here. It's got to be so frustrating to be a person like her dad because he's going to lose this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
But instead of just not getting his way, he's going to lose his daughter and his grandkids. And it's just like, wow, talk about just stepping on your own dong over and over again. It's very interesting how much of a sort of spoiled emotion, emotionally spoiled child her father is acting like. It's very toxic.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Yeah, wishing you the best. Thank you so much for the update. I'm very excited for you. And definitely keep in touch. We'd love to follow this as it progresses. And now for some decidedly non-toxic gift ideas. We'll be right back. This episode is sponsored in part by Ramp. Running a business is stressful enough without feeling like you've been hired as a full-time receipt detective.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Tracking expenses, reminding employees to submit documentation, chasing out receipts is a never-ending circus. Ramp is more than just a corporate card. It's spend management software that saves time and puts money back in your pocket. For starters, Ramp bakes spending policies right into the card.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
I'm not thinking I've got to harass this person that I don't know. It's just such a weird choice. Who has the time and the inclination? That's what I don't get. If you're triggered by that stuff, it's just very bizarre. You're way too sensitive and your world is just way too small. So I just thought that was crazy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
If somebody goes rogue with spending, Ramp detects the policy violation, tracks down missing receipts, even locks the card if needed. My favorite part is it automatically collects receipts and categorizes expenses in real time. So manual expense reports are a thing of the past.
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And because everything, card expenses, reimbursements, vendor payments, it's all in one place, you can actually see where your money is going without needing three different spreadsheets and a prayer. If you're tired of babysitting your business finances, give Ramp a try. It'll save you time, cut costs, maybe even save your sanity. And who couldn't use a little more of that?
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And now, get $250 when you join Ramp. Just go to ramp.com slash Jordan. Ramp.com slash Jordan. R-A-M-P dot com slash Jordan. Cards issued by Sutton Bank, member FDIC, terms and conditions apply.
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This episode is sponsored in part by The Defender. We all have those big goals that seem just out of reach, right? But the truth is, that's what keeps us moving forward. For the people who embrace challenges and explore their way, there's the Defender. The Defender is built to handle whatever comes its way with legendary capability, on road or off.
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This episode is also sponsored by Progressive. Let's face it, sometimes multitasking can be overwhelming. Like when your favorite podcast is playing, the person next to you is talking, your car fan is blasting, all while you're trying to find the perfect parking spot. But then again, sometimes multitasking is easy. Like quoting with Progressive Insurance.
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Comparison rates not available in all states or situations. Prices vary based on how you buy. If you like this episode of Feedback Friday and you find our advice valuable, I invite you to do what other smart and considerate listeners do, which is take a moment and support our amazing sponsors. All of the deals, discount codes, and ways to support the show are at jordanharbinger.com slash deals.
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I've never dealt with anything like that, but it's just another manifestation of how divided we are as a country, but divided in many ways by stuff that probably is just too dumb to really get worked up about. There's a lot to be upset about right now, I suppose, but actually getting upset by someone's license plate kind of makes you a dipshit. I can't see any other way around it.
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1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
The AI chatbot is also really good at surfacing the codes over at jordanharbinger.com slash AI. And hey, if that doesn't work, you can email us jordan at jordanharbinger.com and we'll dig up the code for you. It is that important that you support those who support the show. All right, back to Feedback Friday. And now for the recommendation of the week.
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My recommendation of the week is tailored clothing. I know this sounds a little bit basic and people are like, yeah, I've got a tailored suit. As I've mentioned a few times over the last few years, I've really gotten in shape. I've lost a bunch of weight. My body has taken a completely different kind of proportion, I guess I could say. It's been a cool journey.
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But now I'm literally a size small pants with a 32 inch inseam. And a lot of the dad shirts from a lot of brands, especially American brands, they just don't fit. Because when you're not sort of filling out your gut and stuff like that, and you have, and I will never fail to mention this, when you have a six pack, your shirts are boxy and they don't look good.
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And your choice is to, I don't know, find some fancy European brands and then what, donate all your clothes or look at a reasonably priced tailor in your area and take a couple of shirts in, have them tailored, test them out, see if you like it, and then say, hey, you did a really good job with these. What if I bring you 10 other shirts and four pairs of pants?
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Can you cut me kind of a bulk deal on these things? So instead of, I don't know, 25 bucks to tailor a shirt, it's down to 20. and you pay a couple hundred bucks more, but you don't have to buy all new clothes, and now everything fits to your exact measurements.
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Now, I wouldn't go too small, because you might gain a little bit of weight back or whatever, but you don't have to get rid of your entire wardrobe. You can just have stuff tailored. Most of us don't think about doing that. We think about doing it with a suit. We might think about doing it with some kind of jacket, but you should be doing it with pretty much every pair
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of pants or shirts, as long as they're decent enough to do it with, that doesn't fit you the way that you want. It's actually quite cost effective. Another trick that I have is, say I'm going to Taiwan for a couple of weeks. Instead of paying 30 bucks to have a t-shirt tailored here in California, I'll just pack another suitcase. I might even pay to check the bag, might be 50 bucks.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
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Then I go to a tailor in Taiwan, drop off an entire suitcase full of stuff that doesn't fit, and then for, I don't know, a fifth or a tenth of the price, in a week, I've got tailored everything. And then I come back. So you can really get a whole new wardrobe, essentially, by taking clothes that don't fit to countries where things just aren't as expensive. And I highly recommend this.
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It's very, very much a way to kind of pay for part of your vacation. I've had so many clothes tailored in Serbia back in the day that I paid for my airline ticket in savings.
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And everything fit amazing. You know, you really just have tailored clothes. It's amazing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
All right, Gabe, what's the first thing out of the mailbag?
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It is. Yeah, I highly recommend it. I think it's one of the best ways to look and feel great and you don't need to actually buy new clothes. It's actually cheaper than buying new clothes. Also, in case y'all don't know, there's a subreddit for the show if you want to jump into discussions with other listeners about specific episodes. Something you liked, something you didn't like.
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There's a lot of meme threads, a lot of fun stuff going on in the Jordan Harbinger subreddit over on Reddit. Alright, so this is our last episode of 2024, and as we close out the year, I wanted to take just a few minutes to reflect on another extraordinary year. First of all, as always, I continue to be so proud to host this show, so grateful. I feel like I
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say this every year, but getting to talk to such remarkable people, sharing their stories, their wisdom with all of you, it is very special. It's so much fun. I'm kind of in awe that I get to do this as a job. It's a literal dream come true. Then hearing all your stories on Feedback Friday, getting to grow with you, play with you, sometimes be shocked by you, definitely entertained by you.
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It's truly an honor and a joy. It really is. And then we get to tackle some of my favorite topics on Skeptical Sunday. That stimulates a whole other part of my brain, and it's been really cool to see how those episodes land with all of you.
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And the fact that I get to do all this with such an amazing team, and I know every podcaster out there sings their team's praises, and they should, but our team really is in a league of their own, and you guys notice this stuff all the time. You always write in and tell us all the time. Jen, my wife, my producer, my partner, the magician behind the scenes. She makes the trains run on time.
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She coordinates our marketing, our sponsors, our schedule. Literally every aspect of the show is possible because of her. So Jen's a real MVP over here. Jay Sanderson is our editor. He's a true savant when it comes to audio. We send him a lot of stuff that probably would get trashed and it comes out pristine.
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Kim Jong-un vanity. Does it fit though? Limited edition. I think you can just get Kim Jong. I don't think the rest of it will fit.
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He's also a gem of a human being and he's the person who makes us sound so crisp and clean week after week. And then Robert Fogarty, our other associate producer, the invisible glue holding this whole operation together. He's the guy behind our detailed show notes, our publishing schedule, our tech stack, all that stuff. He's also really funny and erudite and just a lovely, lovely guy.
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Big fan of Bobby Figatti. And Ian, he does all of our video work, so he's not in the audio side of things. But if you've ever watched an episode of this podcast on YouTube, that's his handiwork. Super reliable. the only digital nomad that I would ever consider hiring. And he's been working with us for a long, long time. He always cringes when I say that. Ian, your job is in no danger.
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You're an old standby and you're not going anywhere. Actually, you're going everywhere. But as far as you're, as far as you working here with us, you're a rock solid dude and we couldn't do it without you. And then Tadas, our man from the Baltic States living in Western Europe. He's the guy who hand draws. Yes, those are hand drawn, all that show art for each guest. That is his handiwork.
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He does those for us every single week. And he's just really appreciate the work. He's never been late with anything. I mean, we just really have a lot of good luck with this team. Really incredible. And then there's Gabe, who's, you know, you're all right, I guess. He shows up on time, does the job. Got a few notes. Can talk about those later. I'm kidding, of course.
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Gabe, you are bringing to the show the kind of person that I would like to be in real life. And, you know, I can always rely on you. I never have to worry about The quality of what we produce, I know that you set the standard really high, and we meet that week after week, and I just really, really appreciate that about you. How long have we been doing this together?
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Okay, so it seems like a lot longer, and I don't mean that in the way that it may come across, but we have a lot more coming down the pipe together, and I'm just really excited about all that, and it's really cool to be able to work with your best friend.
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All that to say, this team is amazing. I want to thank all of them from the bottom of my heart for their hard work, their creativity, their love, their dedication. I could go on and on. This show would literally not be possible without them. Gabe, I was thinking about some of the letters we got this year and I was like, should we do a top five kind of thing? Talk about some of the bangers?
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Same. Obviously, we get bangers every single week. It's hard to even begin to try to rank them, but I thought it would be fun to revisit a few of our greatest hits. So for me, coming in at number five is the one from last week, the guy who was reverse catfishing his catfisher kind of.
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I don't think that'll fit, but you could probably make it work.
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It was just like one bit of bad judgment after another, potentially.
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1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Exactly. It may yet unfold even more. Number four, the Maga grandparents who were super right wingy, but then smuggled in undocumented immigrants who murdered somebody in Mexico and smuggled them using a coyote.
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But they still paid a coyote to smuggle an illegal into the country after being like, it's the illegals. And it's like, okay.
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Actually, that's not bad. See if that's taken. All right, let's do it.
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1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
And then number three for me is that I think he said he was a sex addict and he got that lesbian couple pregnant. And then I don't know, they broke up and they were like, we're suing you for child support. And he's like, what the hell?
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They're coming after him for child support. Cause they're like, Oh, we need money.
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1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
But he didn't have a child, but he never got a copy. The whole thing is just totally ridiculous. And then number two for me is maybe the saddest story we've ever taken on the show. The one about the friend with postpartum psychosis who ended up killing her baby. That was horrific.
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Obviously the rubber mallet story. That was episode 926. Yep. Okay.
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Yeah, that one's grandfathered in as far as I'm concerned because that is one of my all-time favorite moments on the show when we couldn't even get through this incredibly dark letter without laughing our faces off. And so many people wrote in after that one. It's just Feedback Friday lore at this point. And I still think about this woman.
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So for those who don't remember or didn't hear this one, and Gabe, it's been a while, the woman who wrote in dated a really abusive guy and she separated from him. And then that guy went on to date this other woman who one day... I can't remember exactly why.
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So they get out of the car and he's walking down the road and she runs up behind him and takes a rubber mallet that she's apparently had in her trunk and just kneecaps the guy. And while he's on the ground, she gets back in the car and runs him over and then runs him over again multiple times. And then drove off. Oh, that's right. She drove up. Gabe's giggling like a psychopath.
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Gabe was giggling like a psychopath. You're doing it now. You're giggling like a psychopath now. We couldn't even finish this letter. We couldn't even. It was so hysterical. And now that I'm saying it makes me feel a little bit like maybe I'm also a psychopath. But it was so damn funny.
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And if you really if you disagree with us or you can't imagine it, you definitely have to go back and listen to episode 926.
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1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
And people were like, Oh, this is fake. You guys fell for it. So we looked up the woman's, the, the incident, there's like a mug shot with her weapon. And we're like, no, no, no, this is, this is real.
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So many good ones. It is kind of fun to look back at all the dues cruises we took this year. Yeah.
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That's right. Still smoldering in the rearview mirror, exactly, next to the limp body of your boyfriend. So, look, I don't know how you summarize a year like this. Any year.
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It was a wild one. Life is crazy. This world keeps getting more and more complicated and you guys continue to blow our minds with your letters. So I don't quite know how to do justice to all that. But I do want to say, I know this year has been hard for a lot of people in so many ways. It's been sad. It's been strange. A lot of the time it's been pretty damn bleak.
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I mean, there are wars being fought all over the world right now, deeply tragic wars. Ukraine, Russia, Israel, Gaza, Lebanon, Syria, Myanmar, Mexico, the list goes on and on. I don't know about you, but for somebody who reads the news every day, who has to follow this stuff for the show, reading about all the awful things going on in the world, it really does take a toll on me.
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It's just indescribably sad. The suffering that people experience, the intractability of certain problems. I don't have enough words here. It's very hard to watch. And here in the States, closer to home, we have so many other problems.
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Division, fear, uncertainty, economic insecurity, a broken healthcare system, maybe the weirdest economy we've had in decades, collective values in a crisis, a confusing and fragmented culture. I could go on and on. And those problems are not unique to the States. We're all dealing with them to some degree.
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But whatever you're going through, whatever side of the political aisle you're on, 2024 was a strange one, for sure. I've felt it. You've felt it. We're all experiencing it. But the idea I keep coming back to, and maybe this is a tiny bit naive of me, but I really do believe this, we have to make room for the good and the bad in our lives.
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We have to be in touch with the tragedy and the joy, because there is so much to be hopeless about, and there's so much to be hopeful for. The news is not going to remind us of that. It is not in their interest. That doesn't make people click on headlines or watch ads for Cialis before reading about something that blew up. Our minds don't easily make room for that.
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Our brains are survival machines. They fixate on the negative. But we can decide how we want to view the world, what values and mindsets we want to lead with. I'm not saying things aren't bad. They are. I'm not saying everything's great. It isn't. But I really do believe it's both.
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And we have to stay connected to our hope, our joy, our gratitude, as well as our despair, our concern, and our healthy anger. Because like we talk about a lot, to only be in touch with one, to quote handsome boy number two over here, is to not be in full contact with life.
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Gabe, let me pause you. If my wife asks me how the party is, and I take pictures of food, and then I say, hey, by the way, there's just lots of men here. So many men. That is so sus. I know you didn't really ask, but it's mostly just men. There's just lots of men.
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And the other thing I've been thinking about, and this one's more about the stories we've heard on the show this year, is how easy it is to judge other people for their choices. How tempting it is to construct narratives about what their behavior means.
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So many of the letters we get, they deal with questions of anger, disappointment, sadness, parents who did harm, relationships that didn't work out, jobs that went away, the list goes on and on. And a lot of those letters are ultimately about the stories, often painful stories, that people live with.
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And we often end up talking about how to work on those stories, either make peace with them, rewrite them, create new ones. So what I'd like to invite you all to do this year, what I'm encouraging myself to do more, is to loosen up on those stories that we live with a little bit.
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Maybe instead of just being angry at somebody who did something to hurt us, maybe we can remember that most people, not all, but most, they're not trying to screw us over. they're not deliberately trying to cause us pain. They're just trying to build a better life for themselves.
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Or they're just scared, they're not operating as their best self, or, and this is so often the case, they're not thinking about us at all. So maybe instead of just being frustrated or disappointed about a situation or an outcome, maybe we can also make room for the unexpected bright spots, the hidden opportunities.
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Maybe we can remember that no situation or relationship is all good or all bad, but always a mix of both. And how we view them or how we respond to them, that's what ultimately determines their quality and whether we get the outcomes that we say we want. I say this not to preach because honestly, I'm not some Buddha in this department. I struggle with this myself.
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I share this because it's the one big theme from this year that's really stuck out to me. And every time I hear myself say, well, you have a certain narrative about why your brother acted this way or well, you're interpreting your boss's decision this way, but isn't it also true that, you know, whatever it is in the back of my mind, I'm also going, yeah, but you do that too.
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And maybe that's something you can work on in 2025. So that's my little sermon, more of an invitation, really, hopefully an opportunity to put this one big Feedback Friday theme into practice. Gabe, is there anything you want to share? Good luck. Good luck topping what I just said. That was straight fire.
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That's right. Someone in our subreddit, please create that flair. My ego is not inflated enough.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Welcome to Feedback Friday. I'm your host, handsome boy number one, Jordan Harbinger. As always, I'm here with Feedback Friday producer, I guess, you know, handsome boy number two, Gabriel Mizrahi. Yeah, can't forget the pecking order. God. No, you cannot. HB1 over here. Gets one nickname. HB2.
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1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Bad service in here, though. That's the downside to this $10 million penthouse. Anyway...
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1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Interesting share. I don't know if I would have done that. I think I would have said coming home soon and maybe left it at that.
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1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Well, thank you for that, Gabe. Man, I don't know if I should try to tag that. I think it stands on its own. Happy New Year, everyone. See you in 2025. Can't wait to continue this open-ended dues cruise with all you. It's open bar 2025. It's on. Much love. Bye-bye. The best things that have happened in my life and business have come through my network.
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1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
I'm just going to shill 6minutenetworking.com. Go to 6minutenetworking.com. Sign up already. You've heard me shill this on the show. I don't need your credit card. Go and do it. Everybody says, oh, I wish I'd done this earlier. Now's your time. Show notes and transcripts on the website, advertisers, deals, discounts, ways to support the podcast, all at jordanharbinger.com slash deals.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
I'm at jordanharbinger on Twitter and Instagram. You can also connect with me on LinkedIn. Gabe's over on Instagram, Gabriel Mizrahi, or on Twitter at Gabe Mizrahi. This show is created in association with Podcast One. My team, again, is Jen Harbinger, Jace Sanderson, Robert Fogerty, and of course, Gabriel Mizrahi. Shout out to Ian on the video side. Toddus does the show art.
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Our advice and opinions are our own. And yeah, I'm a lawyer, but I'm not your lawyer. Do your own research before implementing things you hear on the show. Remember, we rise by lifting others. Share the show with those you love. If you found the episode useful, please share it with somebody else who could use the advice we gave here today.
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1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
No, no. I just thought like, if you say, how's the party? And I say, a lot of men. That's just sus. Why are you thinking about that? I would say, ah, the food and the drinks are not that good. Or like, ah, it's a little slow. Or the view from this place is great. I wouldn't be like, oh, the gender balance of this party is a bit of a sausage fest. Okay. Got it. Didn't ask.
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In the meantime, I hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn. And we'll see you next time. You're about to hear a preview of The Jordan Harbinger Show with former NBA superstar and American icon Shaquille O'Neal.
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1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
To hear more about how Shaq makes important business decisions and manages his expansive career, check out episode 691 of The Jordan Harbinger Show. This episode is sponsored in part by What Was That Like podcast. Have you ever wondered how it feels to watch your house burn down, be attacked by an alligator, or learn that your spouse hired someone to kill you?
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1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
What Was That Like is the podcast for you, if you're that person. Not the person who got hired to be killed, but the person who wondered, more thankfully. Real people come on every episode to explain the unbelievable situations they've been through. I think it's a funny concept for a show. I kind of wish I'd thought of it because I always get crazy stories from people.
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1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Not everything turns into a Jordan Harbinger episode. But What Was That Like? is hosted by my friend Scott Johnson, who's naturally curious and gives his guests the opportunity to share how they've really felt during some of their most surreal experiences. What they did in the morning before an earthquake, what song was playing as a gunman entered, was their stomach growling as they hid?
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1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Guests share everything they remember about their crazy, crazy experiences. So if you want to hear some disturbing slash inspiring firsthand stories about the thoughts that go through your head while surviving a kidnapping or winning the Price is Right, What Was That Like? is the podcast you've been looking for.
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1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Yeah.
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1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Every story is thoroughly researched and fact-checked so you know even the most unreal stories are actually someone's reality. Listen to What Was That Like? wherever you get your podcasts.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
This reminds me of Chris Rock putting a date on myself here. There's no sex in the champagne room. Remember that from like 1998?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
No sex in the penthouse room. Yeah, this is so sus. For the record, this is not what I mean when I say dig the well before you all get thirsty. That's not what I'm talking about.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
45 minutes. How many lap dances fit into 45 minutes? Aren't they like one song each? I don't know. It's been a while. That's a lot of lap dances. Yeah, I'm leaving soon.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
I'm really enjoying these jumbo shrimp doing some great networking over here with Mercedes from Consensual Catering.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Look, we're giving this woman nightmare fuel.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Okay, so he got there at what? 6 p.m. and then he comes home at 1? Oh, that's a long evening. So he was there for seven hours? Seven hours. That is one hell of a mixer. You don't get that at the Learning Annex.
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1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
And if you don't know what we're talking about, go back a few weeks and hear the story of the, probably the weirdest compliment and definitely the most awkward hug of my life. On the Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the stories, secrets, and skills of the world's most fascinating people and turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you.
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1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Yeah. Okay. That would have been rude. Yeah. Look, sorry, but my penis is going to be super upset if I leave right now. So.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Look, to be fair, he might not be 100% wrong about losing out on stuff. This is a thing, especially in male-dominated industries. He's in construction, drilling. It's skeezy and it's weird, but I heard it's a real thing. In fact, a friend of mine who was a dancer of the kind that you're imagining, she told me that their biggest week in Vegas was not New Year's, It wasn't the Super Bowl.
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1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
It was World of Concrete, which is a massive, massive construction conference in Vegas, one of the biggest ones. She said that's the one where it's just like off the hook and you make like, you know, 50 grand in the weekend or whatever it is. Damn. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Right. And it also makes me wonder, you guys can't go to a strip club and then expense it to the client. OK, so we can go, but we can't write it off. We have to spend our own money. Like there's just a guy in the front row raising his hand like, let me clear. I need a clarification.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
OK. Well, look, this stuff used to happen in the law too, at the law firm, especially at the higher levels where it's a lot of times it's a boys club and certain firms are also very much more like the boys than other firms, depending on the size and how old the firm is and stuff like that. That's what's dicey about it because it really does exclude women.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Either they're not invited to this bonding experience, this very weird and kind of sad bonding experience, in my opinion, But look, it's a bonding experience nonetheless, or they're invited and then they're put in this awkward position of either having to decline. Which makes them look like a wet blanket. Exactly. Although it's understandable.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Like maybe, maybe Janelle doesn't want to go to the strip club with us, but then they might be iced out or miss out on certain conversations or they don't want to, when guys are talking about it on Monday, they're like, oh, Janelle's coming, don't say anything.
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1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Our mission is to help you become a better informed, more critical thinker. During the week, we have long-form conversations with a variety of amazing folks from drug traffickers and arms dealers, astronauts and national security advisors, war correspondents and neuroscientists. This week, we had Ali Abdaal. He's a big YouTuber if you don't know him. He interviewed me on productivity, parenting,
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1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
And the other scenario is, this happened at my law firm a bunch, they agree to join, and then they have to sit there uncomfortably while the dudes they work with get lap dances over $28 gin and tonics and just not say anything about it. Awkward. Although I will say, my friend Sonia, she was always the instigator.
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1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
She took me to so many strip clubs, way more than any guys did, and she loved them, straight as an arrow, too. She just loved strip clubs. It was such a weird thing that I thought was out of character for her.
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1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Yeah. And I don't want to say where she worked because her name isn't super common. That's hilarious. She was like an investment banker as well. But then we also had a religious guy who was like, I'm not going in. You guys are on your own. And it's hard to say if that affected his career, but who knows? It's not something we really thought very much about at 25 years old.
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1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
We weren't like, oh, Tom's such a loser. We were just like, oh, he's religious. This is like a thing he won't do. But, you know, maybe later if you go with clients, maybe you do look like a little bit of a square. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Right. This was on his own time, on his own dime. So less forgivable from a thong in your face perspective, but in another way, maybe more forgivable from a this is where the sad men in my macho industry congregate. And I got to move in these circles so we can keep a roof over our heads perspective. I don't know. It's a tough one. It is a tough one.
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1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Huh. Okay. I wonder if that's true. You know, if she went to a women-only networking event at a salsa club or whatever, and all the dance teachers suddenly took off their pants, would he really leave her?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
I don't know. So she's saying that he would leave her pretty definitively. I guess we have to assume that's true, right? We don't really know. Which if it is true, then that is a clear double standard.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Totally possible. Also possible that he truly had no idea or he had a vague sense but didn't know the entertainment would be so overt. It sounds like you're making some assumptions here, just something to keep an eye on. The mind really can tell stories that support the conclusion that we've already drawn or that we want to draw. Yeah.
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1097: Husband's Networking Involves Topless Twerking | Feedback Friday
Well, this is where their closeness comes into play. I feel like you can tell when somebody you know really well is lying. I am a terrible liar. It's pathetic, actually. So maybe she's reading his face and it's obvious that he's being squirrely, which if so, maybe she's right about those assumptions.
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1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Yeah, because the trial is not happening now. They're doing jury selection, right? They're not going to be fair enough.
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1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Oh, man, that's got to be tough. I know what it's like to get a call from school happens occasionally. Jaden used to have his like bitey phase or his I'm going to hit people that I don't like phase, which only lasted a couple of weeks for this to continually happen all through preschool, all through grade. So it's just that feeling would get worse and worse.
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1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
And then, of course, you feel like they blame you. And of course, most people do. Oh, you must be a terrible parent, etc. It's just that stress is I'm getting secondhand stress just hearing about this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Oh, man. I'm just wrapping my head around what you've been through. So you did all the things we'd recommend here on the show. I'm so sorry those resources didn't help, that his teachers couldn't or wouldn't help him. It's just beyond challenging and super sad.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Jury of your peers. Your peers are just a gross mix of your neighbors, which are a gross mix of the people out in the world. Might as well show up in your Lululemon.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Ooh, that is such an ominous sentence and I'm dreading what's coming.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Oh my god. This is a horrible guy. Horrible person.
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1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Okay, wow. This is so intense. Okay, a good reminder to never speak to the police without an attorney. I know there's a lot of cops listening. This is not a personal attack on the police. This is just good legal hygiene. It is so hard to do this when you're innocent. You've done nothing wrong. You literally don't have anything to hide.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
To be honest, I've never actually been on a jury. I've been a witness and stuff, which is fun, too. But I've never been on a jury. If I got selected, I would feel, yeah, it's your duty because if you don't do it, you're like a thoughtful person is going to examine the evidence and like knows things. The person they might select might just be like, screw this. I can't pay attention.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
The cops hold all the cards, but every lawyer will tell you the same thing. Do not ever talk to the police. without a lawyer present. It takes a lot of strength to say, hey, I have nothing to hide, but I'd like to have my lawyer here. But you have to do it. This is a little PSA from Uncle Jordan. There's a lot of reasons for this. There's a video called Don't Talk to the Police.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
We'll link to it in the show notes. It's a law professor. This is a classic. It's got millions of views. And he explains why you should never talk to the police without a lawyer present. It is not because the police are all bad guys that want to put innocent people in jail. Spoiler, there's good reasons for this and you should always follow this advice. Anyway, go ahead.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
No kidding. I can only imagine. This is a literal nightmare. I am so relieved for you. Or am I too early? Let's see.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Good call. Deadbeats, losers, these kinds of people are always judgment-proof. That's the sad reality. You can't get blood from a stone.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Yeah, so infuriating. But that's the difference between you and your, pardon me, piece of crap son.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
You're sane and you're regulated enough to break the cycle, but boy, do I understand your rage. I bet you were wishing you had had that abortion. I know that's dark, but I bet you wish you'd never had him, and I don't blame you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
On the Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the stories, secrets, and skills of the world's most fascinating people, and we turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you. Our mission is to help you become a better informed, more critical thinker. During the week, we have long-form conversations with a variety of amazing folks.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
I got to go home. Sure. He looks guilty because I don't know, he's brown or something. I'm hungry. Like, you don't know.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Oh my God, these people deserve each other. I mean, that does sound like a plausible theory. I can't believe someone would go to great lengths for money, but people have obviously done a lot worse for less. And honestly, this is a psychopath move. I'm going to screw over my mom and ruin her whole life and my sister because I want some money.
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1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Wow, what a nature-nurture cluster this is. This is so sad.
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1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Wow, what a story. What a nightmare you've been through. I am gobsmacked over here, as you might expect, to struggle in this way with a child's mental illness, to lose your husband to suicide, to deal with a nonsense criminal investigation for months for awful things you did not do.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Just the sheer brazenness and mendacity of what your son did, how ruthless this all is, how cruel it is, and then to lose your grandson on top of it all. I am just so sorry, my friend. You've... Really been through the ringer here. This is a lot. It's just insane. And the fact that you're even functioning as well as you are right now is a miracle.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
First of all, I have to say, I am in awe of you and what you've gone through. That you and your husband went to such lengths to try and help your son from a young age. The therapy, the education, the medication, the love that you stuck with him. That your husband adopted him as his own and never complained when that is a very challenging stepchild to have.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
I try to put myself in these situations and if my own kid was like that, you know, it's okay, how do you not love your own kid? But then it's like a stepkid and it's tough. I don't know if I would also be able to do that and not complain and that you managed to take care of your daughter through all that and that you found the help and the resources you needed at every step of this journey.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
You went to therapy yourself. You processed these very intense emotions. You found growth and healing and insight. Like I said, you're just functioning this well after all of this trauma and loss and that you can even tell the story coherently. Just remarkable. You sound like a very resilient person, very evolved, and I really commend you for that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
The other thing I want to say is, how do I even put this delicately? F*** your POS son and his wife. What they've done here is just unconscionable, to put it mildly. Look, your son is obviously unwell. I'm guessing his wife is a total piece of work, too.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
No sane person does something like this, so I know we're supposed to have compassion for them, and on some level I do, and Gabe's going to tell me I should. They're sick people. They're confused. How's that, Gabe? Is that diplomatic enough? Perfect. Very convincing. This is not easy. All these years of cosplaying as a person with actual feelings is paying off for me. Clearly, yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
But anyway, to accuse your own mother of kidnapping you and raping you and molesting her kids and killing her husband and just trying to ruin her life forever so that you can get hands on some money that you are not even entitled to and at the expense of your sibling. It's insane. It really is. It's disgusting. I'm enraged and I've only just found out about this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Your son is a deeply disturbed individual. It's tragic he was born like this to some degree for reasons, by the way, that are so mysterious. The basic wiring is not his fault. But as an adult, he now has a responsibility to take care of himself, to make decent choices, to take accountability. And it sounds like he just doesn't even care to do that at all.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Yes. So on that note about your grandson, I'm so sorry you lost contact with him in all this, especially after building such a beautiful relationship with him. In some ways, that's the saddest part of all this. It's cruel. It's tragic for both of you. I would love nothing more for you than to be reignited for him to at least have one sane family member in his life.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
But honestly, I share all of your concerns here. I am quite positive that your son and daughter-in-law have told him a very different story about you, or they will if they get wind of you trying to talk to him. There's no way that he can't have been affected by being raised by just awful people like this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Even if he's not out of his mind or dangerous, rebuilding a relationship, that'll probably involve some degree of deprogramming. And that process... It's complicated, it's fraught, and then this thing you brought up about severe mental illness running in his mother's family, that is also very concerning. It doesn't mean he's inherited the same problems, but it sounds like there's a possibility.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Gabriel, I've mentioned before my mom's brother on this show, one of them, he was a drug addict, a super manipulative guy, and he had a daughter, and I remember when she was like three, four, five, we would have these little birthday parties, and she was so cute, and she really liked me, and then I didn't see her, and now she's an adult, She added me on Facebook and tried to talk to me.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
She's like, it's your cousin, dude. And I was like, hey. And I told my mom and she's like, don't even talk to her. And I was like, why? She goes, I don't know her at all, but her dad was this way and there's just a very decent chance she's just a total piece of crap who's trying to manipulate you and you shouldn't even talk to her. And she's like, please don't. So I haven't talked to my cousin.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
I just ignored her. It made me feel really bad. But also, my mom was like, you have a really good life. Do you really want somebody who's possibly like Uncle Charlie to join you and try to ruin your life? And I was like, no, that's a really good point. Also, something I learned on one of my psychopathy episodes, it might have been James Fallon,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
When you're raised in a chaotic and abusive environment, that can activate certain genetic factors for mental illness that might otherwise go dormant or unexpressed in a relatively healthy family. Oh, wow.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Yeah, it is. So basically, let's say that you have, I don't know, a psychopath gene or some kind of gene that creates a mental illness, but you grow up and your parents are these really attentive, nice people, and you have these really supportive siblings. You might be really risk-averse.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
You're like a psychopath who goes to Vegas, and you're like, ah, I probably shouldn't have spent all that money, but, oh, man, we had a hell of a good time. We did a bunch of blow with my friends. And your brother's like, dude, Jordan's a wild child, man, but he's cool. And you're an otherwise trustworthy kind of dude, but you just have that little streak.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
But if you're raised by, I don't know, Guatemalan drug cartel gangsters, you can become a murderous Sicario because your genes get activated for sociopathy, and the way that expresses itself is not... I don't know when to stop drinking in Vegas occasionally. It's I kill people that cross me and make me feel bad or something. It can really change the way that you act based on your environment.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
So yeah, you have to be careful because even though this is a sweet little boy who knows what's happened since then, a lot of traumatic stuff happens in a family with two psycho parents. And even in a world where you could rebuild your relationship with him, you'd still just be exposing yourself to your son and his wife, too.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
So even if he is this adorable little boy who grew up to be a nice boy and works a nice job, he's still got these terrible, crappy psycho parents who tried to ruin your life. They're not just going to find out he's talking with you and let that go. So, candidly, I just don't see how fostering this relationship is a responsible move on your part.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
I absolutely get why you miss your grandson, why you want to have a relationship again one day. I would feel the exact same way, of course. But after everything you've been through, you have more than enough data to know the risks that relationship would entail, plus the unknown risks of engaging with your grandson as an adult. You've already been burned in so many ways by these people.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
I just do not think you can voluntarily sign up. to be burned again. Now, look, if you want to make yourself findable, I don't hate the idea of registering with the 23andMe, Ancestry.com, whatever. Be well-informed, be comfortable with the privacy implications and all that, which are complex. I don't know. There used to be something where people were afraid they're going to sell your DNA.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
I'm not totally convinced that isn't something they already do. But if you do that and your grandson gets in touch one day and he's like, My parents are out of their stinking minds. I know what happened. I'm so sorry. I'd like to see you again. You're the only person I know who's not a total creep that I'm related to. If he seems relatively stable and sane, sure, you can entertain that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
But I still think it comes with some big risks or at least some big questions, just like when my cousin reached out to me. But that could be a sign that he's a safe person to engage with or try to have coffee once. I don't know. I just I don't know if I would proactively reach out. Certainly not while he's still a minor.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Certainly not if he's still overly involved in his parents' lives, which would be really hard to know unless you reached out. Unless you can do some sort of recon on your grandson before engaging with him. Can you talk to any trustworthy people in his life? Friends, other family members, neighbors, teachers, anybody like that?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Can you do some light social media stalking and see what his life is like? Because that might tell you a little bit. Just please be very careful if you do this, because A, if you start asking people about your grandson and they tell his dad, that could provoke him all over again. God knows what he might do if he thinks you're targeting them or whatever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
And B, I could see this bringing up some really tough feelings for you. Scrolling Facebook photos of your grandson, watching him grow up from afar, not being able to see him. I have to imagine that would be quite painful. So you have to be very thoughtful here and make sure you're taking good care of yourself. Now, Gabe, I want to say this grandson is a minor.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
If you are in a similar situation and this person is an adult, I would just look up his criminal records or do like a basic background check. If he's got 18 felonies, don't reach out to him. But if he's got a clean record and it looks like he lives in another state away from his parents, there's a sign that this is not a person that's dangerous. The problem is this is a juvenile.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
You can't just look up his arrest record. It's going to most likely be sealed. Unless you know somebody in the FBI is going to lose their job over something like this, you're not going to get a peek at that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
I totally agree, Gabe. By the way, if I'm wrong about that juvenile record thing and somebody out there knows that there's some other way to do this, we are open to suggestions on this. You can test it by looking for my juvenile record, which exists. Really? So if anybody wants a little juicy homework assignment, you can go ahead and grab that. Oh, Little Dark Jordan next? That's right.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
My origin story is in there, yeah. And we can maybe grab this kid's juvenile record if that's a thing. But I'm almost certain they were like, don't worry, it's going to be sealed when you turn 18. I don't know how it all works exactly. We're going to need a deep dive on that later, I think. That's right. One last detail here. We don't know how old your daughter is.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
I'm guessing she's also still a minor, but probably not for much longer. But in the event that something ever happens to you, like some random accident, you get in a car accident, something like that, the last thing you want, of course, is for your son to become her guardian. And for him to get access both to her and to your money, that would be a nightmare scenario.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
So my strong advice here is to consult with an attorney immediately and set up a trust for your daughter and or emancipate your daughter now so she doesn't need a guardian. And then you could leave her all of your assets. You've got to protect her from your son. A family attorney might also have other more elegant solutions for this. But this is absolutely crucial. I'm not trying to freak you out.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
I'm just looking out for you. I don't even want to say this out loud. But given what you've shared about your son, I don't trust this guy at all. He scares me. He obviously scares you. He could escalate. He could target you, knowing that if you just disappear or something bad happens to you, all those resources are his. And he sounds like a ruthless bastard.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
So please find good representation and protect yourself and your daughter. man, what a situation. I'm deeply sorry about all this. It's more than anyone should ever have to go through. But it's also taught you a lot about who in your life is safe, who should be your priority. Keep listening to that data.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Keep building a life that's loving and productive and doesn't land you in an interrogation room. Ultimately, that's the greatest gift you can give yourself. That's your responsibility. And trust that your grandson will find his own path, either back to you or on his own, and that is his responsibility.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Man, Gabe, it's been a long time since I've wanted to give somebody a literal hug during a Feedback Friday letter. We give the old, you know, hugs from California. I mean, I will. The things this woman has been through, my heart just goes out to her. Seriously. Look, ma'am, if you ever see me out and about, don't even hesitate. Just come right up and hug me. No warning needed.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Just grab a couple handfuls of Uncle Jordan. I'm here for it. You're a freaking hero, you poor gal. Alright, you know what else is dangerously sociopathic? The deals and discounts on the fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back. This episode is sponsored in part by No Story Lost.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Ever thought of turning your parents' or loved ones' incredible stories into a stunning coffee table book? Meet No Story Lost. This is not a run-of-the-mill DIY project. We tried it out for my mom, and I have to say, I am blown away. And I don't say that about many things. This is like the Rolls Royce of a personal storybook creation. No need to nag your folks to jot down their memories.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
No Story Lost lays out the red carpet. They handle everything.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
interviewing them with a professional writer they write really well they edit it really well they organize family photos and they bind everything into a gorgeous hardcover book they don't just like sort of print it off it's customized with your color scheme of choice watching my mom pour over her life story her eyes wide big smile on her face reliving all those precious moments.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
She actually said, I'm excited to read this. Who knew I was so interesting? I mean, really, this is priceless. She even joked that she likes herself even more now that she's read it. And I really just, she meant it. It was amazing. And the best part is no story lost can create a book in just three months. This is not a heavy lift, especially for your loved one.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
They're so confident you'll adore it that they back it up with a solid guarantee that you fall in love with the book or they make it right or give you your money back. How was that for top-notch service?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
This episode is also sponsored by Delete Me. Delete Me makes it easy, quick, and safe to remove your personal data online at a time when surveillance and data breaches are common enough to make everyone vulnerable. Let's face it, man, we live online now. Thank God for that. That's why I have a job.
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1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
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1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
They scan through hundreds of data broker sites. They pull your info down and keep monitoring to make sure that it stays down. So if you're even thinking about protecting your privacy, start with Delete.me. You'll be surprised how much of your data is out there and how good it feels to take control of it.
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1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Thank you so much for listening and supporting the show. All of the deals, discount codes, and ways to support the podcast are searchable and clickable on the website at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. Please consider supporting those who support the show. Now back to Feedback Friday. Okay, what fresh hell awaits?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Oh my gosh, no. This is giving me Dolores vibes from our Bad Bosses episode, you know what I'm talking about?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Yeah, it's always like a British guy and then it's, yo, that's not a British accent on the phone, hello. Or do I just watch too much 90 Day Fiancé? Yeah, she was going around the office bragging about her fancy new dude who's 22 and has six pack abs and she's like a 65 year old woman. The listener's like, oh God, do we tell her?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Good memory. That's right. I wonder if that's a coincidence or if that's just a job a lot of scammers use because it sounds fancy. Oh, maybe. Maybe it's project-based, right? So you can have an excuse for being in Dubai for nine months only. Something you can do across countries. Unlike being a doctor or a lawyer, it's like, wait, you're a British doctor, but you live in Indonesia?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
That doesn't really add up. Right. Maybe it's easier to be an architect. The only thing I'm confused about is, is this neighbor pretending he's known this woman for 20 years or he hasn't been targeted by her for 20 years? It's got to be the former, right? Because otherwise he would have been involved in this romance scam while he was still employed and while he had his last girlfriend.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Also, these romance scams, they're relatively new. I mean, this is an internet age thing that's even the last five, 10 years max, maybe not even. They're not two decades old. That's my point.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
There's a couple of things that might be going on here. My hunch is potentially that the scammer stole the contact information of somebody he knows and is telling a story. So, you know, you hack an old lady's Facebook account and then you start messaging people, which is very common with these scammers. And then he's like, oh, it's my friend Angela, who I went to college with or whatever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
It's been 20 years who I used to work with. So he actually knows that person and the scammer just grabbed their Facebook account and is now pretending to be them while they are locked out of it or have passed away or something.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Right, like they'll never understand that I just met you six months ago and I've sent you $35,000 of my $36,000 retirement fund, so I have to pretend I've known you for 20 years or I sound like an idiot.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
What a tragic story. The fact that this is happening to thousands and thousands of people every day is just... Isn't it insane? It makes my blood boil. I hate these scammers. They're so gross. I make air quotes jokes about drones striking these scam centers, and I'm just not even kidding.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Welcome to Feedback Friday. I'm your host, Jordan Harbinger. As always, I'm here with Feedback Friday producer, the moisture-wicking headband keeping you dry on this marathon of sweaty life conundra, Gabriel Mizrahi.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Look, the creepy slavery call center operations that force people to become scammers, I obviously have sympathy and empathy for the people that get labor trafficked. They think they're taking a tech job in Thailand and they get kidnapped into Burma or something or Cambodia. That's horrible. But this is so dark. The people they target, they're so vulnerable. They're so naive.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
They give away money they don't have. It destroys families. People kill themselves over this. It's just absolutely horrible. Yeah, you got to intervene here. You at least have to try. Based on what you've shared, this guy is in serious trouble.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
And unlike Dolores, it doesn't sound like he has that basic level of self-awareness or skepticism or general savviness to realize that he's being taken for a ride. The dude is 65 years old. He's lonely. He's isolated. He's vulnerable.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
He's struggling with what sounds like alcoholism, which is a bad variable to throw in the mix because, of course, it lowers his inhibitions, compromises his already probably poor judgment. He almost certainly has already lost his retirement. This is bad.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
100%, man. So to get tactical here, I would contact as many of Dan's friends and family as you can. If you have to track them down, do it. I would collaborate with them on staging an intervention of sorts. First off, his family members, they are primarily responsible for him You want those people to be aware of what's going on.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
And second, the more people he knows and trusts helping him see what's happening here, the better. It's hard to ignore 12 people in your life than one neighbor that you kind of know from passing or you're friendly with. I'd get those people on an email thread or a Zoom call or whatever, and I would just put your heads together on how to intervene.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
War correspondents and neuroscientists to Russian spies and cold case homicide investigators. This week we had Layla Micklewaite, author of the book Takedown. Layla is fascinating. She went on a mission to hold the pornography website Pornhub accountable for sex trafficking. It's an absolutely wild story. She's super brave. I didn't realize how much sex trafficking and rapey stuff went on.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Maybe his family wants to handle this themselves directly, maybe they would welcome a big group conversation. Whatever this intervention ends up looking like, this conversation is a very delicate dance. So you guys have to walk a line between being confrontational enough that he realizes how serious this is, and safe enough that he doesn't feel judged or attacked and doubles down on the fantasy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
So you want him to wake up and trust you guys to help him find a way out of this. And I would start by telling Dan that you all love him. You all care deeply about him. You're here because you're concerned and you want to make sure that you're being good friends and family to him. Be kind, be gentle, be supportive. Your tone and spirit are really going to matter here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Then I'd move into some good open-ended questions. Those are going to be your best tool here. I'd ask him things like, hey, how long have you known, I don't know, Linda, whatever her fake name is. How long have you known Linda? How'd you reconnect? Who reached out to who? Have you guys met up in person recently? Why not? Have you FaceTimed? Have you seen her live on video lately? Why not?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Has Linda ever asked you for anything? When did she start asking you for money? How much has she asked for? How much have you given her? Do you share any other friends with Linda? Do you actually know those people? Have they confirmed her story that she was actually in this accident? You said she asked for $100. Do you know of any major surgery that costs $100? Does that make sense to you?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
If she has her phone, why can't she access her bank account? If she's stuck in Jakarta, why hasn't she contacted her country's embassy to help with these problems? You said that after her surgery, she'd come live with you here. Why hasn't that happened yet? Are you in touch with Linda now? What's the latest? Is she asking you for anything else these days? Stuff like that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
obviously he's gonna know you're probing. And given how in deep he is, he may actually deflect or double down or shut down. So you really do have to stick with him. You gotta keep reassuring him that you're on his team. You gotta keep making it safe for him to tell you the truth. That is crucial.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
And my hope is that as he answers these questions, he starts to realize none of this stuff is adding up. And that's what you want. For the victim to piece this together themselves with a little guidance. Once they see things clearly, most of the heavy lifting is done. But there's a world where for all these reasons we talked about, he just refuses to connect the dots.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
And then you guys might have to be a little more heavy-handed and say, Dan, I know this must be really hard to hear, but you're caught up in a classic romance scam like so many people out there, and here's how we know. And then lay out the facts for him and help him see why all of this just equals scam, why it screams scam. And if he still can't see it, then I'd get creative.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Ask him to ask her to video chat that day or the next day while you guys are in the room. Tell him to ask her if she can loan him 50 bucks for the gardener or whatever. Ask him to ask her to send her flight information for the trip to the States.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
That way, when she's like, oh, sorry, I can't right now, or all my money's frozen in some account or whatever, you guys can be like, do you see what's happening here, Dan? And if he still doesn't get it, you can watch some documentaries about romance scams on YouTube with him or something like that, showing just how his story looks a hell of a lot like all the others.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
So hopefully he can take that in, at which point you say, I'm so sorry this happened, Dan, we're here to support you, we love you, we're gonna work together to make sure this doesn't happen again. At that point, it's mostly a matter of disengaging from the scammer. Once these parasites realize they're not going to get any more money out of someone, they move on. It's pretty simple.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
But someone in Dan's life, hopefully his family members, somebody's got to educate him about protecting himself from people like this in the future. Because if he doesn't understand how these scams work, if he doesn't identify the qualities that led him to fall prey to somebody like this, it could just easily happen again, especially as he continues to age and live alone and further decline.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Also, you can Google blocks of text that the scammers have sent you. Not everything, of course, but a lot of the core script, they use it on everybody.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Oh, man, you would have gotten dismissed for sure. Like, do you have any previous experience? Actually, I just tried to pick up the plaintiff while I got my seven dollar cup of tea at Starbucks.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
So if you Google something like architect Jakarta car accident purse stolen scam, you might find half a dozen Reddit posts with the exact same story, and that's another way you could show Dan that tons of other people have gotten the exact same message.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
It's so sad because these people, they prefer the fantasy to their reality. Their reality is sad, right? He's a single, lonely alcoholic who's broke. By the way, if Dan doesn't realize what's happening and he won't play ball, his family should absolutely consider getting conservatorship over him. That might be the only option because, again, these people, they're allergic to reality.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
They don't want reality to be what's happening. They prefer the fantasy. That's what they're paying for. That's something I would mention to them, but man, it's a process. They're going to have to talk to a lawyer. They got to decide if they want to go that route. I sincerely hope it doesn't come to that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
It might already be too late, but sometimes it really is the only way to protect an elderly person from scams like this. They just can't control their own money.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Yeah, there are also some Dark Jordan ideas here inspired by some things I've seen on Reddit. Of course, I am not advising you to do any of these things. That would be ridiculous, but it's fun to imagine. And I got a new Dark Jordan sound bite. I think the Bane one is fun, but this is better. Most of you probably know. Yeah, a little ACDC. Dirty deeds done dirt cheap. Dirty deeds.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
It's a little Dark Jordan anthem. So one idea, you could send Linda a quote unquote payment by email and you could include a little snippet of code with a tracker that reveals the person's IP address when opened. There are a lot of services that do this. They're often free or like super duper cheap. You can probably find something like this online easily.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
It's the other side might be like, what's your relationship? Oh, I just thought she was cute. So I went to talk to her at Starbucks. They'd be like, you're out of here because what you think the plaintiff is hot. No, thanks. That's not going to work out in my favor. You're out of here, pal.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Then when the scammer opens it and the IP address says Burma or Cambodia or whatever, you can show that to Dan. And that's going to be a hard piece of evidence that he's going to have to confront. Oh, she's in Jakarta, Indonesia. That's interesting because this is being sent from China. Right. Oh, I don't know. The Internet's complicated. I mean, OK, fine.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
That's another piece of it is another Dark Jordan idea. Get Dan's credentials, get his email, social, whatever he's using to communicate with the scammer and contact them pretending to be him. Tell them, oh, I'm moving to a new email address. I'm setting up a new WhatsApp account. Here's the information. My family took control of the old ones. Don't contact me there because they'll cut me off.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
And then you guys can intercept all future communication and just ignore them or end the relationship on his behalf. Just set them down easy. Say he's totally broke. I'm totally broke. I hope that's okay. Block the scammer on his other devices.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
This one's kind of mid, but it could work with a person who doesn't understand technology well enough to be able to find that person again and reach back out to them.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
So if they are indeed taking over some old friend of his Facebook account, and that's sort of what started this, which I think is less likely, but you never know. Yeah, you could find her unless she's passed away or something like that, in which case you can find relatives that will go, oh, no, I'm Angela's son. She died in September. I'm sorry. You're not talking with her. Her Facebook account.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Oh, look, I can't log in. No, her Facebook account was taken over by hackers a few years ago, and she actually passed away.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
or yes she's right here let me ask her hey do you remember a guy named Dan who you worked with 20 years ago I don't know I don't think so okay well you're certainly not talking with her because she doesn't remember you that would be nails in the coffin the problem is he's probably lying about having known her for 20 years it's probably just a random person who reached out to him you think Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Oh, man. I'm so sorry this is happening once again, but I'm very happy that it is you looking out for him. He's very lucky. Reach out to the people in his life. Collaborate with them. Be forceful but loving. Shut this down before it ruins him if it hasn't already, and he'll thank you for it one day. Good luck.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Man, these people have their work cut out for them because, again, people who fall for this, they prefer the scam, the fantasy, to reality. That's the main issue. But there's a special place in hell for these scammers. There really is. You can reach us Friday at jordanharbinger.com. Please keep your emails concise. Try to use a descriptive subject line that makes our job a whole lot easier.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
If you found out your spouse is cheating on you with their close friend, you and your partner can't decide on whether to have kids or a self-styled guru is targeting vulnerable people in your community. Whatever's got you staying up at night lately, hit us up Friday at jordanharbinger.com. We're here to help and we keep every email anonymous. Also, our newsletter, We've Been Wiser.
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1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
It's a bite-sized gem from us to you. From my past episode, we got a thousand plus of those. If you want to apply that wisdom to your life, it's sent out on most Wednesdays and it's about a two-minute read. I invite you to come check it out. It's a great companion to the show. You can sign up at jordanharbinger.com slash news.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Good question. Look, I know next to nothing about the healthcare industry, but what you're dealing with, it's something professionals deal with in all kinds of organizations, in all fields, all the time. And it's just, it's always a conundrum whether to keep pushing for change or to jump ship. So first of all, I love your passion. I love your commitment. I love your sense of loyalty.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
I get the sense that this team is lucky to have you. all of those qualities are great. They also have the potential to hold you back if you're getting strong signals that it's time to leave. And I'll come back to that in a moment. Second, this job sounds objectively challenging, very dysfunctional, under-resourced for sure.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
And those are really hard things to deal with long-term, given how important this service seems to be to the hospital, to the patients. It is a shame that they're not giving you guys what you need, slash are taking advantage of how hard you guys work or Or maybe the hospital doesn't even feel you guys are as valuable as you are. I don't know.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
It also sounds to me like there's a failure of leadership here. You said your manager is stretched too thin to advocate for change, that they're part-time, which is weird. But if they don't advocate for change, which is primarily their job as the boss... then I don't understand how things are supposed to change. And it sounds like they absolutely need to change.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Things could go downhill quickly in the next few years. If you as a leader are too overwhelmed, you strategize, you prioritize, you delegate to free up time to focus on making sure that this place can actually survive. But maybe your manager just isn't motivated or incentivized to improve things. It's weird that it's a part-time manager of a whole department. So I'm having two reactions here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
One response is, it may very well be time to leave. You've put in a ton of work. You've tried to improve things. You see the writing on the wall. It might absolutely be time to put yourself first. Yes, it's less money, which sucks, but then you get more flexibility, more control, and a better life, which counts for a lot.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
How much that counts, whether it's more important sticking with this work that you understand and really care about, only you can answer that. And I'd encourage you to start thinking and talking about that with some trusted people and see where your head and your heart are at.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
But then I'm also having the thought, if you really care about this team and you have the option to jump ship anyway, why not try to push for change a little bit more boldly? I know you said that your requests have fallen on deaf ears, and like I said, that itself might be a really important signal to pay attention to.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Either this place is hopeless or the hospital doesn't value you guys as much as it should. And that sucks, objectively, but if you can't argue with it, then it makes the decision to leave much easier. I know that you also said reporting this at the chain might result in retaliation or backlash, which if that's really true, that can be scary and I get it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
But you can also look at this as an interesting challenge, an opportunity to flex your leadership muscles and grow here. For example, this manager of yours, It sounds to me like they're kind of asleep at the wheel or they're just ducking responsibility or they're just too afraid to really advocate for what you guys need for whatever reason.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
So what if you approach them and you said, look, we all know this is unsustainable. We are spread too thin. We don't have plans in place for XYZ event. There are big changes coming. If we don't get out ahead of this, we're going to be in real trouble. So let's put our heads together. How can I help? What do you need to communicate this to the higher ups?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
How can we help them understand what we do here? Who do we need to build relationships with at this hospital to have influence? And basically just step up and be the fuel and inspiration your manager needs. If they're open to that from you, of course. If not, then again, this might be hopeless and you know it's time to leave. It's not that you have to do any of this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
It might not ultimately be your job. But the difference between an employee and a leader is that leaders make things their job. They take on responsibility. They step into bigger and bigger roles. They look for open doors when other ones are closed. You've been a brilliant operational employee, all these initiatives and processes you've implemented with great success.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
So part of me is going, is this a chance to flex some other muscles? Why not step up and show how you would lead? What do you have to lose? But honestly, it's been so long since I've worked at a company, I might be off your game. You cosplayed as a corporate guy for a little while way back when. What is your gut telling you here?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
And if he did fail, then he'd really know that it's time to leave. And I think that would be super useful, too. Then he won't leave and go like, oh, I wish I'd stayed. I wish I'd done more.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Yeah. Thank God you were a consultant, Gabe. There was a time when you just couldn't go to work in a spiritual gangster, functional athleisure wardrobe every day.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Yes, it sure would. Even when I was a lawyer, they just said, have a suit at work. You don't need to wear the suit to work. It just sits in your office in case you need to do something. I never used it a handful of times. About that course, 15 grand is a lot of money.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Sure, I get why it makes you feel bad for leaving, but if you've never agreed to stay for a period of time after that or whatever, then you're good to go. If your team needed that from you, they should have gotten that in writing or even verbally. Again, I love that you're conscientious and loyal. You're a real one.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
But if this place is a hot mess and there's no fixing it, I wouldn't stick around just because you feel bad about some course they paid for. Be grateful they did. Go apply it to what you learned in your next job. I hope that gives you a way forward here, though. My sense is that you're probably moving on one way or another, but it might be worth giving this a shot.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
You can never go wrong by taking initiative. It's always educational. It's always expansive, even when you fail. And hey, you might be surprised or you'll be relieved. Love your attitude, amigo. Love that you have options. Keep up the great work and good luck.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Speaking of biting the hand that feeds you, why don't you grease the hand that feeds us by checking out the amazing sponsors that support this show? We'll be right back. Don't do a long quiz, people. It matched me to the exact mattress that I needed based on my sleep style and my body type. Also, if you run hot at night like I do, this thing's got best in class cooling.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
It also comes with a limited lifetime warranty. You get 120 nights to try it out. And if it's not the best sleep of your life, they'll pick it up and refund you. No drama. So if you're ready to upgrade your sleep, Jen, tell them.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
This episode is also sponsored by Haya Health. If you got kids, you know the vitamin aisle is a freaking disaster. Most kids' vitamins are glorified candy. We're talking five grams of sugar, artificial junk, weird dyes that are probably banned in other countries, and our kids love them because they were basically just eating gummy candy. That's why we made the switch to Haya.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
It's a chewable vitamin, zero sugar, no gummy nonsense, and still tastes good. Even our picky eater kids are into it. Plus, I got to eat all the leftover gummy vitamins that they can't take anymore. Haya also nailed the packaging. You get this cool reusable bottle with the first order. It comes with stickers so your kids can personalize it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
That little detail turned taking vitamins from a chore into something fun, and our kids love decorating their individual bottles with the stickers that it came with. And Haya vitamins are packed with the essentials. 12 organic fruits and veggies, 15 vitamins and minerals, like D, zinc, B12, folate. It's clean, non-GMO, vegan, gluten-free, allergy-friendly, so no excuses no matter how fancy you are.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
They also just launched a kid's probiotic and some nighttime essentials. We're excited to try those next.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
I've got homes.com as a sponsor for this episode. Homes.com knows when it comes to home shopping, it's never just about the house or the condo. It's about the homes. And what makes a home is more than just the house or property. It's the location. It's the neighborhood. If you've got kids, it's also schools, nearby parks, transportation options.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
That's why homes.com goes above and beyond to bring home shoppers the in-depth information they need to find the right home. It's so hard not to say home every single time. And when I say in-depth information, I'm talking deep information. Each listing features comprehensive information about the neighborhood, complete with a video guide.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
They also have details about local schools with test scores, state rankings, student-teacher ratio. They even have an agent directory with the sales history of each agent. So when it comes to finding a home, not just a house, this is everything you need to know all in one place, homes.com. We've done your homework.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
If you liked this episode of Feedback Friday and you found our advice valuable, I invite you to do what other smart and considerate listeners do, which is lend us $100 as a one-time thing. Now, to take a moment and support our amazing sponsors, to learn more and get links to all of the great discounts you just heard, visit jordanharbinger.com slash deals.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Use the AI chatbot to search for the sponsor codes if you want to. That's on the website as well. And if that doesn't work, you can email us jordan at jordanharbinger.com. Happy to dig up those codes for you. Thank you for supporting those who support the show. Now, back to Feedback Friday. And now for the recommendation of the week. I am addicted to lip filler.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
I feel obligated to make fun of you for this, but I can't quite put my finger on why.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
I may be, but like cashew butter, that is bougie and hippie-ish and kind of ridiculous. Gluten-free, vegan, raw. You're doing the roasting for me.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
I would actually love a jar of this. Of course you would. I love stuff like this, by the way. Cashew butter, different butters, nut butters. There's something about nut butters, man. I love peanut butter straight up. But if you can get fancy peanut butter that's not even peanuts anymore, it's like, wow, take me to Elysium. It's going to change your life, this stuff, man.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Also, in case you didn't know, there's also a subreddit for our show if you want to jump in discussions with other listeners about specific episodes or specific nut butters. You can find that on Reddit and the Jordan Harbinger subreddit. Okay, next up.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Okay, I'm going to hold off, but this does not sound like a great partner. Certainly not the right partner for you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Generally a plus, yeah, and doesn't complain when you have to attend major life events together. Gabe, I'm wrapping my head around this. They were going to go from seeing each other once a week to being husband and wife. Such a leap.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
As long as you drive over to my house.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
All right, fine. I'll drive another 10 minutes to see you now that I put a ring on it, but I'm not going to like it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Of course, yeah, interesting. I mean, yeah, you'd have to overlook and idealize quite a bit in order to be with somebody like this. Otherwise, why would you stay? I'm glad you're seeing this more clearly now, anyway.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Yeah, look, this is public record. This is a lawsuit. You can find out who plaintiff's counsel was on the lawsuit. You can have Corbin Payne, legal eagle, in front of the show. And you can be like, hey, how would I find this person's name?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Wow, yeah, I understand all of this. So first of all, I'm sorry you went through all this with your ex that you're hurting. Breakups are just always painful, even when they're absolutely the right thing to do, which this clearly was. You've been with this guy since you were 16. You thought you were going to marry him. This is a big transition to go through.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Not just saying goodbye to your partner of four years, but saying goodbye to an old identity, a lifestyle, a way of being, a set of expectations, a future you imagine. All breakups involve a lot of mourning, and it can be super intense. At the same time, though, I'm not really sorry that you went through this breakup, because like you said, it clearly needed to happen.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
It's very obvious to me this guy was not your person. I know you see that quite clearly now, too, which is great. I also find that all of these painful experiences, these unexpected changes, they always end up serving us, always. Just look at how much you've learned since you ended this relationship, how much you now understand about yourself.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
All these skills you've been able to develop, standing up for yourself, having hard conversations, recognizing the boundary between you and your ex, this is profound growth. So I feel for you because I've gone through this kind of thing myself, but I'm also heartened and honestly pretty inspired by everything in your letter.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
So I'm not sure how much help you actually need in healing here, my friend. It sounds to me like you're already healing and healing in the best way, which is feeling your feelings fully, allowing them to evolve naturally, learning from this relationship, trusting that your instincts were correct, even reaching out to us for thoughts. But I will share a few thoughts with you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
The first is this period after a breakup. Yes, it sucks. Yes, it hurts. Yes, it's weird and scary. And it's also very powerful, very clarifying. The insights you get after a breakup, the feelings you're in touch with, the relationships and opportunities and places you get to dive into. Those are one big reward. And you get to navigate them almost as a new person, which is pretty cool.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
So I would give yourself permission to do that. maybe even push yourself to do that when you're ready, because that's a huge part of the healing process.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Yes. And then you can just call and be like, hi, yes, I was a juror. I got dismissed. I just... Wanted to know if you go to that Starbucks all the time, because I plan on trying to run into you there again. How much business do you have at the court? The answer was tons. And if you had it in you to commute to that courthouse Starbucks a few more times, I almost guarantee you'd see her.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
I remember that feeling when I was young. You get so wrapped up in a relationship, and then it ends, and you're heart sick for a week or two, and then all of a sudden you're like, oh, wait, yeah, I'm free. I can see all these people. I can finish that project. I can go to Color Me Mine at 2 p.m. on a Tuesday and make a weird mug. The world is my oyster.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
That's right. I lost the coffee mug in the divorce. It was brutal.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
I know. Lesson learned. Never making that mistake again. All right. Point is, let yourself fall back in love with yourself and with the world, even if it still hurts. Those are parallel processes. The other thing I want to say, and I apologize for pulling the old dad card here, but as a middle-aged person, I can offer some perspective here. You are 20 years old. You're so young.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
You got together with this guy, what, like sophomore year of high school? I'm assuming this is your first big relationship. You're evolving rapidly, as you should. And you're entering a really exciting time in your life where you get to play and explore and try on different identities and learn a ton.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Even if this relationship with this guy had been amazing, there would still be a part of me going, I'd love for you to have some time on your own. Not that you can't be happy when you marry your high school sweetheart. Of course you can. But settling down young does have big opportunity costs. So this period, it's actually really important for both of you, I would argue.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Also, since this is your first big breakup, all this probably hurts a whole lot more. Take it from two older dudes, your fourth, fifth, your tenth breakup, it always sucks, but it's not going to hurt nearly as much, okay? Nope. You build up this muscle, you have way more perspective. Yeah, your defenses get stronger as you get older. Exactly. Not always a good thing, but it can be useful.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
For sure. Diminishing marginal heartache. Exactly. That old cornerstone of economics. So again, a big part of healing is just letting yourself go through it, knowing that you're going to be raw for a little while. And over time, this heaviness will lift on its own. Like we talk about a lot. Grief has its own timeline. There's usually not a lot for you to do in terms of hurrying it along.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
The healing process is happening in the background, so to speak.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
One of the best examples of that is when she said that she's empowered by her ability to finally advocate for herself. That's pretty remarkable because it's not until you're forced to take your needs seriously and risk disappointing or hurting someone else that you realize, oh, I can stand up for myself. I can say the hard thing. I can appropriately put myself first.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
That's one huge gift of this particular breakup.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
It's another huge step forward. Or maybe she's just so over this dude, she doesn't care whether he talks about his apathy in therapy. Should have driven to the Alamo Drafthouse for date night, pal, without grumbling about it. Anyway. I guess I'm not really kidding.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
That's probably her thing. She probably goes to that Starbucks so she's not late, and then she sits there and gets her coffee and does a couple emails, and you could be like... Just working on my screenplay, just doing some Feedback Friday emails over at the totally inconvenient Starbucks with $7 parking.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Totally. It's only when you look backward that the map looks coherent. It's all grasping in the dark, isn't it? Journey over destination and all that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Certainly more than sitting at home wondering why her boyfriend doesn't want to drive 10 minutes to come hang out. But yeah, totally agree, Gabe. She's on an exciting path. Sorry you're hurting, friend. But like I said, I'm also not sorry. This breakup needed to happen. And look what it's already done for you. And for him. You're both growing, which is the whole point of life.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
And now you know so much more about who you are and what kind of person you want to be with. Keep moving through this transition with that mindset. And I know it'll take you to some great places. Sending you a big hug and good luck. Go back and check out Layla Micklewaite and our Skeptical Sunday on cannabis.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
The best things that have happened in my life and business have come through my network, the circle of people I know, like, and trust. Check out our six-minute networking course. I harp on it every single episode of the show. It's free. It's not gross. It's not schmoozy. It's on the Thinkific platform at sixminutenetworking.com. The drills take just a few minutes per day.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
I really wish I knew this stuff 20 years ago. You got to dig that well before you get thirsty, folks. Build relationships before you need them. all for free at 6minutenetworking.com. Show notes and transcripts on the website, advertisers, deals, ways to support the show at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. I'm at jordanharbinger on Twitter and Instagram. You can also connect with me on LinkedIn.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Stuff you don't think about, and it's really dark. what's on that website and how they got away with it for so long. We also had a Skeptical Sunday last Sunday on cannabis. Yes, we did one a long time ago. We decided to do it again. We had, well, it's a complex topic. What can I say?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Gabe's over on Instagram at Gabriel Mizrahi or on Twitter at Gabe Mizrahi. This show is created in association with Podcast One. My team is Jen Harbinger, Jace Sanderson, Robert Fogarty, Ian Baird, Tata Sidlowskis, and of course, Gabriel Mizrahi. Our advice and opinions are our own. I am a lawyer, but I am not your lawyer. So do your own research before implementing anything you hear on the show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Remember, we rise by lifting others. Share the show with those you love. And if you found the episode useful, please share it with somebody else who could use a bit of the advice we gave here today. In the meantime, I hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn. And we'll see you next time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
You're about to hear a preview of The Jordan Harbinger Show with former NBA superstar and American icon Shaquille O'Neal.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
I gotta ask, or people are gonna get mad. What's going on with the Flat Earth thing? Are you just messing with everybody with that?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
To hear more about how Shaq makes important business decisions and manages his expansive career, check out episode 691 of The Jordan Harbinger Show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Yeah. No. Meanwhile, Dolores is like, what's funny, you should ask, because 35 years ago, my husband, R.I.P., was a landscaper. And then 15 minutes later, it's like, what was I talking about again?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
I think storytelling and social emotional intelligence are obviously linked, right? They have to be. The people I know with the lowest amount of social intelligence, they'll just tell a random story that they want to tell at the time because they don't know what to do. They don't know what is even appropriate.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
The smartest people will decide when it's even appropriate to tell a story and what that story should be. And what the goal is. And does it serve everyone there or only you at the moment? There's so much in there.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
On Fridays, though, we share stories, take listener letters, offer advice, play obnoxious soundbites, and compare Gabe to various forms of functional athleisure.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
I've evicted shitbags like this guy representing himself over and over again. And they're always a waste of time, money, space and oxygen. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
It's the opposite. Yeah. Do you think you could give somebody a fair shake? Yeah, I love just looking at somebody and deciding immediately whether or not they've done the thing or not.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
So you're still in the extras pool.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
I thought you meant you got selected as like an alternate juror.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Oh, you're lucky. Okay.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Man, jury duty sounds like it could be awesome or a giant drag, but you can't wear athleisure where you gotta dress nice?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
I suppose they still could. Little miss, I can put aside my judgments, except for I'd love to be judged. Yeah, I know what she meant, but it's just kind of a funny way to put it. I think you should definitely try to date this lawyer. Look, being a lawyer is a tough job. It often precludes having a relationship. There's a very good chance that this beautiful, young, educated woman is still single.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
What about me creeping? And then she's like, how did you even find out about me? I'm like, so here's the thing. I got this podcast and my co-host this and then we looked you up on LexisNexis.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Exactly. And then we just did this whole ridiculous thing. And now you accidentally met at Starbucks. Totally random. It's not the worst idea in the world. And then she'd be like, oh, good. I'm so glad I have a law degree because you're both getting restraining orders immediately. Cease and desist. PTO. Yeah. Fortunately, I think that's probably more likely. Yeah, great.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1144: Can Family Ties Overcome Son's Deranged Lies? | Feedback Friday
Jordan, what's your address? Because I need to serve you with a lawsuit for invasion of privacy. All right. What's the first thing out of the mailbag?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
Oh, wow, wow, wow. Gabe, this might be one of the all-time great character portraits on Feedback Friday. I had a feeling when I took this one.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
Yeah, like I said, we've had a few, but this guy is up there. What a complex human being this guy is, man. I have to start where I always start, which is it's a little hard for me to say this because this guy is objectively problematic in a few concerning ways. But let's just acknowledge...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
that we are talking about a young man who, based on what you've shared, is traumatized, vulnerable, scared, confused, weak, confused in a number of ways. He's walking around with a lot of wounds and pressure points. His brain clearly works very differently from most people's.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
As always, we've got some fun ones and some doozies, and I can't wait to dive in. Gabe, what is the first thing out of the mailbag?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
I'm no doctor, but a lot of what you said does suggest that he's probably on the autism spectrum, although I gotta be clear, ASD does not account for so much of his personality. but it probably plays a big role in his rigidity, his need for consistency, his struggle with social cues, all of that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
And as hard as it is sometimes to love people like this, there's a big part of me that just feels bad for this guy that has a ton of empathy for the things that he's been through. You just do not end up this way unless you were seriously hurt along the way. And this guy has been hurt. I'm hearing a lot of trauma in his story.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
But obviously my heart goes out to you as well because you have to work with this character, man. You're kind of his friend now, whether you want that or not. You guys hit Black Swan together, man. He's attached to you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
That is, again, famously how going to the ballet works. Yeah. So you're in a difficult spot here. This is not an easy person to be in a lot of contact with for obvious reasons.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
Totally. Even just tolerating him. And now he's stuck and exposed to some really toxic, tragic stuff. And it's really hard to know what to do with that. Look, there's so much going on here. I have a feeling Gabe and I could do a whole episode just about this guy. And man, that would be fun. But let me try and cut to the chase here as it relates to you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
First of all, I think it's important to remember that we do not owe anyone, certainly people who aren't our parents or our close family. We don't owe them our time. We don't owe them our attention, our love, our support, any of that. Gabe, this is like the dad from, what's that movie, American Beauty, where he has the Nazi plate and it turns out to be a closet homosexual.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
This is that guy, except for immigrant Sheldon Cooper version. Love, support, attention. Those things have to be freely given and meaningfully reciprocated in order to be healthy, in order to be fair.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
So if you're feeling obligated to spend time with this guy, if you don't want to, but you're like, oh, I have to, I have to eat perfectly arranged snacks at his house with him and listen to his weird rants about Kim Jong-un and go see Mamma Mia 4 with him because I'm in too deep.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
I want you to know that it is absolutely okay to reevaluate, pull back if you need to, spend less time with this guy, spend no time with this guy, and protect your time and your energy and most of all, your sanity. I'm not saying you need to cut him off or drop him completely if you don't want to. You're going to have to decide what level of contact feels right to you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
But I am hearing a sense of obligation in your letter. You're obviously not psyched about most of this. And that's a sign that something needs to shift.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
Absolutely, man. And with people like this, those boundaries are crucial. Boundaries are crucial in every relationship. Boundaries are how we can be close without losing ourselves. But I'm realizing that they're especially crucial with people who struggle to calibrate how much they demand of people.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
who don't realize how they come across, who can sometimes be a little abrasive and combative and just a lot. And again, it's not entirely his fault because of his wiring and his life experiences, but then it's on you to protect yourself.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
And I'm kind of hearing that protecting yourself is a little hard sometimes, which I can totally understand, but also you have to draw a line with people if you're not comfortable with the amount of contact or the quality of contact that you're having. It's just a fundamental life skill. And I feel you because I've also been the guy who makes friends with the guy nobody likes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
And then you're like, oh, he talks to me every second of the day now. I'm attached to this person. How did I get here? How did I make this set of mistakes? And how do I undo them?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
What function did that role in their friendship serve?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
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For sure. Or even morally evolved in some way. Like, I'm the kind of person who can fix a case like this. I can tolerate his crazy. I'm a good person for doing that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
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The second thing I want to say is interesting and talented and deserving of love that this guy is. And he is, although I'm not sure it's necessarily your job to provide it. It's also important to remember that he is objectively problematic and a little scary. I'm not saying, look, that this guy's going to like shoot up your lab or attack your gay colleague. There's no indication of that.
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Although I think it's important to keep an eye on him because God knows people are capable of doing awful things. And this guy is not healthy. But even holding some of these views and inflicting them on you, even privately, it's hard to be around. It's gross. It's offensive. It's not okay.
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And I also think it's important to hold people to higher standards and pull back if their values are incompatible with yours. Gabriel, I hate that I keep doing this, but this reminds me of a neo-Nazi that I met when I was in Serbia. He was obsessed with Jews and how the United States was controlled by the Jews. And I remember talking with him because we ran into him at a park.
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Serbia is a place where when you're young, you go to a park and you drink and it's fine. We ran into him at a park and he knew a bunch of the people that I was with. And I'm listening to his rants and stuff. And my friend pulled me aside and he's like, You can forget everything that guy says. And I was like, yeah, I know. He's a Nazi.
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And they're like, yeah, but he's also like, he was like the biggest loser in our school. He has no friends. He was always bullied. His parents are screwed up. His childhood was screwed up. He doesn't have a dad. And it was like, now it all makes sense. And you just...
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pitied the guy even though he had these really disgusting views and it was all just like edgy bro to make up for the fact that his life was a total mess. So it's fascinating. I'm resisting the urge to engage too deeply with this guy's actual beliefs because they're so reckless and un-nuanced. And frankly, tangential to the real question here, which is how do you deal with problematic people?
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But I find it fascinating that one of his beliefs is that people of different ethnicities will never be able to successfully live together. Meanwhile, he's inviting this white dude over to his apartment all the time for snacks and tea. Okay.
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Which is one of the popular positions of right leaning people. And honestly, even a lot of moderate people, especially over the last 10 to 15 years with this huge wave of immigration all over the world, this idea that there might be a fundamental incompatibility between certain cultures, at least between people who are interested in assimilating and people who are not.
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And you see this a lot throughout history. Once you start to study history, you realize how nonsensical this is. It's like the Mexicans that come here will never assimilate. But then you talk to somebody or you read something from 100 years ago and it's like the Italians and the Irish, they'll never get along.
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And now it's I challenge you to distinguish an Italian from an Irishman in the East Coast. It's impossible unless you know their name or they start talking about it. There's no difference. Why? Everybody assimilated for crying out loud. The whole thing that this guy's arguing is impossible. Anyway, I am not interested in further unpacking that idea here. I'm not trying to get into that debate.
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What is interesting to me is this guy saying all this, and then he's turning around like, also gay people are conspiring to destroy society. Liberalism is destroying women's desire to have a family. Gay men only adopt male children because they want to abuse them, which is obviously incorrect. Whatever. The CIA is trying to turn people gay.
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It's uncomfortable to talk about, but by holding these views... This guy might be the reason that true assimilation, at least for him, is in fact a myth. Quite. He's right because he himself is the problem. Right. He's the one holding these rigid, regressive, hateful views that prove his point.
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Yeah. Meanwhile, he's like, check out this video where a bunch of Ukrainians die.
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They're so feral.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
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Meanwhile, he's furiously cajoling to war footage of the Ukraine conflict. OK, buddy. Every view he espouses seems to be an aspect of himself that he's just blind to.
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Okay, I think I have a hunch about how this guy's mind might work. I'm getting Big Bang Theory vibes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
I'm just sitting over here marveling at how this guy's mind works, what's in his heart.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
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Yeah, it's just wild. What I was trying to get at before is, I think the other big theme of your letter is how to balance empathy with self-protection. And also how to balance tolerance with appropriate judgment. Because yes, on one level, this guy is kooky and odd and objectively fascinating. But on another level, he hates gay people and he hates democracy and he likes...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
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people who are mass murderers. So at a certain point, it's not okay. That's how I feel. Maybe you feel differently, but I don't think you do. So the question becomes, how much do you put up with from people? And when do you say, yeah, I'm not the audience for that. Take this crap to your red pill incel discord group, or you just quietly pull back.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
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Yeah. Ballerino. I never heard that word. Don't get me started, dude. We can't get into all the detail of all these arguments, but it's literally crazy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
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Oh, yeah. You don't even have to show that you're gay, that you might just get beat up for being the wrong color with Putin's brown shirts hanging around, unfortunately. Try being you in North Korea, man. See how that works out.
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Oh, it's American propaganda, Gabe, man. You got to stop with that.
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Top secret. Sorry.
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We just don't get it in the West, man. Workers' paradise. North Korea is so amazing, especially if you're special needs and you're gay and you love theater. Okay. So you have a choice to make. Keep spending time with him and entertaining his crazy or pullback. I think you can tell where I stand on this. Life's too short, man. I think you're leaning towards pulling back yourself.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
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I don't know if there's a perfect way to say this. I think it's going to ruffle his feathers and possibly hurt him no matter what. But if you feel the need to explicitly communicate your decision to him, Maybe you say something like, listen, man, I've really enjoyed our time together. I look forward to more conversations around the lab. You're a fascinating person. I'm glad we met.
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But as I wrap up my program, I'm realizing how disciplined I need to be around my time. And I'm realizing I need to devote most of my time to my dissertation, my work, my wife, myself. So if we don't hang out as much as we used to, please understand it's because I need to dial in and make sure I'm taking care of the parts of my life that really need me right now. I don't know, something like that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
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And yeah, you're sort of lying here by omission because you're not like, and also you freak me out and creep me out and you're totally lacking awareness and you're spooking me. Look, maybe that's a lie by omission, but I think it's appropriate and it actually might be necessary because you are not dealing with a totally healthy, rational person who's thinking straight.
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I don't think this guy could take in the idea, I find your views disturbing and repulsive and you need to seriously re-examine them. Or, I find you interesting but you scare me and I can't be close with you for that reason. Or, I think you're confused and I hope you meet these parts of yourself with more love and curiosity and maybe take some hot bar lessons with Gabriel.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
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I hope he can get to a place where he can engage with those ideas. It's a lot hotter than I thought. I don't know if I'm into it anymore. I'm sweating even more than I thought I would. It's almost certainly not going to be from you, him reexamining these ideas. He's too deep in his rabbit hole. He's too traumatized by his past. He's too limited by his concepts.
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It's incredibly tragic, but that doesn't mean this is your problem to solve. Gabe, am I being too selfish here?
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That's right. Yeah, protect himself, protect his time, his energy, his relationship with his wife.
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Agreed. And yes, you do have the option of saying nothing and just moving on after you graduate. Maybe that's easier.
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1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
There you go. Is that a thing? Did you just make that up? Yeah, I don't know. I just made it up. I like it. Host till you ghost. The strategy of avoidance everywhere.
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1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
True. Like he doesn't want this guy going postal in the lab or whatever.
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You do need to keep an eye on somebody like this a little bit.
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1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
So actually, yeah, I might confide in this neutral third-party professor for advice. That would be very responsible of you. It could give you some more perspectives here, maybe some resources and avenues to pursue. Like if the university needs to look into this guy or have a chat with him about how to behave in the workplace or just keep an eye on him in general, I'd actually do that ASAP.
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I think that's important.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
And I would ask these people how to handle things with your colleague who's gay, whether it's something you should warn them about or something you just stay out of, something they should talk to them about or something they need to keep an eye on.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
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What you don't want is for this guy to do something and then months later it's like, oh yeah, he told me all about how he hates gays and he's homophobic and Nazi this belief and that. But I didn't do anything because I just thought, whatever, he's a weird guy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
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I feel like whenever we hear about these crazies, remember that shooter of the Pulse nightclub and then his wife was like, oh, yeah, he's a closet homosexual and super homophobic and to express ISIS sympathy. And you're just like, you didn't say anything to anybody like you should be in jail for that. It's so negative.
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I know, it's so hard to know what to do, but then if something ever did happen, again, you want that colleague to know that there was a homophobic person in the lab and you just didn't say anything because it might be weird? Cold comfort when he's in a coma from a beating or something.
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Seriously, the contradiction's here. As for staging an intervention with other grad students, I'm leaning toward no for all the reasons we've been talking about. I just don't know how it's going to be received. I don't know if you're going to get the results you want. Maybe seeing eight people say this to him instead of one, maybe that would break through and lower his defenses.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
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It might also just cause him to panic and dig his heels in more, given his history of abuse. So there you have it. I hope that gives you some new angles here. Thank you for sharing your story with us. I'm honestly a little dazed by all this. Such a strange tale. I'm genuinely saddened and worried about this guy going off into the world and trying to build a career and a life and a family.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
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Oh no, but he doesn't want that. Oh, because of the whole someone might hold my child hostage with a gun, which. Yeah. How often does that happen? How weird is that? Just shows you this guy's level of fear. So that's one concern off the table, which is a good thing. But please don't reproduce if you have views like this. But I do think he's going to really struggle in life. He already is.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
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And my hope for him, and I'm just praying over here, is that he somehow ends up in therapy or find some good counsel one day. This guy has a lot to heal. A lot. But that's his work to do. That's his journey. You need to focus on yours. Sending you, and yes, even him, a big hug and wishing you all the best.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
Speaking of coming out of the closet, I'm coming out with some great deals on some of the fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back. I gotta go cajole. Now, back to Feedback Friday. All right.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
Oh, side note, big fan of this one. New nickname for you, Gabe.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
I think what she's asking for is for me to hit the gas and go nuts and for you to be the brakes.
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Earsore. That's a new one. Just make it up words over here now.
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1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
Fair enough, I'll allow it. So yeah, these are awful neighbors. I am so sorry you're dealing with them. I literally don't understand how people can live like this. It's gotta be some kind of mental illness, but then like, is everyone in the house suffering from the same illness?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
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Because you don't live in squalor and sleep with rats and create this much noise if there isn't something that's actually wrong with you. It's also a safety issue. It's a health issue. A house like this might need to be condemned at a certain point. It's just so gross. You watch one episode of Hoarders and you just can imagine what the inside of this person's house looks like.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
I don't know, substance abuse issues maybe. So look, this one was a bit outside our and our expert's bailiwick. And since you asked for Dark Jordan, we did something we've only done once before, actually, when we took another question from people also dealing with terrible neighbors, the Sushi Sludge Dumpster Restaurant, if y'all remember that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
And we posted your letter anonymously, of course, on the subreddit Unethical Life Pro Tips to get some creative ideas about how to handle this.
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1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
Yeah, no, I love it. Let's start with the actually solid advice before we get into the somewhat insane dark Jordan slash dark Reddit stuff.
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So the first piece of advice from a very insightful Redditor, get a copy of the relevant codes that apply here and document all the codes that your neighbors are violating. That'll give you ammunition and increase the likelihood of different authorities taking action. For example, the garbage situation, that's almost certainly a city code violation. The rats...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
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They might be a code thing, but I'm not sure. It might depend on the jurisdiction. Certainly the homeowner would want to know about a rat problem. Not sure about the city. The muffler on the car making noise, that might be a noise pollution code violation.
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The coyotes, that one might be tough to prove, except that they're probably there because of the garbage or maybe the rats that are eating those. Gross, which is an issue. What I would do
The Jordan Harbinger Show
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is set up cameras on your property, pointing at their property, capture all this, and then you could even set up a noise decibel meter if you need one, if the cameras don't have that, in view of the camera, so you can capture both the visuals and the noise issue. And that's gonna be your main documentation and potential evidence.
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That was ornate, my friend. Yeah. I owed you one after last week's sign-offs. Ornate is a good word. Over-engineered. Over-engineered. Yes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
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This Redditor's second piece of advice, start leveraging whatever city entities you can. This person pointed out that calling the non-emergency number, it's not doing anything because it's not recorded. Their advice is to call 911 and let them transfer you to a non-emergency number if they like. Those 911 calls, they're always recorded. That means they'll show up in police metrics.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
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And if you keep calling, your neighbor's house soon becomes a nuisance to the police. Now, this person also recommended calling 911 whenever you see a coyote in your neighbor's yard. I'm not sure why, but maybe that's a legit complaint or maybe 911 can notify animal control. Then you got to follow up on all these calls with written formal complaints to the police.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
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This is where your documentation is really going to start to come in handy because a formal complaint plus video evidence and or detailed notes, that's probably going to make a much bigger impact. This person also encouraged you to talk to other neighbors, see if they're similarly annoyed. If they are, encourage them to talk to the city about it too. File their own complaints.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
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Writing formal complaints, it's an investment of your time. I know, not a huge one, but it is a task. It could very well pay off when the police see that this house is pissing off multiple residents over and over again. Eventually they will respond. This person's next idea, address the rat and trash situation with the health department and your local code enforcement.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
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And if you call a department and they direct you to another one, this person recommended asking the first department if they have a formal complaint form to fill out. If they do, you should fill it out anyway, then go to the second department, fill that form out, rinse and repeat, They said that this is all a very long process. So you have to be patient. You have to start today.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
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And whenever you talk to somebody, their advice is to always mention when this originally began. So if they hear that this has been going on for six months, nine months, 18 months, whatever it is, that's way different from, oh, my neighbors have been keeping me awake for almost two weeks. To quote this Redditor, you're doing two things here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
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You're being the squeaky wheel and you are creating a paper trail, which to my lawyerly ears is music. That is the basic formula for making progress with stuff like this. While you do all this, yes, you do also need to find the actual homeowner. You said you tried the county auditor and didn't hear back. I think you maybe meant county assessor, but it doesn't matter.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
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There are other ways to find the owners. You can use the county assessor's database of property information. You can search for property tax records on the website. You can visit the office in person. You can visit the county recorder's office and request records for a specific property. You might also be able to look up county tax records online. The owners might be listed with the address.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
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You can use what's called the Multiple Listing Service, or MLS. It's basically an online database of properties that are listed for sale. Apparently, you can search for properties by address or APN number, and you can also search for public records for off-market properties. You can contact a title company, a real estate agent, a real estate attorney.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
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These people are real good at finding homeowners. They might have special access to databases or just know how to navigate the system better. Point is, there are options here. Unfortunately, you can't just fill out a form on a government website and then hope for the best. But go in person, try a few different angles, and you'll find the names.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
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And once you find them, you're going to want to reach out with a plan. This Redditor, the one we've been quoting the most here, their recommendation is to explain the situation, but in a polite way that hopefully creates an ally, which I totally agree with. Resist the urge to yell at the landlord for renting their house to a bunch of zoo animals.
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I would just calmly explain to them what's going on and make it feel like it's you and them against their tenants and those neighbors, not you against them and the tenants.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
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So, wow. Rarely do you meet somebody who enjoys watching people die on video. By the way, Raisi is the former Iranian president that died in a helicopter crash. Kim Jong-un is quite famous. Xi Jinping, leader of China. This is like psycho level bootlicker stuff.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
So those are the straightforward ways of dealing with this. Now let's talk about some of the more ridiculous, petty, generally dark Reddit ideas that we got. One idea, see if that super loud car is on the up and up. If it had expired tags, you could report the car for expired tags or other violations. Also see if you can find out if they owe any money on the car.
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It's a piece of crap, so probably not. But look, if you can find that they're not making payments, try to get it repoed. I think that's a long shot, given that it's just an old piece of junk. But another Redditor who was very clear to say that these next few ideas are meant for entertainment purposes only. Do not do this. And I second that.
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They said you could hypothetically, again, hypothetically, sabotage the loud car. You could put ceiling foam in the exhaust pipe or whatever. Another idea, and I kind of love this one. If they drive to bars on the weekend, you could follow them in your car, sit in the parking lot until they leave, follow them home, but on the way, call the police and call in a drunk driver with their license plate.
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Ooh. I've done this before. Yeah, not this exact thing, but yeah. Bonus points if you break a taillight while they're tying one on inside so their chances of getting pulled over increase, which is a level of Dark Jordan that even Dark Jordan can't fully endorse. Vandalism. Can't do it. Getting even pettier here, if you can get to the car without being noticed or picked up by a camera...
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Prep a container of leftover fish or tuna fish in water. Let it sit unrefrigerated, of course, for a few days until it really stinks. Then pour the water into the grill under their windshield wipers. You know, that little spot where everything. When they turn on the car, it'll blow into the car. It will never go away.
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They'll probably be forced to dump the car finally and get a new one because they don't care that they're inconveniencing anybody else with the loud ass noise. But they're going to care when their car smells like the inside of that sushi restaurant's dumpster from that other question.
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And man, that is just a chef's kiss of sabotage, but that is so mean that I cannot in good conscience recommend you do this. So those are some options, dark and regular, like the different kinds of coffee at Starbucks, and I hope they help. And as fun as the dark Jordan, dark Reddit ideas are, I really, again, cannot advise you to pursue those.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
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Certainly not before trying all of the reasonable legal ways. You really got to try to resolve this diplomatically and legally before you resort to anything else. But it's nice to know you have options and it's nice to fantasize about pulling those off.
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She said they've had years to do the right thing, so I don't really care to chat with them. That's what she said.
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Yeah, and it's like one of those, yeah, I'm a contrarian, I'm an independent thinker, but it's, no, you're just a moron who falls for really clumsy propaganda that's usually designed for domestic consumption in places like North Korea, but you're just swallowing it whole, which is so weird. I would normally tell somebody like this,
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Yeah, it's a good point. She should at least try to resolve things that way before going through all this work. I know she's already said that she knows that these people are and she can't deal with them and that's probably the case.
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But is there a 1% chance that you go over there and an exhausted woman answers the door and tells you that she's got three special needs kids and an abusive alcoholic husband and she's sorry?
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And you're just like, oh, I was going to vandalize your car that you need to get to work because your husband is a good-for-nothing substance abuser, drunk, and you have three special needs kids at home and cleaning up your yard is not a thing that you can prioritize.
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No, it's a really good point. They probably don't even realize how much of a problem they are. So it is on her to at least try before escalating to these other options. And given how hard conflict seems to be for her, or at least this conflict, I actually think this could be a really great opportunity for her to build this muscle because it's such an important one.
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Again, I'm sorry this is happening to you, friend. It does suck. People like this are next level rude, and it's not even rude. It's beyond that. But I have hope that with the right approach, you'll get the relief you deserve and maybe also grow in a really cool way. So good luck. You can reach us Friday at jordanharbinger.com. Please keep your emails concise.
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Use a descriptive subject line that makes our job a whole lot easier.
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to listen to our episodes with defectors and targets from Russia, Iran, North Korea, or we can tell them what North Korea is actually like ourselves. Not exactly the people's paradise, but I know that's a fool's errand because people who are really swallowing the tanky Kool-Aid, they just say, oh, you're on the take from the CIA. Everything's propaganda that I disagree with.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
If you're finding dead squirrels in your mailbox, your stepdad's got your nudes, your neighbor's or Eve's dropping on your therapy sessions through the wall, or your family's been keeping a history of abuse in the family a secret for decades and you want justice, whatever's got you staying up at night lately, hit us up Friday at jordanharbinger.com.
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1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
We're here to help and we keep every email anonymous. By the way, our newsletter, We Bit Wiser, is a bite-sized gem from us to you every week. It's a two-minute read on Wednesdays. If you want to keep up with the wisdom from our thousand-plus episodes and apply it to your life, I invite you to come check it out. It's very practical. It's a great companion to the show.
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1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
You can sign up at jordanharbinger.com slash news. All right, what's next?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
Yeah, it's like scratching an itch that you could never reach in the middle of your back.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
Daddy chill.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
Oh my god. I am so sorry, man. That's so sad.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
That is amazing, man. Congratulations. These are huge accomplishments, and it's not easy to repair things like this. I'm proud of you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
Yuck. That must have been hard to do. It sounds necessary, so I commend you for that as well.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
And it's crazy because they'll take someone's real life experience who's been to the place that they're talking about, and they'll discard that. And they're like, Here's evidence to the contrary. And it's like a guy with a hoodie whose face is masked with dramatic music and a video on Rumble. And they're like, this is the evidence. And it's like, yeah, but I've been there and this isn't true.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
Yeah, I hear that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
Wow, Jesus, man, what a mess. This is quite a story. We're not getting every nook and cranny of it. There's so much I'd love to understand, especially about your stepmom and her personality, her intentions, also the specific ways that you feel responsible for so many people, but... I think we're getting the broad strokes. There's obviously something serious going on with your dad.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
Decades of reckless behavior, a pattern of poor choices, lots of compromised relationships in this family. So I can understand why you're so angry and why you feel the impulse to cut him off. It's just a really tough parent to have. And on top of the trauma of losing your mom to suicide, which sounds like it was the result of how your dad treated her, such a tragedy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
I'm just so sorry that you've been through all of this. So, look, your story is obviously very complicated, but my take on your question is relatively simple. Sometimes it's warranted and necessary to formally cut a parent off.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
If they act so egregiously that you can't have a functional relationship, if they're dangerous to be around physically or emotionally, if they've done something truly horrendous to you or your family, if they're hurtful, manipulative, hateful, if they're using you in some way, if you literally can't have a normal conversation with them,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
if there's no upside to having a relationship at all, obviously those are situations where you have to evaluate whether you can really have contact with them.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
Now, I can't quite tell from your letter whether your dad is actively doing those things to you, but I hear that there's a long history of very painful and chaotic behavior here that has hurt you pretty profoundly and a number of other people, and you're not the only one who's struggling with your father. Your sons are too.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
It sounds like at least two of his daughters might be as well, which is helpful information. It tells me that this probably isn't just a you thing, which you clearly already know, but it also sounds like a lot of the problem now is with your stepmom.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
how and when she entered the picture, the way she recognized or rather didn't recognize your mom's legacy, the way she might have taken advantage of your financial support until you decided to stop, the fact that she's ignorant, evil, or both, as you said, which, side note, is a really interesting question and another thing I commend you for, being able to make room for the possibility that she might not be out and out malicious, she might just be severely misattuned and unselfaware, although I know that might not make things much better.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
Point is... These are all very valid reasons to be angry.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
But I guess the question I have for you is, how much of the pain you're experiencing right now, how much of it has to do with your stepmom, how much of it has to do with your dad, how much of it has to do with the past, which is a story, a very real story, of how your dad treated your mom, how it led to her death, how he then remarried this woman who didn't treat the whole situation with the care and respect that it deserved, and how much of your pain comes from how your dad continues to treat you now.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
And they just throw away all sort of credible sources in favor of something insane. And they like don't understand why other people don't come to the same conclusions. We do get those emails that were on the take from the CIA from mentally ill people. And it sounds like this guy might be dipping a toe in those waters.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
I think it's important to parse that because it sounds to me like much has happened here over such a long time that your anger is big and generalized and largely aimed at your father. And I'm not saying it's unjustified. It sounds like it is justified.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
But when it comes to cutting a parent off, I think it's important to have a good handle on whether the solution is not having contact with that parent anymore or whether the solution is about doing some other kind of work.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
Like healing these wounds, of course. Like locating and enforcing some boundaries with dad that might make a relationship with him possible. Containing that mental tornado, as he put it, if that's what he wants, of course. Finding some new ways of relating to dad and stepmom that aren't as taxing and hurtful. There are options here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
And look, it might be the case that you need to not talk to your dad for a while. Sometimes you have to go no contact for a period of time just to hit the reset button, clear the decks, get your bearings, and have some space and privacy to work on some of this stuff. So I'm not taking it off the table,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
I just think that before you make a huge decision like this, it's important to consider all the options and why this one seems more attractive than the others.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
Right. What did he say? There aren't many ways to see it. He is responsible for her death.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
Like it might've been the case that to her, there was only one way out.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
But what you're getting at is she was also an equal party in that relationship.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
Wow. Yeah, because so much of this impulse to cut him off is feeding on this very painful and monolithic narrative, which is you killed mom. But if he's open to entertaining another story, which might be something like dad contributed to mom's death in a big way, and mom was also the kind of person who felt that dying was the answer, his whole stance on his father might change a little bit.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
I don't want to speculate too much, but I do wonder whether he might also be mad at his mom, which I know a lot of people who lose loved ones to suicide often feel.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
And if some of that anger might be directed at dad, because he's the obvious villain here, and fair enough, would opening up this story, making room for some new ones, would that allow him to also get in touch with other legitimate objects of his anger beyond dad and stepmom? And how might that inform his question about whether to cut dad off?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
Well, to pick up the baton here, there's another story lurking in the background of his letter that I think we have to touch on, which is his experience in therapy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
Yeah, I'm obviously very curious about that as well. I can understand giving therapy a go and not finding good results. It happens all the time. It's part of the process, finding the right therapist, finding out how to apply what you've learned to your life.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
Totally. Yeah, the story is therapy hasn't stuck, but I suspect there's an equally true, if not truer story, which is I haven't really stuck with therapy. And I know this narrative is not as profound as the one about his parents, but I flag it because it might be holding him back from the one big place that could help him heal these wounds.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
For sure, how they ended up here, really everything this decision is bringing up for him right now.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
This is so interesting. He knows enough to know that these opinions are absolute toxic shite. They would not land well with other people with functioning frontal lobes. But he doesn't know enough to wonder if maybe that's a reason to reconsider those opinions. Again, just fascinating.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
Sounds like something you do in therapy. Is that the place where you have to keep going every week for a while to make progress with this stuff? That's the one. I kid. That's it. I kid. You get it. It's just funny. OK, we got to wrap this up or we're going to miss our next news cruise.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
But I just want to point out that what you just touched on, Gabe, I'm also hearing that echo in the last big story of his letter, which is my dad is like a mental tornado. He constantly sucks you in. He gets my energy and that's energy my wife deserves. Look, I believe him. That's his experience of his dad. And it's not just that it's his experience that his dad probably actually is exhausting.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
But on our way out here, I want to invite you to consider a couple other narratives here, too. Narratives that might be more accurate, that might give you some more agency and control. For example, your dad might, in fact, constantly suck you in. It might also be true that you allow your dad to suck you in. it might be true that he gets your energy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
It might also be true that you give him your energy by not having strong boundaries with him or by allowing him to take up mental real estate long after you guys interact.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
Yeah, 100%, man. Three stories about three very important parts of his life. So I hope that helps, my friend. I know we went unusually deep here. Took me by surprise a little bit as well. We got into some territory that might be a little tender, painful. If you're mad at us for a little bit, I understand that as well.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
Welcome to Feedback Friday. I'm your host, Jordan Harbinger. As always, I'm here with Feedback Friday producer, the minute hand to my hour hand on this analog clock of life conundra, keeping us precise while I get us generally in the right ballpark, except during daylight savings time in certain U.S. states, only because not all of us observe it for some as yet understood reason, Gabriel Mizrahi.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
I thought you were going to say cuckoo. I was going to be down with that either way. On the Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the stories, secrets, and skills of the world's most fascinating people and turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you. Our mission is to help you become a better informed, more critical thinker.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
But I want you to know that all we're doing here is inviting you to get more curious about your own life your own mind, how playing with different lenses has a way of changing the facts. We're not here to tell you how to feel or which stories are the right stories to believe or whether your dad is really as bad as you think. All of this is for you to decide. And that's an ongoing process.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
It's a journey. It'll probably never end. But something I've learned largely from doing the show, you can't make the right decision if there is a right decision without investigating the stories around it. Sometimes we think we need to make a decision about a specific person or situation in order to be happy or peaceful or whatever, when really there's some work for us to do first.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
Or at the same time. And I do think that's especially true for you, given the profound experiences that you've been through. So take care of yourself, bud. Sending you, your wife, and your future therapist a big hug.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
And now I'm going to take full personal responsibility for being a shameless capitalist shill who relies on our amazing sponsors to keep bringing this life advice to you week after week. We'll be right back.
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1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
If you liked this episode of Feedback Friday and found our advice valuable, I invite you to do what other smart and considerate listeners do, which is take a moment and support our amazing sponsors. All of the deals, discount codes, and ways to support the show are at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. The AI chatbot over at jordanharbinger.com slash AI can also surface codes for you.
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If that doesn't work, shoot us an email, jordan at jordanharbinger.com. Someone here will dig up that code for you. Yes, it is that important that you support those who support the show. Now, back to Feedback Friday. All right, time for the recommendation of the week.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
I think a lot of people wonder if we're sponsored by these companies. I don't know if we've ever said, usually this is just stuff we like. I don't think we've ever actually had a sponsor.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
So when people are like, oh, I wonder how this works or like, what do they get paid for that? Or do they really like it? Yeah, this stuff is all just legit stuff that we find online that we're like, hey, this is cool. And I've been trying to get some of these companies to give stuff away by emailing them and being like, hey, we're going to feature you. Do you want to do a giveaway?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
And usually they say yes. So that's the reason we have a giveaway, not because they sponsored us. I don't know if we've talked about this. I just feel the need to say it again. I don't want it to be like people to think we're secretly like making money off of these recommendations or that they're not genuine.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
Wow. Can we just stop and appreciate how awesome this is? The kid's 15 years old. He's already mastered CAD. Man, you're getting hired by impressive and successful people. You've replaced a full grown adult with an engineering background. You're convincing other talented people to come on board. It's phenomenal. And this is not an accident, man. You're a rock star and I am very proud of you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
Great question. So first off, I'm really sorry that these people are dragging their feet, being flaky here. Not just flaky, but also avoidant. They're canceling meetings to talk about this, which is just poor management, bad leadership. It's incredibly frustrating and honestly disrespectful to everybody involved. also find it pretty short sighted of them to be doing this with you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
I know you probably feel like the junior guy on the team. You're literally a teenager. They're the supposedly successful adults. But honestly, if some 15 year old genius joined my company and started creating products better than any adult and was recruiting other talented people to the team, I would be counting my lucky stars. I'd be starting every day at work.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
Wow, how do I capitalize on this absolute gift that I've been given here? How do I keep this guy engaged and empowered so he wants to stick around and we can keep growing together? So the way your bosses are handling all this, it's not great. That said, I do think it's important to make room for some other explanations here because you never know what's going on behind the scenes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
By the way, this Forbes 30 under 30 person, they might be distracted by something more urgent. They might be dealing with their own frustrations with the YouTuber. They might have some reason for slow rolling the product. The YouTuber, I don't know what this person's deal is, but you said they have ADHD.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
It doesn't shock me that he doesn't know about people having sex. That does not surprise me at all. Doesn't this guy know that families stopped as soon as clubs were invented and music and liberalism took off? There hasn't been a single family since.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
They might literally not be able to concentrate or prioritize in a way to get this done, which is not an excuse. in my opinion, especially if there's some kind of thought leader or influencer around ADHD. They should have some systems in place to work effectively with their brain, but it might explain why this project has become such a mess.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
Point is, there might be a few different things happening here, and you don't have access to all the information, and the reasons might not have anything to do with you. I just want to acknowledge that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
True, but whatever's going on, here's how I'd handle this. I'd write a brief email to them. And in this email, I'd basically say, hey guys, as you know, it's been four months since I finished the prototype of the product. I'm loving working on this project. I sense that you guys were pumped too. I'm super invested. I think there's huge potential here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
When I finished the prototype, you said the video promoting it would take two weeks. It's been 16 weeks now. and I feel we're losing precious time and energy here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
I understand that there's always gonna be delays and roadblocks, and I'm happy to work with them, but I've been trying to talk to you about what's holding us up and how I can help, and all of our meetings keep getting canceled, which has left me confused, disappointed, unsure of our next steps. You fill in whatever words you want there.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
Since a live conversation doesn't seem possible right now, I wanted to reach out to figure out where we are and how we can get our baby back on track. I'd love to understand, one, what are the specific roadblocks we're facing right now? Two, how can I help you resolve them and work around them? And three, what would it take for all of us to capitalize on this exciting product that we've created?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
What resources do we need? How much time, realistically, do we need? How can I pitch in? I'd love answers to those questions, and I'd love to get this project back on track. With all my enthusiasm, gratitude, and confidence in us, your name, something like that. What you're doing with this letter is a few things.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
One, you're elegantly forcing the meeting that they seem to be refusing to have, which is the main objective. Two, you're on the record saying, hey, something is not right here. I'm here to help. I'm giving you a chance to make this right.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
Yeah. What an argument. It's all so very incel. Yeah, if women could have sex with multiple men without being, I don't know, stoned to death, they'll never want to settle down with one man. It's such a weird conclusion because there's evidence to the contrary in every town, in every country, in the free world. Even, I would argue, in the not-free world. Yes, in the not-free world.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
Yeah, which I think is how you get these people to focus without sounding pushy or breaking the project apart, by the way, by approaching them in that spirit. And four, you're creating a paper trail in case things don't change.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
That way you can say, hey, look, I tried to get us back on track three months ago and you still didn't engage, which is also just a mental paper trail for you to know that you really did everything you could to make the team succeed.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
That's been my experience too. At this point in my life, I have zero patience for people like this. Either you do what you say you're going to do or you don't. Anything less is a waste of everyone's time, including yours. Good follow through, open communication. Those aren't just nice to haves. Those qualities are essential. This isn't just a quirk that you have to deal with.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
This is how these people do business. Okay. And I know I'm going a little papa bear here because our boy is 15 or 16 years old, but it is unconscionable to do this with a young person this talented, with anyone, but especially with an asset like him.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
Also, I was biting my tongue during the letter, but Forbes 30 under 30, it's bullshit, actually. It's just paid marketing. That means that people on that list, they have publicists that they pay on retainer. Those publicists are generally getting their clients on the list. They pay Forbes to do it. There are a gazillion 30 under 30 lists for every category imaginable.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
There's hundreds of them, potentially. It's 30 under 30 for music, 30 under 30 for digital influencers. It's just a moneymaker for Forbes. It's like how real estate people can buy those. Like, top real estate in Broward County, three years running. They pay for that. Lawyers have it. It's just a cash grab. So I don't know how much that matters here, but it's something to keep in mind.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
Just because this person is on the Forbes 30 under 30, it just doesn't mean shit. And it certainly doesn't mean that Forbes has done any due diligence on whether they're actually a good entrepreneur or worthy of being included. Don't buy into the hype too much. That might be one of the lessons you're learning here. So look, I hope that gives you a way forward here, man.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
Be productive, be respectful, be positive, and you really can't go wrong. And if nothing changes, then reevaluate, take notes so you can clock these signals sooner next time and find the right people to collaborate with from now on. I'm super excited for you, man. Keep up the great work and good luck.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
Yes, it's absolutely ridiculous to come to this conclusion.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
Don't forget to check out our episode with Amanda Ripley on how to survive disasters, who survives and how. If you haven't done that yet, it might just save your life or that of someone else. We also did a Skeptical Sunday last Sunday on DNA. The best things that have happened in my life and business come through my network, the circle of people I know, like, and trust.
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1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
I'm teaching you how to build that circle for yourself in our six-minute networking course, which is free. It's not gross. It is not schmoozy. It's on the Thinkific platform over at sixminutenetworking.com. The drills take a few minutes a day. Dig that well before you get thirsty, folks. Build relationships before you need them. Start now, man. I wish I knew this stuff two decades ago.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
I really do. You can find all of it at sixminutenetworking.com. It is free, no catch. Show notes and transcripts over at jordanharbinger.com. Advertisers, discounts, ways to support the show, all at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. I'm at jordanharbinger on Twitter and Instagram. You can also connect with me on LinkedIn.
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1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
You can find Gabe on Instagram at Gabriel Mizrahi or on Twitter at Gabe Mizrahi. This show is created in association with Podcast One. My team is Jen Harbinger, Robert Fogerty, Ian Baird, Tata Sidlowskis, Jace Sanderson, the amazing producer Jason Sanderson, who can fix anything that's fixable with audio.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
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And by the way, he also has some limited free time to take on new clients if any of you are interested in hiring a real audio professional. And of course, Gabriel Mizrahi. Our advice and opinions are our own, and I'm a lawyer, but not your lawyer. Do your own research before implementing anything you hear on the show. Remember, we rise by lifting others. Share the show with those you love.
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If you found the episode useful, please share it with somebody else who could use the advice we gave here today. In the meantime, I hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn, and we'll see you next time. Ever wonder why seemingly rational individuals can wholeheartedly embrace the most irrational beliefs?
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1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
You're about to hear a preview of The Jordan Harbinger Show, where Dan Ariely uncovers the captivating psychology behind these puzzling convictions.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
To hear more about Dan Ariely's own chilling encounters with conspiracy theorists, check out episode 903 of The Jordan Harbinger Show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
Once again, nails it, though. It was the secret gay clubs in Moscow, not Perestroika or any of that detente or reforming communism into democracy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
No, no, no.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
No, it was the gay clubs, guys. It was the gays. Every documentary you'll see about the fall of the Soviet Union famously revolves just around the gays. They pretty much don't even give shrift to the coup or anything like that. Come on, man. This is insane. This is absolutely, oh, hold on, this calls for something.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
There you go.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
Oh, what was the hand gesture? They cajole them. They cajole them. That's such a great line. Dude, that's so weird.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
During the week, we have long-form conversations with a variety of amazing folks, from money laundering experts and undercover agents to astronauts and Emmy-nominated comedians. This week, we had Amanda Ripley on who survives disasters and why.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
They cajole them.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
Oh, okay. I see where this is going.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
Oh, gosh, this poor guy. Both men, but primarily your friend here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
Seriously, rude. Rude. But also, this is so cringe, my God, and he's the only one not in on the joke.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
Look, I'm down for a good platonic gay friend date anytime.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
Same, but when the other person doesn't know they're gay, yeah, that's freaking awkward. Super awkward. Oh, what are we doing here? Do you know what's happening? Did you just take me to the ballet and then make me watch you hit on one of the dancers with a bunch of floribundas in your hand?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
It's actually pretty damn fascinating how there's certain personality types, certain little habits that people have that allow them to survive better, and of course, the people around them to survive better in catastrophes, in disasters. Finally, we had Skeptical Sunday last Sunday on DNA.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
Oh, man, this just gets sadder and sadder. I'm starting to have compassion from Gabe. You know what this reminds me of? There's this old study where they asked children which doll was the prettiest. And they were white children and black children. And they had white dolls and black dolls. And all the children, regardless of their race, largely picked the white doll as the prettiest.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
And it's just like this internalized... shame of being different or not of the mainstream culture. That's really sad.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
This is the case with a lot of bootlickers and fans of authoritarianism. They love the idea that other people that they don't like are going to be in the out group. But the irony here is this guy, he himself has said, oh, brown people this and I'm this minority and an immigrant. This guy is a gay immigrant. What makes you think you're going to be in the strong man in group, man?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
What makes you think that? You are like ticking all the boxes of somebody who's on the out group.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
Yeah, yeah. But look, this is kind of my sense all along. His fascination with power and authoritarianism is somehow tied to a need to feel safe. It doesn't matter how misguided that is.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
I was about to say this is not subtle at all, but it totally tracks again with people that I've seen who are just passionate bootlickers. They love this kind of stuff. They don't think the three steps ahead to where they're the ones who are actually getting kicked in the face by Nazis.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
On Fridays, though, we share stories, take listener letters, offer advice, play obnoxious soundbites, and come up with increasingly elaborate and verbose metaphors for me and Gabe's partnership. Whatever you want to call this. That just sounds weird to me. Collaboration, perhaps? Collaboration works. Yeah, that's a little less ambiguous.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
A hundred percent, man. The love for authoritarianism, this disdain for democracy, it's informed by some real primitive stuff in the human brain. This guy sounds like he never had any friends. No one's looking out for him. Not even his mother could love him properly. He's a geopolitical incel, which I love that term. I'm definitely using that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
He has a fantasy of serving as Putin's chief of staff one day, which I have so many thoughts, but continue.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1107: Ballet Date with a Geopolitical Incel Mate | Feedback Friday
Yeah, this dude's hanging out on 4chan. He's not hanging out in the real world.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
So good. On Fridays, though, we share stories, take listener letters, offer advice, play obnoxious soundbites, and watch while Gabe goes off and does some peak Gabe-ish. Speaking of which, you want to fill everyone in on your plans? I know you're packing. Literally, right now.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Yeah, that is interesting. When she was like, I only realized my niece was pathological when I stepped away from the family, despite having a PhD in clinical psychology. I was like, man, I guess it really is hard to see this stuff in your own family, even if you are trained.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
For sure, she definitely, she has her work cut out for her. This won't be easy. It might take a while. But she also has an incredible opportunity here. And if she pulls this off, starting with getting her ducks in a row legally for this coup, something tells me she's going to achieve some remarkable things.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
I just really hope these dumpster fires and their grubby hands get the message early and bow out before this gets messy, or that our friend here can easily remove them, but she might have to prepare for a bit of a fight and a drawn-out process, which I do think is probably worth waging, because this can't continue. There's a lot at stake here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
I just want to see these two get their comeuppance, and I really want to see her shine. So go do your homework, put together your plan, prepare for the worst, surround yourself with good people and resources, and trust that this will turn out all right.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Crossing my fingers that a judge and or a jury finds the preponder Ray Ray of the Evidei shows That she was in brie brie of fiduciary doo-doo If you'll pardon the legalese That was one of my top ten moments of the show that was so good.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Good luck, my friend. Big thanks to Patty Eberwein for her experience and wisdom here. For business disputes in California, Patty can be contacted through her firm, Brown, Neary, Smith & Kahn, LLP at bnsklaw.com. You know what isn't a brie-brie of fiduciary doo-doo? You know what's weird is doody rhymes. You don't even have to change it. It just sounds dumber when you do.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Anyway, taking advantage of the DDs and dis-cow-cows and the fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back. So stupid. So stupid. This episode is sponsored in part by No Story Lost. Ever thought of turning your parents' or loved ones' incredible stories into a stunning coffee table book? Meet No Story Lost. This is not a run-of-the-mill DIY project.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
We tried it out for my mom, and I have to say, I am blown away. And I don't say that about many things. This is like the Rolls-Royce of a personal storybook creation project. No need to nag your folks to jot down their memories. No Story Lost lays out the red carpet. They handle interviewing them with a professional writer. They write really well. They edit it really well.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
They organize family photos and they bind everything into a gorgeous hardcover book. They don't just like sort of print it off. It's customized with your color scheme of choice. Watching my mom... pour over her life story, her eyes wide, big smile on her face, reliving all those precious moments. She actually said, I'm excited to read this. Who knew I was so interesting?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
I mean, really, this is priceless. She even joked that she likes herself even more now that she's read it. And I really just, she meant it. It was amazing. And the best part is no story lost can create a book in just three months. This is not a heavy lift, especially for your loved one.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
They're so confident you'll adore it that they back it up with a solid guarantee that you fall in love with the book or they make it right or give you your money back. How is that for top-notch service?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Thank you so much for watching. I listen on 2 or even 3x speed, which lets me cover a lot of ground without sacrificing quality. Right now, I'm listening to Good Inside by Dr. Becky Kennedy. She's got this really down-to-earth way of talking about parenting that is not preachy. And here's what a lot of people don't realize. Audible is not just audiobooks anymore.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
You get access to thousands of titles with your membership. Podcasts, Audible Originals, and cool stuff like their Words in Music series where artists tell their stories in their own words. The variety makes the membership way more valuable, so you never run out of great stuff to check out. One day I'm deep in a parenting guide, the next it's a podcast or a spy thriller.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
So whether you're into suspense, self-development, or you just want to make traffic suck less, Audible's got you covered.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Honestly, I'm super jealous. It sounds awesome. But just to answer the question everyone's wondering about, you're not leaving the show or anything.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Thank you for listening and supporting the show. It is your support of our advertisers that keeps the lights on around here. All of the deals, discount codes, and ways to support the podcast are searchable and clickable over at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. Please consider supporting those who support the show show. Now back to Feedback Friday. Okay, I'm done with that nonsense. What's next?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Hi, Jordan and Gabe.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Man, good question. This is really hard. It's so tough to watch somebody you care about stay in a dysfunctional relationship, especially when they know that it's dysfunctional. It's gotta be even harder when that person is your co-parent, they're a close friend, and by the way, so awesome that you guys are still friends. That is so rare.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
I love that you guys have managed to build a solid friendship after getting divorced, but yeah, the stakes here are high. His relationship with his girlfriend isn't just hurting him, it's also compromising his relationship with your son, so... You do have a dog in this fight, so to speak. What's tough about this is he already knows this relationship is harmful.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
I don't like it. Crusty flakes. Everywhere. On the Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the stories, secrets, and skills of the world's most fascinating people and turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you. Kind of like how dirty dandruff flakes impact the shirt that you're wearing on any given day.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
So it's not like you need to get him there. Consciously, he's there, but something is keeping him stuck. He must feel that he's getting more out of participating in this cycle than he would in leaving.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Yeah, that's a really good possibility. This might be more about his fear of standing up to her, standing up for himself, than it is about his desire to stay in the relationship. I wouldn't be surprised if both are true. You were married to him. Did you see this quality in any way when you were together? I'm curious.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Anyway, it's also possible that he doesn't experience this chaos in the same way that you do, or understand the effect he's having on other people, including you and your son. I think we all kind of know people like this. Maybe they go through something that from the outside, you're looking at it and you're going like, oh my God, this is insane. How are you not melting down?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
And they're like, oh, it's a little stressful, but you know, whatever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
And if so, man, that's a hard thing to overcome because you can't make someone see their life the way you see it, the way they probably should see it. I'm sure our friend here is right. The facts seem to speak for themselves. This relationship is, our favorite word, objectively bananas. But if he doesn't feel that, how is she supposed to bridge that gap?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Surprises no one. Awesome. Namaste or Namago, as the case may be.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
That is hard.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
She's going to have to work extra hard to empathize with him instead of slapping him upside the head and telling him he's being a chump, which is what my instinct is here, which actually makes me wonder if he might need to hear this from somebody who's more removed from the situation so his brain can't go, yeah, but she's only telling me to break up with her because she's my ex and she doesn't like her or whatever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Whereas somebody with more distance or somebody without the same history with him, they might hear this and go, wait, she constantly belittles you? She accuses you of ruining her kids' lives? But then she has you drive down two hours to babysit these same kids. She keeps breaking up and getting back together with you. Dude, this is insane. You need to get out. What the hell?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
And then he might go, oh, OK, well, if they see it that way, maybe I should see it that way.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
I mean, it sounds like we are that person. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Right. And our friend here can't just wait around for somebody with more influence to save him. I mean, this is like what a therapist would tell you if you went to a therapist and you're like, all this stuff is happening. They might be like, I have a solution that you're not going to like.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
I like that. I think it'll be a lot harder to ignore eight of his friends and family telling him that he's blowing it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
And how does a group intervention telling him to break up with her help and build that?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
The problem is, I'm not sure he can build those muscles as long as he's wrapped up in this relationship. It's kind of like an addiction, right? You can tell an addict, hey, if you want to kick the drugs, you've got to talk about your trauma, you have to face your life, you have to repair your relationships.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
But as long as they're smoking meth or whatever it is, they're not going to be able to really do that. They have to detox. They have to stop using in order to be clear-headed enough to even begin doing this work. And the same thing here, I think. This woman is the drug, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Our friend here might have to be a little heavy handed and push him to finally break up with her so that he can get to a place where he can figure out why he ended up there in the first place.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Of course, we all want him to work on that, Gabe. We're all on team our friend here. But on a practical level, step one is literally stop playing babysitter to the woman accusing you of ruining her kids' lives and then reeling you back in and making you say I'm sorry right before her annual trip to Cabo or spring break or whatever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Jen and I are thinking about visiting you in Portugal. We'll see if we can make that happen. I guess.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
There you go. Show him the dollars and cents of it all. Maybe he'll realize he needs to leave. She has one other big card to play here, I think, which is their son.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
And I'm actually really frustrated about this because it's one thing to subject yourself to a bunch of insanity, but to subject your child to it when you know this relationship is getting in the way of your time with them, when they're obviously seeing this play out, that's just bad parenting. It's irresponsible.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
So it might be time to say, look, if you can't say goodbye to Denise yet, that's up to you. I can't force you to protect yourself. But our son is also paying the price for all this instability. He's watching his dad stay in a toxic relationship. And I'm going to give it to you straight. He's starting to doubt that you are a good role model.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
And I need you to know that this is having a major impact on him. I can tell you, man, as a dad, if someone said that to me, if they were like, hey, Jaden thinks less of you and is getting hurt because you're doing XYZ thing, that just cuts right to the bone. There's no way a decent father could ignore something like that. That might be the lever you're looking for.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
I'm really sorry your ex is caught up in this cycle. I hope some combination of these things works and he finally wakes up. And if he doesn't, Then you might have to consider some other moves, including protecting your son from all of this as best you can, which might be tough. And inviting him to open up to you about what dad's relationship is bringing up for him. Sometimes that's all we can do.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Thanks. I appreciate that. Me roasting you doesn't end when you leave U.S. soil. You know that, right? It's like taxes. You still have to pay them even if you're abroad when you're American. So getting roasted by me still happens no matter where you are.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
But yeah, Denise has got to go. And I don't mean to Cabo. I mean for good. And dad needs to go to therapy. The end. Good luck. You can reach us Friday at jordanharbinger.com. Keep your emails concise. Use descriptive subject lines. That makes our job a whole lot easier.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
If you're finding dead squirrels in your mailbox, your stepdad's got your nudes, your neighbors are eavesdropping on your therapy sessions through the wall, or you're trying to get your paranoid, coke-addled partner to get clean and trust you again, whatever's got you staying up at night lately, hit us up Friday at jordanharbinger.com. We're here to help, and we keep every email anonymous.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
By the way, our newsletter, We Bit Wiser, it's a bite-sized gem. Every-ish Wednesday, it's a really light read, two minutes, very practical. If you want to keep up with the wisdom from our thousand-plus episodes and apply it to your life, I invite you to come check it out. You can sign up at jordanharbinger.com slash news.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
That's awesome. Again, I feel like this is a pretty rare situation. It's so cool that you guys get along so well. You're still involved. I love that. Our listeners are so evolved. This clearly reflects well on us. Gabe, how do I turn this into a compliment about myself, Gabriel?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Yes. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
It's different. That's right. I'm actually really excited about this because hopefully you'll be able to tell us more stories on the show about what you're up to in all these places. It'll be a whole new layer to Feedback Friday. Where's Gabe this week or month, whatever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Pay that man his money.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
New favorite soundbite. John Malkovich doing a terrible Russian accent is just so hilarious to me. It's so stupid.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
This is so frustrating. I'm very sorry this happened to you guys. Having 30 grand stolen from you after you were already the victim of check fraud and your bank throws up their hands like, sorry, it's not our problem. You should have noticed this within one day. That really hurts. And frankly, it makes my blood boil because I know how banks like to dodge responsibility.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
And clearly, this is their fault, right? Someone tricked someone at the bank to allow this. That is 100% their fault. We did a little homework on this. And yeah, it looks like consumer bank accounts, they're protected under something called Regulation E of the Electronic Fund Transfer Act, basically a protection from the government because otherwise they wouldn't protect you at all.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Anyway, this means that if somebody hacks your account or steals money, the bank is generally on the hook for the fraudulent charges, although even consumers have to follow certain rules, including how soon they report the fraud. It sounds like they have up to 60 days, but business accounts, they are not fully covered by Regulation E. They're governed by the Uniform Commercial Code.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
And you can tell us all about the, I don't know, breathwork classes and interpretive dance parties that you're hitting on the Iberian Peninsula.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
We call it the UCC back in law school, no big deal. which is a model law that's been adopted by all 50 states in some form or another. And that code has much more limited protections. Shout out to my OG law professor, J.J. White, who basically crafted the UCC or at least big parts of it. That's awesome. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
He was actually pretty amazing at not making it sound like the most soulless, boring thing on God's green earth, because since he did so much with it, he would get up there and he's moving around and yelling about it. And you go, wow, there's people that are actually this passionate about Stuff like the Uniform Commercial Code. I bless them, right? Otherwise it wouldn't get done, but wow.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
So businesses have to rely on other things to be protected. Contract terms with their bank, fraud detection services, which are unique to each bank. Sometimes they're optional. Sometimes they cost extra, which is such BS if you ask me, but whatever. Honestly, I'd never heard of this either. I'm glad you wrote in because this is a good PSA for me and everyone listening right now.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
First of all, take your money out of Bank of America, those bastards. And by the way, if you'll indulge me for a second, I know this is kind of dry, but while I was brushing up on this, I was like, why the hell aren't businesses protected as well as consumers? What is the rationale? That seems unfair.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
And the answer is that the EFTA was passed in 1978 to protect individual consumers using electronic banking, which is brand new at the time. So the idea was average people are really bad at spotting fraud. They're going to be real bad at spotting electronic banking fraud because it's like the future. So they don't know how to navigate digital banking.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
We need to make sure people aren't going to get wiped out by scammers. Whereas under U.S. law, businesses, even though now we have all these mom and pops, businesses are thought to be better equipped. They have more resources. They understand contracts. They understand risk. They have insurance. They can implement internal controls with their accounting department.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
They're more likely to have in-house compliance and legal advisors. Of course, none of this is true with small businesses, but whatever. They don't care. Also, the law assumes that businesses are capable of negotiating custom terms with banks, LOL. And they can request special features like fraud filters, transaction approval hierarchies, stuff like that, which is absurd.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Imagine walking into Chase and being like, before I do this thing where you fill out a form on your computer, I need all these complex custom terms. The manager of the bank is going to go, I literally don't even know who you would talk to to get that done. I fill out these forms. That's how these big banks work. It's like McDonald's. They can customize the burger by taking the pickles off of it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
That's it. That's all you get. Look, your story shows that this is clearly not the case for smaller businesses. We don't have access to any of that stuff. And of course, that's the majority of business accounts at banks like Bank of America. So small businesses like ours, they're dangerously exposed and we have no recourse.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
So you and your new owners have to do a few things to protect yourselves from now on. And the Easy ones are, one, make damn sure multi-factor authentication is on for your online banking. If somebody logs on, they need to enter a code sent to them by email or text. Every bank should offer this by now. Set up alerts for every outgoing transaction. Limit employee access to accounts.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Use permission tiers. That might not be necessary in your company if there's really few employees. You guys are the only ones with access to funds. It basically should be like the two owners have to approve every transaction. Is it a pain? Yes, but they can go through it at the end of the day with the accounting person and done.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Not like some dude in North Carolina randomly sets access to your funds. Also set up something called positive pay. That's a tool that helps detect and block unauthorized or altered checks before they are paid set up ACH filters. There are two filters you should look into. One is called an ACH debit block. That blocks all incoming ACH debit requests from hitting your account.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
The other is an ACH filter slash authorization list. That lets you pre-authorize specific vendors or payees. And then if anyone else tries to debit you, it's automatically blocked and or flagged. And virtually every bank offers these features now. This should be super easy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
In fact, on crypto accounts, I have maximum security set up for all my crypto accounts and anything that's kept online, and you can't even transfer funds out without waiting X number of days, and before you do that, it has to be a pre-approved address, and adding an address requires a separate login from the login to the site. Once you add that, you can't use it for a few days.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
That's what security should be like in a bank, too. They're just lazy, and a lot of us don't take advantage of security measures. I would also encourage your new owners to create a habit of checking all of their online accounts themselves once a day. Maybe at the end of the day, just see if anything's fishy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
That honestly is a good practice for anybody, business owners or individuals, just to keep an eye on things. All you gotta do is log in and look at recent transactions. The end. And if your friends want to get even more proactive, they can look into getting insurance.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
There is something called commercial crime insurance, which should cover things like employee theft, check forgery, fraudulent wire transfers. It can cover phishing scams and vendor fraud, but that really depends on the policy details. There's also something called cyber liability insurance, which covers data breaches and certain forms of cyber fraud.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
But honestly, I don't know if you guys need insurance. If you do everything else, you should be covered. You guys might also want to consider, please change banks, look for one with better protections. It's no secret that big box banks like Bank of America, Wells Fargo, they don't give a crap about you or your business at all, or any of their customers, frankly.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Look at their conduct over the past few years. They merely do the absolute bare minimum required by law. That is what they're doing here, which is apparently call and leaving you holding the bag. But also, I don't know if you can find a bank that would have made you whole on 30K in this day and age. I used to be a member of First Republic. They were awesome.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
They were super personalized, very secure. They're gone now. Anyway, do some homework, call around, find out which bank is going to take the best possible care of you guys. And frankly, if you find one, it's a national chain. Let me know which one it is because I'll switch there in a second. Again, I'm very sorry this happened to you guys.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Okay, fair. It'll be like sitting with you at a Portuguese fish market or something.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Losing 30K to scammers and not being protected, it's a really tough pill to swallow. But this sounds like an example of how ultimately it is on us to be more proactive and responsible about managing these risks. Because these big companies, if they aren't compelled by law, they aren't helping. They don't care.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
I hate that you had to pay a steep price for this, but maybe this is what it takes to learn how this stuff works and make sure this never happens again. And like I said, it is a really good lesson for all of us. Congrats on selling your business. I love that you want to empower your new owners. I love that you guys have such a good relationship. Good luck and stay safe.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
You know who won't take you for a ride and abscond with your money? Probably the amazing sponsors that support this show. We'll be right back. This episode is sponsored in part by Delete Me. So a friend of a friend had this random guy who found her address and phone number just by poking around online.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
No hacking, no dark web stuff, just Google and a little too much free time, and he actually showed up at her apartment. This man was not well. Your personal info floating around online is not just annoying, it can actually be dangerous. That's why I signed up for Delete Me, and I encourage everyone I know to do the same.
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1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Delete Me makes it easy, quick, and safe to remove your personal data online at a time when surveillance and data breaches are common enough to make everybody vulnerable. Now that we're in the internet age, our data is inevitably on data broker sites, and their business is they sell your info to anybody who will pay for it.
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1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Delete Me hunts down that personal data, scrubs it from hundreds of those sites, and they don't just do it once and call it a day. They keep checking, keep removing it. Delete Me is super simple to set up, and it's really a good call to have.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Not a bad idea. Look, if Jace can make Larry King's basement phone chips interview sound decent, he should be able to handle a fish market. I expect nothing less. Yeah, he could do it. I'm stoked for you, man. I'm pumped that we get to live vicariously through you. If we manage to meet up this summer, maybe we should record an episode live or something. I think that would be really fun.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
I've got homes.com as a sponsor for this episode. Homes.com knows when it comes to home shopping, it's never just about the house or the condo. It's about the homes. And what makes a home is more than just the house or property. It's the location. It's the neighborhood. If you've got kids, it's also schools, nearby parks, transportation options.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
That's why homes.com goes above and beyond to bring home shoppers the in-depth information they need to find the right home. It's so hard not to say home every single time. And when I say in-depth information, I'm talking deep. Each listing features comprehensive information about the neighborhood, complete with a video guide.
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1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
They also have details about local schools with test scores, state rankings, student-teacher ratio. They even have an agent directory with the sales history of each agent. So when it comes to finding a home, not just a house, this is everything you need to know, all in one place, homes.com. We've done your homework. This episode is sponsored in part by The Defender.
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1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
You ever meet somebody and instantly know they've been places, that calm and chaos, I've driven through a storm and found the sunrise kind of energy? That's The Defender in vehicle form. It's not just a car, it's a statement, a nod to the ones who don't wait around for life to hand them an adventure, they go and get it.
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1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
And whether you're a seasoned trailblazer or just figuring out how to swap city limits for tree lines, The Defender is built to back you up. It's capable of great things just like you. It's a celebration of grit, curiosity, and pushing past the usual. So if you've been waiting for a sign to finally take that trip, forge that new path, or just see what you're made of, this is it.
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1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
The Defender's ready when you are. To learn more, visit DestinationDefenderUSA.com. If you liked this episode of Feedback Friday and you find our advice valuable, I invite you to do what other smart and considerate listeners do, which is take a moment and support those who make the show possible.
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1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
All of the deals, discount codes, and ways to support the show are searchable and clickable over at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. And if that doesn't work out for you, you can always email us, jordan at jordanharbinger.com. We're happy to dig up those codes for you. It is that important that you support those who support the show. Now, back to Feedback Friday.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
That would be awesome.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Sorry, I'm confused by that. Wouldn't living in one of the most expensive states make you want to live together more? Because you save on rent.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Welcome to Feedback Friday. I'm your host, Jordan Harbinger. As always, I'm here with Feedback Friday producer, the bottle of Selsun Blue, helping me clear up this stubborn dandruff of life advice, Gabriel Mizrahi.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Interesting.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
As everyone knows, I'm just a huge fan of hot yoga. Definitely wasn't like, my shoulder hurts. I can't go. Last time we had a class plan. Thanks for not ditching us to go to a monastery in Kyoto or whatever. I know that day may be coming, but today is not that day.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Oh, boy. Lots going on in this letter. Gabe, have you heard the term hobosexual, by the way? Have you ever heard of this? No, what is that? So I'm not saying this is her guy, but this is a whole thing. Apparently, it's when guys are like really messy and they're not ambitious. It's called a hobosexual. It's actually not sexual at all, obviously.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
But a lot of women are like my boyfriend or my husband this and we've been dating. And it's always we've been dating for the amount of time that most people would have been dating, married and then had children. So like a decade.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
It's always something like that. And it's just basically a guy who's just going with the flow and like not moving things for coasting. Yeah. Interesting. So there's so much more I'd want to know about you and your relationship before I straight up Lydia you and tell you whether to stay together or break up. But let me start by talking about one of the biggest themes here, which is values.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
You and your boyfriend clearly have different values around ambition, career stuff, money. I suspect also that you guys have different pressure points around these things. For example, he's not being straightforward with you about his finances.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
That might speak to his values around money and communication, but it might also speak to some embarrassment on his part if his financial situation isn't solid. And I'm going to sense that it's not because when I was dating and I had money, finally, I was like, I hope somebody asked me about how, you know, let me... accidentally dropped this metal credit card on the floor.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
I was like, I need to do this without looking like a complete dick because I was proud of myself. In fact, I don't know why I'm telling you this, but I'm going to tell you anyway. I remember when Jen brought me to her parents' house, not maybe the first time, but certainly the first several times. Her mom, legit with love, by the way, she goes, how much money do you have?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
And I was like, in my wallet right now? And she's like, no, totally, like completely, how much money do you have? Wow.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
It wasn't the first time we met. It was one of the first few times that I'd been to their house. And she was just like, okay. She was like, oh, not too bad or something like that, which it wasn't great. And I was like 32 years old or something. And I had run a business. So I basically had... What was that like? Were you like weirded out by that? A little bit.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Gabe, what is the first thing out of the mailbag?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
But I had read that Asian parents could be that way. But I never actually experienced it myself. And then I remember a few years later, literally one or two years later, she asked me again. And then she goes, oh, so much more than last time. In other words, she basically remembered or wrote it down. And so she gave me a break on the first one.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
And then she basically pinned that and then was like, let's make sure he has more next time I ask in a year or two.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
She was. And then when I did, she was like, oh, very impressed that you saved that much. And I remember my dad was all, because I didn't do anything back then, man. I like never went out to eat, never did anything, never spent money on myself. Company was paying my rent. I basically just saved my money. That was it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
So I'm lucky I did that because man, can you imagine if I was like, oh, still the same? She would have been like, loser, right? Harsh.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Jen was like, sorry about that. That's very typical Asian. They didn't know it was going to happen, but now you got through it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Yeah. Thank you for bringing me back because I was like, why the hell am I talking about this super embarrassing thing? Because you just want to flex clearly. My other in-laws asked me many things. She also told me I was getting fat. Okay. That's also very Asian. Cuts both ways. It does cut both ways. No, that was not a flex. That was just, if you have Chinese in-laws, you feel me.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
It doesn't matter what color you are.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
That's right. So yes, if your finances are okay and your girlfriend says, hey, maybe we should get a house or apartment together. How are your finances? And you're like, ah, none of your business, bro. That's not a good sign. And I just want to be clear, this is not about having a ton of money or only dating people who have as much money or more money than you or whatever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
That's not what I'm saying at all. You can be at the beginning of your financial journey, not have much, still be on top of your bills, still be on top of your credit cards, transparent about your situation, all that. So I'm not trying to dunk on anybody for not having a brokerage account or whatever. I was there too.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
I'm commenting on the values around basic financial hygiene and how you talk about it and being willing to talk about it. All right, so what you need to know is two things. First, incompatible values around very important things, things that are important to you, that is so hard to overcome.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
If somebody doesn't subscribe to the same core principles as you, if they don't care about the same things, that is going to continue to be a source of friction, frustration, disappointment, resentment. You're obviously quite driven. You value things like education and ambition and growth. And your boyfriend, okay, I'm sure it's complicated for him, but he might not.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Or he values staying comfortable more. Either way, you guys are mismatched there. Now, look, your values can change. His values can change. So we gotta make room for that possibility. But in my experience, core values and a person's capacity to honor them, it's harder to change, man. It's not impossible. It's just rare.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
And when it happens, it's usually because the person has gone through something profound and the change comes from them, not from the outside. Which brings me to the second thing that you really need to accept, which you're already discovering, which is you can't make your boyfriend do anything that he doesn't really want to do. You kind of did that with making him get his degree.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
It sounds like he actually did that really well, which is awesome. Congrats. But it sounds like he was motivated more kind of by the fear of losing you than by a genuine desire to succeed and improve himself. That sort of internal drive, man. Look, fear of losing something can be useful fuel, but as you can see, it's not sustainable. It's not permanent.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Now, I have to acknowledge that my values are playing a role here too. I also value ambition and achievement and relationship building. I'm more identified with you here, but that's not why I'm saying this. I'm saying this because if those things are important to you, this is gonna be an issue forever, no matter what.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
So your options here are change your values, which I don't think you wanna do, and I honestly don't think you should do that, You can change his values, already talked about that, or you can compromise on your values.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Take certain values less seriously or don't expect them of your partner, which to be fair, some people do that and they do it successfully or they just make peace with the fact that they can't get everything from one person. They choose to prioritize other qualities, whether that's kindness or support or whatever it is. So that's something to think about. The other thing you need to confront is,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
It's been 10 years. There are multiple challenges here. You're suddenly facing all these really pressing questions about each other, about yourself, about the future. And you might compromise your values and then you might be dissatisfied with that later. And I think when these things pile up in a way that creates a crisis, it's usually a sign something's not right.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Gabe, this is another one of me putting my values on someone else here, but why are you dating for 10 years? That's a really long time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Yes. My family is famous for they'll date for like 10 years or 20 years and they basically just never get married or they get married and then they have a kid right away. But they've been dating for literally 20 years because it's like, oh, I get married. If you're not going to have a kid right away, blah, blah. So I get it. People do that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
But this almost sounds like she's trying to get things going and he's just kind of like, huh, whatever, bro. That's the vibe I'm getting from this whole thing. Now, I'm not saying you definitely need to break up or whatever, but it sounds to me like you guys aren't communicating as well as you could about certain important things.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
And they have to be brushed off onto the floor of your existential something. Our mission is to help you become a better informed, more critical thing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Maybe these things are even being avoided a little bit because, you know, it's going to cause conflict. There are just a few gaps here that need to be bridged. For example, you said you don't know if he worries about you as much as you worry about him. I thought that was a really interesting thing to share. Because look, there might be more to worry about with him than with you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
I'm guessing he looks at you and goes, man, she's killing it. She's good. But the fact that you feel like he might not spend as much time thinking about you, that is meaningful, very meaningful. But I also think this is another consequence of that value mismatch.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
When one person's values enable them to take good care of themselves, it can make you worry about how the other person is taking care of themselves. And it can also let him off the hook for worrying about you, because look, you're self-motivated, you're self-sufficient, you're thriving, or at least on your way.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
That's exactly it. It's not just that she worries about him more than he might worry about her. It's that she cares enough about these things to worry at all. And it seems like maybe he doesn't. And that makes her feel like they're just on two different planets.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Yeah, so much going on there.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
It's like that video take on me where it's just the little pencil drawings, but when you flip them fast, it's an animation.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Yeah, I'm trying to be kind here. Maybe these guys offer her other qualities like their kindness or something else she didn't mention that distract or outweigh these frustrations. It's hard to know for sure. I'm secretly and silently very judgy of this particular thing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Interesting. And I'm going to say this. I'm not talking about your guy here because I don't have enough details and I only have your side of the story. There's a lot of women that will pick a messy guy and they're like, oh, he just needs to be mothered and pulled in this right direction. And that's what you're doing. You are mothering him, essentially. Right. You're taking care of him.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
You're taking care of the bulk of whatever issues. And you're like, hey, get your degree and. oh, hey, I'm gonna motivate you by saying that I can't be with somebody who doesn't have a degree, so he finishes his degree.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
So you're like, I'm good for him, I'm fixing this guy, and he's like, gosh, he's so naggy, she wants me to be someone I'm not, but he already knows that he's not really good enough for you, so he's acting spitefully because you're highlighting that in a way that you think is motivating, and he sees as you trying to drag him kicking and screaming into being a better person, but he doesn't want to be that guy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
And I really do think that says more about these guys and their buttons that are getting pushed. But why do you keep picking guys like this? Again, I'm not necessarily talking about your guy here, but so many women who have their ish together, they date these kind of like fixer uppers. That's the kindest way I'm planning on putting it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
And then they're surprised when Mr. Fixer Upper turns out to be kind of a loser after a while. And I feel the need to say once again, I'm not talking about this particular letter, but this happens a lot.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Totally. The other guy she mentioned, though, the one who gave her mixed signals and then started dating another woman who he married right away. I'm not sure what to make about that one. The only common thread I can see is that she seems to be getting push-pull signals from dudes and that bothers her. I don't know.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
But if that's the connection, then there's more for her to know about the men she's attracted to, how she relates to them. Because again, there are gaps here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
But if that's why she brought it up, I don't know. That seems like a very tenuous connection. I get it. You're wondering who your husband's going to be, but the progress you're looking for is so much closer to home. It's here and now inside of you and with this guy, right? But I also know that big crises in relationships can bring up a lot. They can make you think about the past. I get it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Yeah, that's why I'm not trying to be King A-hole about this whole thing. I'm glad you brought it up. That occurred to me while you were reading the letter that he might just be like down and demotivated for other reasons.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Yeah, I saw that. I thought that was interesting. It never would have occurred to me, actually.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Exactly. It's a fair point. I also wonder if he's been depressed this whole time. It's just gotten worse lately. But ultimately, if that's going to get better, that's something he's going to have to take on himself. She can't cure his depression for him. So I hope that gives you a few new angles here. This whole situation is a little messy, kind of like your choice in men. I kid.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
I know this is painful stuff. I'm sorry. But listen, the best thing you can do right now is to really listen to your feelings, honor your values, talk to your boyfriend about why you're struggling, where he is, what he wants. Keep taking all these data seriously. My sense is that this relationship probably isn't working in some fundamental ways.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
And I think you've been together long enough to come to a reasonable conclusion about whether you guys can work on it, whether you guys are able to change. I also don't know if either of you should change. That's up to you. But this might just mean you are not the people for each other. And that's really painful sunk cost fallacy 10 years in all that stuff. But that's OK, too.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
You have to be clear and courageous while you also look at the pieces of this that are yours. Sending you a big hug and wishing you all the best. Man, I hope these two figure it out. I know I'm hard on these guys. And some of it is just that I can't relate to being like constantly demotivated, not doing anything or blah, blah, blah. But look, it always takes two to tango, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
She's putting up with it. Maybe she's dragging him in a way that he doesn't want to or need to go. But man, it's really hard not to be like, you've been dating for 10 years. Somebody's got to shit or get off the pot, one or both of you. And maybe you should just move on. Why are you trying to change people? You don't have kids. You don't own a house.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Just move on to somebody who has better matching values.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
All right, now time for the recommendation of the week.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Yeah. Literally. You're going to love it. You know, I didn't even plan that. I just saw it out of the corner of my eye while you were talking. I was like, oh yeah, banjo soundbite.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Cool. I'm just not going to be mean at all about that. In case you don't know, there's a subreddit for our show if you want to jump in discussions with other listeners about specific episodes. If there's an episode you like or an episode you really didn't like, or you want to share additional thoughts or learn more from other people in the show fam, come check it out.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
There's a lot of cool conversations happening over there. You can find it all in the Jordan Harbinger subreddit. Okay, next up.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Gabe secretly wrote into the show as a 51-year-old special ed teacher so he could defend his life choices. How could you tell? Was it the rodeo? Everyone knows Gabe loves a good rodeo. Famously a huge livestock guy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
That is remarkable, man. Well done. It sounds like you had a lot to repair, and you repaired it. Talk about taking accountability and following through. I gotta say, it's extraordinary. You just don't hear that much these days and age, right? Like, I took accountability for my crap and then fixed my life. Awesome.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Very. I can see why it's become part of the AA curriculum. When you have a lot to repair, a lot to prove to people, at the end of the day, it's, did you actually show up to my graduation? Did you attend your meetings? Did you pay me back for the money you borrowed? Did you help me rebuild the garage door you crashed your car into? Whatever it is, anyone could say, oh, I'm sorry.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
But showing up and fixing the door, that's the part that actually counts. And this is a great reminder of what really heals these wounds. It's inspiring.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Wow. Okay. Well, look, good questions. First of all, just have to acknowledge you have been on a journey, my friend. This is quite a story.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
I don't want to belabor the point, but man, you've been through a lot to battle addiction and suicidality and a mood disorder to end up in the ICU with all these health problems and almost die, which is one of the most dramatic rock bottom moments you could ask for. And then you turn your life around in this incredible way.
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You're running freaking marathons, repairing your relationships with your kids, righting all these wrongs. It's not easy to do. Like I said, it's inspiring. You should be very proud of yourself. So it's a tough predicament. Look, this is not as serious as a lot of the other stuff I feel like we take on the show.
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1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
So I'm glad we can answer something where the stakes are a little bit like less insane. But do you honor the voice telling you to live your dream of traveling? Or do you stay here where you are and remain a steady presence for your children? That's a tough one. Yeah. Yeah, but you're asking all the right questions.
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1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
I guess my first thought is, your children are old enough now, your relationship with them sounds solid enough now, that I would talk to them openly about all this. Instead of wondering privately, you know, oh, how will they process this? What will their experience be like? Is this going to be an abandonment for them while staying? Make it feel like I'm intruding in their lives? They're not six.
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1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
They're old enough now. Why not sit down with them and make it a conversation? I'm sure they would really appreciate that. You could literally say, guys, I hope you know how much I love you. I hope you can see how much getting another chance with you means to me.
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1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
As I also have this dream of traveling, and I think now might be my moment or soon, but I'm torn between staying here, staying close to you, going off and having a really meaningful experience for me.
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1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
I'm going around in circles here asking myself how you guys would feel if I left, whether I need to stay here to really be a part of your lives, whether I can go off and have this experience and still be a good dad, which is my priority. And I just don't know the answer. There's also a part of me going, if I stay, are you going to feel like I'm intruding in your lives?
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1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
You think I'm expecting something more from you guys? So I thought we could talk about it. And I want you to be really honest with me. Being your dad, working on our relationships, that has been everything to me. And I don't want to do anything to compromise that or disappoint you or take a step backward.
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1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
But I want to know where you are right now and what you really need from me so I can make a decision that's right for all of us. Something like that. That's how I'd frame it. I like that. Yeah, they might say, yeah, we need you close by. What are you talking about? I don't know how I'd feel if you moved away. They might also say, dad, we're good. We're in college now, man.
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1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
We're almost in college, whatever. You can stay close even if you're living somewhere else. Go have fun. YOLO. Thank you for asking.
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1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
What they're going to also ask is, can we come visit you? They're probably going to be super excited for you. That's my prediction. They're going to be super excited for you. They're going to ask if you're coming back and if they can come visit. And you're going to find that you're overthinking this. That's what I hope for you. And that's what I predict for you.
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1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
I'm actually glad that you touched on that, Gabe, because that was on my mind, too. If he does go, is he going to keep attending the meetings? Is he going to stay in touch with his sponsor? Will he keep exercising? I highly recommend that you do all that, by the way. It might be important for his kids to know that he has a strong foundation now to make a move like this responsibly.
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1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
That he's not going to go off the deep end and lose all his progress and potentially break their hearts when he puts himself in a new environment.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Really good call, and if you're still in therapy, this would obviously be a great thing to talk to your therapist about. As for the guilt piece, whether you're guilt about leaving the first time is informing all this, that's a very meaningful piece of this puzzle, and that's something you need to work through or just accept as part of the equation.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
You might want to bring that into your conversation with your kids. Hey, there's a big part of me that still feels guilty for leaving you the first time, and it's really hard for me to think about leaving without feeling guilty again. And then let them tell you whether that guilt is warranted.
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1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
But honestly, my hunch is you're going to have to work through that guilt yourself because your kids didn't create it. But here's an idea. Instead of only thinking of it as a reminder of what you did or you didn't do, maybe you can think of it as a reminder of what's important to you, what you really owe your children in the future.
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1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
That doesn't mean you can't go abroad, but it might help inform you how to stay close to them if you do. We can't tell you for sure whether this is definitely the right move or whether now is the right moment.
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1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
What's going to determine that is the way you're taking care of yourself, the quality and stage of your relationship with your kids, what they need and expect from you right now, and the process you're in with them and with everyone else in your life to make this dream of travel understandable and responsible and respectful. I do think that it could be amazing. It could be very doable.
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1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
And it could even be a part of your recovery and your growth. And I do think that your kids going off to college, building their own lives, frees you up to some degree and changes the requirements of your relationship. And by the way, that might mean waiting till your son goes off to college if he goes off somewhere.
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1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Because even though he's older, he's like 17, there's something about finishing high school that kind of ends a chapter. And it might be worth sticking around while he's still in school. Again, something for you guys to talk about. I didn't even go to my high school graduation. So I would have been... bummed if somebody like stayed two months not doing something so they could go to this thing.
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1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
And I was like, whatever. I didn't even show up. I just didn't care. But your son might be like, are you kidding me? This is the biggest night of my life. You're not going to be there. That's worth staying around for. But talk to him. Listen, if you decide to go, I would come up with a few practices that will help you stay connected to your kids. Text them consistently. Send them photos.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Send them email. FaceTime with them regularly. Maybe invite them to come visit you. That's a great way to create new experiences with them. Invite them into this whole adventure. I really do believe that you can still be an important part of their lives even if you move away. But you have to be conscientious and put in the efforts. Super cool dream, man.
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1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Just make sure you're doing it thoughtfully and you really can't go wrong. Good luck and safe travels. The best things that have happened in my life and business have come through my network, the circle of people I know, like, and trust. And I'm teaching you how to build the same thing for yourself in our six-minute networking course. The course is free. It is not gross. It is not schmoozy.
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1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
You can find it on the Thinkific platform over at sixminutenetworking.com. It's not very involved. Frankly, you could binge the whole thing a few minutes a day. This is the stuff I wish I knew 20 years ago. You got to dig that well before you get thirsty, build relationships before you need them. Again, over at sixminutenetworking.com.
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Show notes, transcripts on the website, advertisers, discounts, ways to support the show, all at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. I'm at Jordan Harbinger on Twitter and Instagram. You can also connect with me on LinkedIn. Gabe's over on Instagram at Gabriel Mizrahi or on Twitter at Gabe Mizrahi. This show is created in association with Podcast One.
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1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
My team is Jen Harbinger, Jace Sanderson, Robert Fogerty, Ian Baird, Tata Sudlowskis, and of course, Gabriel Mizrahi. Our advice and opinions are our own. I might be a lawyer, but I'm not your lawyer. So do your own research before implementing anything you hear on the show. Ditto Patty Eberwein. Remember, we rise by lifting others. Share the show with those you love.
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If you found the episode useful, please share it with somebody else who could use the advice we gave here today. In the meantime, I hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn. And we'll see you next time.
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1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Oh, man.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Yeah. And the more you see, the more you're like, do I need this one? I don't know if I have too much DHT. What's that again? DHT? What is DHT? That's the reason that you don't have hair right now. Oh. It bonds to the hair follicle.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
No, breach of Fidudu? Really, Gabe?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Yeah, we really opened Pandora's box with that one. But my God, Breach of Fadoodoo. I don't know how I'm going to get through the rest of this segment here. This is ridiculous.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
I'm afraid she does, but we'll get to that in a second. Man, what a story and what a mess. This is fascinating. You've got your own little succession drama going on over here. I got to say, your mom sounds like a remarkable woman. She really was.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
To lose a husband so early on, turn around his company, sell the company, start another company, make that one even more successful, creating generational wealth, which your niece is now busy squandering. all while raising young kids as a widow, and then leave you guys that legacy. That is just insanely impressive. She must have been quite a powerhouse.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Super interesting mom to have, even with all the flaws, it sounds like, was present here. But man, what's happened since she handed off the business, that is really unfortunate. Your sister and niece sound like very difficult people to deal with, dangerous people to be in business with, that's for damn sure, and I'm sorry they've done such a number on the company.
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1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
No, you've come to the other side. During the week, we have long-form conversations with a variety of bald people from organized crime figures, mafia enforcers, former cult members, rocket scientists, and astronauts. All bald, every single one. That's the criteria for the show.
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1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
I can't even imagine how maddening and gross it must have been to discover that they've essentially been treating your mom's business, the family business, as their piggy bank for dumb crap. It's unconscionable. Yeah. I love your determination, your thoughtfulness about how to carry out this plan.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
If everything you said is true, which sure seems like it is, I obviously share your view that these two have got to go. And it would be so sweet if you could rescue this company and turn it around the way your mom did after your dad passed away. That would be quite a story. We wanted an expert's opinion about all this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
We reached out to Patty Eberwine, a business litigation attorney specializing in commercial disputes. And Patty's take was, your story is quite interesting, and she totally understood your sentiment. But unfortunately, storming into the business and taking it over by coup, That doesn't really work. As Patty explained to us, that's just not how corporations run.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
You can't just kick someone out of a company like a patron in a bar. If your company is a corporation, it's governed by the board of directors. If it's a limited liability company, an LLC, it's governed by the managing member. So the first thing you need to do is look at the governing documents of the company.
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1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
the articles of incorporation and or the company bylaws and see who holds the power to remove officers of the company. Patty said you have two basic options here. Option one, you remove your sister and niece through the process allowed by the company's governing documents. Option two, you carry out this quote unquote coup through the legal process by suing them in court.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Patty explained to us that these types of cases tend to contain three major causes of action. One, breach of fiduciary duty of loyalty, which you're already on to.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
I really stepped very carefully around it. Another is conversion, which is civil theft, basically stealing from the company. And the third is negligence. how the defendant executed their duties to the company, although Patty said this can be a tough win. So to get tactical, here's how Patty said the process usually goes. Step one, get proof of your sister and or niece's wrongdoing.
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1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
And it sounds like you've already done this with the help of your team, which is great. You can also gather more information through the formal records request procedure for the company. If the company's a corporation, you have a right as a shareholder and potentially a director to get all of the financial records of the company.
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1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Patty said you should request them under the formal process of the company's governing documents, and an LLC will have a similar process for owners or members of the company. Step two, you review the governing documents, you learn how they provide for removing cheating officers of the company.
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1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
If there's evidence in the financial records of rife abuse and breaches of fiduciary duty, then Patty said you should see if there's any internal process in the company for removing members, directors, employees who pilfer from the company. For example, if your niece is only an employee, if she doesn't actually own any part of the company, Patty said she can be fired by the board of directors.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
If there is no board of directors or if your sister and niece are on the board, then you need to take the dispute to court, which brings us to step three, which is you file a complaint in your state court seeking an accounting of the company and suing your sister and or niece for the relevant causes of action.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
The complaint against your sister and niece, it'll probably ask the court to relinquish their ownership interests in the company, get an accurate accounting of the company, and sue them for breaches of fiduciary duty to the company. And that's where the coup really begins. Of course, Patty said you'll need to get a lawyer in your state or in the state where the company is based.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
You mentioned that you have one already. That is great. I'm not sure if that person is just helping out or if they're the counsel of the company or if they specialize in this kind of litigation. But one way or another, you really do need a lawyer with experience here. Now, you should know this might take a while. It depends on how clogged up the court is in your state.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Patty's guess is it would take about a year in a state like Oklahoma. In California, it might even take two years. And it would probably be moderately expensive. Patty's rough guess was maybe 20 to 30K in legal fees, depending on how much your sister and niece fight back, whether they engage with their own attorney, et cetera. Just drafting the complaint itself is gonna be like three to five grand.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Patty's hope is that just filing the lawsuit would force your aunt and niece to cave and agree to settle. Now, Patty told us about an interesting wrinkle to all this based on what your company's governing documents say. A lot of time, a cheating member of a company, they can be forced to pay the legal fees for a lawsuit required to kick the cheater out.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Now, obviously, that could be very helpful in forcing your sister and niece to leave quickly and quietly. Patty's take, if the governing documents say that, then you and your team could ever so tactfully, of course, tell them that this could be a very expensive process that they should resolve now.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
She would, however, not advise you to say that they'd be forced to pay legal fees because in her experience, some courts look down on that. It can be seen as bullying or extortionate, even if it's true, which I find kind of weird. But I guess courts don't like it when it's like, hey, by the way, I'm going to make it look like you're wrong and then you have to pay my legal bills.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1158: Can Coup Against Kin Save Family Fortune? | Feedback Friday
You want people to come to the table and not be afraid to fight for themselves, even if they are kind of pieces of crap like your niece and your sister.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
So that's the sense that I'm getting. I mean, look, I'll delete this episode if she becomes the next Taylor Swift.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Exactly. I need front row tickets for the whole family at Madison Square Garden. Something to top Disneyland. No oily packages on the way in, though. No oily packages allowed. Seriously, though, I don't think he'd be writing in if she were like, man, it would be so cool if I went to medical school and made an impact on people.
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1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
This is a great special.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Or, hey, sometimes in the shower I pretend I'm Olivia Rodrigo and I'm singing at a stadium full of people. And then she went about her day and focused on normal, achievable goals and career stuff. He's writing in because he finds all of this a little alarming, probably, because not only is she nursing these extreme fantasies, she's not actually taking any steps toward making them a reality.
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1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Yeah, it's as funny as the other crap that's been on Netflix lately. All right. On the Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the stories, secrets, and skills of the world's most fascinating people and turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you. And our mission is to help you become a better informed, more critical thinker.
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1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
I do, too. This is a really tough place to be as a partner, because if he's, honey, your dreams are a little nuts and I think you need to be realistic, he risks coming across as cruel and unsupportive, recapitulating her whole childhood, and maybe sending her further into her depression, not letting her have this nice out. But then if he plays along, he's colluding with her delusion. Right.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Colulu with the delulu. Yeah, Cthulhu with the Delulu, exactly. Man, speaking of catchy, Cthulhu with the Delulu. That is way too fun to say. I'm going to have to try and shake that by the weekend.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
We're gonna yeah as long as it's a hundred and fifteen degrees or whatever it was that time I'm still trying to rehydrate my body from the hot eight yoga four months ago Look, I honestly don't know how you're supposed to support your wife's dreams if this is the relationship that she has with them and
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
There is a difference between a dream and a delusion, between an aspiration and a fantasy, and any goal, whether it's super attainable or crazy ambitious, the rubber has to meet the road at some point. Like you said, journey over destination. So if she just wants to fantasize, which she's allowed to do, and actually, fantasy isn't all bad.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
It does play an important role for us and maybe an extra important role for her. I mean, I fantasize regularly, mostly about getting a full night of uninterrupted sleep. Good luck with that, by the way. Not going to happen. Exactly. Not anytime soon.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
If all she wants to do is fantasize, I am just not sure what you would even be supporting other than her vivid imagination and possibly, and I hate saying this because it feels mean, a shaky grasp on reality.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Tipflation, that's what it's called. Where it just keeps going up, but their wages stay constant, so we're just subsidizing everything. Just put it in the price of the food. During the week, we have long-form conversations with a variety of amazing folks. From mafia enforcers and arms dealers, rocket scientists, four-star generals, Hollywood filmmakers. This week on the show, we had Russ Swain.
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1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
I like that because he's not saying, grow up and be realistic, Linda. You're never going to be a doctor. He's saying, I'm here for you. And there's a bit of a gap here. And can you help me understand what you're looking for from me?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Which is totally fair, but I still think this is going to be a tough conversation for him, because like he said, when he probes too much, she just shuts down.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Exactly. He needs to go out of his way to make her understand that's not what he's saying so she can take in what he's actually saying.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
That's where I end up falling with all this, too, because if he doesn't say anything, then he's agreeing to live part time in fantasy land to keep Colulu with the Delulu. And that's not just not helping her. It's also kind of harming him. And like I said, that would be just as true for a partner who isn't disabled. That kind of has nothing to do with her disability.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
He was a good little Mormon boy art student. who became a masterful counterfeiter of U.S. currency. We also had a skeptical Sunday on sextortion, those scams where people try to tell you that they have pictures of you doing something naughty. It's happened to me. It's happened to a lot of people with disastrous results, unfortunately, in some cases, especially among teens.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Right, which is why I really feel for him and for both of them. And look, if all of this feels too daunting, maybe you can encourage your wife to talk to her therapist about these big dreams of hers. Maybe you can ask what they make of them, whether they're helping her turn them into action, and if not, why?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Because ultimately, I think therapy is where she's gonna have to work through a lot of this stuff anyway, including whatever your conversation with her brings up. So that's the real conversation that you guys need to have. And once you guys move through that stage, if your wife is willing to go there with you, then you can talk about the one or two goals to focus on and start getting practical.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
We are rooting, of course, for both of you. Good luck. And now I want you to Kalulu in our DeLulu by checking out the totally unhinged deals on the fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back. Thanks for watching. That's one reason why I use delete me. They do all the heavy lifting, removing your info from hundreds of data broker websites.
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Most importantly, keeping it off because these sites love to bring your data back. Plus delete me sends regular reports. It's quite satisfying to look at how much of your info has been scrubbed and taken down. I don't have time to track this stuff myself. Who does? So I leave it to the pros over at delete me. So if you care about your privacy, check out delete me.
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1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
This episode is sponsored in part by Audible. Okay, let's talk about the new year. You're probably thinking about resolutions like maybe hitting the gym, you're gonna eat better, maybe you're gonna finally organize that junk drawer that could double as a time capsule from the 90s. But here's an easier one. Let Audible expand your life just by listening.
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A little bit like this podcast, but seriously, Audible makes self-improvement feel doable. They've got over a million audiobooks, podcasts, and exclusive Audible originals. This show is available in the app. If you want to get fit without actually leaving your couch, there's advice for that. If you need relationship tips that don't involve arguing over the thermostat, okay, they got you covered.
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If you're thinking about making a career move or tackling your finances, they've got listens for that too. And the best part is you can learn and grow while doing stuff you already do. Commuting, working out, folding laundry like an absolute champion. Suddenly, you're crushing your goals and you didn't even break a sweat unless you listen to audiobooks while you're working out, then sweat away.
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Start your 30-day trial at audible.com slash JHS. It's like a personal trainer for your brain without needing to break a sweat. Thank you so much for listening and supporting our amazing sponsors, all of the deals and discounts and ways to support the podcast. Searchable and clickable over on the website, jordanharbinger.com slash deals. Please consider supporting those who support the show.
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1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Definitely a PSA and very important episode as well. Go ahead and listen to those if you haven't had a chance to do so yet. On Fridays, though, we take listener letters, offer advice, and share random stories from our lives. Speaking of which, Gabe, Jen and I took the kids to Disneyland. The other week. Yes, you guys had a good time, huh, man? First of all Pete capitalism. Holy moly.
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1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Now back to Feedback Friday.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Ugh, how dare these people. I might leave and be mad at your wedding.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
You have to be Zen with Just knowing you are going to get bent over It's over when you walk in there and I was like Let's just get a quick lunch on the first day and I ordered a burger and it wasn't that good and the fries were cold and the kids had chicken tenders and the bill was like $200 dude because the burger was 40 bucks, dude. And I was like, 40 bucks? They're like, it's a Wagyu burger.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Yeah, tell him he got into medical school. Problem solved.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Exactly. Man, this story, it bums me out. Actually, it pisses me off if I'm going to put a fine point on the emotion that I'm feeling. This is not your problem, my man. This is between your cousin and the family.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Not that they can ultimately dictate who she sees, like you said, that's up to her, but if they have a problem with him, and look, maybe there are some legit reasons for that, I don't know, whatever, they can talk to her about that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
The fact that they are putting you and your fiance in the middle of all of their personal crap, the fact that they are using your wedding as an opportunity to lean on her to break up with this guy or exclude him from a family event, that is, so not cool, it's so inappropriate, it's wildly inappropriate.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
And all of this stuff about being mad the whole time, the wedding being awkward, leaving early, this is all on them. They are choosing to have that response on arguably the most important day of your life, and choosing to make it your problem so that you will do what they want. This is so insane to me, man. They are entitled to have whatever feelings they have,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
But that does not mean that they need or should feel the permission to express them on a day that is not about them. They are adults. It is time to start acting as such. So yeah, as you can tell, I do not think this is okay. I know you know that, but I am just confirming that all of your suspicions about them being children and ridiculous are 100% correct.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
So your decision to pull back and draw boundaries is exactly the right one. My advice to you is to stand by that decision and respectfully tell your family, listen guys, we hear you loud and clear, you don't like Radhika's boyfriend. You're allowed to feel however you feel about him, but she's my cousin. She and Mike have been together for two years.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
We're giving her a plus one, just like everyone else. If that doesn't sit well with you, we understand that, but that's between you and Radhika. And we ask that you not push us to disinvite him anymore because it's causing a lot of stress around our special day. And by the way, we have a lot of other crap we gotta do. I've got to pick 17,000 different decorations and food items.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
This is not high on my list of priorities. Now, you can leave that part out, but we all know that's how you feel. Our hope is that you can put this aside and remember what this day is really about, my fiance and me. Not one guest that you don't like. You coming and enjoying yourselves and not letting him ruin the whole day would be the best gift you could give us. That and $500, at least.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
That's how I'd do it, and if they continue to make this your problem, they're really gonna look like even bigger a-holes than they do already, but they might not know that, and they might not care. Look, this is probably a little daunting, especially in a family like this. Clearly there's some sort of unspoken rule where this is somewhat okay, because otherwise they wouldn't have done it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
It's awkward, it's scary, it means bearing the discomfort of some people in your family being angry with you for not doing what they want. potentially the discomfort of them not having a good time at your wedding, leaving early, or maybe not coming at all. Although, candidly, I always think this is such a BS bluff. I really think it's unlikely.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
I think they are blustering and they're stomping their feet like my three-year-old daughter when she doesn't get what she wants because they see an opportunity to work on your cousin, and on the day, they're probably just gonna suck it up because that's what decent people do. And that's my strong hunch. I think it's all going to be just gone the day of.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
There's going to be a couple stinky looks and that's it. But you have to be willing to tolerate those feelings in order to protect yourselves and your day here. I hate that they are putting you in this position. It really makes me angry. You do not deserve it. Your fiance doesn't either. But since this is what's happening, you guys just have to have a hard conversation.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
I'm like, this is worse than any ground chuck crap I've ever had. Thanks for the pickles or whatever that I'm sure are gourmet, but this is legit like something that was under a heat lamp for an hour.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
you're putting us in the middle of a problem that is not ours and you guys need to figure this out and decide what to do with your feelings on your own yeah powerful message and it might be a really important first step as they build their lives together agreed so that's how we'd handle this part of this decision means making peace with the fact that you can't make everyone happy here and you can't control everyone's experience which is also an important part of the script that you're rewriting here so when you say how can we mentally prepare for this
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
I would say mentally prepare to compartmentalize this drama so that you can enjoy your day and get clear with yourself about what's yours and what's not yours. If Nani and Dottie have their knickers in a twist because Mike doesn't have an MBA or whatever, fine. Those are their knickers. They are not yours. You guys need to be very clear about that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
And that's not so much turning a blind eye to this BS as saying, I see that my grandparents are missing our wedding because they want to be right. And that's really sad. Now let me get back to Poppin' and Lockin' to Paper Planes by M.I.A. because that's in every Indian wedding. And just enjoy your night because you only get to do your wedding once. That part is your responsibility.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Also, that song is such a banger. It is a banger. You gotta enjoy it. Yeah, with the gunshot. shot sample and everything. Yeah, I mean, it glorifies street violence. Whatever, we take what we can get. I'm sorry you have to deal with all this. I'm also kind of excited for you to set a new tone here. Congrats on getting married. Have a blast at the wedding.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
And make sure Mike gets an extra serving of biryani. He's going to be feeling the heat that night. And hey, if all else fails, invite me to the wedding. I love chicken tikka masala. I'll wear a Mike Tyson face tattoo and act like Jake Paul at the buffet. That'll pull all the attention away from Radhika's boyfriend. Just make Jordan the bad guy. I'll give you a good rate.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
For me, it's offensive when one, somebody asked me for a tip and I basically walked up to a counter and they took my order and that was it. That's no. Common gripe in today's society. Yeah. Perhaps less common gripe. There's a couple restaurants around here that shall remain nameless unless they pay for the sponsorship on this show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Basically, you let me ride the elephant. We call it even. I know what I'm getting for lunch after this, Gabriel. I've got a crankering now for some of that good chicken tikka masala. You know what? The comical part of this is they probably think they're being really chill dictating what kind of wedding he wants because they're like, hey, we let him pick the bride. What more does he want?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
We didn't even try to pick his wife for him.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
That's right. That's right. We just get to pick where you live, how many children you have, what kind of wedding you have. We're totally laid back parents. Come on. Ah, man. You can reach us Friday at JordanHarbinger.com. Please keep your emails concise. Try to use a descriptive subject line that makes our job a lot easier.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
If you're trying to track down an isolated relative, your parents are living next to a psychotic person, or you're debating whether to bring your future kids around your unstable, homicidal uncle, whatever's got you staying up at night lately, hit us up Friday at JordanHarbinger.com. We're here to help, and we keep every email
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
anonymous and by the way our newsletter is a huge hit with you guys it's i really love the feedback we get from this it's called we bit wiser it's a bite-sized gem from a past episode from us to you delivered to your inbox most wednesdays so if you want to keep up with the wisdom from our thousand plus episodes and apply it to your life i invite you to come check it out you can sign up at jordanharbinger.com news all right what's next hey gabe and jordan i'm 24 my wife is 25 and we got married when we were 18.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
You do, there was places where you can buy pins, which by the way are like 16 bucks, just little pins, and you can trade them and it's a whole thing, and there were these wristbands that looked like watches, and I was like, what are these? And they go, oh, if you have a lightning lane pass, you can buy one of these and you can hold it up instead of scanning your phone.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Wait, I'm confused. We realized I was in a lot of debt, so he didn't know he was in debt? Is that possible?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Yeah, so I've run a couple of businesses, nothing major as you all know, but you got to know things aren't good and that you're spending more money than you have. You'd have to be completely asleep at the wheel and actively not checking your bank account or whatever to not know.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
And unless it's a big business where there's an accounting department and they're just not telling you something, that doesn't make any sense to me.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Which means when she said, okay, I'll move back in, but on one condition, you never lie to me again, you lied to her, you didn't own up to the full truth. I don't mean to pounce and nitpick here, folks, but his whole letter is about not being honest with his spouse. I hear this detail and I go, okay, sounds like a pattern of deception.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Yes, I think that's what he means. Because earlier he said double life. Does that mean he's just watching porn? That's the big secret? Or is he having affairs too? Fair question.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Oh boy, okay. First of all, I want to thank you for sharing so much with us. I'm sure this is not easy to talk about. I can hear that it's causing you a lot of sadness, a lot of distress, and I appreciate your vulnerability.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
I also appreciate that you understand that this addiction has become a problem in your marriage, or maybe it was more the deception around it, and you want to get better from the sound of it. I can also appreciate your wife's perspective to some degree here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Look, I personally don't think it's fair to divorce your spouse for having a couple dates with Miss Michigan every now and then if you catch my drift. Wait, what? Miss Michigan? What is that? Drift not caught, I assume? I do not catch your drift.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Growing up in Michigan, when you tell people where you live, you hold up your hand and you point to a place on the hand for the lower peninsula where you live. Okay. And so, if you have a date with Miss Michigan, do I need to fill in the rest of the blanks or are we getting there?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
So people pay $40 for a Star Wars theme, Mickey Mouse theme, whatever it is, band to ride the rides faster. But they've already paid for the front of the line, the lightning box. Correct. It doesn't include anything other than a way to scan onto the ride.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
That is a local ref.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Yeah, I'm hanging out with Miss Michigan tonight, or just me and Miss Michigan. That's what we used to say. And it was obvious because we were in high school and nobody was actually getting laid, so...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Oh, God. It's more of an Oman shape. It's custom. So part of me is like, is it really fair to get divorced based on this? But obviously, look, everyone has different values around this stuff. Obviously, our values are to make fun of it incessantly when we do it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Also, once it becomes an addiction, which you said it is, okay, when it's a compulsive thing, that is a problem no matter what your values are around watching a little bit of porn. Where I really identify with her is she's been married to a guy who hid what seems to be a very significant part of his life from her Two significant parts, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
The porn consumption and the business debt problem, which in my opinion is much more serious.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Also, the job he wanted was taking a while to get back to him, so he went back to the business, which fine, maybe that made some sense because the money was already spent or whatever, but if you desperately need to find employment to climb out of this debt, going back to the company that's compromising you guys without trying to fix the underlying issue, which it doesn't sound like you did, instead of interviewing for other jobs to keep you afloat, I wonder if that was a little questionable too.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
If you're really dying for cash, go work at Target for a month or two. I don't know how easy it is to even get those jobs now, so maybe I'm off on this, but go cut lawns or something for a little while, just to fill in the gap. DoorDash, man, Uber.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
She also took a chance on coming back to you after three months, and then she learned that not only are you still struggling with the porn consumption, although I really do appreciate that you told her about it each time, you deserve some credit for that, that must have been incredibly awkward, but there's this whole debt thing that she didn't know about.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
So your wife has some legitimate reasons to feel angry here, And I can't say that I blame her for not being able to fully trust you. So here's my honest reaction to all this. I hear you that you're sorry about hiding this stuff from your wife, and I believe that. And I hear you that you wanna change, and I believe that too.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
But the reality is, and I'm just gonna be very direct with you, and I say this with love, those are just words. They are just ideas. Saying you're sorry, it does count for something. It's important. Saying you wanna change, that's obviously where change begins. But what are you doing about any of this?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Are you going to Sex and Love Addicts Anonymous or another support group like that and talking about the porn addiction? Are you going to therapy and talking about why it's hard for you to be consistently honest about stuff that's uncomfortable? Are you digging into your company's books and figuring out why it's struggling, what you need to do to right the ship?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Are you really taking care of you and your wife financially while you climb out of this hole? That's some crucial work that you gotta do here, not just for your wife, but for yourself.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
And I'm just not hearing anything in your letter that suggests you're actively taking steps to understand yourself better, make healthier choices, and show her, not through your words, not through your aspirations, but through your actions, your process, that you are on the path to becoming a better person and a more trustworthy partner.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Until you do that, I'm not sure that getting your wife back is really going to even fix anything. And honestly, if she were writing in, I'd probably say, yeah, don't go back to him right now. He has some work to do. Let him do that work. Watch how he does. Then see what's what. So I'm definitely not recommending that you just give up.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
But I do think that you need to get clear on what your priorities are, what a productive path forward actually looks like. What I'm hearing is that you are so focused on getting your wife back that you are essentially overlooking the very problems that led her to leave in the first place.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
He thinks that he has a wife leaving problem, but he actually has a can't stop watching porn problem. And I can't tell my wife certain things problem. And my business is kind of a mess problem. His marriage is just one symptom of these deeper themes. And probably other ones too, including, to be fair, some of his wife's things, but that's tangential to the main issue here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Yes. And apparently, and I don't know this as fact, apparently, maybe sometimes they vibrate when you go on certain rides. That's it. Or they light up or something. But... That's an example of just holy smokes, people actually pay for this. And you'll go and you'll see a guy with a little plastic droid from Star Wars in his backpack and you're like, oh that's cute, I wonder what's in there.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
So this is the stuff you need to be working on, man. Otherwise, what do you think's gonna happen if you and your wife get back together? How is this magically gonna resolve? It's not. It's only gonna get better when you get better. But part of making this shift is realizing that you might have to let your wife go. It sounds like that's where this is heading anyways. I know that's very painful.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
There's a lot of grief in this process, but hey, ultimately that's healthy grief because what your wife has done by leaving It's really that she's forced you to confront some very profound stuff. And if you lean into it, if you do this work, you are going to grow massively. And then, in a way, she'll have done you a great service. So start taking care of yourself, man. We're rooting for you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Good luck. And now, you can spank it to the pornographically great deals on the fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back. I've got homes.com as a sponsor for this episode. Homes.com knows when it comes to home shopping, it's never just about the house or the condo. It's about the homes. And what makes a home is more than just the house or property. It's the location.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
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1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
If you liked this episode of Feedback Friday and you found our advice valuable, I invite you to do what other smart and considerate listeners do, which is take a moment, support our sponsors. All of the deals discount codes that you hear on the show are at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. Our AI chat bot can also surface codes over on the website jordanharbinger.com slash AI.
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1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
And if that thing fails, you can always email us. I'd love to dig up these codes for you because it is that important that you support those who support the show. Now, back to Feedback Friday.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
And I went to the Star Wars place and I go, oh no, they just sell these and the backpack is like $100 and the build your own droid is God knows how much out of plastic parts and then you just take that thing home and put it on a shelf And you can build your own lightsaber.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Welcome to Feedback Friday. I'm your host, Jordan Harbinger. As always, I'm here with Feedback Friday producer, the gratuity included notice at the bottom of the bill you're given after dining at this auditory smorgasbord of life advice, Gabriel Mizrahi. 25%, I hope. 25, yeah, you know, okay, I should speak for myself.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
I mean, it is objectively really freaking cool if you're a kid, but the amount of money you spend, I told Jen, I go, just pay for stuff and don't tell me how much it costs. I don't even want to know because it's going to ruin it for me. It's going to ruin it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Oh man, that's very intense. I'm sorry, I hear you that this is really stressful. I know exactly what it's like to rob Peter to pay Paul to keep a roof over my head.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
When I was in my 20s building my first business, I was in this position, and I remember telling landlords the rent check is in the mail, and then when it wasn't the right amount, because it was short, telling them, oh, my assistant made a mistake, I'll send the balance immediately with another check that is going in the mail. It's a very intense place to be. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Yeah, early days? Yeah, it's tough. That's wild.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
On the last day, we took the kids to the character breakfast where Goofy is run around and Mickey Mouse is run around, they take photos with you and they high five your kids or whatever. And it's $35 for each kid to eat Jell-O and a cookie for breakfast or whatever, like a fake waffle in the shape of Mickey Mouse.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Oh man, this is a tough story. I'm really bummed for you because this is incredibly frustrating. It's funny, Gabe, I see more and more social media content and ads for the beauty industry on Instagram and stuff.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Yeah, I just assumed the industry was booming. I'm not even the target and I see it. So there are so many new products and injections and devices and treatments and social media is making people want to look more attractive. I just... Guess I didn't realize the industry was going through this huge crisis.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
So everything you're describing, it sounds really bleak, really demoralizing, not to mention exhausting. This is a lot to deal with, and most of this macro industry stuff is out of your control, which probably makes everything harder. But look, there's one huge bright spot in your letter, and that is you. Honestly, you sound like an extraordinary employee a really solid person, and I hear you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
You don't have grand aspirations to be super rich or super famous. I appreciate that, but look at how you're meeting these challenges. You're coming in early, you're staying late, you're coming in on your days off, you're working your butt off, you're a champ. I'm not saying those are sustainable strategies.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
I'm not sure they're actually working, but someone else in your shoes might just throw up their hands and complain and expect the world to solve their problems, and you're not doing that. You're just meeting these headwinds with more commitment, and I really admire that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
and I think that quality is actually one of your superpowers, and it's probably gonna be the key to surviving this chapter and navigating the rest of your career, so let's talk about how to do that. It seems to me you have two broad options. Option one is you stay in the beauty industry, but you adapt.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Adapting means accepting the facts of your profession as they are and choosing to work with them, which might mean making less money and adjusting your lifestyle, which doesn't sound like a realistic option. You're already treading water, but that is one way to respond.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
It might mean supplementing your income with a second job, which you're in the process of interviewing for, and who knows, maybe something good will come along. The job hunt can be brutal, I know, but it's a process. You might find something great. It might mean building more relationships at other spas and practices, maybe finding one that pays better or doesn't do commissions or...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
is responding to these industry changes better. Maybe you partner with other businesses. I don't know, a wedding planner, a wellness center, a hotel or something, and you find a way to do some cross promotion to get new clients without having to do the social media hustle. Okay, any brides you send my way for some Botox, great.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Any newly engaged women who come to my spa, I'll send them your way as well. People do this in other industries all the time. It might also mean finding a niche within the aesthetician world and becoming excellent at it. You become the eyebrow tattoo artist or the microdermabrasion expert in your area or whatever, so much so that you can charge more, make your clients more loyal.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
And for an adult to get an omelet and coffee, it was like 60 bucks, not including whatever else. And so I remember paying, again, 250 bucks for a breakfast where they basically just were like, oh, All right, let's take a photo with Goofy, a photo with Minnie Mouse, eat a little thing of jello, eat some ice cream, and go in the car. It was just bonkers.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Jen had her eyebrows tattooed. And I think the wait list for her artist was over a year. It might have even been two years or something. It was crazy long, and it was not cheap. It was impressive. A lot of people missing eyebrows out there, I guess. I don't know. Oh, and you gotta get them touched up. So it's like you're not done when you get them done. You gotta go back again.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
And on a related note, maybe you become so good at that niche, you start teaching other aestheticians how to do it, and you slowly start building a side hustle doing trainings on weekends, which maybe that's not interesting to you. Sounds cool to me, not to mention lucrative.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Look, this might even mean becoming a part-time content creator to make your commissions, which I totally get why you don't want to do that. That is absolutely fair. I hear you that the economics are bad, but, and let's just play with this for a second, it's an interesting question why something like content creation isn't worth your time, but going into the spa on your days off is.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Can imagine why it's probably more doable and more impactful in the short term, but if this is purely a question of time and money, then you're already spending your time working when you're not making money, right? You're already dragging down your hourly wage to below minimum wage.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
So I'm not sure if doing makeup tutorials on YouTube or Botox breakdowns on TikTok or whatever, I'm not sure that that's actually a worse decision just from a business perspective. But anyway, I'm not telling you that the answer is to become a beauty influencer. What I am encouraging you to do is stay open.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Try not to get too attached to your current way of doing things or the obvious way of doing things because that can keep you stuck and another year could go by and nothing will change. Whereas if you tried a few new ways to work with the reality of your industry, as depressing as it is, you might be surprised by what you find. It's just something to think about.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Option two is you make a career change, you pivot to a new industry. I know you left school to pursue this field. I know that probably feels like a huge shift, but honestly, you're in your late 20s. That's still so young. People make career pivots in their 40s, in their 50s, sometimes even after that. So this is another thing I would stay open to.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
And of course, I can't tell you what field that should be. That's for you to decide. It could be another trade. It could mean going back to school. I wish I could just tell you, oh yeah, you've been tattooing people's eyebrows for eight years. Go do this new thing. But that's not how it works. This is gonna be a process.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
So my advice is take this time to think about what lights you up, which aspects of being an esthetician you genuinely enjoy the most, and think about the bigger picture, not just the technical aspects, which are important too, but the experiences you love. Maybe it's interacting one-on-one with people or helping them feel confident or teaching people new things, whatever that is for you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Because those experiences, those callings, those are the things that actually create meaning. Those are the things you can follow into other fields. And those are the things that allow you to tell a compelling story to employers as you make a big shift. I worked as an esthetician for a decade. Now I want to be an executive recruiter. That story is random. It is hard to track.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
And at the end, I wasn't like, what a ripoff, I'm never doing this again. I was like, that was worth it, which is so ridiculous.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
But I worked as an esthetician. I didn't love the industry, but I loved helping people feel their best and empower them to go out into their lives and succeed. And being an executive recruiter is how I want to do that now. That's a story I can wrap my head around and actually get invested in. And again, I'm not saying you should go become a recruiter, I'm just illustrating a point.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
And while you do that, I'd go back and listen to all the episodes we've done on finding your purpose or finding where your passions line up with what the world needs. We'll link to all of those in the show notes for you. Until you get clear on this stuff for yourself, and I would talk to your partner about this, your friends, other peers in the industry, a mentor, until you do that,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
I think this job search is probably gonna feel scattershot and frustrating. Definitely find a second job if that's what you need to survive. Nothing wrong with that. But if you're looking for a pivot that's meaningful and rewarding, if you wanna rise to the top of the resume pile, you're gonna need to do some inner work to get clear on what your intention is here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
And that might take a little while. And that's okay. I know it's stressful right now. I get it. But also, be patient. Hang in the question for a little while. Maybe use some of those hours you're working for free to focus on yourself. And I'm confident that things will start to make more sense.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Yeah, I like that. Also, hey, this is one of the best ways to network, to just reach out to peers and ask if they're open to chatting about the business. It's low stress, it's very organic, and who knows, maybe one of these people tells you about some secret hack they learned how to make better commissions, and maybe one of them says, oh, my spa's hiring, I'll pass your resume along.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
You just never know. But here's what I know for sure. When you're in the middle of a crisis, really any time, but especially when you're in a crisis, your relationships are everything. Everything. So I'd put people at the center of all these strategies.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
You can't know how these dots are gonna connect, but you can book a 20 minute call with somebody while you're driving to the spa, on your day off, or while you're going for a panty de-stress walk on a Sunday, and those calls will eventually open doors you can't even imagine right now.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
I hope that gives you a few ways forward here, but like I said earlier, your work ethic, your attitude, this willingness to do whatever it takes, it's a superpower, my friend, and it's a gift to any employer that you come in contact with. So keep showing up with that mindset, keep sharing that quality with people, and I know it'll take good care of you. We're rooting for you, and good luck.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
All right, now for the recommendation of the week.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
So my recommendation of the week is hand towels in the bathroom. So I went to my wife's friend's house. This is like a decade ago now. And they're loaded. They're just like silly rich. Probably one of the wealthiest people that I know. And I went to the bathroom at their house. And in the bathroom...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Of course they have the regular towels, the one that everyone uses, but they also had a basket, and in the basket were these rolled up little washcloths, and you could use those to dry your hands, and then under the sink there was another basket where you threw the dirty washcloth. Oh yeah, that's a fancy bathroom when you see that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
I was like, wait a minute, you only see this at fancy steakhouses. Hotels. Hotels. So then came out and I said, Jen, you gotta go to the bathroom. She came back, she goes, the hand towels? I go, yeah. And then I said, that can't be that expensive of a thing to do. You're going to reuse these. You're not going to have people doing ridiculous stuff with them because it's your home. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
No one's having a date with Miss Michigan with those towels. Yeah, for sure. No, hopefully not. And you know what? I'll never know because they're washable. They get washed in the basket and under the thing. So gross. That is really gross. We'll link to the bucket-o-towels, basically there's an Amazon that just gives you like 20.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
It's so easy, you just throw them in the laundry, when you wash them, you don't have to roll them up, you can just fold them normally and stack them, and people who go into our bathroom in the living room, in our house, they universally come out and go, wow, These hand towels, fancy. Or they're like, I love that you have these in there. That is so nice.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
And I've had people in my living room from just random parents of my kids' friends all the way to people who have been on the show, have hundreds of millions of dollars or whatever stashed up somewhere and build submarines. And they equally come out and they're like, nice touch of the hand towels. Yeah, way to cosplay as a Four Seasons. I like it. That's right.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
But you know what, they hire so well, and they train so well. A perfect example of this, I went on Space Mountain with Jaden, which I thought would terrify him, but he loved it. It's actually kind of scary. It's just a roller coaster in the dark, and it's a little scary that I thought. When we came out, there was this little girl in the stroller, and she was crying her face off, okay?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
And I will tell you, if I had this kind of towel game as a bachelor, I feel like that increases your chances, right? Because a woman walks in there and she goes, oh, this guy has style. This is a hygiene indicator. Who knew that having hand towels in the bathroom could be an aphrodisiac?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Towel game on fleek. All right, in case y'all didn't know, there's a subreddit for the show if you want to jump into discussions with other listeners about specific episodes. A lot of you didn't love our homeschooling episode. What's funny about this is the subreddit goes crazy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
A lot of people hated the homeschooling episode, and I did that one on purpose because Nick and I have just wildly different opinions on homeschooling and education, but people were furious about that. They were like, I hate that, you've lost all credibility, and it's like, okay, so if I have somebody on who I disagree with and you disagree with, the show sucks now.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
But anyway, it's really interesting to get into discussions on the subreddit about that. There were two threads about that. One was, this is the best Skeptical Sunday co-host because he disagrees with Jordan and they talk about it. And the other thread was about how much they hated that episode of Skeptical Sunday.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
So there's a lot of fun back and forth going on in the subreddit, a lot of fun conversations. So if you are a Reddit user, a Redditor, you can find us over there on the Jordan Harbinger subreddit. All right, next up. Hey, Jordan and Gabe.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
But they will do this thing where you get service, okay, fine, and the tip choices are 18, 22, and 25%. And what's weird is it's not in any sort of order that you would expect. It's not like 18 left, 22 middle, 25 right. It's like 25 left, 18 in the middle, 22, and you're like, wait a minute, wait a minute. I'm on to you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Yeah, I think that's the bind that a lot of potential parents are in.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
And another gal who was probably early 20s was sweeping the ground and picking up gum wrappers and stuff. People dropped gum. and just cleaning up trash and making sure the place was clean, wiped down, and not sticky. By the way, no trash can is full and no trash can is sticky or gross in that whole park. And there's thousands of them in that whole park. Yeah, it's immaculate, actually. It is.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Man, Gabe, you're going to make us tell these people whether they should reproduce? That's the letter we're going out with? Just a light one. Just a casual one to kick off the weekend. Yeah, no presh, just your everyday should I bring children into the world question. Cool, yeah. Thank you. So, first of all, I can relate to a lot of your letter.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
I don't know if there's anyone out there, no thoughtful person anyway, who has zero qualms or zero questions about having kids. It's a massive decision, it's a huge responsibility, it's one of the most, if not the most important decision most of us will ever make. And like all decisions, it involves a calculation of rewards and costs and which trade-offs you're willing to live with.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
You touched on a bunch of them. You'd probably experience a ton of joy and gratification by having kids. I was touched when you mentioned all the cool experiences and talents you'd want to give your children. I would love to grow up like that. That sounds amazing. It sounds like you guys would be awesome parents. And you'd also have to make major sacrifices
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Your lifestyle, for sure, is just a casualty of that. Your time, you say goodbye to that, your stress level goes up, your energy, your body, especially for mothers, these are two sides of the same coin. You can't have one without the other. So I honestly cannot tell you yes, definitely have kids, or no, definitely don't have kids.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
What I can share, based on my own experience and watching a lot of other parents go through this, is a few things. First, if you're gonna have kids, I think you need to make peace with the fact that this is an intense and highly ambiguous decision. There's no way to have kids and not experience the stress and responsibility and sacrifices you described.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Even if you're super wealthy, you got a ton of support, it's always a huge change. And if you decide to do it, you have to be willing to accept that. It's less about finding a way to minimize the burden and more about embracing it as an essential part of the experience. It's the cost, so to speak, of getting to experience all the upsides.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Speaking as a dad here, that stress, that burden, yes it's hard for sure, but it can also be a fun stress and a joyful burden, so it's not quite as binary as you might think.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Something else to keep in mind, but listen, what gives me some pause in your letter is this thing you said, how your husband doesn't really express a desire to have kids anytime soon, he more fears regretting not having them, and meanwhile you fear resenting them. That's a little bit concerning to me, or at least it brings up some questions. Not that there's anything wrong with those feelings.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
They're perfectly normal, totally valid, but they do make me wonder if parenthood is really calling you guys or calling you guys for the right reasons. Look, The thought that you might regret not having kids in the future. That's a real thing and that's a meaningful variable to consider But it's ultimately a thought and it's a thought about the future.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
It's highly abstract It's not about the here and now or about the soon-to-be like I really want to have kids now or soon Let's do it. It's about dodging a feeling in the future So I'm just not sure how much stock you could put in that that fear is also about him, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Yeah, that's also what gives me some pause. He's going, I'm afraid I'll regret not doing it, which again, totally fair, but if that's his main reason for having kids, that's something to explore because the truth is, having kids, yeah, in one big way, it's selfish. We want them, so we have them,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
The trash cleaner gal goes up to this little girl in the stroller next to her mom and goes, what's wrong, princess? She couldn't talk. The mom goes, oh, she rode Space Mountain for the first time and she got scared and she goes, I know how to fix that. I have a magic trick that'll fix that. Why don't we go on Mr. Toad's Wild Ride?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
But I think to be a great parent, at least to feel at peace with this decision, that self-interest has to be balanced by a genuine love and dedication to your future children, the idea that you can set them up to live successful and meaningful lives. And I hear you that your husband does want that. I'm not saying he doesn't.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
I'm just saying keep an eye on the motivations here because avoiding future regret, that's a consideration, but I'm just not sure it's the best reason to do something this big. and then you fear resenting your future children, which also gives me some pause, and again, that is a totally valid feeling to have.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
I also really appreciate that you're clocking that now, rather than rushing into the decision and then waking up in a year with this resentment after you've had a kid or two. but I would really want to explore that feeling before you commit. What specifically would make you resentful? What relationship would you need to have with your kids?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
What supports would you need in place, even if only from your husband, to not feel resentful? Can you get to a place where your resentment, if it's there, is outweighed by your joy? That's the place where I feel like I am, right? It's like I can't pick up and go to wherever I want for a week at a time anymore, but I'm gonna go play Legos and it's gonna be awesome and make it all worth it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Totally. But I'm of two minds here. I hesitate to say, yeah, I definitely don't have kids if you feel that way, because I know that all parents have at least flashes of resentment. I certainly have. It's usually for like five minutes. Then it goes away when I read them a bedtime story or whatever. The little moments of, man, what do we do here? That doesn't ultimately make me regret having kids.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
But if you're already sensing that you'd resent the hit to your life a lot of the time, I would really sit with that, man. Again, I'm not pushing you to any conclusion. It's very possible that you just need to work through some of these fears or make peace with them. Like I said, invite them in more. And the answer on the other side will be,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Yes, I do want children, and I'm willing to risk experiencing some degree of resentment sometimes, and if that feeling ever comes up, I'm gonna work through it, slash I'm determined to make the joy of being a parent greater than any resentment I might feel. And again, that's the spot where I find myself. So again, this isn't game over.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
And then the mom was like, yeah, we went and we're going to go there now. And she goes, I'll walk you to the front. We'll go on that right now.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
It's just an important feeling I would explore in a lot more depth before committing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
So the trash lady stopped what she was doing, took the mom, took the daughter who was still crying to Mr. Toad's Wild Ride, doubtless went through some secret back door and skipped to the front of the line or something like that just to cheer up this girl who was a little bit sad at Disneyland. And I thought, This is such good management and training. My mind is flat out blown.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Yeah, 100%. Or just to keep all options on the table here, because again, we're not telling you what to do. You might explore all that and go, yeah, there's no way I won't feel resentful. I don't want to put that on my children. I better not have kids. I'm not saying that's the right conclusion. I'm just saying absolutely a fair choice.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
But look, all in all, the factors I would prioritize are your genuine excitement about creating a new life, your dedication to people other than yourselves, setting your kids up for success and meaning, because yes, I do think a strong desire is a key, maybe not the only key, but it is a crucial key.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
I also know that people do often grow into parenthood, your love for them, your understanding of what they need, your own instincts, all of that only grows over time, but that is not necessarily true of everyone.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
So, connected to that, I would also factor in your emotional resources, your inner resources, how much love and attention you have to give, how available you are to raise happy, healthy kids, and I realize that it's hard to know that before they arrive, but I think if you really look inside, you can sense whether that capacity is at least there. Also,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Your practical and financial resources, those obviously matter too. I'm not saying you need to be uber wealthy or surrounded by family in order to justify having kids, not by any means. But you want to make sure that you can give them the life you want to give them, that you have access to the experiences and the people and the places they need to thrive.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
And unfortunately, in this modern world, that requires a decent amount of money. Although maybe you guys have more resources in Central Europe just due to low cost of living. So that's pretty cool. The other variable I would prioritize is your relationship with each other.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
How strong your partnership is, how much you love each other, how well you guys work together as a team, that is absolutely crucial to raising children, and that includes how you guys are talking through this decision together.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
For sure, it's an impossible question for anyone from the outside to answer. Unless there were super obvious red flags or green flags, although I will say, that thing you said about how you and your husband don't share that deep, unquestioning desire for kids, not saying that's a red flag or a definitely do not proceed sign, but it is something I would really sit with and unpack.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
You'll never be completely conflict-free about having kids, but if you don't genuinely want them on a pretty deep level, that's totally fair, but that's a signal you wanna take seriously at the very least.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
But you're in the boat I think most people are in, which is there are good reasons to do it, there are good reasons not to do it, and ultimately that means getting clear on your psychology, your motivations, your values, the benefits and trade-offs you can live with, and also making peace with the fact that parenthood will always be a mixed bag, as it should be.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
They do. Even the crankiest looking security guys were on it and would just light up as soon as you talk to them. And the training involved is just crazy. You feel for them though, because they are clearly not allowed to have a single bad moment of any bad day in their whole life while they're at work. Oh, did something horrific happen to you today?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
That's an essential part of the journey. But I appreciate how much thought you're putting into this because the stakes are high, so while you might never get to a place where the answer is crystal clear, I would definitely get to a place where you feel you've done the work to be the best possible parent because you and your kids deserve that, frankly.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Ultimately, they're the variable that matters most, kind of the whole point of having them, so that might be the thing you need to sit with right now. Good luck in whatever you decide to do. Don't forget to check out our episodes with Russ Swain, the Mormon art student gone counterfeiter, and our Skeptical Sunday on sextortion. Go ahead and listen to those if you haven't had a chance to do so yet.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
The best things that have happened in my life and business have come through my network, the circle of people I know, like, and trust. I know we talked about it a little bit earlier on the show. Six Minute Networking, the course is free. The drills take a few minutes a day. Dig that well before you get thirsty and build relationships before you need them in very non-cringy ways.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
You can find the course for free at sixminutenetworking.com. Show notes and transcripts are on the website. Advertisers, deals, discounts, ways to support the show, all at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. I'm at jordanharbinger on Twitter and Instagram. You can also connect with me on LinkedIn. Gabe's over on Instagram at Gabriel Mizrahi or on Twitter at Gabe Mizrahi.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
This show is created in association with Podcast One. My team is Jen Harbinger, Jace Sanderson, Robert Fogerty, Ian Baird, Tata Salauskas, and of course, Gabriel Mizrahi. Our advice and opinions are our own, and I am a lawyer, but I am not your lawyer. So do your own research before implementing anything you hear on the show. Remember, we rise by lifting others. Share the show with those you love.
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If you found the episode useful, please share it with somebody else who could use the advice we gave here today. In the meantime, I hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn, and we'll see you next time. The deepest parts of our oceans remain a mystery, with 75% still unexplored.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
You're about to hear a preview with Victor Vescovo, the first person to reach the deepest points of all five oceans, built and piloted a submarine that defied crushing pressures, revealing a world few have ever seen.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Oh, put on a smile and forget all about that because if you are even remotely weird to one guest at one time, it taints the business image. So you gotta be good. We brought a portable little potty because the kids always have to go to the bathroom the second we're at the maximum distance from the bathroom.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
What did Victor find in the darkness where even light cannot reach? To find out, listen to episode 1089 of The Jordan Harbinger Show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
or we already waited in the huge line to go and they didn't have to go, and then as soon as I go, they're like, now I have to pee, so we bring these little portable potty that a show fan actually gave us, and the guard goes, I'm sorry, I can't let you in with this because it becomes a biohazard for us, yadda yadda, so Jen ran, threw it back in the room, I had a few extra minutes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
So I was chatting with the security guard and I go, hey, what are you actually looking for? I mean, people don't bring their gun to Disneyland. He's like, you'd be surprised. It's almost always just innocent. Oh, I carry this all the time. Or oops, I forgot I had this in this bag, that kind of stuff. And he goes, but we're also looking for things that tick.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
I was like, well, that sounds a little bit last century time bomb. What are you really looking for? He goes, oil stains and weird wires poking out or things that are like unusually heavy. Oil stains. What do you mean oil stains?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
so explosives and i'm no expert at all but explosive materials are often very oily oh god i thought he meant like we don't want people bringing fish and chips into the park no no no no no no they're very oily so if say you put it in a bag to disguise what it is it's going to seep through the paper it's going to seep through the liner it's going to seep through the bag and you're like oh that's weird you're at disneyland and you just have a bag that has a weird oil stain on the outside let me just take a look inside there it's that kind of thing
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
And he goes, can you tell I used to do something else for a living? But he was also this very kind old man who was like, give me a knuckle bump, kid. Oh, you've got magic in you. He's like a really kind grandpa who you can tell can shoot a bullseye at 100 yards. And it was just they picked that guy out of 100,000 applicants as well. He's probably like ex-military special forces.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
You're just trying to get people who are not paying attention in our inner hurry to hit 25% as quickly as possible. Now, I'm sympathetic to the plight of the server. I think they should be paid a living wage. Stop trying to trick me into paying them for that level of service. And it's always the places where the service is not that good.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
And now his retired gig is hanging out at Disneyland looking for bombs and guns.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
that makes me feel better about Disneyland I'm glad those people are in those jobs I am dying to know what plots they've foiled at Disneyland the FBI must have had intelligence on stuff the security guys surely have found things in fact if anybody out there has any info on this hit me up I'll keep you anonymous I'm dying to know because that seems like the perfect Target right the happiest place on Earth very American Peak capitalism you damage the business
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
to the tune of tens or even hundreds of millions of dollars if anything weird happened there, like an explosion near the castle. It would just make international news and damage the business for years. So they must be a very prime sort of target for bad actors, and yet I've never heard of anything happening at Disneyland.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
All that means to me is that they've caught them in time, because otherwise you would have 8,000 phone videos of the aftermath of whatever it was. So I am just so curious. But you never hear about it. You never hear the FBI or the security at Disneyland foiled a plot or found this thing. They keep that under wraps for sure. So I'm just very curious what they have foiled.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
And hopefully nothing ever happens there because it's a bunch of kids and families just relaxing. That's what makes it a target for psychopaths, right, militants and terrorists. Anyway, on that fun note, what's the first thing out of the mailbag let's slip into the feedback Friday, which is always cheerful and upbeat. Dear Jordan and Gabe.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
I will tip you 22, 20, whatever percent if the service is really good at a nice place. If I have to go get the refills myself and I'm getting kicked out of the kitchen by the manager because I've walked back there twice to find a person who freaking works here, I am not gonna tip you 25%. I'm just not going to do it. I know you're overworked and that's why you didn't come to my table.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Boy, this is, it's a tough one, but it's fascinating as well. All right, first of all, I'm very sorry to hear that your wife had this painful childhood, that she struggled with a disability, that she was treated poorly because of it. I can frankly only imagine what kind of messages a child with a disability receives when they're
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
I don't know, not picked for a school play, or they don't get invited to kids' birthday parties, which I hope doesn't happen because that makes me want to cry, or not treated well by teachers, and generally told that a lot of things, maybe most things, just aren't an option for her. That's just terrible.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Yeah, just never getting a shot at anything and then slowly as you get older realizing it's because people see you differently a certain way. When it sounds like your wife could have done so many more things than people said she was capable of, those must be very profound wounds. It's heartbreaking. There's real trauma there on top of the abuse that she apparently endured.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
So your wife has been through a lot. I can understand why she's depressed. I can also understand why all of this has made her kind of defiant. They told me I can't have dreams, so I'm going to dream even bigger. I'm going to dream even harder, which in a certain way, that's kind of incredible.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Why some people might go through a childhood like this and just fold, stay small, and why other people like your wife, they'd enter adulthood with a fire in the belly.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Right. Yeah. Clearly his wife's ambitions and not just the dreams themselves, but the way she's going about trying to achieve them or lack of a way they're all right. Let's call it like it is. They sound kind of delusional.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
It's almost escapist in nature. They'd be delusional even for a person with a bunch of talent, no disability, who's working in a certain industry. Even if you are working in commercials in Hollywood and you say, one day I'm gonna be in a Hollywood blockbuster, even that sounds delusional. She wants to be the chief of medicine at a hospital and a great crusader in politics and a famous artist.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
Just achieving one of these things at the green belt level is hard enough. That's potentially the work of an entire lifetime. So it sounds like there's some grandiosity here. Yeah, it's grandiose, exactly. And again, this would be grandiose for anyone to believe, but all the more so for somebody who apparently does have some kind of real practical limitations.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
In this fantasy, he mentioned that she imagines herself at a production of, I don't know, Wicked or whatever's trending, and she's like, how cool would it be if I left the dinner table and turned up on stage and surprised everyone? Ta-da! Mm-hmm. Along with the letter writer here, I'm just not sure what to do with that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
So part of me hears that and goes, man, that's got to be a really meaningful fantasy for somebody who never got to have big moments in her life. If it's a fun daydream, let her have it. Maybe that highly active imagination is an essential part of her personality, given the life that she's had. And then another part of me hears that and goes, girl, you are a deluder. Deluder.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1130: Giving Wife a Hand When Dreams Are Too Grand | Feedback Friday
That's not my fault. What are we talking about again?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
You're wearing t-shirts that say that you're an alpha. It's just, you think I'm exaggerating or kidding here, but you can get led to some dark places and surround yourself with some negative people. Carbons final thought for you, every case is a marathon. And in his experience, a custody battle is an ultra marathon. You're exhausted, you're at the end of your rope. How could you not be?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
This is more than anyone should ever have to endure. Corbyn hat gesagt, dass das völlig verständlich ist, aber er hat auch gesagt, dass man verlieren wird, wenn man nicht herausfinden kann, wie man die Unendurable verhindern kann, um in der Face von ferocious opposition from your ex in the face of an unfeeling, uncaring legal system to continue in the face of an unfeeling, uncaring legal system.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
If you had a sandwich in your hand, would you put it on a bare naked tray table or would you want to sanitize that sucker first or put some other surface between the tray table and your food?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
I know that sounds really scary. And that's part of the reason that Corbyn is so passionate about recommending things like support groups and telling your story and using it to lobby for change. Because these initiatives, they really can empower you. They can give you a sense of meaning, purpose, community. And you need those things when you're in a soul-sucking litigation and situation like this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
In our experience, they're one of the only things that can keep you healthy, keep you grounded, keep you motivated when the whole system seems to conspire against you. Again, I'm so very sorry for the manipulation and the heartache that you've been through. I'm even sorrier for your son, his health issues, the trauma he's endured and is enduring.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
I'm even sorry for your ex to some degree, because as we talked about last week with the psychotic neighbor, her reality must be a very painful and terrifying one. Und ehrlich gesagt, ich bin es schuld für das ganze Land Norwegen hier, weil appelliert sein Legalsystem einen horrifischen Verbrechen ermöglicht. Nicht, dass es nicht unser ist. Und das ist einfach nicht in Ordnung.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Es enttäuscht jeden Sinn, ob richtig oder falsch. Und ehrlich gesagt, es enttäuscht den Allgemeinen Sinn. Und es ist wirklich traurig. Also bleib stark, Bruder. Bleib für deinen Sohn kämpfen. Er braucht dich. and surround yourself with people who give you love, confidence, hope, energy, maybe some cash on the side. You deserve all of this. Keep trusting. Something will shift here eventually.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Sending you and your son the biggest of hugs. Good luck. Speaking of avoiding financial ruin, a word from the people who pay all of my bills. We'll be right back. Bis zum nächsten Mal. Untertitelung aufgrund der Audioqualität nicht möglich.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
I just want you to know that. Now I'm questioning myself here. If you're a flight attendant, are those really just for your hands or are you supposed to clean your seat? Tell me the truth.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Okay, let's talk about the new year. You're probably thinking about resolutions like maybe hitting the gym, you're gonna eat better, maybe you're gonna finally organize that junk drawer that could double as a time capsule from the 90s. But here's an easier one. Let Audible expand your life just by listening.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
On the Jordan Harbinger Show we decode the stories, secrets and skills of the world's most fascinating people and turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you. Unsere Mission ist es, dich zu helfen, besser informiert und kritischer zu werden. Und während der Woche haben wir langfristige Gespräche mit einer Vielzahl von tollen Leuten.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
If you need relationship tips that don't involve arguing over the thermostat, okay, they got you covered. If you're thinking about making a career move or tackling your finances, they've got listens for that too. And the best part is you can learn and grow while doing stuff you already do. Commuting, working out, folding laundry like an absolute champion.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Suddenly, you're crushing your goals and you didn't even break a sweat unless you listen to audiobooks while you're working out, then sweat away. Start your 30-day trial at audible.com slash jhs. It's like a personal trainer for your brain without needing to break a sweat. Thank you for listening and supporting the show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
All of the deals, discount codes and ways to support this podcast are searchable and clickable over at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. Please consider supporting those who make the show possible. Alright, back to Feedback Friday. Okay, what's next?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Wow. All right. Well, first of all, I'm so very sorry that you and your community have been through so many devastating fires the past few years. I really am. Whether it's fair or not, seeing what's happened in L.A., just because it's closer to me, I have a lot more personal friends there, connections to it. It really makes those numbers you've shared very real and very vivid.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Von organisierten Krimifiguren bis zu Kriegskorrespondenten, Astronauten bis zu Nationalen Sicherheitsanwälten und Technik-Luminären. Diese Woche hatten wir Anne Applebaum über autoritäre Regime, warum und wie sie mit einander kooperieren und den Welt einen schlimmeren Ort machen oder zumindest einen gefährlichsten. Wir haben auch letzten Sonntag einen skeptischen Sonntag über Fake Foods gemacht.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Not to mention the loss of life. These disasters are just awful. And I'm very sorry to hear that they've decimated people financially for so long. That is also deeply tragic and very much a symptom of so many things wrong with our system. And I thank you for writing in and sharing your story because it really does help open up our worldview.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
It's really easy to just focus on what's happening in our own backyards and ignore all the tragedies around the world or even around the state. I also think that's human nature to some degree and part of living in this modern world where there are So many terrible things happening at any given moment. So it's not necessarily that no one cares. It's just hard sometimes to make room for all of it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
So look, I take your point. Absolutely. It looks like Gabe does. He's nodding along right now. L.A. is obviously not the only city in California to be hit by devastating wildfires, to say nothing of all the natural disasters that affect this country every year. Flüsse, Erkrankungen, Hurrikanen. Aber du hast recht. L.A. bekommt viel mehr Aufmerksamkeit, weil es L.A. ist.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Weil viele Leute, die in den Palisaden in Malibu lebten, hochprofile sind. Sie sind reich, weil sie Filmstar sind. Sie sind Influencer. Das Gebäude war sehr teuer. Was auch immer es ist. Und in einer Art und Weise ist das unwahr und verrückt. Ich stimme dazu. Aber leider ist das die Art, wie unser Medien-Ökosystem funktioniert.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Und diese beiden Geschichten, die du über die Familien auf deinem Block erzählst, das ist schmerzhaft. Ich kann mir nicht vorstellen, dass ich in einem RV wachgehe. Es gibt keine Worte. Ich hoffe wirklich, dass sie sich zurück auf ihre Füße bringen können. Über den 9-11-Komment. Ich glaube, ich finde mich, um das klarzumachen, obwohl ich denke, dass ich das auf dem Episode gesagt habe. Ich war
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Ich war nicht direkt mit den beiden Tragedien zu vergleichen. Ich bin mir nicht sicher, ob man das kann. Ich habe nur kommentiert, wie diese Events eine Art und Weise haben, Menschen zu wechseln und das Beste in ihnen zu bringen. Das ist alles. Also, wenn du das als L.A. hat, es ist 9-11. Was zur Hölle haben wir in NorCal durchgegangen? Das ist nicht alles, was wir darüber gesprochen haben.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Das ist nicht, was wir überhaupt meinten. Also, wiederum, ich bin froh, dass du es zeigst, weil es leicht zu überprüfen kann. And it's not right that fires that are much bigger and more frequent get less attention or less compassion or fewer government resources. And I would hope that from now on, you guys don't feel forgotten or ignored when you need help the way LA needs help right now.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
On Fridays, though, we share stories, take listener letters, offer advice, play obnoxious soundbites and go on ridiculous side rants about the state of modern commercial air travel. Alright, let's get to it today. As always, we've got some fun ones and some crazy, of course, ones. So, Gabe, what's the first thing out of the mailbag?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Ich stimme total zu. Und schau, ich will auch darüber nachdenklicher sein, was andere auch durchgehen, natürlich. Aber ich bin auch nicht wütend, dass die Leute in Valencia oder der Amazon nicht aufhören, was sie tun und uns Schriften schreiben und Geld zahlen, wenn wir einen Desaster haben. Ich verstehe, dass wir in sehr verschiedenen Orten leben, in sehr verschiedenen Realitäten.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Und ehrlich gesagt, ich weiß nicht, was ich darüber sagen soll. Es ist ein bisschen kaputt. Aber es ist auch nur so, wie die Welt jetzt funktioniert. Ich sage nicht, dass ich es mag. Ich endorse es nicht.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Aber wir müssen akzeptieren, dass die Art und Weise, wie Leute zu Events wie diesem reagieren, die mentale und kulturelle Realität, die sie aufnehmen, unfassbar ist, dass sie auf Geld und Influenz abhängig sind. Und ja, das ist dumm. Das ist unfair auf irgendeinem Niveau. Aber dann ist es auch ein bisschen verständlich, dass die Stadt, die die meisten der Filme in der Welt produziert,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
und hat eine Menge kraftvolle Menschen, die in der Stadt leben, und ist ein großer Beitrag zu der fünften größten Wirtschaft in der Welt oder was auch immer California ist, dass diese Stadt global mehr Aufmerksamkeit bekommen würde. Und wenn dich das am meisten interessiert, ist es nur das, die Aufmerksamkeit, das Gefühl, sich zu erinnern, was wichtig ist, dann könnte das immer der Fall sein.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Aber ich hoffe, dass es das Staat nicht stoppt, von Bereichen wie deiner, zu kümmern. And I would hope that there are programs to help people like the neighbors you mentioned, because those stories truly break my heart. But I think the answers to that ultimately are at the voting booth and in the way that we live our individual lives in the aftermath of a tragedy like this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
This is a heavy letter. Interesting letter. Very eye-opening. Thank you for writing in. You can reach us friday at jordanharbinger.com. Please keep your emails concise. Try to use descriptive subject lines. That makes our job a whole lot easier.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
If you're finding dead squirrels in your mailbox, your stepdad's got your nudes, your neighbors are eavesdropping on your therapy sessions through the wall, or your elderly parents are living next to an aggressive psychotic person and the state won't intervene, Hey Leute, ich arbeite gerade als Studentenassistent bei der Rechtsfakultät meiner Universität.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
That's like valet. Totally. I don't even know what a valet does other than that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Das ist so seltsam. Cool Manners, Bro. Was für eine seltsame Situation das ist. Was ist das? Dieser Kerl ist ein Turd.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Well said. Not somebody I'd give any time or energy to, more than is absolutely necessary. These people are just a black hole. This guy almost sounds like disabled socially.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Probably a lot of institutions do, to some degree, right? Part of the function of any institution, companies, universities, anything, it always eventually becomes about preserving the power of the people at the top. It's just something our species does, unfortunately.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Yeah, these are great questions. What a character. And I put that, that's the most charitable.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Yeah, exactly. Probably in a, I'm going to have stress dreams and TMJ for the rest of my life kind of character. So to state the obvious here, and as someone who's brushed up against his fair share of Professor Xs, I'm sorry you have to work with this guy. You captured so vividly what it's like to have to interact with an A-hole like this. It's
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
They also have a way of making you feel really awkward. Yes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Yes, I used to work with somebody. You'd start talking and they would just start talking over you. Not to talk over you louder. It was just like as if you weren't saying anything. And I eventually, after a while, I was like... Do they not notice? They just don't listen to anyone else. They're just waiting to talk.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
And if you happen to be talking during that time, he just expects you to stop talking. He's not being louder, nothing. He's just expecting you to defer to him. I eventually started going, excuse me, I'm not done yet. And he was like, ugh, like frazzled out. I can't believe anybody would ever say that to me.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
I like that. Yeah, I didn't even do it rude. I was just like, I'm still talking. I'm sure that the story is, can you believe that Jordan guy? He would just talk and talk, never let anybody else talk.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
And then they're like just flagging that you're interrupting me for the 500th time this week. That's all.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Yeah, that's almost like one of those tricks you'd learn on a YouTube from Charisma on Command.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Yes, don't ever say the last word. Let other people have the last word. I know it's counterintuitive, guys. My friend Charlie runs that channel. Like, I know it's counterintuitive, guys, but trust me, let the other person have the last word and they'll be left reeling.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
No shade to Charlie. Shout out to Charisma on Command YouTube channel. Anyway, this guy, what a character. I'm with you. I just can't with people like this. Like, okay, you're a little prickly, you're not touchy-feely, you're not that warm, you're a tough customer. Fine. I can deal with that. Especially if you're really good at what you do and it's all about the work.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
But if you're actively looking for opportunities to dominate people and disrespect them and throw them off balance just because it's fun or it makes you feel good about yourself, screw you. Life's way too short to deal with people like this. So, is it possible to push back against this guy respectfully? I doubt it. I don't see this guy responding to boundaries or feedback very well.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
I guess there's a world where somebody brave enough to check him might get his attention, maybe in a weird way, he'd kind of respect it. But this could very easily go the other way. He lashes out, he figures out how to punish you, holds a vendetta for the next five years, tries to put you back in your place to reestablish the power dynamic.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
And because this guy is your superior, he might even end up being one of your examiners. There are some delicate politics at play, which he obviously understands better than anyone. It might just not be worth rocking the boat. The last thing you need is somebody who's hellbent on making sure you don't get your PhD or whatever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
And even if he did respect it and treat you better, he'd probably still be a total see you next Tuesday to work with on anything. So I'm just not sure it would do all that much.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Can you stop being such a dick?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
And then you run to the bathroom to change your underwear because that's the scariest conversation of your life.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
On the second point, definitely not.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Yeah, that is an interesting question. Does it actually matter if this guy hates her? Can she talk to her faculty and get a different examiner? Can she still graduate with good grades and good recommendations and land a job, even if this guy is not her biggest fan? If so, I'd be more willing to stand up to him, but that's me at 45 years old.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
I don't know how old you are, but when I was 23, just a little pisher in law school, I doubt I would have stood up to somebody like this. You get older, you start giving... Das war's für heute. You might need to stay in his good graces for when he's your examiner. And maybe you try thinking of him as narcissist grad school. And you learn how to duck and weave with this guy's BS.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Build better boundaries, a stronger sense of self, and just remember that nothing that Professor X does is actually a reflection of you. It's a reflection of how pathological his personality is. Und ich muss sagen, ich denke tatsächlich, dass das wichtig ist, egal, was du im Endeffekt tust, weil das nicht der letzte Narzissist ist, den du in der legalen Welt erleben wirst.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Wenn meine Gesetzeskarriere, meine sehr kurze Gesetzeskarriere, irgendeine Beleidigung ist. Und auch, es ist eine wirklich gute Praxis, zu lernen, wie man nicht A-Holes in deinem Leben verletzen kann.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Es ist nicht einfach, aber es ist so hilfreich, zu lernen, wie man das emotionale Hazmat-Suit bauen kann, wie man sich vergeben und kompartmentalisieren kann, damit schwere Persönlichkeiten einfach nicht dein Leben oder dein Tag verletzen.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
And then once you're safe, when you land a job offer or something, once he can't do anything to you, maybe you write a compelling email to the faculty head, letting him know what it's like for everyone to have to work with this guy. Or you take a chance and you write that email now, maybe signed by some of your peers if they have the stones and you just accept the consequences.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
But you said this place is run like an aristocracy. I'm just not sure that they're going to take action.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
100%. Und Option 2, du entscheidest, dass dieser Kerl einfach zu schrecklich ist, damit du dich weiterentwickelst. Das ist, was ich in dieser Phase meines Lebens mache. Am Anfang ist es komplizierter, aber bevor du das tust, gib vielleicht Option 1 einen Versuch. Behalte es wie ein Spiel. Veränderst du meine Realität, wenn mein Mindset verändert? Und sieh, was passiert. Du kannst dich überraschen.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Oder vielleicht ändert sich nichts. Das ist wirklich unsustainabel. Vielleicht gibt es andere Projekte, die Sie gerne machen würden und Sie einfach weitergehen. Es ist alles legit. Just make sure that you're not shooting yourself in the foot or missing an opportunity to build some of these muscles by leaving prematurely. And who knows?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Fast forward five years, ten years, you're working for some inflated partner at a law firm or whatever, or you're a public servant presenting to some dickish MP. Whatever you do. And you finesse them perfectly. Because you worked with this Professor X guy way back when. And you know all the moves. It's possible. You never know. Whatever you do, keep listening to your intuition.
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Ask for advice from a few other well-informed people. Keep looking for the hidden opportunities and lessons here. And I know you're going to make the right call. Good luck. Man, I have some Dark Jordan stuff, but it's too dark and it's actually not ethical at all, so I'm going to leave it out.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
But I almost feel like if we ever offer premium content, it's got to be like, okay, here's what I'd do if I was in psychopath mode. Because some of it could be juicy and fun.
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And now, are you even smart enough to wrap your tiny little brain around the amazing deals on the fine products and services that support this show? Probably not, but I'll give them to you anyway. You're welcome. We'll be right back. Bis zum nächsten Mal. Untertitelung des ZDF für funk, 2017 If you're ready to embrace the impossible, the Defender is your perfect partner.
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1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
This must have been a really dark time for you and your son.
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1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Be uncapable and ready to go wherever you're headed next. Homes.com. We've done your homework. Back to Feedback Friday. Okay, next up.
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1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Mann, was für eine tragische Situation das ist. Ich bin so entschuldigt, dass deine Mutter so tief verletzt ist und dass du mit einem Sohn wie diesem wachsen musstest. Das ist wirklich nächstes-Level-Stuff. Verrückend. Du hast gesagt, dass deine Mutter mit Paranoid-Personalitäts-Dysorder infiziert war, als du 16 warst.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Und es klingt, als hätte es sich über die Jahre verbessert, was wirklich schmerzhaft ist. Ich kann nicht mal vorstellen, wie es sein muss. Ich bin auch der Leute bekannt, die mich am besten kennen, als der f***ing Arzt. Und Dr. Margolis hat uns erklärt, dass es generell drei Gründe gibt, dass man jemanden involontär verletzt hat.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Schmerz an sich selbst, Schmerz an anderen und was man als Gravedisability nennt, also die Person kann nicht für ihre eigenen grundlegenden Bedürfnisse, Essen, Kleidung, Schutz, wegen eines mentalen Krankheitsverletzungs oder Verletzungen. Aber... Proving that somebody is gravely disabled, that can actually be trickier than it seems.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
For example, you said your mom won't leave the house, so she obviously has shelter. It sounds like she's probably clothed as well, and whether she's clothed, that might be less relevant if she's warm and cozy at home.
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1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
So Dr. Margolis said that your best shot at proving grave disability would probably be if she's not feeding herself or she's otherwise engaging in what's called life-sustaining activities, like if she stops eating because of her delusion that you guys are poisoning her food.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Also hat sie gesagt, dass, weil deine Mutter formal verurteilt worden ist, das vielleicht helfen könnte, einen der Anforderungen für die Definition von Gravedisability zu treffen. Aber es gibt einen Niveau der Kriterien, der für diesen Niveau auch gesetzt werden muss. Und es ist unklar von deinem Brief, ob sie es wirklich treffen kann.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Auch das Niveau könnte von Staat zu Staat oder sogar von Offiziell zu Offiziell verändern, ob es ein Polizist oder ein Psychiatrist ist oder ein Mitarbeiter des Departements für psychische Gesundheit. Wir haben ein bisschen in diesem Bereich gesucht. Und in Ohio, wenn du jemanden involuntär ermitteln willst,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
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Du beginnst generell mit dem Anzeigen, dass die Person die Kriterien für ungewöhnliche Verschuldung erfüllt. Wahrscheinlich nennt man das den Pink-Slip-Prozess, was mich ein wenig erschreckt, weil ich weiß, dass das immer ein Euphemismus war, um von einem Job ausgeführt zu werden.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Yeah, being fired from imaginary lice removal duty, which honestly, that sounds like it would be a relief to get help with a situation like this. Totally. Proleptic relief, I would add. That's right. The other option is to try to get emergency custody of your mother. So either you call 911 and you tell them your mom's in trouble. Or you take her to the hospital to get checked out.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
And if there's an immediate risk, law enforcement or a medical professional can take her into emergency custody and transport her to a mental health facility for evaluation, which usually happens within 24 to 72 hours. If the evaluation supports involuntary commitment, then you would have a probable cause hearing, where evidence about your mom would be presented.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
She would actually have the right to legal representation. And finally, if the court determines that the criteria for commitment are met, The person may then be ordered to receive inpatient or outpatient treatment for a specified period of time. So it's a process, not exactly a simple one.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
And you'd probably need to consult an attorney or a local mental health organization for help navigating this process, because it can get complicated and it can take time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Richtig, es gibt einige Alternativen zum Verteidigungsvermögen. Es gibt das Power des Verteidigungsvermögens, das ist, wenn jemand mit Volontät eine Entscheidungsvermögen für jemanden, den sie vertrauen, ermöglicht, was extrem hilfreich sein kann.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Und dann gibt es das Konservativismus, und das ist, wenn eine Person Hilfe mit dem Managieren ihrer Verhältnisse erfordert, obwohl das deine Moms Partizipation benötigen könnte, was bemerkenswert scheint. Sie sehen auch den Britney Spears-Debakel mit der Konservativität, aber es könnte wirklich hilfreich sein in Ihrer Situation. Also, Sie haben ein paar Optionen.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Keiner von ihnen ist einfach, aber einige können weniger schwierig sein als andere. Egal, was Sie tun, ich denke, Sie werden mit einem Anwalt konsultieren wollen. Sie können Ihnen erzählen, welche Optionen mehr nötig sind, was Ihre Mutter wirklich braucht, was die Gerichte in diesem Fall möglich sind, und dann können Sie von dort aus gehen.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Ich höre das, aber ich frage mich auch, weil sie sich immer mehr und mehr dekompensiert, vielleicht sollte er dieses Fenster benutzen, wo sie ein bisschen kohärent ist, um Konservativität oder die Macht des Unternehmens zu bekommen. Vielleicht kann er oder sein Vater es ihr anbieten, sie gut zu kümmern, wenn sie älter wird, sodass, wenn es schlechter wird, er zumindest das in der Lage hat.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Und das könnte all die Macht sein, die er braucht, um sie sicher zu halten.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Aber wie du vor einem Moment gesagt hast, wenn er das tut, muss er sich auch darauf vorbereiten, dass es in ihrer Meinung nur einige ihrer paranoiden Glaubensmöglichkeiten bestätigen könnte. Und er könnte nicht viel Traction bekommen. Dr. Margolis hat auch gesagt, dass Menschen kompliziert sind und manchmal ist das System einfach schrecklich. And there are limitations to what we can and can't do.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
And as Dr. Margolis pointed out, that requires coming into contact with some difficult feelings and processing, again, some profound grief about not being able to help your mom, about not having the mom that you wanted and needed, about feeling powerless in general, which is where your mom's tragedy really comes back around to you and how you work through all of this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Good point. I also wonder if our friend has some feelings of his own to process around dad's resistance to getting involved. Because that seems to be making his mom's care fall entirely on him, which I'm sure brings up a lot of stuff. And maybe it speaks to his dad's whole way of dealing with his mom for years, which also might be complicated.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Good point. Man, that's so tough. It's really hard to let a parent suffer like this and not intervene. I am so sorry that you have to worry about this. I'm so sorry about the legacy of having a parent like this. But your job now is to find a way to make peace with your mom's story while also taking appropriate action, whether that's legal action or taking care of yourself along the way.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
sending you, your mom and your whole family a big hug and wishing you all the best. Big thanks also to Dr. Margolis for her wisdom and advice. Dr. Margolis is seeing patients in Los Angeles and virtually throughout California. You can learn more about her and her approach at DrErinMargolis.com. We'll link to that in the show notes. And right now, time for the recommendation of the week.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
I'm on it again this week. This one is super easy, super fast. In whatever calendar program you use, your to-do list, your reminders, whatever, set an annual reminder to check expiration dates for medicine in your home and travel kit. The stuff in the drawer, the stuff in the dob kit. I needed Imodium urgently, that's, I'll just leave it there, when traveling.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
And all I found were two pills that expired during the Obama administration. And I mean the first part of the Obama administration. Let's just say I was desperate enough that I took them and they worked, but I don't know. It might have been nice to have something that wasn't old enough to drive, to fix something in my gut.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
And by the way, it's usually safe to take expired medication, but it's not always very effective. We have an episode that we did an early Skeptical Sunday on expiration dates for medicine. It was episode 646. I think we actually mentioned medicine and not just food. But either way, worth listening to, because food expiration dates are kind of BS too. Although, you know, at your own peril.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Medicine, usually harmless, but also might not actually work. Alright, in case you don't know, there's a subreddit for the show. You can jump into discussions with other listeners about pretty much anything. There's a meme thread. It's over on the Jordan Harbinger subreddit, if you are a Reddit user, or a Redditor, as us Reddit nerds call it. Alright, next up.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Yeah, who brought these onions in here? Why did you have to bring the wagging tail into this? This is a very moving letter and a tough letter. I can hear the pain that you're in right now, how confusing this moment in your life is. And I am so sorry that you had to say goodbye to Mumu, which is a really cute name for a dog, by the way.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Die Verbindung zwischen Menschen und Pferden, besonders Pferden, ist sehr einzigartig, sehr mächtig und noch mächtiger, wenn man so viel von ihnen kümmern muss. Ein Tier, das du liebst, ist immer schrecklich. Und ein Tier, das du liebst, ist einzigartig intensiv. So everything you're feeling right now makes a lot of sense. You're grieving, man. Hard. And grief brings up a lot of stuff.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Not just about what you've lost, but about everything leading up to it. About the future, about this moment in your life, having to navigate it all without your bud. As you know, it can be very, very painful. I'm also hearing that you did an incredible job of taking care of this dog. That was not an easy pup to have.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Having your whole life revolve around an animal's care is just a beautiful commitment. It's also a massive responsibility. And it sounds like you took it all on with a lot of love and devotion. And by the way, that includes putting them down when the time was right. That is one of the most intense things you can go through, personal experience. But it's the right thing to do.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Being there with your animal in their final moments, I know it's devastating, but it's also an act of great love and compassion. And I'm confident that Mumu felt that. What a gift for both of you. Das ist etwas, wovon man stolz ist. Es ist etwas, wovon man dankbar ist. Also, du fragst hier eine wirklich große und profunde Frage. Wie gehen wir durch diese Verluste? Wie überleben wir Veränderungen?
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1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Wie holen wir die Teile? Und die Wahrheit ist, ich weiß nicht, ob wir all diese Fragen auf einem Podcast einfach beantworten können. Du bist in einem Prozess gerade. Ein sehr intensiver und heiliger Prozess. Morgen. Und jeder muss seinen eigenen Weg durchgehen. Aber ich kann dir ein paar Gedanken geben. Das erste, was ich dir erinnern möchte, ist die Schmerzen, die du jetzt hast.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Ich weiß, dass es überwältigend ist, aber es ist wirklich die Rückseite von Liebe. Das ist das, was wir machen, jedes Mal, wenn wir in eine Beziehung mit jemandem oder etwas machen. Einen Tag werden wir das verlieren. Es ist sehr intensiv.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Es ist eigentlich ein bisschen verrückt, dass wir unsere Herzen an diese Tiere über und über wieder öffnen, wissend, wie es enden wird, um nichts zu sagen, was unsere Herzen an Menschen öffnet. Aber wir machen es, weil wir wissen, dass die Freude und die Verbindung die Schmerzen, die wir eindeutig fühlen, wert sind.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
In that way, the pain you're feeling, it really is a reflection of how much you loved this dog and how much this dog loved you. And that pain is awful as it is. It's also kind of a privilege to feel. It's a perverse privilege, but a very real one. The second thing I want you to keep in mind, and I know this is trite, but it's true. You will not feel this exact way forever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
This grief is very fresh. You're still reeling from the loss. Everything is brand new. It's probably the most intense that it's going to be. And you have to keep reminding yourself of that. But grief evolves. These feelings, they shift. That's what they do. How you feel today, I can pretty much guarantee that you won't feel that same way in a week, two weeks, in a month, certainly in a year.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Oh, das ist... Ich bin einfach überrascht und es ist schockierend, wie jemand das zu seinem eigenen Kind tun könnte, wie das System es erlauben könnte, es unvergütbar zu machen.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Whether you consciously work on it or not, there's a healing process happening in the background. And our minds are very good at adapting to new realities. It's kind of remarkable. And I say this not to minimize the pain that you're in. I say this just to give you a little perspective. I'm sure you'll always have a pang of grief when you think about Mumu.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
I'm sure there's always going to be an empty spot in your heart. But when it gets really intense, try to remind yourself that your experience of this loss and all of these big feelings and questions it brings up, they won't always feel exactly this way. There is a version of you in the future that's living with this loss and living with it well.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Ich denke also, dass es ein großer Teil unseres Jobs ist, wenn wir durch Schmerzen gehen, uns zu vertrauen und diesen Prozess zu ermöglichen. Das bedeutet, all die Gefühle zu fühlen, die es erzeugt. Das ist essentiell. Aber auch nicht zu stark zu ihnen zu klingen oder zu viel in ihnen zu stecken. Denn sie werden immer weiterentwickeln.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Sie werden neue Gedanken, neue Gefühle erzeugen, insbesondere schöne. Und ich denke, du wirst überrascht sein, wo du in wenigen Monaten bist. So yeah, by all means, these big questions you're asking are important. I'm all for them. But a big part of your job is to just doggy paddle in these waves for just a little while. Just stay afloat.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
And remember that the waters will eventually calm down and what feels very painful and confusing today will start to settle and make more sense very soon.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Damn, I was not expecting Rabbi Gabe to show up today.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
I get it. Look, in my own way also, I haven't had a dog since I was a kid, so that grief is a little more remote for me. But what you said about life breaking down, how we constantly have to mourn, I feel that hard. I have these moments sometimes with Jaden and Juniper where I realize that. Like my life is shifting right in front of me if I really pay attention.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
And I know that in a few years this chapter of my life will be dead and gone and there will be a new amazing one. And then that one will die. And then there'll be another amazing one. And if I'm lucky, that'll go on and on until I am dead. And it's sad to face that. It's also really amazing and awesome in some ways. Something kids have a real way of teaching you just by existing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
And for our friend here, maybe that's what Mumu is now teaching him. So again, I'm so sorry that you had to say goodbye. I'm sorry this transition is so intense. But given everything we're talking about, I'm also not sorry. I'm actually very moved by your story. I'm inspired by it. Because I think you've been thrown into a very profound process. A really important chapter.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
And I'm excited to hear what comes of it. And I know that's easy for me to say, you're the one who has to hold all the pain. But I know you'll get there too. And that this loss, like all losses, is going to play an important role in your life. It's going to lead you to feelings and perspectives you can't even imagine yet. Sending you a big hug, my man. Hang in there.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Shout out to Mumu, that needy little Buddha who allowed us to pop off like a couple of amateur gurus today and who clearly opened your heart in some amazing ways. Don't forget to check out our episodes this week with Anne Applebaum on authoritarian regimes and how they cooperate and why, as well as our Skeptical Sunday on fake foods. I'm at Jordan Harbinger on Twitter and Instagram.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
You can also connect with me on LinkedIn. Gabe's over on Instagram at Gabriel Mizrahi or on Twitter at Gabe Mizrahi. This show is created in association with Podcast One. My team is Jen Harbinger, Jace Sanderson, Robert Fogerty, Ian Baird, Tata Sidlauskas, and of course, Gabriel Mizrahi. In the meantime, I hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
And we'll see you next time. You're about to hear a preview of the Jordan Harbinger show about a guy who went from Nigerian royalty to the rugged streets of the Bronx. Remy Adeleke's life was thrown into chaos after a corrupt government stripped his family of their legacy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Dive deep into his captivating journey from being surrounded by drugs and drive-bys to his inspiring pursuit to become a US Navy SEAL, even though he didn't know how to swim.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Remys Kampf ist weit von vorbei, als er die dunkle Unterwelt des menschlichen Verbrechens und des illegalen Organverbrechens konfrontiert. Um zu entdecken, was den Mann, der nicht getötet wird, fährt, schaut euch Episode 868 von The Jordan Harbinger Show an.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Oh mein Gott, ich fühle mich für dich, Mann. Ich bin absolut lebendig hier. Das ist so ein Verbrechen des Systems. Es ist verrückt, dass sie freie legalen Hilfe bekommt, um ihr Kind zu sehen. Ich verstehe das. Aber dann, wer advokiert für das Kind? Oh, na gut, das kommt aus dem Koffer für dich, Kumpel. Was? Das macht keinen Sinn für mich.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Oh boy, what a nightmare this is. What an absolutely insane custody story. Truly next level stuff, man. God, the things you've been through here, it's insane. Literally, I suppose. I am so sorry that you and your son have been through all this. I can't even imagine how you guys must feel, the damage your ex has caused. I can hear your pain, your anger, your exhaustion in your letter.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
And I really do feel for you. I know I'm saying that a few times here, broken record. But my heart also breaks for your son. dass er diese Verletzung von seiner Mutter erlebt hat, in Zuge dessen, dass er ein sehr zerstörerter und chaotischer Vater ist. Und das ist auf der Spitze seiner besonderen Bedürfnisse, dieser armen Kind, Mann. Ich kann nicht mal vorstellen, was er durchgehen muss.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Es gibt einfach keine Worte. Ich rüttel meine Hände, warum die Gerichte in deinem Land die Möglichkeit erlauben würden, dass dein Ex mit deinem Sohn Kontakt zu haben, nach ihrem Rekord-Rekord und all diesem Beweis und den Threaten, um ihn zu töten und ihn zu töten.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
I thought our courts were flawed? This sounds like a total circus. And I'm so deeply sorry that you've been failed by your system. It's crazy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
No kidding, seriously. What are they thinking? Or are they just following the law and the law is way too forgiving of mentally ill parents?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Or overly accommodating to mothers, which wouldn't be, I guess, a huge surprise. It's like that in a lot of places. This is really just madness. These judges are culpable in the kids' abuse. That's my opinion. So, we wanted to share your story with an actual expert, so we reached out to attorney and friend of the show, Corbin Payne. Corbin was as shocked by your story as we were.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
He said that this kind of thing could happen in the US. He's seen some things, obviously. But while our country also highly prioritizes parental rights, we also have it clearly established that these rights can be overridden by safety concerns for the child. The courts are supposed to document these things, make official legal findings.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
If the court finds multiple instances of a parent abusing and or subjecting their children to dependency and neglect, the courts are supposed to take that into consideration. It doesn't always happen that way. Of course, courts aren't the best always at listening to the non-problem parent or the evidence, but Corbyn said it happens a lot.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
I'm your host, Jordan Harbinger. As always, I'm here with Feedback Friday producer, the sanitizing hand wipe handed to you as you take your seat in this first class cabin of life drama, Gabriel Mizrahi. By the way, I love how it's now our job to clean our seats on an airplane after you pay like... What do you mean?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Now, an important caveat here, Corbyn knows nothing about Norwegian law, but he did offer a few ideas from our legal system that might give you some new inspiration. It goes without saying, these absolutely 100% need to be run by a real Norwegian lawyer or legal expert before attempting. You know the spiel, Corbyn's a lawyer, not your lawyer.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
You have to do your own research before implementing anything you hear on the show, and anything Corbyn shares is general and informational in nature, it is not legal advice. So. Korbin's first idea, he would explore whether Norwegian law allows for supervised visitation.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
That means the court appoints a supervisor and that person would have the legal obligation to monitor the visits and act if things get out of hand. They'd also have the authority to remove your son from his mother's care if things get dangerous. In certain instances, a supervisor terminating a visit can also trigger a reset to lower levels of visitation.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Der Supervisor in unserem Land, und das ist ein bisschen seltsam, aber es könnte ein Freund sein, es könnte ein Familienmitglied sein, es könnte auch ein professionell bezahlter Supervisor sein. Es würde mich nicht überraschen, in Norwegen, wenn du einen Service hast, der das tut. Zweitens, Corbyn würde sehen, ob es möglich ist, Bedingungen auf jeden Besuch zu stellen.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
He shared a story from his own experience with us. Some time back, Corbin worked on a case where a dad got custody of his kids from their mother after she had a mental health episode. She was apparently a good mother when she was stable, but she absolutely lost it. And the team was able to determine that she'd had a breakdown in her teens and again in her late 20s.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
And both times it took her about eight months to get back on her feet once she started therapy and got on her meds. So they started off with supervised visitation and escalated slowly over time to give her more visits with the kids as she proved herself responsible. They also had some conditions, that she meet weekly with her therapist, take her medication, stuff like that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
If she missed any of these conditions, then they went back to square one automatically and started all over again. Corbin said they had a bumpy start with a couple of resets early on, but she had her kids back about 13 months later and she seems to be doing well. So, Corbin is not suggesting that you can magically cure your ex by putting conditions around therapy and meds.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Your ex is clearly a very complex and tragic case. But he did wonder if the courts would be willing to order her to take some of these steps over, say, a six-month period and send her back to square one if she fails. That might be one way to protect your son in the short term and also keep responsible adults looking over her shoulder.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Ich meine, Alter, wenn sie die nächsten zwei oder drei Jahre vor dem gleichen Gericht zurückgeht, jedes paar Monate, weil sie ihre Scheiße nicht zusammenbringen kann, wer weiß, das könnte den Gericht genug frustrieren, um etwas mehr permanent zu machen.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Corbyn wollte auch wissen, hast du einen eigenen Experten engagiert, der kann kommen und eine Meinung geben, dass dein Ex immer wieder verlapsen wird, egal was? Wenn sie einen Experten bringt, der bereit ist zu sagen, oh, sie ist gerettet, sie ist in Ordnung, dann scheint es mir zu sein, dass du einen Experten haben musst, der sagt, hey, das ist nicht der Fall.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Und ich weiß, das wird eine Ausgabe sein, aber es könnte nicht so teuer sein, wie du denkst. Oder wer weiß, vielleicht kann dein Arbeiter einen Vorteil holen oder der Staat eine neue Evaluation von einem anderen Psychiater anrufen, der eine mehr objektive Meinung geben kann oder so etwas. Ich meine, wie viele Schrecken kriegst du da drüben, um Gottes willen?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
No, first of all, I don't think so. I've never seen anyone not use it for the seat and tray table. I assume the reason it's massive and not a little one is because they want you to clean the seat. Like, oh, I just paid six grand for this flight, but by all means, put me to work while I'm here. I got nothing else to do.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Corbyns einzige Kaviar hier war, dass man vorsichtig ist, weil es möglicherweise Regeln in Bezug auf Confidentialität in Jugendlichen-Fällen gibt. Es können auch Regeln sein, dass man nicht öffentlich einen Co-Parent kritisieren kann. Das ist etwas, was dein Lehrer anrufen kann.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1118: Son's Safety Vexed by Schizoaffective Ex | Feedback Friday
Agreed, but can confirm, sometimes these organizations Trojan horse in some really weird mindsets and beliefs into a philosophy that is otherwise attractive and helpful. I don't want to say, I don't want to say like culty, but you can go in thinking like, oh, it's a support group. And then dot, dot, dot, three years later, you're like... All women this, men going their own way, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
And look, if he says yes, now you're what, low key dating your wife's cousin's boyfriend or stealing him from her or causing him to cheat on her. If he says, no, family get-togethers might get super awkward, you're going to have to manage that, as well as any fallout from busting him. So again, consider the implications and what outcomes you're comfortable living with.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Yeah, that's a crime too, as well as being unethical, despite how weird this dude is.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
But again, Gabe, the fact that he feels it might be taking advantage of him because he has some power over this guy, which he finds hot. Isn't that yet another example of the fantasy just taking over here?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Yeah, he's still married to his wife. It sounds like he's just now starting to realize that he might be bisexual, so that tells us a lot about where he is in his journey. So when he says...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
I wake up, I'm like, I'm cured. And then three hours later, I'm like, no, not at all. However, I will say that I'm excited for the results, I guess you would say. So, for the gaming nerds out there, myself included, it's like, you know when you pick up a new weapon in a game and you're like, oh, I can't wait to fire this thing and see what it's like? That's kind of...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Right. Not to express like his intent for this. Yeah. Right.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Yeah, it's a good way to put it. He's painting with two colors, maybe more. And I'm just not sure what painting he's making over here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
In one way, I admire the brazenness in his playfulness. And in another way, though, I'm wincing and I'm going, okay, this is fulfilling a certain function for you that is not entirely healthy. And this is not going to end well.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Yeah, I'm also wincing because... Because I've had my scrotum punctured by a doctor with very little anesthetic. So my strong advice to you is, by the way, you know, you're awake when they do that. Like I was chit chatting with the doctor. No, dude, I had no idea. I thought they put you under for that. Absolutely not.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
No, you can sort of like see most of what's going on, but you're at a weird angle. If you're eating lunch right now, I apologize. But yeah, no, you feel the pulling and the sewing and the chatting. And then it feels like someone's flicking you really hard in the junk, in the nuts. What'd you guys talk about? The podcast.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
He's like, oh, I like podcasts. What do you guys talk about? I'm like, well, we're going to be talking about this vasectomy pretty soon, for sure. Usually not just that. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
A little bit of both. A little bit of both. And he's like, oh, that's interesting. You know, and he grew up, you know, he was in the military. Part of that was him being interested, I think. And part of that was the more I'm talking, the less I'm, you know, tensing up and being weird while he's trying to get something done. Oh, he's just disarming you. Yeah, because there's a lot.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Well, yes, yes, he was disarming me. Indeed, he was. That was that's the whole point of the surgery. Yeah, it's an interesting vibe because, you know, he's done like 10,000 of these things, right? You can just tell.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Yeah. Driving home was also a vibe because you drive yourself home. Like they're basically just like, oh yeah, take Tylenol. And you're just thinking, I've taken Tylenol and I'm pretty sure that that's not going to cut it. Does nothing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Anyway. You know who doesn't need a vasectomy? This guy. Exactly. Yeah, this guy. Hey, if you find out you're gay, you don't need a vasectomy. So there's that. But anyway, back to the task at hand here. My strong advice to you is proceed with caution, stay grounded, stay sober, really consider the risks and implications here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
And whatever you're getting out of this game, whatever you're learning about yourself and your desires and your needs, that's for you to know and do something about, not necessarily to take to this guy to explore. Take care of yourself and good luck.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
I mean, one, you shouldn't feed this delusion. But two, yeah. How did you guys meet? Well, Lionel catfished me as his ex-girlfriend because he was in the closet too. And I thought it was super fun and hilarious and yada, yada, yada.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
It's a name you get from a scammer who has two first names. Like, hi, my name is Lionel Jennifer.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
That's kind of where I'm at with it, although right now it's kind of like getting stabbed even thinking about doing that, so I've got to wait a couple weeks. Your health bar is low, and it's slowly working its way back up. That's right, and every time you fire it, that health bar takes a little bit of a ding, I would imagine, so you've got to be careful.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
The worst scammer name I've ever heard. They always pick two first names. I'm not sure why.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Yes, yes, indeed. And now for some extortionately good deals on the fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back. This episode is sponsored in part by Rosetta Stone. I'm excited to try their True Accent Speech Recognition, which is like having a personal trainer for your accent. Accent's kind of the last thing you develop when you learn a language.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Go to rosettastone.com slash Jordan to snag this deal before it's gone. And that's a lifetime deal. It's a pretty damn good deal.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
This episode is sponsored in part by Airbnb. You know, if you ever thought about hosting your place on Airbnb but found it a little bit overwhelming, here's some good news. It's way easier than it seems now. You don't even have to do all the work yourself. Airbnb's co-host network has you covered. Basically, you can hire a local co-host to take care of your home and your guests while you're away.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
So while you're sipping wine in Tuscany, your home is not only taken care of, it's also making you extra cash. For somebody like me who's often out of town, this feels like such a practical way to make a little bit of extra cash without having to do any of the heavy lifting myself. And it's not just about the money, right? It's a smart move. Very little work on my part.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
But, you know, there's going to be a vast difference between the hanky-panky I had before and the hanky-panky I'm having now. You know what I mean? That was solid fun. I like that one. You can't get a vasectomy without locking in a couple of vas deferens jokes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Why not put your place to work while you're away, right? If you've got unused space, you're heading out of town for a while, this is definitely a no-brainer. Find a co-host at airbnb.com slash host. Thank you for listening to and supporting the show. All the deals, discounts, and ways to support the podcast are all searchable and clickable over at jordanharbinger.com slash deals.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Please consider supporting those who support the show. Now back to Feedback Friday.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Interesting. It's funny. I had a buddy from Lithuania. His name was something like Mindaugas. Mindaugas? Yeah. But his middle name sounded like Marcus. So we just called him Marcus. Or maybe that's the nickname that he picked because he was like, ah, no one can remember to call me Mindaugas. So I get it. Marcus Jennifer. Mindaugas Jennifer. So I get this. I've dealt with this myself in some ways.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
When I lived in Serbia, people used to call me Jole because they couldn't say Jordan easily because of the way the consonants were. Jole? Jolie. Yeah. It's kind of like Johnson. Is it like Dick? So girls would giggle when they heard it. Like Johnson Johnson.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Yeah. Yeah. Hopefully it wasn't quite that lame, but it might be. I don't know if you're Serbian. Tell me what Jolie evokes for you. So I totally get that. It's something they would also call me Johnny just because it was funnier. And I think some guys didn't want to say Jolie all the time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
So I totally get that having a foreign name can be really challenging in another country, some more than others, of course. And yes, it must be annoying to have to constantly explain to people how to pronounce your name or tell them, actually, I'm a woman or actually I'm a guy over and over again.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
What kind of father would I be if I didn't take advantage of this particular opportunity that will never arise again? Speaking of arising, that also is painful. Who's going to say it? I don't know. As always, we've got some fun ones and some doozies.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
I also think that having a foreign name can be really cool and help you stand out, which is obviously a big part of personal branding, even if it means going around being called Dong. I kid, but you know what I'm saying. So my take is, if you're gonna adopt a local name, something easier for people to wrap their heads around, try to find one that's somewhat cool and unique and meaningful to you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
A lot of Chinese people, they come to the United States and they do this, but I've noticed this, especially with kids, that they'll pick names like Cherry You know, it's a little bit like, okay, it's a cartoon character kind of name or stripper kind of name. I also wouldn't go with, you know, Meg. I mean, you're welcome to and no shade to Megs, but there are a lot of Megs in the US.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
There's way fewer Violets, also a popular name with Chinese people who come over. So I'm just plucking a random example out of the air here. If you happen to like the color Violet or you're into flowers or whatever, that would be more meaningful than just going with a generic local name. Your other option is to find a nickname or variant on your real name.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
That way, you're still getting to hang on to your real name. You're just making it a little easier for people to pronounce. Like if her name is Svetlana, you just go by Lana, that kind of thing. Not that Svetlana is hard to pronounce, but you get the point. But look, there's a big part of me that wants to say, own your name, be proud of it, let other people adjust.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Like you said, you always want to lead with authenticity here. So if a name change feels super false, I'd just consider hanging on to your real one or waiting until you find a local one that feels right. There's no rush. I just don't think it's the worst thing for local people to learn a name in another language. We Americans, I'm assuming you're here in the States, we can adjust sometimes too.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Here's another idea. All right, when you introduce yourself, maybe you get out in front of all the questions you're used to getting. Hey, I'm Biruta. I just met a Biruta from Latvia, so that's top of my mind right now. I'm Biruta, like Beirut, like the city, except with beer, like the drink. I know, it's unique. It'll take a couple times for you to remember me. Thanks, mom and dad.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Just have a laugh about it, call it out, give the person a couple mnemonics to remember it, and when you do stuff like that, you'll also be showing people that you have a sense of humor, and that stands out even more, and they'll remember the Beirut beer thing, they'll remember your attitude, which again, doesn't hurt from a branding perspective.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Another thing I've seen people from other countries do, you could add something to your email signature or your social media accounts. Biruta, originally from Lithuania, global approach or whatever. You can even include a pronunciation guide if you want.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
They have this, I don't know if they still have this because I haven't logged into Facebook in like a decade, but on Facebook, it used to show you how to pronounce people's names. So it'd be like Biruta. Just a small thing that can help prevent any hiccups and sidestep that annoying conversation. But look, whatever you decide to do, don't be afraid to own your story.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
It's unique, it's interesting, it's damn impressive. Moving to another country is no small feat. I've done it a bunch, it's never easy. You should be proud of that. And if you stick with your real name, it might be a cool window into that conversation. Like if you say, hey, I'm Biruta, and the other person is like, B what? You can be like, Biruta. It's Lithuanian, crazy name, I know.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
It's made moving here way more interesting. And then eight out of 10 people are gonna go, oh, cool, how long have you been here? Wow, I've never met anyone from Lithuania. And all of a sudden, you're talking about your story, not just how to pronounce your name that they're gonna forget 10 seconds later.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
But listen, more than whatever name you settle on, the most important thing in your relationships, in your personal brand, is of course you, how you show up in these conversations. What vibe you put out, what spirit you meet people in, your kindness, your curiosity, your humor, your vulnerability, your work ethic, those things matter way more
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
And if you keep leading with those qualities, I promise you are going to make a name for yourself literally, okay? And good luck. You can reach us Friday at jordanharbinger.com. Please keep your emails concise. Try to use a descriptive subject line that makes our job a whole lot easier.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
If your partner secretly reads your journal and is holding the contents against you, you're struggling to parent with a criminal narcissistic ex, or your work nemesis is caught up in a romance scam and you're not sure whether to save her, Whatever's got you staying up at night lately, hit us up Friday at jordanharbinger.com. We're here to help and we keep every email anonymous.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Oh, our newsletter, We Bit Wiser, comes out every Wednesday. It's basically a bite-sized gem from us to you delivered to your inbox. It's like a two-minute read. That's kind of what we're shooting for. So if you want to keep up with the wisdom from our thousand-plus episodes and apply it to your life, I invite you to come check it out. You can sign up at jordanharbinger.com slash news.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Okay, what's next?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Wait, okay by himself. Does that mean okay being single or does that mean he can handle it when he's enjoying me time and nothing goes wrong? I don't get it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
I see. Got it. So there's something going on when he has a partner, which I'm guessing this means it's psychological. You hear a lot about the younger generation needing this because they watch too much freaking porn.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Interesting. OK, so stress can definitely, of course, play a role in erectile dysfunction. And it sounds like this guy has a lot of stress in his life right now, especially with the teeth grinding and stuff like that. If your jaw hurts in the morning, you're really you're going after it. I have to imagine the vaping does not help.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Look, whether that's true or not, that does seem like a meaningful detail. Let's come back to that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Okay, well, a lot of firsts on today's episode. Pretty sure we've never had a parent writing in about their child's erectile dysfunction before. Yeah, we're going to need a third bottle of champagne. Over here, I think. Yeah, exactly. So first of all, I can hear how much you love your son. I can hear how proud you are of him and how concerned you are about him in a number of ways.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
I think it's sweet that you want what's best for your son. You want him to have the healthiest life possible, the most fulfilling life possible. I get it. I'm sure if I found out my son was struggling in this area, I'd be worried too. But...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
I am not sure this is an area of your son's life that you should be super involved in, especially if he's not coming up to you and saying, hey, dad, I'm struggling with this. I need a little bit of help. Again, I get your concern. I get why you want your son to thrive. But we're talking about your son's sex life. You know, we're talking about his body at his age.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
I kind of think this is his problem to work on in the way that he wants. He's 23. I don't feel like it's appropriate for you to be trying to make sure your son can get it up. A sentence I never thought I would say out loud, but here we are.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Nice, that's smart. You know what? This sort of catfishing stuff can be really tricky. On Instagram, right, it's really obvious. They all use the same name and the same script. But if somebody's targeting you, really reverse image search is like, that's your first stop.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Well, yeah, I picked up on that as well.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
So I get it. There always are babies. And I was probably a slob at 23. But that is a bit odd. I agree. I don't know. Maybe he went to visit the academy for a parent's weekend or whatever and saw that his room was a mess. And he was like, here, I'll help you as long as I'm here. I'm sure my mom probably did that a few times when I was in my early 20s.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
I could see that my roommate's mom definitely did. She cleaned her room. It was but he was, you know, never mind.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Right. And if he's overly involved in his son's life in small ways, is he also overly involved in his son's life in the big ways, like talking about his erectile dysfunction?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Right. That one might be different, though. That doesn't sound like being overly involved to me. I mean, I think every parent should probably warn their kids about having safe sex.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Right, right. Because if they were harping on about this, that might have tipped over into something else, some kind of anxiety, something obsessive. Who knows?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
I guess I could see that. But to be fair to our friend here, his son is saying that that's what's causing his erectile dysfunction or at least contributing to it. But I mean, we don't know if that's actually the reason.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
That's true. It's also possible that he was embarrassed that his dad found the pills and he was just deflecting by blaming his parents for screwing him up somehow.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
So that kind of fits with a dad who might be probing too much. And meanwhile, there's so many puns that I'm just so glad we're not making. And meanwhile, there are other details here, like the vaping that he doesn't seem to be. Yes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
If I were this guy's dad, I'd be equally, if not more, concerned about my son getting frickin' popcorn lung and shortening his lifespan than the fact that he sometimes can't get it up. Partly because the vaping is less sensitive, and partly because, well, I also wonder if the vaping might be contributing to his erectile dysfunction, although I don't know if that's actually a thing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
I know smoking definitely was.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Well, there you go.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
So, I mean, that could be the problem or at least part of the problem. I guess we haven't ruled out any neurosis he has because his parents freaked him out about getting girls pregnant or whatever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
See, now I wish I'd saved my hole up soundbite for now. That one's going to come in handy a lot today. Yeah. Dang. Wow. This is so bizarre. So I got to make sure I got this straight. This guy. So our friend here, he's being catfished by his wife's cousin's boyfriend.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Good point. And so you're saying maybe that's why he has performance issues?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Ah, interesting. So is that at the root of his performance issues? It's a good question. Either way, I think it's pretty clear that their son is kind of chafing at a number of influences and situations in his life right now. Again... Sorry for all these. It's almost like it's top of mind. I feel like everything is a pun for something to do with my scrotum today. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Yeah, I'm with you, Gabe. That makes a lot of sense, although I suppose backing off also kind of means accepting that they might not understand everything about their son all the time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
So here's my take. I probably wouldn't meddle in your son's sex life too much from here on out. What you can do is say, hey, look, bud, you're an adult. You're a capable, responsible young man. I'm going to respect your privacy on this. And if you ever wanna talk about anything, guy to guy, I'm here for that. You know, I've had the same equipment for a lot longer than you have.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
And in the meantime, I just wanna say, as somebody who loves you, vaping is truly awful for you. I'm sure you know that. If you don't, please spend 10 minutes reading up on it online. I sincerely hope you quit as soon as possible. I think you'll find that it has ripple effects across your life. All I want for you is to be happy and healthy and fulfilled.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
And if I can do anything to help you get there, you know that I'm here. That's how you can respect his privacy and autonomy while still being there for him and without inadvertently contributing to any additional stress or dysfunction. The other thing you can do, of course, is encourage him to talk to somebody. The military really should offer some type of counseling, probably free of charge.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Just keep an eye on that healthy boundary when you do so that pushing him into therapy doesn't become another way to potentially overstep and meddle in his life. And again, I know you're coming from a good place here, man. I know. I know you want your son to thrive. Every parent would.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
But sometimes the best thing we can do as parents, especially if a child your son's age, is take a huge step back so that they can take that huge step forward, especially in sensitive areas like this. Sending you and your son good thoughts and hope everything starts looking up from here. You had to do it. You had to. It just seemed better than sending you good thoughts.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Okay. And for those who don't know catfishing, can you define catfishing real quick?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
And I hope your son has rock hard boners from here on out. Now we're giving this guy a complex cheese. That's right. And now you're going to get a rock hard boner when you hear about the deals and discounts on the fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back. We'll be right back.
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1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
And auto customers qualify for an average of seven discounts, discounts for having multiple vehicles on your policy, being a homeowner, and more. So just like your favorite podcast, Progressive will be with you 24-7, 365 days a year, so you're protected no matter what. Multitask right now. Quote your car insurance at Progressive.com to join the over 28 million drivers who trust Progressive.
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Progressive Casualty Insurance Company & Affiliates. National average 12-month savings of $744 by new customer surveyed who saved with Progressive between June 2022 and May 2023. Potential savings will vary. Discounts not available in all states and situations. This episode is sponsored in part by The Defender. We all have those big goals that seem just out of reach, right?
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1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
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1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Not just what everyone does online because it is kind of like this, but it'll be like someone posts a photo and it's just that's not your photo. It's literally not you. Right. It's just somebody else. Different gender, different look, different age, whatever it is. OK, got it.
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1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
But it's not just about ruggedness. It's an icon reimagined, with a design that feels modern, yet honors its adventurous roots. Plus, there's a Defender for every kind of explorer, from the Defender 90 to the 110, and even the 130, which seats up to eight people. So whether it's just you or the whole family, there's a model for your journey.
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If you're ready to embrace the impossible, the Defender is your perfect partner. Be uncapable and ready to go wherever you're headed next. Build your defender at LandRoverUSA.com. If you liked this episode of Feedback Friday and you find our advice valuable, I invite you to do what other smart and considerate listeners do, which is take a moment and support our amazing sponsors,
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All the deals, discount codes, and ways to support the show are all searchable and clickable over at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. The AI chatbot also can surface codes. It does really well with that now. jordanharbinger.com slash AI. Last but not least, you can always email us jordan at jordanharbinger.com. We're happy to surface those codes for you.
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1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
It is that important that you support those who support the show. All right, back to Feedback Friday.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Wow, okay, that is dark.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Yeah, interesting. So again, we don't know if she's doing this to win him back over or because she really did abuse him when he was a kid.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Yeah, that guy built a whole career off of investigating catfishing and stuff. I've seen a couple episodes. I feel like this is something you watch on an airplane. Kind of.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Okay, so dad was abusive, at least to her. Apparently, yeah. But dad is telling brother that mom abused him, which might or might not be true.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Oh boy, what a sad situation. There is a lot of pain in this story, in a lot of directions, and I'm sure that most of these people mean well. But there's a lot of dysfunction in this family, man. So first of all, my heart goes out to your girlfriend's brother. Wrestling with bipolar disorder on top of a potential history of childhood abuse, that is not easy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
You said that he was recently diagnosed, and I hope that means he's being treated for it, medication therapy, ideally both. Bipolar disorder, when it's properly treated, it doesn't have to derail someone's life. But untreated, it can obviously cause a lot of turbulence and a lot of pain for the person who has it, of course, but often also for family members, friends, loved ones. It's really tough.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
My heart also goes out to you, though, because this is all just really hard to watch. I hear your genuine concern in your letter. I also hear your anger, your disappointment, your frustration, your impatience. I'm getting the sense that you feel a responsibility to intervene and make things better here, but you also feel kind of helpless.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Welcome to Feedback Friday. I'm your host, Jordan Harbinger. As always, I'm here with Feedback Friday producer, the red-nosed reindeer pulling the sleigh of conundra as we drop these fire gifts of life drama beneath your tree, Gabriel Mizrahi. Ho, ho, hold up, I guess. Yeah. Hold up. That's right. It's not going to be socks. I can promise you. You're not going to end up with socks or underwear.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
And I'm guessing that helplessness just makes you angrier because it's like, why can't you people get it together? Why can't you treat one another better? Why can't you work through these wounds and grievances in a normal way? And I get that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
The mental process. that goes into it is so strange. I remember there was one where it was like a gay dude pretending to be a blonde woman and then he was talking to this football player and then he was like, I just want to meet him in real life and explain everything and then he'll understand and then we'll still be in love. And I'm like, dude, what? Yeah, that's not going to happen.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Which I wasn't quite sure what he meant by that. Is he saying if he's mentally ill, treating him like he's different is not what he needs?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Yeah, I could see that. What he's in touch with is his disdain and his anger. But underneath that, he might be going, why does he get that treatment? Slash, why didn't I get that treatment?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Right, so obviously this family has a lot of work to do, but here's the thing. I'm just not convinced that it's our friend here's job to make them do that work. No. Okay, so you agree. Yeah, I feel the same. I get the impulse, what could be more natural, but almost every aspect of this problem is this family's business and just not his business.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Except his relationship with her. That's right. But look, I get why that gets confusing, because I'm assuming that dad tells brother all this awful stuff about mom. Brother then rages at her. Mom goes out of her way to keep him in good graces. One or both of them talk to sister about what's going on, or she witnesses it herself. And then she brings all that to our friend here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
And when our friend tries to help, she just says, what did she say? Like, oh, it's a delicate time for him. I don't know what else to do. I mean, it sounds like, Gabe, this is that classic thing where you got to know when someone's venting to you and when someone's asking for help. And those are two different things. Like maybe she's venting to you and not wanting your solutions.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Just trauma in there. That's all. Just pure, unadulterated trauma.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Right. Plus, her dad was apparently abusive to her, so she has her own trauma, her own stake in all this. So I get why our friend here is going, okay, if you people won't do anything about this, what can I do?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Yeah, it just makes no sense at all. Just totally shocking. So I can't wait to hear where this goes because this is officially the champagne bottle being smashed on the hull of this week's Deuce Cruise.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
But really, the only pieces of this that he can and should control are A, his own way of processing the feelings that this family stirs up in him, and B, how he talks to his girlfriend about what's happening, how he supports her, how he guides and empowers her to work on her piece of all of this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Exactly. And C, which is, I think, the conclusion you're getting at, Gabe, learning to draw better boundaries so that this family's chaos just doesn't infect his life so much. And those boundaries are potentially with his girlfriend if she's bringing too much to him or involving him in an unfair way.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
But they might also be inside of himself in the way that he internalizes this family's dysfunction somehow or decides that it's on him to fix when it's not.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Right, and even if we don't know exactly how that lens developed, that stuff is clearly there. He's bringing in his own thoughts, feelings, experiences, beliefs to this situation as well.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
I do. Until he appreciates what he's bringing to all this, he might march into a situation that isn't entirely his to resolve. Or he might get in there and get confused. But all that said, it might be acceptable for you to talk to your girlfriend's brother, especially if you guys have a relationship of your own.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
I would just be very thoughtful about what your agenda is there, what you're hoping to accomplish, why you want to talk to him. If you're hoping to tell him to forgive his mom or stay away from his dad or bring less to your girlfriend or start taking more responsibility for his life or whatever it is, even if some of those are good ideas, I would definitely, I would just resist that urge.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
I think your best bet to start and also the respectful and healthy thing to do is to just invite your girlfriend's brother to talk about how he's feeling these days, what he's struggling with, what he thinks the answers are, what he needs from you right now and just go from there.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
If he lets you in, if he seems stable, if he seems receptive, then maybe you can slowly start to offer some thoughts on how to repair things with his family, how to take better care of himself, how to ease some of this chaos and pain that he's creating. If he doesn't want to engage with you though, then just, I would back off.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Agreed. So we're back to those boundaries again, that timeless principle of This is mine, this is theirs, and let me make sure I'm not all up in someone else's business. I am sorry that you and your girlfriend are going through this. I really am. I understand why all of this is so maddening and disturbing, especially when this family doesn't have the tools to work through things, seemingly.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
If you can offer them some of those tools appropriately, then that's great. But one tool you might be looking for is knowing when to get involved in other people's work and how much and why. Sending you good thoughts and good luck. All right, recommendation of the week. I am addicted to lip filler.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Yeah, that actually makes some sense. Good thinking.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Yeah, it sounds like a bed of nails.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
But expensive.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
I feel like I've seen these, but I just never really got it. All right, y'all, in case you didn't know, there's a subreddit for our show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
If you want to jump into discussions with other listeners about specific episodes, if there was an episode you really liked, an episode you really didn't like, you want to complain about your pronomet, acupressure thing poking holes in you, and you want Gabe to see it, you can go to the subreddit, reddit.com slash r slash Jordan Harbinger. It's just the Jordan Harbinger subreddit.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
It's a lot of fun. There's a meme thread, which is hilarious. All right, next up.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Like, hey, I got you a present for Christmas. I catfished your husband and now he's sending me dick pics.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Interesting question. So first off, well done on planning ahead for your kids' education. That is awesome. And it says a lot about how much thought and care you're putting into their futures. I also commend you for getting out ahead of this and wrestling with this question now rather than letting it become a source of resentment or conflict later on down the line. So it's interesting.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
I could look at this two different ways. One way to look at this is the breakdown of the college fund doesn't matter as much as the experience your kids are getting. how you're supporting them in a way that uniquely helps them thrive.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
So for example, if one kid goes to Dartmouth or whatever, some famously expensive school, and the other kid goes to a state school, generally way cheaper, but those are the schools they wanted to go to.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Those are the schools that reflect their abilities and goals in life, and they're equally invested in each other's success, which I would hope they are, then you could set the tone for this decision like, hey, the college fund is one big pool for both of you. I want you to go to the school you want to go to the most, the one that's going to set you up best for the things you want to do in life.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
And if one of the schools is more expensive than the other, then let's all agree that that's how it played out. And we're not going to fight over who got more. I'm inviting us all to be grateful that we have the funds to pay for two educations, whatever they cost, which is a gift.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
I'm not saying that that's going to guarantee there won't be some resentment down the line, but it would set a tone and certain values around this college fund that should help. The other way to look at this is the way that you're laying out, which is that the breakdown does matter. And it is unfair for one child to use, I don't know, 75% of the college fund and the other one only uses 25%.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Although I would still hope that your kids are more grateful to be able to afford college in the first place than they are determined to split it exactly 50-50. So here's an idea. What if instead of thinking about this as a college fund, you thought of it as an education fund? And then it's up to your kids to decide how they want to use their half of it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
If one child uses their full 50% on college, great. If they end up using less than their share on tuition and they have some left over, maybe they can use it for something else. Grad school, career coaching, job training, traveling, therapy, whatever you guys deem educational.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Or they save it, they invest it, that money's theirs, and then all this would be totally fair and you'd be giving your kids even more agency in all of this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Exactly, which I'm personally a big fan of. And I realize that it might be a little late to introduce these rules now that one of your kids is already in college, but I don't know, maybe it's still fair game. It is your money. The only other thought is, when you talk to your kids about this, make it a conversation. Invite them to offer their two cents.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Encourage them to tell you how they think about this money. Maybe even ask your kids, hey, if one of you ends up going to a more expensive school or a less expensive school, how would you feel about that? Would you feel cheated or would you be supportive? And then talk about it openly. The more you put on the table now, the better. That's another way to avoid any hard feelings down the line.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
And if they're like, actually, yeah, I would feel kind of cheated, then you can either encourage them to focus on the value of the education they're getting, which, by the way, includes what they do with that education, not just how much it costs. Or you can say, all right, I hear that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
So how would you feel about this education fund idea where you split it 50-50 and you get to decide how you want to allocate it? And then you guys can talk about that. Ultimately, yeah, I'm not sure there's one right answer here. I think your kids' values, personalities, goals, worldviews, those matter a lot.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
But personally, I'm a fan of the education fund idea because it's both fair on a dollars and cents level and it empowers your children even more. As long as you approach this conversation with fairness, curiosity, gratitude, love, they'll feel that. They'll follow your lead. And I think that they'll appreciate this massive gift that you're giving them. And good luck.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Go back and check out our Gene Simmons interview and our Skeptical Sunday on troubled teens if you haven't done so yet. The best things that have happened in my life and business have come through my network, the circle of people that I know, like, and trust. And I am teaching you how to build the same thing for yourself. It's our six-minute networking course. It is 100% free.
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1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
I don't need your credit card, nothing like that. It's not gross. It is not schmoozy. You can find it on the Thinkific platform at sixminutenetworking.com. It really just takes a few minutes a day. One of the things, it's funny, I always have to answer these messages and people are like, I wish I'd started this earlier. Yeah, dig the well before you get thirsty.
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1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Build relationships before you need them. There's really no replacement for that. You can find it at 6minutenetworking.com. Show notes and transcripts on the website, advertisers, deals, discounts, ways to support the show, all at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. I'm at Jordan Harbinger on Twitter and Instagram. You can also connect with us on LinkedIn.
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1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Gabe's over on Instagram at Gabriel Mizrahi or on Twitter at Gabe Mizrahi. This show is created in association with Podcast One. My team is Jen Harbinger, Jace Sanderson, Robert Fogerty, and of course, Gabriel Mizrahi. Our advice and opinions are our own and I am a lawyer, but I am not your lawyer. Do your own research before implementing anything you hear on the show.
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Remember, we rise by lifting others. Share the show with those you love. And if you found the episode useful, please share it with somebody else who could use the advice we gave here today. In the meantime, I hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn and we'll see you next time.
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1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Discover how withholding bathroom breaks can be a strategic negotiation tactic, why everyone should try entrepreneurship at least once, and when it's acceptable to burn bridges.
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1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Yeah, exactly. On the Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the stories, secrets, and skills of the world's most fascinating people and turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you. And our mission on the show is to help you become a better informed, more critical thinker.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Yeah, so that's where I'm going with this because if you think your wife doesn't know, this guy could be like, by the way, I can make your divorce a hell of a lot worse if you don't give me $10,000 or whatever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Dive deeper into these intriguing topics and more in episode 999 of The Jordan Harbinger Show with Todd McFarlane.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Oh, man. Again, I should have saved my holdups. I should just go back and, yeah, what on earth?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
That whole soundbite is so, this is just all, what? Wait, what am I? Continue. Am I hearing what I think I'm hearing?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Wow, this story's got legs, Gabe. What is happening? Catfish-ception over here. Seriously, this is fascinating. So michaeljacksonpopcorn.gif.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Okay, so technically you're not reverse catfishing the catfisher because you are who you say you are. You're just a very self-aware, clever catfishy who's about to step in it, I think.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
During the week, we have long form conversations with a variety of amazing folks from former jihadis and drug traffickers to generals and rocket scientists, even the occasional extreme athlete or tech luminary. This week, we had Gene Simmons, lead singer of Kiss, formerly lead singer of Kiss, on fame, money, parenting, kind of
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Okay, this is so insane. I mean, you're not wrong, man, but my God, you're playing with fire here. What do you think I should do?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Second thing... Bro to the max, yes. What? I can understand the last one right off the bat, definitely twisted and doomed. But that doesn't mean that there isn't a part of me that absolutely wants you to keep this up so you can keep giving us updates and we can air them and see how this whole thing plays out. Because this is bananas. Bananas. This is a new one for us, Gabe.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
I've got to say, I've seen a lot of ish in the last two decades of doing this podcast. Jordan just lit a cigarette when he said that. Yeah. Yeah, I'm just ashing onto my microphone.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Reverse catfishing your catfish. You're scamming your scammer. And getting the weirdest thrill out of it. But not like the thrill of justice. He's getting off on this. There's a sexual component to it that makes this so complicated and fascinating.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Yeah, but this catfisher, he has no idea that our friend here is engaging in a fantasy or a role play. He just thinks that our friend thinks he's engaging with another woman. So they're having two totally different experiences here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Right. Fascinating. So obviously the responsible thing to do, the clean thing to do, is to tell him you know it's him and put an end to this. That's the best way to minimize the drama, the inevitable fallout, and avoid getting yourself into an increasingly messy situation.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Or when he finally figures it out, which he eventually will. But like I said, there's a part of me, Dark Jordan, I guess, that just wants you to keep going just to have the story. And also, look, he tries to blackmail you. You know that it's him. And you're like, actually, I've got documentation that I know it's you. So I'm just going to get the police involved.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
I mean, you could really have this guy wrapped around your finger. And look. You're welcome to do that. Just know that you're playing with fire a little bit here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Maybe a case study on some things, what not to do in life in many ways, even though he's extremely successful by certain metrics. We also had a Skeptical Sunday last Sunday on troubled teens. On Fridays, though, we share stories, take listener letters, offer advice, and get weirdly vulnerable. Because I'm going to get real TMI today and share with all of you that I got a vasectomy this week.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
If this blows up in your face somehow, like things escalate, your wife finds out, this guy tries to blackmail you, like I said, or his girlfriend, your wife's cousin, finds out you guys are having some weird sordid sexting relationship, you just have to be willing to accept the consequences. I mean, you said you have kids too, so it's like, you know, you gotta be careful. There's a lot at stake.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Yeah, yeah, it's not like you're single and some guy you know is doing this to you. That would be kind of different. Then I would say like, yeah, tease this guy until he tries to blackmail you and then call the FBI or whatever. So my advice is think through these consequences right now. Imagine all of them playing out exactly as you fear and ask yourself how you'd handle them.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
And if you'd be kicking your past self for not ending this sooner, or if you'd be willing to accept the costs to have your fun now, which is just like never worth it pretty much,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Yeah, I gotta say, I'm not sure how likely that is. That feels like quite a reach.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Right, because it's exciting to him and it makes him feel like we have a secret relationship. I just feel like he's constructing this in his head.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Okay, but he also said he does that with other people sometimes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
But I feel like he would have said that if that happened. Instead, he just has this like one arm around the shoulder, which he does with a lot of people thing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Yeah, look, I totally agree. I also think we just can we just remember how freaking weird it is that this guy is doing this in the first place? Yeah. First of all, he's using his ex-girlfriend's photo to catfish someone in his own family.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
That's right. He's a serial catfisher, which just sort of seems mentally not all there to me. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Second, whether he's catfishing our friend here because he's actually into him, but just can't come out and say that, whether he's doing it because he's trying to give his girlfriend's cousin grounds for divorce, whether he's planning on blackmailing this guy, whether he's just bored and he wants to mess with somebody, whatever it is, it's messed up. It's so weird to do this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
You sure did. And I am in pain right now. Yeah. So for guys out there, it's like I got kicked in the balls every hour for the last five days. It may be not that bad, but it's like definitely feels like a serious kick in the nuts, maybe every morning, because when you lay down, you're fine. So this thing is that every day I go to sleep and I'm like, oh, I'm going to be good.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
seriously wrong. This is not, you know, odd but understandable behavior. This guy is just, when you think about it, taking time out of his day to pose as his ex-girlfriend and send his girlfriend's cousin's husband flirty messages in a lot of them for some creepy, probably nefarious reason. I just don't want our friend here to lose sight of that. That is so freaking weird.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1093: When the Hunter Becomes the Honeypot | Feedback Friday
Agreed. So, yes, you certainly have the option of coming clean and saying, hey, I know this is you. I'd like to explore this for real. You want to go on a date? But again, I would really think through all the ways that could play out. He could say yes. He could say no. Look, you're putting this in writing, which is not good.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
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This episode is also sponsored by BetterHelp. Therapy can sound big, serious, I gotta lay on the couch and talk about my childhood while staring at a ceiling fan. And hey, sometimes it is like that, but it shouldn't feel like a luxury reserved for people with unlimited time and a black Amex card. And have you seen the price of traditional therapy lately?
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Ah, yes, exactly who you want at your first baby shower. A bunch of woo-woo strangers you've never met before running a shady side hustle and recruiting your friends and family for their downline.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Exactly. Yes. I heard you majored in astrophysics with Julie. Have you ever wanted to be the CEO of your own life? No, thank you. What do you do?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Okay. I'm a Gemini. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Yeah. Years. Just waiting.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Just waiting for an astrophysics reference, which when is that going to come up?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Yeah that's not a fun feeling.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
I think any event like this, right? Wedding, baby shower, any sort of big event with a lot of people involved who think they should have a stake in it, but it's really about one person. And a lot of people cannot handle when that person is not them. Is a minefield.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Yeah, it's baby season.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Who needs a diaper genie when you can have discounts on essential oils that you just can't get anywhere else? That's the gift. Not to mention financial freedom. That's really the gift that you should have put on your registry.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Man, that is definitely annoying. Okay, but to be fair, this might not have been malicious on their part. A lot of people just don't read invitations closely. You might want to let that one slide. Also, the people who didn't give you a gift, they might have been like, we don't even know the couple, so we don't have to get them anything.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
We're just friends of Marlene's or whatever, which is, yeah, rude, obviously. But that might say more about how absurd it is that she invited people you don't even know to your shower than it does about these people's characters. By the way, everybody involved in MLM is broke anyway, so they couldn't have afforded anything.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Wait, what? Okay, first of all, super weird thing to randomly declare if you've never done it. I guess somebody's trying to keep up appearances or whatever, but I'm a little confused. How is that similar to the baby shower thing?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Oh boy, interesting mother-in-law, huh? As with most stories, I think there are many things going on here. I get the sense that your mother-in-law is really sweet and generous in certain ways. Just throwing a party for you at all, even if it's not the one you wanted, that does take a lot of work. And she might be a little self-absorbed and misattuned sometimes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
The MLM, the multi-level marketing scam thing though, that is just a red flag all on its own. And it does, for me, color everything else you shared. But maybe we need to separate these things out. So no. I don't think you're being entirely ungrateful.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
You've literally said, What I'm hearing is that you appreciate what she's done and what some of these people got you and that the day was more about your mother-in-law than it was about you, which is fair. My only caveat is we don't have enough information to know how malicious your mother-in-law really is, how much of this is intentional.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
It does sound like she probably struggles to identify fully with other people, and personalities like that can come in a few varieties. There are people who are out-and-out narcissists, and there are people who just aren't very self-aware or attuned to others. So yeah, it's possible she's just more clueless than hurtful.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
If that's true, then it's not that you're being totally ungrateful, but you might need to work a little harder to appreciate what your mother-in-law did offer you, given her limitations. So that's my one big caveat. But your second question is the most important one. How do you continue to navigate these challenges? Because once the baby comes, things will probably get more intense.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
She's going to want to see her grandchild. Her beliefs are going to bump up against you and your husband's beliefs. That's tricky. You don't want her feeding your kid essential oils or trying to get your husband to not vaccinate your kid for measles or something like that, right? It's going to be tricky. The saving grace is you live across the country. So that makes things way easier.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
But I'm sure this will not be the last time you have to work with your mother-in-law's tricky personality. My feeling is I think you need two things.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
One is a lot of patience, a lot of forgiveness, because in all likelihood, she's not going to do a 180 at her age, and you're probably not the person who's going to make her see things differently, especially these MLM, multi-level marketing, anti-science types. They're very entrenched in their delusional positions. It's very culty.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
The other thing you need is strong boundaries, like you said, and a willingness to tell your mother-in-law, if it's appropriate, when something does not sit right with you. The baby shower's behind you. I probably wouldn't relitigate that unless you feel she could take in some feedback that it would set a helpful precedent for future events or something, but...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Let's say that in a year or two, you fly out again. She wants to host a birthday party for her grandson. That might be a good moment to say, hey, listen, I really appreciate that you want to throw us a party. That's so sweet of you. I want to make sure the day is really about him. So can we make sure the guest list is just friends and family of ours?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Can we be super clear with people about gifts and work with her to avoid the baby shower situation again? Or if that's only going to create tension, you politely decline and you just host the party yourself and just keep her away from planning big events. That's also an option. And whatever she says or does something that serves her but doesn't take into account how it's going to affect you guys.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
If she randomly declares that now there's suddenly an annual tradition of going cross-country skiing with her grandkids or whatever, and it's not something you want to do, maybe you and your husband start gently pushing back or you learn to say, hey, you can go have fun. We're going to stay here. See you in a few hours.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
And if that's not possible with her, maybe you guys just won't be very close, which sucks, but it happens. I'm sorry that your mother-in-law is challenging in certain ways. I also think it's important to recognize her for her good qualities, which you're doing, and validating those qualities. That's going to be just as important as pushing back on the trickier ones, so keep that in mind too.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
This will probably be a process. a subtle negotiation you're in for a little while. The key is to know when to draw a hard line and when to be skillful. And that's something that I'd collaborate with your husband on deciding as these big moments come up. And good luck. You can reach us Friday at jordanherbinger.com. Keep your emails concise. Try to use descriptive subject lines.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
That makes our job a whole lot easier. If you're finding dead squirrels in your mailbox, your stepdad's got your nudes, your neighbors are eavesdropping on your therapy sessions through the wall, or you find out your wife was having an affair with her best friend and you don't know whether to believe it's over, whatever's got you staying up at night lately, hit us up Friday at jordanharbinger.com.
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1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Yeah, great questions. First of all, all politics aside, and I know that's not what your question is about, the anxiety you're feeling, it must be pretty intense. It's very normal. I'm so sorry that you're going through this. However people feel about Doge and Elon and these cuts being laid off or being at risk of being laid off, It's stressful. It's scary. It's unpleasant.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
So I really do feel for you and for your friends and colleagues. I also know that the uncertainty is often the hardest part. Most of us can deal with a clear loss. It's painful, but it's survivable. But not knowing what's coming, when it's coming, not always being able to track the logic behind these decisions, it can drive even the best of us insane.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
You and your peers are over there sweating under the sword of Damocles. So I can only imagine how intense this chapter must be for you, and I'm sorry that you're going through it. So there are no simple answers here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
This is no different from losing your job in the private sector or going through any other loss, although I do know that many public servants, especially the ones who work in more impactful roles, they're usually driven by a real sense of purpose, and that makes getting fired sting even more.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
So the first step, I think, is to accept the loss completely, which means really allowing yourself to go through the pain, not denying or negotiating with it, not suppressing the emotions that come up around it, sadness, anger, fear, whatever it is. And this might be the hardest part for us humans.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Learning to accept that some professional blows are just inherently unfair and sometimes unnecessary. And that's not a comment on Doge or your job specifically. I don't know all the details of your career. I'm not an expert in these government cuts and whatnot. I'm talking about loss in general.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
We go through so many things in life that are quote unquote unwarranted, that don't have a clear rationale, that don't make sense. Then we're left to make our own meaning of them or to accept that there is no meaning. So that's the first step, just grieving. The next step is deciding what to do with that grief.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
The feelings that seem especially powerful for you right now are this anxiety and the anger, which I'm sure is true of so many federal employees right now. I also think this belief of this was unwarranted. I think that's a thought you're going to have to work with. Not saying you're wrong. I'm saying you're going to have to figure out your relationship with that thought. Because look,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Maybe these cuts or potential cuts are unwarranted. Maybe they aren't. I don't know. In a way, it doesn't matter. I don't mean that to be callous. I am not minimizing how stressful this is. Of course it matters to you, to your friends, even to the world, but it doesn't matter from the standpoint of this is what's happening right now, or this is what could happen.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
And if something is happening, especially a force as big as this that you ultimately just can't control, then there's no arguing with it. So whether you find it warranted or unwarranted, fair or unfair, logical or insane, and I can appreciate all those judgments, it's really secondary. What's primary is what you do with those beliefs, how you apply them.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Because look, you could spend months, you could even spend years, and many people do this, being angry, being anxious, resenting the people and institutions that are firing them. Again, those responses are totally valid, but they can also keep you stuck. They can prevent you from working with these circumstances to find better outcomes. Whereas if you looked at this and you went, man, this sucks.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
My friends are being laid off. I might be laid off. I'm freaking out. I think it's unnecessary. I think it's unjustifiable. I think it's dumb. Whatever those beliefs are, and I can't control this. So what can I control? What do I do with these feelings?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
That is a very different process, a much more productive and interesting process because one person might feel this anxiety and anger and just go, this is awful, I'm screwed, I'm just gonna stand here and freak out and wait for the chopping block or rage against government. Another person might feel these feelings and go, wow, this is really painful.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Gabriel and Uncle Gabriel and I are going to do some work, okay?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
This uncertainty is bringing up a lot of feelings for me. Maybe I can find a way to use them. And that could look so many different ways. It might mean starting an informal group for federal workers who've lost their jobs or are at risk of losing their jobs, supporting one another, commiserating, sharing resources, advice, job postings, whatever you guys need right now.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
It might mean reaching out to your contacts now and warming up those relationships in case you need them or building those relationships if you don't have them yet. Telling your story to people, channeling this anxiety into creating the safety net you'd want to have if you do end up losing your job, which coincidentally is exactly what we teach in 6-Minute Networking.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
It's a free course, 6minutenetworking.com. If you're not doing it now, start doing it. Dig the well before you get thirsty. That's literally the whole point of the course. Who knows? It might even mean advocating for your position in a new way, putting in a little extra time to communicate what you do, why it's important, how you're needed.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
And I don't just mean hitting reply to Elon's what did you do this week email, if that's a thing. This is not a subtle endorsement of all that, which I'm sure some people listening right now are really trying hard to suss out.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
I'd have the same advice for somebody in the private sector on telling the story of your job to the people who need to hear it and maybe banding together with other people in your agency to do the same if that's appropriate, whether it's an email to more senior people or an essay you publish on Substack or talking to a reporter or whatever it is.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Point is, these feelings and opinions you have, all of them fair, they're only useful to you to the extent that you work with them, that you put them to work. What I've learned over the years dealing with a ton of uncertainty myself is you can't control the uncertainty because, you know, it's uncertain. It's not even a thing. It's the absence of a thing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
And your mind just cannot do anything about it, even though it really, really wants to. But what you can do is control your sphere, your mind, your heart, your body, your words, your actions. You can decide what spirit you want to meet people in, what mindset you want to greet your challenges with.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
You can take your anxiety and your anger and your sadness and channel them into specific choices as opposed to just being overwhelmed by all of them. So my advice is this. Surrender to what's happening. Look for the open doors. They are always there, I promise you, whether you want to walk through them or not.
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1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
That's right, the little walk-run where you're like, oh, thank you, yeah, yeah. On the Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the stories, secrets, and skills of the world's most fascinating people and turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you. Our mission is to help you become a better informed, more critical thinker.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Exactly. He might as well start thinking that way now.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Hundo P. And I keep coming back to the idea. There's something vaguely Zen about this. This idea that you don't know what this uncertainty means and you don't know where you're going to be in six months or a year. You could still be in your job and totally safe. You could be in a new role in the government and loving it. You could be in the private sector and having a whole new experience. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Sorry about that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
That's right. You could be shilling yarrow oil by the gallon, counting your MLM stacks, and thrilled that you left the public sector. Obviously, I'm kidding. There's no such thing as MLM stacks. We all know that. Point is, all of those timelines could be fantastic. But where you end up, the quality of your work, the meaning you derive from it, that is all going to depend on how you act now.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Both of my kids are funny, but my son is just unintentionally hilarious in ways that sometimes we can't always show. So he's really pissed off the other day, really angry about some nonsense. He goes in the toy room. He brings out this Nerf gun, which he found. We did not want to buy him this, but he found a Nerf gun. And then we just were like, okay, fine. You can shoot targets.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
So come back to the basics. Good work, strong relationships, a healthy lifestyle, strong habits, productive mindsets, generosity. These are really the things that are going to get you through. You don't need to know exactly where you're going, although I can certainly sympathize with wanting to know.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
You just need to use this very strange and stressful time to become the best professional you can be and keep evolving. And if you do that, I promise you, you're going to weather this storm and you're going to be great. I'm so sorry that you and your peers are going through it, but I have a ton of faith in you guys to land on your feet. Sending you a big hug and wishing you all the best.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
And now we're going to drop the sword of Damocles right on the prices on the fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back. This episode is sponsored in part by SimpliSafe. If you haven't heard, which you have, I'm sure, we had a break in recently. While we were home, nothing quite wakes you up like realizing somebody's creeping around your house that shouldn't be.
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1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Whole neighborhood was rattled. We were rattled naturally. My very sweet, very proactive neighbors decided it was time for action. Suddenly, we got a full-on Neighborhood Watch situation. There are signs. There's a group chat. I even attended a Neighborhood Watch meeting. Imagine a room...
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full of very concerned retirees peppering a 29-year-old cop with questions like, why do people light fireworks? Sitcom energy, I mean, 50s sitcom energy. But somebody made a great point. If you don't have a solid home security system yet, what the heck are you waiting for? Enter SimpliSafe, no installers, no weird appointments, no rewiring the whole dang house.
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You set it up yourself, Jen did it in a few minutes. You get sensors, cameras, professional monitoring, the whole setup, and you can check in on your phone from anywhere. And look, after experiencing a break-in, I gotta tell you, knowing somebody's watching your place 24-7,
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It's peace of mind you really can't put a price on, but lucky for you, they actually did put a price on it, and right now, it's a good one.
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1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
This episode is sponsored in part by Audible. People always ask me how I managed to get through so much content, especially since I prep for every interview. I'm talking two to three books a week, and it's all thanks to Audible. I've got Audible in my ears while I'm getting my 10,000 steps in, running errands, even doing stuff around the house. I don't mess with physical books anymore at all.
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1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Audible's just way more efficient. I listen on two or even 3x speed, which lets me cover a lot of ground without sacrificing quality. Right now, I'm listening to Good Inside by Dr. Becky Kennedy. She's got this really down-to-earth way of talking about parenting that is not preachy. And here's what a lot of people don't realize. Audible is not just audiobooks anymore.
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You get access to thousands of titles with your membership, podcasts, Audible Originals, and cool stuff like their Words in Music series where artists tell their stories in their own words. The variety makes the membership way more valuable, so you never run out of great stuff to check out. One day I'm deep in a parenting guide, the next it's a podcast or a spy thriller.
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1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
So whether you're into suspense, self-development, or you just want to make traffic suck less, Audible's got you covered.
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1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
And I said, what are you doing with that? Because I knew he was really angry with his sister. And he goes, got it to protect myself. Just like matter of fact, very matter of fact. And it was just like, okay, stay strapped, yo, in the house.
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1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
If you like this episode of Feedback Friday and you find our advice valuable, I invite you to do what other smart and considerate listeners do, which is take a moment and support the amazing sponsors that make this podcast possible. All of the deals, discount codes, and ways to support the show are searchable and clickable on the website at jordanharbinger.com slash deals.
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The AI chatbot can help you surface codes. And if that doesn't work, email us jordan at jordanharbinger.com. Happy to dig up those codes for you. It is that important that you support those who support the show. Now, back to Feedback Friday.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Interesting. There is something cute and authentic about that, but this is a challenging family member to have for sure. Poor woman.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Oh my God, that's awful.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Oh my god, this keeps getting worse. That's a terrible thing for a kid to witness.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Oh, boy. I got to say, this story really brings to life why having these legal structures in place is so important. Gabe, I'm trying to imagine what those legal and tax reasons are for not having a guardianship would be. I mean, I know it's a headache, but it's got to be more helpful than costly.
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1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
You got to be strict with them because they're doing something wrong, but they're doing it in such a funny way. You have to try not to laugh. And sometimes Jaden and Juniper will do something that Jen and I have to correct. But then we look at each other and we're just like, don't you laugh.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Interesting. Okay, that does make sense. Maybe that's it. But if you provide financial support for somebody who's declared incompetent, don't you also qualify for more tax deductions and credits? For one thing, I remember learning that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
So to bring it back to our friend here, maybe the parents make too much money to benefit from having her declared incompetent. They don't work, so they can't claim that. Or maybe they just don't want to deal with all the admin. To be fair, I guess I can understand.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
And it's costly and it's a pain in the ass. Okay, but then if your child hurts themselves and you need to make a medical decision, not having this in place, it clearly becomes a liability. So it's kind of like, which one is more important, saving some money or being able to fully care for them?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
You have to cover your mouth and pretend you're not entertained because otherwise it reinforces the wrong behavior. And this, the last like 48, 72 hours has been full of this. And it's one of the funnest parts of parenting.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Yeah, I'm not buying it. I'm not buying their stories.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Yeah, I get it, man. I hear the anger in your letter, and I agree.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
It's also very possible they just won't say anything about this because it might complicate their situation. Oh, she'll never do it again. We talked to her.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Yeah, dude, I get it. You don't want young kids around somebody unstable and you definitely don't want them to witness anything traumatizing for no reason. My only caveat is I get why you're angry at Debbie, but mentally she's four years old. She's disabled. She doesn't fully know what she's doing. It's hard, but you kind of got to forgive her.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Her parents, on the other hand, they're a much more legitimate target of your anger. I think they're also probably terrified and embarrassed and overwhelmed, and they're handling this the only way that they know how. Might be good to make room for both of those facts.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Why do you have your gun out, Jay? Nervously, like, why do you have your gun out? Your Nerf gun. Protect myself.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Oh yeah, I totally agree with that. I think you're on the right track.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
It's hot out there for a pint. Yeah, just in the living room while everyone's eating dinner.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Oh, boy. What a story. There's so much going on here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Yeah. Yeah. We could probably spend hours unpacking all this. I'm going to try and cut to the chase here. First of all, goes without saying, Debbie's whole situation is very challenging, very tragic. I know that you're angry with your in-laws. I would be, too. But my heart also breaks for parents who have to care for a child with needs this severe.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
It's got to be so hard, practically, financially, and emotionally. You can empathize to some degree. You have a severely autistic son, different diagnosis, obviously, totally different circumstances, but I'm sure you know how hard this must be.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Yeah. What's the first thing out of the mailbag?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
I'm sure he is and there's nothing wrong with that. Oh, I draw boundaries and don't let this person get whatever they want as long as he keeps them quiet because that's not a good long-term strategy. So could your in-laws be doing a better job? Probably yes. Is it also kind of an impossible situation? Also yes. I say that, again, not to dismiss your concern or minimize your anger.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
They are appropriate, in my opinion. They have to protect Debbie. You have to protect your kids. Just to be very direct here, I like your plan to keep a close eye on Debbie when you go over there. Keep the boys safe if anything terrible ever happens again. Call 911 if you need to.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
I agree that taking care of Debbie is primarily your in-law's job, but because it's their job and they're not doing it perfectly, I think a big part of protecting yourself is educating them, empowering them to be more proactive in managing her care, helping them see the ways they might not be doing enough or moving fast enough and collaborating with them to find better resources, better partners, better decisions.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
You know, fair. That's a much more productive conversation. That's a way better use of your anxiety. It's a much more loving way to show up for your in-laws and for Debbie instead of condemning them for an outcome that hasn't even come to pass.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
I would also try to help them see why that outcome would be bad for all of you and then figure out how to achieve a better one. By helping them take care of Debbie, you'll also be protecting yourselves now and down the road.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
I also think that offering to tag along to the appointment or just advise from the sidelines, I think that's also a great way to start learning how to care for Debbie when the time comes. Don't want to find yourself starting from zero and scrambling to learn everything overnight in 10 or 15 years when this responsibility eventually becomes yours.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
The other way to care for her is to put those structures in place that your in-laws haven't as soon as possible. guardianship, conservatorship, any other programs or resources for people like Debbie. Again, this is probably gonna require you to collaborate with your in-laws, so that's one more reason to proactively work with them, even if they're driving.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
But you and your wife might also need to start driving just a little bit more. I know it's a huge responsibility, but as we keep coming back to, the more you guys can get these supports in place now, the harder you work early on, the easier it's gonna be to care for Debbie when the time comes. And my strong advice is to talk to a family lawyer and an estate attorney as soon as possible.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Getting a guardianship, a conservatorship, that is going to involve a court-appointed plan and some crucial admin. You need an advisor. It just always helps to start this early. You might start with one lawyer, decide you don't like him, move on to another one. I mean, this just takes longer than you think sometimes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
And accessing money to care for Debbie, which by the way, you guys are very lucky to have, that's going to require you to manage it well, which means having the right trust and bank account and paperwork and bankers and systems for managing state resources and all that, all of which are going to require an estate attorney.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
And consulting with these two attorneys alongside your in-laws, or at least the very least relaying what you've learned to them, that might actually help them see why they need to start being more proactive.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
As far as setting a bottom line that Debbie's father will enforce, honestly, I don't know if you can, given what you shared about his personality, sounds avoidant. Your better bet, in my opinion, is to collaborate with him and his wife in the way that we're talking about.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Treat them like partners to be empowered rather than liabilities to be managed, and to help them see how their indecision and avoidance might actually be making things worse, respectfully, of course, if it helps you cut through the fog and actually get them to act.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Wow, what a piece of crap. So shadow work, is that a Carl Jung thing, right? I've heard about it. I don't really know what that entails.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Totally agree. Go deep, and the symptoms generally tend to take care of themselves. As for Dark Jordan advice, honestly, I'm very sweaty about the ethics of using Dark Jordan techniques on a special needs person. No shadow side for Debbie.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Like you said, getting her arrested for something that she didn't even do, that would probably traumatize her way more than it would help, even if it led to her seeing a doctor. You guys also might not need an involuntary hold.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
What you need is to help Debbie's parents see that they need to get her in with a psychiatrist ASAP or to take better care of her until she does get in with her psychiatrist. Now, if you try and they refuse and Debbie tries to hurt herself again and there's really no other option, then maybe you go dark, but you have so many other options to try first, so please don't jump the gun.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
I'm very sorry that Debbie struggles the way she does. It's putting so much stress on your family. Everything you guys are going through is deeply sad, extremely challenging. I don't envy you guys. But what Debbie's forcing you to do is evolve in the way you relate to your in-laws, in the way you take care of yourself and your sons, in the way you engage with the system and the law.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
And during the week, we have long form conversations with a variety of amazing folks from former jihadis and drug traffickers to cult members and mafia enforcers. Even the occasional good guy makes an appearance on the show. This week, we had Mark Fulman, author of Trigger Points, Inside the Mission to Stop Mass Shootings in America.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
It sucks, and I wish you didn't have to do it, but in a very weird and mysterious way, she's actually forcing you to grow. So my hope for you is that you throw yourself into that growth. That's really all you can do. I'm not saying it'll be fun, but it could be pretty profound and quite rewarding if you meet these responsibilities with the right mindset and resources.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Sending you, your wife, your kids, Debbie, the whole family, a big hug and wishing you all the best. All right, and now for the recommendation of the week. I am addicted to LitVilla. My recommendation this week doesn't cost you anything. It's stretching. Oh, nice one. Thank you. Look, I know this is kind of silly because people are going to be like, stretching, I've heard of that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
What the hell do we need you for, Jordan? I have never been a flexible person at all. In fact, really, generally really stiff. We all sit a lot, a lot of us anyways, most of us. And I was really frustrated with some of the lifting and stuff I was doing in the gym. I recently got into something called calisthenics, which is not aerobics. It's actually like gymnastics-y.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
And you don't need a ton of flexibility, but you need some. And just thought, all right, I'm going to stretch my wrists. I'm going to stretch my hamstrings. I'm going to stretch my quads. I'm going to stretch my groin for 40 seconds, twice a day, each muscle, whatever. And it is just night and day. It's crazy. I thought, oh, I'm going to be able to touch my toes more easily.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
No, my stride has changed. My back has started releasing. I don't get shoulder tension anymore. I don't get hip pain anymore. I don't get knee pain anymore. I'm able to lift more weight just because I'm not fighting my body. I'm able to put myself in all these different positions that are way more comfortable. I don't get as sore when I'm sitting in the car. The benefits are ridiculous.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
It's just actually insane. And this is probably what people are talking about when they're all like, you got to do yoga. And you're like, shut up. You've said that a thousand times. This is just a major, major thing. And look, most people, if they're like, I don't have time to go do an hour long yoga class every day. I get it. Just stretch each muscle for 30 seconds.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
And I don't mean your whole body. I mean like your quads, your hamstrings, your groin. That's a good enough start right there. You're just gonna feel massive difference. And what is that, like six minutes twice a day or even once a day? It's... Just very doable. You can do it while you're watching TV. I'll do it while I'm listening to a podcast. I'll do it while I'm texting someone.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
This is not a heavy lift. This is a really easy thing that you can add to your day and it will just change everything, especially if you're dealing with back pain, knee pain, hip pain. That's really going to be a huge difference.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
What does down dog do?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Yeah, downward dog, it's a yoga pose. If you don't know what downward dog is, just Google it. You'll be like, oh, yeah, that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Give it a shot for a week if you don't feel a huge difference. You can have a full refund on this podcast.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
So our take was basically this daughter's facing a number of challenges, all of which probably speak to a very real anxiety. But these parents aren't serving her well by avoiding these conversations, cramping around her diagnoses, helping her stay small, safe.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Welcome to Feedback Friday. I'm your host, Jordan Harbinger. As always, I'm here with Feedback Friday producer, the stranger holding the door for you while you've got your hands full as you enter this edifice of life drama, Gabriel Mizrahi. You know how you gotta speed up a little? Like, you gotta pretend to speed up so you look like you're being polite? The little walk-run?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Okay, and the idea is if you integrate this stuff, you're healed or whole or whatever?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
But then it was interesting. Another listener shared their story. They have two adult sons who are both neurodivergent. One is on the autism spectrum. Both are successful in their careers and are living on their own. And the parents support them appropriately with friendship, advice when asked, money for extraordinary living expenses.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
They said they'd go nuts if their sons were still living in their small two-bedroom home. So that's a fascinating counterpoint, that having ASD doesn't mean that his daughter can't function on her own or build a full life, although obviously that depends on the severity of her symptoms. And clearly there's more going on here than just potential ASD.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
There's anxiety, there's trauma, there's personality stuff. There's just the unique circumstances of her childhood. It can be hard to separate all that stuff out.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Yeah, but she is making the living situation difficult for them, right? I mean, didn't the father say that? That's why they wrote in.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
So, Dark Jordan-ish?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
OK, but that kind of just begs the question, how do we define normal? Because this might be the cultural norm in some places. So it's not weird from the standpoint of this is what we do in our country, but it can still be weird from the standpoint of is this psychologically healthy?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
That sounds useful, just dragging things into the light. I can definitely now see how creepy wannabe culty gurus like this dude could co-opt something like that to take advantage of people.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
I hear you. I think the autism theory is much more compelling than the values argument. Personally, this daughter's rigidity, her fear of change, her clinging to her home, her parents, her cats buried in the backyard, all of that. It could be explained by, say, an anxiety disorder, but that could also totally be undiagnosed autism.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
And I totally agree that somebody on the spectrum needs a different approach, a different set of supports. And we probably should have clocked that. But to be candid, I'm also very wary of screaming autism every time we hear these qualities, because A, people can be rigid and fearful and regressed when they're not on the spectrum.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
And B, as we just heard, not all autistic people fall into these patterns. And we get that a lot. A lot of people will say, you'll see a news article that's like, the person had autism and the top zillion comments are like, I have autism and I haven't shot anyone. What the hell, man? So you've really got to be careful about labeling a lot of this stuff.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
I worry it can be a little insensitive, simplistic to chalk up any certain qualities to just autism automatically when so many neurotypical people struggle in similar ways.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Yeah, the big theme of that letter for me was what should love actually look like? What does caring for a child mean? I'm just realizing that's the big theme of today's episode. The mother-in-law who threw the baby shower, the parents who aren't fully dealing with their disabled daughter.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
I can say from experience that challenging your children and not always saving them, that's one of the hardest parts of being a parent. It can feel like you're being cruel or failing them, but stories like this one really capture how you can also fail your children by not challenging them, pushing them, allowing them to struggle, to face healthy adversity. That's a form of love too.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
And if that doesn't come early enough in their life, it can become really difficult, but it doesn't mean it shouldn't come later too. Anyway, fascinating story. Thanks to everyone for chiming in. You helped us fill in a few gaps and you helped us appreciate just how complex the situation is. Always a delight on Feedback Friday. Always more contours, eh?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
And if you get worked up about anything we talk about on the show, you want to give your two cents or keep the conversation going, by all means, join us on the subreddit. I'm loving these discussions. And as you can see, they aren't just entertaining, they're actually also really helpful. Go back and check out Mark Fulman if you haven't done so yet.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Show notes and transcripts on the website, advertisers, deals, discount codes, ways to support the show, all at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. I'm at jordanharbinger on Twitter and Instagram. You can also connect with me on LinkedIn. You can find Gabe on Instagram at Gabriel Mizrahi or on Twitter at Gabe Mizrahi. This show is created in association with Podcast One.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
My team is Jen Harbinger, Jace Sanderson, Robert Fogarty, Ian Baird, Tata Sidlowskis, and of course, Gabriel Mizrahi. Our advice and opinions are our own, and yes, I'm a lawyer, but I'm not your lawyer. Do your own research before implementing things you hear on the show. Remember, we rise by lifting others. Share the show with those you love.
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1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
If you found the episode useful, please share it with somebody else who could use the advice we gave here today. In the meantime, I hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn, and we'll see you next time. You're about to hear a preview of the Jordan Harbinger show with the investigator who solved a serial killer case that had gone cold for decades.
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1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Anyway, carry on.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
To learn more about how Paul Hulls puts himself inside the minds of serial killers, check out episode 725 of The Jordan Harbinger Show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Clearly, that all tracks. But I will say, I don't know if I chalk this up to the psychedelics. I have a lot of friends who have responsibly turned to psychedelics to heal precisely these wounds, as well as address things like PTSD, depression, anxiety, all of that to great effect under doctor supervision, et cetera, et cetera.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
But yeah, if you're deranged or you're using them inappropriately or you're not applying what you learned from them, yeah, they definitely won't help you. They might even do more damage.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Oof, yeah, that is unsettling.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Really sobering episode about mass shootings, school shootings, what it might take to stop this crazy nonstop problem that we're having. On Fridays, though, we share stories, take listener letters, offer advice, play obnoxious soundbites, and compare Gabe to various means of ingress and egress. Before we dive in today, I gotta tell you guys something funny. My son, Jaden, he now says friggin',
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
I mean, facing charges is an actual consequence, isn't it? And if he gets prosecuted, then he'll really have to face consequences.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Like karma? I don't know, I'd be more satisfied with prison time, personally.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Oh man, this is all super sad and dark. What a stressful situation. Not just that this guy is manipulating and assaulting women in your community, but that these event organizers can't or won't take action to kick him out? That is not cool. So based on what you've shared, I'm going, what the hell are these people thinking?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
A prominent member of the group comes to them and says, this guy's a monster. He's sexually assaulting people in our community. He needs to go. And they just shrug their shoulders and do nothing? But then, I don't know, maybe these organizers are in a tough position.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Maybe they feel they don't have the grounds to kick them out, they don't have enough evidence, they didn't find Taylor's testimony compelling for some reason, or they're trying to be fair to Zach, which, frankly, I'm surprised they'd have that reaction in this day and age, but who knows? Maybe they're also making room for both parties.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Although, if what you say is true, and it sounds like it is, they are clearly making the wrong call here. So I think you have a few options here if you want to hold this guy accountable. First off, I think you need to talk to Zach's victims. I might do this with Taylor's help. Ask them what their goals are, what they want to see happen. I love that you're a champion and an ally.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
You do have an important role to play here, but they're really the ones who get to decide whether to tell their stories, talk about what happened to them, decide who to share it with, whether it's the event organizers or other people in the community or the police or a court if they take out restraining orders. And ultimately, their testimony, that's what's going to matter the most.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Now, you have to tread lightly here because this is very sensitive territory. These women have been assaulted. This is obviously traumatizing. And if you approach them to talk about what happened, you have to do it from a place of great respect and empathy and gentleness. And I'm not sure how close you are with these people, how much they trust you. That's a big factor here. But
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Either way, you got to be thoughtful about how you start this conversation. And that's why I think Taylor could be helpful because A, she's a woman and B, she's a prominent member of the community. And I can't tell if she was a victim herself or if she was just speaking up for other victims. If Zach targeted her too, then she's an even more powerful ally in all this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
But either way, it sounds like she has unique relationships and influence in this world. So actually, I'd start with Taylor first and strategize together about how to proceed. And it sounds like you two could make a good team. I bet it would be very powerful for the event organizers to hear from women and men about this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
And when you guys talk to these women, I would work up to asking them, what do you want to see done? How do you want to handle this? Do you want to file a police report? Do you want to take out restraining orders? Do you just want this guy out of the dance group and just see what they're willing to do? And from there, I would support whatever plan they want to go with.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
One person's story, honestly, that should probably be enough to intervene in this case. But it might be hard for the organizers to know what to do with that. Three, four, five, ten, whatever women coming forward and saying, hey, this guy's a monster. He shouldn't be here. They have to take that seriously. And that can be multiple individual emails to the event organizers.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Oh, that frigging mushroom guy cut me off. We're playing Mario Kart. Sometimes people just yell frigging really loud when he's angry. She took my toy frigging.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
It can be a letter signed by all of them. It can be an in-person conversation where they all tell their stories to the event organizers. But I tend to think that writing is best because it can be more damning and compelling and it can be shared more easily. And then you have to back them up and say, you guys need to listen to these women.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
And as a man, I'm also quite disturbed by this guy being here and I want him gone. That's your role. But again, I think it's primarily the victim's call. This is their story to tell. And you're welcome to share what you know with the organizers on your own too. But ultimately, it's their testimony that's going to make the most impact.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Of course, the victims are going to have to balance that with their own safety. I know one of your concerns is that Zach might actually retaliate, although, yo, there's safety in numbers. If several women report him, I've got to think there's a decent chance he'll be so scared that he'll just disappear.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
You said he's a narcissist in a way that's a liability, but in another way, it might actually be an advantage if he's terrified that people will withdraw their interest and affection for him or stop listening to their fear of him. I would be shocked if they didn't ban this guy after hearing all this, but you won't know for sure until you try.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
And if they don't want to talk for whatever reason, then you can still report him based on what you know. That might move the needle too, but I just, I don't think it'll be as impactful.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
And look, if the group still doesn't take this seriously, maybe you do go a little Dark Jordan on this. Maybe you encourage Taylor to start a private Facebook group where people can talk about their stories. Maybe you guys publish an anonymous essay or post for the whole community to read, naming the guy, detailing what he's done.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Maybe you get everyone to shun this guy on their own until he gets the message. Or worse, you know, I'm sure you can get creative. I'm not a big fan of doing these things before going through the proper channels. But hey, if the proper channels fail and the evidence against him is credible and overwhelming, I do think it becomes fair game. I'm so sorry that this guy is hurting your friends.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Yeah. He also looks exactly like me, but tiny.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
It's truly awful. People like this obviously need to be called out, kicked out, held accountable. They're dangerous and gross and they infect special communities like yours and they ruin them. But I think as a guy, as a non-victim here, you do play a secondary role in supporting the primary victims. So start there and keep asking how you can be the most helpful and you'll know what to do.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
In the meantime, hey, keep dancing, keep being there for your friends and take good care. All right. Now we're going to get in touch with our shadow side by acknowledging what shameless, money-hungry capitalists we are deep down. Even Carl Jung couldn't say no to the deals on the fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back. This episode is sponsored in part by IQ Bar.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
Only my son does this. My daughter doesn't do this at all. He's just got this sort of streak to him. The other day... Hi, Junie. Hi. I knew you were going to come in. Hold on. Let me lift you up. Look out. I don't want to run over your foot. Look out. It's Uncle Gabriel.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
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1141: Dark Pillar of Community Abuses with Immunity | Feedback Friday
It's got 200 milligrams of natural caffeine, plus fancy ingredients like lion's mane mushroom and magnesium. No jitters, at least for me, no crash, just productivity fuel. And it actually tastes good with options like toasted hazelnut and vanilla spice. And it's gluten-free, vegan, kosher. No soy, no GMOs, basically checks all the not going to mess me up boxes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
This episode is sponsored in part by Vital Proteins. Let's face it, your body changes as you get older. As we get older, our bodies don't bounce back like they used to, of course, but there are simple ways we can help support our hair, skin, nails, joints, and bones. All it takes is a daily serving of Vital Proteins Collagen Peptides.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
You're here for my entertainment now.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Which is easy for me to say because my house didn't burn down.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Yeah, 100%. I know it's so obvious that it's literally just a crappy cliche, I suppose, but it's a cliche because it's true. Ultimately, all we have is ourselves and one another, and everything else is just window dressing. Beautiful window dressing, but it's not us, really, when the shit hits the fan.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Of course. But yeah, that's hard to do. You know, we all have lives. We have responsibilities. These memories fade. But I'm with you. We have to keep these stories alive in some way. It'd be a shame if nothing positive came out of this for people.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
No. Bow to your sensei. Bow to your sensei! That's what that reminds me of. I need those American flag skids. That was special. On Fridays, though, we share stories, take listener letters, alliterate way too much. I feel like I should have alliterated there. And generally stand in awe of the strange and profound ways that life slaps us upside the head.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Amen, man. Then that's something I'm taking in over here as well. Well, look, I am glad you're safe because, you know, you have a lot of work to do. No, I'm glad you're safe. I'm so sorry about, of course, your family and your friends and your colleagues and I hope that they're holding up okay. I really do hope everybody recovers as quickly as possible. I hope the winds die down.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
I hope the fires end soon. I hope the land and the people and all the animals heal soon. But it just sounds like a ridiculous, trite, wishful thinking when I say all that. I do hope we get the leaders we need in California to rebuild and live responsibly at this very complicated moment in history. So... Man, sending lots of love to LA right now and to everyone affected by this disaster.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
And thank you again to all of you for being such thoughtful listeners, checking in on us, checking in on Gabe especially. Just one more moment that makes me step back and go, man, our show family is really special. We really appreciate it a lot. Every ad pivot, by the way, that I thought of here is truly tasteless.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
But you know that we have great taste in our sponsors and the fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back. Thank you for listening and supporting the show. It is your support of our sponsors that keeps the lights on around here. All the deals, discount codes, and ways to support the show are searchable and clickable over at JordanHarbinger.com slash deals.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Please consider supporting those who support the show. Now, back to Feedback Friday. Before we kick off, I want to share a little exercise that I've been doing recently that has helped me a lot, actually. It's simple.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
I'm just going to steal the punchline. Just shredded, just torn out of my hands. It's simple, but it's very powerful. This exercise begins by asking yourself, who brings out my best qualities? think of those people, their people, not what brings out my best qualities, who brings out my best qualities.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Think of those people, write them down, then take five minutes right now and schedule some time with them. It can be a phone call, you could shoot them a text, it can be something more involved like lunch or dinner, you could go for a hike, whatever it is, and just kick it with that person. Even if they live a couple states away, arrange something with them, you will feel a lot better for it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Speaking of which, Gabe, you live in LA, my former home, a place I, well, I would say I love. I have mixed feelings, but I feel like I have to say now that I love it. But for the past 10 days, you guys have been experiencing these absolutely insane wildfires. I'm trying to find the right words.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
As I get older, I just really appreciate more and more that these relationships, the ones that bring out our best qualities, they really are one of the great gifts of life. They're assets that can refill our bucket from work, responsibilities, other stressors. They remind us of the best version of ourselves and they reinforce those qualities.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
And then we can take those into the rest of our relationships and responsibilities. And you are that person for other people too. So give it a go. It's ridiculously easy, but like I said, it's very powerful. All right, we got some fun ones. We got the doozies. And by the way, I think our first question here is a little difficult. It deals with abuse, some pretty dark family stuff.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
So just keep that in mind. And yeah, Gabe, take it away.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Okay, pause for a second. I want to make sure we're all tracking this because the family tree is complicated. So this listener's cousin was abused by her stepfather when she was a kid, which is shockingly common, actually.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
And then 20 years later, her three-year-old daughter is abused by her abuser's son. Exactly. Who's the daughter's uncle and the mom's stepbrother. Jeez. Okay. This is so sad. Talk about a pattern. Talk about generational trauma. This is really awful. But also, sorry, not to point fingers or make this worse in any way.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
I know that this is going to be controversial, but why would you put the son of your abuser in charge of your toddler daughter after what happened to you?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
It's been heartbreaking to watch from a distance, and I can't even imagine what it must be like to live in LA right now. To give people, if you haven't seen the news, as of this recording, the Palisades fire on the west side, which is the is that the one that's nearest to you, by the way?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Look, I hear that, I really do. I know this is probably a little, what's the word, presumptuous of me to say so early on, but still, just the proximity to the person who abused her, that would be enough to give me pause as a parent. Like, oh, this guy seems alright, but I don't know, his dad raped me. I wouldn't want to be anywhere around anybody.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Yeah, that must have been horrible. It's horrible enough to find out that your child was abused, but I'm sure it brings up a unique pain if you've been through it yourself.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
And you were the one who put them in the same room. It's not like you left it with your grandma and then she left and put them in charge. And it's like, what were you thinking? You did this. So there's a lot of levels of pain here. She must have been furious and horrified. It's just deeply sad. How is this happening all over again?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Also, if the son of the first abuser is now abusing other people, I guess I can only really imagine what his father did to him.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Yeah. Look, this is dark and I'm so sorry this happened to both of them.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Okay, so this is the same mother who disregarded the original abuse. This is a person who just, like, can't handle anything uncomfortable for themselves. I'm guessing so. The worst. What a failure of a mother. Just an abject failure. Just burying her head in the sand. Oh, this can't possibly be true. This stuff doesn't happen in our family. I... can't with people like this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
It is not okay what you're just prioritizing your own comfort over your daughter's physical safety. I hate this person. I'm sorry.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Oh, so they did have contact, some contact.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Okay, I'm not an expert, but I'm pretty sure that's not how trauma works. Famously not. But who knows how Sarah was presenting at that time, so maybe there's some other logic here. What a strange detail.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
It happened, right.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
So that's like 20 percent contained. And by the way, people think that means it's 20 percent out. No, that means there's a trench or a gap or whatever around 20 percent of it. So it's it's still burning. And it's just not even close to contained. The Eaton Fire on the east side, that's still going as well. Last I checked, that was something like 11% contained, maybe slightly more now.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Look, I'm biting my tongue right now. Nothing I want to say here is appropriate. We gotta come back to this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Okay, so pedophile rapist has a daughter that's involved in drugs and child endangerment. Surprise, he screwed up his own kids. Wonder what happened there. Okay, obviously my mind is going to some really dark places, but who knows what his motivation is there. It's real hard not to wonder why he wants to have a relationship with his young grandkid that's so close. Why couldn't he foster her?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Yeah, well, I'm glad that he's not because he's a pedophile rapist. I hate this guy. I want to castrate this man.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
He won't support them, but he begged them to foster her so he could have a close relationship. But they're like, he doesn't actually give a shit about any of these people. But he has the resources to do that. That's not okay. This is so crazy. This person is defective in so many ways. Not a point in his favor.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
The winds have picked up again, and I hear that everybody's essentially prepared for this to get worse because the wind spreads the fire. And I know a lot of our listeners have been following the news as well. So I just wanted to take a few minutes to check in, talk about what's happening. Everybody thinks that I live in LA or that California is small. So they're asking me if I'm okay.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
What a story, Gabe. Yeah, crazy. There's so many angles here, there's so many subplots, there's so many characters, all this history. Stories like this, they really capture the legacy of abuse.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
It is. It's beyond disturbing. And I'm so sorry for Sarah and her mom, what they've been through, how the family has responded to it. The mom, anyway, like I said, burying your head in the sand, avoiding denying. It's just not OK. I said I wanted to castrate this guy. I didn't mean that. I mean, I want to castrate him with a rusty grapefruit spoon.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Insult on top of injury and also how these traumas go underground and they only get worse. It really does break my heart to hear about people being hurt by these kinds of things. It's horrible. So look, as always, we wanted to get a good handle on your options here. So we reached out to attorney and friend of the show, Corbin Payne.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
And the way Corbin saw it, and this is what I love about Corbin, how he thinks both as a lawyer and as a human being slash armchair psychologist, some lawyers really can't think like humans. I am proof of that. You're asking about two very different things. One is how to obtain justice for Sarah, and the other is how to obtain healing for Sarah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
So Corbin's take was that the justice part, that's going to be hard because 40 years is a real long time by legal standards. Depending on the laws in your state, Sarah and her mom might not even be able to bring a lawsuit. And even if they are, there's no evidence about what happened beyond the testimony of the people involved.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Frank could come in and deny everything under oath, and it wouldn't shock me if this POS does that, of course. Sarah's mom could come in and testify that he admitted to it years ago, and then Sarah's grandmother could come in and be like, that's all a lie, because she wants to protect the family slash herself, which is the only thing she's protecting.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
But you're the one that is kind of in the middle or close to the edge of, I should say, the danger zone. So how are you holding up?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
In Corbin's view, this is the classic he said, she said conundrum. Also, everyone could come in and admit the abuse did in fact take place, but then argue or concede that this was your typical adolescent explorations like Frank said. To quote Corbin here, I can't say which way a jury would go, but I can say that it would be very, very difficult.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
So that's the not-so-good news, and I'm sorry to relay that. These cases are notoriously difficult to prove, and they only get harder with time. It doesn't mean it's not an option. Sarah and her family could certainly try. But I think you guys have to be realistic about your odds of success and aware of what you'd all have to go through.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Lawsuits can be a long and difficult process, especially when it involves speaking publicly about what happened, with no guarantee that you'd get the damages you're hoping for. Sarah's healing, though, that's a whole other process. And Corbyn had a couple of thoughts there based on his experience with the law and working with a lot of victims over the years.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Gabe, you want to share what he told us?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
I just want to jump in here and say I had the exact same response while you were reading the letter. And this is no shade on religion or religious people. Obviously, there's an aspect of healing that is deeply spiritual. Your tradition can be super helpful. But I totally agree with Corbin here. Fast forwarding to forgive and forget in a situation like this, that's not being a good Christian.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
That is just bypassing, which is this weird defense mechanism that doesn't help anybody. Correct.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Yes. I also find it very presumptuous. Oh, you, grandma, get to tell us, the women who were actually abused and sexually assaulted, we just need to forgive. When you denied that it ever even happened? Why should I do that to make you comfortable? F*** you, grandma. That's not a sentence I thought I would ever utter on this show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Yes, of course. It's all about her, which actually maybe the narcissism is passed down from grandma to the her rapey ass kid.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Exactly right.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
I totally agree. And the second thought Corbin shared with us is that sexual abuse, especially within families, is appallingly widespread. So many people go through this kind of abuse, way more than most people realize, which is why there are so many support groups out there and networks where survivors can get in touch with one another.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
In Corbin's experience, these support groups have proven to be one of the most powerful tools for healing. We're all super encouraged that Sarah's been pursuing therapy for a long time. She hasn't just been repressing all this. That's fantastic to hear. I'm very proud of her for that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Although, I do wonder if she needs to better assert the boundaries she's found in therapy in terms of how much contact she has with Frank. But maybe that says more about the family's way of dealing with the abuse or not dealing with the abuse than with Sarah's ability to protect herself. But just in case she hasn't considered a support group,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Corbin wanted to remind you that it's a great resource, and we're going to link to Rain and a couple other hubs for these resources in the show notes. Highly recommend checking them out.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
When I saw the Palisades, I've got a bunch of friends that live there. It looks like something out of Saving Private Ryan or whatever. They're wiped out. I was like, this can't be real. I was like, what? That's just a part of the Palisades. I never thought something like this would happen. The whole thing, it's just gone.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Yeah, I agree with that. You're healthy, you're clear, you're kind, you're solid, and you guys will have that over this crib for the rest of your life. He's incapable of becoming that way due to his narcissism and other issues. That doesn't take away the legacy of this abuse. It doesn't mean that it didn't matter or that you don't deserve some form of justice here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
It just means that even if you can't get legal justice for what happened, you might have already gotten a kind of cosmic justice, and that's often how it plays out. And the more Sarah and her mom own their story, the more meaning and healing I think they'll find from the terrible things that they've been through. That's their work to do, and that's their birthright.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Man, that's a lot to take in. You're right. This is complicated. To your point, I wonder if deep down, Frank knows he did something very wrong. He might even feel that on some level he is the abuser that everyone says he is. And that is why he's trying to portray this image of himself as a successful human being.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
And he desperately wants everyone to forget what happened or view it in a certain way. Even the whole traveling around the world thing, that might just be a form of escapism for him.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Just him trying to get away from himself, which is impossible to do because there's still a world where what actually happened is a source of deep shame for him and a reminder of what his father might have done to him and then what he then did to someone else.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
No amount of money or success or projected self-image could make up for the fact that he did this awful thing, whatever his intention and psychology happened to be at the time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Yeah, I'm now ping-ponging between the two as well. I'm leaning toward the conclusion that guys like this deserve to have their balls cut off. Again, rusty grapefruit spoon. My mind is a-worrying right now, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
An anonymous person could host a website in a place like Russia that can't be taken down with this whole story using his full name, and this successful guy, if he's a partner, let's say, at some sort of bank... They're not going to want a pedophile guy working there. He's going to get fired. His whole life is going to come crashing down.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Yeah, I was going to say before, it looks like Mariupol. I was trying to remember the word. It really does look like a war zone. It's a super nice area. And several of my friends had, well, they had their homes there and they're all gone now. And they're just like, yeah, we're in San Francisco staying at a hotel. I'm like, you better buy that hotel room because where are you going to live? Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
But that is not something that you should do and it would come back and blow up in your face. I'm just saying that that would ruin his life and that might be a shame in air quotes. But Gabe, you're unfortunately giving me some pause with this take because you're right. People who do stuff like this, there's almost always a reason.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
So I guess we have to make some room for some compassion for Frank here, even if Sarah and her mom deserve the lion's share of that compassion. Man, what a story. Like I said, there's so much to explore here. But I hope that gives you a few new angles to consider. And I hope it leads you, Sarah's mom, everyone in the family to the right decision here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Although I think ultimately, this is really up to Sarah to decide for herself. Because it's her story. Sending you and your family a big hug and wishing you all the best.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Jeez, hey, you didn't have to absolutely murder that sign off. It's just a work question, man. This is the light stuff we're throwing in between the other not so light stuff.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Gabe understood the assignment, as the kids like to say, which is a great phrase. Look, I can appreciate why it's stressful to think about being honest with your supervisor here. Being truly candid at work, it is tough. There are politics at play. You don't want to piss off the wrong person unnecessarily. I get it. On the other hand, you have a few things working in your favor.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
One is that this change has objectively changed your job in a moderate to highway permanently, as you said. So you're not just grumbling for no reason or inventing a problem that isn't there. The other thing is that this was not your supervisor's decision. So it's not like you'd be attacking them directly by pointing out that it's making you work harder to be less productive.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
You guys are probably on the same side of the table here because I assume both of you have a stake in making sure that you are as productive as possible. Now, that doesn't mean you have to point this out or even that you should. There might be other reasons to kind of suck it up or let it roll off your back.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
I don't know the politics or the nuances of your workplace, but I actually think there might be a good reason not to dodge this question. And I have two thoughts for you that might make this easier to bring up. First, I would focus on the facts as much as possible. Resist the urge to get angry and complainy and just talk about this as an economic thing. Hours worked versus results delivered.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
The upside to doing things this way versus the opportunity cost of losing time and energy and whether this change actually makes sense to your supervisor. In other words, don't use the word asinine. Just present the facts and let them draw their own conclusion. You can even say, look, I'm having to work harder, I'm less productive, I know this wasn't your call, but what do you make of this?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Can we find a better solution so that we can perform better, or do I have to just suck it up and be a team player? And invite your supervisor to tell you what they make of all this. If they're like, hey, I hear you, but this is just how management wants it now, then you'll know it's probably not worth getting worked up about. But if there's some openness there, you might want to pitch a solution.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
And that's my second recommendation. I'd come to this meeting with a few ideas about how to solve this problem rather than just complaining about it. It's one thing to sit with your supervisor and go, hey, this change sucks. I got to work harder. I'm less productive. It's another thing to go, you know what? This change, it doesn't actually make a lot of sense.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
So here are a couple ways I think we could move faster and deliver more. What do you think? If you come to a conversation like this with some solutions and some next steps, even if they are broad, it'll change the tone completely. Because A, you'll be trying to actively make things better, which always lands better.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
B, it'll force you to lead with a spirit of productivity and collaboration rather than just grumbling and criticizing. And C, it'll empower you and your supervisor to go and pitch some of these changes if they're actually workable. And you'll probably know a lot faster if they are workable or if this asinine change has some kind of logic that you just need to accept.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
So yeah, you can resist complaining about how dumb this is if it's a prudent thing to do. But if you come to this meeting in this spirit, I'm not sure you'll have to resist too hard because you're not just going to be complaining. You might even be kind of excited and you might be able to plead the fifth. But if your supervisor asks you point blank, hey, what do you think of this new change?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
I'm not sure. how well that's going to land. It's kind of weaseling out in a way that doesn't communicate. I'm a trustworthy employee. I'm a leader. While also it subtly suggests that you don't like the change, but you don't have the, I don't know, the courage or the integrity to speak up about it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
What does that mean?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Okay, interesting. So she's regretting something she hasn't even done yet. But is that even regret? Isn't that just worrying? No, it's interesting, right? It's proleptic regret.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
And if that's the case, then this is actually a great opportunity for you to try, well, being more honest at work, more confident and thoughtful about your recommendations and just see what happens. I have a feeling it'll go well as long as you lead with the right attitude. Good luck.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Gabe, I haven't had a real job in a long time, but I have to think that if you have a decent relationship with your supervisor and you come in and you're like, why do I have to do TPS reports every day instead of every week? They're probably like, oh, I know. I know. Right.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
They're not going to be like, how dare you question the management decision, especially because the supervisor didn't come up with it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
I agree. It seems like you'd want your supervisor to go, hey, I know we'd say we need these daily. My guys are way less productive now. Do you care about production or do you care about TPS reports being filed in a timely manner? And it's like, oh, we didn't realize this was causing a production issue. Thanks for letting us know. Change of policy. That's how things would happen here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Maybe in real companies, they just don't care because they're like somebody up top doesn't want their ego hurt. So we're all filing TPS reports, but you got to try.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
All right. Y'all can reach us Friday at Jordan Harbinger dot com. Keep your emails concise. Use descriptive subject lines. That makes Gabe's job a whole lot easier. Now that you're stuck with the inbox.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
If you're finding dead squirrels in your mailbox, your stepdad's got your nudes, your neighbors are eavesdropping on your therapy sessions through the wall, or the church next to your house is owned by a human trafficker, whatever's got you staying up at night lately, hit us up Friday at jordanharbinger.com. We're here to help, and we keep every email anonymous.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Oh, our newsletter, We Bit Wiser, comes to you every week. It's a two-minute read. It's a bite-sized gem from a past episode from us to you. If you want to keep up with the wisdom from our thousand-plus episodes and apply it to your life, I invite you to come check it out. It's a great companion to the show. And you can sign up at jordanharbinger.com slash news. All right, what's next?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Oh, God, Gabe. After that first question, this one's making me nervous already. Don't worry. This one's very different. Thank you. I'm glad. I was having a... There's a proleptic stress response.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
That's a good word, man. It's funny, Gabe. I was just remembering. I was going to take the LSAT, which is the thing you take before law school, if you get in. And... I was really good at the regular SATs, the verbal section, whatever. And then I decided to take the GRE as the backup to the LSAT in case I didn't do well in the LSAT for law school.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
I was like, oh, I need this for regular grad school. And I'm not good at math. I hate math. I really don't like it. And I thought I would do decent on the verbal section and okay on the math section. And what happened is on the math section, this is one of those tests you take on the computer and it gets progressively harder the better that you do. And I was like, oh, I'm not good at math.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Yeah, it really does defy words. Like I said, like many of you know, I lived in L.A. for a while, so I can kind of wrap my head around what it must be like, but for people who don't live there... The Palisades fire alone has burned 23,000 acres so far. It's going to burn a lot more, of course. The entire island of Manhattan is about 14,600 acres.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Why are they showing me all these weird things, calculus things and symbols I've never even seen before? And I was getting really confused because I thought I'm clearly not getting these questions right. I'm just guessing at the answer by looking at the four choices and picking the one that looks the most different from the other ones, kind of.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
And it's showing me more and more very complicated stuff that you would see like in a movie on a chalkboard or something in Einstein's laboratory.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Yes, exactly. I'm taking yarn and connecting it to photos on a cork board.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
What are you doing? Yeah. So I was just like, this is impossible. What just happened? And I left so confused. And then about two weeks later, I get this letter from MIT that's like, hey, congratulations on your GRE results. Stop it. You absolutely slayed the math section. We want to invite you to come out here. Oh, no. We're going to pay for your travel. We're going to pay for your accommodation.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
We want you to take this further testing in our math department. And if you do well on that, we will invite you to a full or partial scholarship to MIT, a grad program.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Yes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
I don't really understand either. I really must have just gotten one extremely lucky, but two, that test was written in such a way where the answers, there's just one that's different enough from the other three multiple choice that you can do it. It's not like I would have been able to do this if I'd had to show work or like actually do the math.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
It's just that if you ask me a question and the three of the answers have graphs and one of them just has an equation and I pick the equation, okay, you didn't need the graph for that one. Or like, all the graphs go to the right. I just picked the one that went to the left because, yeah, and it worked. So, yeah, it was a flaw in the actual test.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Otherwise, I would have had a better chance just rolling the dice and getting six, 12 times in a row. The odds are so low that it had to be a flaw in the test.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Yeah, exactly. Literally, they were probably recruiting me for some weird thing like that because they wanted me to do more math and then give me a scholarship to MIT. Just none of it made any sense.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Hell no. I hate math even more than I hate Boston.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Look, man, I've been to Boston like once in my life. The food was amazing. I'll give them that. I just I can't understand what anybody's saying.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Such a weird thing to say.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
So that's just to put this in perspective, more than the entire island of Manhattan has burned. And it's going to end up being a multiple of that. And all the fires in LA put together have burned more than 40,000 acres, which is just slightly bigger than Washington, DC. And at least 24, miraculously,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
The irony of the guy who was a criminal, Gabe, I'm getting ahead of myself, but she said, my husband and I are successful and we have a great relationship with her. I think that's why he's jealous of that. It's very interesting. This guy's not a good person, I think.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
All right. So I have some ideas from question one. Step one, get the court to take his kids away from him. Step two, foster the child. You can see her whenever you want. Case closed. Wow.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
But I appreciate the effort. Fine. I'm here for it. Look, this is a sad situation. And honestly, I find it creepy. It is. The way he's gatekeeping his daughter. It's so strange.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Gabe, I'm thinking about the letter we took two weeks ago from the woman whose sister accused her of abusing her son and how she was making it super hard for that listener to stay close with the nephew who she adored because she was accusing her of all kinds of heinous child abuse nonsense.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Yeah, interesting parallels here. They're both aunts of kids they really love. Both have very tough siblings. And because they're not the parents of these kids they love so much, they don't have much control over how often they get to see them.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Okay, that's true. I could see that, but they were never close. And it sounds like he's a bit of a difficult character. Look, if I go to prison at age 18 and my 10-year-old sister doesn't want to be my best friend when I get out in five years, like, I get it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
And I say this in sort of radio air quotes, only 24 people have died, but 12,000 homes have been destroyed. And it's just the scale of this is biblical.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Yeah. Good luck when she's older and you're trying to control who she's friends with or who she dates. Like you're strong. My kids don't talk to me anymore vibes in about 10 years for Mary and dad. Look, he's not wrong about that. He does get to choose. But you're right. One of them is at least trying to talk and repair things.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
And the other one is shutting the conversation down and playing hardball with a child. So that does seem to be a point in our friend here's favor.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Yeah, I like that. Like, I'll tolerate your annoying ass if I can see my niece. I'll even smile to your face. But I really just want to see my niece, you man child.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
I'll tell you which one I would pick.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
It's a good point because she's the one who's capable of really listening and talking. He's not. So she might have to do most of the work here and maybe even cater to her brother's delicate personality slash fragile ego so that she can have a relationship with Mary, I guess. I think that's the way forward here, if there is a way forward. But also, there just might not be a way forward.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Your brother might be so rigid and so combative that no matter how much empathy and diplomacy you meet him with, he just won't let you be super close with his daughter. which is really sad for both you and for Mary, and actually also for him, because who doesn't want their child to be close with their family, especially if their family is solid and has loving relationships and is cool?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
I mean, I guess that just might be the way this cookie crumbles, in which case, yeah, you have to deal with the heartache of missing Mary and only getting to see her every once in a while. It's the idea we seem to come back to again and again in situations like this. There's always a limit to our power. A lot of life is about working through the grief of accepting life as it is.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
And I won't belabor that point, but I would definitely encourage you to go back and listen to that other letter that was similar to yours. That was episode 1099, 1099. The first question on that episode, your stories are very different, but the shape is the same.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
And I think you'll find some interesting parallels in that listener's story about loving her nephew and confronting a version of events where she might not be able to be as close with him for a while. At which point, this becomes about working through your own feelings about your family and finding creative ways to stay close over the years when your brother won't let you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
But no, I definitely don't think you're asking too much by trying to see Mary on a more frequent basis. You just want to hang out with the niece you love. What could be more normal than that? So do what you can to change those variables, maybe by trying to meet your brother in a new way, as hard and as awkward as that might be, or start making peace with what this situation will allow.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
My hope is that you and Mary can stay connected in other ways, and when she's a little older, maybe it'll be easier to have a relationship again. It sucks, but it doesn't have to be the end of the story. Sending you and Mary a big hug, and hoping your brother comes around. Good luck.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
And if none of that works, you can always try bribing your brother with one of the fine products and services that support this show. If you like this episode of Feedback Friday and you find our advice valuable, I invite you to do what other smart and considerate listeners do, which is take a moment and support our amazing sponsors.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
All of the deals and discounts are searchable and clickable over on the deals page, jordanharbinger.com slash deals. Our AI chat bot can search for sponsor codes and surface those as well, jordanharbinger.com slash AI. And if that doesn't work, you can always email us, jordan at jordanharbinger.com.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
We're happy to surface those codes for you because it is that important that you support those who support the show. Now, back to Feedback Friday. And right now, time for the recommendation of the week. I am addicted to lip filler. My recommendation of the week, it's called the SunAware UV Tracker. SunAware, we'll link to it in the show notes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
So this is, it really is just a tiny little clip that's the size of half your pinky finger that clips onto your shirt or your hat, and it measures the amount of UV radiation that you're being exposed to. And it's solar powered, so you don't have to fiddle around with batteries or anything like that. It's Bluetooth. It connects to your phone.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
The company's mission is to raise awareness around UV exposure to keep people safe. I spend a lot of time outside. I go rucking and I walk around every day for hours. And during the summer, I had no idea how much UV I was getting. I was like, oh, I'm probably fine because I don't burn. Not really the case. According to this app, I'm really getting a lot of UV sometimes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
And on other days where I think I need to go inside because it's sunny, the UV index is low and I can actually stay outside for like two extra hours. So it's very helpful. You can't really eyeball this kind of stuff. The company, I contacted them when I bought this because I thought it was so awesome.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
They actually are generously offering to send three of these devices to our listeners as part of a giveaway, max one per person, of course. For this giveaway, they're going to ship worldwide for free. So don't be like, oh, I live in Canada. I can't get this. But outside the US and EU, there might be customs duties. I don't know how that works. What do you go to the post office?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
You got to pay 10 bucks. I really don't know. They will, however, cover shipping and customs for the US and the EU. So you'll get it like anything else you order online. This is going to be a first-come, first-served situation. Please only get it if you need it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
If you spend a lot of time outside and you're worried about that, or a loved one does, don't just grab it because it's like a cool gadget, at least not the free one. And also, if we're out of them, go ahead and buy one. Like I said, it's like under $100, I think, and not getting skin cancer is kind of a compelling offer.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
So if you want to take advantage of our giveaway, please email friday at jordanharbinger.com. We'll connect you with the company, and if we hit the three-device limit before you write in, please don't be bummed. I encourage you to buy one for yourself. I did. I bought this. It's not a sponsor or anything.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
It's really just a cool device that I think anybody who spends a lot of time outside should have. Also, in case you didn't know, there's a subreddit for our show. If you're a Reddit user and you want to jump into discussions with other listeners about specific episodes. Actually, it's not even about that anymore.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
There's a lot of talking about the show in general or other stuff that's tangential to the show. It's a lot of fun. But if there's an episode you really liked, an episode you really didn't like, you want to share additional thoughts, you want to learn from other people in our show fam, definitely come check it out. It's a very positive place. I do ban people who are just a-holes for no reason.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Reddit's very tolerant of that. I'm not. If you're going to go over there and crapple over people, I'm just going to ban you. I don't care. But there's some really cool conversations happening over there. And again, it's a very positive place in part because of the no asshole rule. So you can find it on Reddit in the Jordan Harbinger subreddit.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Yeah, so even more proleptic regret. So interesting. Bob's going to put proleptic in the title. For sure. And if he doesn't, you're fired, Bob. You're done. You're proleptically terminated. Proleptically get your ass in gear and throw that in the title.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Yeah, you're useless, man. Pack it in. Thanks, everybody, for listening. No, this is a really good question. First of all, congrats on this exciting new opportunity. I love that you're pumped about it. I'm even more pumped that you're thinking of it as a massive opportunity and that you want to make the most of it. Obviously, investing in your relationships is a huge part of that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
And I also love that you want to offer something meaningful to the people you meet. You're doing so much right here. So yes, it definitely sounds like some of these events are where you need to be. And yes, I do think you're thinking about this a little narrowly. It might be true that in some ways you don't have a ton to offer every single important person you meet at these events.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
It's also probably true that you have something to offer these people, even if it's something really basic like your curiosity, your listening, your empathy, or your willingness to introduce them to other people who might be more immediately useful in their worlds.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Those are really huge assets, and they don't depend on your title or your technical experience or your assets under management, and you can't discount them. I have been massively helped over the years by people who, to be totally honest, can't really immediately help me in my podcasting career.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
But let's say they hosted a dinner party where I met some amazing guests for the show or they talked me through a business problem and they had a unique angle on that because it was different from mine. Or they were just a solid peer or an inspiring presence. And I've tried to do the same for other people as well. So I would not get too hung up
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
on whether a CTO or a venture capital investor wants to talk to you just because of their title or their background. I think that's already putting you on your back foot. I also think it's probably making these conversations a little bit strained. If anything, I would go into these conversations thinking, man, this person is in a position of some power.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
This person is wicked smart or this person deals with money. That's not my domain at all. So how can I get to know them and their world better? How can I learn something new? How can I listen for the human being behind their role? How can I find one or two points of connection, connect some dots for them? How can I just be an enjoyable person to talk to?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Going in with that mindset, that's gonna get you a lot further. Ironically though, you have to be both more and less strategic in order to succeed with some of these folks.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
More strategic in the sense that on some level, you're actively looking for ways to be useful, whether it's walking them across the room and introducing them to a person you just met by the bagels or whatever, or getting their email and sending them useful stuff that you learn, or thinking about how these folks might fit into this new office your company is opening, whatever. But less strategic
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
in the sense that you're not constantly doing the math of, okay, am I offering this person enough? Am I fancy enough to be talking with him? Am I giving them something valuable enough to justify taking up their time? Which is where these chats can become transactional, which is the only way that you can really fail. So it's a dance, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
You walk that line between being thoughtful about what you can offer, but not only viewing your relationships through that lens. Because look, man, Even if you are super valuable to these people, you still want to be personable. You still want to be funny. You want to be open and interesting and all that jazz.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
And honestly, meeting someone like that at an event, even if no work gets discussed at all, that's usually way more fun than meeting someone who's like, oh, how can I help you? How can you help me? Let's get to the next level together from the jump. I can't stand it. Actually, this brings up an interesting reminder. This is something I talk about in my keynote when I do talks.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
There was a student who told me the same thing, like, I'm not useful, I don't know any people, I'm young, I don't have any money, I don't have a rank in a business, but he was in the cyber security club at his engineering school, and what I told him was to lean into that. He met a recruiter who was like, why should we hire you?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Yeah, that's what I've been thinking about a lot this week, just how incredibly exposed we are as human beings in ways that we frankly just don't really want to admit.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
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And he brought his resume or whatever, and I said, lean into the club angle, because that's valuable for a recruiter. So he told the recruiter that he was also in the cybersecurity club, and she, in part, hired him because he knew all the other people at his school who were interested in what she was hiring for, which was cybersecurity, and think about it.
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You're getting the dog and pony show, the Riz, the Razzle Dazzle, from everybody who comes in for an interview. But now you've got one guy who's already got a job, and he goes, yeah, I know that Tim looks impressive, but he's all blow, no show, shows up late to everything. You don't want that guy.
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Angela, on the other hand, she's soft-spoken and she undersells herself, but she's actually really brilliant. So now you've got this inside man. So she, in part, hired him because he knew... Everybody else who was interested and could shed light on whether they were a good fit for the company. So it didn't matter that he didn't have a job. It didn't matter that he didn't have any money.
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He was actually one of the most valuable people that she could have met at that particular time.
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It does. It does. Like he thought, oh, I don't know anyone. Yes, you know, a bunch of other students. And that's actually who she's looking for. And you have insight on every single person and their personality. But he misvalued himself until that moment. That's exactly right.
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So all that said, if you are, in fact, starting on the back foot here, if it's actually true that you have little to offer, then part of your job right now is building up those assets so you do feel more equipped and confident at these events. Maybe that means boning up on your technical knowledge.
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Maybe it means taking on more responsibilities at work so you have more experience, more power, more points of connection with these people that you're meeting. Maybe it means continuing to invest in all these interesting people that you're meeting. So if nothing else, you can introduce them to one another. You become the hub for these connections.
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It might also mean really taking stock of what you do already know, what you do already have to offer and correctly valuing those things so that you are in touch with all of the things that you actually do have to offer to these people. it's absolutely okay to still be developing. Hopefully you're always going to be developing.
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But then you have to use your gaps or weaknesses to identify the areas that you need to grow, and then put in the work to expand in those places. And you don't need to put your networking on pause until you get there. You can do both at the same time, and a lot of your growth will happen through your relationships. So these are really two sides of the same coin. But listen, man,
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I'm actually not worried about you. The fact that you're so concerned about what you can offer people, that actually tells me that you're coming at all of this with a really great mindset, and it also tells me that you 100% deserve to be at these events.
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Just embrace where you are, resist the urge to pretend to be anything that you're not, keep working really hard to level up, and meet people with kindness, curiosity, generosity, and you really can't go wrong. Good luck with the new office, man. Hope this is the start of an exciting new chapter.
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Don't forget to check out our episode about dictators from earlier this week with Dr. Marcel Dersis, as well as our Skeptical Sunday. If you haven't heard those yet, now's a great time to go check them out. The best things that have happened in my life and business have come through my network, the circle of people I know, like, and trust. We just talked about the value of that.
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I got a whole course on that that's free on the Thinkific platform at 6minutenetworking.com. The drills take a few minutes per day. I really wish I knew this stuff 20 years ago. Dig that well before you get thirsty, folks. Build relationships before you need them. Six minute networking dot com. There's no upsells or anything like that, at least not at this time.
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And I've got no plans for any either. So you don't need your credit card to show up. It's a free course. Yes, really. Show notes and transcripts at Jordan Harbinger dot com. Advertisers, deals, discounts, ways to support the show all at Jordan Harbinger dot com slash deals. I'm at Jordan Harbinger on Twitter and Instagram. You can also connect with me on LinkedIn.
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You can find Gabe on Instagram at Gabriel Mizrahi or on Twitter at Gabe Mizrahi. Thank you so much for having me. It's intended to be general and informational in nature and does not represent nor indicate an established clinical or professional relationship with those inquiring for guidance. So basically, she's a therapist, but not your therapist. Remember, we rise by lifting others.
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Share the show with those you love. If you found the episode useful, please share it with somebody else who could use the advice we gave here today. In the meantime, I hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn. And we'll see you next time. You're about to hear a preview of the Jordan Harbinger Show with Olympic speed skater Apollo Ono.
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For more with Apollo Ono, the most decorated winter athlete in Olympic history, check out episode 783 of The Jordan Harbinger Show. This episode is sponsored in part by What Was That Like podcast. Have you ever wondered how it feels to watch your house burn down, be attacked by an alligator, or learn that your spouse hired someone to kill you?
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What Was That Like is the podcast for you, if you're that person. Not the person who got hired to be killed, but the person who wondered, more thankfully. Real people come on every episode to explain the unbelievable situations they've been through. I think it's a funny concept for a show. I kind of wish I'd thought of it because I always get crazy stories from people.
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Not everything turns into a Jordan Harbinger episode. But What Was That Like? is hosted by my friend Scott Johnson, who's naturally curious and gives his guests the opportunity to share how they've really felt during some of their most surreal experiences. What they did in the morning before an earthquake, what song was playing as a gunman entered, was their stomach growling as they hid?
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Man, that's so intense. And it doesn't matter how much money you have, how safe your neighborhood is, how nice your car is. It's nothing. It's nothing compared to nature. One of my friends, I said, how are you doing? He's like, I'm trying to find... My house is still there. Our friend Kevin Rose lost his house.
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Guests share everything they remember about their crazy, crazy experiences. So if you want to hear some disturbing slash inspiring firsthand stories about the thoughts that go through your head while surviving a kidnapping or winning the Price is Right, What Was That Like? is the podcast you've been looking for.
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Every story is thoroughly researched and fact-checked so you know even the most unreal stories are actually someone's reality. Listen to What Was That Like? wherever you get your podcasts.
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And he's like, yeah, well, I'm trying to find someone who will go to my house, like drive through the Palisades fire, go to his house. get a pump, shove the hose in his pool and try to save his house. I don't know if he succeeded. I'm afraid to check in with some of my friends because I don't want to be the 100th person today being like, is your house still there?
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I doubt that he managed to do that on short notice using his phone. It just seems like an impossible task. It's just crazy.
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By the way, those photos of the cars left on the side of the road on Sunset Boulevard, these bulldozers had to push them out of the way to create a fire lane for the firefighters. And that was one of the most haunting images that I've ever seen. This is like a scene from The Last of Us or something.
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Just imagine everybody getting out of their cars to run from the pandemic or the aliens or whatever, and the military just bulldozes them out of the way so they get emergency vehicles through. It's absolutely nuts. Tell me about it, dude.
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1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Welcome to Feedback Friday. I'm your host, Jordan Harbinger. As always, I'm here with Feedback Friday producer, my co-conspirator and consultation, cutting through these cosmic life conundra, Gabriel Mizrahi. On the Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the stories, secrets, and skills of the world's most fascinating people.
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It's surreal. Our brains are not wrapped around this level of discomfort and emergency here in the United States. So you're okay. I know a lot of our listeners have reached out asking. The subreddit had multiple threads asking if we were okay, especially you.
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This episode sponsored by Jasper air filter. No, truly.
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It's gotta be like 200 level. That Jasper would be coughing if it was over there right now. Yeah.
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I can only imagine. I'm curious to see what the recovery process is going to look like for LA, how many years it's going to take to rebuild. Do people even want to rebuild, knowing what can happen in these places? How are the insurance companies going to pay out? And also, the permitting process in LA is a nightmare.
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Are they going to speed that up at all, or is it just going to take 15 years for people to rebuild their house?
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1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Yeah, I'm afraid. And I also think heads are going to roll. And L.A. is definitely getting a new mayor. I mean, bye bye career after cutting the fire budget and then being abroad when the fire started after saying you weren't going to go abroad. Good. Not a great look. Bye bye job. And maybe we'll get a new governor as well. But we'll see.
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Sorry, I'm just laughing at the guy who said I looked like a middle-aged lesbian with my new haircut.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
I don't really follow local politics, especially down there, but it doesn't seem like this was well managed. And I think there was an interview I saw where somebody asked her a question, like, what are you going to do about this? And she just paused and stared at the wall. And I was like, you are finished.
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I don't know what to make of that. That was the opposite of a person you want in a crisis is somebody who has fight, flight, or freeze and just freezes. Yeah. It's like, hey, man, this is the easy part. You're answering questions for journalists. This isn't like real work, pal. You need to get on it. So, OK, we're going to get to the letters here in just a second.
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1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
But any big takeaways from this experience so far or is everybody just in survival mode right now?
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For sure. I mean, look, LA was always a crazy place to build a city in the first place, but if you're going to have a city there, it's got to be done responsibly. And that just does not seem to be what happened at all.
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Yeah. I don't even know, actually. It was just somebody who was trying to be a jerk on my Instagram profile, and I just thought, wow, that was actually really funny. He was annoyed that I found it funny instead of insulting, but whatever. That's his problem. I do love that our fans are roasting you a little bit. No, I think this is actually an un-fan. Who cares? Whatever.
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1104: Rich Abuser Admits Crime But Won't Spare a Dime | Feedback Friday
Right. Or that delusion. I imagine it's kind of like how New York felt after 9-11. They're very different tragedies, of course, very different. But that feeling of vulnerability and then what it brings out of people, it's just it's powerful.
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Not to be a wet blanket, but I'm curious how long that lasts in LA.
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That's the cultural equivalent of when you go to Europe or Argentina and you're like, I kiss people on the cheek now. And then for a month you're doing that. You're trying to force it among your friend circle and everyone's like, what are you doing? We're not kissing. We don't kiss. This is America.
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So look, I don't want to, again, I don't want to be a sourpuss, but it's just one of those things that these events bring people together and then eventually people treat each other like crap again in cities. That's just how it rolls out. I hope not. Look, I I don't know about you, but I'm looking at a lot of this and I'm thinking you are not your stuff.
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I'm sure a big component of this is just numbing the pain he's in, given his childhood, his experiences in prison, all that. But you're working out something on your own too, right?
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When you said that you might have to leave Adam for your own good, but you're not willing to give up on him just yet, that you feel you could be really good together, Adam would fit in perfectly with your family, somewhere in there is the key. And I can't tell you exactly what it is, but my hunch is that there's some kind of enactment going on here.
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Whenever we stick with somebody who's troubled, who isn't putting in the work to work on their stuff, I think that's always a sign that there's something deeper at play. And it's almost always something that's just a lot older. In other words, your own childhood and early experiences are playing a big role here. And that can be true even if it's not one to one.
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For example, you don't have to have a parent who's an addict to explain why you're in a relationship with an addict now.
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But if, let's just say, you were always trying to fix a parent from a young age or a parent withheld love from you, or you got the message that you would only be loved when you prop somebody up or whatever, you're anxious about confronting a future without a partner, even one as chaotic as this. Look, I'm just naming a few common templates here.
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Then all of this could explain why you're staying in this relationship, what you're trying to master or work out through it. This is the work of untangling codependence. Anyway, I'm digging into all this, not so much to like diagnose you, which I obviously can't do. This is really for you to figure out for yourself.
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We covered North Korea, meth in North Korea, human trafficking, the way North Korea makes money for the state. Very different episode than the Drew Carey one, of course, but also equally interesting, especially if you're into geopolitics. On Fridays, though, we share stories, take listener letters, offer advice, play obnoxious soundbites, and compare Gabe to various high-end kitchen appliances.
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Really, I just want to encourage you to get a lot more curious about what's happening on your side of the equation, because this whole relationship contains... A ton of crucial information about you and the work that you need to do. You're asking a lot of questions about how to help Adam, how to respond to Adam, how to make Adam get help.
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Not so much about you and how you ended up here and where this need to rescue Adam is coming from in the first place. You need to be looking at both. No, I would not text him pictures to prove that you're not cheating. Of course he needs to learn to trust you. That's so weird that you're even thinking of doing that. I'm not trying to be insulting, but holy smokes, do you hear yourself?
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The thing is, I don't know if he's going to learn to trust you until A, he kicks the drugs that are making him paranoid or triggering that paranoia. B, he starts addressing his trauma and the root of this fear that you're constantly cheating on him.
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And C, finds out what it's like to sit with the feeling of trusting you when he's sober and confronting this pattern and the paranoia and the distress. That's basically the process.
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And yeah, a lot of that should probably happen in therapy, and you can't make him go to that either, just like you can't make him go to rehab or attend a 12-step meeting or do anything, really, which is the conclusion that you're heading toward. But therapy isn't the only place to begin working on this stuff. There are so many people and resources out there if you really wanted to get help.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
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I appreciate that she's trying not to invalidate or dismiss him, and being told you're crazy is never easy, but the fact is, yo, he's acting pretty nuts.
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1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
Yeah, I don't know.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
Or just kitchen appliances in general, I don't know. Toaster of yesteryear, not exactly something to write home about. Before we dive in, I gotta tell you, I just started jumping rope. It's kind of awesome.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
I'm with you. His resistance, his shame, his self-concepts, They're too great right now for him to go, holy cow, I need help. That is why many addicts have to hit what they call rock bottom or several rock bottoms, because those are the moments that shock a person into going, oh, OK, I'm in trouble. I can't deny it anymore. I need to face things. And those moments are profound.
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He just might not be there yet.
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1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
Yeah, I discovered something that all children know about. Yeah, I was never good at it as a kid because I was just out of shape. I was a normal Midwest couch potato growing up. And I decided to jump rope. And day one, I was like, this is so difficult. I do not want to do this. And on day two, I realized that the workout I did on day one that I really couldn't even barely finish was too easy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
Yes, Al-Anon also talks a lot about cleaning up your side of the street, which means focusing on your behavior, your thoughts, your healing, not the addicts, which again, you're already starting to do. And you deserve a lot of credit for realizing that on your own. But you and Adam are still very wrapped up in one another.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
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For sure. I've actually been to a few myself. This meeting, it's going to give you some great tools to respond to Adam. It'll give you a new lens on your relationship, and it'll put you in touch with other people who are dealing with the exact same thing. It's powerful. Please check out this meeting. You can even drop into a virtual one to start and see how it goes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
they really can change the game for you. I went just for an awareness sake. Some guys from my company were like, hey, check these things out. And I was like, all right, fine. I went with a friend and I was like, oh, I get it. Okay, now when I recommend this, I'm not just talking about something I read about on the internet. Look, candidly, I'm very concerned about you staying in this relationship.
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I'm touched that you care about this guy. I'm sure there are some objectively sweet and meaningful things about your relationship, or you wouldn't care so much. This guy is beyond lucky to have you on his team. He deserves love and support, but not at your expense.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
You have enough information now to know how Adam operates, how serious he is about getting better, so it's time to start considering whether this relationship is truly healthy and sustainable. I'm going to be very blunt with you. I think it would be unwise and potentially quite dangerous to stick around if he doesn't take steps to getting better very soon.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
And parting ways with Adam, hey, it doesn't necessarily mean it's the end of the road. That might be what forces him to seek treatment. Although I want you to be very thoughtful about how you leave if that's what you decide to do because Adam, look, he's unstable. He's potentially violent. And again, I'm worried about you. Come up with a plan. Find a friend who can help you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
Make sure you're safe because this might be messy. The bottom line is time to come back to your side of the street. If you do that, you'll know what to do. Sending you a big hug and wishing you all the best. Man, this is a tough situation. You really are watching somebody you love just flush themselves down the drain and you can't stop them.
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And now grab your mirror and razor blades because we're about to chop up some pure, unadulterated deals and discounts on the fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back. This episode is sponsored in part by Airbnb. I gotta give a shout out to Brian McDonald, who listened to the show and absolutely hooked me up in Vietnam recently.
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Brian runs A Taste of Hanoi, and I had this layover in Hanoi, and he's like, I got you, set me up with one of his guides for a motorbike food tour in Hanoi, which was awesome. Now, if you've never been in the back of a motorbike in Vietnam, it's something, man.
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You're weaving through scooters and traffic like a video game where you can actually die, and then all of a sudden, we're inside someone's house, literally inside. We rode the motorbike. I'll tell you, the guide pulls you to what looks like an alley, okay?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
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but it turns into a hallway and then he turns around, grins and goes, okay, put your hands on my shoulders, duck your head down, pull your knees all the way in. The next thing I know, we're riding through someone's living room, not even kidding, like actually someone's living room to get to this little courtyard kitchen where this auntie is making pho that'll just ruin your life.
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No pho will ever taste as good. And Vietnamese egg coffee upstairs on the balcony. I don't even know how to describe it. It's like tiramisu and espresso had a beautiful caffeinated baby. Short trip, chaotic, absolutely incredible. And I can't wait to go back and bring Jen next time because I know she's going to love it. And next time, we'll put our place on Airbnb to help fund the adventure.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
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That's how fast I started to progress in this. Day three is like the same. It's like, oh, I'm going to do five minutes instead of two minutes. It was crazy. And it's wild how fast your body adapts. Yeah, sure. Maybe I was a little tired on the first day or something, but it's absolutely bonkers how fast you get better at this. And it doesn't have to be brutal. It wasn't like I'm not heaving.
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You can too. Airbnb makes it super practical, it doesn't take a lot of effort, you set it up before you leave, and then boom, your house is earning money while you're on vacation and making memories. Your home might be worth more than you think. Find out how much at Airbnb.com slash host. This episode is also sponsored by BetterHelp.
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Therapy used to be this thing people only talked about in a whisper. Thank you. Whether you're dealing with stress, relationship stuff, you're just trying to become a better version of yourself, there is a therapist for you. And if you don't vibe with the first person you match with, no awkward conversations, switch therapists anytime, no extra cost.
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Over 5 million people have used BetterHelp, and for good reason. This Mental Health Awareness Month, let's keep pushing to normalize, get in support when we need it, because the world's a better place when we're all a little more self-aware, a little more grounded, and a lot less afraid to ask for help.
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Thank you for listening and supporting the show. It is your support of our advertisers that keeps us going. All of the deals and discounts and ways to support the show. To learn more and really rub those great discounts into your gums, visit JordanHarbinger.com slash deals. Please consider supporting those who support the show. Now, back to Feedback Friday.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
Yikes. Yeah, this is tough. I feel for you. It's a position I imagine most managers find themselves in from time to time, stuck between doing right by their people and doing right by the company. And management not being very thoughtful about how good news, like this $15 million over plan thing, how that's going to square with doing a huge round of layoffs in three months.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
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I don't feel like barfing afterwards. I really encourage you all to give it a try because There's so many people out there that are like, oh, I need to improve my cardiovascular health, but running sucks, and I don't have a pool to swim in, whatever. Just try jumping rope. You just need cheap PVC jump rope. They don't kink. They travel well. They're super cheap.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
And then you're left holding the bag emotionally. The fact that this is eating you up inside, that you want to take care of your people, I think that says a lot about you. A lot of good things. He's a good dude.
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Yeah, it would be easier to do what most middle managers do, which is basically just turn off your emotions, say whatever you got to say, hide behind the idea that you're just doing my job. So your struggle here, I think it's a sign of your character. But here's how I'd approach this. First off, I think it's important to remember that you didn't create this situation. You are just managing it.
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Is that fair? No. Is that the reality of the world we live in? Yes. Like you said, your company is signing your paychecks. You signed a confidentiality agreement. It sucks, but that is how the game works. Also, you described what you and your company are doing as shadiness. And yeah, I can understand why, but all companies need to make certain decisions with a degree of secrecy.
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So yeah, it sucks that they're saying, yay, we're killing it. Go tell your team and then quietly putting in place an offshoring strategy that's going to cut half the jobs. But also companies are allowed to do this. They might need to do it in order to satisfy shareholders and all that. And yes, we can complain about the system, but that's not what we're talking about here in this question.
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So I would be clear about what piece of this is yours and what piece of this isn't yours. It's not on you to toss and turn every night because of your company's decisions. But that doesn't let you off the hook for treating your people well through all of this.
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So when your employees ask you tough questions, I would still try to be as honest and empathetic as possible within the limits of your role and that confidentiality agreement. I wouldn't take your favorite people aside and say like, hey, listen, guys, shit's about to hit the fan. Go dust off your resume. But if people ask you, hey, is our plant safe? Are we in trouble?
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Maybe you have to say, look, I understand the concern. There's always a degree of uncertainty in every company. At this moment, there's no big news that I can share, but I'm always here to support you in any way that I can. Something like that. I know it's a little awkward, but look, it's true. You're not spilling the beans, but you're not lying either.
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And you're acknowledging the uncertainty and tension instead of telling your own version of the lie, which is, hey, everything's hunky-dory. It's going to be fine. Don't worry. And then just body slamming everybody without warning.
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And maybe that's his way of taking care of his people while still towing the party line.
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And even the ones that aren't cheap that are really good, you can grab one of those. It's going to last you for the rest of your life. Get a custom length one if you find that they're too long or too short for you, if you got that sort of weird body type like I do. I think it's just a game changer. I had a health exam recently and my resting heart rate was quote unquote too low.
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I'm not saying he shouldn't be thoughtful about how he delivers this. But if his employees do pick up on something and word spreads about layoffs and his bosses come to him like, what the hell, man? Did you tell your people what's happening? He's going to want to be able to say, absolutely not. They asked me if everything's OK. I didn't reveal any details.
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I feel like that should be his guide here, what he would want to be able to defend if he had to. The other thing I would do is keep investing in your relationships. Even if you can't tell your people what's coming, you can be a solid leader. You can be a supportive colleague. You can listen to your team's concerns. You can advocate for them where you're able. You can help them build new skills.
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You can give them endorsements and recommendations. You can subtly prepare them for what is next.
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Exactly. The way you treat these people in a time of uncertainty, that's what they're going to remember, not just the fact that you were on the other side of the table. And while you do that, keep investing in your relationships outside the company, too, because you never know what's coming. Not to make you even more anxious, but you're seeing how a big company operates.
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There might be a world where you're looking for a job down the line as well, maybe just not in the next 90 days. Everything you'd hope your subordinates are doing without you telling them, I would do that yourself and create your own safety net. And after that, you have to accept there's a lot you don't control, including people's feelings. Some people on your team might still be upset.
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Some of them might feel betrayed, no matter how well you handle this. And you might be the obvious target. You're going to have to tolerate all of that and then forgive yourself. Not because you did something wrong, but because this is part of being a leader in a complicated situation.
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And your empathy, your thoughtfulness, your communication style, all of those are going to be real crucial skills here. So hold on to those. And hey, man, I'm sorry this is happening, but I'm also happy that you get to build some new muscles as a leader. It's good experience. It won't be the last time you have to walk this line. We're rooting for you and your team. Good luck.
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You can reach us Friday at JordanHarbinger.com. Please keep your emails concise. Try to use descriptive subject lines. That makes our job a lot easier.
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If you're finding dead squirrels in the mailbox, your stepdad's got your nudes, your neighbor's are eavesdropping on your therapy sessions through the wall, or your friend ruined your girl's trip by obsessing about food and reading every restaurant menu she could get her hands on, whatever's got you staying up at night lately, hit us up Friday at JordanHarbinger.com.
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And they're like, oh, this is bad unless you're athletic. And I was like, I'm athletic. And I thought, huh, I wonder how low I can get my heart rate because I don't run. I don't really do any of that stuff. I get cardio during my workouts just from other things. And I thought, what if I just did something cardio specific?
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It's about a two-minute read, nothing too involved. You can sign up at jordanharbinger.com slash news.
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Great question and something so many people, all of us at some point or another, struggle with. You're not alone there. So first of all, you sound like a really solid friend. You obviously care a lot about this person. You're kind, you're loyal, you're generous with your time and energy. Your friend is very lucky to have you in their life.
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At the same time, though, this friendship is clearly taking a toll on you. This is a lot for anyone to take on. And the role you've been playing for this person, whether it's necessary or not, warranted or not, I think you know that it's unsustainable. I also think deep down that something isn't quite right here. Yes, 90% of these crises are legitimately beyond their control.
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Like you said, although candidly, I have my doubts about that. Not that somebody can't be the victim of objectively crappy luck or go through multiple hardships at once. Of course they can. But if someone's going from serious crisis to serious crisis for literally years, And it's always like a life or death situation.
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is kind of like a fat burn every day or five days a week, and this is what I chose. And I'm really interested to see how over time this works for your heart. The other thing that jumping rope does is it's good for bone density.
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I think there's usually something else going on, something they can probably control, at least partly. And if it's not in preventing the crisis itself, then it's in managing it or responding to it in a way that's more helpful.
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Yes, but let's put that aside for a moment. Let's assume that this person really is the victim of objectively bad luck, stuff they have zero control over. I would still argue that something isn't quite right here.
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Either this person is depending on you for far too much, asking far too much of you, and or you are taking on far too much for this person, taking on their own crises personally at your own expense. I'm going to guess it's a little bit of both. So let's talk about boundaries for a second.
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You obviously understand the concept, you say you agree with the idea in principle, but in your view, the idea of having boundaries, it sounds like it's black and white, rigid, simplistic, basically leave your friend to solve their own problems or dive in with both feet. That's not exactly what boundaries mean in practice.
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What boundaries actually allow you to do is be there for people without compromising yourself. to support them without losing yourself, to leave enough room in the relationship for them to still have agency, to not rob them of the opportunity to solve their own problems and manage their own lives. Having boundaries doesn't mean abandoning a person when they're struggling.
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You're not watching them drown and going, should've packed some floaties, bye. Having boundaries and managing those boundaries well, which is just as important, it's about being in a situation with somebody and not confusing yourself with them or taking on the situation yourself.
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Most of us don't think about, but hey, I'm 45 and I'm a guy, my bone density, according to my DEXA scans, went down just a very minute, almost imperceptible amount that could actually be statistical noise. But they were like, eh, just in case it's not, you should jump rope. And that was another reason why I picked this.
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My sense, just based on what you've shared with us, is that you feel boundaries are very blunt, they're very cut and dried, that they're about cutting yourself off from people or cutting yourself off from your feelings about them. But I would argue that's not really what good boundaries are about.
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Yes, exactly. You need that line to be in a truly intimate, high-functioning relationship with someone.
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Yeah, I mean, it is a fair question. How do you learn to stop doing that? Because for some people, that's really hard. I think it's really hard for her.
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So especially if you're a female and you might end up with the whole osteoporosis type stuff, jumping rope is even better for you for that reason too. So even if you don't need cardio, jumping rope is good for bone density and that is something that all of us need. And if you're young, Build that bone density while you can.
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Also, you might find that distress isn't actually as bad as you think, or it is bad, but it's survivable. And it's not actually a sign you need to be responsible for this person. It's just a part of your conditioning. Also, you don't know if this person would actually hurt themselves. If they're not suicidal, then this is just your mind going to the worst case scenario.
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If they ever did hurt themselves, then it's time to embrace another difficult truth, which is that you are not responsible for keeping anyone else alive. Full stop. And the moment you feel that you are, that's a sign that you have to take a step back and remember what's yours and what's theirs and how this dynamic got created in the first place.
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Yeah.
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1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
Yes, which kind of brings me back to my original point, which was, I think there's a good chance that your friend is not showing up to their life in the best possible way. I have a ton of compassion for anyone who's struggling, but if it's true that your template is taking on other people's stuff, I think it's likely that you're finding people who are looking for people to take on their stuff.
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1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
I'm not saying they don't need help. I'm not saying they don't deserve help. I'm saying a high functioning relationship is when both parties have a good grasp of what that help should look like, where to find it, how to make the best use of it. So that's where I'd focus. This is not about cutting and running.
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This is about putting yourself in the right relation to this person and inviting them to do the same, not so you can be more distant, but so that you can be sustainably close. Good luck. And now, enmesh yo self in the deals and discounts on the fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back. This episode is sponsored in part by Audible.
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People always ask me how I manage to get through so much content, especially since I prep for every interview. I'm talking two to three books a week, and it's all thanks to Audible. I've got Audible in my ears while I'm getting my 10,000 steps in, running errands, even doing stuff around the house. I don't mess with physical books anymore at all. Audible's just way more efficient.
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Because right now, once you get to a certain age, you're just staving off the inevitable instead of rebuilding it at a fast rate. So jump rope. And hey, if you do it, let me know how it's going for you, especially if you do blood work or you measure your heart rate, stuff like that. I'm curious. how this goes. I looked up advanced workouts and they all involve coordination that I can't do.
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I listen on two or even three X speed, which lets me cover a lot of ground without sacrificing quality. Right now, I'm listening to Good Inside by Dr. Becky Kennedy. She's got this really down-to-earth way of talking about parenting that is not preachy. And here's what a lot of people don't realize. Audible is not just audiobooks anymore.
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You get access to thousands of titles with your membership, podcasts, Audible Originals, and cool stuff like their Words in Music series where artists tell their stories in their own words. The variety makes the membership way more valuable, so you never run out of great stuff to check out. One day, I'm deep in a parenting guide. The next, it's a podcast or a spy thriller.
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So whether you're into suspense, self-development, or you just want to make traffic suck less, Audible's got you covered.
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This episode is sponsored in part by The Defender. You ever meet somebody and instantly know they've been places, that calm and chaos, I've driven through a storm and found the sunrise kind of energy? That's The Defender in vehicle form. It's not just a car, it's a statement. And nod to the ones who don't wait around for life to hand them an adventure, they go and get it.
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To learn more, visit DestinationDefenderUSA.com. I've got homes.com as a sponsor for this episode. Homes.com knows when it comes to home shopping, it's never just about the house or the condo. It's about the homes. And what makes a home is more than just the house or property. It's the location. It's the neighborhood. If you've got kids, it's also schools, nearby parks, transportation options.
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If you liked this episode of Feedback Friday and you found our advice valuable, I invite you to do what other smart and considerate listeners do, which is take a moment and support our amazing sponsors. All of the deals, discounts, and ways to support the show are all searchable and clickable over at jordanharbinger.com slash deals.
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If that doesn't work, you can always email me, jordan at jordanharbinger.com. We're happy to dig up codes for you over here. It is that important that you support those who support the show. All right, back to Feedback Friday.
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1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
Oh, try triple unders and double unders. I'm like, okay. And let's try this where you skip from one foot to the other and then you switch hands with the rope. And I'm like, okay, they're giving me a little bit too much credit here. I can barely do this without stopping every 10 seconds because I hit myself in the foot or the head. That's where we're at coordination wise.
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1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
Another great question. So first of all, I'm very sorry to hear that your company's been through this turmoil recently. Layoffs are stressful, they're ugly, and as you know, they can create a lot of chaos, a lot of uncertainty. I'm glad you made it through, though, especially since your husband's between jobs. That's a gift, so let's just take a moment and be grateful for that.
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The bright spot in all this is... First of all, your company on some level must have trusted you to do this new role or they wouldn't have put you in it. So that's already a vote of confidence. And even if procurement isn't what you want to be doing, that's a great learning opportunity. You're going to be thrown into the deep end. You're being exposed to another part of the business.
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You're meeting new people. You're learning a new language and skill set. And it's really that's terrific. I have a feeling that once you're in your new role here or somewhere else, you're weirdly going to look back on this chapter and go, man, that was weird, but I learned a ton and I have more to offer now. So try to keep that in mind when things get stressful. This is how you grow.
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Anyway, we got some fun ones. We got some doozies. Gabe, what is the first thing out of the mailbag?
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1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
But the thing about growth is it always comes with some degree of imposter syndrome, always, because you can't grow if you're not being stretched and you can't be stretched if you're not doing things you don't know how to do yet. So this fraudulence you feel, it's stressful, it's unpleasant, it's a little scary. I totally get it. It's also a symptom of being challenged.
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And it's not necessarily a sign that you're failing. Even high performers feel like frauds a lot of the time. In fact, they usually feel it the most because they're usually pushing themselves beyond their current abilities. So the question isn't, how do I get rid of this imposterism? The question is, how do I work with it? And how do I succeed even when I don't quite know what I'm doing?
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So let's get tactical for a second. The first thing you got to do, you got to really embrace what I just said and make peace with the fact that you don't entirely know what you're doing and just trust that's okay. Like I said, your company put you here. So my guess is they understand there's going to be a steep learning curve.
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But even if they didn't, you personally need to give yourself some time and some grace as you learn this new lingo and skill set and perspective, which also includes just giving yourself some time. I think you're going to be shocked by what you can handle in another month or two.
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Now, I know you're overwhelmed right now, you're drowning a little bit, and I get it, these transitions, they can be a lot. Part of this is just being willing to hang in there and tolerate the intensity of this learning curve until you get a handle on things. But you can also do a few things that'll help. One of them is finding one or two safe people on your team you can turn to when you're lost.
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I would find a colleague who's cool and generous and isn't going to hold it against you when you don't know what you're doing and go to them when you're like, what does tailspin mean again? How do you create a procure to pay process? And if you're wondering how I know those procurement terms, I did just Google it and I did just use the only two examples I understood.
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I'm definitely not studying Gabe's former management consultant face to see if I'm totally out of my depth right now.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
Welcome to Feedback Friday. I'm your host, Jordan Harbinger. As always, I'm here with Feedback Friday producer, the toaster going ding as this sweet loaf of crispy life advice pops on up. Gabriel Mizrahi. That's a breville. That was a breville sound.
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Passing as a corporate person with a consultant is like pulling off a magic trick for another magician. Double compliment right there. The point is, sometimes all you need is one or two peers to just get up to speed on stuff. But... I would be thoughtful about how you use these folks. I would not pepper them with 37 questions throughout the day.
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I wouldn't ask them questions that you can answer yourself or at least start to answer. I would develop a few key habits, like batching your questions, and then when you can grab 10 minutes with your friend, you just run through them all in one go. Using ChatGPT or Google to answer your questions, trying to learn as much as you can on your own.
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I have a feeling AI would be an amazing tool to help you grow right now, especially when it comes to just learning the lingo, developing basic skills. You could literally type, explain the procure to pay process to me like I'm five years old. maybe 10 years old, and it'll probably explain it perfectly. It might even be able to do part of your work for you, which is kind of wild. Welcome to 2025.
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At a minimum, it'll be a great first step when you are totally lost. And then if you still need somebody to help you, you won't be going, hey, can you explain this entire concept to me from first principles? So I read up on this concept. I get the gist of it, but I just need to ask you a couple of questions so I can finish this deck. Very different conversation.
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asking for help without becoming a burden. There's an art to that. These folks are going to appreciate your resourcefulness, your thoughtfulness, and that's going to make them want to help you even more.
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Exactly. She has so much to gain by kicking butt in this department, even if she decides she hates the work and she wants to leave. Although it's funny when you start doing well at something, it gets way more fun. So who knows? Maybe you'll surprise yourself. Maybe you're in the middle of building this unexpected talent stack, which is HR plus procurement plus organizational change.
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Maybe in six months, you'll be the expert on how to help companies manage all the transformation around changing their vendor contracts or whatever. That is so valuable, especially if you tell that story well. And the cool thing about a talent stack, I've talked about this before, it doesn't require you to be a rock star in every layer of the stack.
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You just need to be moderately good at all of them. And then the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. So that's how I'd handle being a genuine imposter. That sort of healthy fraudulence Gabe mentioned a moment ago, that's a very different kind of imposterism from the, oh crap, I have zero clue what I'm doing. I should not be here. I'm actually doing damage by being in this role.
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You can overcome that imposterism too, but it's different from just having to fill in some gaps in order to do the job. I also want you to check out the deep dive we did on imposter syndrome. It's a great crash course on how to overcome this stuff in a bunch of interviews and feedback Fridays we've done on this topic. We're going to link to all those in the show notes for you. You've got this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
We're rooting for you. Good luck. All right. Now for the recommendation of the week.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
My recommendation this week, Quest Protein Chips. Quest Nutrition is the company that makes them. Yes, they're protein chips. I know that's kind of weird, but they're essentially whey protein chips with flavor sprayed on them.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
It's true, though. Here's the thing. Protein snacks are usually gross. We're only a few years from when protein bars were the most disgusting thing you could put in your mouth. And now you've got really good protein bars, but now I'm kind of sick of them because it's all a variant of chocolate.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
And sometimes you want something savory and crunchy and you're like, oh crap, the only thing I have are Cheetos. Those aren't good for you. These protein chips are basically, yeah, it's like a flat whey protein thing with barbecues sprayed on it or ranch sprayed on it. And the flavors are good. So they're snackable even if you're like, I don't need more protein.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
They got 19 grams of protein per bag, which is pretty awesome. I recommend trying all the flavors. Most stores like Target carry some flavors, but not all. You can order them online. I really love these things. Jen loves these things. There's bags in the car. There's bags in her bag. There's bags in my office. I just feel like I do one a day and they're kind of guilt free, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
Because they're not loaded with fried trans fatty stuff. It's just more whey protein. So crunch your way to bigger biceps. I don't know.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
Get those gains, bro. You can't just jump rope. You got to feed those muscles too. Also, in case you don't know, there's a subreddit for our show. If you want to jump into discussions with other listeners about specific episodes or about your favorite flavor of Quest protein chips, that's over on the Jordan Harbinger subreddit.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
If you're a Redditor, just search for Jordan Harbinger and you'll find the subreddit right there. A lot of people from the show, a few thousand people in there. Really kind of a fun distraction. And we'll see you there. All right, next up.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
Yeah, that's a lot of change. I'm sorry you're hurting. Bay Area in me is going 500K for a starter home and that's considered expensive. I was about to say, damn, that sounds nice. But yeah, that's besides the point, I guess. I know it's all relative, but damn, yeah, you'd die if you saw what the housing market is like in Northern California. Holy smokes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
I want to start by saying I really feel for you, my friend. So many parents must feel the way you do. I think my parents felt this way to a certain degree. I was an only child, so you can imagine how strong that bond was. And there's a lot of grief in being a parent. I'm a dad of two young kids now.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
There's already a lot of grief, happy grief, but grief nonetheless, just in watching them grow up so quickly. to raise two children, to support them, to have a certain vision for how their lives might look, how your relationship will look. And then for them to leave the nest and go a totally different way.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
Yeah, that could be very painful, especially when you've done things differently with your own parents. So my heart goes out to you. It really does. And I feel like I can't use that phrase anymore, Gabriel, because of the whole Elon thing. Wait, what is this? Oh, you didn't, you don't know about this? So you know about his quote unquote Nazi salute, whether it was a Nazi salute or not.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
So he put his hand on his heart and then he did like a controversial Nazi salute a little bit. Yeah. And people were like on his team or whatever were like, it was my heart goes out to you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
Yes, that's right. The Department of Government Efficiency doesn't want any more empathy and feedback.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
My heart actually does go out to her in a very non-controversial way. Nazi way. I don't know if there's a world where parents watch their children set sail without a healthy amount of sadness. That sadness is partly an expression of the love you feel for them. I get it. At the same time, I can also understand your kids' decisions.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
These practical things like being able to buy a home, they're important. I get it. And moving to another state, we don't have all the facts here, but maybe that's important to your children for other reasons. Maybe it's part of their individuation, their healthy separation. Maybe it's more aligned with their dreams.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
Maybe they need to go off and be their own people for a while before settling back in your home state or getting to a point where they can visit more often. So I really get both sides here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
Your best bet, in my view, is to make room for multiple feelings here, multiple perspectives, to hold this grief you feel alongside your acceptance of your children, your excitement for the lives they're building, your pride in their accomplishments, their independence, and to recognize that your children's goals and priorities are just as real and valid as yours are.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
Sometimes what makes our feelings painful is that they're the only feelings we're in touch with, the only ones we can identify with. But if you can empathize with your kids here a little more, all of this might hurt less. If you can do just that, even if your stance doesn't change, I think that'll help a lot, actually.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
I don't have to deal with this for another 12 plus years, maybe longer. I'm already kind of dreading it. Jen's dreading it too. She's, oh, one day she's not going to like me. When Juniper is like, mommy, I love you so much. I want to snuggle. She's like, oh, I love you. And I'm like, yeah, wait till she's 12. And she's like, I hate you. And Jen's like, no, don't tell me that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
Wait, wait, wait. Hold on. Confusing. Yeah. How does eating a bunch of ice cream or coming back quickly from lunch mean you're cheating? I don't get it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
Yeah, I see that. To be fair, I don't think she's trying to do that. In fact, she's trying to do the opposite to keep her grief at bay. But yeah, I take your point.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
No, it's a fair point. I think as a parent, I'm a little more compassionate to our friend here, but I'm taking in what you're saying. And I'm thinking about how I want to be when Jaden and Juniper go off to college, move out, travel the world, whatever they decide to do. And I think the answer is I want to be more excited and proud of them than sad and resentful that they're going away.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
Maybe he's outing himself here like, aha, you must be seeing another two-pump jump because nobody can eat a burrito that fast.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
Or at least I want to be able to hold both. She's working with another assumption here that I think we need to touch on, which is the idea that seeing someone only for a few days a year doesn't feel like family. She feels cheated. Again, I can appreciate why she feels that way.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
I don't know any normal parent who wants less time with their kids, but it also sounds to me like her definition of family is very narrow, very rigid. If they don't have a ton of contact, they're not really family.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
She's clinging to one definition of what family is. And to your point, Gabe, that is preventing her from having a full relationship with her kids, even when they live in separate places, which let's acknowledge is totally doable. It's different. It requires more work, but it is doable.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
Good question, something I would definitely encourage her to consider. Also, the way she and her husband have cared for their parents is obviously playing a big role here. And that's another assumption I would encourage her to look at, whether her kids need to treat her and her husband the exact same way as they've treated their parents in order to truly love them or whatever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
Also, she and her husband are not in need of constant care yet. So she's getting upset about something that has not yet come to pass and is already holding that against her children. And if she wants her kids to care for her the way she did with her parents, she could be channeling that anxiety, in my opinion, in more productive ways.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
by having an open conversation with their daughter and soon their son, like, hey, look, guys, now that we're living in different states, we're a little anxious about who's going to look after us as we get older. We just want to know that when we get to that point, you're going to be there in some way, and it would really put us at ease if we could talk about it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
Exactly, exactly. If the rumors are true. Okay, so this guy is a little intense. Cocaine will do that to you. Or so I've heard. This is worrisome. This is weird. It's beyond just like the sort of mania that you get from being high.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
That would be one way to start the conversation. I like that. Or our friend and her husband could stay open to different situations. Like, for example, eventually moving to the state their children live in once their own parents are gone. I'm not saying they have to or that's even the right solution for them, but it is an option.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
Although I would also encourage you to talk to your kids about that because that's something you want them to want to. Not like, hey, I'm moving down the street and it's, oh, God, I moved two states away and now mom's moving down the street. There's other concerns here, potentially.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
Wow. Yeah, I think there's possibly some truth to that. And that's compatible with loving her children. But you're right. There are a few layers to this. The fact that she's in such distress is a sign that it's time to investigate these feelings more deeply. So the answer isn't to just get over this or move on emotionally. And I don't think you can just stop feeling let down or lie to yourself.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
Your better bet is to invite these feelings in, allow them, but get way more curious about them, which also means getting curious about the beliefs that underpin them. Because oftentimes, it's these beliefs that give rise to the feelings, and then they make the feelings even more intense. What I would be working toward is a way to enjoy as much of all of this as you can.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
Your kids can be independent and loving towards you. You and your husband can be largely on your own and cared for. Your family can be close and geographically spread apart. But the ands are only possible when you stay open. If you cling to your own ideas too strongly here, all you're going to get are ors. And creating ors, that's a good way to create more grief for yourself.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
Sending you, your husband, and your kids a big hug and wishing you all the best. Go back and check out the episodes with the one and only Drew Carey and Sean Williams on meth and human trafficking and making money for the regime in North Korea. Two very different, very interesting episodes for you to check out if you haven't done so yet.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
The best things that have happened in my life and business have come through my network, the circle of people I know, like, and trust. We did some business networking layoff question earlier today. I should have plugged sixminutenetworking.com. It's a free course. It's not schmoozy. It's not gross. You can find it on the Thinkific platform.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
This is the stuff I wish I knew 20 years ago, especially during my layoff from the whole legal industry thing. Dig that well before you get thirsty, folks. Build relationships before you need them. You can find the course again for free at 6minutenetworking.com. Show notes and transcripts are on the website. Advertisers, discounts, ways to support the show are at jordanharbinger.com slash deals.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
I'm at jordanharbinger on Twitter and Instagram. You can also connect with me on LinkedIn. Gabe's over on Instagram at Gabriel Mizrahi or on Twitter at Gabe Mizrahi. This show is created in association with Podcast One. My amazing team is Jen Harbinger, Jace Sanderson, Robert Fogarty, Ian Baird, Tata Sidlowskis, and of course, Gabriel Mizrahi. Our advice and opinions are our own.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
I am a lawyer, but I'm not your lawyer. Do your own research before implementing things you hear on the show. And remember, we rise by lifting others. Share the show with those you love. If you found the episode useful, please share it with somebody else who could use the advice we gave here today. In the meantime, I hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
And we'll see you next time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
Yeah, okay. So this guy is either incredibly insecure or the drugs are doing a number on his brain, which is kind of what drugs do, or probably a little bit of both.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
Yeah, I hear you. But man, count your lucky stars that you are not having a child with this guy. Just imagine how much worse this would be with a kid in the mix and you've got a cocaine addicted husband. Yeah, no.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
I would imagine a breville toaster is a digital.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
Oh, God. This is dark and this is scary. That is crazy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
Oh, what did we tell her to do, Gabe?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
Yeah, that pops up and you smell the burned crumbs that are in the bottom that have been in there for two months just getting roasted every time. The toaster of yesteryear. It is. On the Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the stories, secrets, and skills of the world's most fascinating people and turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
Solid advice. Okay. I think we crushed that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
Exactly.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
Let me stop you right there. Yeah. That is so sad because, bro, you are a junkie. So he's in denial slash ashamed of how bad this has actually gotten. Rehab doesn't turn you into a junkie, but he doesn't want to admit that he has a problem that's bad enough for rehab because doing so would be him admitting to himself that he is a junkie and needs help.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
Yeah, that's right. They try to make me go to rehab and I said, blow, blow, blow, blow, blow.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
That sounds like my kind of party these days, too.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
Exactly. A jump rope and some spindrift.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
It's what plants crave.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
Let me stop you once again. So not clean for two weeks. I just want to be clear about that. He's been clean for two weeks except for one relapse. So he's been clean for X number of days. That's all that means.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
But that was last week. Fine. It was on Sunday. So technically this week, but it was like several days ago.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
Our mission is to help you become a better informed, more critical thinker. And during the week, we have long form conversations with a variety of incredible people from former jihadis and drug traffickers, astronauts, tech luminaries. This week, we had comedian and game show host Drew Carey. We talked about his career, the Price is Right.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
Boy, okay. Wow. It goes without saying, I'm very sorry that Adam is caught up in this addiction. I'm sorry for the impact it's had on you. Being in a relationship with somebody in active addiction, any kind of relationship, it's really tough. You know this. It's upsetting. It's chaotic. It's dysfunctional. It's scary. Sometimes it literally doesn't even make sense.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
And I'm just very sorry that you've had to deal with all this, that Adam has put you through this. So there's a lot we could talk about here, but let me try to cut to the chase here. You are in a relationship with an addict who has what sounds like serious trauma and some pretty severe mental health stuff on top of all that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
So the cocaine use is concerning, though, but I'm actually very concerned about the paranoia. What you're describing, it sounds like more than your garden variety drug induced paranoia. Gabe, look, I'm not going to pretend I don't know anybody who's used cocaine a lot.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
You either have to do just a ton of it for a long time to do that to your brain, or it has to bring out something that was already there that doesn't show up unless you're blown out of your mind.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
Yeah, look, people do cocaine at parties and they don't go, I can't go home because there's cars following me. They don't do that. He's got to buy a gun. Come on. This is serious, man. Look, it might just be the drugs. OK, there might be a paranoid slash delusional quality to whatever mental health stuff he has going on as well.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
Or he might be experiencing something even more severe like psychosis, which can be brought on by drug use. And it's also violent. That's what worries me the most. Yeah, that freaks me out. I mean, you hear yourself, right? He wants to buy a gun. He's calling you hundreds of times, even if you're exaggerating what it's dozens and dozens of times at four o'clock in the morning.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
He can't stay clean for two whole weeks. He's threatening to hold men that you talk to at knife point to find out if they've been cheating with you. How's that going to go down? What if he's hopped up on cocaine, somebody decides that this guy's trying to kill them, and they get in a fight, and he ends up stabbing and killing someone?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
I asked him a lot of kind of crazy Price is Right questions. Has anyone cheated? What's the trick? There's a lot of fun stories about that. Actually, we laughed a lot during this episode. No big surprise. He's got a ton of stories that he's volunteered regularly. It was a really fun conversation. We also had Sean Williams on. He's a journalist.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
Or I hate to even imagine this, I know he hasn't done anything like this before as far as we know, but who's to say he's not gonna snap and get violent with our friend here who's writing it?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
Yeah, especially if he continues to decompensate. I mean, it's not that big of a jump from cars are following me and you're cheating on me to you are the one who's arranging the cars to follow me and you're trying to kill me. Okay, that's not that big of a leap. There's just so many red flags here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
And the point is there's no indication whatsoever that he's serious about addressing this stuff, about getting sober. I know you know that. What I get the sense you aren't fully aware of is this complicated dynamic that's developed between the two of you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
Where Adam goes off the rails, pardon the pun, and you respond by managing his anger and his paranoia and reassuring him and letting him go through your phone and pushing him to get help, forgiving him, holding out hope that he'll improve. Now, to be fair, you have made some important adjustments, okay? I really commend you for that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
These new boundaries, your ground rules, making sure you're taking basic care of yourself, all of that is super helpful. It's important, so that's great. But it doesn't change the fact that Adam is in serious trouble and that you're left managing and holding a lot of his anxiety and pain, that this whole situation is all kinds of dysfunctional.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1155: Love Could Be Dandy If He'd Quit the Nose Candy | Feedback Friday
What I want to encourage you to start appreciating is that you're both getting something out of this situation, or more to the point, you're both working something out. Like you said, when you met, you guys just clicked, but it's clear that your puzzle pieces fit together in ways that go beyond just basic chemistry. What Adam is working out, honestly, I'm not entirely sure.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Get started today at simplisafe.com slash jordan for 50% off your new system with professional monitoring and your first month free. Okay, next up. Okay.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
And our mission is to help you become a better informed, more critical thinker. We have long-form conversations with a variety of amazing folks. Former cult members, astronauts, cold case homicide investigators, Russian spies. This week we had Richard Reeves, president of the American Institute for Boys and Men, on the struggles that men are having these days.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Das heißt, sie ist traurig, wenn sie in die Therapie geht, dass sie nicht ein Polizist werden kann. Das scheint es zu sein, was er sagt, was nicht unbedingt wahr ist, aus meinem Verständnis. oder irgendeine andere Bedingung, wo man nicht institutionalisiert ist, wahrscheinlich nicht aufstehen wird. Und ich glaube nicht, dass Polizei-Departementen Medikamente von Kandidaten anbieten.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Ich bin mir nicht sicher. Ich glaube nicht, dass sie das ermöglichen. Aber sie machen обычно Kandidaten eine Psycho-Evaluierung, sodass irgendwelche Probleme der Psychiaterin während des Interviews visibel sein können.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Für mich, Mann, muss ich sagen, wenn du von der Polizei-Departementen nicht qualifiziert bist, weil du ein Krankheitsproblem hast, vielleicht solltest du von der Polizei-Departementen nicht qualifiziert sein, weil du ein Krankheitsproblem hast. Das könnte ein kontroverses Ausdruck sein, aber ich weiß nicht, Mann.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Ja, das ist eine lustige Art, es zu sagen. Er bedeutet, dass sie ein bisschen delusional darüber ist, vielleicht.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Das ist der Vibe, den ich bekomme. Es ist ein einfacher Weg, einfach zu sagen, ja, nein, das ist nicht eine Option für mich.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
I know a lot of people are probably going to say, what are you talking about? What about women? Turns out there's a massive gender gap. It's just actually the other way around. Hey Leute, ich bin dieses Sommer verheiratet und bin überrascht darüber. Ich liebe meine Freundin sehr und während unsere Beziehung weit von perfekt ist, sind wir aus unseren Schwierigkeiten stärker als vorher.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Man, this is a tough one. I really feel for all of you here. I'm sorry that your daughter struggles in some big ways, that she's clinging to the family nest. I'm sorry that you and your wife feel stuck and that you don't have a way of really talking to her about this. So just to state the obvious here, your daughter has some very challenging mental health stuff, perhaps debilitating.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
And my heart goes out to her for that. It really does. It also sounds like she's failed to individuate. And that's a real issue. Now, whether the OCD, the hoarding, the emotional stuff, whether that's caused her to stay at home and keep her life small, or whether failing to separate in a healthy way is contributing to all that, that's an interesting question.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
I'm guessing it's kind of a feedback loop. It also sounds, and look, man, I say this with love, that you and your wife have in some ways participated in this dynamic with your daughter. You've helped create the conditions for her to not have to separate.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Like you said, by not encouraging her to live on campus, for example, by allowing her to stay home for another five years, by cramping around certain topics when she doesn't want to talk about them, like therapy, by having these nightly unloading sessions.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Yes, it is fascinating. Look, on the one hand, it's sweet, right? They're close. She opens up to her parents. There's a real bond there. I'm glad she has them, at least. On the other hand, this nightly routine raises a lot of alarm bells for me. It does for me as well. I'm hearing a grown woman who's relying emotionally on her parents way too much. She's dumping on them a lot and more and more.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
How did he put it? Nightly she sits at the end of their bed and she just emotes. Emotes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
It is. And again, I have compassion for their daughter because she's clearly struggling. She's very isolated. She doesn't have any friends. Her parents are her whole world, her parents and her cat. But this is something you kind of might expect from like a 15-jährige Mädchen? Nicht mal. Viele 15-jährige Mädchen wollen nicht so viel mit ihren Eltern sprechen.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Ich stelle mir nur vor, dass Mutter und Vater sich gegen die Pillow sitzen in unheimlichem Gelächter, während ihre Tochter einen 90-Minuten-Rant macht, wie traurig sie ist, über ihren Boss am Arbeitstag, wie süß ihre Katze ist, welches Steroid der Katze für sein IBS ist oder was auch immer.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Und sie denken einfach nur, Mann, das ist schlecht, aber wir können nicht darüber sprechen, was hier wirklich los ist. Schau, ich meine nicht, dass ich hier nichts davon sage. Das sind alles legitime Dinge, über die man sprechen muss. Sie verdient offensichtlich Unterstützung.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Aber wenn du 27 Jahre alt bist und du machst das mit deinen Eltern jeden Abend für eine Weile, und sie ist deutlich traurig, das ist nicht das Leben, das sie will.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Ihr seid auch hier versteckt. Die Sache ist, dass deine Tochter das sehr schwierig macht. Sie schlägt auf Verteidigungen, Smokescreens, wirklich, links und rechts. Du sprichst über die Entfernung und sie ist so, oh, das ist mein sauberer Raum. Ich habe meinen Raum, Fluffy und Trixie sind im Hintergrund gebürtigt.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Ich mache euch eigentlich einen Vorteil, indem ich die Hausaufnahme mache, wenn ihr weg seid. You talk about going to therapy and she says, no way, I want to work for the sheriff's department one day. This is going to ruin my career, which again, not necessarily true, if that even is a real dream of hers. We're not even sure about that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Gabe, I'm kind of marveling at all the ways this young woman has found of not having to face her life and not having to work on herself. From the outside, it's so obvious. I just wonder how much she knows the corner that she's backed herself into.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Es ist wahrscheinlich ein bisschen beides, würde ich vorstellen. Aber es ist offensichtlich, dass die Grund, warum sie all das tut, ist, dass sie überrascht ist.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
They need to stop tap dancing around this. But how do you do that? I feel for these parents, it's a scary conversation to have.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Aber es ist nicht so. Ich verstehe es. Es wird ihr schmerzen, sie zu hören, aber sie sind auch schuldig, wenn sie spielen, obwohl ich verstehe, warum sie das machen. Richtig. Nein, absolut. Ich stimme dazu. Meine Angst ist, dass sie sie ermöglichen. Sie haben sie jahrelang ermöglicht. Für Gründe, die ich absolut verstehen kann. Aber fünf Jahre später. Zehn. Sie ist 37.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Sie lebt immer noch in ihrem Kindertagesstatt, weil der Kühlschrank immer gestockt ist. Und sie will nicht mehr als zehn Yarden von dort leben wollen, wo ihr Kindertagesstatt geboren ist. An welchem Punkt wird das regressiert? Und ist es ehrlich gesagt tragisch? Weil ich mich fürchte, dass das, wo es geht. Also kommt diese Konversation in einem oder anderen Weg.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
I thought it was telling when he said, it definitely pulls on my heart when she cries and I realized that we're not only her parents, but the closest thing she has to friends. That is objectively sad.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Whoever's doing the tugging, it almost doesn't matter. What matters is, can you guys allow yourselves to be sad, anxious, scared, whatever your daughter brings up for you, in order to help her grow? And my sense is that right now they can't actually do that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Das ist im Grunde die Botschaft. Aber dann ist die Frage, was passiert, wenn sie sich nicht engagieren lässt? Weil ich könnte sehen, dass ihre Tochter einen Schmerz darüber hat, oder sie sie auslässt, oder sie sich in ihrem Kindheitsabstand lockt und für eine Woche nicht rauskommt.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Right. And if she throws up the usual smoke screens, you got to have some responses ready. Maybe you tell her that talking to a therapist won't disqualify her from a career in law enforcement, not on its own anyway. And if she's like, I'm not going to therapy, I'm not that bad. Maybe say, honey, I think you're struggling in some profound ways. And that's okay. We understand.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
But it's very clear to us that you're dodging this because it's scary or embarrassing or just too overwhelming. And maybe you literally ask her, how do you want to handle all of this? Do you want to handle this? How do you see your life unfolding from here on out? Because I'm not sure this is it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Yeah, the reality where she's not doing a total 180 and throwing herself into getting better, but they're no longer colluding with her.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
At which point they might need to consider taking a stronger tack here. I do think there's a timeline where they lovingly push their daughter out of the nest. If six months go by, a year and nothing has changed, I think there's a point where they're allowed to say, hey, look, honey, we love you, but it's time for both of us
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Let's find you an apartment, let's find you a therapist and a psychiatrist, let's see what it's like for you to become a little more independent. And maybe she takes to that, maybe she doesn't, but that's not on you. She's 27 years old.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
This might be a situation where she's mad at you for a while and then one day she wakes up in her own apartment and feeds her cat and looks around and goes, oh, got it, I'm responsible for me. Wenn ich Freunde haben will, muss ich daran arbeiten. Wenn ich eine Karriere wechseln will, muss ich mich auf meine mentale Gesundheit konzentrieren. Ich muss anfangen, an Arbeit zu arbeiten.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Und das könnte der Anfang eines sehr tiefen Prozesses für sie sein. Und um klar zu sein, sage ich nicht, dass Sie sich nicht direkt auf sie aussteigen sollten. Ich denke, es ist eigentlich wichtig, dass sie sich liebt und unterstützt fühlt, auch wenn Sie ihr ein paar schwierige Nachrichten geben. Ich möchte nur, dass Sie sehen, dass Ihr Lieben hier ein paar verschiedene Formen nehmen kann.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Liebe ist nicht nur, wenn Sie auf dem Bett sitzen, während Ihr Kind sich emotiert.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Sometimes love means being firm, saying the uncomfortable thing, appropriately holding your child's feet to the fire, staying connected with them even when they're angry at you, and if you're unsuccessful, remembering that you and your wife are adults too with your own goals and needs, and at her age, you're allowed to factor in your own interests too.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
What the, that's psycho. That's not what I expected at all. Wow.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Let's not lose sight of the fact that your marriage is now suffering as a result of all this, which is an equally important symptom here, and something that you and your wife need to acknowledge as well. So, I wish you and your wife the courage to have these conversations with your daughter and I hope your daughter taps into her own courage and vulnerability to take it all in.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
This won't be easy, but it is obviously very necessary and it could be one of the best things to ever happen to all of you. And good luck. You can reach us friday at jordanharbinger.com. Keep your emails concise. Use descriptive subject lines. That makes our job a whole lot easier.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
If your friend violated their professional ethics by having an affair with an unstable patient, a skeezy businessman might be using the church next to your house to engage in human trafficking, or your 105-year-old great aunt has been hidden away by a dodgy family member. Whatever's got you staying up at night lately. And by the way, it doesn't have to be nearly as crazy as all that stuff.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
We like the boring questions too. Air quotes boring. Hi Gabe and Jordan. My fiance and I have been friends with another couple for approximately two years.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Okay, that's concerning. You're making me do math. I don't like it. Alright, how old was Mark when she was 14? So he's 9 years older, so he was 23 when she was 14. That's gross. Flying across the world to meet up with a 14-year-old girl you met online. That dude is lucky Chris Hansen wasn't waiting for him like, why don't you have a seat over there? This is bad. That is creepy illegal behavior.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Ja, okay. So it sounds like Homeland Security agreed that this was creepy too and they were like, hey, go back to Amsterdam, bro.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Okay, just to state the obvious, even if that's true, that doesn't make it okay. He's the adult, she was a child, she can't consent, she can't make moves on you. End of story. But man, it's so interesting that Mia pushes back on this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
So either she genuinely does not experience this as problematic, which this is creepy whether she feels it was or not, or she knows it was dodgy and she's just doubling down because she doesn't want to face it or get him into trouble.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
This is uncomfortable. So, Mark almost certainly groomed Mia when she was 14. I honestly can't imagine another explanation if they met online and he flew out to visit her at that age. It's not like they just happened to meet through mutual friends or family or whatever and then years later they took their relationship in a different direction. This is not Celine Dion.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Right, and her husband, although I don't know all the details there, so maybe it is. Although even that would raise eyebrows for me. This is very sus. And the fact that they told you guys a different version of events at first, and that Mark got deported? Come on! It tells me they know this all sounds so bad. In fact, it probably was.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
But as you're finding out, I'm not exactly sure what you're supposed to do about it. Mia ist jetzt ein Junge, legal gesagt. Sie will mit diesem Mann sein. Sie wird vielleicht von all dem verletzt. Wir wissen nicht, was ihr Erfahrung ist, was ihr in der Hand habt. Aber auf einem Niveau will sie mit diesem Mann bleiben, jetzt, dass sie 21 ist. Und ich denke nicht, dass jemand sie stoppen kann.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Was die Freundschaft mit ihnen betrifft, wenn du wirklich Sorgen hast über Mark, basierend auf dem, was er mit Mia damals tat, oder wie er sich jetzt verhält, And that doesn't feel like something you guys can talk about openly if you're not getting any indication that this is something he's worked through or is open to discussing with you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
And if that doesn't sit well with you, which it clearly doesn't, I would not stay in this friendship just because you don't have any other couples to hang out with. I hear you that it's hard to make couple friends, but it is not impossible. And I personally would not remain friends with a probable child predator just because it's slim pickings out there.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Besonders, weil ich nicht den Sinn bekomme, dass du und deine Freundin mit Marc und Mia Kopf über Hüllen sind. Vielleicht bist du es und du hast das einfach nicht in deinem Brief eingefügt. Es ist nicht so, als ob ihr ein Familie seid und ihr eine Art von Beziehung mit ihnen haben müsst und alles herausfinden müsst.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Ich höre nicht, dass Marc dieses wirklich tolle Freund ist, der dieses wunderschöne Ding vor einem langen Zeitpunkt gemacht hat. Oder dass Mia dein bester Freund ist. Es klingt so, als ob du ihn nehmen oder verlassen könntest. Und wenn das der Fall ist, dann hast du zwei Gründe, diese Freundschaft zu wiederholen.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Ja, aber dann, wenn sie nicht mehr darüber öffnet.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Exactly. I think that's what this letter is about too. Not just what to do about Mark and Mia, but really how they choose their friends, what they look for in people. Welche Beziehungen sie haben wollen.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Mein Gefühl ist, wenn du Zeit mit Leuten spielst, weil du fühlst, dass du nicht besser tun kannst, oder weil es zu schwer ist, andere Freunde zu machen, oder du willst, dass ein weiteres Paar Wein trinken und Karten gegen die Menschheit spielen, das ist nicht der beste Grund, nahe zu bleiben. Das könnte ein Zeichen sein, dass es Zeit ist, sich auszudrücken.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Investiere in ein paar Hobbys, Gemeinschaften, die dich mit anderen Menschen in Kontakt bringen. Und vielleicht brauchen sie nicht andere Paare. Vielleicht ist das ein weiteres Kriterium, das du anschaust. Vielleicht verpasst du andere tolle Freunde, die Single sind. Etwas anderes zu überlegen. Was Marc und Mia angeht, ist es deine Entscheidung, ob du mit ihnen nahe bleiben willst.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Ich höre nicht, dass es etwas super kompensierendes über sie gibt. Ich höre, dass es eine potenziell sehr schreckliche Sache über sie gibt. Although how worrisome, it's a complicated question. I think that comes down to how Mark and Mia make sense of this unusual part of their story and how they share it with other people.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Look, even if you pull away, I would definitely try to keep the door open to Mia. Because if she ever decides that she needs a friend to talk to, I'd love for her to be able to reach out. I mean, she might eventually realize how weird this all is and have to process it. And you don't want her to be alone for that. Weird story. I hope Mia's okay. And good luck.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
You know what you won't get deported for putting your hands on? The fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back.
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1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Bis zum nächsten Mal.
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1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
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1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
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1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
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1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
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1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
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1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Damn, that is a lot to happen all at once. Jeez, living a double life for a year and a half? Crazy. I could never handle the stress of this. I'll never understand these guys.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
They've got to be wired in such a way where they just don't care. They just don't care about getting caught. Because I would be nervous the whole time. I would preclude any enjoyment I would get out of something weird like this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Und deine Familie und deine Kinder. Ich meine, ja.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Oh my God. This is terrifying. So this guy's legitimately out of his mind and dangerous. Legitimately.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Alright, pause. That is a lot to handle, my friend. I'm tempted to say maybe a little too much. But anyway, I'm so glad you're looking at how you've been handling all this, carving out time for yourself. I'm glad we could play a role in that. Therapy is so key, especially when your life is as full as yours and brings up a lot of intense feelings. So I'm proud of you for that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Man, what a challenging co-parent. Bob sounds like a tricky person, to put it lightly. I'm sorry he lied to you when you were together, that he's been hurtful in all these ways. I'm also sorry that he hasn't been the most loving father to Jane, although I also hear you that he probably does love her. He just might not know how to show that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
And if he's actually a narcissist, he has all kinds of other mental issues that he's dealing with. It's a challenging situation all around. I'm not sure there's a perfect answer here. So look, I share your view that Jane is old enough now to start asserting herself more and deciding where she spends her time. She's 15, she's very mature.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
I absolutely agree she should have a say in how often she sees her dad and what the rules are when she's at his house. But my fear is that if you guys ignore the custody agreement, Bob is going to make things really difficult for you. You said, again, he's a narcissist, he's controlling, he's been aggressive and abusive in court. I said he's a tricky person.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
It really sounds like he's a trashy a-hole. And I'm going to imagine that he's going to do all this stuff all over again, just to make your life harder. He has no problem hurting your daughter to get to you also. And now, look, it might be harder for him to drag you back to court, given that you guys live in different states. The court system, at least here in California, is pretty backed up.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Who knows, it could be months, a year or more before you finally get a date. In the meantime, Jane could enjoy more freedom and pursue all these awesome things that she wants to do. And when you guys do have that hearing, Jane will be 16. Even older, even more equipped to advocate for herself. That could help.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
But that doesn't mean you won't face legal consequences for violating a custody agreement. See, you do have to consider the cost. My understanding is that could include fines, loss of custody rights, being required to attend counseling or parenting classes in extreme cases could result in jail time, although I think that's probably very unlikely. So this is a very real risk here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
On the other hand, my understanding is that the court tries to prioritize the child's best interest in these hearings. They often take a child's wishes into account, especially when that child is 15, 16 years old. So, if they hear from you and Bob and maybe even Jane, they might modify the custody arrangement, reduce Bob's visitation time, give Jane more of a say in all this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Now, that probably means you're going to need to hire a lawyer. And I know you said you can't afford it right now. I also don't know if you can avoid it. Not if you plan to deliberately ignore the custody agreement and definitely not if you plan to actively revisit it. My feeling there is you just have to find a way to pay for an attorney. Period. It might not be as expensive as you think.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
The heavy lifting of the custody order is already done. I wonder if a lawyer might help you modify it or plan ahead for not a huge amount of money. And if you need to do a GoFundMe or ask for family support, I think it's worth it. There are also pro bono, low cost, sliding scale legal services out there and I would definitely look into that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
At a minimum, I would book a consultation with a family attorney and talk to them about your options. fragt sie, was passieren würde, wenn ihr die Verabschiedung verabschiedet hättet, fragt sie, wie lange es dauern würde, um sie zu modifizieren, wie viel die Präferenzen von Jane in der Entscheidung des Gerichts spielen würden.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Ich würde keine großen Entscheidungen wie diese ohne die Begründung eines Juristen machen. Du hast aber auch andere Möglichkeiten. Du könntest mit Jane arbeiten, um ihren Vater zu erinnern, wie viel Zeit er mit ihr braucht, wie er sie behandelt, wenn sie da ist, was er ihr ermöglicht, zu tun. Maybe there's no reasonable conversation to be had with Bob.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Maybe that's why you feel your only choice is just to ignore the custody agreement. But if Jane sits down with him, looks him in the eye, this super mature, thoughtful, driven 15-year-old person, and she's like, Dad, I'm glad we have a relationship. I appreciate that you want to spend time with me. I know our situation is complicated, but I also have some big goals that I want to achieve.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Und ich denke, dass das von ihr zu hören, anstatt von dir, mehr beeindruckend wäre. Obwohl, ihr könnt euch beide entweder kämpfen, wer weiß. Aber es ist wert, und vielleicht versucht sie es zuerst, und dann rufst du sie an und backst sie langsam zurück, damit er weiß, dass es nicht nur du bist, die Stränge ziehst und Wörter in ihr Mund nimmst.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Obwohl, ich weiß, dass ich einfach nur Wörter in ihr Mund nimmte, indem ich dir das Skript gegeben habe. Aber, weißt du, wir geben dir ein bisschen Sprache, mit der du arbeiten kannst. Der Punkt ist, dass das von Jane kommt, in ihren eigenen Worten, basierend auf dem, was sie wirklich will.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Agreed all around. So no, you're not crazy for wanting to allow Jane to choose how much time she spends with her dad. Any rational healthy parent would start to listen to a mature 15-year-old's wishes, but that doesn't mean there aren't some good reasons to stick with the court order, even if it's doing some harm, but that's why you guys need to get creative and explore every other option here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Talk to a lawyer. I would also run all of this by your therapist, see what they say. They might have some great ideas for how to help Jane cope with her dad, assert herself. They might also know certain things about how much you can push the law and definitely keep going to therapy. It sounds like a really important space for you personally in all of this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Sie mussten sie wählen, nicht wahr? Sie waren nicht nur Verbrecher, die in der Haustür wanderten und sich herumschlugten. Ich glaube, sie ging zum Krankenhaus.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Yeah, at least he didn't give him a rifle. This is so tense. This is like a John Wayne movie or something like, howdy partner, I come in peace. Here's the finest hat west of the Mississippi. As you can tell, I've never seen a John Wayne movie. Or at least the finest hat I could find on Etsy. Yes, exactly. I kindly ask you to take me off your little hit list there, friendo.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Yeah, good point. I'm sure this responsibility thing comes from a good place, but even she knows that it might be a bit of a fatal flaw, which again is why I'm glad that you're talking about it. Whatever you do, make sure it's in service of empowering Jane and setting her up for as much success as possible. She sounds like an extraordinary kid. She's going places.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
She deserves as many advantages and as much love as possible. sending you guys a big hug and wishing you all the best. It's concerning Gabriel. I get it, he's controlling, he doesn't let her go out at night. Maybe he's a product of his environment when he was growing up.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Not wanting her to do extra school online from home, something about that sits very poorly with me because the disadvantages are none and the advantages are she gets ahead in her education and it's like, okay, now I'm not convinced that you have your daughter's best wishes in mind at all. I feel like you just want to say no to things.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Yeah, that whole thing just does not sit right with me. It would be different if she wanted to go away to camp for two out of the two and a half months. Okay, then you're not gonna see your dad. But if my kid says, hey, I gotta spend three or four hours a day on the iPad doing homework, I'm thrilled that I have a go-getter kid, not whining about how you're not paying attention to me.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
He maybe really is like an actual narcissist to the point where he's only looking at what she does for him and her source of narcissistic supply for her dad, which is not a good situation for a child to be in. At all. Alright, time for the recommendation of the week.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
In case you don't know, there's a subreddit for our show. If you want to jump into discussions with other listeners about specific things here on the show, like you want to tell Gabriel to stop recommending Netflix series that are 12 hours long and recommend more 20 minute films. I can get behind that. I will upvote that. You can find that on Reddit in the Jordan Harbinger subreddit.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Yeah, Gabe, it's like, I'm like, hey, buy this UV detector to keep from getting a sunburn. And you're like, watch 27 hours about the history of Japanese flower arranging on Netflix. And I'm just like, okay, just buy the UV thing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Right, exactly. You know what this reminds me of, Gabe? You remember Billy Madison? This is more my speed. John Wayne, eh, Billy Madison. There's this scene where Adam Sandler calls Steve Buscemi to apologize for bullying him in high school. And he's like, hey man, I just did a lot of things that weren't funny. And Steve Buscemi's like, oh, yeah, no problem. All good. Just super chill about it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Are you single and unemployed? Take Gabriel's recommendations and binge all of those things. You have nothing else to do. You know what?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
I think they have the time. Are erotic novels that long? I mean, get to the point, for God's sake. Jeez, maybe that's what I'm doing wrong. Well, when I narrate them, they will be. Alright, speaking of narration, what's next out of the mailbag?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Oh Mann, ich bin so entschuldigt, Freund. Das ist wirklich schrecklich. 31 Jahre alt. Drei Monate nach der Verheiratung? Das ist so schrecklich, Mann.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Yeah, I get that. What could be more normal? I'd feel the same way.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
And then once they hang up, the camera zooms out and you see this paper taped to the wall that says people to kill and he just crosses Billy Madison's name off the list and applies lipstick and lays down on the couch.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Like I said, I'm so very sorry that you had to say goodbye to Raquel. Losing a best friend, especially so young, especially after fighting a battle like that, after her wedding. Just devastating. There's no other word for it. What you're going through right now, what her husband must be going through, that poor guy. Es ist extrem intensiv. Und es könnte für eine Weile intensiv sein.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Also, ehrlich gesagt, es macht Sinn, dass du dich verdrängt fühlst. Es macht Sinn, dass du versuchst, dich zu konzentrieren, Arbeit zu finden, die furchtbar und unbedeutend ist. Das sind alle klassische Symptome von Schmerzen. Und du fühlst dich bereits demoralisiert, bevor all das passiert. Also, mein erster Gedanke für dich, und ich weiß, dass das offensichtlich klingt, aber es ist wichtig, ist,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Gib dir ein bisschen Gnade hier und sei aufmerksam. Du bist in einer Rolle, die viele von dir benötigt. Du sagst, du hast nicht viel Unterstützung, dass du versetzt bist, zu verlieren, und jetzt gräbst du einen riesigen Verlust darunter. Und ich denke, jede Arbeit wird wahrscheinlich ziemlich unbedeutend fühlen, im Hinblick auf das, was du gerade durchgeführt hast.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
And I would argue that it should feel a little meaningless in a way, because one of the functions of loss is to remind us what really matters. And 90% of the stuff we have to deal with in this modern world just does not matter. It matters in terms of getting a paycheck and keeping a roof over your head, sure, but it doesn't matter philosophically or existentially.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
I'm sure Raquel's death is bringing up a lot of things for you. One of them might be a new awareness of how precious life is, how nothing is guaranteed, which in a way that's terrifying. And in a way, right, it's beautiful, it's profound. Grief brings a certain clarity to certain things. And that clarity is a gift. It can be really enlivening.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Es kann auch sehr frustrierend und bedrohlich fühlen, wenn es sich gegen eine To-Do-Liste befindet, die eine Weile lang ist, oder eine dumme 45-minütige Abendbranche.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Und das ist Teil des Prozesses des Heilens von Schmerzen, den Fuß in diese beiden Realitäten zu halten, dass so viel unserer Leben trivial und verrückt ist und dass wir diese Dinge kümmern müssen und zu einem gewissen Grad zusammen spielen.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Und in der Zeit, als der Schmerz sich beendet, verspreche ich dir, dass es einfacher wird, diese beiden Perspektiven zu integrieren, in die beiden Halben der Leben zu teilnehmen, But that's going to take a little time. And you just have to kind of allow that process to unfold on its own.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
But on a practical level, yeah, you got to give yourself permission to feel the waves of morning when they come on, or just that persistent, low-grade meh feeling. Also, you have to accept that work's just going to feel different for a while. You might perform differently for a while, and that is normal.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
And in two, five, ten years, whatever the minutiae of what you're dealing with at work right now, you probably won't even remember them.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
For sure, I like that. I think it's smart to keep the conversation focused on solutions rather than your emotions and feelings. Because even though your feelings are legit, it can be hard for a company to make exceptions based on them. And it's your job to take care of yourself. But performance, productivity, effectiveness, that's a language your boss definitely speaks.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
I would also find ways to create a few habits and systems that will allow you to do your job well, even when you don't feel emotionally invested. Routines, E-Mail-Templates, Stand-Up-Meetings, Shortcuts, tägliche Check-Ins mit Leuten, kleine Arbeits-Sprints, die du mit dir machst, diese Dinge machen wirklich einen Job viel mehr nützlich, auch wenn du nicht eine Verletzung verweist.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Und ich finde auch, dass es einfacher ist, die Architektur eines Jobs, diese Routines, die Systeme und Vermutungen zu servicen, wenn die Substanz nicht viel für dich macht. Durch die Unwahrheit zu steuern, das ist schwer, aber wenn du nur das System fährst, sage ich nicht, dass es super erfüllend sein wird, aber es kann nützlich sein,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Und es kann dich von einem bestimmten Niveau der Leistung verhindern, was wichtig ist. Auf eine Relativnote, wenn es schwierig ist, investiert zu werden in das, was du tust, finde ich es hilfreich, sich auf wirklich kleine Dinge zu konzentrieren. Also, was ist eine Sache, die du heute gut tun könntest? Was ist eine Art, wie du dein Leben morgen einfacher machen könntest?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Eine Konversation, die etwas vorwärts bewegen wird. You'll be amazed by what a handful of just tiny wins can do for you. They really will keep you in the game. And while you do that, I'd keep looking for jobs. I'd keep scheduling conversations. It can take a while to find a job you're really excited about. So you have to play the long game. You got to keep applying.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
You got to keep doing the six-minute networking stuff. Keep looking for opportunities to connect with people in your industry. Just keep putting dots on the board and you can connect them backward later on.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
I'm just picturing you talking to crazy cousin off the ledge by handing him a Kay Bonito hat. Like, hey man, chill bro, it's just vibes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Yeah, good point. This might be a parallel process, but also it might not be, and that's okay. But whatever you do, invite the grief in. There are no shortcuts here. This phase you're in at work, whether you stay or Bis dahin, das Beste, was du tun kannst, ist, intensiv zu sein.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Über deine Schmerzen, über das, was du von deinem Boss brauchst, über die Art und Weise, wie du deine Zeit verwendest, welche Art von Arbeit du für die nächste suchst. Und wie gesagt, das ist das eine große Geschenk eines so großen Verlustes. Es hat wirklich eine Art und Weise, uns zu erinnern, was wichtig ist. Also nimm dir diese Zeit, um klar zu werden, was das für dich bedeutet.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Sprich darüber mit Freunden, mit einem Therapeuten, mit der Familie, schreibe darüber, was auch immer das aussieht. Ich verspreche dir, dass es alle anfängt, Sinn zu machen. Hang in there, my friend. We're sending you a huge hug, thinking about Raquel, and we're rooting for you as you chart your next move. Go back and check out Richard Reeves, as well as our Skeptical Sunday on Bananas.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
I mentioned it before, I'll say it again, 6minutenetworking.com. It is a relationship development course. It takes a few minutes a day. Bis zum nächsten Mal. This show is created in association with Podcast One. My team is Jen Harbinger, Jace Sanderson, Robert Fogarty, Ian Baird, Tata Sadlauskas, and of course, Gabriel Mizrahi.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Just a thought. Yes, the hat is lined with lithium that is transdermal.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Our advice and opinions are our own, and I might be a lawyer, but I'm not your lawyer, so do your own research before implementing anything you hear on the show. Remember, we rise by lifting others. Share the show with those you love, and if you found the episode useful, please share it with somebody else who could use the advice we gave here today.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
In the meantime, I hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn, and we'll see you next time. Du wirst ein Vorlesung des Jordan-Harbinger-Shows hören, über das, wie hormonale Erkrankung eine Frau als Persönlichkeit beeinflusst und sogar beeinflusst, wen sie als Partner wählt.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
To hear more from Dr. Sarah Hill about the problems with taking birth control, check out Episode 280 of The Jordan Harbinger Show. Das war's für heute. Bis zum nächsten Mal. That's when you might notice things aren't working quite like they used to. Your joints, your skin, maybe even your hair.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Vital Proteins steps in to help keep those areas supported so you can stay active and keep doing what you love. Vital Proteins is the number one collagen peptide brand in the US, so they know what they're doing. It's super easy to take. Just add a serving to your coffee, smoothie, even water. It doesn't even taste like anything, so it blends right in. The key is consistency.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Making it a daily habit is how you see the benefits.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Yeah. Like the one he attacked with a chainsaw? Yeah, I might skip their house at Christmas.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Wenn Steve in einem Psych-Wing gehört. Gabe, I have to assume that Steve is seriously traumatized, maybe by his father holding him and his family at gunpoint when they were kids? I don't know.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Welcome to Feedback Friday. I'm your host, Jordan Harbinger. As always, I'm here with Feedback Friday producer Gabriel Mizrahi. Old Fifty Shades of Gabe over here. Nice. I like that one. Not that you don't know what that's a reference to, but maybe you don't know why I'm saying it now. I don't actually. What is this?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
So Grandpa, his dad, was out of his tree. This kind of violence leaves a real mark. Maybe Steve has some mental illness apart from that, because it sounds like Bob is relatively normal, maybe, but their father clearly did a number on them.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
He does have a bitchin' new hat, that's true. So things aren't all bad. The chainsaw, though, that worries me a little bit.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Yeah, I mean, look, we're having a laugh, but this is actually quite terrifying.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
I'm pretty stunned that the police were not called after he attacked that kid in the neighborhood.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Yeah, super weird that he attacked my son with a chainsaw. Man, somebody should do something about that guy. But, you know, it's lunchtime and they're probably not going to answer the phone. I mean, how do you not immediately dial 911 and have this person? He didn't have a good hat. He didn't have a hat. He didn't have a hat. I'm really at a loss here. Like, okay.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
The family is obviously protecting him. She did say that Steve is the reason the parents are still able to live at home, which, okay, I'm happy for them. I'm glad he's good for something. But he's also kicking his dog. He's going after children in the neighborhood with a chainsaw. He's barricading himself in the house with an arsenal of guns.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
He's threatening to kill multiple people, including his nephew. Because he makes too much money, which is totally ridiculous. Understatement. Is it really worth protecting that guy so Meemaw and Pop Pop don't have to eat frickin' mashed potatoes in a nursing home? I don't think so, Bob. I don't think so.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
So, look, just to cut to the chase, if it's true that you wouldn't trust Steve around your dogs, you absolutely should not trust him around your children. End of story. The guy's mentally ill and dangerous. He's untreated. He's unstable. He has weapons in the house. He has a kill list. Your fiancé was on it. Why? Again, because he makes too money and he doesn't spend time with me.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
The guy is a lunatic, okay? If I had a family member like this, I would never go over there. It's too risky. You don't owe this person anything. This is somebody you notify the police about. In fact, if I was your fiancé, I would do just that. Not just for your benefit, but for all the other people and animals this guy might hurt. He could have killed that kid. Easily. It's a miracle he didn't.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
And what if he had? A child would be seriously injured or dead or maimed. He'd be in prison probably.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Now, I know things have cooled down a bit, the cowboy hat did the trick, but that doesn't mean Steve's not going to have another episode, isn't going to come up with some new imagined grievance, or wake up one day and decide that he's mad you guys didn't visit him on Easter, or that you're making too much money again. This could happen without you guys even knowing it. That's the thing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
So, a bunch of people in the subreddit are like, oh, Gabe should narrate erotic novels. Oh, okay, got it. Yeah, it's something to consider if the whole podcasting thing doesn't work out. You know, it's hard to make a living podcasting. I'm gonna add that to my LinkedIn. Looking for work, just not specified. W-E-R-K. That's right. I don't even know why it's funny to say W-E-R-K, but it just is.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
You're lucky you knew about the kill list at all. The next time you just might not. And you might find out when you walk in the door and get shotgun blasted by this psychopath. So yeah, I'm pretty adamant about this. That house is not safe for you. It's not safe for your fiancé. It's certainly not safe for your future children. Even if it is, it's not even worth the risk.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Why would you roll the dice on this? And if that ruffles some feathers in your fiancé's family, tough Kischka. This is so beyond the pale. It's insane that you're even debating whether to go over there. I mean, Dark Jordan's just like, burn the house down.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Das ist wie, er ist immer, fast immer schlecht, oder er ist manniglich hoch und glücklich, weil wir ihn gebraucht haben. Oh, und auch abusiv Großvater ist dort mit einem Haus voll von Waffen. Wo ist der Vorteil?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Ich bin nur... Gut, aber wenn das die einzige Grund ist, warum sie da sind, dann ist das noch weniger Grund, sich riskieren zu lassen. Es gibt keinen Vorteil. Also, ich bin nicht sicher, ob ich zufrieden bin, dass du die gesamte Familie auslösen musst, wenn du nicht mehr da bist. Du kannst vielleicht nicht so viel Zeit mit dem Großvater haben, wenn Steve immer noch da ist.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Obwohl, warum du so viel Zeit mit dem Mann, der seine Familie an der Anlage hielt, sparen würdest, ist mir unklar. Vielleicht verpassen wir etwas. Obwohl die ganze Familie stark hinter Steve ist, was sie vielleicht sind. Vielleicht ist das der Grund, warum niemand die Polizisten anruft oder hier interveniert.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Aber ich kann mir nicht vorstellen, dass jemand in der richtigen Meinung auf Team Steve wäre. Also sehe ich nicht, warum du sie alle auslösen müsstest. You can still have dinner with these grandparents at a restaurant. You can invite them over to your house. Just make sure you install a metal detector at the front door. You can plan get-togethers without Steve.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
And if everyone is on Team Steve, if you can't stay away from them without alienating everyone else, again, I am not sure that that's such a big loss. If your entire family is lunatics that don't find this to be problematic, then they are also lunatics who are problematic. That's my take. Maybe your fiance's family handles things differently.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Maybe they have a higher threshold for violence and dysfunction. I don't think you should though, especially not if you become a parent.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Ja, das ist eine gute Idee. Hoffentlich hat diese Person eine objektive Meinung. Wenn sie die Familie kennt oder sie in der Gemeinschaft involviert ist, könnte das sie ein bisschen kritisieren. Aber ehrlich gesagt, ich kann mir nicht vorstellen, dass irgendein Konseln wert ihres Salzes künftig Eltern beurteilen würde, ein Kind in so einem Umfeld zu bringen. Stay away. That's my advice.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
You have so little to gain by having contact with any of these people and so much to lose.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
That's right. Just to stay alive. Take care of yourselves. Stay strapped. Now I'm going to take a chainsaw to the prices on the fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back. Bis zum nächsten Mal. I highly recommend BetterHelp. It is completely online. You don't have to worry about commuting, sitting in waiting rooms, dealing with the hassle of finding the right fit.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
With over 30,000 licensed therapists covering a ton of different specialties, you can be sure to find somebody who actually gets you. And if it's not the right match, you can switch therapists anytime, no extra cost.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Whether you're dealing with stress, relationships, career struggles, or just trying to be the best version of yourself, therapy is one of the most valuable investments that you can make. And with BetterHelp, it's more accessible and convenient than ever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
Everybody knows what I mean. Everybody knows. I don't understand. Everybody knows but me, and I'm the one that said it. On the Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the stories, secrets, and skills of the world's most fascinating people and turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
We find it honestly hard to believe that it even happened to us. And I think a lot of us don't think that something like this would ever happen. We live in one of those safe neighborhoods, the kind of place you don't worry about security beyond locking the doors at night.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
If you haven't heard, a few weeks ago, three masked intruders shattered that illusion literally by kicking in the glass door of the room I was in, trying to force their way into the house.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1127: Chaotic Kin Has You Rethinking Children | Feedback Friday
So glad that we had SimpliSafe installed because in the chaos of me screaming for Jen to call the police and rushing these guys like some sort of psychopathic bear, she couldn't find her phone, but she remembered that we had panic buttons installed around the house. She hit one, instantly sirens blaring, emergency response dispatched. The guys took off. We were left shaken, obviously, but safe.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
This episode is sponsored in part by Vital Proteins. I want to tell you about Vital Proteins Collagen Peptides. That's a mouthful. It's a daily supplement that supports your hair, skin, nails, bones, and joints all in one in one simple step each day. Collagen makes up about a third of the protein in our bodies, but as we hit our 30s, it unfortunately starts to decline.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
You also have the option, and this is something I talk to the lawyer about, you have the option of getting a restraining order or a peace bond order. Now, is this lady going to honor that? Probably not. But the benefit is if she harasses your parents after they get one of these, they get to call the police and say, we have a restraining order or a peace bond against this woman.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
She just verbally attacked us on our way into the house. She's shining a light through our window. She's banging on our door, whatever it is. And that'll A,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
probably make them come out to the house sooner and b if she's in violation of these court orders they might be able to arrest her right then and there especially if it's all on camera the problem there is she'll probably be out in a day or two and then she'll be back home and then she's going to be really pissed but she's going to be pissed at like the cia that's coming after her but she might know that they called i don't know she might but you know what that's the calculation
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
My hope is that if the cops arrest her for violating a court order, they'll see how sick she is, they'll take her to the psych ward. So it's a gamble, but it could work out even if you have to have her arrested a few times.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
I had the same thought. She's posting pictures of your family, their addresses, vaguely threatening comments. That is crucial to document as well. And I talked to the lawyer about how to file a formal complaint with the police about that specifically. And I'd ask them how to make the best possible case that it violates the letter of the harassment laws in Canada. So the cops take it seriously.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Also, gonna dip my toe in the dark Jordan waters here. This is ethically dicey, okay, which is every dark Jordan pitch, but you guys might be able to sue her for defamation, and she might not be able to mount a defense in her condition. Now, somebody like this, they're probably judgment-proof, aka they have no money to pay you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
But if your parents win a case against her and she doesn't pay up and she defaults or doesn't show up to court or shows up and starts talking about the CIA or the NSA spying on her, maybe they get a lien against her home and dot, dot, dot, failing to pay a debt on a lien could lead to a forced sale of her home to satisfy the lien. Now, that's a messy and complicated process.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
And it is cruel because you're throwing a woman out of her home when she can't defend herself. But look, it's an option, at least here in the States. Not sure about Canada. Again, I can't say I endorse this, But it is an option. This woman is terrorizing your whole neighborhood.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
It's not just about parenting gamers. Really interesting show, as was our first round. That guy just has a ton of wisdom to share. Smart dude and great at delivering it. On Fridays, though, we share stories, take listener letters, offer advice, play obnoxious soundbites, and just generally fancy ourselves the first responders of the advice world. That's not inflated at all, is it?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
I hear that. I also think it might motivate you guys to keep calling the authorities because this woman is suffering.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
To be clear, for when they go to sleep, they definitely shouldn't be wearing earplugs when they walk from their car to the front door. Honestly, their situational awareness needs to be high when they're outside because who knows what this woman is going to do.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Not narcissistic, even in the least. All right. Before we kick off, I want to share an exercise. that I've been doing when I'm facing a big problem. And it may be a problem that I can't really wrap my mind around.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Your parents might also want to change their routine to minimize contact if that's an option. Like, can they walk a different route to the door? Can you go out the back and walk around this other side of the house? Can you leave at times when she's not watching? Stuff like that. And I hate that I'm recommending this because this woman is just making everybody crazier.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
I had the same thought. I'm generally not a fan of litigation unless absolutely necessary. But in this case, yeah, it's kind of warranted because the previous owner did something pretty damn unethical in not disclosing this neighbor. And I kind of want her to pay for that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Whenever I'm dealing with something super tricky, something that bothers me and I'm not sure why, I write down maybe a page, maybe even two pages of all the reasons I don't like it, all the different aspects of the problem, why it's such a problem in the first place, everything it's bringing up for me, all the ripple effects and implications of the situation. Really anything that comes up.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
I know. It's like, what would I do?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
It's like she might have called a lawyer and been like, so do I have to say anything? And the lawyer's like, well, in theory, yes, but only if yada, yada, yada. And she's like, I'm rolling the dice. I can't take it anymore.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
It sucks to think that one person should just have to suffer or eat the cost on a house because the cops won't do anything about the loony tune next door that's flashing her neighbor screaming and smoking pot and yelling at your 80-year-old dad. But how can you in good conscience... Sell a house next to a psychotic person to a couple of nice people in their 80s. That does not seem right to me.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
You want a buyer who's like 30? Like five dudes, right? Who are just like, ah, yeah, there's a crazy lady next door, but who cares? Turn the music up. And the price of the house should be discounted, really, to account for the fact that there's a crazy person next door. If it wasn't, in my view, those are the damages that you sue for. Like, hey, my enjoyment's been limited. I need 30 grand.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
The psychotic discount?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
We could. It's an interesting ethical dilemma. But here's my Dark Jordan fantasy. Your parents sue the previous owner. They get some damages or they get a settlement, even if it's a small one. They use that money to move to a new house to cover the capital gains and land transfer taxes, again, with the money that they got from the settlement.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Unfortunately, that could take a year or two, could be longer, but it is a possibility. And sadly, it might be the only way to get some peace here. It's just another thing I'd talk to a lawyer about.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Man, now I'm feeling for the previous owner because I'm fully on our friend's side here. I just want her parents to ditch this house and live in peace. So I really can relate.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Pretty sure this is the plot of 80% of horror movies involving a family in a house. There's always that scene where they start investigating and realize the previous owners dealt with the same thing and no one told them like, oh yeah, we left because of all the people that come out of the closet at night.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Yes. Well, mandatory.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
And I think a lot of people do this, they journal or something like that. I usually do this on the computer. But I delete all but the two or three sentences that capture the real problem or some of my main concerns. You might end up with a couple paragraphs and then you weed those down. Now I know it sounds super obvious. Like I said, it's basically journaling.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
But I also think you guys need to be creative here and stay open to all the possibilities because there might be a world where your parents need to sell the house and move as stressful and as exhausting as that is. Or maybe they spend a couple nights a week at your house. That way they can get some peace and quiet, enjoy some quality time with your daughter.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
And if you aren't willing to at least consider those solutions, they might stay stuck in a disturbing situation. You could also Airbnb the house, rent it out to somebody else. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Yeah. Yeah. You might end up with a couple.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Exactly. Nods coming back. Loved the pool. Didn't love the prison spotlight coming into the bedroom at 3 a.m. Friendly neighbor. Talked about the CIA's mind control experiments for six hours in the driveway.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Oh no, it's much worse than that. Anyway, look, it's not fair whatsoever, but it is what's happening. And again, I'm so deeply sorry this is happening to you guys. Watching Gabe go through this, it gave me so much compassion for anyone living next to a seriously mentally ill person. Gabe, you were kind of a zombie for six months or whatever it was, and you're only 80 years old in your soul.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
So I can't even imagine what the writer's poor parents must be going through right now.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Yeah, I really hope you guys catch a break soon. Sending you and your family a huge hug and wishing you all the best. You know what else is batshit crazy? The psycho deals on the fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back. Thank you for listening and supporting the show. It is your support of our advertisers and sponsors that keeps the lights on around here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
All of the deals, discount codes and ways to support the podcast are all searchable and clickable over at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. Please consider supporting those who support the show. Now back to Feedback Friday. Okay, what's next?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Jeez, overachiever much? You sound like a rock star. Congrats. Yeah, I just do triple backflips after running 12 miles a day, then singing acapella mashups of Neil Diamond and Flo Rida.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
But there's something about having permission to go a little nuts, be neurotic and anxious and messy on the page, And then you just literally start crossing out or deleting all the superfluous noise around the problem, and you boil it down to its essence. And once I have those two or three sentences, I might jot down a few bullet points for each that would meaningfully address the problem.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Literally, yeah. His resume is making me feel so lazy. Seriously.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Okay.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
This is so bizarre. So this teacher she's overstepping, it sounds like. There need to be better boundaries here. Just wait.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
I don't like where this is going.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Get sued by whoever that is, Nate Dogg. I was on the fence between that and Hot for Teacher by Van Halen, throwing that in the old sample bucket, but that seemed even more inappropriate than making a bunch of teenage boys strip down for no reason in her foyer. Okay. So this is officially super weird and gross.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
First of all, going to your teacher's house when it's not some kind of school-sanctioned event with lots of people, the whole class, whatever, it's just not appropriate. It's super sus. Second, having your teacher make you undress in front of her when you definitely don't need to do that at her house? This is textbook creepiness. It's almost certainly a fireable offense.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
I am just gobsmacked that she did this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Yeah, it's fascinating, isn't it? Good reminder that both genders are capable of terrible stuff. There's something legitimately wrong with this woman.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Meaning she's doing this to other kids?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Gabe, I'm tempted to make a joke about him banging his teacher, but I'm realizing that part of the problem here is that we tend to not take stuff like this as seriously when it's a female teacher and a male student. And I know that's not OK.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
And bam, I've got an action plan. I feel way less overwhelmed and freaked out by the whole thing. And I wanted to share that with you guys. Not the most original, maybe, but it was definitely... something that changed the worrying game for me. So give it a go and see if it helps you. I have a feeling it will.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Yeah, the double standard is disturbing and very interesting. That was like my gut reaction was like, ah, and who knows? Maybe that's also informing how our friend here feels about whether to report this. There might be some desensitization or stigma around stuff like this for men. Okay, I'm a little stunned over here. First of all, to state the obvious, what your teacher is doing is not okay.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
It's oversteppy. It's inappropriate. It's unboundaried at best. At worst, it's legitimately creepy and predatory. And again, doing the whole like, what if this was a male teacher doing it to female students? It would, of course, be creepy and predatory. One hundred percent. Hey, girls, can you try on new swimsuits in my garage? That's just you're going to jail, hopefully, for something like that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Now, we obviously don't know this woman. We don't know what her intentions are, what her moral compass is like, whether she's actually being pervy with you guys or she just has no sense of what's appropriate and inappropriate as a teacher. But it almost doesn't matter to me because she's an adult. You guys are minors. She's a teacher. She knows the law. She knows the rules, or she should.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
And I cannot imagine a universe where a teacher has a good reason to invite a handful of her students to her house to try on new outfits in front of her. This is just patently inappropriate and gross. And how it made you feel? Uncomfortable, like it crossed a line. You said it was a wake-up call. That's absolutely a normal response to something like this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
And I think it's kind of all the data you need to know that something wasn't right about that situation.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Right. It sounds like there's a pattern of this behavior. It's getting worse. So my strong feeling is that you need to report her. And here's how I do it. First, I'd get together with your friends, inquire anyone who's had contact with her, create a shared document, document every concerning interaction or experience you've had with this teacher up till now. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Again, this is best suited for tricky problems where you're like, I can't put my finger on why this is so bad or why this is so annoying or why this is keeping me up at night. If you fully understand a problem, I don't know how much more fully understanding it you need to do. You got to brainstorm solutions.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
This is one of those best for nebulous problems, emotional type stuff, situations with a lot of moving parts. But yeah, this one's a winner. As always, we've got some fun questions. We've got some doozies. Let's dive in. Gabe, what is the first thing out of the mailbag?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Thank you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Okay, sorry to jump in again, Gabe, but I just got to say, all of these details are really painting a picture of a person who's unstable, impulsive, which means she probably has some serious mental health and or addiction stuff going on. You know how hard it is to evict somebody? You have to try pretty hard to get evicted twice in two years. It's tough.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Right. I'm furious with this woman, but I also have to acknowledge that she must be suffering. A mood disorder, personality disorder might just be a generally chaotic way of going through life, but something is wrong here. But it's her responsibility to address that, to talk to somebody, to go on meds, ask for guidance, whatever it is.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
As long as she's not even bothering to do any of that, this is ultimately her fault slash responsibility.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Just add a serving to your coffee, smoothie, even water. It doesn't even taste like anything, so it blends right in. The key is consistency. Making it a daily habit is how you see the benefits.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
What a mess. Yeah, what a story. First of all, I'm very sorry that your ex is handling her life this way, that she's treating you so poorly, that she's exposed your kids to all this chaos, this danger. It all seems so avoidable. If she'd just look at what she's doing and get some help. I'm really straddling my anger and my compassion when it comes to her. We gotta make room for both.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Something I'm trying to work on, if you can't tell. My knee-jerk response to stories like this are to just get mad at the obviously dysfunctional a-hole partner. But doing this show, I think I talked about this on our end-of-year episode, It's really making me realize why we have to make room for more than just one story at a time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
That he worked too much when they were married to provide for them. Look, we don't know every detail, but even if he did play a role in her struggles, at what point do you stop blaming your ex and dragging him on Facebook and go, OK, that's I gotta own my piece of this now. I gotta take care of my life.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Even if he were somehow a crappy husband, which it doesn't sound like he was terrible, I just can't imagine a narrative that would justify her behavior at this point. So you're asking a really good question. Do you finally hold her accountable or do you withdraw the claim to not add to her hardships and preserve your relationship? And I'm not sure there's one right answer
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
But here's what I'm thinking. First of all, based on what you've shared, it sounds like you are well within your rights to ask her for child support, both on a purely financial level and given how she's treated you. At the same time, I think you need to parse your motivations for enforcing this child support order because there's a lot going on here. Part of it's the money, sure.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
You pay for everything for your kids. You cover debts of hers that you're not even, of course, at all responsible for. She's not responding to that with even basic courtesy. So again, just on a financial level, it does sound appropriate, going after the cash. But I'm sure there's another part of this child support order that's informed by your anger, your very warranted and very appropriate anger,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
and might even be a form of revenge or comeuppance, which I can also totally understand and relate to. Fine, you want to treat me this way? You want to push me to my limit? Here's what you get. Sucks to suck. Like you said, enough is enough. But I also think there's more for you to know about that impulse to hit back at her. Not because it's undeserved. I think it's largely deserved.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
but because it might be designed to make you feel better, to give you a sense of justice and a sense of control, and to punch back after being beaten up by this gal for so long. And in the end, it's possible that it won't make you feel much better. In fact, it might make you feel worse. It already is because of your guilt.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
And when you couple that with the fact that she's struggling so much financially, which means in all likelihood she won't even be able to pay you this child support, she can't even pay her rent in low-income housing. She's basically homeless. On a practical level, this child support order becomes even less useful.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
It's kind of a symbolic screw you as opposed to an arrangement that would make life easier for you and your kids. Plus, like you pointed out, it'll probably just give her more ammunition to blame you for her problems and to poison the well with your kids and for zero benefit financially. I don't know, Gabe. I'm torn here. I'm of two minds.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
I think I would go after it and then just maybe, I don't know, give her some of the money back if I felt guilty. But still, it comes to me. I don't know. On one hand, she's acted egregiously. She should objectively contribute to helping their kids. I don't think he has any reason to feel guilty about that, given the facts here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
On the other hand, she probably can't even comply with this child support order and it might just degrade whatever relationship they do have even further, if there is one. So like, I don't know, which one's more important?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Exactly. My hunch is it's the latter. I also wonder if he might have felt a version of this guilt when they were together and he's been protecting her and enabling her in various little ways the entire time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
That is so disturbing and also just irritating, man. So they have their very own Josh situation, huh, Gabe?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Yeah, I hear that. But honestly, if it's me, I'm taking her to the f***ing cleaners. I don't care if she's homeless.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
But that's her fault. Child support notwithstanding, that's all her fault.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
That her life is a mess?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Totally. So what does he do about it? Because if I'm him, I'm just walking around freaking furious at her for the rest of my life, and that sucks.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
It's funny you mentioned channeling your rage into work and the gym. It's like, how'd you gain 25 pounds of lean muscle over the last 18 months? And why do you spike the TPS reports to the manager's basket? Wham! Let me tell you a little tale called Sucks to Suck. Sucks to Suck. Wham! Look, Tom, we appreciate your hard work, but... You don't need to dunk on everyone in the office.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
We're all in the same team here. This is the fifth Keurig machine we've had to replace this month. Yeah. You push the lever down. You don't have to use your hammer fist on it. I guess I'm realizing that a lot of this job is it's really just bearing this anger. All jokes aside, because she's probably going to continue acting this way and continuing to provoke him. And he ultimately can't fix her.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
In a way, people like this, triggering other people's rage is all they have because the rest of their life is completely out of control, right? It's like, oh, I can always get a rise out of my ex-husband. So the answer might just be letting the feelings be and increasing your capacity to tolerate them.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Ultimately, Gabe, it sounds like his revenge is handled because he's a solid dad and her life just sucks. It sucks, everything about it sucks. All that said, I do sincerely hope that your ex finds a way to take care of herself better, and if there's anything you can do to gently nudge her in that direction without enabling her, if she's willing to hear that stuff from you or whatever, I would.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Do that for her if you can. Again, I'm not getting the vibe that she even wants advice or help from you other than the occasional bailout check, but if there's a window, I would take it. Who knows with somebody like this? I'm very sorry you and your kids are going through all this. You guys don't deserve any of it, but it is an interesting opportunity to learn how to work with a tough situation.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Sending you guys a big hug and wishing you all the best. You know what else sucks to suck? Missing out on the crazy good deals on the fine products and services that support this show. That one got stuck in my craw if you couldn't tell. We'll be right back.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
If you like this episode of Feedback Friday and you find our advice valuable, I invite you to do what other smart and considerate listeners do, which is take a moment and support our amazing sponsors. All the deals, discount codes, and ways to support the show are searchable and clickable over at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. The AI chatbot also on the website can surface codes for you.
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1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
And if that doesn't work, email me. I'll dig up the code for you. It is that important that you support those who support the show. Now, back to Feedback Friday.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
This is a good question. I love that you want to work on this. I also love that you're pushing for the best possible salary, even at this level. It's like my friend Ramit Sethi says. He's another great negotiation expert I would follow. He's been on the show a bunch of times. You don't get what you deserve. You get what you negotiate.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
So yes, from what I can tell, it's common for entry-level or part-time roles to not do formal written offers, especially in industries where turnover is high, the roles are more transactional, retail, food service, internships, jobs like that. Those positions often use verbal agreements or informal emails to talk about salary. But does that make negotiation harder? Maybe not.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Alex Kutz, who's a great negotiation teacher, big fan of his, He approaches negotiation as a conversation, ideally one based on empathy, mutual respect, collaboration. Yeah, a formal offer letter might help. It might give you something concrete to respond to, but not having one doesn't mean you can't negotiate.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
In fact, I might argue that informal discussions can be more helpful in some ways because nothing is set in stone yet. The offer isn't boilerplate. It might be somewhat flexible. So if a manager calls you and goes, all right, we want to hire you, $25 an hour.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
there's nothing stopping you from going, hey, great, thank you, I think I'm worth 30, and I'm gonna work my butt off for you, and here's a bunch of reasons how I'm gonna do that. What do you say? Whereas if they send you a formal job offer that's a copy-paste from HR that says 25 bucks an hour, that might just be what they offer everyone, and that's that, and there's no flexibility at all.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
So yes, I'd adjust your strategy a little, but mostly I'd revisit this assumption that entry-level jobs are trickier, that informal offers are hard to negotiate. I'd adjust that assumption and give it a go, Beyond that, I do have a few tips that I've learned from Alex and Ramit, and just from experimenting myself over the years. First, you can negotiate more than just salary.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
If an employer is firm on pay, you can pivot to other things. Flexible hours, so for example, you could change your schedule during final exams or whatever. You could push for remote work options if that even applies in your case. You can ask for professional development opportunities if they exist.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Really. I would be losing my mind if I had a neighbor like this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
You can request a performance review sooner so you can try to negotiate your salary up after proving yourself, stuff like that. Also, if negotiations are happening during the interview, then you have to show up to these conversations prepared with the number you want and with market data to back it up. you could literally say in the room, okay, 25 an hour, right, I hear that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Based on my research or based on my experience, a competitive rate for this role would actually be around $30 an hour. What do you think? How flexible are you on that? Be respectful, but be confident. A big part of negotiation is just getting comfortable owning and standing by your value.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
It's framing your counter with logic, not emotion, and backing it up with the specific value you can bring to the role. So instead of being like, but I'm a college student. I can't survive on 25 bucks an hour, which they don't care. I'd say something like, look, I'm great with customers. I learn fast. I can tackle XYZ projects for you immediately with ABC results.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
I feel, based on this, that 30 is fair and reflects what I can offer you. Of course, that assumes you know what you can uniquely offer and that has to align with what they actually need, which is crucial. That's part of your prep too. Look up briefcase technique. We'll link to it in the show notes. I think I've talked about it on the show before as well.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
You basically roll in and solve a problem for the employer and they're like, I can't afford not to hire this guy at the rate he's brought up. And if getting a written offer would help you, you can always ask for it. Maybe you send him an email saying, hey, great to meet you today. Thank you for the offer. Could you send the details over in writing so I can review it and get back to you?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Totally fair. My last thought, just a timeless negotiation technique. You always have to be ready to walk away. If you're not getting the salary you want and the salary you want is attainable, sometimes saying no is the best move. It might shock an employer into giving you the salary you want if they really like you. It might also free you up to keep looking until you get the number you want.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Either way, having options gives you leverage. Also, if you have another offer for, say, $30, they have to match it or beat it, or they have to give you something valuable to make up for it, like they cover your lunch every day or whatever. And don't forget to think about this as practice. All of this is practice. You're learning by doing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Negotiation is about having confidence, and confidence only comes from asking for what you want and standing by it, which you can only really learn by doing. I'm not sure how much this offer thing is really an obstacle, but if it is an obstacle, it just means you need to be more prepared and more creative.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
And you might have to, in the end, settle for a salary you don't love for this period of your life. You're a college student. That's somewhat normal. It doesn't mean you can't get in there and crush it and then get that number up in a few months. I'd always keep trying to perform better and earn more.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
You do this enough times, you build a great reputation, you'll be amazed at what you can earn in just a few years. You got this. Good luck. And now for the recommendation of the week.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
My recommendation of the week is the Fidelity debit card. No ATM fees globally. The interest rate in the cash management accounts, it's something like a high yield savings account rather than a checking account, which most ATM cards are attached to. Those are like 0%. And I think I'm getting somewhere between four and five or maybe even higher. It depends on the interest rate. It fluctuates, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Also, Fidelity has great customer service, especially compared to retail banks where you're stuck talking to an automated system. And if you get a human, they're like looking at the same website as you are. It's infuriating. Debit cards are usually crap across the board. They don't pay you interest on the money in the account. They charge you fees to use it. Not good.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
This one actually offers some solid benefits. Interest rates, good customer service. They reimburse the ATM fees. Even if you get money out of a machine that charges you six bucks, they just refund it to you. We're going to link to this card in the show notes. I hope it's a helpful one for you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
I found this because I was so sick of the retail banks that I use offering me just terrible options unless I had a ton of money in there and then the options were mediocre. I looked at Fidelity and immediately was like, oh, this is a real debit card for somebody who is not going to get taken advantage of by the McDonald's of banks, which is every retail bank.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Also, in case you all don't know, there's a subreddit for the show. A lot of fun discussions going on in there. Just look for the Jordan Harbinger subreddit if you're a Redditor. Okay, next up.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Ooh, okay, that could come in handy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Yeah, maybe. And if so, you should thank yourself for staying safe. You never know what people like this are capable of, especially lowlifes. I mean, these are scammers who knows if they're like, and if she just says we can't take it, just pistol whipper. Right. You don't know.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
I don't know. I'm sure that played a big role. You're overwhelmed, you're distracted, you're maybe in some pain still, you're sleep deprived. You're definitely not at 100%. You're vulnerable. You gotta have some compassion for yourself here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Wow, that is amazing. So cool. You never hear of that happening, really. Yeah, very rarely. Great job. That is a happy ending. Man, that must feel great. I hope they nabbed the scumbags hard for this, although I don't know how you trace something like that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
They just got the stuff. Yeah, but what a bunch of asshats.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Gabe, I'm curious, when the cops seize fenced goods from a pawn shop, does the pawn shop just have to eat the cost of that? I don't know how that works.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
It does. Yeah, because they can't ask everybody who walks in to prove ownership before they accept stuff. Hey, this has been in my family for 100 years. Okay, show me the receipt. Although I have to imagine that a huge amount of pawn shop business, especially in dodgy areas, it has to be stolen goods. Yeah, it has to be. So again, I'm very sorry this happened to you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
It is awful to be scammed, even when the stakes are relatively low, even when you end up being made whole. I'm also sorry this happened right after you had a baby. Like I said, it's a vulnerable time already. So to be taken advantage of on top of it, I'm sure that made all of this feel even worse.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Also, as a parent, I know the last thing you want to think about the world after you have a child is that the world is full of bad people or that you are somehow a bad parent for not clocking people like this before they could scam you. So I'm sure there's a lot going on for you in all of this. It's a really interesting question. Why do we feel guilty and ashamed when we're victims?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
The criminals are the ones who should feel guilty and ashamed. Victims should just feel sad and angry. But we hear from scam victims fairly often, and they all describe the same thing. I shared this several months back. Even I was a victim of a scam recently.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
It was a small-time Facebook advertising scam that locked me out of my account for the show for a little while, and I had some of the same feelings myself. Because, oh, I'm savvy, I talk about this stuff, and I still ended up installing something that looked like it was from Facebook and wasn't, and it was clearly a hole in Facebook security, but still, I felt dumb for falling for it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
So I've been thinking about this a lot lately, and I think what happens is, first of all, when we get scammed or targeted, we tend to ask ourselves what we could have done differently. And that's appropriate to some degree, because we obviously need to understand what role we played in a situation, own that, and figure out how to prevent it from happening again.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
But I think we often go a few steps further and blame ourselves entirely for what happened, or we turn our anger at the scammer against ourselves for some reason, and then that turns into guilt and shame. So that's one thing I think we need to parse, how to take the appropriate accountability without entirely self-blaming. The other thing that happens is getting scammed. It's a blow to your ego.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
It reveals where we are vulnerable. It reveals our mistakes. We feel dumb. We feel naive. We know we're supposed to be better than this, right? But here we are down, I don't know, whatever, 20 grand or five grand in photography equipment, being sextorted on Instagram, whatever it is, realizing we let a couple of two-bit criminals in our living room, whatever it is,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
That can be a big blow to how we view ourselves or how we like to view ourselves. And that can create a lot of shame too for not being as savvy or powerful or cautious as we wish slash thought we were.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Yeah, totally. The control piece is huge, I think. And look, some of this shame might be somewhat adaptive. It might be helpful to feel a certain degree of shame just enough so that we're motivated to learn and get better. Those people who are always falling for scams, they've been falling for scams for 20 years, they probably don't have this reaction.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Yeah, that is so uncool. Man, I mean, I guess if I were in her shoes, I'd be trying to get out of there too, but that's, oof, that sucks.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
When they fall for a scam, they're just like, oh, and then they just go give their money to another psychic or another get-rich-quick MLM. Yeah, like maybe you should be a little ashamed. Maybe that would help. Maybe a little bit of, gee, I thought I was better than this, would have helped you avoid doing this for another decade.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
So the motivation part is there, but that's different from being so embarrassed that you can't leave the house, you won't talk to anyone anymore. Then there's something that needs to get worked through. The only antidote is to own the shame, talk about it with a few people,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Allow yourself to fully confront the vulnerabilities that the scam exposed, which you're doing beautifully already, and then to take steps to protect yourself and do things differently next time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Shame tends to thrive in secrecy, in unresolved tensions between different parts of ourselves, in stuff we don't want to face, but it has a hard time surviving in whatever is owned and acknowledged openly.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
It's like the shame is a kind of reagent in the chemical reaction of growth or something. It has to be in the mix. A lot of victims also feel like they're going to be judged for what happened to them. That's a part of it. They're worried about what their friends and family will think, especially if the scam is perceived as embarrassing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Gabe, I'm thinking about that guy who wrote in a few months back. I think he lost 19 grand in Bitcoin from a pop-up on a porn website. It's like, I may want to leave that detail out.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Yeah, look, I get it. There might be some people out there who do judge. I can imagine if I lost 40 grand on a Bitcoin scam and I told my dad, he'd be like, oh, that's what you get. But I think if people haven't been scammed themselves, they do that. But mostly, I think we project onto other people the self-blame and the self-judgment that we feel.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
We assume we're going to find it in other people, and that perpetuates the shame.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Yeah, or who are forced to by a really scary world. I keep having to remind myself of that going back to the interview I did with Nathan Paul Southern and Lindsay Kennedy on cyber slavery. It's basically how a lot of online scammers are actually slaves, literally, in these massive call center operations. That was episode 833, by the way.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
My initial instinct is to always rage at these creepy scam texts we all get, but then I remember they might very well be refugees from Burma or Thailand or whatever, being held hostage literally somewhere in Laos or Burma. It's horrifying to think about. That obviously doesn't apply to our friend here. It's just something to keep in mind.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Another reason that victims feel guilty is they often put their families and themselves at risk. And this one I understand the most. If you lose a significant amount of money that you or your children need, or you create a ton of work and headache for your family in trying to recover, I get that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
If I lost my kid's college fund to some Bitcoin scammer, or I couldn't pay the mortgage because I was sick-storted or something, I would feel pretty guilty too, even though it's largely not these victims' fault.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Look, we're always prepared for these scams. After they're over. Right, like that guy who got scammed by a locksmith a few weeks ago, he described the exact same thing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
100%.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
So look, that's the psychology of being a scam victim, as far as I understand it. But on a practical note, from now on, definitely meet any Facebook marketplace or Craigslist customers out on the sidewalk or even down on the corner of your block or ideally in a public place, never in your house. One huge lesson you can take away from all this. I'm glad this came at a relatively low cost.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
I'm glad you and your family are all okay, and congrats on the baby. Go back and check out Dr. Allo Konoja if you haven't done so yet. The best things that have happened in my life and business have come through my network, the circle of people I know, like, and trust. I'm teaching you how to build the same thing for yourself in our six-minute networking course. The course is free.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
I don't need your credit card number. I don't care about any of that. It's not gross or schmoozy. It's on the Thinkific platform at sixminutenetworking.com. A few people told me that questions had been turned off in there. That was a setting that got changed without my knowing it. So if you have questions, you can ask them in the course. We get to those pretty quickly.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
And the drills in the course take a few minutes a day. Dig that well before you get thirsty, folks. Build relationships before you need them. You can find it all at 6minutenetworking.com. Show notes and transcripts on the website, advertisers, discounts, ways to support the show, all at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. I'm at Jordan Harbinger on Twitter and Instagram.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
You can also connect with me on LinkedIn. Gabe's on Instagram at Gabriel Mizrahi or on Twitter at Gabe Mizrahi. This show is created in association with Podcast One. My team is Jen Harbinger, Jace Sanderson, Robert Fogerty, Ian Baird, Tata Sidlowskis, and of course, Gabriel Mizrahi. Our advice and opinions are our own, and I am a lawyer, but I am not your lawyer.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Do your own research before implementing anything you hear on the show. Remember, we rise by lifting others. Share the show with those you love. If you found the episode useful, please share it with somebody else who could use the advice we gave here today. In the meantime, I hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn, and we'll see you next time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
You're about to hear a preview of The Jordan Harbinger Show about junk science.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
If you want to increase your scientific literacy and not get suckered into believing weaponized hogwash and passing it off to your friends and family as fact, check out Episode 745 with Dave Farina on The Jordan Harbinger Show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Yeah, that sucks. My parents just moved. It was really hard for them and hard on them. So I don't blame you. I know exactly what you're talking about.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Welcome to Feedback Friday. I'm your host, Jordan Harbinger. As always, I'm here with Feedback Friday producer, the soothing red fire retardant helping me douse the flames of these apocalyptic dumpster fires, Gabriel Mizrahi. Ooh, we don't use the R word anymore, bud. Ooh, my bad. The soothing crimson fire retardant helping me douse the flames of these apocalyptic dumpster fires. That's better.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Oh boy, what an awful situation. I am so sorry that your parents are dealing with this. After hearing what Gabe went through with his schizophrenic neighbor a few years ago, I really do feel for you. Having to deal with somebody like this is super stressful. It's also deeply tragic.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
You know, not the vibe you want around your home, especially when you're in your 70s and 80s and you just want to enjoy life, kick it with your grandkid. This is so sad. I also feel badly for this woman. I know she's clearly suffering.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
I think it's unconscionable that other people just have to suck it up and deal with a psychotic person who's ruining their life, especially if that person is self-medicating and making things worse for herself and everyone else. But I do genuinely have compassion for these folks. They're obviously unwell. They desperately need help and their system fails them constantly.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
So ideally, any interventions you guys pursue will give your parents some peace and get her the help that she needs and deserves. Gabe, you're our resident psychotic neighbor expert. You want to take the lead here?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
This is the part where I usually make a tasteless plug for SimpliSafe, but that's obviously unnecessary today and I won't do that. I'm glad your parents are already on this, although they might want to go a little further and install a true home security system like SimpliSafe, simplisafe.com slash Jordan. Oh, there it is.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
But yeah, motion sensor lights, sturdy locks, and alarm on all their doors and windows just in case might put everyone at ease and help them gather more evidence. I'm not worried about this woman breaking in, but if you can get her on camera doing something, ooh, that's good.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Thank you. Good catch, Gabe. You got to keep a PC out here. I'd be canceled already if it weren't for you. On the Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the stories, secrets, and skills of the world's most fascinating people and turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you. Our mission is to help you become a better informed, more critical thinker.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
And by the way, I know that sounds like a ton of work, but after the first report, you guys all have a template for this thing. You can literally copy and paste, make a Google doc with this, right? Change the date, change two or three sentences about what she did at that time. And you're done. Could take 10 minutes. Adobe PDF editor finally coming in handy, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
The thing you bought a license for 13 years ago. That's what this is going to help with. Really, when you have a stack of these and copies of your own, you're starting to build a case again. this person.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Oh, she said the neighbors across the street said she's never gone on quite this long before. Is that an indication?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
There was a comment in the subreddit today about how you expand people's vocabulary with this show. Criterion being... The singular of criteria and decompensating. People should go ahead and write that down. We'll wait for you. It's just the singular. Yeah. Is the bar getting lower? I mean, I don't think a lot of people know that datum and data. I would never say datum ever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
During the week, we have long-form conversations with a variety of amazing folks, from former cult members and arms dealers, rocket scientists and astronauts. This week, we had part two of my interview with Dr. Alok Kanoja, author of How to Raise a Healthy Gamer. We discussed mental illness, confidence, dating, culture, and communication. It's not just for gamers.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
criterion and criteria. First of all, I've heard people say criteria. So the bar is that low. Yes. Does not work for me.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1115: Schizophrenic Spite Dims Golden Years' Light | Feedback Friday
Criteria is just one of the criterias.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Your approach was absolutely the right one, though. Ask a lot of questions, plant the seeds for them to realize what's happening, give them some room to figure it out. I think you handled it well.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Of course. Of course. No one who's happy even bothers to make someone else's life hell at work. Why would you go through the trouble?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
That was super bizarre because do you remember how tired and exhausted she was where when you didn't order something, she would just shut off like a robot and look at the wall. And then when you ordered something, she would just like perk up a little bit and make a drink. Yeah, it was so weird. She would like boot up, yeah. I was like, are you malnourished or tired or are you just having a day?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
For sure. Yeah. Why else would you fall for something like this? She literally said, I just want to feel important and loved, which is pathetic. That's so sad. And sad. To your point, Gabe, that's a strange thing to admit to someone. Because if you're self-aware enough to know that you fell victim to a scam because you just wanted to feel important and loved.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Wouldn't you then want to figure out, you know, why you wanted to feel important and loved to the point of blindness?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
I mean, there is an app. It's called BetterHelp. But maybe I'm overestimating Dolores here. This is a great co-worker story. Poor, confused, thirsty Dolores. Carmela Soprano with a hole in her heart and an addiction to crossword puzzles. A hole in her heart and apparently four in her head, too. The hole in her heart, though, that's six across.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
I hope she's doing okay wherever she is. She's probably sitting near a hot dog cart by a children's park.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
It's one of those two places for sure, yeah. But seriously, this is a good reminder that everyone's going through something. And while you never have to put up with cruel treatment, it does help to remember that it's rarely about you. More importantly, I hope you're doing well. Sounds like you moved on and up and are living a Dolores free life, which is something worth celebrating.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
You know what costs less than $23,000 and will actually make you happy? The fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back. Thank you for listening and for supporting the show. All of the deals, discount codes, and ways to support the podcast are all in one place, jordanharbinger.com slash deals. Please consider supporting those who support the show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
All right, back to Feedback Friday. Okay, what's next?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Wow, impressive. Nicely done.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Or it was such a bizarre, that was so weird.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
That isn't shady whatsoever. Cool accounting, bro.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Hey, don't spend it all in one place. Could this guy be any less subtle about what's going on here? Come on.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Yeah, pretty sure that's not true. The manager is probably getting a taste of all this. It's so corrupt.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
All paid for by the hard-earned tips he was stealing from you guys, right? What a mess.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Wow, so he must have been in way over his head, man. Probably owed money to some loan sharks or some underground casinos or something like that. Meanwhile, he's putting garnishes on people's tilapia every night. That's actually kind of terrifying.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Ooh, so he might have skipped town. Maybe he's sleeping with the fishes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Yeah, this is all I got. I was kind of bummed my last ad pivot wasn't as funny, so I feel like I'm trying too hard now to make up for it. I don't know if it's working.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Okay. So this is going to be a Gabe going ham in the sign-offs kind of week. Is that what's going on?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
I feel that. You're getting upstaged by these absolute maniac bosses and you got to keep up.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Man, what a grift though. Now I'm sure the general manager was getting a cut of that. How else could he look the other way? This is wild. I'm also curious, which restaurant has 65 chefs?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
I'm trying to even imagine how many people can work at once. I mean, it's just supposed to be a massive kitchen. It's a big operation. The only thing I can really say about this story is good on you for confronting this guy when something was off. That takes some cojones and was absolutely appropriate. Of course, it didn't fix the issue.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
It just made things somewhat right for you and your colleague that week, but kudos to you. The fact that the GM didn't do anything about it, even if there were a world where it wasn't under his control, I think that's unconscionable. If I were in your shoes, I would have kicked it up to the owner.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Because you know that person would have been pissed to find out the chef was almost certainly stealing from his staff and that the GM refused to do anything about it. And as it turned out, he was stealing from the restaurant too. So I can't imagine the owner not taking action if they got wind of this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
It truly is. I wonder if they recruit specifically good-looking women for that job because they're highly visible, especially in the touristy areas. Let me catch myself. There's no such thing in North Korea, but in a capital where tourists might actually see them.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Of course, the stakes are incredibly high. Everyone pays some kind of price for being around an addict, which is why so many people have to pull back, draw hard boundaries, because it can be too chaotic and painful to have a lot of contact with somebody like this. This is a wild story, man.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
I do wonder what happened to this guy, if he's buried in the woods outside Schenectady or whatever, or if he's hiding out Walter White-style flipping burgers in New Hampshire. Who knows? What a world, man. I mean, he went to jail and no one ever heard from him again? That's a little bizarre. You can reach us Friday at JordanHarbinger.com. Keep your emails concise.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Try to use a descriptive subject line that makes our job a whole lot easier. If your sister-in-law is ruining your parents' life, your partner's been accused of things you can't disprove, or your partner read your journal and is now holding your private thoughts against you, whatever's got you staying up at night lately, big or small, crazy or mundane, hit us up Friday at JordanHarbinger.com.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
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1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
That's a great image. Peter Griffin buffing the linoleum floors at Albertsons.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
No, you cannot. Pretty sure that's 12 different health code violations in a supermarket as well. Especially if you are anywhere near the deli section. That is not okay. His only answer was, it gets hot in here, though. Amazing. So this guy was like, it's toasty in here. I'm just going to strip down to my fruit of the looms. I got to be comfortable.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
And so they probably choose that for a reason. All right. Well, on the Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the stories, secrets, and skills of the world's most fascinating people and turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you. Our mission is to help you become a better informed, more critical thinker.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
I mean, it does tend to get hot when you're absolutely blasted on cocaine. From what I've been told. Even if you're standing inches away from a stack of frozen Stover's lasagna.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
I love that he uses the Sigmund Freud defense, dude. Hey, cocaine's not so bad. It's basically just espresso you put in your nose.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Yeah, the chef from the last question wouldn't be skimming tips if he was addicted to flat whites.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
I mean, what can I add to the story? Just a chef's kiss of a visual.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
The only thing that would make this better is if the janitor was singing when our friend walked in, like Risky Business. Remember that scene?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Exactly. Backlit by those heat lamps on the roasted chickens.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
You know how you can get it?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Cocaine. Oh, there you go. It's a little bit like coffee.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
That's right. Sometimes I agonize over which button down shirt to wear on camera. And then there's this guy doing manual labor in his tighty whitey's After calling his boss to come to the store. That's the funniest part.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
That's a level of de-gaff that I personally aspire to. Wow. Yeah. You're right. The yayo helps. I think it does. I think that might be the secret to his success.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
I wonder why he did that. Was he just sensationalizing the story? It's a weird choice.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
And during the week, we have long form conversations with a variety of amazing folks, war correspondents, neuroscientists, investigative journalists, national security advisors, This week, we had Victor Vescovo on diving to the deepest parts of each of the seven oceans. He designed submarines and crazy exploration vehicles, and it was an episode all about the general spirit of adventurism.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Either way, and I'm sorry to keep repeating myself, but yeah, cool journalism, bro.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
No, yeah, I got it. I might have been an average lawyer, but I do know that courthouses don't give sneak peeks, especially to journalists. So this guy is a total loon.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
I love this no excuse thing. I want you to cover two different trials, one's in Ohio, one's in Kentucky. Okay, but I can't bend space-time to make that happen. Ah, it's no excuse.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Exactly. You're supposed to Doctor Strange this shit or you're fired? This guy's, yeah, he's literally nuts. Okay, so then what happened?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Wait a minute, wait a minute. So when you're missing a trial because you guys have to discuss how insane he is, he's fine with that. But when you miss it because you can't defy the laws of physics, you're bad at your job.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Of course he did. Wow.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Yeah, and now he's pulling the same BS with fifth graders. Oh, yeah, for sure.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Such an interesting guy. He was in the military, ends up getting a PhD in something like air power in Eastern Europe, and then he starts a hedge fund, makes a bunch of money doing that over the years, then uses that money to climb the highest mountains and dive to the deepest parts of of the ocean.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Man, Gabe, this one scares me because this guy sounds legitimately unhinged. It's one thing when your boss is a dick or out of control or he's wrestling with an addiction, but when your boss lives in a completely different reality, that's a little terrifying.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Yeah, for sure. Someone was asleep at the wheel or he was being protected by somebody higher up. Another interesting theme I'm hearing on today's episode, bosses looking the other way when it comes to bad behavior. It's not OK.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Maybe, but he did say this was years ago, so they have even less of an excuse. Plus, they were big enough to cover trials. This wasn't like, you know, new community garden opening in Pleasantville. This sounds like a fairly legit operation.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
It could be that he's being protected. So, man, local newspapers, they got to be hotbeds for dysfunction. Apparently. I wonder if other listeners have experience with that. I'm curious to know. You do hear about older industries like print publishing. They're just full of weird folks.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Yes. Yeah. I don't know why, but they seem to be that way.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
It's just a fascinating conversation with somebody who's got kind of like a Jules Verne OG explorer guy vibe. It's really something. He's really something. On Fridays, though, we share stories, take listener letters, offer advice, play obnoxious soundbites, and compare Gabe to various pieces of essential infrastructure.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Yeah, came with the furniture. Great way to phrase it. Anyway, my takeaway from this story is when your boss isn't just difficult, but literally nuts, there's no reasoning with them. You got to either let every terrible thing they do roll off your back because they're off their rocker, or you got to make management understand that a literal crazy person is at the wheel. There's no gray area here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
It's not like, oh, my boss is tough and he screams at me sometimes. This is my boss believes I can physically be in two places at the same time, that I can bend the rules of space time. He's out of his tree. Do something about it. And if management won't, then you bounce because you're never going to get any backing. If this won't cause them to take your side, then nothing will.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Or you stage a coup with the other reporters or something because you can't work under a straight up crazy person. You just can't do it. All right. Now it's time for recommendation of the week. So my recommendation of the week is Gmail keyboard shortcuts. Do you use these, Gabriel? I feel like you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
So I didn't really know that these existed until a couple of years ago. And every person I show them to, they just go gaga for this. Because it's something you kind of think like, oh, maybe it exists or you forget that it exists or you didn't have any idea in the first place. They save you a ton of time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
You'd be shocked at how much faster it is than clicking around to the next thing and clicking the buttons. Just these keyboard shortcuts, you can process hundreds of emails in a short period of time. Look, think about it this way. You can respond to your insane boss's demands. even faster.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Geez, I've got a few. I mean, I use a special client for Gmail called superhuman. So that has even more keyboard shortcuts, but I know that everybody has Gmail. So I think my favorites are the ones that remind you if somebody doesn't answer your email within a certain period of time. Oh, nice. That's a good one.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
I remember, and I have to be focused to do this, doing the click method, just the normal method, I think it took me all morning to get through about 100 emails, you know, maybe four hours. I got through 100 emails in one hour using keyboard shortcuts. So it's something like three to 400% faster. So cool. And I know people are like, oh, I got to memorize all this stuff. It takes a few minutes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
You know, the first half an hour, it's a little slow. And then for the rest of your life using email, it's lightning fast. It just becomes muscle memory at that point. It's great. Exactly. Also, in case y'all didn't know, there's a subreddit for our show. If you want to jump into discussions with other listeners about specific episodes, episodes you like, episodes you don't like.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Or if you want to share additional thoughts, learn more from other people in the show, fam, come check it out. A lot of cool conversations happening over there on Reddit in the Jordan Harbinger subreddit. Okay, what's next?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
We're doing something a little bit different from our usual Feedback Friday today. We're taking another round of bad boss slash ridiculous colleague stories. You guys sent us a ton of crazy workplace stories the last time we did this, and we couldn't take them all, so we decided to do a bit of a part two, since y'all seem to enjoy part one so much.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Something I've learned over the years, when people are super vague or they use a ton of buzzwords, and then when you ask them to clarify, they just leave you even more confused, they're almost always, not always, but almost always, just full of shit. They're usually confused themselves or they're afraid of committing to a plan or a point of view, so they just deliberately obfuscate things.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
The perfect plan that she was too busy to show up to, defend, or present in the first place? That perfect plan?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Yeah, so underneath the bluster and the narcissism is a ton of insecurity, as per usual. Yeah, once again, always the case, isn't it? Yep, always. Just appreciating how that theme shows up again and again. Insecurity, it's not just a weakness, it's a real vulnerability.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
And on that note, given our theme today, I want to kick off here by sharing a little piece of advice for anybody considering a new project, job, opportunity, whatever. Before you dive in and commit to something, always ask or think about what is the day-to-day actually like?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Whether you're threatened by other people's good ideas, you're falling for a romance scam on Wordle, and it can create a ton of dysfunction in the workplace.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Yeah, I'm over people like this. What good is your intelligence if you're going to use it this way?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
They are, but it probably kind of... intense. Also, you don't want to get hit by a car. So you got to wave around. You know what it reminds me of? I don't buy it for the record.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Wow. So she knew how to work all the angles and apparently had no shame in doing it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
You see that all the time in online videos, right? Where people are just doing things in public where you go, how do you? What's wrong with your brain? What is wrong with you? These people, they don't fold the way a normal personality does. And then you've got to work for them for another six months or a year before the company can fire them because they're so batshit crazy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
They don't care if the whole company knows they're the literal worst. It's wild.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Man, I'm so happy to hear that. Incredible what a good boss can do for a person. And on the other side, Gabriel, look how one toxic boss can get rid of essentially a whole department of talented people. No one wants to work with them. It's like having a cancerous cell.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Because a lot of opportunities, they really do seem exciting, but they actually give you less of the life that you really want to live. For example, being a writer might sound fun, and I'm sure it is, especially if you're James Clear, Mark Manson, Ryan Holiday type of person, and it becomes even more fun when you're thinking about release parties and book signings and fan mail.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Yeah, Jelga. Most people don't realize this show is good because I hold daily shaming sessions at 4.45 a.m. where I chew out Gabriel and the rest of the team for not grasping my vision. Which I'm too inept to understand anyway. Exactly. Doesn't stop me from cutting you down, though, does it?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Well, once again, I don't have much to add here. I mean, I did all the talking during the letter. I think our friend here put it brilliantly.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
That's right, such a Jelga move. You can be the smartest person in the world, but if you don't know how to inspire people, how to support them, how to be open to other ideas that you'd never come up with, what good is that intelligence? If you're too insecure to let other people thrive, what is the point of being a leader?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
In my view, a hallmark of a good leader is not believing they're the only one who has the best ideas or that they need to control every aspect of their department.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Exactly, yeah. My other takeaway from the story is when a leader doesn't make things clearer, when they actively make things harder or more confusing or more complicated than they need to be, that is just a huge red flag. Good leaders, they don't add obstacles. They remove obstacles, and they don't leave their subordinates confused or disempowered.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
They arm them with the information and responsibility they need to get things done. So any leader who Helga's stuff is just not a leader in my view. And you either got to act despite them or give them some direct feedback so that they can get better or take it up with their superior or look for another job. And sadly, looking for another job is often the only way to escape these kinds of people.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Yes, it's always the silver lining to these situations. It's hard to know how leadership impacts people until you've been one of the people impacted. Totally agree.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Yeah, I think you're right. Some people work under a Helga. They just get angry. They get demoralized or they're indifferent or whatever. And some people go, OK, I got to do things differently. I got to be the anti-Helga. Right. I want to learn from this person. Learning from people who suck is kind of a superpower. It does, yeah. So I applaud our friend here for doing that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Like I said, he sounds awesome. I'm sure wherever he is now, he's crushing it and he's making a lot of people do their best work. So kudos to you and well done on moving on and handling all of this in the right spirit. And now some brilliant ad copy crafted by yours truly that I couldn't possibly outsource because nobody else here is smart enough to grasp my vision. We'll be right back.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
But the reality is routine, writer's block, rejection, followed by years of grind and promotion, if you're lucky enough to even get that far. Designing furniture is another one. Sure, sounds sexy. It sounds glamorous. There's a reason every romantic interest in Hallmark movies does that, has that career. But it involves a ton of physical labor. You've got to coordinate logistics.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
If you liked this episode of Feedback Friday and you found our advice valuable, I invite you to do what other smart and considerate listeners do, which is take a moment and support our amazing sponsors. All of the deals, discount codes, and ways to support the show are all searchable and clickable over at jordanharbinger.com slash deals.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Our AI chat bot can also surface codes for you, jordanharbinger.com slash AI. And if that doesn't work, email us, jordan at jordanharbinger.com. Somebody here will dig up the code for you. Yes, it is that important that you support those who support the show. All right, back to Feedback Friday. Okay, next up.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
That sounds a lot like the workplace from question one, to be honest. Wow.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Wow, that is uncomfortable. That's not just racist. That's a cartoonishly dumb and racist. Where did that come from? You have to be so misattuned to even think about making that joke.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Ah, yes. We're all about networking. Unless you're networking within our industry after we created a toxic environment. That tracks.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Again, this is like Dr. Romney 101.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Damn, strong play there. Good for you. He would love nothing more than to be like, oh, she resigned so she doesn't get unemployment. Yeah, exactly.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Welcome to Feedback Friday. I'm your host, Jordan Harbinger. As always, I'm here with Feedback Friday producer, the community service officer directing traffic beneath this broken traffic light of life conundra, Gabriel Mizrahi. And I got my white gloves on and everything. That's right. Going way too hard with the hand motion. Why do they do that? I guess it has to be visible.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
You've got to deal with difficult clients. You've got to source materials. In other words, everything that isn't the sexy fun phase of sketching something in a cafe in your little book and making it a reality. Every job has the 15% maybe of glamour or excitement or fulfillment involved. The other 85% is usually pretty routine and banal and sometimes quite taxing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Oh, that is so embarrassing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Yeah, that's right. And these people are therapists, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
It sure is. I guess prostitution is one of those crimes that cuts across all professions, even podcasting, or so I've heard.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
You know, Gabe, when I hear about backstabbing at a regressive brokerage firm or criminal behavior in a restaurant kitchen or even nudity on the graveyard shift at a supermarket, I'm like, OK, that's wild. But I could see that that happens.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
But when you hear about therapists, people whose whole purpose is helping people, when you hear about clinicians bullying their staff and soliciting sex workers.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Yeah, it's just so hard to wrap my head around that. But maybe I'm being naive. I know therapists are human beings too, of course. So maybe the mental health world is just as dysfunctional as any other industry. But I guess it just shocks me. It seems like it shouldn't happen.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Yeah, wouldn't you want to address that? That's what I'm saying.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
You know how much I pay someone to just sit there and listen to me while I do lines and walk around my neighborhood? I should get into that business. Yeah, then they just don't. fix the problem. Look, that I understand. You got to have some of it in you in order to want to devote your life to it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
But how are you going to treat a patient for an addiction or a struggling marriage and then leave your office and go hire a sex worker or do recreational drugs and not feel like a total hypocrite? I mean, that's Feedback Friday territory, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Okay, maybe I'm being a little unfair, but also, what are the odds of that?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Really bad luck. So I'm speculating, obviously, but I'm guessing that was not the only time he did that. And I look, I have very few issues with sex work as long as everybody's safe and consenting and all that stuff, which is obviously a complicated topic. What I find problematic is the idea that a therapist who maybe slash probably has a habit of frequent frequenting sex workers. Get it right.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Yeah. is then trying to treat patients for addiction and dysfunctional behavior. Maybe I'm just a total Boy Scout and a square and everybody be dysfunctional AF and hiring sex workers. I don't know, though.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Project management, admin, grinding, stumbling in the dark, dealing with fear and rejection, whatever it is. So when you're assessing a new opportunity, your job is to pierce through the fantasy or the exterior or the sales pitch and find out what it is really like. This is part of your due diligence and your homework, not just if you're choosing something, a creative thing on your own.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
And then when they turned it down in our facility, yeah, I think he thinks he's going to get a job, but they're like, no, no, no, we're billing Medicaid.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Well, Gabe, you know that my mom's brother, the one I've talked about on the show a few times, he was supposedly an addiction counselor and he was also a lifelong heroin addict.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Yeah. It's just, you know, and he was an addiction counselor, at least after getting out of prison once he became that. Although now that I think he was such a bullshitter, I don't think any of us know for sure that any of that was true.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Anyway, my takeaway from this is even professionals who are held to higher standards can act a fool. And when that happens, you either got to call it out or you got to get the hell out. The advantage to working in licensed professions like mental health, medicine, law, industries that have clear ethical standards is that you can report an ethics violation and the relevant bodies will investigate.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Like this thing about firing a clinician without giving their patients closure? That's an ethics violation. I've heard that before. It's something you could let the board of psychology or whatever it is in your state know, and they should take action.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
It doesn't mean they'll necessarily strip the person of their license, but they should at least look into it and maybe notify the person that that's not cool. And in fields where people's lives and mental health are in the balance, that is so important.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
I completely agree.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Yep, there's that insecurity again.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Totally. But the thing with narcissistic leaders and insecure bosses and just petty people in general, they can't play that bigger game. They only see the world through a very narrow prism. And that prism is, what does this mean for me? How do I look out for number one?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Right. I think a lot of these folks are just gaping wounds of insecurity and neediness. And every little bump in the road is a catastrophe. Every degree of freedom is a risk or a potential risk, which is why they develop these very rigid ideas like, oh, we need allies, not enemies.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Also, when you were getting a job or getting into a career, there's a kind of a little bit of a, it's a joke, but not really, that most people who went to law school really should have just been a summer intern at a local law firm and they never would have gone to law school. Because most of us, we had no idea what a day-to-day for an attorney looked like.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Bingo. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
And is therefore the enemy and doesn't deserve our curiosity or our support. And by the way, that black and white thinking, it's also kind of a hallmark of narcissism, I think, and also of just dysfunctional personalities in general.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
The analogy to countries is actually kind of a good one. It's the exact same thing. Because in both cases, if you're going to control people, you need them to fear you. But the difference is in a free market economy anyway, people can just peace out if they feel controlled and threatened. And they will eventually if they have any sort of other better opportunities.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Anyway, I'm sorry you dealt with these a-holes. They sound like awful leaders. We didn't even touch on the rampant sexism and racism at this place, which is absurd.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Yeah, it's unconscionable. I'm glad you saw the light and you started your own practice and that you're thriving now. That is super exciting. Well done.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Yeah, so two interesting things here already. First, oversharing like that, again, bit of a red flag, even if it is kind of innocent. Dolores vibes, 100%. Strong Dolores vibes. At a minimum, this kind of thing shows a lack of discernment and lack of boundaries, in my opinion. Second, the whole, oh, my rogue employee made me lose a million dollars thing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
That's also weird because A, something seriously wrong must have happened for you to lose a million dollars as a contractor. Huge. Huge. And B, where were you in all that? What does that say about you to say nothing of the fact that it's totally unnecessary to be sharing that with a new hire?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
And the people that did, most of them chose not to go to law school because they were like, ugh, this is pretty ugly and heinous. Another way to get insight is to informally interview people at whatever job or in that field. Make it safe for them to tell you the truth, as well as doing your own homework, reading about the reality of the situation.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Yep. desperation, even just eagerness, it can really mess with your judgment. There have been tons of studies about this. It's one of the things that can make people fall for scams too. When you want to believe something, your mind will help tell that story. It'll discount a lot of the concerning facts along the way.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Something I always have to keep in mind when I'm evaluating an opportunity, you have to correct for that bias when you're excited about something, whether it's a job or an asset or a person, especially a person.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
OK, so not only is he oversharing, he's telling everyone a different story. So he's a liar.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Oh, my God.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Oh my God.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Yeah, what are you talking about? Again, the narcissism and the you're either with us or against us thing. I'm starting to think the moment you hear a boss say this kind of thing, just start dusting off ye old resume. Jeez.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Wow. That's a great detail. I mean, look, he's allowed to believe whatever he believes. I'm not going to mock him for that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
But there's something objectively hilarious about Michael Scott, Tony Soprano screaming at old ladies on the phone to go themselves and calling his staff retarded toddlers and then turning around and splashing himself with holy water in the office because somebody's talking about ghost stories.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
And if you can't do that, you can at least remind yourself that it will not be all high fives and rah-rah and creative satisfaction 24-7, because no job, not even hobbies, are that. All right, Gabe, what is the first thing out of the mailbag?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Yeah. She's a mob wife type. He's a mob type wannabe. Exactly. She's missing some teeth. He's missing some brain cells. It might just work.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Yep. We could get the chef from question two into the treatment center from two letters ago, see if they can help him kick his addiction to gambling and blow. I think you might be onto something here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Do you need more email in that inbox, though? But how great would that be? Dear Jordan and Gabe, a few months ago, I met a woman in a pink pantsuit who was missing four molars. Sorry, molars. Molars.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
I'm shocked there's an HR lady at this company, I'm not going to lie. There's five people and one of them is HR? Exactly.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Well, I like that one, Gabe. That one was clean. Thank you. Got some double internal rhymes in there too. Oh, you'd like that. Appreciate it. I did not see holy water and golden daughter come. Really channeling your inner Eminem today.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Damn it. You saw through my manipulation. How dare you call me? You're like a son to me, Gabriel.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Anyway, great job on getting out of this place, writing up that letter. You should be proud of that. It's scary to stand up to a boss like this, even if he is kind of Michael Scott-ish. I'm actually impressed it only took you four months to realize you had to get out. Kudos to you for that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Oh, yeah. At which point he turned on her and she couldn't do anything right.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Yeah, I remember that. So again, there's either something about these listeners or these bosses that triggers some father-daughter template or personalities like this use the whole I think of you as a daughter thing to keep them in their orbit because they have zero shame.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Well, right. So that's what makes me think it's bullshit. If you really think of me as a daughter, maybe don't manipulate me and cut me down all the time, bro.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Right, recognition she said she never got at any other job.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Yes, that's another thing to keep an eye on. I'm with you. Being validated appropriately at work, that's a form of value that's necessary. It's a form of psychic compensation, to steal a term Scott Galloway used in our interview. Oh man, I love that term when he used it. That was a good one. Yeah, it's a good one.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
They have to make this like huge theater kid from high school turned law enforcement.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
But if a boss is showering you with compliments in order to avoid paying you what you are worth, or if they're praising you one day and then being cruel to you the next day, that's a different thing. Then you've got to wonder if the validation is even genuine or if it's just another tactic.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Dolores, great choice. 10 out of 10 on the name. I'm already getting a picture of who this person is.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
When there's a disconnect between those two things, that's another good signal to pay attention to. But that's a good point. Desperation can really seduce you into a questionable job and an imbalanced need for validation can keep you stuck in that job too.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
So the other big thing that jumped out at me about this one was when Tony Scott accused her, you mentioned this, of another employee conspiring against him. That paranoia, the everyone's out to get me mentality, those qualities, man, they just scream run to me.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Also, like, why? Just take the L, dude. She quit. Time to bamboozle someone else or finally sign up for therapy. Better help and figure out why your business is plagued by so much drama. Hint, it's you. Anyway, I'm thrilled you got out of there so quickly. I'm even more thrilled that you got an offer of almost double your salary at a huge company. I think that's fantastic.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
I'm sure that speaks to just how valuable you are. And I love that you have that email to look back on. That document is a testament to your confidence, your ability to protect yourself and your courage in standing up to an objectively frightening personality.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
And now that you know what to look for and what pressure points you have that might have made you susceptible to a personality like this in the first place, I doubt you'll end up working for somebody like him again. But listen, if you still have his email address, shoot that on over to Gabe. It sounds like he wants to play matchmaker for Dolores with the help of our friend from question one.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
And you know he's going to make that happen.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
The metaphor being that we're all the kids of these two nut jobs and we just want to get the family back together so everybody can be happy and dysfunctional together.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
No, that's nothing to look at here. I want to thank all of you for suffering through these horrible jobs and putting up with these ridiculous bosses so we could learn from your stories this week. I know this episode was a little lighter than our usual fare, but I think there were some really valuable lessons in there.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
To be fair, if you're not hiring coked up chefs, you're going to have a hard time hiring chefs. That like eliminates like half 50% of the chefs. You are going, the pool of applicants is going to be significantly diminished. I was going to say beware the narcissists and uplift people rather than cut them down. But sure, yeah, let's go with yours, Gabe. Don't hire cokeheads.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
or you will see Homer Simpson in his tighty-whities and or a dumpster fire of a chef robbing your safe at 2 a.m. after getting a hand shandy in the parking lot. And on that note, go enjoy your own auditory hand shandy by going back and check out Victor Vescovo and our Skeptical Sunday if you haven't done so yet.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
The best things that have happened in my life and business have come through my network. That's the circle of people that I know, like, and trust. I'm teaching you how to build the same thing for yourself in our six-minute networking course. The course is free. I don't need your credit card number. There's nothing for sale. It's not schmoozy or gross.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
And you can find it on the Thinkific platform at sixminutenetworking.com. The drills really take a couple minutes a day. Dig that well before you're thirsty, people. Build relationships before you need them. Once again, 6minutenetworking.com. Show notes and transcripts are on the website. Advertisers, deals, discounts, ways to support the show, all at jordanharbinger.com slash deals.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
I'm at jordanharbinger on Twitter and Instagram. You can also connect with me on LinkedIn. Gabe's over on Instagram, Gabriel Mizrahi, or on Twitter at Gabe Mizrahi. This show is created in association with Podcast One. My team is Jen Harbinger, Jace Sanderson, Robert Fogarty, of course, Gabriel Mizrahi. Our advice and opinions are our own, and I'm a lawyer, but I'm not your lawyer.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Do your own research before implementing things you hear on the show. Remember, we rise by lifting others. Share the show with those you love. If you found the episode useful, please share it with somebody else who could use the advice we gave here today. In the meantime, I hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn, and we'll see you next time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Here's a sample of my interview with Guy Raz, who hosts NPR's How I Built This. He shares his number one secret to getting a great interview, how asking difficult questions during the interview serves both the overall story and the guest being grilled, and it's kind of nice to just riff with somebody else in the business.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Yeah, so instead of a bottle of whiskey, she just busts out her favorite of the 57 flavors for her hot dog, her daily hot dog. What a character.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
For more, including the one teachable quality all entrepreneurs seem to have in common, check out episode 404 of The Jordan Harbinger Show with Guy Raz.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Okay. Well, okay. Interesting data point there already. When people open up way too quickly, like there's nothing wrong with appropriate vulnerability, of course. But when you tell the new person at the office, yeah, so I meet men through words with friends and also I don't have any molars.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Why don't you solder that into your memory?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Well, when we start doing the show in England, you'll be right. But until then, you're wrong. You're still wrong.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Anyway, I feel like nine times out of 10, these rapid over sharers, they're just, they're a little nuts. These people.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
You know what this reminds me of? Those North Korea traffic ladies. You've seen those, right, when we were there? Of course, yeah. What's weird about them, not only is it that they don't have traffic lights, that's strange, of course, but the fact that they use these ladies that stand on those little podiums in the middle of the intersection, what's weirdest about that
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
I'm going to go with mentor.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
However you want.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Well, there you go. Insta besties, insta enemies.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Ooh, hypersensitivity and paranoia. Red flag number two. Yep. Maybe typical for a mob boy from the 1960s, but you know what's weird? She brought it to her. She didn't go to the boss and was like, Dolores messed this up. Good point. She brought it to her attention where no one else had to know and she still wasn't smart or her EQ was still so low she thought, oh, she must be out to get my job.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
I mean, it doesn't make any sense.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
I mean, I kinda get it, but also way to dodge a necessary conversation. Cool management, bro. Just wait it out. She's gonna be gone soon.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Yeah, okay, speaking of tales as old as time, but which apps? Dating apps or, like, Scrabble Go?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Why are you asking? I'm hoping that's a real game. For some reason, I want to know if she met a guy on Bumble or on some New York Times brain teaser. Literally doesn't matter at all.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Yeah, we've seen this movie before. Jeez.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
I was going to ask you what those actually are.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
is not the uniforms, the makeup, the whole thing. What's weirdest about that is they do all of the motions, even when there's like three cars in a mile, and there's no cars in the intersection. So they're still doing it, like as if there's just a full load of cars. It makes absolutely no sense. Just take a break until a vehicle pulls up. 20 cars in Pyongyang that have gasoline.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
You can't pretend you don't know now.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Oh, they have the tiny little spike in the back. But you're right, it's lower. It's a low one, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Nice. Well done. That's a tricky dance right there, especially when the person doesn't like you, doesn't trust you, and doesn't want to hear what you have to say.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Okay. So I think you might be a little confused. Dolores, the nurse reached out not to say, hi, I'm a nurse and I'm this guy's power of attorney. She reached out to be like, hey, Dolores, this stranger that you've never met and talked to once on the phone, you're his power of attorney. And also he needs $23,000, which you don't need a power of attorney. Like none of it makes any sense.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
It's just all hilarious.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
It's just a cheesy romance scam that you really have to have three neurons maximum to fall for.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
That's actually faster than I would have thought. Good for her. I'm glad she didn't get scammed, even if she is the office busybody.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Well, fair point. And it's really nice that you could have that empathy for her. But yeah, this is exactly the vulnerability that these scammers exploit. And it is so sad.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
That happens a lot with these scams. That's also what she's saying, right? But who knows if she really knew it was a scam? Maybe she just said that to save face because when she realized it, she realized it was so late that she should have realized it earlier. Yeah, like I'm not that dumb. I'm just lonely and I run a company. Which is, I don't know, maybe that's better. I don't know.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Well, you'd be surprised. It is hard to say, but you're probably right. Scammers don't like to hang around if they're not getting anywhere. It seems like before asking for $23,000, they would have tested the waters with $500 or something like that. They look for easy targets, and when those targets dry up, they just move on.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
gee wonder why signed cringing at the scavenger bachelor who went after my petty office manager and because her judgment wasn't spectacular with debt he tried to saddle her even though i tried to cross-examine her wow poor dolores huh what a piece of work you know potential plot twist that male co-worker is like you're asking too many questions i'm messaging her on this app to keep her from driving all of us crazy and you want me to warn her
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
Exactly. You know, what this person coulda slash shoulda done has been like, this is a scam. My next steps are clear. Go on Google Images and find another handsome person. Start talking to Dolores by using words with friends or whatever, just so every day isn't a bloody nightmare in the office.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
What a sort of unrewarding... Some weird craft. What is your angle? I really just wanted to go one day without you belittling me for absolutely no reason. So that's why I'm sending you pictures from a dude who's an underwear model online. It's interesting.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1090: More Workplace Fails and Bad Boss Tales | Feedback Friday
We've talked about how to support people who are the victims of scams, especially romance scams, but that gets a lot more complicated when there are people at your office and they have some sort of power over you or in the place where you work. It can be hard to intervene when bruising someone's ego might actually create blowback for you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
This episode is sponsored in part by Vital Proteins. I want to tell you about Vital Proteins Collagen Peptides. That's a mouthful. It's a daily supplement that supports your hair, skin, nails, bones, and joints all in one in one simple step each day. Collagen makes up about a third of the protein in our bodies, but as we hit our 30s, it unfortunately starts to decline.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Alright, now we're going to come out of the closet with some scandalously good deals on the fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back. Thank you for listening to and supporting the show. All of the advertisers' deals and discount codes are searchable and clickable over at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. Please consider supporting those who support the show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Alright, back to Feedback Friday. Okay, next up, Gabe.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Okay, she does obviously remember that you asked. Come on. But she's chalking this up to what? Indecision? This doesn't add up. Doesn't make sense. Sounds to me like she's not really taking in your offer slash she deliberately told her friends that she was getting zero help so that she could get sympathy from them. Like, wah, no one's helping me.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
And our mission is to help you become a better informed, more critical thinker. During the week, we have long form conversations with a variety of amazing folks, war correspondents, neuroscientists, rocket scientists, a lot of scientists, astronauts, cold case homicide investigators. This week, we had former ATF agent Jay Dobbins back on the show. You guys loved my last interview with him.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Yeah, that's super annoying, and that's the real problem.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Oh, surprise, surprise. All right, let's hear it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
That is also a move. My goodness.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
What on earth? This is so obviously transparently deliberate. Oh, my God. Okay, first of all, so she plans her wedding in another city or another country when her own sister-in-law is also getting married at the same time. Of course, there's probably a ton of overlap between those guest lists. This is so bizarre, man.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Look, we're going to find out who likes us more and then we're going to cut the other people out of our lives and complain about them.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Yeah, this is so strange. I'm almost having trouble believing somebody would do that. But of course, Chelsea did. Also, hiring our friend here's husband's ex to do her hair. That means she wanted there to be some kind of drama between her hairstylist and a guest at the wedding.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
OK, but then she didn't take the free hairstyling from the cousin that offered it. She had to pick that one hairstyle. Come on, man. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
It's a destination wedding, though. I don't know. It doesn't make any sense. The only perfect ballerina bun in their town? I doubt it. So she'd rather spend more money to create an awkward situation than have her cousin who's a professional do it for free. Maybe I'm stuck on the money thing, but none of this makes sense.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
More volumes than her hair on that day, yes. Well, depending on who did the hair, but yeah. Depends on who did the hair. That's right. Every ounce of my being is going, this person is a nightmare, but I know I should hold off until you finish reading because it probably gets worse. God knows what else.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
But it's good to know because it's not just you, which is somehow better.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
There was so much more to talk about because I actually ended it early because it was like the Perfect ending rarely comes along in an interview. And I was like, I can't go past this point. So I decided to do another round with him, round two. Once again, there was so much to talk about.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
unfortunately that's almost certainly true whenever i notice people do something like that especially gossip i always try to make a mental note of it jen's really big on this they'd probably spill the tea about me if they had some juicy goss not to feed your paranoia but i think it's smart to clock that like i said jen's always whenever anybody says something negative about somebody if it not maybe not just one thing but like a pattern of this jen's always like don't say anything to this person that's important because they always they're a shit talker and they're going to talk about you
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Yeah, I'm going to disagree with you there. You've been making it largely about her for a long time based on what you've shared. You're a nice person. I appreciate that about you. You don't want to kick someone when they're down, etc. Maybe you haven't been making it about you enough. But look, I'm going to hold off. You're nicer than me, etc., etc.,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
No, I think it's a fairly large Australian termite mound. You know, those ones that are like six and a half feet tall or whatever. Strong metaphor. Yeah. Yeah, extreme. Wow. So when you started off, you said that Chelsea had a devastating miscarriage. She was depressed for a year. Look, I was fully on her side when you said that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
This poor woman. I've had friends who go through that. They don't leave their apartment for four months. I mean, it's bad news. It's sad. That's a really painful thing to go through. We don't know the circumstances. We don't know how far along she was. We don't know what she was going through leading up to the miscarriage. I'm curious about all that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
But losing a pregnancy is an objectively horrible thing to go through. It can be quite traumatic. I really do feel for her there. But then you started talking about how she's handled this whole baby shower thing. And I was like, OK, I know you went through something awful. Things are looking good now. None of that explains this behavior.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
We talked about the specifics of his undercover operation to take down the Hells Angels biker gang, among other operations and stories from his career. Just a great storyteller and done a lot to fight crime. On Fridays, though, we take listener letters, offer advice, and generally stroll through the brambles and thickets in this spooky forest of WTF.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
And then you shared all the wedding stuff, the fact that she bullied your sister to the point where your sister's like, I'm drawing up the hard line. I'm not talking to her again. That also damaged your sister's relationship with your brother.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Oh, yeah. OK.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
That is a good point. It's not like she was an angel before and then she went through this loss and it did a number on her mental health and she has unresolved trauma and now she's acting out. She honestly just sounds kind of mean. And then there's this latest drama with her friend who's planning to shower. So my reaction earlier was more or less right, I think.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
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1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Chelsea is a little bit of a nightmare. Now, look, there are two ways to respond to a person like this. The brutal, obvious one is to go, hey, you're acting like an a-hole. Maybe you are an a-hole. You're selfish, you're mendacious, you're a little nuts, you're driving your friends and family away, you need to take a hard look at yourself.
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1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
And then there's the more compassionate lens, which is to say, people don't behave like this unless there's something wrong, they're in pain, they're confused, they're insecure, whatever it is. Obviously both can be true. Me personally, I find it hard to have a lot of empathy for people who act this egregiously. It's so extreme, it lacks self-awareness, it's so un-self-aware and unnecessary.
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1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
You do this once or twice, I'm in your sister's camp, screw you, I'm done. But I've also learned to make more room over the years for some forgiveness and empathy for these folks, because again, you know, pathological people, they're always kind of messed up underneath. That doesn't mean you have to continue to put up with them, though. It doesn't mean you don't say something.
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1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
It just means that you can be appropriately judgmental and compassionate at the same time. So to answer your question, no, you're not making a mountain out of a molehill. In fact, I feel like you haven't made this into enough of a mountain, especially since it's coming from somebody in your own family.
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1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
okay, fine, she's your sister-in-law, so maybe it's harder to know how much to push back, but still, it's a problem.
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1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
And you said that it's better for me and our family to just ignore Chelsea's behavior, which is another way of saying that all of you, except your sister, have basically agreed to pretend that this isn't as bad as it is and given her a ton of leeway to be difficult and hurtful and frankly just super irritating. That's right. And I understand that to some degree.
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1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
The frustrating thing about personalities like this is they don't have enough self-awareness to realize what they're doing most of the time. They don't have the ability to regulate themselves in a mature adult fashion. So it's on the normal people. It's on us to cramp around them so you can keep things on an even keel.
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1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
And the problem, as you're finding out, is that only enables these people further because it's so intimidating and awkward to say, hey, you are kind of a problem. You need to hear some things. So they just keep doing what they do with very few consequences until they wake up one day and go, oh crap, why have I driven everyone away?
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1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
And by the way, a few weeks back, I recommended chia seed pudding to you guys. It has some protein. It tastes good. It's easy to make. What I didn't tell you when I mentioned it is before I got into this stuff, you know, I've been having my blood work done probably every 10 weeks for the past couple years. And my cholesterol was not good.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
And even then, they might not even register that as a problem depending on how severe they are. Some people's narcissism is so great they can't even entertain the idea that they might be the reason people don't want to be around them. They just blame everyone else for one reason or another or it goes through this filter of like, oh, everyone abandons me.
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1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
And unfortunately, I've known a number of people like this over the years and they never seem to see that they are the common denominator.
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1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Exactly. Her victimhood is making it impossible for her to see her own behavior, which again is super disturbing. Because you have to literally ignore multiple offers in order to preserve the narrative, the story, that no one's there for you.
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1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Yes, and that's why Chelsea is a tough case. I bet we don't even know the half of it. So what is the best way forward? As it relates to the baby shower, I think you have a choice.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
You either decide that you want to help her friend plan the shower and you let all the crazy roll off your back and you collaborate really well with this other friend who's probably going through a version of what you're going through too. She might be a solid partner to you in all this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
You just get through this and then you're done, which will involve cramping around your sister-in-law for just a little while longer. Or you bow out and you say, hey, I'm sorry, you're making it really hard for me to be there for you. And then you have to deal with the implications of that, because, of course, that's going to further her story. Your sister bailed on planning our shower.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
You're going to hear that.
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1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Yeah, man, everybody walking on eggshells. And these days, that's expensive. So... Man, these dad jokes are so dumb. All right. Hitting you in the wallet and the heart. That's right. Yeah. You got to go to Costco. Okay. So he got to get there early. So he's a massive blind spot before they sell out of dad jokes. Or he has a massive blind spot about her because it's his wife.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Yeah, I would not want to be in this guy's shoes, man. He's having a baby with this person and he's probably like, please let this be the end of this nonsense.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
The LDL cholesterol, the bad cholesterol, it went from like 68 to 78, 88, 98, 119. Not good, especially for somebody who doesn't eat a ton of junk at all. That's just a bad trend. And that happened for about a year. And then I threw chia seed pudding in the mix, and I've eaten it pretty much every single day since I had my last blood work, or previous blood work.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Man, I don't see that happening unless our friend talks to her brother directly and tries to help him see all this more clearly. But then it gets messy. Is she overstepping? Is she stirring the pot? How is he going to respond? Maybe he was like, if you're going to be that way, fine. That's not a good sign. Although, if multiple sisters are like your wife is nuts.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
At what point do you have to start listening? Yeah. At what point does he listen? Exactly. So look, one option is when the time is right, maybe after the baby shower, you could sit down with Chelsea and say, look, I know you've had a very intense couple of years, the miscarriage, the baby, planning all these events, super stressful. We all go a little nuts around these events.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
I'm also seeing this and this behavior. And I see this narrative. I see a relationship with my sister falling apart. And I don't think I'd be a good friend or sister-in-law to you if I didn't just tell you that I see you getting in your own way here and pushing away people who genuinely love you, including me.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
And I know that's going to be scary to say, but that's one way you could begin this conversation. Now, of course, how she'll respond to that, that's a totally different question. But like we always say, how she responds to something like that, that's really going to tell you a lot about whether there's a possibility for a healthy relationship here.
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1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
you might have to risk triggering Chelsea a little bit in order to find out if she's actually somebody that you can be close with. Gabriel, you know, this is weird, right?
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1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Because your choice is to either play their game forever where you're unhappy with it and they're seemingly unhappy with it, or you just push things to the next level and you find out, is the inevitable conclusion that you're just going to get pissed off at some point and cut me off? Because like, let's skip to that part.
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1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
You're ripping off this emotional band-aid. You can either sit there and be delicate around it for years where everybody's annoyed by it, or you can just go for it and see what shakes out. And this does not get easier the longer you play along. Right. Because, you know, when you get like an injury, like a shoulder injury,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
And then it's like, oh, your lower back kind of hurts and your bicep hurts and your other arm has this weird thing because there's an imbalance going on. Your whole family is rearranging themselves slowly over time with different people breaking at different points.
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1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
So the sister was already like, I'm out. She's already like the tendon in your elbow that's sore every day. You can't use it because you got to wear a sling because something's going on. You have to eventually heal the injury with surgery, with rehab, whatever it is, because eventually all of the other joints are going to have a problem with this. And that's no way to live. All right.
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1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
We went through the one option where you just be a little more direct with it. The other option is to pull away like your sister has and just have less contact with her. No contact. Perfectly legitimate option. I'm sure she'll notice that. You might have to talk about it at some point.
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1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
And as of my latest blood work, my LDL went from 119 to 78. So I dropped 41 points. I mean, a crazy amount. And that's... I mean, that's like 30% plus drop. And I made basically just that one big change to my diet since my January blood work. The daily chia seed pudding is loaded with soluble fiber, enough for a whole day's RDA in just that one meal. And I wasn't getting enough fiber. That's it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Or you could find some middle ground where you're friendly but not super close, and that allows you to stay connected to your brother, protect yourself from Chelsea at the same time. It's also a fair option. I, as you might guess, think option one is the most authentic and productive approach.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
It'll get you closer to a more honest relationship with Chelsea and with yourself, even if that means you guys aren't as close, which I will argue... You're not really close with somebody if they're pulling this crap and you're tolerating it. It's an illusion. It's a mirage.
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1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Right. Maybe it's slightly more awkward in the short term and then you just never deal with her again. Cool.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Yeah, I like that. But I also know that, look, any of these options is going to require a lot of courage and strength on your part. Really.
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1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
That's good. Wow, I really like that. Also, it's going to be really hard for her brother to be like, you never do anything for her when you just threw the world's greatest baby shower and everyone saw it because they were there. I got worked up on this one. I don't know if it's just Friday or this particular thing. Everybody's family has a Chelsea somewhere.
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1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
So maybe this is plucking little cords that I have calloused over or thought I calloused over.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
screaming into the microphone. I'm really sorry you have to deal with all this. It sucks, man, but it shouldn't be your responsibility. But I also think Chelsea desperately needs to hear some things, and I would imagine a few other people would have your back. You're not the only one who's headed up to here.
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1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
I hope you find the solution that feels right for you, and good luck, and enjoy that baby shower. Thank you. Thank you.
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1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
I haven't changed anything else. No medications, nothing. Look, can it be something else? Of course. I'm not going to give medical advice. Bodies are weird. They're mysterious. Obviously, no one can pinpoint with 100% certainty that it was the chia seeds. But in two months, my LDL could be back up and it was just some weird glitch. And I'm like, hey, guys, wasn't the chia seed pudding?
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1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
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1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
But what I will say is most of us, especially Americans, we don't get nearly enough soluble fiber. Not the stuff you take that makes you poop. Not the stuff you can't chew it or digest it. This is the stuff that ends up in your blood. And I measured and I was getting less than 10% of the US RDA for fiber before I started eating this stuff. And now I'm getting over 100% each day.
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1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Thank you.
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1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
So I'm not saying it's the chia seed pudding, but I'm hinting strongly that it very well may be the chia seed pudding. So if you're struggling with some rising LDL and your doctor thinks it could be the lack of soluble fiber, I would say give this a shot. Chia seed pudding saving lives over here. And it tastes good. So it's not like, oh, God, I got to eat more fiber.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Thank you.
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1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Oh, my God. Emergency cocaine. Wow. I've never heard that one before. What a ridiculous excuse for getting high. I can't be a good dad without the yayo. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
And you're putting broccoli in the blender and choking it down every day. This is the way to do it. All right. As always, we've got some fun ones. We got some doozies. Can't wait to dive in. Gabe, what is the first thing out of the mailbag?
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1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Yeah. Have you heard of five hour energy, buddy? They're not even a sponsor, but you might want to try it. It'll also help you stay awake with a sick kid. God, this guy is just a full blown drug addict. Oh, so sad. Oh, this poor kid up all night with a coked up dad. If the kid was even sick. Yeah, good point. That could have been a lie, duh. Okay, so ridiculous.
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1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Oh man, so they're both addicts. Great.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
I cannot believe Brad's mom goes over there to do their housekeeping for them. And they're acknowledging that they can't take care of their child. Hey, can you come over and do laundry? We've been doing rails of blow all night. We want to sleep till 5 p.m.
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1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Just add a serving to your coffee, smoothie, even water. It doesn't even taste like anything, so it blends right in. The key is consistency. Making it a daily habit is how you see the benefits.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Erratic is a very polite word for this behavior. This is neglectful at best. Very reckless, honestly.
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1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
For sure. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Why am I not surprised? Yeah.
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1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Oh man, what a tragic story.
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1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Man, this kid's really stuck. Obviously, I share all of your concerns. This must be incredibly hard for you and your husband to watch. If this were happening in my family, I would be deeply disturbed. Very sad. It's even sadder given how happy and successful you and your husband are as a couple.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
It really does. Your cousin and his wife, they sound very troubled. Brad's whole upbringing obviously did a number on him. His parents did not set him up to be a high-functioning adult. They probably created and then enabled his dependence on them, on substances, on gambling. And these addictions, like all addictions, they're obviously masking some kind of pain. God knows what that is.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
It's so strange to think that somebody who grew up this privileged, who probably has very few major stresses in life, would have anything that they need to numb. But this happens all the time, of course.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
It's funny because if this happened at a party in LA, I'd be like, they were doing cocaine. I don't know, maybe there's more to the letter. So here we go. Gabe, just to clarify, this is a man, right? And his wife was in the bathroom with another woman?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Everything was handed to him. He probably never had any big goals. And if you've never struggled to achieve things you want, if you don't even want things in the first place, you don't get to form a true personality. And Gabriel, no mention of his father. So was this like single mom doted on him? Probably never addressed the fact that dad wasn't around.
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1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
There's so many other things going on here that make a person like this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Yeah, some sort of existential trauma.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
He's coping with the abyss in his heart or whatever. It is sad. Okay, there's so much going on in this letter. Let me try and cut to the chase. Your little cousin is clearly vulnerable. He's growing up with parents who are drug addicts, who can't care for him. There's a strange, formerly criminal stranger living with them.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Cocaine at a minimum in the house, to say nothing of what I can only imagine is emotional neglect. I get why you want to call CPS, and it is definitely an option. It might be the right thing to do. I'm really worried about drugs around kids, especially. Look, that can kill a kid. It doesn't take much.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
There are some potentially painful consequences to calling CPS, of course, and it's hard to know if the fallout from an investigation is worse than what he has now. I honestly don't know. What I do know is, this thing you said about how your family's way is just to shove things down and never talk about anything uncomfortable, that is making the situation worse.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
And I'm sure it's played a role in why Brad turned out the way he did. I'm guessing his parents have that avoidance. He inherited that avoidance. He chose a partner who doesn't want to talk about the important things and the rest of your family doesn't want to go anywhere near it. Which, by the way, the Brad dysfunction aside, that describes many slash most families.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
It is incredibly awkward to confront difficult truths in a family. So I totally don't blame you guys for tiptoeing around this dumpster fire. But if there's a way forward here, someone's going to have to say something. And given what you've shared, it sounds like that person is you and your husband because you guys are high functioning. You see the situation clearly.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
You have a fairly close relationship with Brad or you did at one time. You love your little cousin. And it doesn't sound like anybody else has the stones to do this. So my take is, I think there's an important conversation to be had with Brad, maybe his wife as well, about what's happening in their home, how it's affecting their son.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
And as uncomfortable as that conversation is, I think it might be a necessary step before calling CPS. And I say that for two reasons. One, I think it's the right thing to do, give Brad and his wife one real shot at waking up here, turning things around, taking better care of their son before you get the authorities involved.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
And two, if you do end up calling CPS, which like I said, that might end up being the right move here, I think you'll sleep a lot better at night knowing you didn't jump straight to getting them into trouble, you didn't subject your little cousin to more instability, you actually tried. And they have full license to intervene here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
It's not like they're looking for drama or they're being petty about some family squabble. There's a four-year-old's life at stake. Brad and his wife are lucky that our friend here might talk to them directly and not just call the cops on their ass. So if they can't handle that conversation, that is on them. Our friend here is on solid ground.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
I love that. If she can get her whole family involved here, that's going to make a much bigger impact on Brad. It's easy to brush off one cousin who's three feet shorter than you. It's harder to look at 12 of your family members dead in the eye and deny that you're a hot mess when you're admitting that you were doing blow all night and need your mom to do your laundry at age 33.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Okay, oof. So, poor kid. I don't know how I feel about that. Gabe, this kind of reminds me of the niece from a couple weeks ago who found out her dad was cheating. Yes, totally. Not something you want your child learning about you. No, I guess that's on the wife since she apparently kissed her friend in front of her son. But I do wonder what he means by involved his son.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
I also think it'll make it way less scary and stressful for her.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Yeah, they might appreciate the leadership since they struggle to take this stuff on themselves.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
yeah it's also possible though that her family goes yeah no we're not getting involved right and then our friend here is on her own which is really that's a tough place to be but i still think she can have the conversation with him agreed and look if you do obviously there's no guarantee that brad and his wife will clean up their act become better parents i sincerely hope they take in what you say i think you have a shot but given everything you've told us this whole upbringing and family ethos and these wounds you're up against a lot
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
there's a decent chance your intervention doesn't work. It's absolutely still worth trying, though. But if this continues, I do think you need to at least consider calling CPS because your cousin is being parented by addicts. There are drugs in the house. That is a real issue.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
It's not like mom and dad go to Reno once a month, they get blasted in the hotel room and come home and mostly parent the kid. Okay, that would be concerning, but at least they'd be keeping it away from him. Brad's using cocaine to be able to stay up with his son, which is almost certainly an excuse, by the way, but it does mean he's using drugs around his kid.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
He's letting some deadbeat who just got out of jail sleep on the couch. Your little cousin's locking eyes with this guy while he eats Cheerios in the morning? That is not a safe environment.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Yes, that's very good to remember, but it obviously doesn't mean that it'll be all smooth sailing. And Brad and his wife will have to deal with the tense conversation with CPS at a minimum. Also, you can make a report to CPS anonymously, and they should protect your anonymity. Now, Brad or his wife might assume that you or his mom called, but they won't be able to prove it
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1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
And if you don't tell Brad's mom you're going to file a report, then she really will be clueless. And my hope is that they see that and don't keep her from seeing their son.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Did the son help him set up the cameras in the bedroom or whatever the recording thing was?
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1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Agreed. And we're back to grief, our faithful friends. But that's another reason I feel this intervention is so crucial so that they know they did everything they could do. Also, going back to that theme of integrity from the last letter, deciding not to look the other way, leaning into this tough conversation, actually protecting the little cousin they say they love so much.
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1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
That is a form of integrity, too. What you're saying here is I value doing the right thing here more than I value my own comfort, which I really admire. I'm going to say it anyway. I'm so sorry this is happening. Your little cousin is very lucky to have you looking out for him. My heart just breaks for this kid who was born into a very dysfunctional family. But who knows?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
He might turn out okay with the right interventions and support, which might begin with you. Hope Brad can hear what you say. Sending you all a big hug and wishing you all the best. All right, and now for the recommendation of the week.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
You bougie bitch.
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1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Hopefully it. It's unfortunate, but maybe he needed his son's help to prove this. I just, it's messy at best.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
That's right. And I also have these. I left my other ones in an Uber, my old Sonys. So I went to the airport and bought them before a trip. And they actually are amazing. And I use them all the way to Turkey and all the way back. And the battery lasted the entire time without me having to charge it. It was only like 50% gone after 20 hours or something crazy. Battery life on these things is great.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
It's bananas. What I love is when you take them off, they pause. And if you put them back on, they play again.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
I got the newer ones because they were on sale. They were actually cheaper than the older ones. And in the airport, somehow, I got them for cheaper than you can get them at Best Buy. It was just random. Yeah, so I highly recommend these as well. Also, in case you didn't know, there's a subreddit for our show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
If you want to jump into discussions with other listeners about specific episodes, something getting you worked up, come and shake it out over on the Jordan Harbinger subreddit. A lot of fun stuff going on there. Meme thread, a lot of fun, casual conversation going about the show as well.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Yes. Prompted one of the weirdest moments we've ever had on this show of just uncontrollable, semi-psychopathic laughter from me and Gabriel. And so her question was, he's alone in the hospital. He might never walk again. I don't hate him. I feel bad for him. Do I reach out or do I stay away?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
And we were kind of hoping this would be a wake up call for him, right? Like maybe he's sitting in the hospital going, how did I get here? Maybe I need to take a hard look at myself and make some changes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Just gonna say he's lucky, but that's still pretty bad. He lost a foot? Jeez, how tall is he now? Anyway, he might be in pain for the rest of his life. I shouldn't laugh as I read that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Just runs you over with a RAV4 twice.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
That is wild. Imagine using your vehicular assault injuries to pick up chicks at a bar. Just flashing your prosthetic foot like, look what this lady did to me. You wouldn't do that to me now, would you?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Yeah, that's well said. And I cannot stop thinking about pickup lines that involve vehicular assault injuries. Like, hey, girl, I got a foot for you. Just slams the prosthetic foot down on top of the bar. I got a whole foot for you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
And that, my friend, is why you are a better person than me. This is exactly right. I commend you for being boundaried and responsible about all this. I'm just glad this all happened far away from you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
That sounds like progress.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Ah, so you're hot and attracted to toxic men. Name a more iconic duo. Just kidding. Go on.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Amazing. Congratulations.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Thanks for that, friend. Appreciate the update and the kind words, and I hope 2025 treats you well also. I'm sitting here marveling at the fact that this guy almost lost his legs and he apparently has not changed at all. At all. No. Gabe, it's actually kind of terrifying to think that somebody this troubled could just go through a crisis like this and not question any of their life choices.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Wow. So she turned this around on you, gaslighted, and you were right all along. Tale as old as time. It's funny because, seriously, turning shit around on the other person is the classic response in situations like this. I feel like every cheating story on Reddit goes exactly like this. I confronted her and she said, you have a mental problem. You need therapy and you're paranoid.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
But I guess that speaks to how pathological people like this actually are. You could be almost paralyzed in a hospital room and alone and still think that you're entirely the victim. It's scary.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
If you have that capacity, you probably don't get this bad in the first place. But then if you get this bad, what does it take to wake up? If he ended up in a wheelchair, would that have done it? If he almost died, or would nothing cut through those defenses?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
It's just so hard to wrap my head around. But also, to be fair, we don't know what this guy's thinking. She said he's up to his old tricks, womanizing, causing chaos wherever he goes. But maybe on some level, he knows something isn't quite right.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Yeah, or like Cousin Brad from the previous question, that low self-esteem, poor sense of self, it just manifests as an amorphous anxiety. Like a hollowness. Hollowness, exactly. That's kind of a hallmark of narcissists, right? They just feel generally empty and inadequate and full of doubt, and that's why they need other people to admire them and prop them up to compensate for that emptiness.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
But it's almost a lack of a feeling more than a feeling. So, I am sorry to hear that you ended up dating another narcissistic partner, but I appreciate that you got out before it escalated. You're clearly learning and growing. You're still in therapy, learning to rewrite these patterns. That is brilliant.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
I know how hard it is to change these templates, but it's on us to learn to protect ourselves from people like this, especially because they're not gonna change. Ultimately, they serve to show us where we need to grow, which is the weird upside to these awful situations. As long as you're taking good care of yourself, And congratulations on all of your growth. It's really wonderful to hear.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
You're clearly thriving after this relationship. You're doing the work. You're working hard. You're leading a full and productive life. You should be very proud. I know I am. I am proud of you. But mostly, I'm proud of you for feeding our narcissism by showering us with all of these compliments. Way to read the room. We take all the supply where we can get it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Of course, again, I kid, keep up the great work, keep thriving, and keep a rubber mallet in your trunk. You never know when you're going to need one. Go back and check out the Jay Dobbins episodes if you haven't done so yet. The best things that have happened in my life and business have come through my network, the circle of people I know, like, and trust.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
I'm teaching you how to build the same thing for yourself in our six-minute networking course. It's 100% free. It's not schmoozy. It's not gross. It's on the Thinkific platform for free at sixminutenetworking.com. The drills really just take a few minutes a day. Dig the well before you get thirsty, folks. Build relationships before you need them. all again at 6minutenetworking.com.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Show notes and transcripts on the website, advertisers, deals, ways to support the show, all at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. I'm at jordanharbinger on Twitter and Instagram. You can also connect with me on LinkedIn. Gabe's over on Instagram at Gabriel Mizrahi or on Twitter at Gabe Mizrahi. This show is created in association with Podcast One.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
My team is Jen Harbinger, Jace Sanderson, Robert Fogarty, Ian Baird, Tata Sidlowskis, and of course, Gabriel Mizrahi. Our advice and opinions are our own, and I might be a lawyer, but I'm not your lawyer. Do your own research before implementing anything you hear on the show. Remember, we rise by lifting others. Share the show with those you love.
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1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
And everyone's like, they're doing it. They're cheating on you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
If you found the episode useful, please share it with somebody else who could use the advice we gave here today. In the meantime, I hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn, and we'll see you next time. You're about to hear a preview of The Jordan Harbinger Show about the warning signs for civil war.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
To hear whether we're on the cusp of a civil war here in the United States, check out episode 718 of The Jordan Harbinger Show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
How much time do we have? How much do you like cocaine? There's a lot of things that can be worse than cocaine if you really like cocaine. Anyway, that's not what the question's about, Gabriel, you weirdo.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Welcome to Feedback Friday. I'm your host, Jordan Harbinger. As always, I'm here with Feedback Friday producer, the little chocolate left on your pillow during this existential turndown service, Gabriel Mizrahi.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Oh, man, what a mess. It was nice of her to try and get rid of her friend's cocaine by shoving it up her nose. But the rest of this is a terrible solid favor. Yeah, solid favor for a friend. First of all, I am very sorry that your wife had this affair, that she hurt you, that she created a situation that involved your son, that she ruined not one but two marriages. Think about that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Although that's also her friend's fault. That woman clearly has some big issues. This is all very messy, very painful. I can hear how difficult and confusing this is for you. It just sucks, man. And I feel for her husband, too. Fascinating that both of you had the same suspicions and the same instincts about how to prove what was going on.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
I guess it's not that unusual to want to get to the bottom of something in video evidence 2025. Gabe, I found it interesting. when he said that his wife had taken on the role of counselor for this woman, and maybe that explains why they were so close. But it doesn't fully address the betrayal that he feels. And I'm going, of course it doesn't. These are two totally different things.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Yeah, that's kind of the sense I get. But it was a cover for whatever was going on.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Yeah, of course. And we all know the difference between friends and lovers. It doesn't matter if his wife was this woman's confidant. It became romantic and she cheated on him.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
And I think so. He's a nice person for doing that. But I had to comment on that. It might be something for him to consider. Agreed. Look, I know you feel conflicted about spying on your wife, and I totally get why. It's an icky feeling. But then, yeah, how else do you confirm your suspicions?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Like you said, there are more invasive and less invasive ways to dig around, I guess, like talking to this woman's husband, for example. That helps confirm your suspicions. And you can do stuff like that before you go through your partner's phone or set up cameras in the bedroom. But man, if you're looking for slam dunk proof... I guess you kind of have to invade someone's privacy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Yeah. I came up with this one while I was staying at your place last week. I felt like I was in a hotel, except it was my friend's house. Pretty sweet. Little gift on the pillow. Essential oils diffuser, obviously. I'm not even kidding about that, by the way, folks. You did not turn that on. It was just there. No, it was just there. Salt lamp in the corner. Luggage rack.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
The other thing you don't want to do, Gabriel, thinking about this now, what you don't want to do is go and ask the husband, and he's like, oh, that's weird, and then he decides to just confront his wife immediately, and then if you set up cameras in the bedroom, your wife's like, I heard from my lover that her husband yelled at her, so I know that you think, you know, you kind of want them to not know that you know.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
So if you're looking for that slam-dunk proof, that evidence, you really have to invade someone's privacy in a semi-gross way that would be wildly inappropriate otherwise. Obviously, the ideal scenario is to be in a marriage where you don't have those doubts in the first place, where there's total trust and honesty and you don't feel the need to snoop.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Of course, man, the second you're knocking on your own bedroom door and your wife and her friend are inside and they won't open up. And when you barge in, the friends all suss and your wife is adjusting her blouse in the bathroom or whatever. The second your son is like, I might have seen them kissing in the pantry. I think you have license to dig around a little bit more. It's awkward.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
It's unsavory. But if your wife is gaslighting you when you confront her and she's not going, look through my phone, talk to my friend. If she's not an open book, which she obviously wouldn't be because she's cheating, I'm not sure what else you're supposed to do.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
You had to find that text thread to know that you were right and you were not crazy when she was trying to make you feel like you were crazy. But let's talk about your other question because that's really the issue here. Should you trust that they are only friends now?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
I'm going to just bold highlight that. Hell no. They're still spending time together. Why would the romantic element stop if they're still hanging out?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
To be fair, I do think it's probably more likely for two women to go back to being friends than, say, a man and a woman. But, I mean, maybe that's naive.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
I'm not hearing that. She's not doing any of that, at least not in the letter. So I feel like this isn't even the right question. The right question is, do I still want to be in this marriage? Are we genuinely working on things? Are we resolving anything? Or is it time to part ways and start building my own life? Based on what you've shared with us, I think it probably is time to part ways.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Your TripAdvisor review is going to be fire. I appreciate that. I'm glad you enjoyed your stay at Chez Gaby. Five stars, man. Best oatmeal of my life. Strong couch. My only complaint, hard to wedge all my protein shakes in between dozens of boxes of kidney beans in the fridge.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
I'm not hearing anything to suggest that your wife is working on things on her own or with you. I'm not hearing that she's said goodbye to this woman so she can refocus on you. I'm not hearing that you're particularly keen to work on things. So honestly, I'm a bit puzzled by why it matters whether she's telling the truth or not about this other woman. outside of your curiosity, of course.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
But if you're asking because you think there's a chance of saving the marriage, then you have to be asking these questions. And you have to have a partner who's equally invested in working on things. If she's off doing her own thing and you're over here wondering what's going on, I'm not really sure what's left to work on. I'm sure that's painful. It's also clarifying.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Look, I get it if you don't know how anything technological works and your son is a tech genius. I get asking for help. I don't love it. Pick someone else, but I get it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
But if he asked his son for help because he needed backup and solidarity, if he was essentially giving his son a role on his team against his mother, he's recruiting his child into this drama that all else being equal, he should be protecting his child from. And I don't have teenagers or older kids, so parents will have their own opinions on this maybe, but I think I'm right.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
So I'm not exactly sure what to make of this. I guess I'm just realizing that's another subplot in this story that makes things even more complicated than they are. Because it's not our friend here's fault that his wife cheated on him, but he can control who he brings that information to and who he involves.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Because I'm sure, frankly, all this is definitely doing a number on a kid, especially a kid that age.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Either he knew his wife was bi or closeted gay before, or her orientation is just less important to him than the fact that she cheated. But if I were in this guy's shoes, I think my curiosity would be even greater slash equal to my hurt, at least in the beginning.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
I don't know what to tell you. Yeah, that one's on me. I'm booking through Amex Travel next time. There you go. For the late checkout. On the Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the stories, secrets, and skills of the world's most fascinating people and turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life. and those around you.
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1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Fair enough. I still think she's done a lot of damage here, man. But I understand that people can do hurtful things when they're really confused. So I hear that. I am very sorry that this happened, man. But obviously it kind of had to happen because something's not right here. This is not a healthy marriage.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1138: Her Exposed Bi Affair? It's Over! She Swears! | Feedback Friday
Time to take stock of things, confront some hard facts, and accept that you just might not know the full story about your wife and this other woman these days. But more importantly, you might not actually need to know in order to make the right call. And good luck.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
This episode is sponsored in part by What Was That Like podcast. Have you ever wondered how it feels to watch your house burn down, be attacked by an alligator, or learn that your spouse hired someone to kill you? What Was That Like is the podcast for you, if you're that person. Not the person who got hired to be killed, but the person who wondered, more thankfully.
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
Yeah, maximum impact is not a proper noun, bro. Why are you capitalizing? This is not high German. You didn't trademark that. Anyway, I'm sorry that you're living next to this guy's new stand-up comedy theater slash brothel or whatever. And that he's causing so many waves in your town. You got to give him some credit for combining those two genres of business. Like, oh man, it's Tuesday.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
Not a lot of customers for the brothel. That's fine. We have open mic night.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
He definitely seems a little sus. He's clearly into some unsavory business practices, and I get why you're concerned. At the same time, as you pointed out, you do not have hard evidence that he's engaged in criminal activity. A lot of this is based on rumor or assumptions, which is a massive obstacle to proving anything. And it also it might be somewhat unfair to hold against him.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
And again, his website's not doing him any favors. He's pretty out there with the whole, like, hey, I pose with beautiful young women at networking events. That's his brand, and he's leaning into it. So I get why you're concerned. And all signs point to something shady going on here, but shady and unsavory are just... They are meaningfully different from criminal.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
And even criminal is different from provable, prosecutable. We wanted to talk to an actual expert here. Again, I'm not your lawyer, according to this mug. So we reached out to defense attorney and friend of the show, Corbin Payne. And the first thing Corbin said was that human trafficking has a notoriously wide and ambiguous definition. This is probably by design.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
It's hard to tell from your letter of what Bob is doing is truly human trafficking. Also, like you said, you don't have a ton of hard evidence, just a mix of rumors and observations, which, again, it's not irrelevant, but it's not like slam dunk proof that Bob is working with shipping containers full of people, so to speak.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
But Corbin did say that the construction industry and contractors in general, they can just be a bit scummy about how they treat people. Look, I know there's tons of contractors listening that are like, hey, hey, hey, we don't mean you. We mean the other people that you know that you don't work with because they're scummy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
He said that he was hearing enough to think that Bob's Enterprise, his whole way of doing business, they might be exploitative. So here are a few things Corbin said you might want to be aware of. First, the sort of folks who work for people like Bob, they're often desperate. People with criminal backgrounds, they can struggle to find work.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
They're often reduced to accepting whatever they can get, which means they regularly have to put up with a lot of mistreatment that other people could just walk away from. They often have no recourse.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
The arrangements they enter are, they're technically voluntary and the powers that be generally don't care if ex-convicts get treated poorly, which is really sad and not the way you rehabilitate somebody into society, but I digress. Same goes for immigrants or people whose residency situations are shaky. They can't go to the police like, hey, my boss is mistreating me.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
They're pretty great. I'm always amazed when people can actually make commercial quality stuff like this as a hobby. It's very impressive. I appreciate you. I can't even make commercial quality stuff as a career. So here we are. Thanks for listening to the show, by the way.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
They can't go to a lawyer and sue their employer for harassment or unpaid wages or whatever because the police will often report them to ICE and they risk deportation. And point being, to quote Corbin here, it's excruciatingly difficult to prove a case like this because the victims are more afraid of the authorities than they are of their exploiters, and they're not wrong to be afraid.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
So the question becomes, who does care about the victims of exploitation, and who's motivated enough to do something about it? Corbin's advice is to start with local nonprofits. There may not be an anti-trafficking nonprofit in your area, but there are probably a bunch of them nationally and many that would be willing to step in and help or at least advise.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
If anyone in Bob's orbit who's being exploited had access to resources to help with housing, employment, medical care, all that stuff, that can go a long way in getting them out of a bad situation and away from the person exploiting them.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
And if nothing else, Corbin said that resources that help people plug into a community of others who speak the same language or who have all gone through something similar, like prison, that makes a huge difference. And he pointed out that people with community... They have access to more people with more ability to actually help them. They have a greater sense of strength, self-worth.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
They're harder to exploit, basically. And by the way, this can also encompass you and your friends, your family, your neighbors. Even something as simple as the occasional friendly wave can actually make a big difference, especially in a small community. Forging some sort of friendly relationship with these folks, it really could be huge.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
And just to be clear, for you, that might mean looking for small ways to support vulnerable women in his orbit or innocent contractors. I'm not necessarily advising you to buddy up to any scary, hardened criminals who are doing the drywall on the church. Although, who knows? Honestly, maybe some of those folks are decent, too. You really don't know.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
I've met a lot of amazing people working in prisons. Now, all of that helps victims, but it doesn't address the injustice of somebody being trafficked. It's nice to get people out of bad situations, of course, but as long as somebody out there is willing and able to exploit people, they're just going to create more victims.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
Speaking of low quality, not fit for commercial use, on the Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the stories, secrets, and skills of the world's most fascinating people. and turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you. And our mission is to help you become a better informed, more critical thinker.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
Corbin said that to get Bob arrested, tried and convicted, that would involve, at a minimum, a witness willing to talk to the police. They have to testify before a grand jury and or in a preliminary hearing. They've got to testify at motions hearings. They got to testify at trial. That's not an easy task.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
And if people are, in fact, being exploited or trafficked by Bob, Corbin said that they're going to be precisely the sort of people who want to do none of those things, much less all of those things.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
Solid advice. Look, I do have a Dark Jordan pitch here, but it's going to require some investment on your part, and it'll mean taking on some personal risk yourself.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
I was born in it. What if you message this guy posing as a woman looking to, you know, join his community or whatever? You could use an AI generated photo so you don't catfish him using someone else's real photo like that guy from the letter we took a couple weeks ago. Make it a good one. Ask him how he can help you achieve your goals or get ahead or, I don't know, find a husband or whatever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
He might not be dumb enough to put his whole skeezy strategy in writing, although his website suggests that he just might, but he could inadvertently reveal some other information that's useful, or he could say just enough to get the cops interested. Even darker, Jordan? You could place a listening device in the church while it's being renovated.
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
You could hook it up to your Wi-Fi because you live next door. And you've got a microphone streaming everything that gets talked about in that place. Now, this is, by the way, highly illegal. So naturally, I am not telling you to do this. It wouldn't necessarily be, of course, admissible as evidence in any sort of trial.
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
During the week, we have long form conversations with a variety of amazing folks, national security advisors, astronauts, generals, rocket scientists, Fortune 500 CEOs, music moguls. This week, we had legendary author James Patterson on writing, creativity, and being the best selling author on the entire planet that has ever lived, as far as we know. Really interesting and sharp dude.
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
But it would very theoretically and hypothetically tell you everything that's going on in there. But this is such a bad idea. You should definitely not do it. I'm not even being cheeky anymore. Definitely don't do that. I'm just throwing out advice that, you know, somebody should not follow because that's what Dark Jordan does. A better Dark Jordan idea, maybe Grey Jordan.
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
Submit a tip to whatever agency oversees renovations and constructions in your town. Tell them about any suspicious activity happening around the worksite. You might have to file a few of those complaints, but somebody should come out and look. And if they find one thing, they're going to find 10 things, especially if they want to find 10 things.
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
I might also consider putting up some subtle cameras on your property pointing at the church and see if you catch anything sus. So maybe there's weird cars pulling up at three o'clock in the morning. Maybe you notice people with duffel bags or briefcases or something weird like that going in and out. Tons of women coming and going at all hours of the day and night.
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
And then if you ever do go to the police, you can show them the camera footage like, hey, here's some evidence. Here are license plate numbers. Here are timestamps. You can see for yourself something's not right here. If the cops see known criminals or gang members or whatever going into that place in and out every day at 2 o'clock in the morning, they're going to know something's up.
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
As opposed to, you know, okay, the landlord of the church, he's weird. Go check it out. And they'd roll by and they don't see anything for that five-minute period. They're never going to believe you again. I'm sorry this is happening in your area. I know it's gross. I know it's unsettling. It might also be a situation that you need to make some peace with.
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
If Bob is mostly keeping this within the letter of the law... The fact that he's doing it in a church makes it all worse, but it's his property now. It's not a church anymore. Unfortunately, you can't manage every aspect of this guy's business or convince every person in his orbit to stop associating with him.
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
But you can keep digging, taking notes, documenting things, alerting the proper authorities when it's warranted, and looking for ways to directly support people who might be being exploited or hurt by him, and that might be enough to help and feel okay about all of this. I love your concern and your eagerness to help, and good luck.
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
Gabe, I don't know if they even do this anymore, but if this is such a small town that there's only a sheriff or whatever she mentioned, what if the husband becomes a deputy? Like, you know, hey, I'm a volunteer, part-time, had to go to a training course in the capital city, but now I'm back and they call me when there's a big thing.
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
Okay, so now a cop lives next door and has clout enough with the local law enforcement to be like, hey, there's something going on here. He's documenting it or he knocks on the door in his uniform in six months and he's like, hey, we're getting reports of something going on in here. Maybe those reports are from his wife, but whatever.
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
Real people come on every episode to explain the unbelievable situations they've been through. I think it's a funny concept for a show. I kind of wish I'd thought of it because I always get crazy stories from people. Not everything turns into a Jordan Harbinger episode. But What Was That Like?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
There are ways to do this where Bob goes, this is no longer profitable for me because the heat's on. So I'm going to put this place back on the market. I like it. That's a real small townish right there. Very small townish. Yeah, it's very Ozark to do something like that.
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
All right, and now we're going to traffic in the deals and discounts on the fine products and services that support this show, and you won't even have to traffic any minors to afford them. We'll be right back. Thank you for listening to and supporting this podcast. All of the deals and discounts and ways to support the show are searchable and clickable over at jordanharbinger.com slash deals.
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Please consider supporting those who support the show. All right, back to Feedback Friday.
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
On Fridays, though, we share stories, take listener letters, offer advice, share wild updates on previous episodes, which is actually kind of where I want to begin today. Because crazy, actually, update for you guys that surprised me. I found out I was reading the New York Times. Y'all remember Nuri Turkle? He's an attorney. He's a public official.
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
Seven to ten pretend Ford Focus, Ford Focus-i, Fos-i, should fix this in no time.
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
Yeah, just fight more with your wife in worse ways that are from higher stakes. You're welcome. Exactly. Threaten to leave. Yeah, just threaten to get divorced at every little drop of a hat and you'll eventually master this. First of all, I'm sorry this happened. It is so frustrating. And this is a chunk of change. I totally get why you're beating yourself up for it.
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
It hurts to look back at a situation like this and know that you could have handled it better. But that's how we learn.
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
He's author of the book No Escape, the true story of China's genocide of the Uyghurs. He's also a past guest on this show talking about how China targets and oppresses the Uyghur population. Y'all remember that? That was episode 730, by the way.
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
For sure. I think the show Reply All, which doesn't exist anymore, even did a whole episode about locksmith scams way back when. But look. Even if a locksmith isn't actually scamming you, even if they're just charging you a ton, they've got you over a barrel, it's really hard to tell an actual person who's standing in front of you, yeah, no, you can drive back now. I'm not doing this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
It's so awkward. They know that 99% of people are not going to tell them to screw off once they've driven an hour and a half and they're staring into their soul like, what's it going to be, pal? The expensive option or the disgustingly expensive option? So you're not the only person to fall victim to these people. I'm sure it happens constantly. And I gotta say, I love your mindset here.
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
I appreciate that you're noticing that this quality is making you vulnerable. You wanna work on it. That's terrific. So just to get this out of the way, The first big takeaway here is not to ask a locksmith or any vendor to drive out without giving you a quote or at least a ballpark figure or a range.
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
Because I imagine that's how they create this high pressure situation where they're standing in front of you, your door's locked and you can't get in. You feel like you have no option but to accept their ridiculous quote. It wouldn't even surprise me if they got there and they're like, oh, he's with a baby. Yeah, I'm doubling the price now.
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
Yeah, we had to call Locksmith when we lived in San Francisco. And the guy got in in like 10 seconds. But what he did was illustrate how insecure our door actually was. And he charged 150 bucks, but he came out on a Sunday night in, I don't know, I think we were waiting there for 15 minutes. So I was like, okay, I paid for that service.
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
And we laughed and he was like, yeah, sorry, this is how much my boss charges. It wasn't like, ah, you idiots. He was a kid. And so I get it. But again, that was 100 or 150 bucks, not $500, right? Also, you could have paid this guy his $129 drive-out fee at worst and found someone more reasonable. So that's a lesson learned. And you won't make that mistake again.
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
It was pretty extraordinary, to say the least. Nuri, of course, is fascinating. He was born into a re-education camp in Kashgar, China. And the state interned his mother when I think she was six months pregnant. So Nuri lived in the detention center as a baby for the first few months of his life. Years later, he comes to the U.S. for graduate school, and I believe he never went back to China.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
Although now that I think about it, I truly get the sense that $129 service fee was essentially tacked on at the last minute. And he just made that up. So unless he disclosed that over the phone and you agreed to that in advance, I'm saying you don't owe the guy anything.
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
I think the reason that he does that is because then if you say no, you're like, but then I still have to pay him sunk cost fallacy, yada, yada. So he builds that in at the last minute.
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
Yeah, I think he does that. If you pull the ripcord now, it's not that you're off the hook. You still have to pay me. And it's like, no, you didn't tell me that. There's no contract. Get off my porch.
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
key in the planter or whatever. But let's dig into the real issue here. Look, there's nothing more normal than wanting to avoid conflict with another person. But obviously not being able to engage in necessary conflict means that other people can take advantage of you. especially vendors like locksmiths. They've practiced this a bunch. They're probably doing several of these calls a day.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
So they're used to hanging in the awkwardness of holding firm and then laughing all the way to the bank if they're crooked. There's locksmiths who aren't right now who are like, hey, you're painting with a broad brush here. So look, those guys, unethical people in situations like this, like mechanics who have your car up already, they have a few advantages and they've done this.
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
This is their business. What I want to know is what happens to you in these moments of conflict? What's going on in your brain? Slow down this response. Relive this freak out you had. What was actually going on for you? Because it sounds like these exchanges aren't just uncomfortable. They're borderline terrifying. So let's dig into those responses. Let's trace them back.
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What is it about the pressure of a negotiation that triggers this fear? What is the fear when you get down to it? What are you afraid the other person will do or think if you say, yeah, sorry, I'm not playing this game with you. What other thoughts or feelings do these moments bring up for you?
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
For example, you said you were afraid that you and your wife and child wouldn't be able to get back into the house. But is that true? Your wife, she was out running errands. She might have had a key too, right? So you could have waited it out. Or if she didn't have a key, you could have called a different locksmith.
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
You also said the fact that this isn't your house, the couple who owns it wasn't available, that contributed to the panic. So I wonder if your feelings about this couple or how you imagined they would react to your mistake, maybe that played a role too?
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
Totally. I'm sure that amped up the stakes on the whole thing. My buddy, a long time ago, There was a broken lock and we had done something where the key had gotten stuck in the lock and now the door wouldn't lock and we were going to go out to eat. And I'm like, okay, let's scrap the dinner plans. And I'm like, okay, what we're going to do is go to Home Depot and replace the lock.
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
And he's like, it's not that simple, my man. I can't tell my wife that we replaced the lock. And it was this whole thing about how she'd been asking him to replace the lock before and he didn't do it. So now it's broken and she's going to blame him and get really mad. I'm like, okay. What we can do then is just replace the lock in the keys.
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
And then we had to go through this whole rigmarole of like, but then there's a cat sitter and she has a key. We're going to have to replace that. But the cat sitter's friends with the wife, so they're going to tell. And then he's got to get her keys when she's not looking and make sure that he's home and answer the door. It was like this whole...
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
So he leaves his mother, he leaves his whole family, his whole life behind. He's one of the most outspoken critics of the Chinese Communist Party. So you can imagine why he couldn't return. Amazing news. China just released his mother, Aisham, from the country after 20 years. So she and two other Uyghurs were included in a prisoner swap between the United States and China in November.
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
cycle of crazy sitcom-level antics to get around the idea that he might just have to tell his wife that we went to Home Depot and replaced the lock finally, which he had been asking him to do. Why'd you do it now suddenly? Oh, well, it broke. I told you. It's just, okay, do we really need to just frickin' do this easy part?
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
But there's all this psychological stuff that was preventing that and making it seem harder than it was.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
I really feel like he could have gone, hey, we went to Home Depot and replaced that lock, by the way. Here's your key. I hid a key under the mattress for when you come home. It seemed so simple.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
I could see that. And then he comes out of the fog and he's like, what the hell? I could have handled that so much better. But the thing is, he's not in that moment of stress anymore. So he's holding himself to a standard that he can't quite live up to in the moment.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
Although the question is, is he angry at the other person or is he angry at himself? It's probably a little bit of both. But he's also saying that he's a conflict-averse person in general, which means he's probably found himself in situations like this many times over the years.
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
Interesting. I could see that. So before you can think of this negotiation as a skill, you have to rewind the tape and work on it as a capacity, a capacity to tolerate the feelings that the skill requires. Because whether the root of this conflict avoidance is anger or fear or anxiety or shame or whatever it is,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
At the end of the day, I think winning these conflicts, or at least being able to avoid being scammed, it ultimately comes down to being able to tolerate the tension of the moment. Just being able to withstand the mild to moderate awkwardness of not caving in when there's a vendor standing on your doorstep.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
Yeah, like the locksmith's anger. Even if he's a scammy son of a bitch, he's going to be pissed off that he's not getting a victim today.
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
So basically, we gave Chinese spies back and they gave us innocent people that they had interned because they were Uyghurs. Anyway, don't get me started on that. This is amazing news because I imagine Nuri had probably by this point somewhat made peace with the idea that he was never going to see his mother again, which is heartbreaking.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
Also, the repercussions of deciding to go a different way, whether that means having to call a few more locksmiths or deal with your day being derailed while you wait for your wife to come home or having to explain to the people who own the house what happened.
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
So I think this is less about preparing for these situations and more about doing some of this deeper work on what these situations bring up for you. And you can do that on your own. You can do it with a therapist. You can do it with your wife. You can do it with some peers or colleagues. I just talk to as many trusted people about this as possible.
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
But even if you prepared perfectly for these conflicts, you'd still have to feel what it feels like to tolerate these feelings right there in the moment, which you can't do until it's actually happening. So while you do some of this analysis, I would think of these moments as opportunities to try things in a new way, learn more about yourself, adjust, get a little bit better every time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
Like I said, I love your eagerness to grow. I love that you're facing this head on. It's absolutely something you can work on, and I know that mindset will serve you well. So good luck and go buy a freaking lockbox on Amazon right now. Come on, man. By the way, a little negotiation tip that I would like to share, and this is something he could have used in that moment if he had known about it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
That locksmith came out and said, oh, I drove so far. So there's the guilt factor. There's the guilt lever, I should say. And this is what it costs. And then I'm standing in front of you and I've got all this pressure on you. Whenever you're in that moment, take a pause and think, okay, how does the leverage he supposedly has on me, how is that actually leverage that I have on him?
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
Now, this doesn't always work. It's not always the case. But in this case, I would say, okay, my leverage is this dude drove an hour and a half out to me, so he's wasted his time. He's trying to make up a new rule where I owe him $129 so that he hasn't wasted his time. But he has wasted his time. He doesn't have any of my money. He doesn't have my credit card on file. He can't charge me for this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
All he could do is try to send me to collections, which I would, of course, fight. And OK, does he expect me to pay him in cash? Who has 500 bucks in cash? He's going to ask me for a credit card. OK, I've got an American Express. I could pay him with this and say that he forced that issue and that this wasn't actually the service he provided.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
And I immediately sent him a text because I saw the names of the prisoner swap and I was like, wait a minute, that's not a coincidence. He shared a little more detail with me as a response. He said she wasn't imprisoned the whole time. She was subjected to regional travel restrictions, so she couldn't go anywhere.
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
And he forced me to pay him with this and I could dispute the charge. Now I've got leverage there and I could just tell him, look, man, I'm not going to pay you this amount of money. I'm going to pay you $129 for coming out, and you can open the door, or you can go home empty-handed. That's the leverage you have. And he would have probably gone, I don't like you, but you know what?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
I'd rather make $129 than zero. That's his choice that you could have thrown right back in his face. So whenever somebody's got a bunch of leverage on you... Think about how that also might be flipped around back on them. This happens more often than especially if somebody's already performed a service or drove a long way to get to you, that kind of stuff.
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
He doesn't have unlimited hours in the day. You can allow him to monetize that time. And then, of course, don't pay him until the service is completed. Or you pay him up front with a credit card. And if he doesn't complete the service, you dispute the charge and he gets nothing. In fact, he loses money because he has to fight that with the credit card company. He has to pay a fee to do so.
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
And then he loses on top of all that. Clever, very clever. I try to do that kind of stuff because I get it. I also go, oh my gosh, he's telling us it's gonna cost this? Okay, what I'm gonna do is not use this person, call someone else, write a terrible review, and I will simply tell him that.
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
I'll say, this guy came over to my house and tried to extort me to clean my HVAC vents at an exorbitant price. That's bad for the whole business. I also tell them things like, have you ever had a thousand negative reviews come into your business over three months? Because I know where to purchase that. Yes, they're not valid. Good luck fighting every single one.
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
And they go, huh, I get all my business from Yelp and Google. This guy's threatening to destroy that using an unethical technique, but I'm here threatening him in his house with an unethical technique. Maybe I should just like turn around and go home or do the thing. There are ways that you can take these unethical guys and twist the stuff right around. You can fight fire with fire a little bit.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
Yeah, look, I don't recommend pulling Dark Jordan stuff when someone's standing in your house or like can turn off the power or do something horrible to your electrical system. But if somebody is going to try and threaten you to unlock your door, it's like, I'll post some jujitsu and twist your arm right back, pal. All right, you can reach us Friday at jordanharbinger.com.
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
She lived under constant surveillance and harassment by the state on top of social isolation for many years. Not that she was in like a solitary confinement, but if you are being monitored by the state and everyone knows you're being monitored by the state, the last thing that anyone is going to do is come hang out at your house.
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If you want to keep up with the wisdom from our 1,000-plus episodes and apply it to your life, it's great. We go in, we get a lesson, we write it down. It's a two-minute read. We're not trying to talk your ear off every Wednesday. I invite you all to come check it out. You can sign up at jordanharbinger.com slash news. Okay, what's next?
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
All right. So cute. Yeah, it is. I love this. I love that you're nurturing your son's natural talents at such a young age. And I love that he's so enterprising. This is really cool and touching. Also, I love playing RC cars with my son, so I'm super on board with all this. And my childhood friend just told me that his kids...
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
are making thousands of dollars a month with their 3D printer printing topographic 3D artsy maps of where they live in New Zealand. It's really cool. Yeah, the 3D printer, it just prints like a 3D model topographically of the whole area where they live and people love it. So they buy it and it's not cheap. That's insane. Yeah, really cool.
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
Yeah, exactly, exactly.
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
is hosted by my friend Scott Johnson, who's naturally curious and gives his guests the opportunity to share how they've really felt during some of their most surreal experiences. What they did in the morning before an earthquake, what song was playing as a gunman entered, was their stomach growling as they hid? Guests share everything they remember about their crazy, crazy experiences.
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
Yeah, paying his way through B-School with his side hustle, something cool like that. I'm a big fan of this kind of stuff.
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
they're going to get arrested and they're going to have the same problem. So you're basically a pariah and nobody even wants to talk to you. House arrest at best. House arrest at best. Yeah. So he says, I had not seen my mother since 2004, had only spent 11 months with my parents since leaving China 29 years ago. My mother suffered immensely, beginning with her arrest while pregnant with me.
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
All right, okay, I doubt it. I don't know how it works in Puerto Rico, but I'm going to guess it's the same as here on El Continente, where violating the CC&Rs of a building, it can result in fines, suspension of privileges. There could be court orders compelling compliance rather than criminal charges. However, getting that far, they think it's too much trouble to amend the rule.
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
Wait till they try to get a court order, okay? If things get really bad, the HOA might place a lien on the property or try to initiate foreclosure proceedings. Those are civil issues. They are not criminal issues. And that is way down the pipe and completely insane and going to be way more expensive than amending the rule that they agreed to amend.
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
So the only thing I can think of that would get you in criminal trouble is operating a business without the necessary permit or somehow creating a public nuisance, like you get into an aggressive fight with a neighbor over this. But look, most cops in the States, they're not going to enforce this crap. And I'm guessing it's even less likely where you are.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
So I really wouldn't lose any sleep worrying about that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
Yeah, definitely don't do that. It's only going to piss off your neighbors, and you want these people on your side as much as possible.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
This is a great story. So before we talk about solutions here, I don't want to lose sight of what a great problem this is to have. Your son is bright, he's driven, he's creative, he's enterprising. You're encouraging him and empowering him in all these amazing ways. And now you guys are bumping up against these annoying people and administrative nonsense issues as a result.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
One, you sound like an amazing mom. Supporting your kids like this is a very powerful act. It could literally change the course of his life. So this tussle with the homeowners association, as annoying as it is, it's kind of a great sign. So here's my take on this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
Instead of thinking of this as a problem that requires some kind of legal battle, why don't you and your son just treat it like a business problem? This could be your son's first major lesson in navigating the challenges of owning a business. This is no different from a company butting heads with local regulators, battling with a competitor, dealing with a difficult vendor.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
So a few ideas come to mind. First off, if the board members say they'd support an amendment, then they went back on their word, your son could try to lobby them in some way, either by writing them a letter or speaking at the next HOA meeting and make his case for following through on their word.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
He could also start by pointing out that the rules say people can't sell stuff in the activity room, but he's doing it in the lobby and just challenge them to uphold the rule as it's stated. If they go ahead and they amend the rule, You guys can turn around and say, oh, interesting. I thought it was going to take too much time and money to amend the rules.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
Her offense was being her father's favorite child and answering the door to his visitors, who were also under the watchful eyes of the authorities in the late 1960s. So that's also, of course, why his mother now also can't hang out with people, because you go to prison for that, even if you're a pregnant woman.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
So if you're going to amend it, you can amend it the other way, according to the vote that you already took where I came out on top. But also, is it actually even true that it would take too much time and money? Or is the president just saying that because he's lazy and doesn't feel like dealing with this because it's such a small issue?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
my money is on that i think he doesn't want to deal i get it so then why deal with enforcing it okay but what if you and your son did a little research into what it would actually require to change this rule how much money it would cost for the board to hire whatever attorney if they even have to do that to change the ccnrs how much time it would really take you could even reach out to a lawyer maybe somebody you know who would do this as a favor because they like you guys and they find it amusing
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
Your son could even pitch it to them as an investment in his business education. You'd be amazed how many people would do stuff like this for a smart, precocious kid like your son, and you go back to the board like, hey, so we looked into it. It's actually not expensive. It won't take more than a couple hours. We even found a lawyer who will do it pro bono, or we found a way to do it ourselves.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
It's not a big deal. We ask that we proceed with the amendment. And if the president still refuses, he'll have to explain why he won't do this super easy thing that you guys made even easier. Also, maybe part of your son's presentation is pitching the building on why it's good for them to allow him to run his stand on the property. It fosters community.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
It supports kids who want to build businesses. Shutting him down is buzzkill. My hope is maybe hearing all this from your son instead of you would move them. And that would also be your son's first lesson in the power of PR and the power of storytelling. Another idea, he offers to contribute part of his revenue as a kind of tax to the HOL. It's a little mafia, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
Like you got to pay an extortion fee to the place to allow you to operate. But look, I doubt they'd take him up on it. They'd be a-holes if they did. But offering that might be a nice gesture. It might show them that he's being respectful of the building. It might buy him some brownie points. Maybe the funds are used to increase the activity room or whatever the hell.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
In other words, investigate all the assumptions here. and see if you can change the inputs to get a better output.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
During that era of repression, her father—so his mother's father, Nuri's grandfather— once an official in the short-lived Second East Turkestan Republic— He became a target. Red Guards sent him to a camp and accused him of being intoxicated with separatist ideology, which is the most communist thing that I've heard in a while.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
Also, that'll teach him door-to-door sales, high-touch customer service, which are also amazing skills to have.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
For sure. Look, it's funny. This is no different from startups that treat fines from regulators like speeding tickets on their way to dominating an industry. So true. It's very self-interested and ethically dubious, but you did ask for some Dark Jordan ideas, and this is how a lot of companies succeed and transform industries.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
So I'm actually pretty excited for your son to learn that lesson now while the stakes are low. Isn't this kind of what Uber did? They were just like, oh. Textbook Uber, actually, now that I think about it. We're not allowed to run this service here and we're going to get fined by the taxi authority? Okay, how much is that? $100,000 a month? Great, we're making $300,000 a month.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
Our investors will fill in the gap. Whatever. It doesn't make any sense to follow crappy rules that you can change by force. Another option is to get creative and look for new sales channels. You said all the neighborhoods are gated. You can't set up a stand in a park nearby. Okay, but there must be other places.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
What about setting up at his school or selling one-on-one at school or setting up a stand at sports games or extracurricular activities or you sell at family events? Again, there's a creative solution to be found here. If he can't sell in the building, where else can he sell?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
It is. Look, same here. That's a part of my business slash dad brain that's lighting up as well. Obviously, we're spending a decent amount of time pitching all these solutions as if this were a real business run by an adult. And I understand the stakes are relatively low. In another way, they're not.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
Because what's at stake here is your son's business acumen, his creativity, his confidence, and his sense of agency, the opportunity to learn that he does not have to settle for life as it is. The whole rules are made to be broken in appropriate ways kind of thing. And he can shape And that is a very powerful lesson.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
Similarly, my father, Ablikim, an educator and public intellectual, spent three years in labor camps for having relatives across the Soviet border. His crime was to have been infected with Soviet ideology, which I got to admit, not to go all history nerd, but I was surprised to hear that communist China would imprison someone for having ties to another communist country.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
And like I said, learning those lessons early on, that could literally change the course of his life. You know what it reminds me of? When I was a kid, my mom, she says as an adult, the reason she did this was she was too shy. But if I wanted to return something that I bought, like a video game, my mom would not ask the manager to do it. She made me do it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
So I'm this eight or 10 year old kid going into, I think it was Babbage's was the store that sold video games. And I'd be like, I don't like this one or this one doesn't run well on my computer. And usually they'd be fine with it. But sometimes they were like, oh, we don't allow returns of open merchandise. And I was like, that's not true. your policy has allowed me to do this previously.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
And they'd be like, oh, we don't allow it. And I'd be like, can I see the policy? And I'd read it in front of them. And then if they still didn't agree to it, my mom would be like, actually, we do this all the time. And I'm going to put my foot down here because you're bullying my son. And this is BS. But it only happened once or twice. And I returned stuff for years or clothes that I didn't like.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
She'd be like, oh, you want this Eddie Bauer thing returned for store credit? You got to go do it yourself. And she would stand there while I negotiated with full grown adults on their policy in returning. I love this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
Exactly. Or I'm negotiating with opposing counsel when I was a lawyer. I'm not afraid of this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
I like that. That'll be a much more rewarding conversation for both of you. So I hope you guys can find some ways forward here. I'm pretty sure you can. And even if your son doesn't succeed in every way, maybe he pivots to some other business, some other model. This is still going to be a great experience for him. He's lucky to have a mom like you. Keep up the great work.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
Keep trying to frame this as a fun and interesting exercise. And I know something awesome will come out of it. I'm genuinely excited for you guys. And any parents listening right now, take note. I know I am. And this is an amazing example of how to cultivate your child's natural abilities and teach them creativity, resilience, responsibility. It's really inspiring. And good luck.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
You know what's a great use of your son's fruit kebab revenues? The fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back. If you like this episode of Feedback Friday and you find our advice valuable, I invite you to do what other smart and considerate listeners do, which is take a moment and support our amazing sponsors.
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All of the deals, discount codes, and ways to support the show are all searchable and clickable over at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. You can also use the AI chat bot to surface any codes. It's super handy. That's over at jordanharbinger.com slash AI. And if that doesn't work, you can always email us jordan at jordanharbinger.com. I'll dig up the code for you.
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
It is that important that you support those who support the show. Now, back to Feedback Friday.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
one that supported them and that they fought alongside, no less. But I feel like that had to be a pretense for just targeting Uyghurs because his crime was having relatives. It's not like his relatives were Communist Party officials in the Soviet Union. They just lived there. Which, by the way, you couldn't leave that country either.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
It does seem unless he's some kind of freakish genius who's already talking or something.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
First of all, huge congrats on the baby. That is always exciting. No congrats to Gabe for that sign-off. That was definitely a step down from Q1. I think so. I think you should ask her baby for some notes. Get some outside counsel.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
Yeah, he's already in the podcast. That makes sense. Prenatal show fan right there. Exactly. Anyway, I also love that you took a moment to acknowledge how lucky you feel that your son is healthy, that he's happy. It's something we can take for granted so easily as parents. There's lots to be grateful for. Second, congrats on building such a successful career. I'm sure that's not an accident.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
It's not like you could just walk out of the Soviet Union and be like, you know what, I prefer China. I'm gonna go live over here. They were both keeping people in. So that's what makes me think this is just pretense for targeting Uyghurs. Like, yeah, we're gonna arrest you and your crime is your cousins live across the, whatever. Anyway, Gabe, do you want to read that section of the article?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
The fact that you could probably coast for the next year and still get promoted, it is funny, but it's really a reflection of all the hard work you've put in or maybe the smart work. This kind of reputation and momentum, those are assets. I'm super proud of you for developing them. So you're asking a great question, not just for new moms, but for all parents.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
We wanted to run this by an expert, so we reached out to Alyssa Cohn, startup coach, investor, and author of the book, From Startup to Grownup. And Alyssa said the same thing I just did. She's pumped for you and the baby, that you're doing an incredible job navigating new parenthood while maintaining a strong career trajectory, which is no small feat.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
To quote Alyssa here, I wish everyone would put the strategies of building relationships and creating value in place rather than complaining about how they can't get ahead. and on four hours of sleep at the moment, no less. Seriously, four hours of sleep, she's still crushing it, wanting to find ways not to stagnate.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
A lot of people are just trying to survive during this phase, so this says a lot about your drive and your capacity. Alyssa also pointed out that becoming a parent, it is such a massive adjustment, and it's perfectly natural to feel torn between your ambitions at work and your responsibilities at home.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
The fact that you're even asking these questions, it really does show how much thought you're putting into both roles. But Alyssa also understood why you're feeling stuck right now. You've spent years building a strong reputation, making smart moves, proving your value, so the idea of stagnating, even if it's temporary, it feels like a step backward.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
But it was pretty clear to her that you're not somebody who just coasts, so she wanted to reframe this phase you find yourself in as an opportunity rather than a setback. So Alyssa's first thought was, this is a great time to explore different meanings of growth. The next 12 to 18 months, they don't necessarily need to be about the next promotion.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
You can find satisfaction and stimulation by developing skills that will help you, both as an executive and as a parent. You can also use this time to think in a more big picture way about your career. For example... Where do you want to be in two or three promotions? What kind of problems or situations do you want to be managing? What roles or functions do you want to be taking on?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
How do you want your days to look as your child gets older? How much control and flexibility do you want to have? Just a few questions to guide you. Answering those, figuring out some next steps to work towards them, even if you don't go full beast mode, that would be super productive. It might even help you get further ahead in some ways.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
Alyssa's other recommendation, rather than fixate on the next rung on the ladder, you could use this time to build some core leadership skills. For example, you might want to improve your delegation ability.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
This is incredibly moving.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
That would free up more of your time, give you a step up as a manager, or you could develop your strategic thinking, position yourself as a stronger executive, and that would also push you to ruthlessly prioritize, which is really a superpower. But you get to decide which skills would be most fruitful to invest in.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
Whatever you decide to work on, Alyssa said the way to do this intentionally is to give yourself structure. One idea she proposed is you could put a 30 minute meeting with yourself on your calendar each week and use that time to think about key strategic topics, 60 minutes, 90 minutes, whatever you can budget, whatever you feel you need.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
For example, what are the biggest changes happening in your industry, your company? What problems keep recurring on your team? What long-term trends could affect your work? Or you could use that time to review what you've delegated to other people and make sure that everything is moving forward. How are those projects going? Are there other areas you can delegate? Again,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
This time is yours for whatever skills you decide to build. These are really just examples. Even if you're not driving towards a specific milestone, Alyssa said that you'll know you're using your time productively for your long-term success, plus you'll be intellectually engaged.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
Another area for you to consider, and Alyssa stole my thunder here, but I'm glad to hear an elite career coach preaching about this too, is to use this time to continue to build your relationships and to form new ones. you already have great relationships, now might be a good time to expand them externally.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
Alyssa pointed out that you're probably meeting a lot of other parents now, so in addition to enjoying their friendship, there might be a few who could be influential peers or mentors or future colleagues, so her advice, Be on the lookout for interesting parents in your orbit. See if you can combine playdates and school pickups and other parenting responsibilities with little organic chats.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
It's very sixminutenetworking.com, but applied to the new situations that you find yourself in as a mom. So I love this idea.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
And on that note, I want to remind you, part of your job, especially right now, might very well be to slow down and enjoy your time with your little one. You've worked your butt off. You've built a lot of capital. I don't think it's the worst idea to cash in some of those chips for a little while so you can just be like a human being and a present mom.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
That doesn't necessarily mean you're falling behind. I know it might feel that way at first, but it just means you're directing your time and energy to another hugely important thing, arguably the most important thing. I love your hustle. I love your gratitude. I love your thoughtfulness. I know those qualities are going to serve you very well.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
Enjoy this time with your son and keep up the great work. Big thanks to Alyssa Cohn for her wisdom here. We're going to link to Alyssa's book and her podcast, From Startup to Grownup, in the show notes, of course, along with her five scripts for Delicate Conversations PDF. Highly recommend all of those resources. And right now, it's time for the recommendation of the week.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
So speaking of what actually deserves our time and attention, the previous letter was a perfect lead-in to this, Gabe. Our final letter this week is a little different from our usual fare. A listener wrote me recently to share a story that frankly moved me, and I wanted to share it with y'all as we kick off this new year and get clear on the people and places that truly matter. Gabe, take it away.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
Oh, man, you're very welcome, my friend, and you are not rambling. You are sharing something crucial and powerful, and I thank you for it. Look, this letter obviously speaks for itself. Very difficult to read, very difficult and heartbreaking to hear back even a second time here. What you went through with your son is unspeakably sad.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
This is a tragedy that I cannot even imagine having to go through, and I am so deeply sorry that you and your family had to say goodbye to your son. It's just, it's terrible. Before I had kids, you'd hear something like this and you'd be like, oh, that's really terrible, it's so sad. Once you have kids, you just put yourself in that person's shoes and it's hard to hold it together.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
I think that this also helps answer the question of how much time do you spend in your career versus being with your child. I often go through this conflict where I'm like, oh, If I didn't have kids, I could be doing this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
I could write this book or I could spend more time working and I could grow this and then I could have more money and I could live abroad in Spain half the year, whatever it was, because I'd have all this time and money. And I never regret spending the time with the kids. Am I using my kids as an excuse not to advance in my career?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
Yes, and it's the best excuse that you have and it's perfect and you should always take that trade. I think a lot of us dads... We need a break some time. Maybe I'll hide in my office because I've had enough, the noises or whatever. I do it, like I said, on a regular basis, but this story is reminding me that you just don't know the last time you're going to be able to hug your kids.
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
I'm not trying to be dramatic, but it is true. On the other hand, we're all human, and sometimes you need a break from lying on the floor or stepping on Legos, so it's a balance. Obviously, prioritize your kids or whatever is most meaningful and precious to you in your life, but do it consciously. Don't just coast on autopilot. Don't check out without a reason. Be there as much as possible.
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
I'm just gonna go ahead and guess that the best thing this guy has ever done is spend more time with his kids, especially, a lot of people say, well, when I'm retired, we'll spend lots of time together.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
Your kids are gonna be older, and they're not gonna have time for you, and in this man's case, they're not gonna be around, no matter how much you love them and how much you do, and that's just something that you can't change. Man, this letter just really brings all this to life. So thank you, my friend, for sharing your story. I needed to hear it this week.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
I'm sure everyone listening does as well. Big hug to you and your family. All right, y'all, go back and check out James Patterson. The best things that have happened in my life and business have come through my network, the circle of people I know, like, and trust. We mentioned it earlier on the show, sixminutenetworking.com. You can find it for free on the Thinkific platform.
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
The drills take a few minutes a day. Dig that well before you get thirsty. Build those relationships before you need them, sixminutenetworking.com. Show notes and transcripts on the website, advertisers, deals, discounts, ways to support the show, all at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. I'm at Jordan Harbinger on Twitter and Instagram. You can also connect with me on LinkedIn.
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
We're also on, what is it called? Blue Sky. You can find us there tweeting or not tweeting. Blue Sky-ing? Blue-ing? I don't know. Gabe's on Instagram, Gabriel Mizrahi, or on Twitter at Gabe Mizrahi. This show is created in association with Podcast One. My team is Jen Harbinger, Jace Sanderson, Robert Fogerty, Ian Baird, Tata Sedlowskis, and of course, Gabriel Mizrahi.
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
Our advice and opinions are our own, and I'm a lawyer, but I'm not your lawyer if this mug is to be believed. So do your own research before implementing anything you hear on the show. Ditto Corbin Payne. Remember, we rise by lifting others. Share the show with those you love, and if you found the episode useful, please share it with somebody else who could use the advice we gave here today.
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
It really is extraordinary. It's so intense, right? It kind of makes you tear up when you read it. I certainly did. I just wanted to share that great news with you guys. I I'd love for the handful of people who listen to this show and stand for the CCP to justify this. There aren't many of you, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
In the meantime, I hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn, and we'll see you next time. Imagine facing a rare incurable disease and finding out that AI could repurpose an FDA approved drug as a potential cure. That's the breakthrough achieved by Dr. David Fagenbaum and the mission of his company.
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
Tune into episode 1005 of The Jordan Harbinger Show to explore how existing medications are bringing new hope to those confronting elusive illnesses.
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1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
So if you want to hear some disturbing slash inspiring firsthand stories about the thoughts that go through your head while surviving a kidnapping or winning the Price is Right, What Was That Like? is the podcast you've been looking for. Every story is thoroughly researched and fact-checked so you know even the most unreal stories are actually someone's reality. Listen to What Was That Like?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
But we do get emails from time to time saying, hey, look, you're too hard on the Chinese government. You lose your mind when you talk about China. There's no Uyghur roundup taking place. It's American propaganda. Look at this YouTube video made by some influencer about how tolerant China is. Look, he's shopping in Xinjiang. Yada, yada, yada.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
I would love to hear how this whole thing is somehow fake. What's going to happen is they're going to go, oh, shh. Look how many people the U.S. incarcerates for drug crimes. They're going to engage in whataboutism because that's all you can do at this point is just try to distract from the conversation. This is literally happening.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
My friend's mother was not allowed to leave the country because of her ethnicity, period, and her family's political affiliations. So it's like, how can you simp for China? When there are firsthand reports of this stuff happening, it just does not compute for me. We are allowed to criticize the crap out of the U.S. government, the prison system. We do that all the time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
You are not allowed to do that in China. Okay, explain to me why. Anyway, I'll wrap this up by quoting Nuri one last time here. May this moment inspire renewed efforts to reunite all separated families and restore the dignity and freedom that they deserve. Also, one more wild story before we dive in here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
Akshay Nanavati, who has also been on the show a couple times and is a good friend of mine, he is crossing Antarctica on foot right now. This is so crazy. Literally, he's walking, okay? Which, by the way, there's not like a trail system there. There's not roads. This is Antarctica. For people who don't know, I told a friend of mine, she was like, oh, so is he stopping in cities?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
There are no cities. There's nothing there. This is not a country. There's no government. He's on day something like 62, 63, whatever, of 110, so slightly over halfway. He posts audio messages and a tracker on his website, which we'll link in the show notes, Fearvana, F-E-A-R-V-A-N-A.com. Nobody's ever done this before. That's one reason why it's special.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
The audio messages, they're cool, but they're a little chilling because it's like, hey, guys, really big day today, crossed this mountain ridge, pulled up 430 pounds of supplies on sleds. And it's the kind of audio where they play it during the documentary when something horrible happens and it's like really haunting. And I'm not trying to be funny.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
I really hope that we don't watch him die doing this. First of all, there's nobody around for hundreds slash thousands of miles. And no, he's got a rescue team standing by, but it's not like they're behind him by 10 miles. They're in a place where you can land planes and there's buildings or whatever, like some science station. Also, it is freaking cold out there, as you might guess.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
I always chuckle to myself because his tracker says negative 20 feels like, and then it's like negative 18, as if that's helpful. And he's out there pulling sleds full of his own supplies. And I know what you're thinking. 400 pounds. Nobody can pull that much. No, he has three sleds.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
So what he has to do is go up the mountain with 150 pound sled, walk back down the mountain or hill, go back and pitch another sled to his harness, walk back up the mountain, put that thing down and anchor it, walk back down and get the other side. So he's like, hey, the plus side is it's getting lighter as I use the stuff.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
wherever you get your podcasts. Welcome to Feedback Friday. I'm your host, Jordan Harbinger. As always, I'm here with Feedback Friday producer, who's, you're just holding the largest Kay Bonito mug that probably exists, now that I think about it, courtesy of our awesome listener, Stephanie Keller, Gabriel Mizrahi.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
And I'm just thinking, yeah, OK, that's a little bit of cold comfort, if you'll pardon the pun. What a nightmare.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
It's a nightmare but that's like his thing he's like what's the most painful thing I can do and he's like Jordan I'm telling you man I've been in the dark for eight days you should totally do this and I'm like what do you mean dark he's like I'm in a dark room and people feed me through a slot I haven't seen any light I've been hallucinating for four days you came across my mind I just want to say I love you man and I'm like why are you doing this to yourself.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
A 20-day meditation retreat wasn't painful enough. I have to be in the dark next time, or I have to only eat liquid food and be in the dark, and there's no sound. It's just bonkers. Anyway, speaking of insane, Gabe, what is the first thing out of the mailbag?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
Yeah, we're going to ogle female body. You know what? The ogling is only a C minus or the oglage. It doesn't... Yeah. Where's the par?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
Yes, and I've said it before. Not only am I stoked that it says not your lawyer, I'm stoked that it holds approximately enough coffee to kill a baby elephant. Should it be administered to said baby elephant? But for me, it gets me out of bed in the morning here when it's all rainy like it is right now, even in California.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
No, no, I told you guys not to encourage him. Signed. Here we go. A really weird smile is now forming on Gabe's mouth right now. You've created a monster.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
OK, so the only provably criminal act in this segment is that sign off because you slay, which, as I'm sure you know, violates Section 104B of the California Penal Code. Look, ask and you shall receive.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
Yeah, guys, but please don't ask. This show is long enough as it is. I got to keep MC sign off over here and check.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
If everyone in the Sopranos is talking at a table, he's on the end and he's just an extra. No lines. Just the face. Yeah, there's also tons of pictures of him posing with women at his networking events straight out of Central Casting. I mean, he's a real estate guy that runs shady beauty pageants. Where have I heard that? He should run for president, really.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1101: Church, Steeple, and the Trafficked People | Feedback Friday
Yeah, it's janky as hell. It's so perfect. Man, these headshots look like a mob boss running for mayor of a third tier city. That shark skin suit is just blinding. Doesn't work with the flesh.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
This episode is sponsored in part by Vital Proteins. Let's face it, your body changes as you get older. As we get older, our bodies don't bounce back like they used to, of course, but there are simple ways we can help support our hair, skin, nails, joints, and bones. All it takes is a daily serving of Vital Proteins Collagen Peptides.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Now that Southwest just got rid of free bags, we're really your only option, whether you like it or not. How's that?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Yeah. And it's such an interesting, fascinating, really rationalization of totalitarian police state government, because I get those arguments. But it's also why you can't then do anything like I felt like asking her. So when you were trapped in your apartment during covid and some people literally starved to death or couldn't get medication, that is also a downside.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
But you're just not going to talk about that, huh? Yes, it's easy to forget about the times when you were welded into your apartment and died. This sounds like North Korea lite. Yes. She also said, and my mother-in-law, funnily enough, kind of shared this one. She goes, we have so many people that if we had democracy, if everybody had a say in how things were run, we would never get anything done.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Oh, wow. Isn't that funny?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Not wrong. Yeah. I get it. Democracy, not to get into a history lesson here, because I'm far from qualified, but original democracy, sort of ancient Greece democracy, that wasn't everybody gets a say. That was everybody who's educated and lives in a big city and also does this and also does that. And these guys that don't like, they can have a say.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Man, imagine if we started an airline. Passengers just encouraged to share their drama with one another. The flight attendants give you advice by the lavatory. No peanuts, because somebody might be allergic.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
It wasn't like everybody and their uncle could just vote. Yeah. They weren't interested in everyone's opinion. They were interested in a bunch of opinions that were from people that they had selected.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
That's right. It is an interesting way to look at things. Maybe when you have 1.3 billion people, which we also don't necessarily believe they have, but let's say they have a billion. That's a lot of people. Do you need them to vote? Do you want them to vote? it seems to be working for them. Would I want to be subject to that particular level of government governing? No, I wouldn't.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
But it's also harder to argue that they should be a democratic free country.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
It's possible. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Yeah, but I mean, at the end of the day, it's do you want toilets or do you want democracy?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Look, I live in the Bay Area, so I have a sort of selection bias. But even the Chinese people here that I know, they're like, America has so many problems. I'm like, oh, are you going to move back to China? And they're like, hell no. I move my parents over here, too. And I'm like, wait, you just got done complaining and ranting about how bad it was.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
And you're moving your parents and your uncle over here, too. And you're never moving back. And then I remember one older guy was like, you can't even have this conversation in China. Yeah, truly. You go to jail if you have this conversation on the Internet in China. So, yeah, it's bad here. We're sitting here screaming about how we hate the president. You can't do that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
It's illegal to do that in China. So it's kind of ironic and funny. There's a lot of Chinese people who will complain about the United States and how terrible it is. But then their dream in life is to move here and bring their family over. And you hear that a lot. I just think that's really interesting. I'm not even trying to throw shade on Chinese people. I get it. It's a weird choice.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
That's right. On the Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the stories, secrets, and skills of the world's most fascinating people, and we turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you. And our mission here on the show is to help you become a better informed, more critical thinker.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
But clearly they're voting with their feet in many ways. Whether it will stay that way, TBD, I remain fascinated with China. I really think it's a cool place. Don't love the government. If I'm allowed to go back, I'll go back until I'm not. Hopefully I don't find out that I'm not by going to jail over there. Also Taiwan, a listener recognized me in a cafe in Taiwan. No way. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
It was funny because it was the only other person in the cafe too. Me and Jen sat down in a small cafe. Nobody was there. It was like a cafe that was also in a store. She's like, oh, this is just a convenient location. And then I'm talking with her and I'm like, I'm going to go to the protein store and get my meathead fix. And this guy goes, excuse me, are you Jordan Harbinger? And I was like, wow.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
That is so random. Very random. So I sat down and talked to them for like half hour, 45 minutes. That's awesome. Oh, that's so cool. One other guy in the dang cafe and he's a show fan. What the hell are the odds of that?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
No, no. It's a white dude from Germany who happens to live in Portugal and was visiting a buddy in Taiwan. Oh, that's so unexpected. I know. That's a good dude. Really good conversation. Sure was more fun than just going to the protein store and coming back. So I'm glad that he stopped me. So that reminds me, say hi folks.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
If you see me, this is probably a little bit of a weird thing to assert, but I do see people stare at me in some places for a little bit longer than I think is normal slash polite for people to be looking. And I always wonder, does that person recognize me and they just don't know whether or not they should say something because otherwise, why are they still looking at me?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
And I thought that about this guy. And then it turned out that he knew I was 95% of the time. They're probably staring into space. But I will say that other times when I'll finally say hi to that person, they'll be like, hey, do you have a podcast? It happens all the time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
So it started to train me in this weird way where I'm like, if someone looks at you for too long, check and see if there's a booger hanging from your nose. If no, maybe there's something else going on. I don't know. Maybe you have a podcast. It's happened quite a bit. So I don't know. It's got me feeling some kind of way. The moral of that story, though, is please say hi.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
During the week, we have long-form conversations with a variety of amazing folks. Russian spies, chess grandmasters, money laundering experts, gold smugglers. This week we had Randy Blythe, lead singer of the heavy metal band Lamb of God. Really cool guy. He's the author of a new memoir, Just Beyond the Light. We talked about mental health, addiction, crazy rock star stories.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
It's like the coolest thing that happens to me in any given week. I meet someone cool from some other place who listens to the show and I get their story. Even when I'm in a hurry, I try and talk with people. And like I said, it usually only happens when I really have to go to the bathroom. I've told that story many times.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
I won't get into it now, but basically the closer I am to shitting my pants, the more likely it is that someone's going to recognize me and want to chat. Yeah. That's some sort of like Murphy's Law rule of Jordan Harbinger show fans. You guys can feel when I urgently have to take a leak. You're like, hey, Jordan, I have a couple questions for you if you don't mind. And I don't mind.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
My back teeth are floating. That's the only problem. All right. Gabe, what is the first thing out of the mailbag?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
So annoying already.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Collagen is the structural protein that keeps everything in your body feeling smooth, strong, and supported. But after your 30s, your natural levels start to drop, which is why you might notice some creaky joints.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
He actually spent time in a Czech prison castle for murder. Super interesting conversation with a guy who's seen and done a lot. We also had Wendell Potter, editor-in-chief of Healthcare Uncovered. Wendell was a marketing executive at a health insurance company. He saw a lot of shady stuff and he ended up becoming a whistleblower.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
This is why you go to the freaking Cheesecake Factory, right? For the 30-page menu, there's something for everyone. This is so bizarre. I'm secondhand irritated already, if you couldn't tell.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Yeah, I'm getting worked up. And I'm also trying to put myself in this situation. I almost kind of want to see something like this firsthand and then be like, okay, I don't want to deal with this anymore and leave. I've never experienced anything like this. I've never heard of anything like this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Oh, worst hobby ever. Menu's just my thing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Knowing whether something needs to be hand-washed, cold, and air-dried. Kind of my thing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Oh, I'm so surprised that her husband doesn't share this passion. This seems like the most annoying thing to deal with on an everyday basis. Sort of basis. My God. Okay. So there's something going on here. Clearly. This is not normal. This is not a hobby. This is an obsession. It's almost like a compulsive behavior. If this were my guest, I would be going out of my mind.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Okay, so this is so extreme. This isn't even just the menu thing. This is some kind of OCD... Something.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
And we dive into how these companies make money by actually not covering life-saving treatments. It's a truly fascinating and horrific look inside the American healthcare system.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Oh my God. Okay. There's something disordered. It's official. This is a disorder. This woman is fixated on food in a clearly unhealthy way. And this is actually sad. I'm curious if you're this fixated on food and you're eating entire boxes of breakfast bars, whole pizzas, that's not somebody who's going to stay at a healthy weight for a very long time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
We also did a Skeptical Sunday last Sunday on slavery, how it still very much exists and is actually more prevalent than ever, which is both incredibly depressing and wild and something I wasn't even sure that I was going to believe until I saw the numbers. On Fridays, though, we take listener letters, offer advice, play obnoxious soundbites, and rehash our own bizarre stories.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Not cool at all. So she's staying with you. She's putting you through all this objectively weird crap. And then she's not even singing for her supper. Literally, she's dead silent at the meals, which is so weird. She is an awful guest. She didn't even offer to help pay for the rides. So entitled. This is bizarre. Obviously, her husband has grown very sick of this nonsense.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Maybe. I almost feel like you're giving her too much credit. She might not be fully conscious of that shame. Yes, the shame has to be there on some level. But honestly, she could just be that entitled. I guess people can be entitled as hell and also detail-oriented at work.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
You just came over for the menus. That isn't strange. What's strange is using your friend to get your restaurant menu fix and then not even acknowledging it or picking up a lift here and there. I think if you had some sort of weird compulsive thing, you'd be like, okay, look, I got this weird thing that I do. I'm going to handle it. I'm going to drag you along. It might be a little bit boring.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Let me know when it gets a little bit boring. And then you just pay for everything and you go, thanks for indulging my weird ass thing that I have to do. Sorry, I had to go to every model train store in New Orleans. I'm a weirdo. OK, now let's do something fun.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Okay, as you might have guessed, I had my suspicions, but that tracks. This person really struggles with food, and I do feel bad for her a little bit here, but you can't eat a whole box of breakfast bars or frozen pizza, read every menu, eat everything. I mean, it's just, it's a pathological issue.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Gabe, are you trying to fill my inbox with hate mail?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Speaking of which, you just got back from China. That's right. China! And Taiwan. And Taiwan. You don't have that sound clip idea. And Taiwan! Taiwan! Jace, tell people what timestamp they can go to if they don't care about my trip to China.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
I got nothing. So the last time we took a question about how to respond to a friend's weight, or I guess it was a person writing in about their colleague's weight. This is two, three years ago. Man, a few people got really mad at us, dude.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Yes, that's true. This is such a charged topic, and I get it. Anything to do with weight, appearance, food, it's sensitive. There's a lot of political correctness that people have, in my opinion, just gotten used to getting. A lot of grace that they've been getting. We're supposed to walk on eggshells around this kind of thing. I understand, but I struggle with this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Because yes, on one hand, talking to somebody about their weight is one of the hardest topics. I get it. There's a lot of pain and shame and history involved. around all that stuff. But on the other hand, being severely overweight, like to the point where it's a medical issue, that is objectively a health risk and it is objectively dangerous.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Are you really not allowed to tell a friend or close colleague, hey, I care about you and I'm worried? I'm not saying it's an easy conversation. I'm not saying people shouldn't be thoughtful, but the emails I got last time were basically along the lines of, I'm never listening to the show again because you should never tell people they're overweight. It's hateful. You're fat shaming.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
You're a terrible person. You're cruel. You should be ashamed of yourself. This is their business and no one else's. I agree it's ultimately their business, but that doesn't mean that they couldn't benefit from somebody who actually cares about them saying, hey, I'm concerned about you and here's why. How are you doing? How can I support you?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
delivered the right way from a place of genuine concern, I just cannot see that as anything but an act of love. Tough love maybe, but it's love. This is not your mother shaming you in front of all your friends and saying you look fat in your prom dress and no one's ever gonna love you. This is a close friend saying, hey man, how's everything going?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
If I can give a personal example, my buddy, this is 15 years ago, I was in New York and he goes, oh, you look like you lost weight. And I go, yeah, was I big before? And he's like, yeah, you are. You look great now. I'm wondering if this is a conscious choice. Not really. I just stopped eating a lot of takeout. And he goes, I got to tell you, you're a good looking dude. You look even better now.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
He did that and he had the opportunity to do that because I was a little bit lighter and I never forgot that. And it was one of the reasons why I paid attention to my weight from then on. What was it like for you to hear that? It was fantastic because what I realized was, oh, I should pay attention to this because I honestly hadn't really noticed.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Another guy that same week who I worked with had said, you know that you'd probably get more girls if you lost a couple of pounds. You should work out with me. And he said it in a kinder way than that, but I was like, oh, yeah, you're probably right. And... I realized that they only told me that because they actually cared. They weren't being jerks about that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
These guys knew me so well that they knew that they could say that and I wasn't going to be like, screw you, you jerks, and cry in my room.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Yeah, but look, maybe I'm the exception to some rule here where I don't get offended if somebody tells me something that I need to hear. Look, I don't want to hear somebody go... Hey, you jerk, you look like an idiot because you're wearing these stupid clothes that make you look like a fat lop of crap. You don't have to be mean about it. That would make me angry and sad.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
If you're not getting away with some kind of behavior, overeating or being rude to people or being late all the time. Look, if you're late all the time and a friend goes, Hey, Gabriel, when you're late and everybody has to wait for you, it makes us resent inviting you. And we don't want to do that, man, because we love you and we love when you're there.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
We just need you to be there when everybody else is there so we don't miss our dinner reservations because we love you, man. We want to include you. We don't want to think about whether or not we can or should include you because we don't know if you're going to show up on time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
It's the same thing, only there's less shame around somebody who's late all the time than there is about somebody who's maybe overeating. But why is that the case?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Exactly. Which one is really serving them, though?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
It is. I agree. I mean, we're dancing in that minefield right now. People have already got their emails ready to yell at us one way or the other.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
duller skin hair that's just not as full vital proteins helps you stay ahead of that vital proteins is the number one collagen peptides brand in the u.s so they know what they're doing and it's super easy to take you add a serving to your coffee smoothie even water it doesn't taste like anything just blends right in and if you stick with it daily studies show you'll be seeing benefits in four to eight weeks get 20 person off by going to vitalproteins.com and enter promo code jordan at checkout these statements have not been evaluated by the food and drug administration this product is not intended to diagnose treat cure or prevent any disease
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Yeah, clearly, and we don't quite know what that is, although what's happening with her husband is almost surely a part of it, or maybe that's another symptom of it. But yeah, this friend is clearly in some kind of distress, and this food obsession, the menu-hunting hobby, if we can even call it that, maybe it's playing a role in keeping her together somehow. Or staving something off.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Yeah, numbing, basically, kind of like all addictions. Although that detail about needing a snack on the plane home, making sure there was plenty of food in the house to begin with, that makes me wonder if she's afraid she'll find herself in a situation without food at all. Is that the deeper problem? Is it some kind of food insecurity?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Did she go through some kind of deprivation as a kid that's now getting triggered again? It's so bizarre.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
I am just trying to imagine every possible reason somebody would behave like this because it's so unusual and so extreme and I've never heard of anything like it. But yeah, we can't know. What I do know is this. This woman is a colleague and a friend. It sounds like maybe less of a friend after this trip. She's not your bestie, okay? She's not your homie since high school.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
She's not a family member. So I'm really not sure that you have any sort of strong obligation to talk to her about this. And because you guys aren't super tight, I'm not sure how much she'd even let you in and listen. Does that mean you can't say something? No, you totally can. Who knows? Maybe she would love to talk about it, be open to talking about it at least.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
No, I'm not okay. First of all, the jet lag is brutal. And I use Flykit and you can use our code Jordan Harbinger. It's an amazing product that limits your jet lag. What doesn't limit my jet lag or doesn't allow me to do Flykit like you're supposed to actually do. Is having to. Is having two young children, because what happens is they're like, I'm not tired.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
I just don't know if you're close enough where you are obliged to. To walk into this same minefield to help this person address this weird thing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Tell me, and thank God, because I don't want to be the only one getting hate mailed this time. You guys can reach Gabriel at Friday at JordanHarbinger.com.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
No, I like it, Gabe, although I think it's equally likely that she'll dodge the question or shut down. But yeah, maybe that's a way to test the waters. I just, I can't help but notice, though, there are two things you did not touch on in that script, which are her friend's weight and the whole thing about her sticking her with the Uber bills.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
And I'm like, I know you're not lying about not being tired, because even though it's 10 p.m. here and you were supposed to be in bed hours ago, it's nine o'clock in the morning or whatever in the other place. So we force them to go to bed. They can't go to bed till really late. They're rolling around. They don't want to go to sleep. Then they get up at one, two, three, four a.m.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Because it makes the conversation about money or manners rather than, hey, I'm worried about you kind of thing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
That's a gentler way of saying you were so obsessed with studying menus that you missed us and by extension me. Yes, yes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
If this conversation does go well, she can work her way towards that. I guess, hey, I guess I want to help you see that when you did X, Y, Z things, it left me thinking this, it left me wondering that, and it left me feeling a little used, which I doubt you intended, but that's how it landed. Although now that I'm saying that out loud, I don't know.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
I'm not loving it because it does sound kind of petty. And the point is, her friend is a serious problem and it's impacting their friendship and possibly all of her relationships, including and especially her marriage.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
I like that. That's another invitation for a friend to be like, okay, what kind of difficult feelings?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Because look, if our friend here is being vulnerable by saying, hey, this really worried me. This didn't sit right with me. I'm willing to wade into this awkwardness to resolve it. And her guest is like, Ah, yeah, I don't know what to tell you, Manny. It's just my thing. Sorry if that wasn't fun for you. Nothing over here for me to talk about.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Then I don't think that this deeper conversation is even possible. And there's just nothing our friend here can say to make her want to go there. That's exactly right.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
and they're like, I'm hungry. normally when your kid wakes up and goes, I'm hungry, you're just like, ah, you just don't want to go to sleep. No, you're starving because you barely ate dinner because it was a weird time in the old time zone. And now you're starving because you missed lunch and now it's dinner time in the other time zone. So it's really been hard.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Exactly. And if she does, it's into a room with another door and then another door and another door. This might be several conversations. It's a labyrinth is what we're saying. Yes, it is. A lot of doors until she finds herself in a room called food and she's willing to walk around in it with you. But honestly, my feeling is that might not be a room you can or need to walk into with her.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
That's a room she needs to walk into on her own or with a therapist or whatever. But Gabe, you touched on something interesting. It's actually one of the things that I really struggle with when people write us going, how dare you encourage people to talk to somebody about their relationship with food? That's none of your business. When is something actually your business?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Look, if you work with somebody who's unhealthy, you're not super close to them. You go up to them in the break room and you're like, hey, you're overweight. Put down that Krispy Kreme and hit a Pilates class. That is obviously overstepping. It's rude. It's hurtful. It's not going to work. But if you invite a colleague to visit you, they stay in your home.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
They request a bunch of special snacks that are expensive. They make the whole trip about them and what they want to do, and they don't check in and see if you're having a good time at all and make sure they're not overstaying their welcome or taking advantage of you. If they're a crappy guest, basically, and co-opting you into their objectively, again, bizarre interests. Then it is your business.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Right? I mean, you are being impacted. If this woman were staying at a hotel or she paid for these menu outings because she needed them for her, she was like, hey, I'm going to go out for a few hours, do my menu thing. Let's link up in the afternoon and do that boat tour. That would be different. But the reason our friend here was left with these difficult feelings...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
is that her friend involved her in her compulsive weirdo behavior and subjected her to some objectively uncool things. Isn't she somewhat warranted in bringing it up? She's not looking for drama. She's not going out of her way to make this woman feel bad. This happened in her home, in her city, on a trip that she planned. I guess what I want to appreciate is sometimes a difficult conversation.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
It is your business, just by virtue of the fact that you're a human being in a relationship with another human being.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
So I've been up from 1am to 4am, you know, sleep a little bit before that, sleep a little bit after that. So my aura ring is like, are you trying to kill yourself or what? That's basically what's happening.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
And then her friend has an opportunity to go, huh, if I'm leaving this person with those thoughts and feelings, is there something for me to look at here instead of feeling like she's being lectured to?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
But look, the way your friend behaved, it was objectively challenging and worrisome, even if she didn't intend to be difficult. And I am sorry that you didn't get the trip you hoped for that sucks. And I do think that on some level, she's got to know that, right? Even if she can't acknowledge it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
But she's also given you something potentially greater here, which is an opportunity to consider whether you want to lean into a difficult conversation and build that muscle or whether you want to redefine your relationship with her and pull back. Both are fair choices. Both lead to some growth on your part.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
But whatever you do, remember that your friend is probably going through something pretty intense, however difficult this was for you. I can almost guarantee it's 10 times harder for her. So make sure you approach her with empathy, kindness, patience, curiosity, and you can't go wrong. Good luck. Gabe, I just got a delivery of some clothes from a show sponsor. I have to go read every label.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
It's kind of my thing. We'll be right back. So they were looking in and they didn't see anything. These guys are geniuses. Three masked intruders kicked down the glass door of the room I was in. Jen's in another room reading a bedtime book to the kids. Luckily, we had SimpliSafe. The sirens went off. Take this as a lesson that hoping for the best is not a security plan. Get SimpliSafe.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Easy to set it up. Jen had it set up in an afternoon. Cameras, door, glass break sensors. We got more of those after this. 24-7 monitoring, all synced to your phone. So whether you're at the grocery store or across the country, we did check in when we were in Taiwan. You know what's going on at home. And after what we went through, that peace of mind is absolutely worth it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
So I didn't want to go. And my family was like, we want to go to China. We want to go to China. We want to go to China. This is like my in-laws, parents, everything. And I was like, I don't think it's safe for me. My mother-in-law does a lot of business in China. And I was like, you need to check and see if I'm going to get arrested at the airport.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
And right now it's actually affordable and it's definitely a better plan than sleeping with one eye open.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
This episode is also sponsored by Aura Frames. Friendly heads up, it's almost Mother's Day. I know, I've got like 17 alarms to go get a card. But one of our go-to gifts and something we love using ourselves is the digital photo frame from Aura, A-U-R-A. What makes it special? You can preload it with photos before your mom even opens it. So we packed ours with pictures of the grandkids.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Now my parents are obsessed. We keep an Aura Frame in the kitchen. Every time we walk by, it's like a mini time machine. The kids, as you all know, they grow up super fast. Seeing those little moments pop up unexpectedly just hits different. The kids actually love looking at themselves, too. Aura is not just a crowd favorite.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
It was named the best digital photo frame by Wirecutter, featured in nearly 500 gift guides last year, uploading photos, even live photos, so those little ones that are like kind of mini videos. You can do it straight from your phone. It takes seconds, and it's one of the gifts that actually gets used, and it keeps on giving. These things have been hugely popular.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
We gift them to other people constantly, and they all love them.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Thank you for listening and supporting the show. It is your support of our sponsors that keeps us going. All the deals, discount codes, and ways to support the podcast are searchable and clickable over at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. Please consider supporting those who support the show. Now back to Feedback Friday.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Now, if they really want you, they're going to not say anything, but I'm not that important. My whole personality in business is not just like saying bad things about China or the CCP, but I've definitely covered China in a negative light for sure. I've also covered them in a positive light, but yeah, I was worried about that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
And I was like, why? To protect myself.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Oh my god, this guy's crazy. He's a loose cannon. You're out of control when you're spewing rage in the text thread and then you've got to delete the message. This guy's a kooky loser weirdo and you want to stay away from people like this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
And she was like, all right, we asked, and I can't get into detail, but basically we wanted to make sure I'm not on any lists and I'm not on any lists. So the other thing that if you don't know people in China and you want to make sure that you're going to be safe when you go there, safe-ish, there's always a risk with authoritarian regimes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
No, I don't know. Apparently citizens can get deported to El Salvador. So, you know.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Well, this sucks. You're not crazy for being angry about this. You were a loyal student for years. You did a nice thing by continuing to pay, even when you weren't training. And when you tried to leave, which you're obviously allowed to do, this dude manipulates and rages at you. Your martial arts coach, no less, which on top of being gross and uncomfortable, is a huge violation of trust.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
So first of all, you did nothing wrong here. You're totally on solid ground. Contracts generally have to be in writing to be enforceable. Not always true, but that's especially true when it comes to specific terms like fees, cancellation windows, things like that. The fact that your contract doesn't mention a cancellation window, that he tried to retroactively impose one based on nothing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
I mean, he just made that up. That tells me that he doesn't have any real claim here. And that's probably why he's not sending you to collections or dragging you to small claims court. And the amount, by the way, is so small, it's not even worth it. So if you walked away now, you'd almost certainly be totally fine. Nothing is ever going to come of this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
But just to be safe, I would definitely keep all those screenshots, copies of all your messages, just in case you need to defend yourself down the line or warn other people. Now, about reporting him, filing a complaint with the FTC is fine, and it might make you feel like you did something. I would not get my hopes up for that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
In all likelihood, the FTC is not going to act on a single complaint about a local gym for such a small amount. But... since you think he's been scamming other students for a while now. And if you can get proof of that, maybe get them to submit complaints too. You could also file a complaint with your state's attorney general's office or your local department of consumer affairs.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Those agencies do investigate, especially if they get multiple complaints. Another option, although I'm not a big fan of it in this case, but it is an option, is to leave negative reviews of the dojo on Google, Yelp, Facebook.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
But I had to reapply for my visa, which was also a point of issue because I had my original 10-year visa from 10 years ago where I was probably not talking about anything having to do with China. I got it really easy. This one, I had to tell them, hey, I'm a journalist, podcaster, whatever, I've covered China.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
This way you can warn other potential students without putting yourself at legal risk as long as you stick to facts and you don't veer into opinions that could be construed as defamatory. For example, if you say, hey, this gym's cancellation policies were not clearly disclosed, I was pressured to pay fees not stated in my signed agreement, that's fair game.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
If you say, this guy's a criminal, even if you show some proof of that, eh, it gets a little dicey. And if you post, I would do it anonymously and carefully. I would not do a whole Twitter thread with your real name about this. Just sidestep all that drama.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Although he'll probably figure out that it was you on Yelp, unless he's scamming so many people and has made so many enemies that he can't tell who's doing what. Honestly, it sounds like this guy's probably in the scamming business at this point, essentially. For most people, he's just charging them whatever he wants to, and they're paying because they feel like they don't have a choice.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
My trick for this, by the way, is to wait like 60, 90 days because they've scammed so many people in the meantime and they've probably forgotten about you. But doing it the same week that you had a blow up with him, yeah, he's going to know it's you. The other benefit to waiting is that your emotions are so much calmer when you wait a little while.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
So the reviews can be way more incisive, scathing, and fact-based instead of whiny and ranty and sounding like you're venting because you feel like it was unfair. People tend to take those reviews much more seriously. But listen, given what you know about this guy, this is a situation where you probably just want to quietly leave and stay away. Your fears are valid and well-founded.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
This dude is unstable. He sounds like a kooky total loser of a guy. You don't want to set somebody like this off, somebody with nothing to lose who's bragging about how they're armed and can't wait to fight. I mean, over 140 bucks, whatever. You're in a decent position. You owe him very little, probably nothing from a legal standpoint. He's not coming after you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
You're free of what I have to imagine is a toxic gym. The people who stay in a situation like this are probably not cool, well-adjusted, or fun to be with. You've got a new house that you own. I would not give this a-hole any more of your time, money, or emotional energy. He is just a total loser. What I would do though is take these lessons into the rest of your life.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
The biggest thing you've learned here is how to stand up for yourself in situations like this, how to protect yourself. Most people, I'm sure they back down with this guy because he's scary, he's intimidating, he's a bully, which is why he gets what he wants and feels like he can get away with it. You had the cojones to say, nah, this is not right. Show me the contract and called his bluff.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
And you stood your ground when he tried to manipulate you into paying more and more money. Being willing to do that when it's necessary, it's kind of a superpower.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
And the agent who was handling this for us was like, if they approve your visa, you're fine because we're going to disclose this. If they find something that's a problem, they just won't let you in. They're just going to not give you a visa.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
And given that he's not sending you to collections now, I do wonder if being a little stronger with him early on would have nipped this in the bud. Maybe not resulted in you getting pistol whipped in a parking lot or whatever. It's possible this guy is just more bark than bite.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Agreed. This one is a little ambiguous given what a loose cannon his coach is, but also this whole situation does seem to be revealing an interesting quality for him to look at, which is ultimately helpful. So sorry this happened to you, bud. It sucks. I feel like everybody has a bad martial arts teacher story. I know I do. What about you, Gabe?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Yeah. Look, it's relatively low stakes. The real headline is you got out. That's the win. All right. What's next?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Jeez, this is a tough kid to have. Sorry to hear all this, man. Jeez.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
This is so strange. This guy is super dysfunctional and super effective and accomplished, and you don't often find all of those qualities in the same person. It's kind of fascinating.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
And so I really was like, OK, it's not like my whole career is anti-China journalism or something like that. It's hard to argue with a balanced view of China. And also, frankly, my problem is not with the whole nation of China. My problem is with the Chinese Communist Party and some of its policies, not even all of its policies, honestly.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Oh man, Gabe, this reminds me of the letter we took a couple weeks back from the woman whose son accused her of all these heinous things later in life because he wanted her money.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Total armchair diagnosis here. I could be totally off. Let's hear it. Based on what she shared, this could be partly ADHD, the not being able to sit still, the climbing on things, the impulsive behavior. That's all kind of textbook. But the temper tantrums, locking his parents out of the house, physical aggression, hurting people, that is more serious.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Oppositional defiant disorder is what the guy from the other story a few weeks ago had. I wonder if this applies to this son as well.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Yeah, that's not how open marriages are supposed to work, but okay, oof.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
You're not supposed to say, I'm going to divorce you if you don't let me bang one of your best friends. It's supposed to be like more consensual stuff here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Okay. Wow. I can understand why you did that, but I'm not sure that was the right move. This is insane on so many levels. The fact that he had her admit that it got his way and was like, okay, I can pretend to be happy now.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
So I'm not exactly a force telling people to never go to or do business with China. Do I think people should do certain things or not buy certain things? Yeah, and I say that, but I'm not doing enough damage. I just don't think that they care.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Oh my gosh. Wow.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Wait, Gabe, tell me if I'm just not listening. The husband thing wasn't mentioned at all earlier? No, it comes in the close. Isn't that kind of a detail you might want to throw in there that the husband didn't support you, didn't protect you from the violence, didn't help you in any way? Why was that just a footnote?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Yeah, what's happening there? Okay, sounds like you aren't either. It just seems like important information. Your spouse didn't support you in all this. Whether that means there's another version of the events, or he doesn't have your back, whatever, I'm not sure, but we'll come back to that. So to state the obvious, I'm so sorry that you've been through all this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Like I said, very challenging son to have, very upsetting. He's a terrible guy. Part of me is going, what happened to this kid in his early years? Because it's hard to believe a child would just act like this for no reason. And he did accuse you of some stuff later in life. But Brian does not sound like a reliable narrator. I feel you're probably telling us the truth. I agree with Gabe.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
I know that nature is real. Some people are just born with certain wiring. Maybe you struggle to respond to Brian in a way that would help him address his issues and work on these behaviors, which I can't entirely blame you for. Because what's the playbook? for a child like this. Maybe Brian has real mental health, brain disorder stuff built in, and it's an impossible situation.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
I'm also sorry for him to some degree, especially when he was young. It sounds like he was at the whim of a lot of rage and impulsive behavior, chaotic energy. It's very hard for a child to manage that, and then to deal with the reactions you get to that energy from your family and other kids, teachers, everyone you deal with. It's heartbreaking, really it is. But as an adult,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Yeah. Look, Taiwan was great. Taiwan is basically clean China in many ways. It's cleaner, safer. I really like Taiwan. The food there is great. Had a blast. China itself, this is going to sound so stupid and cliche. There's so many people.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
while he sure has an opportunity and a responsibility to take care of himself in a very different way. To look at this behavior, this dysfunction, these feelings, to find some healthy ways to address them, it just doesn't sound like he's doing that at all. Although it also sounds like he might not even recognize these as problems.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Yeah, right. How can you work on anything when it's always somebody else's fault? Man, there's so much going on here. But to cut to the chase, which we don't do very often on the show, I am not sure you can really have a true relationship with Brian. Not a fair, healthy, high functioning one anyway. Not an honest one. Definitely not a safe one.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
You're describing a person who is not only aggressive physically and emotionally, apparently abusive. You are talking about somebody who is emotionally coercive, unstable, chaotic. And if the nonstop selfies, just weird as hell, and projection and general failure of empathy are any indication, possibly this guy is a clinical narcissist in some ways. This is a weird mix of behavior.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
You are up against a lot. If you can't say, son, I love you, but you're out of control. You're being hurtful. You're making a mess of your life. You're accusing me of things I didn't do. And if he can't even begin to take that in, no, I don't think you can have a real relationship. I'm sorry to say.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Now, you might have some kind of relationship with him that allows you to see your grandchildren, which is where you are now. And maybe that's worth it. If Brian is a hopeless case, there's no other way to be in your grandkids' lives. That's your priority. I would want to know what the quality of a relationship with your grandkids is.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Whether you guys have a meaningful connection despite how Brian's acting, whether your relationship with him infects your relationship with his kids, all of that matters.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
And how does all of that make you feel?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
There's a lot of people in China.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
So I was in Shanghai, Hangzhou and Suzhou and some other smaller cities as well. By the way, a tier two or tier three city in China is the size of New York. Yeah, I bet. And a big tier one city like Shanghai is like Sao Paulo. So it's just absolutely massive. Or it's the size of New York if you count the whole metropolitan area. It's hard to even wrap your mind around that many people.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
I also want to point out that doing that, that hasn't healed the family, not in the slightest. If anything, it's just sidestepped a ton of dysfunction and hurt. And she must know that or she wouldn't have put that phrase in quotes. But I guess I flag that because it's OK, besides getting to take your grandkids out for ice cream, who's ultimately being served by this approach?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
And look, I get it. Her son is legitimately terrifying. But the more we talk about this, the more I wonder what's worse, her having to bear Brian's rage and irrationality or her having to sacrifice her integrity and dignity and still possibly be at his rage and irrationality at any given moment when he decides to snap.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
So to come back to that thing we kicked off with about your husband, how he didn't support you, to me, that is another rich area for you to explore. I'm speculating here a bit, but if your husband didn't support you in challenging Brian's lies for years...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
That does raise some important questions about how you and your husband are communicating and about his lens on all this and ultimately who's really on your team. I guess it makes me wonder if you also feel alone in all this. And if so, how exactly did you end up here? Because what Brian's done is, my favorite word, objectively insane.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
So I'm struggling to imagine why your husband wouldn't support you in just saying, Brian, this didn't happen. This isn't right.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
And I think I'd just be speculating even more if I tried to offer some theories. But I really got to encourage you to explore that question on your own and with your husband.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
It's almost like she's resigned to the idea that this is just the way it is, but she's also looking for a way out of the distress.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
She either needs to stand up to her son or pull back or draw better boundaries with him or talk to her husband in a new way and find the support she needs. There are options here. But alongside all that, the real question of your letter to me is, where am I in all this? What do I need? What do I stand for? When do I get to say enough is enough? I get to have a voice here, too.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
And in a really painful way, your son is giving you the opportunity to explore these questions. I'm so sorry that he's put you through so much. This is awful. But you are all at a very different stage of your life now, a very different role as parents, and there are approaches that can make this situation more sustainable or at least fairer.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Sadly, that could mean not being as close with your grandchildren, which I know would be so hard. But in a situation where your son is not allowing you to have everything, the question he's posing to you is essentially, what matters most? And I can't tell you the answer to that,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
But I can encourage you to factor your own values and needs into that equation a little more than you've been doing, sending you a big hug and wishing you all the best. All right. Now you're going to want to ram your fist through the wall to reach the chaotically generous discounts on the objectively amazing products and services that support this show. We'll be right back.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
So if you go to a touristy area like the Bund, which is like the water side in Shanghai, there are so many people that you can't barely walk. And there's military everywhere keeping order, especially on the weekends. We also went over a holiday. So I'm not sure if there was an increased presence there.
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1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
This episode is sponsored in part by Delete Me. Delete Me makes it easy, quick, and safe to remove your personal data online at a time when surveillance and data breaches are common enough to make everyone vulnerable. Getting hit with identity theft is a nightmare. Freezing your credit, changing passwords, calling banks, filing reports. It's a full-time job just to undo the damage.
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1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
And the worst part, most of the time it starts because your personal info, like your phone number, address, even your family members' names, is just sitting out there online, easy to find. That's why Jen and I use Delete Me. It's one of the easiest ways to make yourself less vulnerable.
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1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
They go through hundreds of data broker sites, find your info, get it removed, so you're not just a sitting stinking duck every time somebody decides to go digging. It's one of those things you don't think about until it's too late, but once you get Delete Me working for you, it's a huge weight off your shoulders.
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1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
This episode is also sponsored by BetterHelp. Let's be honest, therapy used to have this weird reputation like you had to be in full meltdown mode to even consider it, but now we know better. Taking care of your mental health doesn't mean something's wrong with you, it means you're doing it right. It helps you set boundaries, build coping skills, and not spiral when things go wrong.
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1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Still, one in four people avoid therapy because they're afraid of being judged. That is bananas. It needs to change. That's where BetterHelp comes in. It is all online, super affordable. They will match you with one of over 30,000 licensed therapists. If you're not vibing with your therapist, switch anytime. No awkward breakup text required.
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1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Over 5 million people have used BetterHelp, including me, Jen, and yes, even my parents. And it's helped a ton of people through big transitions, tough moments and everything in between. So if therapy has been on your radar, even as a maybe someday kind of thing, give it a look. The world is just better.
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1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
When we're a little more self-aware, a little more supported, and a heck of a lot less afraid to say, hey, I could use a little help.
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1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
I've got Homes.com as a sponsor for this episode. Homes.com knows when it comes to home shopping, it's never just about the house or the condo. It's about the homes. And what makes a home is more than just the house or property. It's the location. It's the neighborhood. If you've got kids, it's also schools, nearby parks, transportation options.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
And I remember I was like, I'm just going to use my Chinese and talk to them and ask them questions and stuff. And I said, is there going to be fireworks? Is there a special event? And the guy goes, no, man, it's just Saturday. Yeah. And I was like, wow, there's always this many people here. He goes, yeah, Friday, Saturday, Sunday. Yep. He's like, they're here for you.
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1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
That's why homes.com goes above and beyond to bring home shoppers the in-depth information they need to find the right home. It's so hard not to say home every single time. And when I say in-depth information, I'm talking deep information. Each listing features comprehensive information about the neighborhood, complete with a video guide.
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1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
They also have details about local schools with test scores, state rankings, student-teacher ratio. They even have an agent directory with the sales history of each agent. So when it comes to finding a home, not just a house, this is everything you need to know, all in one place, homes.com. We've done your homework.
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1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
If you like this episode of Feedback Friday and find our advice valuable, I invite you to do what other smart and considerate listeners do, which is take a moment and support our amazing sponsors. All of the deals, discount codes, and ways to support the show are searchable and clickable on the website at jordanharbinger.com slash deals.
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1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
If you can't find a code, you're not sure if it exists, email us. We'll dig up the code for you. It is that important that you support those who support the show. Now, back to Feedback Friday. Oh, that's right. It's time for the recommendation of the week.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
This is like an upgrade. I remember a few months ago, I was like, get a Yeti mug. It keeps your drinks cool for a long time and hot. And you're like, no, get the beast. It's a whole gallon of boiling hot for you for 12 hours.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
It even comes with a metal straw from the look of it. Well, look at that. 30 ounces.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
It just, you couldn't even move. It was like being at Disneyland. It was like New Year's Day in Times Square, New York level of crowd.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
I was so big on metal straws and I was like, oh yeah, save the turtles. No more straw garbage. I'm going to bring my own straw. Then I was talking to an expert about waste. I think it was actually Krista Armit on the show. And he's like, the energy to create a metal straw. Do you have any idea how many plastic straws that is? And it was something like tens of thousands of
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
You will never use that many plastic straws in your life. So you have two metal straws. Congratulations. You've used multiple lifetimes of plastic straws worth of carbon and energy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
You kind of can't win. And also, if you fall with a metal straw in your mouth, it's game over. If you fall with a plastic straw in your mouth. Who's walking around with a metal straw in their mouth?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
I've fallen and I can't get up. Because I got a straw in my carotid artery. That's right.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
By the way, you can reach us Friday at jordanharbinger.com. Please keep your emails concise. Try to use descriptive subject lines. That makes our job a lot easier. If your son manufactured criminal charges against you to get your money, your neighbor... Are you okay over there?
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1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Your neighbors are eavesdropping on your therapy sessions through the wall, or you're debating whether to call out a parent who abused you as a child when you need their inheritance. Whatever's got you staying up at night lately, hit us up Friday at jordanharbinger.com. We're here to help, and we keep every email anonymous.
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1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Also, our subreddit, if you like the memes or you want to tell us to stop using the sound bites, I'm going to ignore those, by the way. But if you want to discuss the questions or the episodes, we're having so much fun over there. You can find it on the Jordan Harbinger subreddit. We got to cut one of the questions because we're going so long. Let's go out with a bang here, Gabe.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Yeah, I remember that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Hey, look at that. Congratulations.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Great, yeah, I'm glad you found a solid first partner. I remember that was a big question for you. Man, that must have been a relief.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Well, what's interesting is I thought I'm in Shanghai. I'm in a touristy area. There's going to be foreigners everywhere. Jen thought the same thing. We saw maybe five white people. The whole time. Which tracks, right? Because a lot of them have left. They have left. I even asked, I said, oh, I thought there'd be more foreigners here at the hotel.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
First of all, amazing update. I remember how anxious you were in your original letter about whether this was going to happen, how it was going to happen, who it should be with. The fact that you went through this major milestone with somebody who treated you well and ended up being a meaningful part of your life, that is just, it's wonderful. It's so sweet. I love this. Yeah. Big congrats there.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
I also love that you and this woman have developed a real friendship, especially after sleeping together. It's quite rare, and I gotta think that says a lot about both of you, you know, that you guys are mature enough to put your old relationship to bed, pardon the pun, and begin a new kind of relationship based on different feelings and different goals. And again, I think that's tremendous.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
So it probably won't surprise you that my feeling is yes, it is possible for this friendship to continue and for you guys to date new people.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
as long as you guys are totally for realsies on the same page and your intentions are clear, you say neither of you is secretly pining for the other, when you're alone there's no sexual tension, I gotta take your word for it, then I don't see why you guys can't stay close while you date other people.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
If one of you secretly has feelings for the other, if one of you is like, well, I'd sleep with them again if I had the chance, then no, I don't think it's sustainable because the foundation is kind of a lie. I can't say it's the majority, but a lot of male-female friendships, one person, they would, and the other person wouldn't, but they're not on the same page.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
I'm going to take your word for it that you guys are totally on that same real page and your friendship is legit. Whether a new person that was going to buy that, whether they're going to be comfortable with your history... That is an entirely separate question. If either of you meet somebody who's not cool with you guys being friends, that is going to raise an interesting question for you guys.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Whether you should end this friendship to make them feel comfortable, whether that person needs to trust you guys and reconsider their stance on someone being friends with an ex, that is ultimately up to you guys and, frankly, this new person to decide. My stance on this is men and women can absolutely be friends even when they have had a romantic past.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
as long as both parties are super clear and transparent about their feelings, their goals, there are appropriate boundaries in place, all of that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
And he was like, recently more Chinese tourists, more other tourists from Asia. And I was like, oh, he didn't say foreigners have left or they stopped doing business here, but there's tariffs. And I was like, eh, that was yesterday. I don't know if that's really going to affect everybody who's here now. Right. Literally, this happened like yesterday or two days ago. That was weird.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
If things are still messy, if there's any loose end anywhere, if one person is still secretly crushing on the other, or the friendship lives in kind of an ambiguous zone where it's kind of platonic and kind of romantic, and if alcohol gets involved, it's a whole thing, that's a different story. Then it's complicated. And maybe then that friendship, big air quotes around friendship there,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
that's probably incompatible with dating a new person seriously.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Definitely. For sure. It's just that those messy friendships, the mess gets clearer when somebody starts dating someone new because then it's like, who is this person? Why are you guys hanging out? But you're right, there are good reasons to get clear on those ambiguous friendships regardless of your dating status.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
But in this case, where it's truly platonic and there's a lot of pure affection for each other and he's just a big part of her life, I just don't see why they should have to give that up when they start dating someone new. But again, that assumes that the new person they meet shares that view. And I recognize that many people don't, especially based on their experiences in life.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
And that is a legitimate gripe.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
And look, that's kind of selfish in my view, because if you're weirded out or you're insecure about somebody's past and it's truly all in the past, which again, that part is key, my feeling is, you know... Then it's kind of a you problem. Exactly, it's a you problem. So maybe try working through those feelings first, because your partner has not actually done anything wrong, but...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
and this is the crucial part, you have to tell a new partner when you and a friend have any sort of romantic history. You don't tell them a month in after your new partner has hung out with them 10 times. You're up front with the information, and you give your new partner a chance to get to know this person and see for themselves, hopefully, that this friend is really just a friend.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
If your new partner walks away from that meeting with a bad impression, if they don't believe that your friend is sincere, assuming your partner met you and your friend in good faith, of course, then you have some decisions to make.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Whether it's to reassess the friendship or talk to your partner about their concerns or talk with your friend about what signals were getting sent, maybe all of the above. Now, I've had female friends where we talk on the phone all the time and I'm single and they're single and then they meet a new guy and it's like, oh, I want you to meet my boyfriend. And it's like, all right.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
And we stop talking on the phone as much and eventually I meet the new guy after maybe even a few months and he's like, oh, I'm happy to meet you. I've heard a lot about you. Look, he's not going, you're the guy that talks to my girlfriend three hours a week on the phone, because we stopped doing that. Your role in their life shifts a little bit.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Some things are more appropriate for a person to do with their partner instead of you. And this was really important because, frankly... He would have had every right to be suspicious of this. But after a while, they're dating for a few months. He feels quite secure in the relationship. Then he meets me and it's, oh, you used to date Kim. Yeah, well, a couple of times.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Stores were really surprised that we were there. I remember people were like, oh, are you a tourist or do you live here? And I'm like, no, I'm a tourist. They're like, oh, okay. I said, there's not that many white people here. And they're like, no, not really. I thought that was interesting because it's Shanghai, man. This was in Shanghai. This is not in a tier three, four city.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Then we realized we were better off as friends. And he's like, yeah, OK, cool. He's not thinking you're the guy that hangs out with her all the time when I'm not around. And I'm supposed to just be OK with this. I don't want to get involved with this nonsense. It's a totally different situation.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Yeah, I totally hear that. I have a couple of those in my life too. But look, the key is you have to navigate these situations thoughtfully and carefully. Everyone involved has to be honest and open. Look, you got to be willing to make some adjustments along the way, like you said, that are compatible with staying friends. So yes, Harry and Sally can be friends under the right circumstances.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Although Harry and Sally in that movie, look, it's been a while, but they're slowly falling in love with each other. That's the whole point.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
And they're confused about how they feel. So that's where all of this falls apart. But that's not what's happening with you and this woman. You're not Billy Crystal. Congrats. Better hairline, hopefully. You're a true friend. Fine. You're good. Also, I don't know how much I would stress about this until it actually becomes a problem. Right now, it's just sort of an abstract concern.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
This is not someplace where it's, oh, there's a white person here. How odd. I'm in a shopping mall with like an Omega store and an Apple store.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
That's a good point, Gabe. Man, there's so much nuance here. There's so many variables at play. When you hang out, who else is there? Is it a solo hang? Is there alcohol involved? What do you guys talk about? How are these topics discussed? Ultimately, all of that comes down to the intentions and characters of the people involved. But hey, look.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Whatever happens with this friend, let's celebrate the real victory here, which is you lost that V-card, man. You had that experience with somebody special, which isn't often the case, and you were able to build a great friendship afterward.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
All of that, it just says so much about you and your capacity for meaningful relationships, which I know will play a big role in all of your relationships going forward. That is the win. whatever ultimately happens with this woman. And good luck. Go back and check out the episodes with Randy Blythe, Wendell Potter, and our Skeptical Sunday on slavery, if you haven't done so yet.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
The best things that have happened in my life and business have come through my network, the circle of people I know, like, and trust. I'm teaching you how to build the same thing for yourself in our six-minute networking course, which is free. It's not schmoozy. It's all available for you on the Thinkific platform at sixminutenetworking.com. Build relationships before you need them, folks.
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1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Dig that well before you get thirsty. Sixminutenetworking.com. Show notes and transcripts are on the website. Advertisers, discounts, ways to support the show at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. I'm at Jordan Harbinger on most social media. You can even add me on LinkedIn. You can find Gabe on Instagram at Gabriel Mizrahi. On Twitter, Gabe Mizrahi.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
This show is created in association with Podcast One. My team is Jen Harbinger, Jace Sanderson, Robert Fogerty, Ian Baird, Tata Sidlowskis, and of course, Gabriel Mizrahi. Our advice and opinions are our own, and I am a lawyer, but I am not your lawyer, so do your own research before implementing things you hear on this show. Remember, we rise by lifting others. Share the show with those you love.
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If you found the episode useful, please share it with somebody else who could use the advice we gave here today. In the meantime, I hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn, and we'll see you next time. This episode is sponsored in part by What Was That Like podcast.
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1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Have you ever wondered how it feels to watch your house burn down, be attacked by an alligator, or learn that your spouse hired someone to kill you? What Was That Like is the podcast for you, if you're that person. Not the person who got hired to be killed, but the person who wondered, more thankfully. Real people come on every episode to explain the unbelievable situations they've been through.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Actually, not at all. But again, I'm not really qualified to opine on whether a foreigner would feel welcome in their neighborhood in China. I felt totally fine in Hangzhou and Suzhou and Shanghai walking around shopping and doing touristy crap as a foreigner.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
I think it's a funny concept for a show. I kind of wish I'd thought of it because I always get crazy stories from people. Not everything turns into a Jordan Harbinger episode. But What Was That Like? is hosted by my friend Scott Johnson, who's naturally curious and gives his guests the opportunity to share how they've really felt during some of their most surreal experiences.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
What they did in the morning before an earthquake, what song was playing as a gunman entered, was their stomach growling as they hid? Guests share everything they remember about their crazy, crazy experiences.
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1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
So if you want to hear some disturbing slash inspiring firsthand stories about the thoughts that go through your head while surviving a kidnapping or winning the Price is Right, What Was That Like? is the podcast you've been looking for. Every story is thoroughly researched and fact-checked so you know even the most unreal stories are actually someone's reality. Listen to What Was That Like?
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1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
wherever you get your podcasts.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
It's a world of difference from like going to your local lunch place where the guy suddenly is not nice to you anymore because you're white or black or whatever. I didn't have any sort of experience like that. And additionally, even if there was anti-foreigner sentiment, I speak Chinese. So people were like, Whoa, a white guy that speaks Chinese. How come you speak Chinese?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
I mean, that was the first thing that they wanted to ask. So I think even if they were going to be like, oh, I'm so sick of Americans, they're terrible. That wasn't what we talked about. They were like, how did you learn Chinese?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
It changes the whole dynamic. Yeah. And so maybe if I talk to those people and stayed around for a month or two, they'd be like, by the way, we hate America and Americans are crap. But I didn't get that. I got holy crap. How did you learn Chinese? That's insane.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Definitely. Yeah, they are worried about the economy because of the tariffs. They're getting tariffed into oblivion, too. They have noticed business go down pretty much the day after this happened. They were like, yesterday was abysmal and today is also abysmal. It could be a coincidence, but we just think people aren't spending. And I was like, wow, these guys talk about canary in the coal mine.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Yeah, yeah. China invading. People are absolutely worried about this, but they're so used to hearing about it all the time that it's not like they live their life looking up in the sky worried about the missiles coming in. It's like South Koreans and North Korea. So I go to like Korean restaurants around here that are basically only Korean people in them.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
And they have a news channel playing on the TV. And the news channel every single time is footage of South Korea firing missiles and then some crap about North Korea. They're desensitized. So you get desensitized, right? Like this is Xi Jinping. He said he's going to invade by 2027.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
And people are like, that gives me enough time to go to work, come back, go to the mall, hit the gym and do my laundry. That's where they're at. They're not like, oh, my God, they're threatening us. They've been getting threatened since 1949 or whatever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Almost certainly. I mean, the Chinese said that the People's Liberation Army should be ready to take over Taiwan by force by 2027. Now, does that mean they're going to invade in 2027? Not necessarily, but we can see them building invasion equipment on the shore. So regardless of whether or not they use it, they're preparing the invasion. So that's scary. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
And it depends on whether the United States is going to blockade them. If there's a result, if we detach significantly from them, how that all plays out. Yeah, that's totally real.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Wow. Yeah, I remember that. That's kind of scary if you think about it. It's so intense. Oh, my wife's family is going to pick up arms and join the insurgency.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Yeah, I think so. If the United States decides that they're going to blockade China somehow by not letting them get petroleum or something like that. I mean, yeah, but that's a massive escalation.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
So instead of an actual invasion, it seems like what they're going to have to do is posture that there's going to be a major invasion, and then it's going to force everybody to the negotiating table. And I'm not going to get too much into this, but I also get it, right? I mean, Taiwan is supposed to be like the real China, but it's not. It's an island off the coast of China.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
And the communists aren't going anywhere in China. And they took over Hong Kong and nobody batted an eye, really.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Different. But yeah. And then so the question is, do they destroy the whole island so that Xi Jinping can look strong or do they just negotiate and figure out how to make closer ties? And OK, over the next 20 years, we're going to slowly integrate into the mainland, yada, yada, and start doing this and retain some autonomy. I don't know.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Man, I really enjoyed it and I would go back. I definitely wanted to see more of China, not just major cities. I think there's going to be, like we were just talking about, a major conflict with China in the future.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Welcome to Feedback Friday. I'm your host, Jordan Harbinger. As always, I'm here with Feedback Friday producer, my co-pilot on this flight where you never pay extra for bringing your baggage, Gabriel Mizrahi.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
And maybe we won't be able to go back because if we say that we're blockading them or we're cutting them off at the knees at every turn because of this whole thing, they're not going to give Americans visas or it's going to be really hard. It's going to be straight up too dangerous or really just unpleasant there because everybody you see is going to throw a rotten tomato at your head.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
so I would love to go back soon. You and I should go if you're down. I don't know. We'll see.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Look, that was Beijing where you and I went to, but it felt way more dodgy. And also, remember last time I visited you in Shanghai because you spent a couple nights there and we witnessed a literal street fight? Oh, yeah, that's right.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
Yeah, these two shirtless dudes were beating each other's ass.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
I've worked security, so I've seen crap outside of clubs and bars. But outside of me working security, I don't think I've ever seen two people actually beating each other's ass. And they were bleeding. It was like Fight Club. Yes, it was. And they were shirtless and yelling and people were gathered around because everyone else had gathered around.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
And again, this is not a country that has a lot of guns. So it wasn't like someone's going to start spraying. This was like two middle-aged dudes too. And they were going after it. So it felt a lot cleaner and a lot safer. And honestly, part of the reason is because when you have an authoritarian police state, a lot of the violent criminals are in prison or dead. Weigh that however you want.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
And I remember one of my tour guides, she said something, I'm paraphrasing here. She said something along the lines of, we don't really have freedom and we can't vote. America is a free country, but also we don't have gun violence. We don't have fentanyl. We don't really want that if that's what freedom means. Now, the irony is not lost on me. I might quibble with some of that argument.
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1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
The irony is not lost on me that fentanyl precursor chemicals mostly come from China.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1152: Freakish Food Fixation Fractures Friendship | Feedback Friday
They don't use it there. And it's not true that you don't have drug addicts and violence. You just have violence with knives, cars, other things like that. And the other reason is because anybody who says anything on the Internet about how they might start a criminal enterprise goes to a reeducation camp and you never see them again.
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1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
So Monica has Joe's phone and she's keeping it activated so she can read his messages. What the heck? So creepy. Maybe like, okay, when somebody calls to get the mortgage payment, I'll have to tell them that he's passed away and I can get information. I mean, I kind of get that, but you don't reply to somebody, Joe's dead. Something's off.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
But it makes sense if Joe was the legal point of contact for Julia. This must be Monica's way of intercepting any useful information that would otherwise go to Joe.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
Speaking of which... Funny story I remembered this week. I wanted to share it with you guys. So years ago when I was living in L.A., I was a host on couchsurfing.com or couchsurfing.org.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
Oh, man. What a sad story. I'm so sorry for Julia that she's being isolated like this, especially because she's still sharp. She's probably got a lot to offer. I'm so sorry for you, your mom, your whole family, these neighbors, everyone who loves this woman and just wants to spend some time with her. It's tragic, but it's very disturbing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
As per usual, we wanted to talk to an expert here, so we reached out to attorney and friend of the show, Corbin Payne. And Corbin's first thought was contacting the police in Julia's County in New York, trying to get them to do a wellness check. That's a good idea. It sounds like you've tried and you haven't had any luck.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
We looked into this in more detail and you might need to file a missing persons report for Julia. If she's officially missing, then the police might be more obligated or motivated to assist in locating her. Even if she is in a nursing home, the cops have access to resources like databases. They can usually talk to healthcare facilities with more ease than a civilian and
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1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
Corbin's second idea, reach out to Adult Protective Services. If you don't know, they're the agency that investigates exploitation or abuse of elderly people. It's a very important agency, super useful. Now, we don't know if Julia's actually being abused or exploited. Like I said, I have some questions about Monica, but who knows?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
But I would definitely make a report, tell them your story, ask if they'll look into it. Now, if they do track her down, they might not be able to tell you where Julia is right now. These cases can really be sensitive. But Corbin said that at the very least, APS could try to get eyes on her, confirm she's safe and healthy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
So for the uninitiated here, this is a website where you could basically say, hey, I live in San Francisco. I'm willing to host one or two people, and I've got a spare bedroom, and people just from all over the world who are young and don't have enough money for a hotel or prefer the couchsurfing experience.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
Just know that Monica will probably find out if APS manages to meet with Julia, and it's not going to take Sherlock Holmes to figure out who tipped him off. But also, it doesn't sound like you have much to lose. Your relationship with Monica is already strained, to say the least. I'm sure you'd rather know that Julia is alive and safe than stay in Monica's good graces.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
We're going to link to APS in New York State in the show notes for you. I would make that a priority. Corbin's other strategy? Reach out to those three other people Joe set up as power of attorney. See what they know. Ask them why they didn't take on the duty of caring for Julia. Something's weird about this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
If you can persuade them that Monica isn't taking proper care of Julia, maybe they'll step up. Also, if you guys have a legal reason to find Julia, like enforcing a power of attorney, then the police might actually be required to assist, although that usually goes through legal channels first. So I'd definitely try to get your hands on that paperwork.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
If you can't find it, track down the attorney Joe worked with to set all that up. They should have a copy, and they can tell you what your options are. They might not even charge you at this point. Having that power of attorney paperwork might also help you get around any HIPAA laws.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
These are our patient privacy laws here in the United States that might prevent a nursing home from telling you whether Julia is a resident. The other thing you could do is hire a private investigator in New York to find her. Licensed private investigators, New York probably has more than any other state. Maybe Texas, I don't know.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
But if I had to guess, New York seems like a place that PIs would be a dime a dozen. They have access to databases and other resources that the rest of us don't. They're also not as expensive as you might think. Definitely cheaper than flying back and forth trying to knock on doors yourself.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
If they track Julia down, they could maybe even go and visit her or just verify where she is, and then you guys could do a wellness check of your own. A PI might not be able to actually get into a nursing home, but I bet you guys could.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
Corbin said that Monica has the ability to order a nursing home to keep people away from Julia, but she might not have yet thought to do that, especially if she thinks nobody knows where she is. Another option, and I'd probably do this regardless, you could retain an attorney to reach out to Monica.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
If Monica thinks there might be a court case over Julia, maybe she'll back off and let you guys talk to her, or at least tell you where she is. Or who knows, this could go the other way and make her dig her heels in more, but an attorney would be super helpful in advising you either way.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
they would write you and go, hey, we're two German girls and we're gonna come visit and can we stay with you? And you're like, yeah, sure. And you look at their profile and there's people that say like, hey, these people are fun, they're clean, whatever. And I was one of the first 500 members of this website. And I remember being like, this is the coolest idea ever. And I've used it a bunch.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
Yeah, I agree. I don't know if they'd have much luck there, even if they want to give it a go. So those are your conventional approaches. One dark Jordan idea I had, what if you contacted Monica posing as somebody from the state lottery, for example, or some sort of sweepstakes saying that Julia has won a bunch of money, you need to get in touch with her.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
Something tells me Monica is going to respond to that, especially if she's trying to get the money for herself and that's what this is all about. but you have to say that you guys need to verify her current residence or you need to talk to her directly in person to sign something, whatever it is. That's maybe how you find out where she is. Now, is this strictly legal?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
Probably not, but you're not fraudulently posing as a state lottery official to get money. You're just trying to track someone down. And besides, you guys are in the UK, so New York state law could kiss your crumpets as far as I'm concerned, right? Who cares? Look, I'm so sorry this is happening. It's super sad. It's got to be very stressful.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
I hope you guys catch a break and you get to spend some time with Julia before she's gone. She is very lucky to have so many people who want to track her down and spend time with her. If you find her, it's going to be so sweet. Giving you and Julia a big hug and wishing you all the best.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
And by the way, if you do want to retain a private investigator in New York, get back to us because that's where Kevin Barrows works, isn't it? Primarily, Gabriel? Oh, yeah, I think so. And he's like the guy. Retired FBI. He's been on the show before. He specializes in finding missing people.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
I don't know what his rates are or anything, but if somebody's missing in New York State, Kevin Barrows can find him. You know what's a great use of your imaginary lottery winnings? The fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back. This episode is sponsored in part by BetterHelp.
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1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
When did we all decide that struggling alone is kind of a flex, like, oh yeah, I'm totally fine, while internally screaming into the void? Meanwhile, the people we admire, leaders, mentors, successful folks, they're out here actually asking for help when they need it. Maybe they're onto something. Thank you so much for watching.
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1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
I've had people host with me a bunch. And in LA, when I lived in Hollywood, I did it a ton when my roommates were out of town because it was super fun. You know, because hundreds of people in LA at any given time off of couch surfing. And I ended up hosting a guy and his sister from Saudi Arabia. And they came over and they stayed with me.
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1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
And if your therapist isn't a good fit, which pro tip, you definitely want to try a few out. You can switch at any time, no extra cost. I've done that myself a few times. So if you've been meaning to try therapy, but you keep procrastinating, consider this your sign. Your future self, the one who actually has their life together, is going to thank you.
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This episode is also sponsored by Delete Me. Ever get a scam call where they know your full name and even your address? Yeah, that is not just a weird coincidence. That is data brokers selling your personal info to the highest bidder. These companies collect everything, your phone number, email, home address, even details about your family, and they don't just sell it to advertisers.
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Scammers, spammers, all kinds of sketchy third parties can buy your data too, which means more phishing attempts, identity theft risks, and worse. That's why I use and recommend Delete.me. It's a subscription service that tracks down and removes your personal information from hundreds of these data broker sites so you don't have to spend hours doing it yourself.
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And Delete.me keeps scanning and removing your data on a regular basis to make sure it stays gone. They also send you privacy reports so you can see exactly what they've found and erased, which is honestly pretty satisfying.
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Thank you for listening and supporting the show. All of the deals, discount codes, and ways to support the podcast are searchable and clickable over at JordanHarbinger.com slash deals. Please consider supporting those who support the show. Now, back to Feedback Friday.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
And one evening we got to talking, which was the whole point of couch surfing. I learned a ton about Saudi and the culture. And just, I was like, hey, can't women drive? She's like, I don't care. I'll drive anyway. And I'm like, how do you get away with that? Don't the police do anything? She's like, well, my dad is a big deal in Jeddah. So they let me do it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
Gabe, that sign-off was longer than the police report the cops filed last week. That sign-off went on for days. Jeez. Oh, man. I can't stop thinking about that story, by the way. I can't believe that happened to you. Me neither. I can't believe I was the victim of an attempted... Hold up.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
All right, so first of all, I'm very sorry that your cousin did this to you when you guys were kids. It's awful. It's traumatizing. It's all the things you know it is, and my heart goes out to you. We've taken several letters on the show from people who've experienced this kind of abuse, and it comes with its own unique traumas and challenges.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
So you're not alone in struggling with the aftermath of this. In a message like this, it can bring up a lot. It can put you in touch with some very painful memories and feelings. It can dredge up stuff you've mostly put to bed. I think that's all very normal. That said, it sounds like you've done truly extraordinary work in your life. You've come so far. I'm so happy to hear that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
Good on you for seeking out the support you needed for finding healing and insights from so many different sources. You should be really proud. So look, I totally understand why Megan's message threw you. I also don't know what her intention was. It's absolutely possible that she was trying to express her love and support for you. And maybe she did that in a clumsy or ignorant way.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
I'm like, so it's almost just like a might makes right kind of situation over there. If you're important, you can do whatever you want. And I asked about wearing the... I think it's called a chador. But it's basically what we think a burka is, right? The covering, the head-to-toe thing. And she's like, I threw mine out, but I gotta buy one at the airport because I can't roll in without it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
Maybe she didn't think through what it might be like for you to receive that message. Maybe it would have been nice if she said, hey, I know this might bring up some stuff for you. Maybe you don't want to talk about it, but here's what I know. Here's what I'm seeing. And I just want to tell you that I'm on your side and I'm here if you need anything.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
Yeah, it's like that weird volcanic ash bowl that has three little legs on it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
That might have clarified things and landed better with you. But if Megan's never been through something like this, it might be hard or even impossible for her to frame things like that. to even imagine that her message wouldn't be welcome. Now, is it possible that she had some ulterior motive? Sure. Is she stirring up drama? Is she looking to bond with you over something dark? Maybe.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
Could she be trying to create evidence for a custody battle? Honestly, that makes a lot of sense to me, considering that she's in the middle of an active divorce. The timing is pretty sus. But do we know for sure? No. It's also possible she's just trying to be kind and empathetic in her own weirdly imperfect way.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
It can be even simpler than that. If you don't feel like sharing your reasons why, just, sorry, not interested. You could even ignore the message completely, although I do appreciate that you want to close this loop. I'm the same way. I'd rather put something to bed than just dodge it, even if it is a little uncomfortable. But honestly, I don't think it requires much more than that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
And it's just very interesting little cultural notes here. Anyway, one night, we all went out to some bars in Hollywood. And it was the brothers' first time drinking ever. So it was kind of a big deal. So the gal, she'd been touring all over America for like a year. He came to visit her and they met up in L.A. And these are Muslims, right? So he's like, I might have a beer. I'm like, cool, man.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
And how she responds to that question, that's probably going to tell you a lot about whether she's somebody you want to let in.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
Good point. That's actually what I think her letter is about. Not just what to do about the Megans who trigger you, but how to move through these moments when the legacy of this abuse pops up again. Megan is the easy target of that anger. And like you said, that might be appropriate to some degree.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
But I get the sense that this anger is best directed at this cousin and perhaps his mom if she really did enable him. And I also wonder if she might be a little angry at herself for simply being vulnerable in this department. Look, I haven't gone through what she's gone through, but I can relate to that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
Sometimes somebody will pop up in my inbox and say something thoughtless that pisses me off and I'll hear myself going, Hey, screw you. Why would you say it that way or whatever? And then I'll go, Okay, I'm a little raw in this department. Feel a little off kilter. This person just revealed that to me, so maybe I also need to look at that. So I'm with you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
It's important to parse our anger and make sure we're directing it at the right people and drawing the right conclusions from it. Also, I would talk to your therapist about all this if you're still working with them and see what they say. That's a great place to talk through the upsides and downsides to engaging with Megan, and more importantly, whatever her note has brought up for you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
But again, this is totally up to you. We're just inviting you to get more curious about what Megan's note is bringing up for you and your process. in addition to whether you want to take her up on this invitation to chat. Sending you a big hug and wishing you all the best. You can reach us Friday at jordanharbinger.com. Please keep your emails concise. Try to use descriptive subject lines.
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1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
That makes our job a whole lot easier. If you're locked in an endless custody battle with a psychotic ex, you're gaming out career moves in this highly unpredictable world, or your doctor friend is accusing you of victim blaming after they had an affair with an abusive mentally ill patient, Whatever's got you staying up at night lately, big or small, hit us up at Friday at JordanHarbinger.com.
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1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
We're here to help, and we keep every email anonymous. Also, our newsletter, We Bit Wiser, it's a bite-sized gem from an episode from us to you, delivered right to your inbox most Wednesdays. If you want to keep up with the wisdom from the show, I invite you to come check it out. You can sign up at JordanHarbinger.com slash news. Okay, what's next?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
Oh, got it. I was like a big, I'm going to break the covenant with God and have a beer. So he dressed in this traditional dishdasha. This is a long robe and headscarf with the black rope thing that a lot of men wear in the Middle East. He did not want to wear this. He wanted to look beautiful. The Hollywood part and blend in.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
Thank you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
I was like, trust me, man, if you want to go out and talk to people and have conversations and meet Americans, you need to dress traditionally. That's going to get everybody's attention. So we go to my friend's bar because I'm like, nothing's going to happen here. This is a safe place. I know everybody. No security. No, the bartenders know the owners.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
And of course, some a-hole there who a guy I talked to a million times and was always normal. He's sitting at the bar and he's really drunk and he just starts calling my guest all this racist stuff. And being like, you guys are all this. I was really pissed off. And my friend came over to me and he's like, I'm scared. I want to go home.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
They do. Oh, wow. You put the onions in there. I see you. Can we speed this up a bit? I'm hungry. The chips have been on the table for like five minutes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
And my friend was already scared to go out looking like an Arab dude in Hollywood. So this basically ruins his night. And he felt really scared. And he's like, let's go home. I don't want to be here. And this dude was almost in tears. It was really sad. I was pissed. So as we start to head out, because my friend's insisting to just go home. He wants to change and go somewhere else.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
Before we leave, these two jacked Filipino dudes that turned out to be army guys, they walk up and they're like, don't go anywhere. We're taking care of this. And they start speaking Arabic to my friend. And then they go back to this dude, the racist guy, and they tore him a new asshole. And they were like, cut that shit out. He's welcome here. This guy didn't do anything to you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
Oh, man, this is so sad. Bullied by students and teachers, and then he doesn't get the education that he needs on top of it. This poor guy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
Oh, okay, that's intense. So she was too young, clearly. Otherwise, look, this is usually a non-issue for two minors. If it's like a 15-year-old boy and a 14-year-old girl, okay, but if it's like a 15-year-old boy and a 10-year-old girl or 11 or something, it's like... Yeah, it sounds like what happened.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
Interesting. So that has since been folded into autism spectrum disorder in the DSM, yeah? That's right. So I assume that played some role in the incident with the girl next door. Maybe not, but maybe they're totally unrelated. But I know ASD can make it hard to read certain cues, control certain impulses. It can impact decision-making in general, even if somebody is high-functioning.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
You can either deal with us or you can get the fuck out. And the bar owner was like, yeah, you can't do that here. I will ban you in two seconds. You either apologize or you leave and you never come back here. Never. You're not doing that in my bar. So we stay and now suddenly everybody in the bar is buying us beers. My friend's like, do I have to drink all these? And I'm like, no, dude, relax.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
There you go. That might help explain that incident with the neighbor.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
Look, I know it can be hard to know how to best care for a child with special needs. It's confusing. How much do we accommodate them? How much do we empower them to be on their own? How much do we protect them? So I feel for your parents there, this is a really challenging child to have. It's a lot.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
But it does sound like they might have made some pretty big mistakes, and they are not owning up to those now. And they might not be helping him become independent, which it sounds like he might actually be totally capable of, even if he does forget his deodorant here and there. And that's really worrisome. What does a person like Dave do when his parents die?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
This is not his son. That's quite a burden to carry. And meanwhile, the parents don't seem to be doing much to make this as easy as possible down the road.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
Of course she does, because she knows that her tears are going to manipulate you. Now, that's a cynical view, but you said she's a covert narcissist, so it's par for the course. Look, this is not okay. I feel very strongly about this. I can understand why she's emotional, assuming her tears are not, again, just a way to prey on your sympathy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
But for her to put Dave's care entirely on you, starting when you were a teenager? Not okay. And apparently unnecessary.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
This is going to be a crucial boundary for you to actually enforce.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
I'll tell him this is your first time drinking. And the problem is they're going to buy you that drink. So he's like, I'll give it to you. So me and the other guys were just like drinking these beers. Even this racist dude bought us a drink and he was actually, to his credit, apologized profusely.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
Fascinating theme on today's episode, huh, Gabe? People clinging to control over situations instead of letting go, letting people in, being open to new approaches. Just incredible how much that can backfire.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
Or that they screwed up their kid, which a narcissist is not going to want to do.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
But if he becomes independent and actually goes, you know what? I don't need mom. That's her worst nightmare.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
They're actually afraid that it will help. That's my bet.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
Well, put Dave in the program and kill your parents. Not necessarily in that order. Darkest of dark Jordan takes. Yeah, I'm kidding. Do not do that, Menendez. All right, so this is a really good question. This is so intense. Look, like I said, I really feel for you here. I obviously feel for Dave, too. It's a really tough diagnosis to have. It's a tough life he's led.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
My heart breaks for anybody who was treated poorly, who struggles to take care of themselves. And I feel for your parents, too, despite their flaws and their mistakes. They obviously didn't ask for this. And I'm sure that raising Dave has been extremely challenging, to say the least. But right now, I largely feel for you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
Because not only have you been impacted by having a sibling like this, your parents are putting a massive responsibility on you. And as you can tell, I'm a little angry about that. Not because Dave doesn't deserve love and support. Of course he does. But because taking care of him for the rest of your life... That is not fair to you. You have your own family now. You have your own life.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
And when we started talking, it turns out that his best friend's brother had been killed the week before in Afghanistan. So he was basically drowning his sorrows and got triggered. In which, great Feedback Friday principle in there, you just never know what quote-unquote insane person is going through. Because I remember being like, wow, this guy's been here a zillion times and he's always nice.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
And caring for your brother Dave forever, it does not even sound necessary. So let's get tactical here for a moment. I think your first order of business is to start working with your parents to put some structure around Dave that will allow him to live independently as much as possible. And I'd start now.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
Because certain programs can take a while to access and you want to have all the pieces in place before your parents are too old to care for Dave. Specifically, I'd start looking at options for housing, supported living arrangements, options to live alone with support services, group homes, co-housing communities designed for neurodiverse individuals. There are tons of options out there.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
I would also think about what Dave is going to require financially. That might mean setting up a special needs trust. That's a kind of trust that protects a person's assets without jeopardizing their eligibility for government benefits. That is a super useful thing to have in place. It can be managed by a trustee who could be you. I would also look into something called an ABLE account.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
That's a tax advantage savings account for people with disabilities. Lots of helpful financial products out there. On the legal front, you're going to want to look into whether you guys should have some kind of guardianship over Dave or allow for something less restrictive. Basically supported decision making where he gets to call a lot of the shots with your input.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
Obviously, the housing, money, legal pieces of this, that's all top priority because Dave struggles with self-control and personal responsibility. The last thing you want is to set him up with a bank account and he drains it in a few months to buy a bunch of expensive Lego collector sets on eBay or something.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
Like, I know that sounds like I'm being mean, but if he's got impulse control and he spends all his money currently on Legos, that might not change when your parents are gone. It might just get worse. You're going to want to talk to a family attorney and or an estate attorney about all of this. Maybe somebody who specializes in disability law. That's going to be key.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
Healthcare is another area you're going to want to look at, although I'm not sure that there's a ton for you to do here right now. Basically, just make sure Dave has access to doctors that he can talk to a therapist if he needs to.
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1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
On the Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the stories, secrets, and skills of the world's most fascinating people and turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you. Our mission is to help you become a better informed, more critical thinker.
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1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
Yeah, that's true. That is sad. I also think some general life skills would be nice. Cooking, budgeting, advocating for himself, maybe some vocational training, supported employment services. And then there's the social aspect of all this. Clubs, interest groups, maybe pairing with mentors through a nonprofit who can give him some guidance, some friendship.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
I know you said he's kind of a loner, but I also wonder if your parents didn't encourage this part of his personality very much. I don't want to go down a whole rabbit hole of resources here, but we went ahead and gathered a bunch of great ones for you from financial planning to housing to employment support to mental health. We're going to drop all of that stuff in the show notes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
What is going on? That's what was going on. Not that it makes it okay, but Now it makes a little more sense than guy who you thought was normally a nice person turns out to be virulent racist. Then another guy at the bar walks up and says, I saw what happened. I'm so sorry. Come to this club tomorrow night. I'm a promoter there. And this is like the club in LA, at least in Hollywood.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
And look, if they fight you on this, or they're like, yeah, okay, you're right, and then they keep burying their heads in the sand and do nothing, you might need to make this urgent for them. Maybe you say, look, if something happened to you tomorrow, wouldn't you want to know that Dave is safe and cared for? Wouldn't you want me to have the support I need to do right by him?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
How are we guaranteeing that he's going to be okay? Hey, maybe you can even make their collaboration with you a requirement of your help. I feel like I would do that. I'd say, look, I'll keep an eye on Dave and make sure he's okay once you're gone. But if you don't help me find the support we need, you cannot count on me for that. I am out.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
I know that's a little intense to say, but you might need to scare them a little or take a harder line if they refuse to be cooperative. My mom actually is considerably older than her siblings. You've probably all heard about the one who was like a heroin addict and died. There's another one who was mentally ill, and my grandparents never set him up for success.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
And my mom had to take care of him, and he had a guardian, and he was always mean to her and stuff like that. It's just this really annoying... And it was made a million times worse by my grandparents doing nothing to set him up for success. They basically made it impossible for my mom to have any resources. Then finally, when they finally passed away, they left him a trust.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
But unfortunately, they didn't make her the sole person in control. It's just a huge mess. Right. So he's fighting around everything. And then she finally got him a guardian from the state. And the dude basically just embezzled the money. At this point, my mom was like, I've done all I can.
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1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
I'm not going to keep helping you if you're going to be a total prick to me and then take control away from me. And then this guy takes some money. It's like, oh, well, too bad. Bye. And it's really a shame because if my grandparents had cooperated at all, my mom could have set him up for success and it wouldn't have necessarily been smooth sailing. But they made it harder.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
This one he invited us to. So the next night, my new buddy wears his usual dish dash. He lends me one of his. This night he's like, oh no, no, I'm definitely wearing it now. He's like, oh, yeah, no, this is on now. So he lends me one of his and I wear this thing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
And it's already hard to take care of somebody like this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
For sure. And if they can hear those stories directly from other parents in similar situations, that would be even better. So maybe you also take your parents to a couple support groups or parent networks. You get them talking with other parents in their shoes. I bet that would make an impression. And then you got to break all of this down into very small, very doable things.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
I would tell your parents, hey, look, we don't need to tackle everything today. How about we just look at housing options, see what's out there. No commitments, just information. You want to look for easy wins. Attend a 30-minute webinar with your parents. Schedule a quick consult with a special needs planner. Small things that aren't overwhelming.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
That'll show them that this is way less scary than they think.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
I'm having a dark Jordan idea here. I wonder if you can use your mom's narcissism to your own advantage here, just a little bit. Maybe you tell her that setting this stuff up is going to be the best thing she ever did. It's going to make her look like such a loving mother. That's going to last way beyond her lifetime. You've done so much for Dave over the years.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
This is how you can make sure that love continues. Everyone's going to be so impressed with you. This is how you can make us feel that you are an amazing mom, even after you're gone. Now, this is manipulative, but if it works, I think it's fair game. 50-50 on this working because her immediate need for narcissistic supply might trump the long game here, but who knows.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
Listen, while you do all that, stay connected to your empathy. Keep treating your parents as your partners in this. That might be hard sometimes. There are so many intense feelings wrapped up in this conversation about your brother.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
But the more you approach your parents with kindness and patience, even when they make things difficult, the more you're going to be doing right by your brother and by yourself. Most importantly, I really want to encourage you to keep prioritizing yourself and your family. I think that you already know this, but it doesn't make you a monster. You deserve a life of your own.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
You're not abandoning your brother. You can help take care of him in a way that's fair and sustainable to you. Feeling secure in those priorities, not letting this caretaking eclipse your own life or impinge on your own family, I think that's crucial. And I'm proud of you for that. Good luck. Now for recommendation of the week.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
Welcome to Feedback Friday. I'm your host, Jordan Harbinger. As always, I'm here with Feedback Friday producer, the Molcajete, helping me mix together this tableside guacamole of life drama, Gabriel Mizrahi.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
So I use Crystal brand deodorant. It's basically a rock of alum salt. The reason I'm bringing this up, normally I don't recommend things like this, but I hate smells, but I also don't want to smell myself. Of course, this is a rock of alum salt, which kills bacteria that ends up stinking, but it does not have its own smell. It doesn't smear on stuff. It doesn't end up on your clothes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
None of that gross waxy perfume crap. This stuff lasts like five years. In fact, it lasts until you accidentally drop it and it shatters. That's how long these things last. I swear I've had one of these for like a decade. And you just rub a little thin layer of it on and I don't even need to use it all the time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
I just use it when I know I'm really going to be stinky and it will absolutely demolish BO. I don't totally get how it works. I guess it's just impossible for bacteria to grow in that little place. You only need a little bit. It goes a long way. It travels well. I can't recommend it enough. For people who hate deodorant, this is deodorant for you. And it's not antiperspirant.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
You're still going to sweat. It's just not going to stink. And I don't know, antiperspirant I think is bad for you. Who knows? Also, in case y'all don't know, there's a subreddit for the show if you want to yell at me about how alum salt is secretly bad, and I just don't know. You can find a receptive audience over on the Jordan Harbinger subreddit, if you're a Redditor. Alright, what's next?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
Oh, wow. I love this, man. What a play. Well done. So delish.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
That's right. What a picture. With my Saudi buddy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
Unreal. Talk about cutting off your nose to spite your face. What a bunch of clowns. What a short-sighted play, man. Hoist by their own petard.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
Unless he's not telling us something, like he did something before all this to piss him off and they're like, you owe us this. I don't know. It doesn't sound like he did. It sounds like they were just being selfish or who knows. Maybe the company's in dire financial straits and they couldn't pay him. But then you explain that. You come up with a payment plan. You work it out.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
You don't just fire somebody and tell them to get bent and then pretend you can't find their contract because you don't want to abide by it. Whatever the reasons, they were dicks about it and they deserve every part of this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
And the promoter knows what's up. And he's like, oh, hey, guys, what's up? Welcome in. So we go to this club. And like I said, it's the hottest club in Hollywood at the time. So we're sitting at the promoter's table surrounded by the usual Hollywood types. Models, muscle bros, out-of-work actors, some not out-of-work actors. Not really my scene, but super funny and an amazing experience.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
Yeah, it's always fun to talk to a lawyer who knows their client's full of crap and has absolutely no recourse. You just watch them desperately tap dance while you lay out the facts.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
That sound you hear is me licking my fingers because this is so tasty. Man, what can I add to this absolute masterpiece? This is a Feedback Friday gem, real Dark Jordan play, although it's not even that dark. It's a little diabolical in the best way, but it's totally fair game. And like I said, these people almost certainly deserved it from the sound of it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
What I'm taking away from this story is a few things. First, and this goes back to the letter from our friend at the credit union, the one who's working under Diane, relationships are everything. If you own a great relationship, you own the power. I don't mean that in a Machiavellian way. I'm not saying you should own the person. I'm saying whoever has the better relationship wins.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
And in this case, you owned the relationships with these customers and you were probably well positioned to do that being in sales. You were their main touch point with the company. Your employment contract that they couldn't find probably says otherwise, but that doesn't matter. And I'm also willing to bet that you treated those customers pretty well before all of this happened.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
And there was some trust and rapport built up there because all it took was one phone call to get them to follow you to a competitor, which is a lot about you. And that's awesome.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
Totally. There's another relationship that completely changed the game for him here. And by the way, whoever that lawyer is, take that guy to a great dinner, share a piece of your new commissions with him. He earned it. That's a homie right there and a damn good lawyer.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
By the way, this other thing he said, how his old bosses shredded their credibility with the other contractors in the community because of what they did. That also goes to show how important your relationships are. Reputation is crucial. These people shot themselves not just in the foot, but in both feet.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
But this is also something only people who don't take their relationships seriously would consider doing. This is why I'm always banging on about digging the well. And I'd be remiss if I didn't shamelessly use this opportunity to plug 6-Minute Networking over at 6minutenetworking.com.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
Everything our friend here probably did leading up to this crisis, what he did during the crisis, it's all in the course. It's totally free and you will love the course. The other big thing I'm taking away from this letter is we can't control so much about what happens to us, like being fired, but we can control how we respond to it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
And that's really the game of life, finding the healthiest, most productive, most proactive ways of meeting adversity, using these setbacks to catapult you into something better, or learning from them in a way that sets you up for even more success down the line. And if you can be clever and take some calculated risks when you do that, like this guy did, it can pay off massively.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
And we see, like, the guy from the A-Team movie and the guy from the TV thing and the HBO guy. And then it was just so hilarious that... My friends from Saudi Arabia come in and they're like, let's go maybe have a beer at a bar. Woo, like let loose. And then it's, no, we're going to the hottest club in Hollywood and dumping gray goose all over Instagram models.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
So well done, bud. Super proud of you. I'm going to file this one under just freaking pay people what you owe them. And if somebody screws you, look for fun ways to turn lemons into lemonade and just keep moving forward. Such a great story. I'm super excited for you. Enjoy this new chapter and good luck.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
Go back and check out our episodes with the one and only David Eagleman, always just a favorite here on the show, and our Skeptical Sunday on Feng Shui. Show notes and transcripts on the website, advertisers, deals, discounts, and ways to support the show all at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. I'm at jordanharbinger on Twitter and Instagram. You can also connect with me on LinkedIn.
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1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
Gabe's on Instagram at Gabriel Mizrahi or on Twitter at Gabe Mizrahi. This show is created in association with Podcast One. My team is Jen Harbinger, Jace Sanderson, Robert Fogerty, Ian Baird, Tata Sidlowskis, and of course, Gabriel Mizrahi. Our advice and opinions are our own, and I'm a lawyer, but I'm not your lawyer. Do your own research before implementing anything you hear on the show.
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1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
Ditto Corbin Payne. Remember, we rise by lifting others. Share the show with those you love. And if you found the episode useful, please share it with somebody else who could use the advice we gave here today. In the meantime, I hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn. And we'll see you next time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
You're about to hear a preview of The Jordan Harbinger Show with an investigative journalist that uncovers how a fraudster siphoned off billions of dollars.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
To get a deep dive into the shadowy world of corruption, money laundering, and embezzling by the shadiest shysters among the elite, check out episode 602 of The Jordan Harbinger Show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
And I'm wearing aviators indoors because that's how you do. Sure. Honestly, I only remember parts of the rest of the night because we got absolutely obliterated.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
But one interesting detail I do remember about that week, like I said, she didn't wear the burqa or the chador or anything while she was in the States. But I learned how some Saudi women handled that. She kept one in her suitcase for when she lands back home. And she had turned out she gave that to another girl that she stayed with. She never wears it if she doesn't have to.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
During the week, we have long form conversations with a variety of amazing folks from rocket scientists and CEOs, neuroscientists, war correspondents, and astronauts. This week, we had my friend David Eagleman back on the show. Such an interesting guy. We talked about whether or not we'll be able to upload our consciousness, our brains to the internet.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
She said, I'm going to buy one at the airport when I get to Saudi. And I'm like, are you sure you can find one? She's like, there's a million places where you can buy this at the airport in Jeddah. She also, I thought, was particularly interesting. She told me how she met her husband. So you can't just go somewhere and socialize.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
You're not just like at a university talking to the boys in your class. That's just not a thing, I guess, that happens over there. So they met on Yahoo Messenger of all places. Granted, this is like mid-aughts, so I don't even know if Yahoo Messenger exists anymore. Anyway, either way, this was also not allowed or at least is dicey.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
But they wanted to meet up and you can't just be like, oh, I'm going to go to my friend's place. And then the guy shows up like that doesn't work either. This is a very strict society. So she told me this elaborate plot where the guy flew to her area on business and then went to her dad and said, oh, I heard you're a very esteemed businessman. I'm looking to get married.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
Do you know any single women between this age and this age who are interested? Or like, I don't know how you do it. But he basically convinced the dad to introduce his daughter, her, to him, even though they had already been talking for like eight months. What a weird con. Isn't that weird?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
He basically thought, oh, it's my idea. I met this guy. They're hitting it off. I'm such a great matchmaker. Meanwhile, it's like a whole plot to just manipulate him.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
Yeah. Oh, I heard you're well connected. I'm looking for a woman to marry. And the dad was so flattered that he didn't go, huh? How'd you find me? Who told you about me? It was just like my daughter's single and he just brings the guy home or whatever or wherever this happens and introduces them. And they were kind of like, oh, cool. He seems nice. Let's get married.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
And meanwhile, they've been chatting online for like eight months. It's so funny. So it worked out. Yeah. The other thing that was weird is I was like, hey, I heard you need your husband's permission to leave the country. And she's like, that's true. And I said, how did you convince him to let you just travel around the U.S. by yourself?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
She's like, I basically told him I was going to leave him if he said no. So I was like, oh, so you don't have no leverage. You have some. She's like, here's the thing. I'm leaving him anyways. And I was like, oh, OK.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
Yeah, she was like, just so you know. I thought it was like true love that they told her. No, I think it just, you know, it's hard to get to know somebody on frickin' Yahoo Messenger. And what about the brother? Was he attached or single or what? This took me a while to realize what was going on. Because you think, oh, it's a strict society.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
You don't realize just how strict it is until you start really talking to these folks. So her brother, he was constantly on Skype.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
constantly skype chat and he would constantly have incoming calls at weird hours and i remember a girl called him and he answered with video and i was like oh hi and i waved and she like ran off camera and i said oh okay why you're wearing a tank top and shorts i don't care and he's like this is bad you can never see her like this it's very bad for you to see her with her pajamas on
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
If we might create MRI technology that could read minds a whole lot more. We're always kind of all over the place. I'm just really interested in the brain. He is one of the world's foremost experts on the brain. So these are always super fun conversations. You really don't want to miss this one if you're into neuroscience, futurism, from a grounded perspective.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
And I just thought, this is so ridiculous. But then I realized nobody knows she's calling him. She's calling him from bed. And that's why I was like, why are they calling you at night all the time? And he's like, hey, if they get caught chatting with a guy, they're in so much trouble.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
Imagine being a member of a conservative Christian family and they find out you're a cam girl or work at a strip club. That's the equivalent of your daughter calling a dude on Skype from Saudi Arabia. So what I thought was interesting is like, so what happens? You just meet up with them? And he's like, no. And I said, how do you meet up with them? How do you make anything out of this?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
He's like, you can't. And I said, how many women have you talked with outside of your family? And he's like, none. Can you imagine that? So he's only got these online relationships. He said one time he went to someone's house with a bunch of women and he stayed outside and he saw the girl at the door and she said like goodbye to him and that was his contact with a woman.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
It's so bizarre. So just imagine how overwhelmed this guy was when girls at a club who are half drunk are sitting on his lap. You're so cute and you're in fancy robe.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
Zero to a hundred with zero to a thousand with a girl Yes, so it's a girl who guest starred on pretty little liars on one side and he's got a magnum of Grey Goose on the other Yeah wearing his traditional outfit right the funniest part of that. I will never wash this It's got glitter on it. The whole trip was just peak couch surfing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
To be getting hammered in your 20s at an exclusive club in Hollywood with some Arab dude and his sister from Saudi Arabia while we're both wearing traditional garb. They for sure never forgot their week in the United States. All right, Gabe, what's the first thing out of the mailbag?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
And he's just such a great explainer of things you can't miss with this episode. We also had a Skeptical Sunday on Feng Shui. You know, that furniture arranging thing that's supposed to be science but is really just kind of ancient Chinese interior design. On Fridays, though, we share stories, take listener letters, offer advice, and revisit weird and nostalgic memories from yesteryear.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
Yeah, what's this woman's deal? This is so odd. Did Julia do something to her? Does she just love having control over this woman, which is scary to think about? What's weird is if you want to move somebody to a home, you usually move them to a home near you, not a home near where they used to live that you don't live near.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
Yeah, this is very odd. She clearly doesn't actually like her slash hates her. Maybe she put her in a really depressing nursing home that's cheap and she didn't want anyone finding out and yelling at her to put her in a nicer one or bring her home or something like that. There's something going on here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
Bingo. Yeah, I think so. Or, and I hate to say this because it's so depressing and cynical, but in cases like this, you always got to wonder, who stands to benefit financially? Does Julia have assets? Is Monica isolating her so she can get her hands on them? Has she already gotten her hands on them and she's just hoping Julia passes away and can't do anything about it?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1124: Your Aunt's 105 — But Is She Dead or Alive? | Feedback Friday
Those are really the only rational explanations I can come up with right now. Otherwise, Monica is just a jealous, controlling... See you next Tuesday.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
This episode is sponsored in part by Vital Proteins. Let's face it, your body changes as you get older. As we get older, our bodies don't bounce back like they used to, of course, but there are simple ways we can help support our hair, skin, nails, joints, and bones. All it takes is a daily serving of Vital Proteins Collagen Peptides.
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1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Unfortunately, I can also see a guy like this responding with, oh, you can't handle the truth, Snowflake. You're trying to censor me now. I feel a lot of times that these tone-deaf, alt-right people do that, and they do it a lot. Actually, people on both extremes of the spectrum do this. They're just looking for a fight. They'll find it anywhere.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
And again, they thrive on the attention, the engagement, even in real life. It's still worth a shot. And if you don't have any luck, maybe you ask the organizer of the group, if there even is an organizer, maybe just ask him to say something so he knows that it's coming from the top. And he should love that, right? He loves authority.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
But then authoritarian bootlickers, they always like authority over other people. They don't necessarily like it over them. They want to be on top. Remember, one of the core beliefs of bootlickers is that they're going to be in the in-group when their team takes over. The problem is they don't realize they're usually never that guy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Just that's what I said a couple weeks ago about this random Indian immigrant guy. He was like, Putin's the best. It's like, you don't think you're on the chopping block next, buddy? Come on, bud. Get with it. Option three, you try to get this guy removed from the group, which I'm guessing is going to be quite hard given how popular he is or the organizer of the group doesn't want to intervene.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
It might also be unfair on some level, although this guy, he obviously sounds like a problem. It might not be fair to kick him out for his beliefs, and I'm sure that would only entrench him further because he'll feel persecuted, although I don't know if that's your problem. I don't think this is a realistic option or even a necessary one yet.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
It's going to be hard to ban someone from a real-life group. I would just try options one and two first and see what happens.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
I already planned to have him back on the show because there's a lot there that we didn't even get to. If you liked our Ken Croke episode about going undercover in a biker gang, this one is similarly fascinating. On Fridays, though, we share stories, take listener letters, offer advice, play the occasional ridiculous soundbite, and co-opt absurd catchphrases from past letters.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Yeah. Look, I definitely try ignoring him or encouraging everyone to keep the group politics free before leaving because you don't want to leave for kind of no reason.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Just be like, hey, guys, crazy idea. How about we listen to the sound of the birds and not talk about how to jerry-rig a Glock to a featherweight drone? Just a pitch. As for letting his beliefs go unchallenged, you're worried that that's how fascism spreads. I actually love that you're worried about that. And it says so much about you. You're a decent human being.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
And sure, in a way, that is how a lot of this toxic crap spreads. But like I said, I also think this guy is in way too deep for you to change him. I also don't know if it's your job to change him. I don't think you're somehow enabling his views by choosing not to stand up to him. This guy is pretty extreme.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Yeah, that's something I would have thought was cool at age 12, just not understanding consequences and violence. And here's what I really think. I think he's a scared, weak dweeb inside, and he wants to feel powerful because most fascists are like that. But you never know. Sometimes these people are actually violent. There's no reason for you to put yourself in harm's way or become a target.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
But look, like I touched on earlier, if this group really is drinking the Kool-Aid and overlooking this stuff, That might say something about the group. There's this phrase in German. I don't know if you've heard this. I'll do it in English. But if there's a Nazi at the table and 10 other people are sitting there talking to him, you got a table with 11 Nazis.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
I kind of wonder if the same is true of this hiking group. Gabe, if you joined a yoga class and the teacher's like, welcome to your Friday night, you didn't fry flow. And everyone else like, oh, he's so funny. So charming. That's a class full of Nazis.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
I know he wants to put people in camps that are brown, but have you seen his abs?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Right. I don't know. I don't think he's going to convince this guy very much. But yeah, he might want to chat privately, discreetly with a few people he's close with. Take the temperature of the group. Find out if anyone else feels the same way. That'll be good data. Maybe they don't even realize how bad this guy is.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Or maybe they perfectly understand what he's about and they just don't care, which would be a huge red flag for me and probably enough reason for me to leave. I'm so sorry this creep has infiltrated your hiking group. That is, again, such a bummer. I hope this isn't the end of the group for you. I don't think you're there yet. But here's the good news. You can hike literally everywhere.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Gabe, you know what I was thinking about this morning?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
And there are good humans everywhere. And if you've met some good folks in the group, maybe you invite them to come with you on your own hikes. You join another group. You make even more friends. Whatever you do, don't let this guy ruin your hobby in the bigger picture. And definitely don't let him get in the way of your larger post-divorce healing journey.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
And yes, I just used the phrase healing journey.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Yeah. That's what is happening. I don't know. Obviously, I'm hanging out with you too much. But seriously. It sounds so weird coming out of your mouth.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
It's awesome to hear about. You're doing great. It's inspiring. Keep it up. Keep growing. And I know it'll lead you to even more great people and places. Speaking of murder drones, now I'm going to drone on about the murderously good deals on the fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back. Thank you for listening and supporting the podcast.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
That time years ago, we ended up on a video chat with that supposedly super successful entrepreneur smart guy who wanted to overthrow the government of North Korea.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Your support of our advertisers keeps the lights on around here. All the deals, discount codes, and ways to support this show are searchable and clickable over at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. Please consider supporting those who support the show. Now, back to Feedback Friday.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Yeah, so a really successful friend of ours, I don't want to give away too much, but anyway, he's like, we should talk to this guy. He's really credible and really smart. So we're like, all right. So we get on this call. And he's very odd and grandiose. And he comes up with this cockamamie scheme. Like, we need to drop a bunch of computers with internet broadcasted into North Korea.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
There almost always are. It's very helpful to clock those in the post-mortem, but don't beat yourself up too much about not seeing him at this point.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Collagen is the structural protein that keeps everything in your body feeling smooth, strong, and supported. But after your 30s, your natural levels start to drop, which is why you might notice some creaky joints.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
And then we're like, well, they're just going to confiscate the computers. Let's drop in Navy SEALs, take over part of it. And then we'll have the people there learn a bunch of stuff. And then they'll spread it to everyone else. It was just like the dumbest.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Oh boy, okay. Look, I'm very sorry you guys are going through this. I'm sorry that your husband is struggling in all these ways. Some of them understandable, some of them self-created, and I'm sorry that you pay the price in many ways and that you feel stuck. There's a lot of pain in your letter, a lot of sadness, a lot of confusion.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
And the stakes are fairly high given that you have a child together. You live in a foreign country and all of that. So I can appreciate the bind that you're in. That said, I'm very concerned about how your husband is coping with his challenges. The main concern, of course, is his alcohol dependency. Your husband has an addiction, period. Let's be clear about that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
He says he uses it to cope, which means he recognizes that he's self-medicating. He hides it from you. He's lying about it. This is a problem.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
But when you hold it alongside all of the other problems, namely the cheating, whether it was just emotional or not, kind of doesn't matter in my opinion, the fact that he's not giving himself every possible advantage in working on his mental health, his work stress, this larger pattern of lying about so much of his behavior, it's deeply dysfunctional. It's very chaotic. It's very disrespectful.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
And if he's not willing or able to meaningfully address any of this, ideally in some kind of couples therapy, which I'm very glad to hear that you want to give it a try, I just don't know what you're supposed to do here. It sounds to me like you've given this a real go over a period of what sounds like at least two years. That's a long time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
If this were new behavior, I'd be like, all right, work on this. Here's how. You got to go through XYZ stages before you decide to leave. But what I'm hearing is that your husband is not showing much interest.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
No interest beyond his words in addressing the root causes of his unhappiness and his addiction, his impulse to carry on with other people, the stress and dissatisfaction he feels around his work. And look, I got compassion for him to some degree. I really do, especially as a man. I get it. The responsibility of taking care of a family, it can be a lot. You got to earn money.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
You got to take care of everybody. He's obviously in pain. He deserves some support. It's intense. Okay, I get it. But he also has a responsibility to take care of himself, to make himself as easy to help as possible. He has to throw himself into therapy. He has to admit he has a drinking problem and work a program. He has to turn to his wife and go, look, I'm out of control. I'm miserable.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
I need help. Or turn to somebody and he's not doing any of that. So just to bottom line this here, your options are either to put up with this crap and suppress the obvious pain that you're in for all the reasons you laid out, or separate, remove yourself from this dysfunctional situation and find a new co-parenting relationship with your husband.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Yeah, he was going to run hot air balloons, which will obviously get shot down over North Korea to have internet in the whole country.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
My strong feeling, as hard as this is, is that option two is the right decision. It's the right decision for you, for your daughter, and even in a way, it's right for him. And if you're not there already, I think you're heading in this direction.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
She pays a price either way. The question is, which price do you want to pay? You say you still love him, okay? Not seeing your daughter every day would be devastating for both of you. You don't know how you'd cope without him. You're limited professionally. I hear you on all this, I get it, I really do, but what I'm hearing from your letter is a lot of fear.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Fear about how you'd build your own life and make your own way without your husband. Fear about stepping into a new relationship with him. Fear of trusting your daughter to understand your reasons for separating, to stay close with you even if you didn't see her every single day.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Fear of trusting yourself to figure out the practical aspects of building your own life, getting a job, working your way up to better ones, all of that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Yeah, look, I can relate to that the most here. That might be the toughest form of fear to deal with. And all this fear, it is absolutely appropriate. It is very normal. It would be strange if you didn't feel it. But what you need to see is that your fear is keeping you stuck and it is keeping you vulnerable to a very tragic, very hurtful partner.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
He wanted it to hold internet routers. I mean, it was like the dumbest plan that I've ever heard for anything.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
As long as your fear of what's on the other side of this is greater than your anger, greater than your sadness, greater than your dignity, you're going to stay in this problematic situation. Now, look, I'm not saying you have to leave tomorrow. And I'm still making room for the possibility that your husband turns a corner and wakes up here. These things happen.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
If you sit with what we're sharing with you today for a couple months and your husband suddenly realizes he needs to maybe meet his challenges in a different way, great. I'd be over the moon. I tell you to give him that chance. I'm just encouraging you to really take stock of the data that you now have on him and be realistic about where this is going. That's where I'm at with all this, Gabe.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
What is your take? I've been going for a minute.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Yeah, the whole we have to stay together for the kids thing, it just does not hold much water for me in situations like this. Think about your kids are eventually going to see everything that you're seeing. Is that a good example for them to be around? That's terrible.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
No, and trust me, if this continues, she's gonna know what's going on real soon.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
I've got a friend who's getting divorced. She's trying to hide it from their three kids, which I fully understand. I think they're like 13, eight and six. And one night recently she called me. She was upset because her eight year old son started crying and she's like, what's going on? And her son said, I know you guys are fighting. What did I do wrong?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
No. And also like you're going to drop Navy SEALs in and start a massive conflagration over this. And then those people are just going to get thrown into reeducation camps. They're not going to like go spread the word of capitalism throughout North Korea. This is such a ridiculously dumb head in ass plan. And you and I were just texting each other.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
And they weren't fighting in front of him at all. There was just that tension that kids can feel. Kids absorb way more than you think they do. Yeah, and they often internalize it, sadly. Exactly, which is heartbreaking. So I would really investigate this reason for staying. I also want to remind you that you don't know that you and your daughter wouldn't see each other all the time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
There are all kinds of custody agreements. Who knows? Your ex might grant you full custody, formally or informally. or you see her five days of the week. You guys share every other weekend, whatever that looks like. A slightly different living situation doesn't have to be the end of the world.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
I've got a friend who got divorced, and he has 50% decision-making legal custody, but the kids live at the house seven days a week. They don't go back and forth, because he didn't want to disrupt their routine, and he lives in kind of like a bachelor apartment. That's further away. He didn't want to have to deal with the logistics of that, so he just comes over every
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
every other day whatever their arrangement is you could do something like that so you might not have to give up your kid you don't necessarily have to have them go back and forth all the time there's all kinds of custody arrangements but i also suspect that she's clinging to her daughter here in an interesting way in a way that might be more than just a mom who wants to stay close with her child so we have to talk about
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Yeah, that concerns me. The whole, I know what it's like to live abroad. It can be lonely.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Clearly there's more to it than just, oh, it just doesn't work for me. This is a skill she needs to work on because this is a crucial asset that she's missing right now that's keeping her trapped.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
I mean, that really sums it up, doesn't it? And that is heartbreaking.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
And back then, for whatever dumb reason, the operating system of the iPhone would vibrate the phone even when it was on silent every time you got a text. So my phone was sitting at a cup holder and my car was like constantly while you were like, I can't believe this guy. Is this guy for real? Why are we on this call? And then they all noticed that my phone was doing that because you could hear it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Which, not to put too fine a point on it, but I think she's projecting what she thinks about herself onto this friend. She's afraid they're going to meet her with judgment, when I think it's more likely they're going to meet her with loving compassion.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Good question. I might go a step further and say, even if there is a good reason to be embarrassed, let's say you have made a few choices that were less than ideal. And again, I'm not judging you. This is more of a thought experiment. Even if you should be embarrassed for some reason, what would happen if you just allowed yourself to be embarrassed?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
What would happen if you called this friend and said, listen, I haven't wanted to reach out to you because I'm ashamed. I don't know if that's warranted or not, but that's how I feel. But I need some advice and some support so I can just be embarrassed and tell you what I'm going through. And can I just ask you to listen and not judge me too much?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
I seriously doubt you even need to ask your friend to do that. But that would be one way to invite your shame into the conversation and stop it from keeping you paralyzed.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
duller skin hair that's just not as full vital proteins helps you stay ahead of that vital proteins is the number one collagen peptides brand in the u.s so they know what they're doing and it's super easy to take you add a serving to your coffee smoothie even water it doesn't taste like anything just blends right in and if you stick with it daily studies show you'll be seeing benefits in four to eight weeks get 20 person off by going to vitalproteins.com and enter promo code jordan at checkout these statements have not been evaluated by the food and drug administration this product is not intended to diagnose treat cure or prevent any disease
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
And also, so what if it damages this person's opinion of her husband? I'm sorry, but this guy cheated on her. He lied to her over and over. He won't get help. The list goes on and on. I'm just not sure why she's being so loyal to his public image.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
And it just turned into this
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Man, that's wild. So fascinating. It's just a hall of mirrors, this relating business, isn't it? It sure is. So look, now that we've dug into all these pieces, I think there are actually two different processes happening here, and they're both really important. The first is what to do about your husband.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
The second is how you navigate the challenges of your life in general, how you let other people in, and how those relationships play a role in your outcomes. These two levels of your story are intimately connected, but the second one is where the real work is going to happen. So
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
More than telling you whether to stay or leave, although I think you can tell where I'm leaning on that, my hope for you is that you find the courage, and I promise you it's there, even if you're not always in touch with it, to share these parts of yourself and your life with other trusted people, starting with this friend back home, and invite all of these feelings, the fear, the sadness, the shame, into your conversations.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
They do not need to paralyze you. They do not need to isolate you. If you are willing to face them and share them with people who care about you. If you do that, I know it'll lead you to the right decision here and to a life that you can't even imagine building right now. Sending you, your daughter, and even your husband a big hug. You got this. You can reach us Friday at jordanharbinger.com.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Keep your emails concise. Try to use a descriptive subject line that makes our job a whole lot easier. If a shady businessman is possibly trafficking people in an old church next to your house, Your neighbors are eavesdropping on your therapy sessions through the wall, or you're trying to decide whether to tell the mother of your future child that your father abused your siblings growing up.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
And also the call lasted a long time because he kept pushing back on our ideas. Our obvious reasons that this was a completely dumb idea where we were trying to be polite about telling him why it wouldn't work. And he's like, well, let's just have the Navy SEALs going. And I'm like, all right, President Reagan, you do that. But in the meantime...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Whatever's got you staying up at night lately, big or small, hit us up Friday at jordanharbinger.com. We're here to help, and we keep every email anonymous. Speaking of email, if you haven't signed up yet, come check out our newsletter, We Bit Wiser. It's a bite-sized gem from a past episode from me to you, delivered to your inbox once a week every Wednesday.
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1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
So, candidly, this is news to me. I've never heard of people in the South specifically being suspicious when a single woman contacts a married person, assuming she's being professional and respectful and all that. But I'll take your word for it. Maybe I'm totally disconnected from the rest of the country living in California. Gabe, have you ever heard of this?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Some dudes are clumsy with it, right? Or they have ulterior motives. But look, we all know guys tend to holler at women wherever they can. We get letters about dudes spitting game in their frickin' LinkedIn DMs, which always makes me chuckle. But hey, you meet people wherever you meet them, right? So who am I to judge? But it is a thing that women have to deal with.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Like, does this person genuinely want to connect with me? Or is he low-key hitting on me? Which is admittedly, I'm sure, very annoying. But assuming a single woman has some other agenda when reaching out professionally to a married man in the South, I just I've never heard that before. So to state the obvious, this is ridiculous. Women and men are all allowed to invest in their relationships.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
And if there's some assumption about single women talking to married men in a professional context, that's got to speak way more to something just dumb in our culture or in men's minds. But let's take your word for it. Let's assume this is a real thing that you can't change yourself and you just got to work with it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
If that's the case, then first of all, you might want to overcorrect a little and just be super direct in your messages. Maybe you say, I'd love to hear what you're up to at work these days. I'm trying to learn more about such and such industry. What's your take on X specific issue? Whatever it is.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
We're driving to get bubble tea somewhere in Rancho Cucamonga. So I think we got to go.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Although I just heard myself say this with bias in mind, and now I'm afraid that everything I pitch is going to sound like a coded way to say, I'm thirsty for you, married guy. What's up? But again, the tone of your messages is going to go a long way. Maybe you pull back on the emojis or something.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Maybe you talk about having a 15 minute phone call instead of inviting them to coffee, at least at first. Maybe you mentioned some of the other people you've talked to in their field so they know you're not just focused on them, something like that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
And yes, you could send group messages to more than one person, but I also worry that that's going to dilute the power of reaching out to people individually with a clear intention. So I'd only do that if they're kind of a team in some way and you want to get to know both of them for the same reasons.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
You know, like, I want to take both of you gentlemen at the same time to Starbucks where we can discuss innovations in the packaging industry.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
That's right. Seriously, though, do not let this stop you from messaging people one-on-one. I think that direct communication is important. Honestly, whether this is a universal thing in the South or not, I would not let this stop you from building great relationships with men or women.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
If it's a thing, it's a thing, and you might have to risk people projecting their own weird assumptions onto you now and again, but I'm confident that most normal, well-adjusted people, certainly the people you want to build meaningful connections with, They'll respond to your messages in the right way and engage with you as the thoughtful professional you are.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
And the ones who assume every single woman who writes them is trying to hit on them or worry what their wives will think, maybe they just don't get to enjoy your friendship and that's their loss. It's weird and that makes them kind of a weird person to be around. Focus on the ones who share your values, who take you seriously. You'll be great. I love that you're doing six-minute networking.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
I know it'll take you to some great people and places. And good luck. And by the way, as this listener is figuring out, my six-minute networking course is great for this stuff. It's 100% free. It is not gross. It is not schmoozy. You can find it on the Thinkific platform at sixminutenetworking.com. Dig the well before you get thirsty, folks. Build relationships before you need them.
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1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Sixminutenetworking.com. It works everywhere in the world, even in the Bible Belt, I promise you. And now it's definitely time for a three-way with you, me, and the amazing sponsors that support this show. We'll be right back.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
If you like this episode of Feedback Friday and you find our advice valuable, I invite you to do what other smart and considerate listeners do, which is take a moment and support our amazing sponsors. All the deals, discount codes, and ways to support the show are searchable and clickable over at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. Our AI chat bot on the website can also surface codes.
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1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Or if that doesn't work, you can email me, jordan at jordanharbinger.com. I'll dig that code up for you. It is that important that you support those who support the show. Now, back to Feedback Friday.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
I forgot about that. And it was cool because the band was totally into it. And their agent was like, here's the problem. There's no money. And we were like, yeah, we know. There's definitely no money. It's North Korea. And the band was like, we don't care, man. It's going to be amazing. Historical. And he was like, yeah, but I'm the agent and everything costs money and I need money.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
It makes me happy to live in a house. The only tyrants I have to deal with are my kids, and they actually say thank you, or they don't get popsicles.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
So something definitely sounds fishy here, and if this is actually happening, it's obviously not cool. My first thought is, you said that you and other residents suspect that something is going on, but my first move would be to gather as much solid evidence as possible. You know the drill. Document.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
If a neighbor tells you they slipped one of the managers a C-note to fix his HVAC before everyone else, write it down. The date, the circumstances, all of it. If you get forwarded a text message between a resident and a handyman doing some off-the-books job, same deal. Save it, print it, write it down. You want to have as much solid evidence that this is happening before you take action.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Once you do that, or while you do that, you have a few options. Option one, you can request a financial audit of your building. Under most state laws governing condos, owners are entitled to request access to financial records and audits. In California, for example, members of an HOA have a right to inspect financial documents, budgets, income statements, receipts, all that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
So you could submit a written request to the HOA board or the property management company if you have one and ask for an independent audit of the financial records citing the relevant laws. In this request, I would say, hey, just FYI, this is a routine matter. It doesn't imply any accusations. I just want to ensure compliance and transparency.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Yeah, I can't imagine they'd be like, oh, totally cool and normal here, just an audit, nothing to worry about.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
This would also obviously require you to be the face of this and confront the HOA directly, which I know you don't want to do. So option two is you can report this anonymously to local regulatory agencies. That would be the Department of Housing or local housing authority in your state. Could also be the local chapter of your state attorney general's office.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
The California Bureau of Real Estate might be helpful. You can also consult with the Homeowners Protection Bureau. They offer a guide to California HOA laws. But we also looked up what the California Attorney General says about this, and their website says if you suspect criminal activity by an HOA, you should file a report with the police or sheriff's department.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
And if they look into it, they might send the case to the county DA's office for prosecution, if appropriate. But honestly, just knowing what I know about California would not hold my breath for this. These agencies usually have forms on their websites that you can fill out. Maybe you can send them something by snail mail or pick up the phone and ask.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Also, some HOAs and management companies have a way to submit anonymous complaints. Although if the board and or the management company are the ones behind these shenanigans, something tells me they're going to read it and just crumple it up. Or who knows? Maybe it'll spook them into cleaning up their act like, oh crap, they're onto us. We got to stop.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
And then he's like, I got an idea. Let's have Budweiser sponsor it. You also understand that there's no American beer brands and American flags and things like that that are going to be displayed in downtown Pyongyang.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Your third option is, if you can prove that board members are complicit in favoritism or mismanagement, you and the other owners can petition to hold a special election or remove problematic board members. Check your HOA's bylaws or articles of incorporation for how that works.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Most state laws require a petition signed by a certain percentage of the owners to initiate a recall or a special meeting.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
there's no advertising or any billboards whatsoever but there's certainly no billboards from budweiser north of the 38th parallel not happening it made no sense and just showed that this person couldn't find north korea on a map and was only concerned with the money which is his job but it was short-sighted because the band was like wait
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Yep, and if all that fails, maybe you propose that the building hire a neutral, professional property management consultant to evaluate operations and efficiency. Obviously, the HOA will have some feelings about that, which, again, might not be a bad thing, but you can frame it as a way to protect the financial health of the condo, not as an investigation.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Some states offer community mediation programs for HOAs, some of them are government-run, some are run by nonprofits, so Google that and see what comes up. And while you do all this, I would also consider leaning into this conflict a little more. I know it sucks, I know it's exposing, but you can't stand up to bad actors without being willing to feel the heat a little bit.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
And if you gather a bunch of great documentation, you'll probably feel a lot more empowered to stand up to these people. Whereas just going on rumors and suspicion, that puts you on much shakier grounds. Do your homework first, then act. Sorry this is happening to you, but I hope you can hold these people accountable and clean up your HOA. You got your work cut out for you. Good luck. All right.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
And now for the recommendation of the week.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
All right. Also, in case y'all didn't know, there's a subreddit for the show. If you want to jump into discussions, Gabe and I are on there. If you're a Redditor, come join us in the Jordan Harbinger subreddit. There's a meme thread and all kinds of fun stuff going on in there. All right. What's next?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Aren't multiple bands famous for playing at the Berlin Wall, playing in different places behind the Iron Curtain? This is kind of the same thing, except the 2020 edition or whatever year it was, 2018 edition. The guy was just like, yeah, but I want to get paid.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Yeah. So this one worries me a little bit. And I am not one of those people who's like, well, the State Department elevated the risk level in Honduras from one to two. Most of the time, even somewhat dangerous countries can still be enjoyable. There's just an elevated risk of crime. But Afghanistan right now, I don't know. This just does not seem like a place you really want to go.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Certainly not as a woman, an American woman. There's just too many unknowns for me. I did a quick goog on this, and that seems to be the consensus online as well. Highly dangerous for all U.S. citizens. Elevated risks above that for women. Level four travel advisory from the State Department. That's high enough to give me pause.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Risk of civil unrest, crime, terrorism, wrongful detention, kidnapping. If you get sick or injured, you could be in major trouble. There's no U.S. embassy in Kabul anymore, so if you get into a scrape, the U.S. is going to be very limited in its ability to provide consular services and help you out. Look, Gabe and I went to North Korea a bunch of times. We had some incredible times there.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
I'm so glad we got to experience it, but when we were going, it wasn't actively dangerous unless you tried to go looking for trouble by breaking as many rules as possible. So I get the extreme travel itch, I really do. But at a certain point, this kind of thing can be just reckless. So my initial take was, hell no, don't go.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
And then I reached out to my friend Jill Kornetsky, who's a consultant, researcher, analyst, and social entrepreneur based in Kabul. And she had a slightly different take. Her first thought was, your friend's safety depends on a lot of things. The main one being, okay, what's the tour company?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Because she said a lot of people have seen YouTube videos with foreigners, with the Taliban or whatever, and they get a lot of clicks. So they decided they do tours now. Basically, with a crap economy, they're going to always follow the money. Jill said that tour operators might not be dangerous for her. They might just not know what they're doing at all.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
And she wanted to know, okay, what are they charging? What are they promising? What references do they have? What experience do they have? She said a lot of them have zero experience. And that is not good. How are they going to guide her? What housing arrangements are they offering when they leave Kabul? These are the practical questions that she would really want some good answers to.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Also, where does she want to visit? How's she going to get there? Where will they stay along the way? Some places apparently have safe, clean, decent hotels to stay at. Other places, not so much. And the reason that this matters is Jill said that if your friend is at risk of kidnap, or worse... It wouldn't be walking around being a tourist in some market.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
It's going to be where somebody knows she's going to be and the security is no good. And then they have time and opportunity to set something up. That's just one more reason that the tour company she's going with is crucial. Jill was also curious to get to know what your friend's background is, what her goals and intentions are.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
She said there's a few things that get people arrested in Afghanistan on the regular. Big one is evangelizing. Just like North Korea, she said people keep coming here to spread the word of God or whatever in a Taliban-controlled Islamic environment, and they're surprised when they end up in jail.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
What was that called again?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
She says it's not a small thing to the Taliban or the many locals and even tourists should absolutely not do that. Jill also wanted to make sure your friend was prepared for the infrastructure. She said it's a beautiful country, but depending on where your friend goes, what she does, there will be times with no electricity. There's going to be a lot of pit toilets, squat toilets.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
There's going to be limitations on options for food, definitely limitations on options for entertainment after dark. Almost nobody will speak any English, but everyone will want to talk to her and practice whatever English they do know. Men are going to want to take photos with her.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Yeah. The only beer made primarily out of fermented children's tears.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
as jill explained this is not another modern country with some ancient sites this is very underdeveloped her tour guide needs to be able to handle these things for her aka have experience and not just be like yeah bro let's go a last few practical tips your friend can't and should never share a room with a local man at any time under any circumstances it won't be allowed
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
And culturally, it is not normal for him, and it may be taken as an invitation for untoward behavior, which she might not have any recourse if that happens. Also, Jill's advice is she should not take local buses. Too much risk of pickpocketing or being bothered in some way. She doesn't need an armored car or anything, but she does need a reliable one.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Because if you get a breakdown in the middle of nowhere, AAA is not just a phone call away. Let's put it that way. And Jill recommended finding a company with a female translator, if possible. So to quote her here, this is doable if she's smart and aware of her surroundings. In general, she'll be treated well, including by the Taliban.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
They're ordered to treat foreigners with kid gloves unless they are literally ISIS, trafficking drugs, evangelizing, or doing spy stuff. And it can be safe. if her expectations and preparations are reasonable. So what I would do is share all this with your friend, talk to her about her plans. If she won't listen to this episode, you can share the transcript with her.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
You can tell her what you learned. The main thing you want to pin down is just how reputable and safe this tour company is and whether she's truly prepared logistically and mentally for what this country is like. And hey, maybe you realize she really has done her homework, she's in good hands, she understands the risks, and you can feel more at ease.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Or maybe you help her see that she has not really thought this through at all, and she either makes better plans or she scraps the trip altogether. But if she is going, I would give her as many resources as you can, whether it's information about the security situation there, how to follow local laws and customs, the phone number and address of the nearest friendly embassy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
I believe the embassy of Qatar is the protecting power for the U.S. and Afghanistan right now. Maybe you find stories of Americans who've safely visited there since the handover to the Taliban. You try to figure out how they traveled, who they traveled with, how they navigated any bumps in the road, stuff like that. That's really all you can do. She's an adult.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
I'm hoping she's a savvy traveler and in her right mind. And she's ultimately going to have to make her own choices and live with the consequences. And that could be a hard thing for a friend to watch because you don't have control. situation. But that's where you need to let go and let her live her life and just set her up as well as possible for this decision.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
I wanted to open up the window and throw the notebook and pen out the window. Like that's how unimportant everything else that you say after this particular point. That notebook was a prop to make me look like I was on top of it. I was like, we've got to impress this big-time Hollywood agent. Then I realized he had no clue about anything, and I was like, I don't need to put on this facade.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Yeah, I totally get that. It's different when you're older. It's very different when you're a parent. Of course.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Yeah, I could see that, which might explain the whole, I'm not going to listen to those episodes you sent me. I don't like podcasts. Just fingers in the air, la la la. An attitude that I candidly find pretty immature, but also understandable from certain people to a degree.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
I'm just going to enjoy this bizarre conversation, and we're going to go out to lunch after this. Bye. What was Air Supply's famous song again? Something about love, of course. I'm all out of love. I'm so lost without you. Yeah, that's right.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
I totally agree. And that might mean ending up in the exact same place. Having to watch your friend go on this extreme trip and surrender to whatever happens. But at least you'll know that you did everything you could and you'll understand why this trip is so important to her. But look, as much as I think this is a dicey idea, I also want you to remember that she might be totally fine.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
So don't torture yourself more than you have to. I know it's hard, but just keep an eye on that. It seems to me that this is an interesting opportunity for you to learn how to accept and surrender... and for her to trust her research and intuition and live with her choices, both of which are important. Whatever she does, I sincerely, sincerely hope your friend stays safe.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
I hope she has a great time if she goes, or as good a time as you can have in Afghanistan. Not super high on my list. And I hope you guys get to grab a burqa-free drink when she returns soon. And hey, who knows? Maybe after this trip, she'll also end up on super weird but fascinating Zoom meetings to overthrow the Taliban from a distance. It happened to us. It could happen to her.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Just tell her that's an even worse idea than evangelizing on the streets of Kabul in the first place. Just a total waste of time. All right, y'all, go back and check out Jay Dobbins if you haven't done so yet. Show notes and transcripts at jordanharbinger.com. Advertisers, discounts, ways to support the show, all at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. I'm at jordanharbinger on Twitter and Instagram.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
You can also connect with me on LinkedIn. Gabe's over on Instagram at Gabriel Mizrahi or on Twitter at Gabe Mizrahi. This show is created in association with Podcast One. My team is Jen Harbinger, Jace Sanderson, Robert Fogarty, Ian Baird, Tata Sidlowskis, and of course, Gabriel Mizrahi. Our advice and opinions are our own, and I'm a lawyer, but I'm not your lawyer.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Speaking of North Korea, Christopher Ahn, the veteran and activist who was involved in the failed raid on the North Korean embassy in Madrid several years back, he was a guest on the show that was episodes 996 and 997. Unbelievable story. As you probably remember, he's currently facing a very complicated and expensive legal battle. The U.S. is considering extraditing him back to Spain.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Do your own research before implementing anything you hear on the show. Remember, we rise by lifting others. Share the show with those you love. If you found the episode useful, please share it with somebody else who could use the advice we gave here today. In the meantime, I hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn, and we'll see you next time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
You're about to hear a preview of The Jordan Harbinger Show with former NBA superstar and American icon Shaquille O'Neal.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
I got to ask, or people are going to get mad. What's going on with the flat earth thing? Are you just messing with everybody with that?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
To hear more about how Shaq makes important business decisions and manages his expansive career, check out episode 691 of The Jordan Harbinger Show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
He's probably going to face criminal charges and or... actual assassination by North Korea, Christopher and his team are still raising money for his defense. And by the way, this money isn't going to the lawyer. She's doing it pro bono, but there's materials and there's court fees and stuff, so it's not like you're paying some rich lawyer to defend him.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
It's not very often that I promote fundraisers for guests, but if you listen to my interview with Chris, I think you'll hear what we heard. which is a guy with a very strong moral compass and a big heart whose life has been completely derailed by a genuine attempt to help North Korean defectors that went seriously sideways.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Proceeds from the fundraiser will go toward Christopher's legal and necessary expenses while he fights to stay here in the United States. We'll link to the GoFundMe in the show notes. I would love it if you took a couple minutes, and if you have it, give a few dollars. A bunch of small donations can actually go a really long way if enough people do it.
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1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
So if you're like, oh, I only have five bucks. I'm like, oh, I only have 10 bucks. That's fine because if a thousand people do that, that stuff adds up real fast. All right. As always, we've got some fun ones and some doozies. I can't wait to dive in. Gabe, what's the first thing out of the mailbag?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
That is awesome, man. I love to hear that. There are broadly two paths to take after a major blow like this. You either tie one on three nights a week at a bar and slur into every single person you can find. The full divorced dude cliche. Or you take good care of your body, your mind, your life. You open up your world, you meet other healthy people, and you flourish.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
And I'm glad that you chose the latter. Honestly, joining a hiking group or a yoga studio or literally any hobby is a thousand times more helpful than getting wasted down at a pub every other evening.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Welcome to Feedback Friday. I'm your host, Dr. Jordan Harbinger. As always, I'm here with Feedback Friday producer, my co-captain cajoling these complicated conundra, Gabriel Mizrahi. Not Dr. Gabriel Mizrahi. Just Mr. Nope.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
I'm rolling my eyes. Very edgy, bro. He's real proud of this, but it's so dumb. All right.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Politics aside, you join these groups to get away from this annoying partisan stuff. Even when it's reasonable, this is just annoying beyond the pale.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
That is largely Nazi ideology. Gabe, this guy sounds like the supposedly handsome popular version of the geopolitical incel colleague we heard about a couple weeks ago. Similar beliefs, kind of. Very different package, though. Maybe we should introduce them. Maybe they could hike together and cajole each other and talk about how they wish 1984 was nonfiction.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
That's possibly worth reporting to the authorities if relevant.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Yeah, you know, the ATF would beg to differ, but this guy sounds out of his mind. And look, I can appreciate a good second amendment argument. There's obviously responsible gun ownership. I don't have the law in front of me, but I'm going to go ahead and guess that making a flying gun is not something that you're just allowed to roll through and do. Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe I'm wrong.
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1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Somebody email me and tell me the legal fine print on this. But there's a class of these alt-right weirdos who just want to play with guns because it's cool and it makes them feel powerful and they're obsessed with their sovereignty or whatever. It is so creepy and it is so dumb and immature when it gets to this level.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
That's got to be hard to watch. It just goes to show you how far personality will get you. You can literally be a fascist, misogynistic, gun psycho POS, and some people will find you compelling. It's wild.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Yeah, that's the quiet part that we haven't said out loud yet. Are these people just fooled by the exterior? Are they willing to overlook disturbing stuff because he's funny and charming and he has nice biceps? I'm so confused as to why anybody with two brain cells to rub together would put up with this guy for more than just a few minutes.
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1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Yeah, a doctor of laws. Anyway, on the Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the stories, secrets, and skills of the world's most fascinating people and turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you. And our mission is to help you become a better informed, more critical thinker,
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1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Oh boy, this is a tough one. I definitely feel for you here. I'm bummed for you. Blake, or whatever, and his cartoonishly regressive alt-right politics are infecting your otherwise lovely hiking group. Like I said, part of what's upsetting about this is the ideas themselves. It's disturbing and gross to be around racist, misogynistic, violent people. It's like being around a weird child.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
But to have to listen to this crap while you're just trying to get outdoors and heal from your divorce and relate to people beyond their politics, which is so important... That's almost worse. If this guy showed up to my awesome friend group, I'd be beyond annoyed. But here's the thing. I know you feel like the a-hole because you're the only one who seems to see this guy for who he is.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Everyone else really likes him. But what I've learned over the years is whenever there's a problematic person in a group, I always feel like I'm the only one who feels some type of way about it. And then eventually I'll be talking to someone else and we'll tiptoe up to the topic and nine times out of ten they'll be like, oh my god, I hate that guy, he's so annoying, I just tolerate him.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Or somebody's gonna get a little tipsy and confess that they feel the exact same way, which is always so tasty when it happens, isn't it? Like, oh, you think Brock is annoying too? Thank god, it was going out of my mind. And then you guys get to dunk on Brock for 20 minutes, which admittedly is not the most enlightened thing to do, but man, is it satisfying.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
So I have a sneaking suspicion you're not the only one who has some questions about this guy, unless he's only sharing this stuff with you, but it doesn't sound like it. He sounds pretty vocal again. He's probably thriving on the attention. So no, you're clearly not the a-hole here, but this is an opportunity to learn how to deal with a-holes, how to navigate the tribal politics of a group.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Humans are funny like that. We don't like to go against the grain. We don't like to be the odd man out. But there's a kind of social proof that people like Blake develop. And the more he seems popular, the less likely it is that people will go, uh, actually, this guy's really creepy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
During the week, we have long-form conversations with a variety of amazing folks, from war correspondents and neuroscientists to journalist-turned-poker champions, music moguls, and tech luminaries. This week, we had former ATF agent Jay Dobbins, who went undercover in the Hell's Angels. So if you like our undercover-ish episodes... This is a really good one. It was a two-parter.
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1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Now, it is possible that the people in this group really do know how he feels, and they still approve of him for whatever reason. And if that's the case, then I have some questions about this group, honestly. But we can circle back to that. So... Let's just talk about your options here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Option one is you say nothing, you do not engage, you let all this hateful stuff roll off your back, and you focus on enjoying the hiking and the group apart from this guy. That's going to require some black belt level compartmentalization on your part, but it is possible.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Although if he's walking up to you and going, hey, I just read this new thread on X by Cat Turd on how melanin affects your IQ, that's going to be hard or impossible to do if he keeps trying to cram this stuff down your throat.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Or if he's talking about it loudly with everyone else, maybe you can't ignore it, but you can always pop in some earbuds or start your own conversations to drown this guy out.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
No, he shouldn't have to do that. I'm just saying it's an option, which brings me to option two, which is you gently push back or you say something to this guy. Now, you can either do that publicly, which might mean starting a debate in front of everyone, or you can do it privately. You take him aside and politely say, hey, listen, bud, I can see that you're very passionate about your views.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
That's fine. But I just want to share a couple observations about how it comes across to people. And I want to ask if we can keep our hiking group politics free so we can enjoy the outdoors and the fresh air and each other and have a break from how crazy the world is. You get it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1113: You Just Want to Hike, Not Revisit Third Reich | Feedback Friday
Usually these people are not ever looking for a meaningful debate. They don't care. They've already made up their mind. They're choosing contrarian and edgy viewpoints because it gets attention. They're not going to trade that for something reasonable. This guy just wants an audience. So I say don't make it about his ideas. Make it about the vibe of the group. I think that's the way to go.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Before we kick off, a funny story I remembered the other day, Gabe. So about 20 years ago, I was going on a cruise with my girlfriend and her family, and I didn't have a flight. So I drove to Miami with my college roommate, because he had a cruise too, and I ended up getting there a day early. I guess they had their cruise left a day early.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Oh, man, there's a lot going on here. We already talked a lot. So let me try to cut to the chase here. First of all, no, you're not being unreasonable. Just going to address that one right off the bat. Like I said, you're allowed to consider an offer like this, even if it's a risky one.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
You're allowed to go through whatever process you find helpful to arrive at the right decision for you, which, by the way, you absolutely did. I think working with your ex would have been a disaster. and very dangerous, and totally unproductive, and the fact that you got there in your own way when your initial instinct was to maybe say yes, I personally, I think that's a huge point in your favor.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
It confirms that the journaling practice is healthy and productive and gets you to the right decision, at least in this case. So, you know, well done there. And apart from this specific fight, reading a partner's private journal without their permission is just not okay under any real circumstance. Like, why would you do that? No, that was a violation from the start. Absolutely.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
And it doesn't even sound like he's acknowledged that. Honestly, it's one of the things that makes me a little worried about this guy. He didn't say like, I'm sorry, I know I shouldn't have done that, but I did and now did it. No, he's like, I'm right and you're wrong. And by the way, any opinion of the contrary, I'm just not interested in. So no, you're not the one in the wrong here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
You're not being unreasonable. And I can also make room for the idea that this offer was very disturbing to your partner. He might have felt, I mean, fill in the blank here, disappointed, betrayed, threatened, weirded out by the fact that you were even considering this offer. I have some empathy for that. Some.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
What I don't have empathy for is the fact that this guy goes and reads your private journal, sees something he doesn't like, then turns around and says, well, this was all you. I didn't do anything wrong. You You made me feel this way, but also I won't accept your apology and move on because it's not sincere.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
And the reason I think it's not sincere is because you should have done the thing I wanted you to do beforehand. What? I find that incredibly immature, not to mention manipulative, to be honest.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
So I had to sleep in the lobby of a hotel until it was the earliest time that the boat opened up and I could actually board. So I get there and they let me check in early. And it was like they had no room, but they made an exception because I was like, I'm basically homeless and I'm just going to wait by this weird ramp unless you let me on the boat. And they're like, all right, fine.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Exactly. And that's where I start to worry about their relationship a little bit. I want to be very careful here. I might be connecting some dots that might or might not exist. I could be totally wrong. But given her history with her ex, some of what her current partner is doing here is setting off some alarm bells for me. I'm not saying he's as bad as the ex.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
I'm not saying he's abusing our friend here the way the other guy did. I'm not saying there's absolutely no reason for this guy to be a little upset. But when I hold all these facts together, reading her private journal, weaponizing what he reads against her, taking this offer from her ex extremely personally for whatever reason and then retaliating against her...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Yeah, and refusing to accept her apology. Then he ices her out and holds her to these impossible standards.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Yeah, which, again, largely makes this all about him.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Am I crazy? This does not sound good to me at all. It does not. Look, the reason I want to tread lightly here is I'm not saying she's ended up with the exact same partner again or that she hasn't made a ton of progress since she left her husband. She clearly has, as evidenced by this very powerful journaling practice and her decision making and yada yada. I get it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
It is huge. And when she said that, I kind of wanted to give her a little standing applause here. To me, that's a sign of massive growth on her part. So I am not taking any of that away from her by pointing this out. But we also have to appreciate that she's in a relationship with another possibly kind of tricky partner.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
And it does make me wonder if she might be vulnerable to personalities like this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Yeah. Or if she has a tendency to settle into a certain dynamic or a way of being with partners that helps create conflicts like this. And I'm not blaming her, by the way, for this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
You framed that really well. That's one of the more concerning things to me. It's not just that he read her journal. It's just that he's kind of like, I don't care how you make decisions. They have to be the right ones according to what I want you to do.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
So I boarded and then I went to go get off the boat for a bit after dropping off my luggage and taking a shower in the room. And I'm dressed in flip flops and a polo and like cargo shorts, whatever the hell I was wearing back then. And I go to get off the boat and there's a bunch of staff and people moving, you know, drink carts and food and supplies on and off the boat.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Right. I can't help but feel that there's something objectively disrespectful and controlling about that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Ooh, fascinating.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Right. And has the abuse she experienced with her husband, and I imagine formative events long before that, are those also playing a role in her relationship now? So to answer your question, what are you supposed to do here? Well, it's hard because your partner isn't making it very easy for you guys to make progress. He's dug his heels in. That doesn't allow for much conversation.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
What I would do is go to him again with the benefit of a little more time and insight and tell him basically, look, I appreciate why this offer upset you so much. I've done a lot of work to see things from your perspective. I agree with you that working with my ex was a bad idea, which is precisely the conclusion I came to on my own. And now I'm asking you to see things from my perspective.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
So I go down, I guess it's called a gangway. I don't know if that sounds nautical. Yeah, the thing that you walk down to get. The thing you walk down to get off a boat, on and off a boat. And suddenly this guy goes, where the hell do you think you're going? And this like weird, you know, stodgy accent. And I stop. I'm just like, uh, what? He's like, you get back on the ship right now.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
What I went through with my ex, it left a real mark on me. It impacted my sense of self, my feelings, my ability to take my own thoughts and needs seriously. It also made me eager for vindication and validation from my ex, as weird and irrational as that might sound. And that's part of the legacy of this abuse. The journaling I do, it's part of my therapy. It's part of my process.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
It's really important. I needed to sit with this offer and really analyze it in order to know that I was making the right decision here. Not for him, not for you, but for me. And by the way, that's my private journal. I'm still very hurt and angry that you read it. That is not okay. And I'd like you to acknowledge that and respect my privacy going forward.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
But more importantly, I'm inviting you to empathize with me here to try to understand why I had to go through this process in my own way in order to say no. I've owned and apologized for my piece of this. It hurts me to know that I hurt you. But I also feel that I'm not getting the same consideration or curiosity from you in response. That sucks. And it concerns me.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
And it's making it impossible for us to make progress here. So are you open to doing that? Can you make some more room for me here? Can we really talk about this? So that's basically what I would say to him. And how he responds is going to tell you a whole lot about whether this relationship really works.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
My hope is that he can hear you and he realizes how hurtful and unproductive his response has been. And he tries again with more openness and more compassion. It's also unfortunately possible that he won't want to be in this process with you, maybe because it's too complex for him or too vulnerable.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
At which point you're going to have to decide whether you can accept that, whether this is the partner you want to be with given how far you've come. I'm not telling you what to do here. There are some conversations that need to happen first. So my hope for you is that you take everything you've learned from this situation and use it to assess your relationship and hopefully improve it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Although that's going to require both of you to want to do that. But more importantly, my hope for you is that you stay connected to your own experience here, which you're doing beautifully, by the way. Your thoughts and your feelings and your process, they matter a great deal and they are worth protecting.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
And you can do that while you're making room for your partner's feelings and process as well. We're sending you a big hug and wishing you all the best. You know, it's in my journal. Some great deals on the fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back. Thank you for listening to and supporting the show.
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1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
All of the deals, discount codes and ways to support this podcast are all searchable and clickable over at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. Please consider supporting those who support the show. All right, back to Feedback Friday.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
I'm like, okay, can I ask why? He's like, I don't have to tell you why. I'm the captain of this ship. You turn around, you turn and get back on this boat right now. So I turn and I head back to the boat and he's like, where do you work anyway? And I'm like, I don't have a job. I'm a student. And he's like, oh my God, are you a guest on this ship? And I'm like, Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Whoa. Holy smokes. Oh, wow. I was not expecting that. That is ridiculous. That is insane.
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1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Wow.
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1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
And he's like, oh, God, I am so sorry. I thought you worked on the boat. And I was, no, I'm just really early. I checked in. I wanted to go walk around for a while. And he's like, I am so, so sorry. I'm the captain of the boat. I owe you one. Let me know if you're interested in any sort of events or anything special on the boat. I owe you a massive apology.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Super interesting and good questions. First of all, I appreciate your attitude here. I love how much you want to guide your son without shaming him or driving him away. I think that's terrific. More parents should do that. Having a parent who can teach you and correct you when necessary, but still be a safe parent to go to when you need help. That's a gift.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
And I'm glad your son's going to have that with you. Second, man, I'm sorry to hear about your brother. That is a super tragic story and a cautionary tale for sure. And I actually think his story will be quite useful in these conversations. Let's come back to that. Third, this journey you've been on with your faith, there's a lot to say about that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
But as it relates to your parenting, I'm not sure that you need any specific framework or set of beliefs in order to be a good parent. What you do need, while people get angry about that last statement, what you do need are strong values, clear intentions, and a healthy and trusting relationship with your child.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Now, there might be some overlap between those qualities and the ideas that, say, Catholicism or any other religion might offer, but that doesn't mean you absolutely need to be religious in order to be effective as a parent. And the reason I say this is I hear some confusion and anxiety on your part about how to parent without having the church for guidance, which I can understand.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
it's probably easier to point at a specific doctrine or commandment or concept in your religion and say, this is why we don't do that, and here it is in black and white in the New Testament or whatever. And a lot of those ideas are legitimate. But I also think that approach, it has the potential to cut off or bypass some important conversations with your child.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
For example, about why they're feeling drawn to alcohol in the first place, how it functions in their social environment, how they're developing their own values around this stuff, whether they feel safe talking about certain subjects with their parents, what process they're going through around making big decisions like this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
It's not that a church's stance on something like alcohol is always wrong. I'm sure there's some value there. But when a parent points to some external system and goes, don't do it because they say it's wrong, I think that has the potential to miss something very important.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
I would imagine the best pastors, priests, whatever, religious scholars, they also tell you why instead of just pointing to something and saying, well, it says here that we don't do that.
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1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
All that to say, I understand you're feeling a little lost without your faith, but in a way, I think you might be in an even better position to have this conversation, because now you can share ideas and approaches and be in a process with your son that A, you really believe in, and B, allows for the two of you to be in open and ongoing dialogue about this stuff, rather than just, you know, you have to do it this way in order to be a good Catholic, or we don't have to talk about why you shouldn't drink, just, you know, honor thy parents.
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1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
which I'm guessing is part of the reason you deconstructed your faith, because it kept you in a place of wanting to be a good girl and possibly held you back from exploring and discovering your own identity in a responsible way. So, my take on teens experimenting with alcohol?
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1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
I mean, look, it's available, they can easily do it, I don't have to worry about this for many more years, thank goodness, but it's on my mind. Ideally, they don't do it until they're a little older, and if they do it, it's minimal, it's responsible, it's rare, we're on total communication about it, hopefully.
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1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
I don't think I fall into the never drink ever or you're screwed camp of parents, but I'm also not like, hey, do whatever you want, it's your life, kid, man, it'll be fine. To your point, this is all about how you help your child make safe and healthy choices.
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1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
And the way I would do that is by sitting down with him, talking to him about his relationship to alcohol these days, how it functions in his life, sharing your thoughts on alcohol, and making a lot of space for him to be open with you about his lifestyle, his friends, his desire to drink at this stage of his life,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
So as for appropriate expectations and consequences, I really think that's up to you. I can't tell you how strict you should be with your own kids. If you want a zero tolerance policy with him until he's 21, hey, that's your right. If you want to be like the cool mom who's okay with him drinking a little with some guardrails, I guess that could be legit too as long as he's being responsible.
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1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Yeah, he just thought I was like, yeah, faffing off, avoiding whatever sort of prep duty that I probably was supposed to be doing in my department on the boat to go dick around in Miami. And most of the staff was around the same age. They were all from Poland or Eastern Europe or someplace like that. There was a bunch of staff from Estonia.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Just, you know, be careful with that. Obviously, the less a teenager drinks alcohol, the better. Ideally, he doesn't drink for a while longer, although this is kind of an American thing too. I know kids in Europe are drinking wine at dinner with their parents when they're, I think it's like 16 or something like that, beer and wine.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
And I've read some theories that that leads to less abuse of alcohol later on. I don't know how rigorous that research is or if it's done by like the European Wine Producers Institute, right? I don't know. But look, my general stance on this is, first of all, being strict with kids, there's obviously a place for that in parenting, especially when they're young.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
You gotta set those standards and parameters early. As they become teenagers, though, I think that approach can change. Being strict, that's a way to enforce behavior you want because you think your child won't live up to your standards.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
But if you educate your child appropriately early on, if you positively reinforce their good choices and instill solid values in them, and you teach them to make good decisions for themselves, then over time, you don't really need to be strict because they'll be holding themselves to those standards. And ideally, that's what you want as a parent, in my opinion, anyway.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Yeah, and when you share that with them, that's a moment when you can say, look, if you're ever at a party and you've had a couple beers, call me, I will come pick you up. I will never be mad at you for choosing to not drink and drive. And I will never be mad at you for asking for a ride home if the person who was supposed to drive you home is drinking. All I care about is you come home alive.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
And I'm guessing here and there they make a hire or two that just screw around a lot, and this captain has to constantly keep them in line, or some officer on the boat has to constantly keep them in line.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
That is a crucial thing for a child to hear.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Yeah, I remember you talking about that, Gabe. It's so sad, but yeah, it's very effective. But even if you don't take your son to see him, the message here is basically, look, as you get a little older, a beer or two at a party, a drink with your friends every once in a while in a safe environment to let loose, that's one thing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
So later on, I'm there with my girlfriend and her family, and the captain comes up to us at the dinner and is like, hello, my friend, and gives us this awesome tour of the bridge and all this cool stuff. He has a different accent now. I can't really do a Dutch accent other than the one from, I love gold. Oh, that was Dutch?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
I can be okay with that, if in fact you are, of course, okay with that. slamming eight beers every Saturday, having a couple drinks and then partaking in other stuff, that's when things get problematic. That's where it can seriously derail your life. That stuff is not okay.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Agreed. So that's how I'd approach this with your son. 16, man, it's an interesting age. He's between two stages, so it's hard to know what's okay, what's not okay. But in a year or two, he might be off at college or he might be living somewhere on his own, spending time around plenty of alcohol, and you are not going to be able to monitor him every second.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
So the question I'd be asking myself if I were in your shoes is, how do I empower and educate my son to be the kind of person I can trust to take care of himself? instilling these values and standards starting now in a way that isn't as punitive, but is maybe more meaningful and self-directed, that is everything.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Because yes, you can manage or punish him like a teenager, and there might be a role for that sometimes, or you can teach him how to respect and take care of himself like an adult. So be direct with him, lead with some basic strong values around health and safety and self-respect, make plenty of room for him to be open with you, and you really can't go wrong here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
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1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
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1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
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1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
That homeless people urinate on during closing hours. That took a weird turn. Yeah. But you know, that's what happens to all those barrels in the alley. That is kind of what kombucha is, you could argue. Yeah. What's the difference at that point? There was a Chinese restaurant, I want to say, somewhere around here where they busted one of the owners crushing garlic with his bare feet. Nice.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Fascinating question. Well, first of all, I'm very sorry that your girlfriend has these parents. This dad especially, this is deeply painful stuff. The fact that he withholds love, she craves it from him, and they fight so often, especially over trivial things, it's just really sad. Clearly, that's left a real mark on her. Obviously, her father sounds like he's got some real issues.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
I know that hoarding is often caused by anxiety, trauma, OCD, other mental health stuff. Hard to say what's going on there, although it's interesting that it all started after his wife got injured. I'm guessing that he's maybe grasping for a sense of control and safety after the accident, and hanging onto things, items, gives him that control.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
And it sounds like he's carrying a big burden, so he's probably in a lot of pain. But candidly, he also sounds like a miserable old coot who's treating his daughter like crap, which is not okay either. So yeah, that puts you in a really difficult position to have to constantly support a partner who's suffering because of family stuff. It's a lot to deal with, man.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
It's got to be exhausting, stressful, unpleasant, and it probably drives you crazy. And the worst part, like you said, is it doesn't seem to be getting any better. It's never ending.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
We're going to New Zealand. So yeah, he gives us a great tour of the bridge, all this cool stuff on the boat. And he told the family it was because I was such a charming guy and had talked to him early on in the trip. And he and I were sort of chummy and laughing about this really funny mistake. He didn't really want to admit that mistake to the family that I was with, which I thought was funny.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Right. I also find it fascinating she's saying all this to our friend here. She's going, I need a partner to help me deal with my parents. I don't know how to handle my life. But then she's also saying, you better run while you still can. Those are very stressful messages to receive.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Right, right. But how do you respond to that? He's taken on a lot here and he's having to stand by and watch his girlfriend get hurt over and over by her family and then come home and just bring all of that to him. So I get why he's going, I think I need to get out of here. This is a bit much.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Yeah, unclear from his letter, based on what he shared, they haven't really done that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
And kind of unfair to her.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
I agree, because if he doesn't, that kind of sucks, right? Then he's just ditching her for having a shitty family without giving her much of a chance. Yeah. Also, he might break up with her and then regret it if he realizes that he didn't give her a shot at finding a new way of managing her parents. But I will say, this is her responsibility and not his.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
It's not all on him to make her change or something. But as her partner, he can and should support her in doing that if she's willing to actually give it a shot.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
So he turned it into a compliment, which wasn't really true. But I thought it was funny. I was just enjoying the special treatment. He later said, I knew I was in trouble the minute I heard your American accent, because I guess they don't hire... Americans on the boat for probably a million different reasons, but one of which is it's $4 an hour.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
I like that, Gabe. That's exactly right. I think he needs to go on record as saying this isn't sustainable or fair to me anymore. But also, I'm here to support you, again, appropriately in finding a new way of managing this situation. And then it's up to her to decide whether to take you up on that, whether she wants to try things in a new way.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Maybe she tells her dad that she won't fight with him anymore and she expects more from him. And if he doesn't treat her better, maybe she decides to have less contact with him or pull back on her responsibilities with him. Maybe she goes to therapy. Given what you've shared, I sincerely hope that she does because I think she's got a lot to work through. Point is, she has options here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
In the meantime, though, I'd sit with this impulse to leave and see what that might be saying about you. Your girlfriend might be avoiding certain conversations with her parents, but you might also be avoiding certain conversations with her. And that's your work to do. Good luck. You know what you're going to want to hoard while driving your future son-in-law away?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
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1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
It is that important that you support those who support the show. Now, back to Feedback Friday.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Welcome to Feedback Friday. I'm your host, Jordan Harbinger. As always, I'm here with Feedback Friday producer, the Sidewalk Sandwich Board, inviting you into this bougie gastropub of delicious life conundra, Gabriel Mizrahi.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
I guess that was probably the de rigueur migrant labor- Uniform for all these young guys. Stowaway uniform. Yeah. So I don't think there's any kind of lesson in here. It was just a really funny thing that could have soured the experience for me or could have turned out poorly, but ended up making the trip even more memorable because we got special treatment
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
You know, it's funny that you mention this. I totally agree. I actually just discovered temporary tattoos as well. Now, I mean, my kids like them.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
I've always known that they exist, but I went to Laos and Vietnam with this group of entrepreneurs, and one of the organizers said, okay, we're having a costume party, and everyone groans, right, because you're already packing for two weeks in Laos and Vietnam, and now you've got to bring a freaking costume that you're going to wear for three hours.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
So I thought, OK, the ultimate hack is going to be just order a couple dozen tattoos off of whatever website, pack those. They pack as flat sheets, of course, and bring those. And then I'll have enough left over for other people to the party theme was come as you aren't. And that's a pretty damn cool theme, right? Because it's essentially what do you mean?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Like, come as you, Michael, aren't or come as you know. Yeah, I know. Come as you are not. So, you know, come as you are is a thing, right? But this is like, you know, come as sort of the alternate ego, the alter ego that maybe lives inside you or something like that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Yeah, the Tyler Durden.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
So I was like, all right, it's hot in Laos. I'm just going to take my shirt off and put on temporary tattoos, speaking of Tyler Durden, and walk around with my brand new dad bod six pack hanging out and sort of enjoy it. And I got to tell you, man. I've never wanted so many tattoos in my life. I would love if I could just immediately wake up tomorrow with 17 actually cool, tasteful tattoos.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
But the problem is, yeah, I want them gone in 10 years without painful laser surgery.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
And if you guys have any recs on cooler sets of tattoos, the options on Amazon, they're kind of limited and kind of a mixed bag, right? Because it's clearly like designs from China that are made in China. Some are cool. Some are really lame. So maybe, yeah, who knows? Maybe some of you make your own temporary tattoos or something.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
If so, I'd love to hear from you because that's definitely a cooler, more fun way to go.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
And I had a funny start to the vacation by being yelled at by the captain of the ship. I love it. I love when stuff like that happens. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Wow, that's really special, man, and really great feedback for you. Sounds like you're an awesome leader.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
That's cool. That sounds super rewarding.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Interesting. So this might also be good feedback for you, but let's see where this goes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
What a blow. This guy just keeps on getting pumped up and then cut down.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Wow. If that's true, that sucks. I wonder if there's more to the story there. But man, if dangling job opportunities in front of addicts is just a way to keep them on the tap, that is deeply messed up and highly unethical.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Right. It's hard to know what conclusion to draw from this pattern if it is a pattern. Right. It's happened twice, which is enough for me to go, OK, something seems to be happening here. Let's look at this. But also it could just be bad luck.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Ooh, boy, candidly, this makes me nervous. There's no negotiating with recovery. I admire your discipline, your confidence, I really do, but I'm a little concerned that you're not totally on the wagon.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
That's a beautiful dream. This is touching.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Phew, okay. Well, this is quite a story, man, and I appreciate you sharing so much with us. I really love your vulnerability. I know that vulnerability could serve you well, both in your own recovery, which I want to talk about, and also in helping other addicts.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
There is a lot going on in your letter, and we don't have a ton of time left, so I'm going to try to cut to the chase as best as I've ever done that. First off, no, you are not overthinking this, and no, I would not just toss cow shit in the wind and let the chips fall where they may when it comes to your financial situation. Also, I've never heard the phrase toss cow shit in the wind before.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
That made me laugh. Did you make that up, or is that some idiom I've never heard before, Gabe? I don't know.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Oh, I see. That's what happens when you voice to text your feedback Friday emails. That's hilarious. Well, regardless, no, I would not throw caution nor cow shit or anything really into the wind. I know how powerful having a purpose is. I know how much it sucks to feel like you're not living a life that's meaningful, that's authentic. I hear how unhappy you are and believe me, I get it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
But you also can't compromise yourself financially by recklessly chasing your purpose without a plan for how to take care of yourself. That could put you in a very stressful position. It could exacerbate a lot of the difficult feelings that you're wrestling with. It might even make it more tempting to drink. I also think it could kind of infect this beautiful mission of yours.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Because if you rush into recovery work without a way to take care of yourself, you might put a lot of pressure on that new career to take care of you. I'm going to go ahead and guess that it's not super lucrative, at least not at first. And it might end up souring you on the work or making it unsustainable.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Whereas if you found a way to keep a roof over your head and pay the bills while you took some steps towards this calling, I have a feeling you'd be able to engage with it in a very pure way. You'd be able to enjoy it because you truly love it and not allow money to get too wrapped up in this calling from the jump.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
The distress you're in about money, I know that feels like a huge sign that something isn't aligned in your life, and I agree with you, but you also wouldn't feel that distress of taking care of yourself financially weren't really important.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Exactly. So my strong advice is you need to find a way to support yourself and engage in the recovery field. Maybe that means keeping your job and volunteering at a recovery center nights and weekends. Maybe it means getting a new job that's less demanding or a job that's part-time or a job that's closer to the recovery world in some way and using it as a transition to support your recovery work.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Maybe it means staying at your job but making more peace with it, not thinking of it as abandoning your calling but as a way to support your calling until you can make enough income from the work that really matters, which, by the way, that isn't just a cute story. I really do believe that. I don't think Einstein felt like he was living inauthentically by working in the patent office.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
He was holding down a job he needed to be able to do the work he cared about, and he did that work.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Oh, wow. That could get dicey, but I also totally get it. That's definitely a loophole. Call the game warden so that they can open the door and then the rest of us will just run roughshod over this person's Fourth Amendment rights. Yeah, that is super interesting, though. I kind of remember from my law school days, open fields doctrine.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Exactly. I mean, how many aspiring writers work as baristas? You know, you can either sling lattes all day, miserable and bitter that it's not your calling, or you can say, thank you for this job that allows me to go home and write.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Now, about stepping back into the recovery community again, actually moving closer to your calling, I think there's something more important we got to talk about first.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Yeah. Like I said, I'm pretty worried about this. I know he said he's, I have a couple of beers here and there. I know he said he'd never gotten any serious trouble with alcohol, no fights, no DUIs, no arrests. Maybe his dependency wasn't too severe.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Exactly. And by the way, just because you didn't get into a fight or drive drunk or get arrested doesn't mean you didn't have a problem. It might just mean you weren't aggressive or reckless or you were lucky enough not to be busted by the cops. But more to the point, you've relapsed twice. Now, I know everyone's on their own journey.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
I understand that some people can find their own paths to sobriety. Maybe you're one of those people who's learned how to keep this in check on his own, but candidly, man, and I say this with love, I am not convinced that you are one of those people. You have a problem with alcohol, by your own admission, and that doesn't just go away.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
You might be keeping it in line right now, but that doesn't mean that you've addressed your addiction or the roots of your addiction.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
I think so, Gabe. It's so interesting. He's remarkably self-aware about his patterns, his tender spots, his conflicts, but I don't know if he's going all the way and asking himself how his ongoing relationship with alcohol might be serving to cope with those things and then in turn making it really hard to heal them. Yes.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
And the reason he needs to dig into this first is I just don't understand how he thinks he's going to be a truly helpful guide to other addicts if he's casually tossing back Coronas a couple times a week. I have a lot of compassion for this guy. I really do. He's been through a lot.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
But again, if I'm being totally honest here, I find his flexible relationship with recovery rather hypocritical and lacking in integrity, frankly, and it kind of antithetical to the whole premise of recovery.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Yeah, it argues that the Fourth Amendment's protection against search and seizure. doesn't apply to so-called open fields. So police can search open fields without a warrant or probable cause. Again, clever, little shady, but clever. So we don't know whether this guy was illegally hunting or trespassing or something.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
This is so interesting. This parallel is so interesting. When I was doing the dating coach thing, there were so many guys who would walk in on like day one of the boot camp or the beginning of their journey. And you'd ask them what their goals are and tons of them wanted to be coaches. They're like, how do I get to a coaching role? How do I? And I was so confused by this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
It's funny because I also kind of went through that in an initial stage, I guess. But then I was shocked by how many people had the same desire. And I would ask them why. And some of it was like, oh, look, all these people look up to you. It feels good. So there's status. But I also think that you kind of get to say, I've arrived. I'm healed.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
I have a little bit of power over this problem because I am in a role of a teacher. And it just feels good because you go, oh, of course, I've done the work. Look at me. I'm the one who's teaching the class.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
And that's why the game wardens were there, whether the cops were like, uh, bring the game warden because we don't, we're going to do a fishing, well, pardon the pun, a fishing expedition. And we might be able to find something and we can't, we don't have enough to get a warrant. Who knows? Yeah, that's right. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
A hundred percent. And I have to ask, and I recognize I'm speculating here. I cannot know this for sure. But is this a quality that the first treatment center also noticed and went, I don't know if this is our guy. I don't know if he's ready. I'm not saying they necessarily went, oh, this guy's going to fall off the wagon or he's not ready.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
But this aspect of his personality might have come through in certain ways or popped up in a few different situations or moments or just his overall way of being. And that might have sent a signal that he had no idea he was sending. Again, we cannot know this for sure. It's just a theory.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
But my point here is I think there's something meaningful for him to know about the feedback that he got, assuming, of course, that it wasn't all just a scam to run his insurance for more money.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Right. But if that priest is secretly sleeping with women or the therapist isn't addressing their own wounds, that's a different story.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
The other thing that's complicated about this is he's been burned by two different recovery centers, and I can appreciate why that's left a bad taste in his mouth, and I can understand why it's left him wary of the recovery world. Like I said, the first center that turned him down and then hired two other people, they might have been responding to certain qualities in him.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
I think that's at least useful for him to be aware of them. The second center, though, that really does sound like a money thing, and like I said, That is super gross and hurtful. And unfortunately, it doesn't surprise me in the least here in the United States with our privatized kind of rehab thing. Our health care system is so broken. So much of it is driven by profit.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
It really is. So in case you were also wondering what the heck was going on, why there was a game warden involved, that's why. So they don't need to call a judge and argue for probable cause. And now let us trespass over any semblance of normalcy by diving into the mailbag.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
And I've heard tons of stories about shady practices at rehab centers not being certified. I mean, just the list goes on and on. So that might not have been about him per se.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
For sure. And who knows, maybe continuing to drink a little bit. Maybe that's even a little like screw you to the recovery world on some level, a form of protest in a way. Like, okay, you guys don't actually care about me. I'm not going to play by your rules. I'm going to do this my way.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Right. It's hard for him to be vulnerable.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Yeah, as opposed to the guy who has to go back to the staff at a rehab center where he's been burned a couple of times and say, I need help. Yes. I need help as a patient. Exactly. It's a really good point. It's something I think he needs to sit with. So, wow, okay, we spent way more time on this than I thought we would, but it's such a rich story. I hope this gives you some new angles, man.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Sometimes when you feel stuck or stymied, it's because you still have some work to do exactly where you are. And then when you do that work, you start to find that the doors open in a new way.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
For example, if you find a treatment center that works in an ethical way, that values you, that really helps you, and you open yourself up to that help while you hold down this job, that might create some excellent opportunities in the recovery world. If you get and stay sober, that might put you in a headspace to pursue those opportunities in a way that's financially sustainable to you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
It isn't magical thinking. It's real stuff. So take care of yourself, man. Open yourself up to the people and places that you need to get healthy. Get as solid as you can in every way first. Then see where you can take this purpose and talent of yours. I have a feeling you could make a big impact on people, man.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
But I feel very strongly that this journey you're so passionate about, it really has to begin at home. And we're rooting for you, dude. Good luck. Go back and check out our Ryan Holiday episode and our Skeptical Sunday on traditional Chinese medicine if you haven't done so yet.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
The best things that have happened in my life and business have come through my network, the circle of people that I know, like, and trust. And I'm teaching you how to build the same thing for yourself in our six-minute networking course. It's free. You hear about it on the show all the time. It's not schmoozy. It's on the Thinkific platform over at sixminutenetworking.com.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
These drills just take a few minutes a day. It's stuff I wish I knew 20 years ago. You got to dig that well before you get thirsty, folks. Build those relationships before you need them. You can find it all again for free at 6minutenetworking.com. Show notes and transcripts on the website, advertisers, deals, discounts, ways to support the show, all at jordanharbinger.com slash deals.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
I'm at jordanharbinger on Twitter and Instagram. You can also connect with me on LinkedIn. Gabe's over on Instagram at Gabriel Mizrahi or on Twitter at Gabe Mizrahi. This show is created in association with Podcast One. My team is Jen Harbinger, Jace Sanderson, Robert Fogarty, and of course, Gabriel Mizrahi. Our advice and opinions are our own, and I am a lawyer, but I am not your lawyer.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
So do your own research before implementing anything you hear on the show. Remember, we rise by lifting others. Share the show with those you love, and if you found the episode useful, please share it with somebody else who could use the advice we gave here today. In the meantime, I hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn, and we'll see you next time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
If you're looking for another episode of The Jordan Harbinger Show to check out, I wanted to give you a preview of my conversation with the legendary Dennis Quaid. We got into rejection both in Hollywood and outside and how he brings his characters to life on screen. This is really a fun episode. I think you're going to dig it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Yeah, I'm very sorry to hear that. Man, Gabe, we have been hearing from a lot of partners of narcissists lately, haven't we? Yeah, I don't know. I guess it's that time of the year.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
I saw the smoke when I flew in this morning. And our flight originally was canceled, and I was like, you got to get me to L.A. I got Dennis Quaid coming here. I can't stand him up for this bullshit fire. You use a lot of different accents in many of your films. I'm curious how you learn and practice those.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
So there's that. That has nothing to do with anything we're talking about. I just wanted to share that. Absolutely nothing, but I love it. Thank you. On the Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the stories. Yeah, I ate there last week.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Oh, man. Are you the guy that hears one on TV and then spends the rest of the week annoying everybody in the house? I prepare in secret. So, like, you're in the shower going, One more ginny.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
That one's awesome. That's definitely good. There's a reason you get paid the big bucks for these and I don't. That's for sure. I know music's a big part of your life. You wrote a few songs for three of your films. Been in a band for like 20 years. Same guys. Same guys.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Well, that's really good. I like that. You can steal that. I definitely think I just made that up just now. Really? Yeah. I've never heard you. I've also never heard. Wow. It just came out.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Is it true that you play with your band in bare feet?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
For more with Dennis Quaid, including how he uses fear to stay motivated, check out episode 279 right here on The Jordan Harbinger Show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
It just feels like a massive uptick. I guess the Dr. Romney episodes have also been landing with people because they're like, oh, this person is a massive narcissist. It's not just a weird thing that we have. Anyway, carry on.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
The stories, secrets, and skills of the world's most fascinating people and turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you. And our mission is to help you become a better informed, more critical thinker.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Thank God. Good move. I don't even like doing business with people I'm friends with, let alone people I've been dying to get away from for a decade.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Meaning for lying about the fact that she didn't discuss this with her ex beyond that initial conversation?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
She says that didn't happen.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Interesting. So her partner is angry that she was even considering this offer, which I got to say, given how he treated her, I can understand. But she's looking at this like I didn't do anything wrong. In fact, I did something right.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
During the week, we have long-form conversations with a variety of amazing folks from undercover economic hitmen, gold smugglers, Russian spies, astronauts, four-star generals, This week, we had my friend Ryan Holiday on his new book, Right Thing, Right Now. A lot of talk about integrity, how to make difficult choices. Just great conversation with Ryan Holiday.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Yeah, I get that. But this vindication piece, that's a little trickier for me to understand. I mean, I guess I understand why this was nice to hear. The guy who tortured you now needs you. I'm guessing that speaks to a part of her that wants to know that she's valuable, that he's less capable. Sure. But I can't help but wonder what this guy's motivation really was.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
I don't want to take the win away from her, but she started this letter by saying that her ex was abusive emotionally, physically, financially, psychologically, that he's tried to control her in various ways over a decade.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Yeah, you're telling me there's not anyone else out there who can run his freaking Instagram account for his printing business or whatever. Come on, man.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Yeah, again, I can understand why this validation was meaningful, but I also think it's important for her to have an accurate read of this situation. Yeah, it's possible this guy's going, oh, I need you. I'm hopeless. You're talented. I'm sure she is. But I'm not convinced this is as simple as my abusive ex finally admitted that I'm a strong and capable person and he needs me.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
A disaster, man, which I have to imagine is why her partner got so upset about this. I can also imagine this guy knowing her past, hearing this offer from her abusive ex, reading her journal, which, by the way, is not okay, but he did it, whatever, and going, you're talking to this guy again? Are you seriously considering this? I think I would be a little frustrated, too, to be honest.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
So that might be part of what's hard for her partner to understand, too. Like, why are you looking for validation from this guy? Why not from me, from your family, from yourself? He might even be a little threatened by how compelling this invitation was coming from her ex. And that's making it hard for him to appreciate the process that she went through.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Well, there you go.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Yeah, again, I don't think your partner's 100% right here. I think he's missing something important about your process. It doesn't sound like he's open to hearing it. And I'm starting to gather that he's not understanding how complicated this is for a victim of abuse or for you specifically. I can also understand why he's saying, okay, screw this guy. You fought so hard to be free from him.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
I think he's been on probably more than any other guest on the show. And I always enjoy, I always learn so much from him. I always enjoy my conversations with him. I think he will as well. We also had a Skeptical Sunday last Sunday on traditional Chinese medicine. On Fridays, though, we share stories, offer advice, compare Gabe to quaint analog marketing tactics.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Why is this even a question?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Yeah. You heard me. I was kind of empathizing with this dude until just now. Telling her that it's her choice to be hurt when he's accusing her of doing something she didn't do.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Right. Even if he disagrees. That's a little worrisome. A little bit. He is just making this all about him. Who does? What kind of person does that again? Gabriel makes it all about themselves. There's a word for this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Somebody should make a word for people who make everything all about themselves.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Yeah, I'm also confused. First of all, the answer to what do they have to do with each other? The answer is almost nothing. He's rejecting her apology, which, by the way, I'm not fully convinced that she owed him at all in the first place. But I do appreciate that she's taking his feelings into account.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
He's rejecting that apology as insincere because she didn't do the thing he would have wanted her to do from the beginning, which is not what insincere means at all.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
You're not confused. This just makes no sense. Okay. Also, she's allowed to consider this offer even if it's an objectively terrible idea. He's framing that as somehow an affront to him personally. And I get that it impacts him, but it's her life.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Okay, so communication is just totally broken down here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Ooh, well that's just very telling. So this guy does not want to dig into all of this stuff very deeply, does he? He just wants to be right.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1087: Can Trust Be Recovered After Diary Discovered? | Feedback Friday
Right. And to make room for different perspectives. He's just shutting down and going, you screwed up. This is on you. I don't have to look at anything. Certainly not my own stuff. It's all you. I don't believe in that. Which, how do you make progress if that's your position?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
This episode is sponsored in part by Vital Proteins. I want to tell you about Vital Proteins Collagen Peptides. That's a mouthful. It's a daily supplement that supports your hair, skin, nails, bones, and joints all in one in one simple step each day. Collagen makes up about a third of the protein in our bodies, but as we hit our 30s, it unfortunately starts to decline.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
I totally agree. But one thing I know for sure, do not have kids with this guy if he is not psyched to have them too. It's not fair to anyone. And if you did that, if he agreed to that, he'd really be recreating that pattern in his family Gabe was just talking about. And you guys have good data on how that goes. That would be a whole other tragedy. So don't make that mistake.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Time to start talking. Good luck. And now we want to knock you up with deals so potent they'll get you pregnant. We'll be right back. This episode is sponsored in part by BetterHelp. Therapy shouldn't feel like a luxury that only certain people can afford. Come on.
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1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
With BetterHelp, you're getting solid professional care that fits into your life and your budget, whether you're dealing with anxiety, stress, relationship stuff, or you're just working on being the best version of yourself. Therapy helps, period. One of the best things therapy's done for me is help me through some major life transitions. Plus, you learn tools that you can use every single day.
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1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
And BetterHelp's legit. They got over 30,000 therapists. 30 freaking thousand. They've helped more than 5 million people. It's the best online therapy platform in the world for a reason. Your mental health... is worth investing in, and now it's actually within reach.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
That's something you learned probably in college or whatever, high school now. Goals are powerful. Goals can be really helpful. But I've always been more interested in how you turn an abstract goal into into reality. Because a goal is essentially it's a vague aspiration, right? It's just an idea. It can be a very powerful idea. All change and ambition starts with that idea.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
This episode is sponsored in part by Strawberry.me. You know, I'm a big believer in coaching. I've got a fitness coach, a nutrition coach, a voice coach. I used to be a coach myself. It's simple. Anytime I can save by learning from somebody who's trained in what I want to master, it's money in the bank.
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1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Why waste time fumbling around trying to figure out things when you can have somebody guide you along the way? Well, that's when Strawberry.me approached me and I was like, heck yeah, absolutely. Strawberry.me makes personal growth slash life coaching accessible. And within four hours, they had me connected with a certified coach and It's online, affordable, incredibly flexible.
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You can schedule live video sessions that work with your schedule. You can message your coach at any time. If the coach is not a fit, switch any time, no additional cost.
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So whether you want to work on your career or financial growth or life transitions, you got some self-doubt, time management, building healthier habits, staying motivated, their network of certified professionals has somebody who specializes in exactly what you need. Visit strawberry.me slash Jordan today and get a $50 credit applied to your first session.
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That means you can try personal coaching for as low as $25 to see if it's right for you. Thank you so much for listening to and supporting the show. All the deals, discount codes, and ways to support the podcast are searchable and clickable over at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. Please consider supporting those who support the show. Now, back to Feedback Friday.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Oh, yeah. I always forget about that. That's cool. Flus. It weirdly sounds kind of like what it is. It does, doesn't it? Also very similar to floss, which is appropriate.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
But the reason so many people never achieve their goals is that they remain just that, goals. If you ever achieve something, it's because you've woven that goal into your life in some way, because you're in a relationship with it. And the older I get, the more I realize that goals are They're kind of the tip of the iceberg. They're just the headline.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Somewhere between tip and bribe, but it leans towards bribe, but not like outright graft. Exactly. It's just, oh, you want to get into this place five minutes before it opens so you can get a good seat? How about a little box sheesh, right? It's like, okay.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
It's not something that would put you in jail, but it's something that probably you shouldn't be doing, but everybody's, that's just how it works around here. Yeah, it's a great word. And if you go to a place like Egypt, you're going to hear it every five minutes if you want to get anything.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Never heard that word in my life. Interesting. That would be the first time I've heard you use a word on this show that I've never heard in my life. And we're all smarter for it. Okay. I'm very sorry to hear about all this. This is super stressful. I can, of course, understand why everyone's spiraling because of this. 500 grand in debt is no joke.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
500 grand in debt you inherited after your spouse died weeks after losing your sibling is just super sad and a lot to handle. We wanted to run all of this by an expert, so we reached out to Erin Hoskins, bankruptcy attorney and a friend of the show. Erin practices here in the States.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
She's not as familiar, of course, with Canadian law, but she did some very brief research and she said that the laws in British Columbia, they don't seem significantly different from ours when it comes to liability for debt. Just keep that in mind. Lawyers, we're not your lawyer and all that. Do your own research before fleeing the country to escape a crushing debt, et cetera, et cetera.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
My new favorite disclaimer. We should use that more often. Exactly. Before fleeing the arms of justice, please consult your own attorney. So Aaron started off by reminding us that people are only responsible for debts that they personally sign for or are found liable for as like in a lawsuit.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
So she was a little confused, as we were initially, about how Eileen's late husband's ex-wife could still make her life miserable due to what seems to be a family support obligation of his. But Aaron said that when somebody dies with outstanding child support, that debt can sometimes be considered a claim against their estate.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
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The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
So that must be paid from the estate assets before any inheritance is distributed to beneficiaries. She assumed that your uncle's estate is still being settled after his death. And if there are any joint assets, his portion of them would go to pay any outstanding debts, which might explain why the house can't be sold due to the pending litigation.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Aaron would also assume that Eileen's portion of the estate, that would be hers to keep. In her view, there's no reason that her late husband's ex-wife should be entitled to that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Now, there does seem to be one big exception to all of that, which is if a spouse is directly involved in managing the deceased person's finances that led to the unpaid child support, then they might be personally liable, particularly if this management involved the transfer of assets from the person who owed the debt to the non-obligated spouse.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
The real substance is how you're engaging with that goal in tiny ways all the time. In other words, at some point for a goal to actually become real, it has to become a process. It has to become a system.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
You said that Eileen and her husband made, quote, questionable financial decisions to obfuscate assets and minimize child support. So maybe that's what's going on here. Maybe that's why the ex has a claim.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
She's trying to recover funds that were transferred essentially to the wife in order to keep them away from the ex-wife for the child support purposes, which does sound quite dodgy and unfair to the ex and their daughter. So these people might have a very legit claim, but it's just unclear how involved Eileen was in all this. Maybe it's ambiguous.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
But property laws often differ from state to state or province to province, so you would need to seek specific legal advice on all of this, of course.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Now, about you and your brother's exposure here, Aaron said that you guys would not be considered liable for Eileen's debts, even if they are personal to her, unless one of you co-signed or somehow guaranteed the debts, or they were somehow a joint obligation, which it doesn't seem to be the case. You would know if you co-signed something from your aunt.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
So just helping her out by talking to a lawyer or supporting her in other ways with the litigation or otherwise, that should not make your brother or anyone else in your family liable. Doesn't mean the ex-wife won't hate you. It just means that you're not going to be legally on the hook for anything.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
And if Eileen fled the country, Aaron said that still wouldn't make anyone other than her liable for her debts. And it definitely wouldn't make anyone else liable for your uncle's obligations. But if any litigation plays out, her moving to another country, Aaron said, that's not going to help the situation because by not defending herself, a judgment will still be entered.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
And that can be used to seize the defendant's property or bank accounts. I saw this when I was an attorney. Also, people would go, oh, there's this thing I owe this money. I'm just going to be somebody nobody can find. OK, but what happens is court goes on and you're just not there to defend yourself. So the judge goes, well, OK, I have no choice but to rule for the plaintiff.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
It has to become a ritual, especially if the goal is not a one and done thing, but something you want to be or have for the rest of your life, like being in good shape or writing books or speaking another language, that sort of thing. Goals are for people who care about achieving something once.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
And the other person's not there, but they have a bank account somewhere with money in it or a house that's sitting around or vacant land. Take that. OK, well, we're going to force the sale of that or give it to the. That's just how it works. It's not that, oh, everything's on hold until we find this guy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
This is not a criminal proceeding where you have to find the person in order to put them on trial. This is OK. Well, we just assume you're abandoning all this and you're guilty. So we're taking it. That's how this works.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
So that's not really going to help unless she's going to flee and move all of the assets away in the meantime, which is, again, not legal, almost certainly if the pending litigation is happening. But again, if the litigation is against the estate, Aaron said that still wouldn't transfer the obligation to Eileen unless joint property can be seized for one of the spouse's debts.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
And again, specific to the jurisdiction where she lives, you got to talk to somebody who really knows what they're talking about in the area where she lives.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
So Aaron's take on all this was if Eileen's goal is to keep the property, it might be to her benefit to try and settle the litigation to allow anything that belonged to her husband to go to his ex-wife or whatever fair slash relevant portion of it. After all, it does sound like they failed to pay her child support and they did so on purpose because they didn't want to.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
And at that point, Eileen would be able to keep her portion of the estate. But Aaron recommends that she seek legal advice on that point as well. You don't want to try and navigate this stuff alone, period.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
And if Eileen would receive a portion of the proceeds from the house, Aaron said that an attorney might actually be willing to represent her if she agrees to pay them out of the proceeds once it's been sold. Or she could look into legal services or pro bono representation that means free. You can always find those on the applicable court's website or through a Google search.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Another option, look into engaging a mediator to resolve the litigation. A good mediator can help both sides realize the reality of the situation and walk the parties into an agreement that usually works well for all involved, or at least equally badly.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
And hey, maybe your brother-in-law's lawyer or your dad's estate lawyer, maybe they'll offer to have a quick chat with her or at least pass on some high-level legal advice. One way or another, she needs to get some good counsel here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
But systems, processes, these are for people who care about achieving something repeatedly and who are interested in seeing that goal evolve into new goals, new opportunities, new levels of mastery. You don't get into great shape by saying, oh, I want to look like Brad Pitt in Fight Club, which I think every guy did back when that came out. It was at college, I guess, for me, probably.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Agreed. Look, there is a resolution here eventually, but it's not going to happen by fleeing to Portugal or whatever. It's going to happen when the lawyers start talking. And honestly. Before you flee, sometimes fleeing and moving assets that are going to be involved in a litigation. Now you're talking, OK, contempt of court, criminal proceedings, potentially. This can get a lot worse.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
You think it's bad now? It can get a lot worse when you try to unplug from it. Not wise.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Totally agree. And I'm not entirely sure that your brother-in-law should talk to the ex-wife himself, especially if he's prone to blowing up. Aaron said that sometimes engaging directly can help, but that largely depends on the relationship between the two sides, which clearly isn't great.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
There's a long history of tension here, so it seems more likely that the attorneys will be able to talk without historical emotions that could end up clouding judgment, making things worse. But if there's a world where your brother-in-law could manage his feelings and play the role of somewhat neutral third party, hey, maybe it's an option. But I don't know.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Gabe, it sounds like, do you want me to take this? I'm a hothead and I get angry at gas stations, but let me give her a piece of my mind and set her straight.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Yeah, exactly. Let me handle this. No, Frank, I think we got this. I'm sorry you're dealing with this. I'm sorry the child support and estate stuff played out this way. But this is ultimately something Eileen needs to sort out with the help of her attorney. It is not your job or your dad's job, although you guys are welcome to help if you want.
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1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
I hope Eileen finds the representation she needs, works her recovery, gets through this. She's lucky to be surrounded by so many people who want to help. And good luck. You can reach us Friday at jordanharbinger.com. Please keep your emails concise. Try to use descriptive subject lines. That makes our job a lot easier.
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1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
If you're finding dead squirrels in your mailbox, your aging parents are living next to an aggressively psychotic person, or your niece found out that her dad is cheating on her mom and now you're stuck in the middle, whatever's got you staying up at night lately, hit us up Friday at JordanHarbinger.com. We're here to help and we keep every email anonymous.
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1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
I'm putting a time stamp on myself, which you should never do. But you get in shape by doing five push-ups, and then you do 10, and then you do 20, and you walk on the treadmill, and then you start jogging, and you start running. Gabriel, did you ever do the couch to 5K? Did you ever try to run? No.
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1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Also, our newsletter, We Bit Wiser, it's a bite-sized gem from a past episode from us to you, delivered to your inbox on most Wednesdays. It's a two-minute read, very practical. You can sign up at jordanharbinger.com slash news. All right, what's next?
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1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
And if you don't know, you're lucky. Don't Google it. Don't try to spell it.
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1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
So I was looking forward to this one because I have the exact same question with my own kids. The landscape has changed a lot. Kids are getting phones so young, they almost need them at some level. It's hard to know how to educate and protect them without freaking them out or holding them back. And it's a great question. I love that you're thinking about all this now. Thank you. Thank you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
So I wanted to run, but I was essentially just like overweight and had never run in my life. And a friend of mine was like, oh yeah, couch to 5K. And I was like, yeah, ha ha. And he's like, no, you've seen that, right? And I said, no, similar to what just happened now. And there was this plan on the web in 2004, whatever the year was. It was like the couch to 5K plan.
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1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
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1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
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1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
It was like, get up and walk for 10 minutes, and then stop and relax and then walk for 10 more minutes and then stop and then relax and then go home. And the next one was like, jog lightly for 10 seconds and then stop and walk for 20 seconds. And it was just that, but slow.
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1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Thank you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Yeah, eight months later or whatever, I was just running three miles a day or whatever it was. It was awesome. And I'd never felt more accomplished than having done that because I'd never really gone for any sort of fitness goal in my life until that. It was amazing. So these incremental gains really are something. You don't write a book by saying you want to be a bestselling novelist.
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1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Thank you.
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1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Thank you. Thank you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
You write a book by writing a thousand words a day for years at a time and getting rejected constantly. So goals, great, very helpful. Definitely nice to have. They're an important stage, but they have to become something more, something active, something consistent, and they have to become very small, tiny ways of engaging with that goal every day in order to be truly useful.
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1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
If you like this episode of Feedback Friday and you find our advice valuable, I invite you to do what other smart and considerate listeners do. Take a moment and support our amazing sponsors. All of the deals, discount codes, and ways to support the show, searchable and clickable over at jordanharbinger.com slash deals, or use the AI chatbot to surface the codes for you. That's super handy.
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Also on the website. If that doesn't work, email us. We're happy to dig up codes for you. It is that important that you support those who support the show. Now, back to Feedback Friday.
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1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
And I know it seems obvious, but I just thought it was worth repeating, especially as we enter that part of the year where your New Year's resolutions, if you are not already in full on habit mode, they're gone. They're falling away because the resolutions were just goals. The goals were just ideas. There wasn't a consistent system or habit or routine created around it to make it real.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Nice. You get to be the hero. You catch a cockatoo at Barnes and Noble or whatever, and the people working there are like, holy crap, you're a hero. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Just add a serving to your coffee, smoothie, even water. It doesn't even taste like anything, so it blends right in. The key is consistency. Making it a daily habit is how you see the benefits.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Look, maybe they have Barnes and Nobles in Papua New Guinea or something. I don't know. Cannibals read books too.
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1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Interesting. Sounds shady. So they're almost certainly trying to stop you guys from comparing notes and or starting your own company. And Gabriel, it's also weird. Oh yeah, all the communication is on phone or video. So not recorded and not in writing. That's very odd. When I was working for the law firm, we had approved apps, but we also used email.
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1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
And if you had a meeting, somebody was like, let's type up everything in this meeting. And if you had a meeting that was like, then they were like, let's not send a summary of this meeting, okay? No emails about this. If you have a question, call me. And that was rare. And also there had to be a damn good reason for that.
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1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
This sounds like the reason is we don't want to get caught for doing things that aren't quite right. That's what that sounds like to me.
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1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Okay, hold up. To what I said earlier, this all sounds shady as hell. The last one is particularly ridiculous, but also half the going rate. No, no, no. The reason the rate is going is that's the rate. And hey, don't report that overtime. I'm guessing that didn't come in an email. That came in one of those video calls that's not recorded. This is all very shady.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
But how is it his fault if another bird enters a customer's store? That's what I can't... That's what I...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Yeah, you guys just weren't persuasive enough because we got a blue jay in here. That makes no sense to me. I could be wrong, but it sounds like a random policy that essentially allows the company to not pay their employees for 17% of their work. That plus all these other nickel and dime-y exploitive practices really just sounds shady.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
And there's no shame around this. You just gotta modify the way that you do things. Modify your thinking, get those systems in place. All right, as always, we've got fun ones, we got doozies. What is the first thing out of the mailbag?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
They're straight up stiffing you. This is not cool. There's all kinds of ways to just not pay you.
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1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Oh, wow. Cool strong-arming, bro. These bosses sound like real a-holes. Yeah, we decided to just not pay you. Can I ask why? No. The matter's closed. We investigated ourselves and found that we're just going to keep your money. No.
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1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
That's funny, man. Wow. Look, despite my laugh at the sign-off, I am not happy about this. Your employer is shady. They are manipulative. That is for sure. And look, all companies have their BS. There are certain policies they can come up with just to benefit themselves.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
But things like reimbursing employees for mileage, if you live in a state that has laws mandating mileage reimbursement for employees who use their personal vehicles, they have to do that. And that rate, I believe, is set by the IRS. They can't just decide to give you half because that's our company policy. Reporting overtime, that is also usually governed by labor law.
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1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Holiday pay, I don't know, maybe that's a company by company thing. Vacation, sick time, probably in the law. And then this whole revisit policy, that is what we in the legal business call complete hogwash. Yes, that's my opinion, but you certainly have good reasons to be pissed. I'm not an employment attorney, but I have to imagine the law is largely on your side here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
And candidly, I am shocked by your company being just so brazen about this, because if they were investigated for this stuff, they would probably be in big trouble and on the hook for a decent amount of money.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Bingo. And if they do talk, they want to be able to review the AI transcripts of their chats or whatever so they can get out ahead of any headaches and fire any troublemakers. Even that is, in my opinion, incriminating. So great question. Which laws is your employer bound by?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
We did some quick research, and interestingly, it looks like an employer is generally bound by the laws of the states in which its employees work, not just the company's home state. And this makes sense, right? Because otherwise, you'd have a Florida where you can just punch your employees in the face, and then they'd have all their employees in California, and they'd be punching them in the face.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
When I passed the bar, it was in there. So there are some caveats to that. First off, no matter what state you work in, employers have to comply with federal law, the Fair Labor Standards Act, the Family and Medical Leave Act. Nobody is exempt from that. Maybe in the military, of course.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
But when it comes to wage laws, hour laws, workers' comp, paid leave, overtime, non-discrimination, wrongful termination statutes, employers generally have to comply with the laws of the state's where the employee performs the work, even if the employer is based elsewhere.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Now, an employer might be able to include clauses in your contract specifying which laws will govern your employment, but based on what we read, that does not override mandatory protections granted by the state in which you're working, and definitely does not override federal law. Nice try though, guys.
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1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Most contracts have what's called a choice of venue provision, which means they'll have something that says, this contract will be interpreted according to the laws of this particular state. Even my contract has that. Hey, you got a problem? Okay, we're going to be doing this by California law. And if you want to go to court, you got to go to court in California.
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1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
So that if I decide to move to Texas, Podcast One doesn't have to fly a lawyer down to Texas and hire local representation. That's just what that is. But that doesn't mean that they don't have to follow the laws where we work here in California or in Texas or whatever it is. But even then, there are certain state laws that have to be followed where the employee is located.
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1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
For example, if you work in a state where there's a law that limits an employer's ability to require overtime, they generally cannot override that protection by requiring you to sign a contract saying the employer can just require whatever overtime they want. But again, state-specific. And if you are a random freelancer... and you're not a full-time salaried employee, that's going to be different.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
So bottom line, employers typically have to follow the employment laws of the states where you're physically catching birds. And if that means following multiple different state laws, that's what they got to do. Compliance is a bitch. Sorry about that.
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1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
That's got to be part of it. But I strongly suspect that it's both. Here's the thing. The kind of people that are too lazy to do things properly... They're also generally the people who also don't want to do right by their people.
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1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Now, this would be different if you worked at a dry cleaner and the owner's like, yeah, I printed this off the internet, this contract, and it's got a bunch of weird stuff in it. That's just ignorance. That's just he didn't want to pay a lawyer. This is a company that's operating with, what did he say, 120 people in different states. This is not a Mickey Mouse operation unless they want it to be.
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1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
And they want it to be because they want to skim off the top instead of giving their employees mileage money. They want to put it in their own pocket. This is all it is. And it's very clear to me that's what it is. Look, I'm sure it's a minor nightmare tracking all this stuff across five different states. But I'm also sure that thousands and thousands of companies deal with this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
There's literally software that does all of this automatically. So they really don't have an excuse.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Who knows? They might freak out so hard that they cave and give you guys what you want. That can happen too. It's really hard to say with these people.
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1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
And if your bosses retaliate against you or fire you for speaking up about this, I have to think that would make a lawsuit pretty easy, especially if you document everything that happens. So they'd be silly to get rid of you for this or make your life difficult, although I wouldn't put it past them.
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1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
In a weird way, little dark Jordan, little gray Jordan peeking out here, I'm hoping they do so that you can turn around and sue the crap out of them for sacking you or targeting you after you simply pointed out that they're breaking the law. And then not only would they have to pay you, they'd also have to deal with the fallout of an investigation. That's my fantasy here.
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1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Just check if your contract has an arbitration clause in there, which means that you'd need to resolve disputes through arbitration instead of litigation. Although, big asterisk, arbitration clauses, I've had those. And when I wanted to sue the employer, I just said, I don't think I should file this arbitration clause. And my lawyer said, yeah, I agree.
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1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
And then we went to their attorney and they said, no, you have to. And the judge went, nah, I'm going to just go ahead and allow this to go to trial. I'm just not going to honor that. Wow. Yeah. Arbitration clause means we really want you to go to arbitration, but a judge can go, no, thank you. I think we're going to deal with this my way. And that's it.
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1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Look, if there isn't an arbitration clause and you did sue or they sue you, they'd be giving you a great opportunity to pursue discovery, conduct depositions, air the employer's dirty laundry, which I cannot imagine would be good for them. And I know what you're thinking. Oh, my God, this sounds expensive. But here's another dark Jordan pitch.
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1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
You mentioned that you work full time hours, but you might be classified as a freelancer or a contractor, which would mean they aren't paying the employer side of paycheck withholdings, even though you work as much as a full time employee. which means they could get hit with a very unpleasant tax bill in addition to all of the other difficulties and expenses.
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1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
If, I don't know, you were to report them for misclassifying all 120 plus employees, something else to think about. Your other option is to file a complaint with the Department of Labor. as well as any relevant labor agencies in the state where you live, the states where you work, and the state where the company is based. And then there's going to be five investigations.
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1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
And send them a detailed list of all of these violations. Ask them to look into it. Maybe also the attorneys general in those states. They have a complaint system, too. And yes, it is. It's attorneys general, not attorney generals. They're not generals. They're attorneys general.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
It's just a Buxy grammar lesson for those of you who think it's attorney generals. It's not. It's attorneys general.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
And you're going to sound real educated when you use that next time, which of course you will.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
You can also call into your state's labor board and just be like, hey, if I work for a company and they're doing this and all this, is that legal? Is there something wrong here? And get their take. That should be a free consultation at any rate. Just know that these complaints can take some time to get processed. This is not going to be Monday. There's a check in your hand.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
All of those reasons make sense. They're the usual I don't want kids reasons. But the last one, it confuses me. What am I missing?
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1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
That's just not how these things work.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Yeah, but if he files a complaint, they act on it, and then he's fired shortly after that, wow, that sounds like a wonderful lawsuit for retaliation.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Yes, it's also another violation of the state's labor laws, whistleblower protections. I mean, there's... So many things can happen to a company that fires somebody who files a complaint. So you really do want to talk to an employment attorney about all this. In fact, I think personally, I've got employment attorney friends.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
They salivated the prospect of a multimillion dollar class action lawsuit across multiple states for over 100 employees. This could be a huge case and the kind of case that's an existential threat to a company like this. And your other option is just to move to another company that treats its people better, avoid the whole debacle. That's also a fair option.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
But there's a part of me, the attorney that has a strong sense of justice. I love to watch companies like this just get picked apart and dismantled by labor organizations and the law. This is a great use of lawyers. But really, man, I'm sorry they're treating you this way. I hate companies like this, if you couldn't tell.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
But I appreciate your conviction and your curiosity, and I really hope they start treating you guys better. Or you just flap your wings to another place that does, because this bird-catching gig sounds pretty sweet. I'd love for you to be able to enjoy it without getting your wings clipped. Enough bird metaphors in there? I think you nailed it. Yeah. Keep flying, my man.
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1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
And now for the recommendation of the week. I am addicted to lip filler. My recommendation of the week, these are vitamin cases or pill cases. They're called Ikigai, I-K-I-G-A-I. Of course, we'll link to it in the show notes. Not a sponsor, just something that was advertised to me relentlessly on Instagram.
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1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
And I take tons of vitamins and different things, breakfast, lunch, dinner, before bedtime. And it really was annoying to have all these bottles. And if you go away for three days, you got to bring all the bottles. You got to count it out in advance and put it in another bottle and then be ready to identify them. It's just a huge pain.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
And these vitamin cases, they're made out of metal, they're engraved, and they look really cool. There's a zillion colors you can choose from. They're magnetic, and they're just well-made.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Yeah, I shouldn't have kids because one other person didn't want to have kids and then this whole thing imploded. I guess I'm just not sure what to make of that. Let's see where this goes. But side note, anecdotally, every adult that I know who was parentified as a kid basically at some point soon after decided they didn't want kids as an adult and ended up never having them and is...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
And so you can put in a week's worth, a day's worth, depending on which model you choose, of your vitamins, your pills, whatever it is, and then you can break them into different pieces, put them away, they don't come open in your bag, and then you don't have 17 vitamin bottles in a Ziploc like I used to do. It's just a more elegant way to handle this. This is not super duper cheap.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
They have great sales all the time. And it took me a while to pull the trigger because I was like, oh, I'll just do it the other way. Once I got one of these and splurged, it's just been great. You leave for three days, you only need this. You leave for five days, you only need that. It's just a much better way to stay organized and handle all of these things.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Again, they've got ones that are a week long, ones that are a day long, ones that are two weeks long. If you take a ton of vitamin stuff, if you take just a few, ones that fit in purses, ones that definitely are so big they would never fit in a purse. They've got a lot of different options and I just think they're really nice. So thank you for allowing me to supplement your supplement game. Enjoy.
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1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Also, in case you didn't know, there's a subreddit for the show. A lot of activity in the subreddit. Discussion of episodes, meme threads, discussion of the news, questions about the show. If you're a Redditor and you're on Reddit, go over to the Jordan Harbinger subreddit and come hang with us. All right, what's next?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
That's so gross. Skin crawling over here. This would be a deal breaker for me, too. I mean, you don't brush your teeth? Bruh. I can't imagine not doing that. I'm not like Gabe, obsessed with dental hygiene. I do the basic stuff. But how can you not at least brush them once a day, usually twice in the morning, right? How can you go out in public with furry teeth? That's insane to me.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
I'm just going to read the letter.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Oh, I thought she meant because of his teeth. I'm like, yeah, I'd be insecure too if I had teeth like venom. No, this is a separate pathology.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Usually at this age, I can say, do you regret that? And they almost immediately say no as they sip on their old-fashioned or their martini. And they book their flights to Italy from their phone at the bar. So we talk about this a lot, but that just really does seem to do a number on people. Having to raise your siblings when you're 12 to 18, it's just like, I'm done.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Okay. As you can tell, Gabe and I are both horrified by the no brushing thing. Obviously, that is a major health and hygiene issue, but it really also speaks to some larger themes that are the real issues here that he apparently needs to be pushed to do basic things. He's not taking very good care of himself. Dental hygiene. That's not just a cosmetic thing or like a nice to have.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
And also he is somewhat oblivious or maybe even indifferent as to how he comes across to other people. I mean, dude, if you don't brush your teeth ever and you're not worried about your breath or what your partner is going to think when they kiss you, that is very weird. That's concerning to me. But look, I hear you. He has some great qualities. He's kind. He's funny.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
He makes you feel very comfortable. That's new for you. And you don't have many relationships. The ones you do don't last very long. You say you feel you need to work on your empathy and patience, which, look, I appreciate that. So you don't want to give up on this guy prematurely. I get that. I can understand why that puts you in a bind, but you've listed three major challenges here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
One is the oral hygiene thing. I think we've covered that. The second is that he's somebody who needs to be pushed in the right direction. So he really might be needing or even looking for a mother.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Or to be more accurate, he might need a mother figure in his life, but you're also falling into that mothering role, which I can't say I entirely blame you for because it sounds like he's a bit of a mess. but that might also speak to something in you that's willing to mother him. And the third problem is that he seems to be insecure.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
He doesn't, or at least didn't early on, seem to be all that curious about you. Your read is that he's very concerned about you liking him, that he's not secure enough to make room for you, which maybe that's exactly what it is. I also wonder if that oblivious quality I just mentioned is also playing a role. Maybe he's just not aware of how he comes across, or maybe he's a little narcissistic.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
I don't know.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Is he communicative or is he just yammering on about himself a lot? Because those are two very different things.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Or, to be fair, maybe she's only clocking these concerning qualities now, two months in, which is still very early days, and it's complicating her feelings about it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
No, good point. That is meaningful because there's the stuff he's doing, objectively speaking. Right. And then there's how she's responding to those qualities, what pattern she falls into as a result. And those are just as important for her to understand. So, yes, these are all normal feelings, but I'm not sure they're feelings that you should just wait out.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Two months into a relationship is when you start to get a handle on what the other person's stuff is. and everything your partner's qualities are bringing up, whether your interpretation of them is right or wrong, whether they reflect more on him or on you, they're not gonna go away. Two things need to happen if you guys are gonna be able to move forward here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
The first is to take some time to appreciate this dynamic we've been talking about, how you both are playing a role in these feelings and experiences, what's coming up for you in this relationship, how your history and your patterns and your needs, these qualities you feel you need to work on, how all of that is informing your interpretations and responses right now.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
The second thing that needs to happen is you guys need to start talking openly about this stuff. The more superficial stuff, like the not brushing his teeth thing and the deeper stuff, like flossing. No, I'm kidding. Like him needing someone to tell him what to do in his life. And in that conversation, I would make room for what's going on for both of you here, frankly.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
So, for example, I think it's totally fair to say it really concerns me that you need someone to push you in the right direction. It makes me annoyed. It makes me resentful. I want you to take more responsibility for yourself.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
but if you really want to get somewhere, maybe you tell them, but I'm also noticing that there's a part of me that might be willing to push you, if that's true, of course, or my pattern is to have short relationships and to be single for long periods of time, and I think I need to work on my patience and empathy. So I'd like to tap into that more and understand where you're coming from better.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Obviously, you get to decide what to share with them, what's relevant. I'm just saying there are broadly two ways to have a conversation like this. One way is to say, here are all the things you need to fix for me to be happy. And the other is, here are the things I'm finding challenging, and here's why.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
That second approach will probably lead you to a better outcome, or at least give you a lot more information about whether to stay in this relationship.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Yeah, that jumped out at me too. And her last question, should I just start over?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Yeah, and that is another reflection of that thing she said, how she needs to be more empathetic and patient.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
A hundred percent, man. And also she wants to work on her empathy and her patience. Here's your chance. All that said, though, the one thing that has to change here, this just has very few nuances for me, is the tea thing. I'm sorry. It's so gross. First of all, it's dangerous. It's inconsiderate.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
This is the one problem where I'm not going, okay, but how does your partner's stank breath make you feel? What's your pattern around three-day-old spinach in his teeth? No, he's a freaking adult. He has to brush his teeth and he shouldn't need mommy to tell him to do that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Look, this is something I would expect from maybe a 10 to 11, 12 year old boy, a rebellious 13 year old who's like, I'm going to not brush my teeth now. Even then, that comes across as immature. This is an adult man who's, I'm not going to brush my teeth. I'm too lazy. Who cares? I'm just, wow. And if you're not brushing, you're obviously not flossing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
I mean, this is just like really disgusting on so many levels.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Couch to 5K, but it's more like, just brush one tooth, and then you can stop.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Yeah, that's the thing where it's like, just put your running shoes on, and if you don't want to run, you don't have to run, but then you've already got your shoes on. Yeah, just put the toothpaste on the toothbrush. That's right. Just brush one tooth. If you don't want to brush the rest, you're off the hook.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
They're screaming. I literally don't want to talk about this anymore. It's too gross, man. If you don't brush your teeth, you need to seriously reconsider your relationship with society at large. I'm sorry, but that's the truth. So clearly, it's about more than just teeth. This is about your partner's ability and desire to care for himself. And so there's always something deeper there, I suppose.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Ah, okay. I got it. So she was just avoiding it because it would spell the end of their relationship, basically. That's what it sounds like.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Something else you can try to make room for. Proud of you for asking these big questions. Good luck. Gabe, I can't even get over it. Like, your home would smell. Your car would smell. Because once your breath is that bad, I mean, you're just, that level of bacteria is just insane. I don't know if I've been around somebody like that, but yeah, it's bad news. I have.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
And you can smell them when they walk into the room. Gum disease is no joke. It's terrible. And it causes stomach problems. I mean, it's bad for you. It causes heart problems. It's terrible. Go back and check out if you haven't yet. The best things that have happened in my life and business have come through my network, the circle of people I know, like, and trust.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
I am teaching you how to do the same thing for yourself in our six-minute networking course. It is free. It is not schmoozy or gross. It's on the Thinkific platform at sixminutenetworking.com. The drills are designed to just take a few minutes per day. It's almost the same amount of time you would spend brushing your teeth.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
For some of you, it might not work, but for the rest of us, there's sixminutenetworking.com. Build relationships before you need them. Show notes and transcripts are on the website at jordanharbinger.com. Advertisers, discounts, and ways to support the show, all at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. I'm at jordanharbinger on Twitter and Instagram. You can also connect with me on LinkedIn.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Gabe's over on Instagram at Gabriel Mizrahi or on Twitter at Gabe Mizrahi. This show is created in association with Podcast One. My amazing team is Jen Harbinger, Jace Sanderson, Robert Fogerty, Ian Baird, Tata Sidlauskas, and of course, Gabriel Mizrahi. Our advice and opinions are our own, and I am a lawyer, but I am not your lawyer.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Do your own research before implementing anything you hear on the show. Ditto Aaron Hoskins and Derek Fisher. Remember, we rise by lifting others. Share the show with those you love. If you found the episode useful, please share it with somebody else who could use the advice we gave here today. In the meantime... I hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
And we'll see you next time. And I got to go brush my teeth. I just did it, but I got to do it again. And I know I'm not alone. Join us as Adam Gamal, a Muslim Arab American and former Egyptian refugee, recounts his rise to become a key operative of one of the U.S. 's most secretive military units in this two-part podcast series.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
In part one, Adam delves into the high-stakes world of counterterrorism and covert operations, revealing the personal and ethical complexities of fighting terrorism from within the shadows.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Tune in to uncover his unique journey and critical insights only he can provide on episode 978 of The Jordan Harbinger Show. This episode is sponsored in part by What Was That Like podcast. Have you ever wondered how it feels to watch your house burn down, be attacked by an alligator, or learn that your spouse hired someone to kill you?
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1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
What Was That Like is the podcast for you, if you're that person. Not the person who got hired to be killed, but the person who wondered, more thankfully. Real people come on every episode to explain the unbelievable situations they've been through. I think it's a funny concept for a show. I kind of wish I'd thought of it because I always get crazy stories from people.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Not everything turns into a Jordan Harbinger episode. But What Was That Like? is hosted by my friend Scott Johnson, who's naturally curious and gives his guests the opportunity to share how they've really felt during some of their most surreal experiences. what they did in the morning before an earthquake, what song was playing as a gunman entered, was their stomach growling as they hid.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Guests share everything they remember about their crazy, crazy experiences. So if you want to hear some disturbing slash inspiring firsthand stories about the thoughts that go through your head while surviving a kidnapping or winning the Price is Right, What Was That Like? is the podcast you've been looking for.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Every story is thoroughly researched and fact-checked so you know even the most unreal stories are actually someone's reality. Listen to What Was That Like? wherever you get your podcasts.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Okay, so was it like...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Welcome to Feedback Friday. I'm your host, Jordan Harbinger. As always, I'm here with Feedback Friday producer, the complimentary cucumber and strawberry flavored ice water keeping you cool in this boot camp of life advice, Gabriel Mizrahi.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Oh, don't worry. Kids are distressing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Wow, it sounds like you just gave birth to triplets right there. That makes us co-parents. You're doing the diapers, that's all I'm saying. I'm not very nurturing. Fair. Look, this one's a bit sad, but I'm glad you're finally confronting this question with your partner because you're clearly on different pages here. Look, there's a lot going on here. There's the basic desire to have a child.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
There's the fact that your relationship is good in a lot of other ways. There are the qualities you guys have or don't have that would play a big role in how you raise a child, so it's complicated, but honestly, I'm not sure how much all of that other stuff matters because ultimately you know in your bones that you want a child and he pretty clearly does not want a child.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
And I don't think that anyone should have a child with a partner who isn't equally or at least similarly pumped to do something as big as this. His struggle to be nurturing, to understand and validate other people's feelings, your fear that you're gonna end up feeling like you're raising two children, those are important variables too, and they're very legitimate concerns.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
On the Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the stories, secrets, and skills of the world's most fascinating people and turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you. I meant like a fitness boot camp. You know, like you're in there about to vomit and you're like, I need some water.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Those are obviously crucial qualities in a parent. To be fair, I also know there's no such thing as a perfect parent. And even people who don't have all these qualities can still do the job pretty well sometimes. I also know that people can grow into parenthood to some degree.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
If you're a decently functioning person, seeing a person that you created kind of unlocks certain nurturing qualities that might not have been obvious before. So there's that. But in my view, these concerns of yours, they're secondary to the fact that this guy, when you told him that you knew in your bones you were being called to be a mother, said, f***.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Or potentially, f**k, which is not really the response you want from a potential co-parent. No. Yeah, I'm sorry to say that I'm just, I'm not totally sure that having children with this guy is a good idea. It sounds like it would involve you convincing him or trying really hard to convince him, maybe even pressuring him to some degree. Cajoling him, if you will. I will, exactly.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
A different kind of cajoling from the geopolitical incel, but yeah, that's a good word.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
No, you do not want to have to cajole your partner into creating another human life. The act is too special. The stakes are too high. And I'm also concerned about what that would do to your relationship. What feelings it would leave him with, both of you really, knowing he was somewhat pressured or convinced to do something he clearly has major reservations about.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Look, he might have a kid and go... Man, I'm so glad you pushed me. It's possible. But that list of concerns he has about having kids, I just, I don't see those just going away. I worry about what a guy with those reservations would have to deal with if he capitulated to having a child, kind of just to make you happy. I just don't think this is a good decision for either of you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
And most importantly, I don't think it's fair to your potential child to possibly give them a parent who isn't really that excited and on board with bringing them into the world.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
And they only have this weird concoction in the back of the room in that little cooler thing. Anyway, our mission is to help you become a better informed, more critical thinker. And during the week, we have long form conversations with a variety of amazing folks, former jihadis, drug traffickers, Fortune 500 CEOs. What's the difference?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Yeah, I'm with you, Gabe. But honestly, my sense is that this guy is a no. And when you add in those other concerning qualities, that sort of tips it for me. They're going to have to decide for themselves, of course. I'm just thinking about that last reason that she mentioned that his dad was married to a woman who wanted children, but then his dad didn't.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
So she ended up leaving him for someone else. I'm still puzzled by that, because like we said, that's not a reason not to have kids. That's just it's literally just a story about other people in his family who have wrestled with this decision. And interestingly, the outcome there was that they broke up. So if anything, that story just illustrates what he might have to give up.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Rocket scientists, four star generals, investigative journalists. On Fridays, though, we share stories, take listener letters, offer advice and generally offer new hot takes on age old themes. Before we dive in, I had a little insight this week, I suppose you could call it. I wanted to share it with you guys. So we all know that having goals is important, right?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1136: Marriage on Skids If You Can't Agree on Kids? | Feedback Friday
Or is that like a parable giving her his indirect form of communication? Yeah, they wanted to do this and then one person didn't, so they just broke up. I'm not the only guy who might stick to his guns here. Exactly. Or maybe you should have thought, I need to be very upfront with my partner about this no kids thing so I don't waste their time or mine.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
Everything you've shared, paints a picture of a remarkably difficult personality to be close with. She's combative. She's rigid. She sounds unstable if her outbursts and turbulent relationships are any indication. She's dogmatic about her beliefs. She's disrespectful. She's misattuned. I don't know how you can be consistently close with somebody like this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
She's now alienated both of her siblings as well as apparently countless other people. So it's like, at what point do you go, huh, maybe the problem is me. Except it sounds like she can't even begin to wrap her mind around that, which, like you pointed out, is kind of a hallmark of narcissism.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
Right, and those threats can be other people's opinions.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
Yep, shame, imperfection, failure, all things that might arise at deep levels.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
I'm gonna make a bold interpretation here, but I have a feeling this is probably what happened. Our friend here went, hey, your son was out of control. He kicked my daughter in the chest and he wouldn't calm down, so I spanked him. And her sister, instead of sitting with that piece of information and whatever feelings had stirred up in her, she jumped straight to, you're a child abuser.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
She escalates, she condemns, and just kind of like sends it outward. Yes, she's projecting or just deflecting hard. So given how difficult she is, There's a part of me that's going, great, you don't talk anymore? Good freaking riddance. And I'm sure there's part of you saying that too. The real tragedy, though, is that it means you can't be close with your nephew. And that just, that sucks.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
I'm sorry for both of you that you guys pay the price. But honestly, if your relationship really is beyond repair, which it sounds like it is, and being in each other's lives means exposing yourself to more accusations, to say nothing of just the rest of the crazy, then this might just be the cost of protecting yourself. And it's incredibly sad. It's incredibly painful. It's hugely disappointing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
So they would dig these holes in the clay and they had kitchens, schools, bunking areas, armories, tunnels that would go to different parts of the jungle so they could pop up in one part of a village or another part of the jungle or something like that or escape during raids and then come behind the enemy, which was us and the South Vietnamese, of course.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
But this might be one of those situations where you just can't be very close with your nephew because his mom is nuts. And you do your best to stay connected however you can. You leave the door open to a relationship. You grab little moments with him here and there when you run into each other, if you run into each other, I don't know.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
And when he's older and he has a little bit more control over his life and his relationships, you guys hopefully come back together.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
Also, I'm wondering if the son's father has visitation rights. We didn't hear anything to the contrary. I'm assuming that part of the reason they split up is because she is the way she is. So he might actually be sympathetic to you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
So another solution potentially might be staying close with your ex-brother-in-law and seeing if you can drop in on your nephew when he's with his dad every now and again. That might be a nice way around your sister.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
Yeah, right. So it either has to be a secret, which creates all these other problems, or it needs to be on the up and up. And the ex-husband just says, look, she's his aunt. I'm with them the whole time. He's safe. I'm allowing it. You don't have a choice because it's my time. But I agree. It is a lot to ask because, again, it's his time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
He might not be like, yeah, let me have your aunt hang out with you during my weekend. No. So she does have another option, though, which is to find a middle ground where her relationship with her sister is maybe not good, but still able to attend family events together, and she gets to see her nephew that way.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
It might mean she has to endure all this BS, and her sister might not encourage their relationship, but at least they won't be completely estranged.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
Look, if it's me, I'm protecting myself because as much as this nephew needs and deserves an aunt who's healthy and cool and kind and not batshit crazy like mom, the unfortunate spanking incident notwithstanding, this is not her child. And I know how infuriating it is to have to deal with an unstable family member.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
There's plenty of grief to go around for the nephew, obviously, for the sister she's lost, although it sounds like maybe that's countered by her relief. But I also think some grief for the family unit as she knew it as dysfunctional as it is. Gabe, I know this is not the main thing that she wrote in about, but we got to talk about her sister's past for a moment here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
It was crazy, and so now, those tunnels, despite it raining like crazy in Vietnam, they still exist. Some of them are maintained, some of them they dug out more, so fat-ass tourists like me can crawl through them, and they're miles and miles long. It's insane to think about.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
I am just struck by the fact that her sister is, how do you even put it delicately, she's kind of insane. She apparently creates chaos and dysfunction wherever she goes. She's driving people away. She's buying into highly questionable, dumb political conspiracies and inflicting them on other people even when they ask her not to.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
So it sounds like she's getting their mom worked up also, converting her to her side. The list of problems just goes on and on. But whenever you scratch the surface of personalities like this, you almost always find unresolved trauma. And bam, when I was wondering what happened to this woman, you get to this part about this incredibly dark thing that happened to her. And I was like, oh, dang it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
Now I got to empathize with this person because she's seriously wounded and that was not her fault. Okay. And that kind of complicates the picture of how much agency she really has to some degree.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
Yeah. Hot eight doesn't have that one.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
Of course. But she's not doing any of that from the sound of it. And it doesn't even sound like she even sees herself as the problem.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
Yeah. That's another detail that gives me pause, whether that phone call happened or not.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
It's really nuts, and you can go in there, and of course, there's also stuff in there that you don't wanna find, like weird bugs and snakes. But you can go in these tunnels. They're just unbelievable. This tunnel complex is just absolutely insane. They had their own water supplies. They ran electricity in there. It was just absolutely crazy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
It's really interesting you put it that way, because I'm still thinking about her attraction to conspiracy theories. We know that one of the big appeals of conspiracy theories is that they give people a sense of control.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
On the Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the stories, secrets, and skills of the world's most fascinating people and turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you. Our mission is to help you become a better informed, more critical thinker.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
And if her sister has felt out of control for most of her life, which I'm guessing she has, perhaps since the abuse, but possibly even before that, I can imagine it would be quite comforting to her to feel... I know how the world really works. I see through the charade. I'm unplugged from the matrix.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
I have access to all the right information and the true beliefs that I get off of Q, Twitter or whatever. And that makes me feel like I have a solid place in the world.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
Yeah, solidarity. Look at all these flat earth people that go to conferences and stuff and they sell T-shirts and they find other people that are also like neckbeardy basement dwellers.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
Yeah, my, I hate using this word, but I'm going to do it. Spidey senses went off there as well.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
Yeah. So, Gabe, every time we hear the phrase keep the peace in a Feedback Friday letter, I'm always like, OK, something's off here. Something's getting swept under the rug.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
Anyway, I went there, and I just got so into it that the guide, who in the beginning told me how much he hated Americans, was actually like, hey, if you pay me like 40 extra dollars, I'll take you on a really cool hike. And I was like, are you going to kill me in the jungle? He's like, actually, the North Vietnamese killed my family. So I hate the Vietnamese as much as I hate the Americans.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
Which is another way of saying, in a way that benefits her.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
Not just lie, okay? She wants her to commit perjury, which is, by the way, a frickin' felony in most places.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
No, they're absolutely related.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
Look, let's also remember that their mom allowed the sister, her husband, and her child to move into this small home after they sold their house, even though they had proceeds from the sale.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
Yeah, that's just odd and strikes me as somebody who wants to live around and control the family. Anyway, when she had surgery, it was our friend here who was apparently left to care for both kids while also managing the household, which is also completely unfair.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
Now that we're digging into it, I do wonder if maybe her feelings about her sister might have been building for some time and it just all came out in the spanking. Not that she intended to take it out on her nephew or anything. It doesn't sound like that's her nature from this letter alone.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
But when the son of the woman driving you absolutely nuts kicks your daughter, there's some stank on that spank.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
I always think about this. When I hear, like, such and such elites have a cabal that's trafficking children in order to regain their youth, I'm kind of like, well, that's dumb. But I would imagine, let's imagine that you're a sexual abuse survivor of a powerful person in your community who runs the local church or something like that. They've abused a bunch of kids there.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
He's a complicated dude, but he was a little bit older than me, only a little. And his English was awesome. So he would tell me these really sick stories and be like, are you having a good time? And I'm like, I don't know about good time, but yeah. But that is the tour guide you want.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
And, of course, it was really disgusting, but maybe there was egregious... Additional things happening, who knows? And then you go through that life-changing, traumatic experience. And suddenly you find the internet has a community of warriors that are decoding secret messages from a secret government agent on Twitter or whatever BSQ drops are.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
And it's, oh my gosh, I can maybe save someone else from going through this thing that I went through, not really being emotionally intelligent or just regularly intelligent enough to realize that it's complete crock of shit. And you go, aha, okay, this is where I find my community. This is where I find people who are as upset and fired up about this as me.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
And so you play into it because now you feel like you're doing something, not to mention, It sounds like her sister's life is a mess, right? Multiple ex-husbands getting kicked out of churches.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
So her being able to figure out the puzzles, which is what Q-drops are, they're like riddles that people try to figure out together or whatever online, trying to figure that out and then having some measure of success because, of course, they just make up whatever thing they think happened in the Q-drop, that's a lot easier than figuring out why your life is a total frickin' disaster. So I get it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
Oh, we figured out what Q was saying about the pedophile Epstein Island child trafficking, Zelensky missile, you know, whatever, like the stupid lines they connect between the dots that don't exist. That's a lot easier than like, why can't I keep a husband? That's a lot easier to figure out.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
Right. Why is my life a complete disaster and always has been? That's a tough one. Figuring out what a tweet means with a zillion other idiots chiming in about other things, that's a lot more interesting and probably a little bit easier.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
Exactly. Not to mention, everybody with two brain cells or three firing neurons or whatever... They know that Q Anon stuff is dumb. We mercilessly mock these people for good reason. She feels mercilessly attacked in other areas of her life. She can definitely relate to, sure, join the Q thing and get mercilessly attacked by other people outside again.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
He was a little bit like messed up. Like he wanted me to suffer. Clearly. Telling me how Americans died in gruesome ways and stuff. He showed me these pits where they would take like sharpened bamboo and put leaves over it. So when you're walking, you fall into it and you just bleed to death in this like pit. And so he showed me some of these old pits that still existed.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
They're all trying to sabotage us because they don't want Q and us to find out the truth about the pedophile cabal of elite Jews or whatever the hell Q talks about. That's just another sort of shade of what her actual real life really is, according to her. Everyone's sabotaging me, even my own sister's in on it, yada yada. So it all makes sense. It's pathetic in many ways.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
And a person who had handled their trauma and probably been a little bit more intelligent would have handled this differently. But it's not impossible for me to get there in my head about why somebody in her shoes believes in this crap. Anyway, fascinating. And like I said, so much going on in this letter. And I'm really sorry that you're going through all this with your family.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
I also think that a lot of it, most of it really, except for the decision to spank your nephew that morning, most of it is not your fault. And it is not really under your control. least of all your sister's weirdo personality and her way of dealing with stuff.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
So this does feel like a situation where you probably won't get everything you want, your peace and your relationship with your nephew, and you're now in a process of acceptance and mourning, essentially. And I think that process is gonna be painful at times. I also think it'll be liberating, given how difficult your sister is. I couldn't deal with somebody like this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
But it is objectively sad that you and your nephew won't get to be as close. It's sad for both of you, but I especially feel for him because he could really use the friendship of somebody who is not nuts. I mean, imagine having that as a mom. That sucks. My hope is that you guys find your way back to each other when it's safer and that you get to be an awesome aunt to him in due time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
Sending you and your nephew a big hug and wishing you all the best. All right, now I'm going to hit you with some stanky spanking good deals on the fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back. Thank you so much for listening to and supporting the show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
All the deals, discount codes, and ways to support the podcast are all searchable and clickable over at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. Please consider supporting those who support the podcast. All right, now back to Feedback Friday. Okay, next up.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
They don't have the sticks. They're just like a little washed out holes now. And he's like, this is a punji pit or whatever they're called. And so I would be walking around and he's like, there's landmines around the outside. So don't go too far, but you can walk here and ask me if you're not sure.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
She's teaching 100 kids a day in the hallway. I can't even wrap my mind around that. How are you teaching in the hallway?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
So I was walking around with this guy for a few hours and I found a Zippo lighter in the dirt, clay, whatever. And It's so weird because on the front it has, it's not quite a coin, but it's glued on or welded on. And it says US, U.S. So it's clearly military. And then on the back is Mickey Mouse driving a little car, which is so weird because it's totally out of place.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
I got to say, no wonder this person's a fan of Feedback Friday, because when you hear the stuff that goes on in other people's lives, maybe teaching in the hallway is not as bad, but this is bad. And first of all, look, I am really sorry you're going through it right now. Everything you're describing is very troubling and very intense.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
And I am sorry to hear that it's taking such an emotional toll on you. I can hear how demoralized and disenchanted and frustrated you are right now. I know so many teachers are feeling the same way. My heart goes out to you. It really does. I think a lot of people probably know this. My mom was a teacher. She was a special ed teacher. She had a lot of these same gripes in the 80s and 90s.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
I remember her being like, can you believe they're making me teach in this way with this thing and this resources or lack of resources or they're making me do this? And it was bad then. That was 30 years ago, man.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
So I'm guessing that the feeling of being disempowered and stuck, in some ways, that's the worst part, because being in a crappy environment, dealing with the normal challenges of teaching, that's one thing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
But feeling like you aren't making the impact you want to make, you're being held to what sounds like literally impossible standards, and then feeling like you can't even leave, that's just a whole other layer of unhappiness. So it's an interesting question. Are you truly stuck from a practical perspective? In a way, yes, you are.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
It sounds to me like you have some very good reasons to stick out your final six years. The pension, the health benefits, the ability to retire and not work again if you don't want to, especially given that your husband needs your benefits too. I'm not saying you can't leave. You're obviously welcome to, but like you said, given the way they calculate your benefits, it's a risky move.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
And you're 50, and I'm guessing you don't want to spend 10 years instead of six years just to be able to teach in a classroom with freaking walls that might or might not be meaningfully any better than where you are now. And I know it's depressing to make major life decisions based on dollars and cents alone, but man, that stuff matters. You have to take care of yourself.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
You have to do what's right for you and your family. This might not have been your true calling, but yeah, it's your career. And you've invested a significant amount of time into it. You're blessed to be able to enjoy these generous benefits upon retirement. So I don't think...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
that surrendering to this objectively tough situation is the worst thing in the world, although stuck and trapped might not be the most helpful words to use. Obligated or responsible or committed might be friendlier ones. Look, I'm not trying to hit you with simple cute reframe here, like just use different words and your life will change.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
I know no matter what adjective I use, it's not gonna reduce your classroom size. It's not gonna get you a proper freaking classroom with actual walls. One thing I don't understand, Gabriel, My high school went under construction one year and they put a bunch of trailers in the field out back in the parking lot. And we just had some classes in these kind of like construction-y trailer.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
Because I remember we thought, this is so ghetto. I can't believe we're in a trailer. But it was like, all right, at least we had walls. Anyway, I do think the story you tell here, it does matter. Because you can spend the next six years at this school only feeling stuck and only feeling trapped.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
Or you can spend them feeling committed to sticking out your time to enjoy the significant benefits you want to enjoy that you deserve. Or you can make room for both stories. And the language we use, I know it sounds a little hokey sometimes, but it does play a big role in which story we lead with and how difficult that story is to live with day to day.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
We talk about this a decent amount on the show. You can either show up to your job angry and bitter that it's so dysfunctional, which, by the way, is totally warranted.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
It's hand etched, you can tell. And then below that, also hand etched, which just haunts my dreams, says, we are the unwilling, led by the unqualified, to do the unthinkable for the ungrateful. Isn't that just... Wow. So an American left it behind and you found it. So left it behind is interesting, right? Because I have this lighter in my possession and I'm like, why did he drop it?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
I'm not saying you don't have good reasons for being frustrated, but you can either show up angry and bitter or you can show up gracious and grateful that you have this job that's gonna take care of you for the rest of your natural life and just do your best.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
So from a mental, emotional perspective, I'm not so sure you're stuck because the narrative you embrace, the mindset you bring to work, that can liberate you. You can be teaching 20 students in the hallway, you can be telling yourself, I'm doing my best in a deeply flawed system, and one day this system is gonna allow me and my husband to take care of ourselves.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
You can be in a meeting with your principal where he's laying out impossible standards and you can say to yourself, I'm not gonna get twisted up in knots about these impossible standards, I'm just gonna do my best and thank you, school system, for rewarding me for this unending torrent of BS and stress, that kind of thing. So honestly, yes, I am leaning toward biding your time, trying your best,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
Take mental health days. You got plenty of PTO, I would imagine, as a teacher. Use that-ish and suck it up for a few more years. I hate that this is the answer, but that's really where I'm falling on this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
Yeah, or the answer might be building this Etsy side hustle. If you spend a few hours a week investing in that, who knows where that could lead? Maybe having a fun little house plan or custom mug business. Maybe that'll give you just enough gratification to cope with the next six years. By the way, I don't know, Gabriel, if you've noticed that I am drinking out of my fancy not your lawyer mug.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
Yeah, I hope so. What I love most about this, not just that it says not your lawyer, but that it holds like a straight up liter of coffee. The only thing it's missing is an intravenous tube for me to shoot it directly into my veins. That's the only thing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
Agreed, Gabe. And I would argue that finding that meaning isn't just a coping strategy. It's an essential part of her job just as a human being. Because look, she's counting down the days until she can retire so she can be free of all this. But when she retires, then what? She's still going to have to find meaning in her life.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
And there's nothing stopping her from investing in those sources of meaning starting now. which could help her get through the next six years and set her up to thrive in retirement. I am very sorry that you're going through this crisis. I'm sorry that our school system is so dysfunctional. It makes me really sad that thoughtful teachers like you are suffering so much.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
But I also feel that there are ways to work with that suffering, to meet these frustrations in a way that leads to better outcomes. That's your job now. And I know it'll help you get through the next six years and beyond. Sending you a big hug and wishing you and your students all the best. You can reach us Friday at jordanharbinger.com. Please keep your emails concise.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
Or was he killed and it was left behind? Did he get startled and a sniper shot rang out over his head and he dropped it because he was lighting a cigarette and he ran? Did he get shot and die right there and that's why he dropped it and they removed the body but they didn't find the lighter because it was in the dirt? Is he still alive right now?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
Use descriptive subject lines. That makes our job a lot easier.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
So if you know somebody who's stuck experiencing psychosis after giving birth, you're stuck co-parenting with a dangerous ex, or your partner's insisting on going to naked parties in order to advance his career, whatever's got you staying up at night lately, even if it's not as dramatic as all that, we like those more mundane questions too. Hit us up Friday at jordanharbinger.com.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
And during the week, we have long form conversations with a variety of amazing folks, such as organized crime figures, cold case homicide investigators, gold smugglers or astronauts. On Fridays, though, we take listener letters, offer advice, compare Gabe to various ad hoc solutions to mundane everyday problems, while also subjecting you guys to multiple takes of our stupid little bits, apparently.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
We're here to help, and we keep every email anonymous. What the hell was the naked parties in order to advance the career? What was that?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
By the way, if you haven't signed up yet, come check out our newsletter, We Bit Wiser. It is essentially a bite-sized gem from a past episode from us to you, delivered right to your inbox once a week. If you want to keep up with the wisdom from our thousand-plus episodes and apply it to your life, I invite you to come check it out. It's a great companion to the show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
JordanHarbinger.com slash news is where you can find it. Okay, what's next?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
Welcome to Feedback Friday. I'm your host, Jordan Harbinger. As always, I'm here with Feedback Friday producer, the sugar in the raw packet, evening out the wonky leg of this tabletop with savory life conundra, Gabriel Mizrahi.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
And it's like, is he alive now? Did he die of cancer from Agent Orange? Did he die of lung cancer? Because I guess he smoked. So many questions. That is an incredible artifact. Yes, I kept it. My mom was like, should I get rid of this? You don't need lighters. And I was like, ah, that one I'm keeping.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
Oh, man, what a tough situation this is. First of all, I am so deeply sorry that your daughter struggles in this way. This is a lot for one person to go through. Between the mom stuff and the psychiatric stuff and the personality stuff, it just sounds like there's many layers to your daughter. She has some powerful gifts and also some profound challenges, and my heart really does go out to her.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
Obviously, though, my heart also breaks for you and your new partner and your sons because... Well, being in contact with a family member like this is really hard. You don't need me to tell you that. I can't even imagine what it's like to care for somebody who's suffering in this way, to not feel like what you're doing is even helping. And it really does sound like you're doing so much right here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
You're meeting her with a lot of love, a lot of patience, a lot of resources. This is really hard. But what's especially tough about your story is that you guys are at an interesting crossroads with your daughter. She's 16 years old. She's still very young. She obviously needs help. But in a couple years, she's going to be an adult, legally speaking, anyway.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
And she does have some degree of responsibility to engage with her care and relate to you guys in the most helpful way possible. You have a lot of data about your daughter now. You know that she has a disorder, that she's defiant, difficult, manipulative, that she might not be getting better. And a lot of that is out of your control. But you also can't give up on her. She's still your child.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
She still needs and deserves your love and your support. So again, this is really hard. You're kind of on the precipice of a new phase with her. And how things go over the next year or two is probably going to tell you a lot about how to engage with your daughter long term.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
So we wanted to run all of this by an expert, and we reached out to Dr. Aaron Margolis, clinical psychologist and friend of the show. I'm also known to the people who know me the best. And the first thing that Dr. Margolis said was, if your daughter is being medicated, if she's going to therapy and she's not getting better, she might need more comprehensive or involved treatment.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
And I put a new sort of innard in it because the one that was in there, I remember, was just like completely not usable, dirty and washed out and rusty. But I paid someone to clean it up because I was like, oh, this is a mess. So this guy like brushed it off. And I don't know if he used chemicals, but it looks pretty good. You can tell it's old, but it looks pretty good.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
You mentioned this super expensive residential program. I get why that's not an option, but those are not the only residential treatment centers out there. Dr. Margolis said it's worth doing more research on your options because there are almost certainly places out there that are more affordable and or that insurance would actually cover.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
Your daughter's been diagnosed with at least two disorders and has a history of self-harm and threats to others. So if this kind of treatment is indicated for her recovery, then Dr. Margolis said that you could very well get this covered by insurance. You might need to get a psychiatrist on board or get a doctor to refer your daughter in order for your insurance to cover it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
You'll probably have to work with the system a little bit, but there are much more affordable options out there. You don't need to send her to some bougie treatment center overlooking the ocean in Malibu where they do yoga three times a day and they have a chef or whatever. There are so many other effective options out there. And they don't all have to be residential either.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
Maybe there are outpatient programs or therapies or groups focused on people with bipolar disorder or ASD or other personality stuff.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
That's a really good question. I'm not sure. Maybe it is. But I'm just so curious what caused that guy to drop that, especially in that area. It's like, is he still alive? So if that's your lighter, or your grandpa's lighter... And if anybody has any insight to what the Mickey Mouse driving a little car would be, because they deliberately put that there.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
I thought that was a really important point as well. I also thought it was interesting when Dr. Margolis said that consistency, that commitment, it's compatible with having boundaries because you also have to protect yourself here and your partner and your two sons. There are a few responsibilities here and they sometimes compete.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
The responsibility to be a steady, loving presence for your daughter, the responsibility to keep your house relatively safe mentally, emotionally for the rest of your family.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
So part of the process that you're in with your daughter is communicating to her and showing her through your actions. I love you. I'm here for you. I'm not going anywhere. While you also communicate that there are things you find really painful and perhaps might not tolerate anymore.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
Whether it's her yelling at you guys to F off all the time or not engaging fully with her treatment or blaming you for all of her problems, whatever those boundaries are, those are for you to decide. But Dr. Margolis also pointed out, you can set all the boundaries in the world and your daughter might still trample all over them. She might continue to cause you guys pain and chaos.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
And that's when she shared something really helpful with us, which is... Boundaries aren't always about what you need someone else to do. They're about what you yourself will do if someone doesn't honor the boundary that you've set. So you can't stop somebody from speaking to you a certain way, right? But if they do speak to you a certain way, then it's up to you to decide what to do.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
Do you challenge them on it? Do you ask them to leave? Do you remove yourself from the situation? Do you not engage with them the way that you used to? This is what all boundaries are ultimately about because we know that a lot of people don't honor boundaries. Some people can't even really appreciate boundaries.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
So when we say, hey, that's not cool, no more of that, Dr. Margolis' point is that we're really talking to ourselves and we're really saying, okay, self, this is not cool. We don't want any more of that. What are we gonna do if that happens again and how do we stand by that commitment?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
So as you continue to find the right stance with your daughter, it's worth asking yourself how you'll respond to your daughter in the future if she acts in a way that doesn't meet your standards, doesn't meet your expectations, and your desire to protect your wife and your sons.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
Maybe you say, hey, look, I'm happy to talk to you, but I'm not gonna talk to you when you behave like this, so let's try again when you're more grounded. Or maybe when she blames you for her mood or something, she did, you can say, I can hear that you're angry and I get it, but I'm not going to take all this on myself. There are two of us in this relationship. You're 16.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
I'm asking you to look at the role you played in this latest event. And if you want to talk again in a different way after, I'm here for that. Or whatever version of that works for you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
It's not like this was a Disney-themed Zippo lighter. Somebody etched that in there. We are the unwilling, led by the unqualified, to do the unthinkable for the ungrateful. Is that something that people said? Was that a common refrain or is that a poem that this guy himself wrote? I don't know.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
And by the way, a lot of those resources are actually free, low cost or donation based. So they're actually very accessible.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
One book that comes up again and again is Stop Walking on Eggshells. It's primarily about borderline personality disorder, which does seem to have some overlap with what you described about your daughter. But even if that's not what's going on with her, I still think this book will be very helpful in defining your relationship with her, defusing arguments, protecting yourself.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
Again, I am so sorry that you and your family are going through this, but you're meeting her with a lot of love, a lot of steadiness, a lot of generosity, which is incredible. And you're also learning about the limits of your ability, which is equally important. And long-term, I do think that will be a profound part of your process with her and your personal growth, psychologically, spiritually.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
And my hope is that it allows you to have the most peaceful and high-functioning family possible. Sending you, your daughter, your sons, your partner, the whole family, really, a big hug. And big thanks to Dr. Margolis for her wisdom and advice on this one. Dr. Margolis is seeing patients in Los Angeles and virtually throughout California.
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You can learn more about her and her approach at DrErinMargolis.com. Or just kill her. With kindness, of course, by giving her some of the fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back.
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If you liked this episode of Feedback Friday and found our advice valuable, I invite you to do what other smart and considerate listeners do, which is take a moment and support our amazing sponsors. All of the deals, discount codes, and ways to support the show are all searchable and clickable over at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. Our AI chat bot can also surface promo codes.
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That's over at jordanharbinger.com slash AI. And if that doesn't work, you can email us, jordan at jordanharbinger.com. Someone will dig up that code for you. It is that important that you support those who support the show. Now, back to Feedback Friday. All right, and now for the recommendation of the week.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
My recommendation of the week is using AI in your everyday life. Learning how to use AI and prompt is basically learning how to use Yahoo back in 1995. In five years, if you can't do this, you're gonna be way behind and largely clueless about how the internet works in many ways. ChatGPT, it's like 20 bucks a month for a regular kind of hefty account.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
There's a free tier, I'm not sure what the limits are, but we have the $20 a month one and we basically just use it instead of Google now. There are also services like Poe and others that I think are just free. But this is very much the future. And soon it'll be as essential and commonplace as email and Google search.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
This is not like cryptocurrency where it's like Bitcoin's going to replace the dollar. I was never that guy. I'm still not that guy. But this is something that will replace cryptocurrency. internet search for people who are still using things like Yahoo, Google, whatever. This is just, it's so much more useful.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
And if you don't believe me, when you use Google, do you read the AI summary that shows up at the top? I know not everyone has this, but this is what convinced me. I was using Google and I was like, oh, I use ChatGPT for some things. And my wife only uses ChatGPT
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
And then I found myself just reading the AI summary that Google was giving me, and I thought, why am I using Google's version of this when I can use ChatGPT's version of this, which is much more comprehensive, and then I can ask follow-up questions, which you cannot do on Google. So it just became so obvious that this was the switch I needed to make.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
But that's the internet. I'm going to drive to the library and look up the answers to these questions. That was a big lift. But looking at 20 sources on Google is harder, but we're so used to it because it's still quite easy. You're doing it from your phone. There's a lot of small tasks that Jen does that I'm like, oh, that's a good idea.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
She used to be like, how do I word this email so it's not rude, but still gets you off the hook for this thing that you don't want to do? And she doesn't ask me that anymore. She asks chat GPT and it gives her an email. She tailors one or two sentences and boom, done.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
That's right. I searched for a lot of health stuff because I had that operation and the complications resulting from it. And so I didn't want to just get like the dumbest, easiest answer. And so I wanted sources. And I wish I'd known about that earlier because there were some things that ChatGPT told me that were quite alarming.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
And I researched that stuff with Google and found out that it wasn't true. And I bet if I turned on sources, it would be like either no source or it's like, the New York Post has a story of one guy 30 years ago that this happened to, so maybe this can happen to you. And it's like, no, that was just some made-up BS, actually. So yeah, AI for the win, man. Chat GPT, just use it instead of Google.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
That's the new move. Use it instead of Yahoo or whatever search you're using and get in the habit of it. And it's getting better very rapidly, but also you'll get better at asking it the precise questions and follow-up questions that you need to get good answers. And that's the future, folks.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
Also, in case you didn't know, there's a subreddit for our show if you want to jump into discussions with other listeners about specific episodes. It's over at Jordan Harbinger on the Jordan Harbinger subreddit. Of course, a lot of cool conversations happening over there, a meme thread that's funny, and just a lot of horsing around, which I think is a lot of fun. All right, next up.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
Yeah, I'm glad you did. It's a good opportunity to appreciate that both men and women are capable of really awful stuff. Even though the data shows women are more likely to experience severe physical violence and sexual violence than men, although I recently read that the data on emotional abuse is much more complicated.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
When it comes to psychological harm, that's more evenly distributed between genders, which is interesting, if not predictable, I suppose. But either way, if you're a man and you're in a relationship like this, and I actually, I remember us talking about this at some point, it's often harder to recognize this behavior as abuse. It's harder to ask for help from people.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
It's just as hard sometimes for men to admit that they're being victimized because generally speaking, our threshold for this stuff can be higher and it can be shameful for men to admit that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
Yeah, 100%, man. For me, this is a really great illustration of how crucial our relationships are. I feel like I've been saying this a lot lately, the past, I don't know, 18 years or so, so I'm sorry to repeat myself, but when I talk about digging the well before you're thirsty, it's not just about work stuff. We need good people around us to stay informed, to stay safe, to see ourselves clearly.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
What would have happened to this guy if that friend hadn't said, dude, this is abuse. You need to get out. If his friends hadn't been there for him, it's kind of scary to think about.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
Yeah, Mickey Mouse is driving this thing, kind of. Clearly that guy was not a huge fan of his leadership, given the palm or whatever on the back.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
For sure. My theory is that his ex knew that she needed to chip away at his sources of support and get everyone on her side in order to keep him in her orbit.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
Corollary, by the way. And if you're the abuser, the flip side- Do you really say it that way?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
It's true. I did. That's maybe what I get the term. My time in the old country. So, look, if you're the abuser, the flip side of this is drain someone else as well so that they become thirsty. The other thing I find very touching about this letter is when he said that hearing other people's stories on the show has helped him feel less alone.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
It just really captures one of the things that I love about our show family and why telling stories is so powerful. To read something or hear something and feel less alone. To learn from other people who are walking a similar path. That is one of the greatest experiences that we can have.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
All the more so when it helps somebody like our friend here who's coming out of 16 years of this kind of abuse.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
No, for me too, absolutely. Anyway, this feels like it became a little bit of a plug for our show, which is not our intention, but this listener was gracious enough to mention the role we played in this, and that means a lot. And I know you weren't asking a question here, just sharing your story, but if I can slip in one piece of advice here, and this is for everyone listening.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
surround yourself with good people. Invest in them, open up to them, let your relationships take good care of you, and do the same for them. Make that a little resolution for yourself this year. And a big part of that is share parts of yourself, be vulnerable, tell your story, because look what can happen when you do, and when you allow other people to help you see your own story more clearly.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
I'm sorry you went through all this, man. I'm so glad you got out. That must have taken a lot of courage, a lot of trust, a lot of conviction in your own experience. Kind of a theme on today's episode and also a lot of confidence in your ability to rebuild your life. And I am super proud of you for that. Sending you a big hug and wishing you all the best. 6-Minute Networking.com
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1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
advertisers, deals, discounts, ways to support the show at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. I'm at jordanharbinger on both Twitter and Instagram. You can also connect with me on LinkedIn. Gabe's over on Instagram, Gabriel Mizrahi, or on Twitter at Gabe Mizrahi. This show is created in association with Podcast One.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
My team is Jen Harbinger, Jace Sanderson, Robert Fogerty, Ian Baird, Tadas Sidlauskas, and of course, Gabriel Mizrahi. Our advice and opinions are our own, and I'm a lawyer, but I'm not your lawyer, as evidenced by this mug that I'm holding in my hand here. So do your own research before implementing anything you hear on the show.
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Dr. Margolis's input is general psychological information based on research and clinical experience. It's intended to be general and informational in nature. It does not represent or indicate an established clinical or professional relationship with those inquiring for guidance. Remember, we rise by lifting others.
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Share the show with those you love, and if you found the episode useful, please share it with somebody else who could use the advice we gave here today. In the meantime, I hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn, and we'll see you next time. which gives cash with no strings attached.
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To learn why cash charity is best and what's wrong with foreign aid, check out episode 867 of The Jordan Harbinger Show.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
Ah, okay. That makes sense. It doesn't seem like a Disney thing to be like, let's get Mickey Mouse offed by the Viet Cong.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
Yeah, fascinating. I'm still curious about that poem, or if you can call it that. I'm so curious about that. So if anybody has any insight there, I am all ears. As always, we've got some fun ones and some punji pits, and I'm excited to dive in. Gabe, what's the first thing out of the mailbag?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
So, welcome to the first show of the year. Hope 2025 is off to a great start for all of you. This is another year full of joy and growth and healthy challenges and all that good stuff. Thank you for continuing to spend your Fridays with us. We really do hope to make your year as rich and entertaining and productive as possible, if that's your goal.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
I'm not a big believer in spanking, as we've talked about before, and research shows that it just doesn't work that well. I know people disagree, I always get emails about it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
There are simply much better ways to discipline children, but if your sister literally gave you permission to do this, and you didn't go overboard with the spanking, although the fact that you left a mark does make me wonder if it was a bit much, but if she said, yeah, you can do that if I'm not around, and you did it after your nephew did something objectively not okay, I mean, he physically hurt your daughter,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
It does sound absurd for her to turn around and then call you a child abuser, especially if there's no history of this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
So Gabe, I was cleaning out some old boxes over the holidays, and I came across a Zippo lighter. I used to love Zippos when I was in high school and college. I don't know why.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
Yes, she is. This is interesting. So there's a pattern of this that seems to stretch back a ways from the sound of it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
Churches have notoriously gotten away with a lot of egregious stuff. You have to elbow an old lady in the face because she cut the communion line. If you can't behave yourself at church, imagine what a nightmare you must be in the outside world. Jesus literally looking down on you from above, hanging off the cross, and you're like, take that, Edith, you old bag. It's my cracker.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
Okay. So that was a thing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
And you like learn that trick where you put two fingers on top and the thumb on the bottom, it goes bling and it flips open and it's like magic. Like you're a pool hustler in the 80s. Totally. Yes. Like me and James Dean just hang out regularly. Anyway, I came across this Zippo lighter that I found in Vietnam in the jungle while I was walking around with a guide near the tunnels that they have.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
Oh man, this is mental illness. This has nothing to do with politics. This is a conspiracy theory and some kind of mind virus. This is just not political. Once you start believing in all this kooky stuff, it's crazy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
Yeah, okay, that's actually helpful data. So it's not just you who's having problems with your sister. And again, she sounds like a bit of a nightmare. Although I know that people who really buy into conspiracy theories are generally scared, actually. They're vulnerable deep down, so I guess we need to have some compassion for her.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
You don't normally meet people whose lives are working out really well for them, and they believe, I don't know, Jewish space lasers caused the fires in Maui. That's not something that normal, sane people who have things going on believe. But man, what a tough sibling to have. So hard. Especially since she lives with your mother, with whom I presume you still want a relationship.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
Yeah, fascinating, first of all. Well, I have to think that helps explain why she is the way she is. So she has some serious trauma, although I almost hate myself for saying this, Gabe. When somebody believes that martial law is going to happen and that whatever sort of celebrity that they idolize is actually a prophet from God, all these other kooky QAnon things...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
I kind of don't believe anything else that they say, which is really not doing this woman any favors. So it's hard to say, is her craziness caused by the trauma because of the abuse? Or is the abuse also like some weird thing that she made up in her head?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
It sounds like the high profile case was high profile because it was a scandal that was obviously true.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
Boy, what a cluster. What a sister and what a family. So, man, first of all, I'm very sorry that things have played out in this way with your sister and your nephew. Like I said, I am not a fan of corporal punishment of any kind myself. Obviously, there is a huge difference between lightly slash moderately spanking a kid once with his mother's permission after he'd beat up somebody else, whatever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
Some of those tunnels that the Viet Cong dug. Do you know about these? I mean, I've heard loosely, but tell me. So for people who don't know, the Viet Cong, one of the ways they evaded the U.S. government was everything they could, they did it underground, literally.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1098: Sanctioned Spank Sparks Sibling Split | Feedback Friday
and being a full-blown child abuser. I know we only have your story to go on here, but it just doesn't sound like this is who you are. There isn't a pattern of this behavior, despite your sister accusing you of abusing her randomly. So this accusation really does sound hyperbolic. It's like it's designed to accomplish something for her. And this is a really tough sibling to have, really tough.
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1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
This episode is sponsored in part by Vital Proteins. If you wanna support your skin, hair, nails, joints, and bones without adding another complicated step to your routine, check out Vital Proteins Collagen Peptides. Collagen is like the glue that holds everything together in your body. It's a big deal.
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1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
That's a good point, because right now, confronting dad seems like his only real option for healing. Just like not confronting dad seems like his only real option for making sure he and his family are financially secure. So his choice here is very binary. And I'm not saying he's necessarily wrong about either of those. Both might be true to some extent. But what you're getting at, Gabe, is...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
What is he investing in these options? Why do they mean what they mean to him? Because that is at least somewhat under his control. Does that make sense? He gets to decide what significance these decisions have for him, at least emotionally.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
That is right. Yeah, that's ironic. He's either giving him the power to rescue him from financial insecurity and relief from being a quote unquote loser talent void, which is such a hard thing to say about yourself, dude. You should probably stop talking like that. Or he's giving him the power to resolve his anger and his sadness about the abuse, which kind of like neither.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Does he have the power to do that? Gabe, what do you think?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
No, I know. And that's why he was getting abused by his employer, because it's the only game in town where you can get paid for catching birds at Costco or whatever. All right, on the Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the stories, secrets, and skills of the world's most fascinating people and turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you.
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1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
This theme of power is really important here. His father had all the power growing up, physically, emotionally, all the ways. And the abuse he went through, that disempowered him greatly in adulthood. And I think we're hearing that. Yeah, it's fascinating. What he probably really wants deep down is to reclaim his agency in so many ways.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
By approaching this dilemma in such a binary way, he's undermining that power.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Which could begin by putting this conversation with his dad on hold for a moment and doing a little bit of work closer to home.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
My strong hunch is that if he processed more of this pain and stepped into a new relationship with his past, with himself, with his career, with everything really, that itself might be the healing that he's looking for. And that would automatically change the equation when it comes to his dad. I can't tell you how you're gonna feel or what you're gonna need. You know best.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
You're gonna have to find out for yourself. But I do know that the stakes of this decision about your dad, they're just gonna feel very different when you feel different. Both options are legitimate. Both options are gonna get you different things.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Although I would really take a moment to think through what they're gonna get you and what your expectations are, which outcomes are more important to you. But whatever you decide, know that this conversation will never be a substitute for doing this important work yourself. And I'm really sorry that you've been through all this, but it's very tragic, very intense.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
But I also know that this difficult childhood has brought you to this moment. You're kind of on the brink of discovering some really profound stuff yourself and potentially charting a new course. So I would lean into that. And I know you'll make the right call. Sending you and your daughter a big hug and wishing you all the best.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
But once we hit our 30s, our natural supply starts to dip, and yeah, you might start feeling a little creaky. Notice your skin and hair just aren't what they used to be. Daily collagen supplementation can help with skin, joints, hair, nails. Vital Proteins is the number one collagen peptides brand in the US, so they know what they're doing. It's super easy to take.
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1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
And if you end up getting cut out of the will, then you'll definitely need the deals and discounts on the fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back. This episode is sponsored in part by No Story Lost. Ever thought of turning your parents' or loved ones' incredible stories into a stunning coffee table book? Meet No Story Lost. This is not a run-of-the-mill DIY project.
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1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Our mission is to help you become a better informed, more critical thinker. During the week, we have long-form conversations with a variety of amazing folks from war correspondents and neuroscientists astronauts and national security advisors. This week, we had the one and only Ed Helms of The Office and The Hangover fame. He was really a lot of fun. I got to do that one in person.
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1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
We tried it out for my mom, and I have to say, I am blown away. And I don't say that about many things. This is like the Rolls Royce of a personal storybook creation. No need to nag your folks to jot down their memories. No Story Lost lays out the red carpet. They handle everything. interviewing them with a professional writer. They write really well. They edit it really well.
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1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
They organize family photos and they bind everything into a gorgeous hardcover book. They don't just like sort of print it off. It's customized with your color scheme of choice. Watching my mom pour over her life story, her eyes wide, big smile on her face, reliving all those precious moments. She actually said, I'm excited to read this. Who knew I was so interesting? I mean, really,
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1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
This is priceless. She even joked that she likes herself even more now that she's read it. And I really just she meant it. It was amazing. And the best part is no story lost can create a book in just three months. This is not a heavy lift, especially for your loved one.
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1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
They're so confident you'll adore it that they back it up with a solid guarantee that you fall in love with the book or they make it right or give you your money back. How is that for top notch service?
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1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
This episode is also sponsored by Aura Frames. We all know the number one thing your mom wants is for you to call her. And yeah, you should call her. But this Mother's Day, step it up a little bit with a perfect gift. Before my parents moved to live across the street from us, they were out in Michigan and we got them an Aura Frame. It's the perfect gift.
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1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
You snap a pic, you hit send, and it pops up on their frame. It's like a screen in the kitchen or wherever. No dealing with, how do I download this? You don't get the text or the call for that. It made them feel like they were still part of our day-to-day lives. So no wonder Wirecutter called it the best digital photo frame. And it landed on almost 500 gift guides last year. Moms love this thing.
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1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Grandmas love this thing. Way better than sending another world's best mom mug that she's going to use for pens.
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1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Thank you for listening to and supporting the show. All the deals, discounts, and ways to support the podcast are all searchable and clickable over at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. Please consider supporting those who support the show. Now, back to Feedback Friday. Okay, what's next?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
It was just a heck of a good time. I had a shoulder injury, which was really distracting me. So I'm in kind of a different mood, and he is in an awesome mood. So it's a funny episode, I thought. And a fun conversation. We also had Daniel Levitin on the power of music. I mean, I'm not a music guy, but music can heal you. It can do all kinds of really, I mean, not like woo woo.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Yeah, wow, this is a tough situation. First of all, I'm really sorry this vendor screwed you. It sounds like a mistake any number of smart people could make, and maybe, sure, you overlooked some things, but it really does sound like these partners deliberately misrepresented themselves, and now you're essentially left to pick up the pieces. But I've been there, and yeah, it hurts.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
All the thoughts and the feelings that you describe, they make perfect sense. But let's start by acknowledging a few bright spots in all this. You sound like a good leader, thoughtful, conscientious, responsible. You're also clearly invested in the mission of your company and well regarded by your colleagues, and I can see why you strike me as a solid person.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Also, this partnership has already gone wrong. You didn't get fired. You didn't even get punished. That's a really good sign. And the CEO and the board are being super supportive. That is a great sign as well. If they didn't have your back or this mistake were truly as severe as maybe you feel it is, they probably would have sacked you immediately or at least put you on hard notice.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
And the fact that they're going, okay, this happened. Let's figure out how we got here. Let's make sure it never happens again. Not only is that a very encouraging signal, it's also a very positive way to manage a company. So I got to say, I really like what I'm hearing about your team and your company.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
So the first thing you got to do here, and you're already doing this, but it might be an ongoing process. You got to fully accept this mistake and you have to forgive yourself. Accepting it fully means not indulging that part of your brain that wants to go, oh, but if I only did this or whatever. Well, if I could have just done this, then that wouldn't have been so bad. What's done is done, man.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
If there are ways out of this partnership or ways to mitigate the downsides, hey, great, pursue those. But if any part of you is still resisting reality here, you got to make peace with it inside of yourself. And at the same time, you have to make peace with the fact that you were capable of making a decision that didn't turn out well. Obviously, this is how we learn. We can't be perfect.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
This is a real science episode about how people regain memories and music does a lot of stuff that honestly seems kind of magical. So I really enjoyed this one. And if you're a huge music fan, you're going to love this one because it's about how music is essentially healthy for you. And if you're not into the woo woo stuff, do not worry. Again, it is completely science based.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
If someone as responsible as you can make this mistake, and if the company is confirming that you made good decisions leading up to this, that there was no massive oversight or reckless failure on your part, then anyone could have made this mistake. And by the way, that's compatible with doing the forensics and figuring out what happened and how to avoid this in the future as well.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
The second thing you need to do is fully acknowledge and own this mistake with your team. And again, you're probably already doing this, But I can't tell from your letter just how transparent you're being with your CEO, your other bosses, your peers about what you're struggling with right now.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
I wouldn't blame you for wanting to put on a brave face, cover your tracks, not draw any more attention than necessary to the fact that you had a hand in this decision. But those are precisely the conditions for guilt and shame to grow, especially shame.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
And I wonder what would happen if you went to your CEO or your direct boss or your peers, whoever's involved in this, and just said, hey, guys, this whole vendor debacle is really doing a number on me. I feel I did everything right leading up to the decision, but it turned out poorly. And I feel that just ultimately reflects on me.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
I'm taking ownership of that fully, and I'm committed to making sure this never happens again. But I got to tell you, I feel like I failed here. I'm feeling guilty. I'm embarrassed by how it's played out, how you guys might be viewing me right now.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
And I'm a little worried about how I can continue leading this project and stay positive, knowing that we're stuck with these people for three to five years. And I just, I want to share that with you because this is where I am right now. and I could use your help in dealing with this, learning from it, showing up as the best possible colleague right now.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Look, not every person wants to be that vulnerable at work. It depends on your personality, your relationships at this place, the culture, your company. If you worked in a super cutthroat environment, or if your bosses did not have your back the way that it sounds like they do, I probably would not tell you to do this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
I'd probably say, hey, find your own ways of working through the guilt and shame. Show no weakness. Focus on solutions. No mercy. What is it? Strike first. Cobra Kai. Right? Sure. But because you have their support and this wasn't an epic level screw up, I think a script like that, it might just be the beginning of a really great conversation with your team.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
And I have a feeling that it'll also be a massive relief for you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Exactly. Part of me wonders if really owning this mistake might even help his reputation. It's funny how that works sometimes, right? I guess that's that Jocko Willink extreme ownership principle.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
This is not like sound healing for people who like bowls or whatever. We also did an Out of the Loop last week on the ongoing situation in Rwanda. And because this one was with journalists Nathan Paul Southern and Lindsey Kennedy, we actually did an update on scam call centers in Cambodia. You know how a lot of people are human trafficked and put in these scam call centers?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Totally. And I'll also throw in there why it might be hard for him to really take in his boss's support.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Agreed. And if he does that, I think this question of how do I stay engaged when every day might remind me of where I got it wrong? I think that question might go away, too, because right now, every day is a reminder of where he got it wrong as long as he approaches his colleagues and internalizes this decision in a certain way.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
But if he invites them in, if he starts to view this whole thing as a learning opportunity, not just a liability, every day won't actually be a reminder of where he got it wrong. Every day might be an opportunity to get it right, which is really a growth mindset. That is the shift that I hope you make here.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
I like that idea. So you have some great work to do here. I promise you one day soon you'll look back on this with a very different lens. So keep showing up as your best self, have the conversations you need to have, and I know you'll get there soon. Good luck. You can reach us at Friday at JordanHarbinger.com. Please keep your emails concise.
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1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Try to use a descriptive subject line that makes our job a whole lot easier.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
If you're finding dead squirrels in your mailbox, you just found out your partner doesn't want children and you do, or you're debating whether to track down your estranged grandson after your son ruined your life by falsely accusing you of a number of heinous crimes, whatever's got you staying up at night lately, hit us up, Friday at JordanHarbinger.com.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
We've covered that with them earlier. Turns out they live next to two of these things now. So they've got an even closer look at how these things work. Apparently there's still kind of crazy mineral washing, rare earth metal stuff going on in Rwanda. Just the world slowly falling apart. And not really that slowly.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
We're here to help and we keep every email anonymous. By the way, our newsletter, We Bit Wiser, is a bite-sized gem almost every Wednesday. It's very practical, something you can apply right away. If you want to keep up with the wisdom from our thousand plus episodes and apply it to your life, I invite you to come check it out. And you can sign up at jordanharbinger.com slash news.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
On Fridays, though, we share stories, take listener letters, offer advice, and occasionally play way too many soundbites, which I have a feeling might happen today. We'll see. Gabe, what's the first thing out of the mailbag?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
My god, that's, you're going hard into pain today.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
yeah seriously we'll get into all that so yeah man this is infuriating and i'm sorry this happened to you sucks i know how much it hurts to get screwed by a shady company my god do i know although i guess that's also the risk you take when you invest in these sort of speculative experimental financial companies that might go belly up or turn out to be scams from the start crypto funds need i say more we wanted to run all of this by an expert so we reached out to aaron hoskins bankruptcy attorney and friend of the show
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
And the first thing Erin said was she understands that this situation is super frustrating, especially given that the company seems to still be taking investments from people, which that is crazy. So she had a few ideas. First, this company has a financial institution license from Estonia, and the company is governed by the European Union.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
So Erin said that it might be possible to submit a complaint against the company with the relevant licensing entity, maybe both in Estonia and at the EU level. The problem is, after that complaint is submitted, any action is then at the discretion of that agency. Now, if other investors also file complaints, it could lead to an investigation.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
And even if the money is gone, the company would likely lose its license and be subject to other consequences. Another option Aaron shared, look into involuntary insolvency proceedings. This would probably need to happen in Estonia, and Aaron knows nothing about Estonia's insolvency laws or processes, and of course, neither do we. But here's how this works in the U.S.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Basically, three creditors can petition a bankruptcy court to put a debtor into an involuntary bankruptcy case. So instead of me being broke and declaring bankruptcy, which makes me want to sample the office, instead of doing that... you can say, hey, this guy owes me money. And if enough people do that, then the bankruptcy court says, oh, okay, well, you got to pay these people. Oh, you can't?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
All right, you're bankrupt. Whether I agree to it or not, whether I walk out of my office and scream at everybody else that I'm bankrupt or not. So there's a process that would allow the potential debtor to respond to the petition But if the creditors succeed, a trustee would then be appointed to investigate and liquidate the debtor's assets.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
And that would include looking into any wrongdoing by the officers, the corporate debtor. So if Estonia has a similar process, and they probably do, the whole EU probably does, you could pursue that if there are other creditors willing to join you. And I assume the other investors would be if you could round some of them up. By the way, we did some very quick reading up on this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
It does seem that Estonia's bankruptcy act, the Pankratis Seadis, So Estonians, how close was I?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Yeah, it does. Estonian language is related to, I think, Finnish, which is related to Hungarian, which is related to Basque. Oh, I did not know this. and then every other language around is not related to them at all.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Yeah, I don't know enough about it, but I do know that pancrotiseadus is really hard to say, and I'm not doing it correctly. But anyway, Aaron said that this could be a relatively cost-effective way to proceed because you guys would only need to pay an attorney to file the petition and adjudicate the potential debtor as insolvent.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
And so once that's occurred, the trustee would hire counsel to recover assets if there are any. Pay that man his money.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
When he's like, no, he beat me straight up.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
His fake Russian accent in that movie is worse than my pronunciation of Pankrotiseadus.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
He's a great actor, but you got to wonder why they weren't like, hey, take five minutes of accent training.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Very aggressive. Any Russian that's that fluent in English will not talk like that. Maybe. I don't know.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Right on the nose.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Now, this could end up with you receiving nothing, even if you hire counsel and the trustee goes to recover the assets and the assets are all gone. Or if you do recover your money, the process could take literally years. But you might have the satisfaction of shutting this company down and having the people behind it investigated.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
And if they've done illegal stuff, then they could be punished for it potentially.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Also, my legal knowledge is rusty, but here in the States, if a derivative action lawsuit succeeds, the damages go to the company, not directly to the shareholder. Oh, interesting. So that approach wouldn't necessarily or directly benefit you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Yeah, this might be a small platform where somebody is just absconded with the funds and is hoping people deposit more so they can abscond with those. On the flip side, if a class action is viable. then a lawyer will usually take the case on a contingency basis, meaning they fund the costs and then they take a portion of any judgment.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
So that would be a way for investors to sue without having to bear the risk and the cost. Obviously, you'd need to talk to a civil litigation attorney, ideally somebody who's done consumer fraud and finance cases before.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Also, to your point about how shady these companies can be, Aaron said to be careful. Debt collectors, not generally known for their ethics, as we all know, and God knows what they're like in Estonia.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Yes, exactly. And they probably just walk up to the person that they find that owes the debt and say, Pay that man his money. But if you do end up working with one, Aaron's advice, get any agreement in writing and try to make sure that the money is transferred before signing over rights, although the agency might not agree because this business in general leads to a lot of risk.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Yeah, and look, it's not impossible. I invested in a crypto fund years ago. It was through reputable folks and the fund itself got scammed. And the fund owner was like, hey, man, we have a massive loss. It looks like it's fraud. We're going to try to recover it. And I was like, kiss that money goodbye. And I've been following up for years.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
And just this month, they were like, hey, we do actually have an update for you. We have recovered almost all of the money. for everybody in this whole fraud. Very unexpected, but I think what happened was they were paying attention to their investments, because that is their job.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
They caught the fraud, reported it, and then whatever platforms or transfer banking whatevers were in charge of this, they basically just froze everything. And so there's something called the receiver, which can then say, you can release this money. So they're like, we have your money. And once the receiver authorizes the release of the funds, I'm just gonna get my money back.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Now, there's no return on it. So it's been sitting there doing nothing for, I don't know how long, four years or something like that, or three. But I didn't lose my money. So look, if the EU takes action, there's a world where they recover some funds and you might get some or all of your money back. It might take half a decade.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
But are you really going to put in a ton of time and energy trying to get that for the next five years? I would not do that. I'm lucky because they have to recover the money because it's their duty to their shareholders. You might just do a ton of work where you could just earn way more than the amount of money you've lost with the time you spend on this. I would not spend too much time on this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
I would file these complaints, forget about it. And if you ever see a dime of it, hey, it's just gravy.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Totally, because listen, this stuff happens to all investors at some point. Basically, there's a saying in investing, timing the market is less important than time in the market. So this is also a terrific lesson for you as an investor and a relatively low stakes one. You're doing all of the macro stuff right. You're dollar cost averaging. You started investing early.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Don't sweat the micro stuff too much. You're not wildly gambling out there trying to regain your losses. You're doing all of the right stuff and you've hit a little speed bump. at five miles per hour too quickly, not a big deal in the scheme of things. This is not gonna be like, now I can't retire at age 65. That's not gonna happen to you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Yeah, to serving to your coffee, smoothie, even water. It doesn't taste like anything, so it just blends right in.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Wow. OK, we got to pause here. What this guy is describing is very painful, indescribably so. My heart just breaks for this guy. I don't know exactly what his parents did, but he's painting a very vivid picture of the legacy of abuse. And this is so sad. I also just want to say his vulnerability here, his clarity about his trauma, his patterns, his beliefs. It's actually pretty remarkable.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
So take the L, the very light L, figure out what you got wrong, learn, don't make this mistake next time, and I know you'll continue to succeed. Love that you're into taking such good care of yourself as well, and good luck.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
One thing I learned, I did all kinds of crypto investments and funds and real estate and da-da-da, and then I just was like, you know what, screw it, index funds, man, because when you really compare all this stuff, If you are not hyper-interested and you don't have a financial manager, it's just better to get rid of all of this fancy stuff and invest in index funds.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
By the way, this is not financial advice. This is just a little thing I've embraced in my own life. Set it and forget it. Don't spend your life thinking about how you can get a 0.1% higher return on whatever. Just don't make big mistakes. Have a good credit score so your mortgage isn't super high interest.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Stuff like that is going to be way better than trying to eke out an extra half percent return on a risky real estate platform that only exists online in Estonia. And I think he's learned that lesson.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
But for everybody else out there, there's a reason that investment advice is generally put this in a S&P 500 and then go about your day and do it again every month for the rest of your life until you retire. That's good advice because it actually works. The returns are about as good as it gets. The end. You know who doesn't need our sponsor codes? The shady bastards who stole your money.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
You, on the other hand, could probably use some of the deals and discounts on the fine products and services that support this show. We'll be right back. This episode is sponsored in part by Skims. Underwear is not something most guys think about until there's a problem. But for me, I hate it when they ride up or the waistband rolls. I'll leave it there.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
So when I heard Skims was making underwear for men, I was definitely curious. Jen's been buying Skims for a while. She's always going on, oh, this is so comfortable. So I figured, all right, if they're bringing that magic over to the men's side, I am in. And man, they delivered. I tried the Skims cotton three-inch boxer briefs first right away.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Felt like they solved a lot of the complaints I've had about underwear without overcomplicating it. Perfect weight, super soft cotton, simple, clean design. It's not flashy. I'm not a flashy underwear guy. Surprise, surprise. Nothing weird. Just solid, comfortable, everyday gear that actually fits right. Doesn't stick, you know? You know what I'm saying?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
It actually holds up when I'm working out, not rolling up into a nightmare situation. So if your underwear drawer is looking a little college era, it's time. Skims Men's is absolutely worth it. Replace that old stretched out stuff or see-through stuff that you've been holding on to.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
This episode is sponsored in part by The Defender. engineered to meet challenges head-on, whether there's a river crossing or a chaotic school drop-off on a rainy Tuesday. Either way, you're rolling in a machine that was built to take the hits and keep charging forward. And get this, Destination Defender is back this May 16th through the 18th in Port Jervis, New York.
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1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
It's a full-on festival for people who love the outdoors, who love The Defender, and who aren't afraid to get a little dirty. We're talking off-road driving courses, live music, chef tastings, and the kind of vibe that makes you want to just dust off your hiking boots and write a new story. To learn more, visit DestinationDefenderUSA.com. This episode is sponsored in part by Nomadic Matt.
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1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
If you've ever thought, I'd love to travel more, but I don't have the money for it, my buddy Matt Kepnes, aka Nomadic Matt, I've known him forever, wrote this super practical guide called How to Travel the World on $50 a Day. I know there are a million travel books out there. This one is actually useful. Matt has been everywhere, man. Inside the book, he breaks down how to save for your trip,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
It takes a lot of courage to talk about this stuff. And of course, I assume he found this out by doing a deep dive into things that are very hard for him to even think about. So kudos to him for doing all that. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
even if you're not raking it in right now, so no, you don't need a friggin' trust fund or Moonlight is a crypto bro to pull this off. He gets into all the ways you can score free accommodation, and if you're like me, you nerd out on points and miles and all that stuff, there's a whole section on how to master travel hacking so you can basically fly for free.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Plus, he teaches you how to actually meet locals instead of just bouncing from tourist trap to tourist trap. So you get these real experiences and there's insider tips, stuff like where to eat, save on activities, what not to waste your money on, all the things you probably wish you knew after you got home.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
And so, yeah, if you've been dreaming of traveling more, but you thought it was out of reach, go ahead and grab a copy of his updated book, nomadicmat.com slash how to travel the world. Grab a copy at nomadicmat.com. We'll link it, of course, in the show notes as well.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
If you like this episode of Feedback Friday and you find our advice valuable, I invite you to do what other smart and considerate listeners do, which is take a moment and support our amazing sponsors. All of the deals, discount codes, and ways to support the show are searchable and clickable over at jordanharbinger.com slash deals.
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1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
If that doesn't work, always email us jordan at jordanharbinger.com. We're happy to dig up the codes for you. It is that important that you support those who support the show. Now, back to Feedback Friday. Okay, next up.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Man, a lot going on, a lot to keep track of.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Yeah, that's alarming.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Great question. This has actually been on my mind a lot lately because I'm also watching my parents get up there. And that's part of the reason they moved out to California. Now they live across the street from us. I know that's not possible for everyone, of course. So I really, I feel for you. Living so far away from a parent in another country, no less, is just really challenging.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
And watching your parents start to slow down, especially in dramatic ways like this driving thing, that's got to be very stressful. I'd be freaking out if they found my mom driving around in the country the wrong direction like this. The bright spot is you have your sister nearby, which is wonderful. I'm confident you guys can find some ways to make sure your mom is staying safe.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
We wanted to talk to an expert about all this, so we reached out to Pam Dukes, expert in senior issues and friend of the show. Pam regulated senior services in South Carolina for the majority of her career, and she was also an executive director of a nonprofit for many years that provided senior services, where she often spoke with family members in the exact same situation as you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
And the first thing Pam said was, this is such a familiar story to many who are helping with aging loved ones. The issues that you're raising. She felt that they were concerning. She also felt that it's important to know that it's probably only the tip of the iceberg. You only know what your mother tells you or what you and your sister observe, okay? And Pam said that this isn't uncommon.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Elderly people, they sometimes forget things that happen. Sometimes they intentionally hide things that happen because they know their loved ones are going to be like, oh crap, this is serious. This is worrisome. And maybe they'll limit their independence. Nobody wants to say... Oh, I forgot where I was going, and I drove in the wrong direction.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
You should take away my car keys so that I can't function. They're going, oh, that was weird. Yeah, never mind. Not going to think about that anymore. Or another common scenario, an older person loses the cognitive ability to even recognize these issues, or they forget about them, or they don't recognize the significance of something which sounds like is happening to your mom.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Yeah, I totally agree. It was a different time back then. You couldn't get arrested for this. The fact that you haven't continued this cycle with your own child, which so many people do, that's also remarkable and you sound like a solid human being.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Oh, don't you think it's weird somebody had to drive you home from a random place because you were going in the wrong direction on the wrong side of the road? Yeah, no, whatever, what's for lunch? You know, that's even more alarming than the initial problem, in my opinion. Pam's thought for you, it's important that your mom be assessed by a physician.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
A doctor can determine for sure whether she's truly declining cognitively or whether it might be due to some other medical condition. And ideally, this would be a gerontologist, but a family physician can also work Pam said it's also really important that you or your sister have access to that doctor. The easiest way to do that, of course, is to go to her appointment with her.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
And if your mom pushes back on that, remind her that she sometimes forgets things and that one of you wants to be with her to pass along what the doctor says to the other. Pam also recommends going to that appointment with a list of concerning things that have happened recently. That way you can ensure the doctor has all of the information and your mom's not, yeah, nope, nothing, totally fine.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Definitely not driving around the country by myself alone at night, forgetting that I left the stove on and the front door open. You also want to make sure that your mom allows you to access her medical information. That probably means having her sign a form at the doctor's office that says you can communicate with my daughters concerning my care. Pretty standard HIPAA stuff.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Now, it's interesting that your mom has a job. That's kind of amazing, also pretty unusual. Pam said that cognitive declines are usually noticed at work, so you might want to ask her how work is going, what kind of feedback her boss is giving her, that type of thing. If she answers you honestly, that'll tell you if they're aware of what's going on.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
And if you happen to have a relationship with any of her colleagues, her boss, if it's appropriate, I might call them and ask how she's doing there, what they're seeing, see if there's any cause for concern. Now, assuming that your mom is declining cognitively, Pam said that there are other steps you can take to ensure her safety and well-being.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
First, most areas, even rural areas with few services, they should offer some kind of senior services. She might be eligible for home delivered meals, if not daily, maybe weekly frozen, something like that. The people who offer this service, by the way, They often use the delivery appointment as an opportunity to check in with the senior. And if something isn't right, they can contact you guys.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Pam said that some providers even offer a daily or weekly call service where they just call, just check in to see how someone's doing. Many areas also operate senior centers and provide transport for socialization, meals, stuff like that. Again, even in rural areas. Pam also recommends signing her up for automatic bill payments for as many services as possible.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
That way she doesn't have to remember to pay her bills every month. And some utilities have a feature where the company will call you if the bill goes unpaid, or you and your sister could take over bill payments.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Pam said you could actually ease her into this by telling your mom that you want her to show you what bills she has, how she goes about paying them, just so you know in case there's an emergency one day. And if she's having trouble explaining the bills to you, or you do this with her a couple of times and she finally gets comfortable, at some point you just go, hey mom,
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Why don't I just take over all this for you? You don't even have to worry about it. She might just go, oh, you know what? That sounds nice. Thanks.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
That was a mailman, not a speed bump, mom. Hand over the keys. Exactly.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Pam actually pitched a dark Jordan idea here. I guess it's a dark Pam idea, which I did not see coming from Pam, so it really made me chuckle, but either way, sound bite-worthy. So what Pam said was she knows people whose parents shouldn't be driving, but they wouldn't give up the keys. So they sabotage the car. They punctured two tires. Then the car has to be towed.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
They disconnect the battery cables, stuff like that. Then the car disappears for repairs and it just never comes back. Now, obviously, that's a lot of work for something that I hope your mom just collaborates with you on, but there's a little dark approach to tuck in your back pocket if she really fights you on this.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
What you don't want is your mom killing someone or hurting herself, and then she loses her keys because she's in prison for something like that. That happens a lot. All you need to do is look online. There's so many videos of somebody at a gas station getting run over three times by an old guy who turns into the street. It's really terrible.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
In fact, my dad's uncle, before he passed, my dad went over to visit him and was like, oh my God, your car is in terrible condition. And he was just like, I don't know. And the neighbor comes out and goes, your uncle has hit my house twice, pulling back into the driveway. Oh my God. And so my dad was like, give me the keys to the car. Wow. Yeah.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
I've fallen and I can't get up.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Yeah, for sure. Yeah, man. Definitely. There are also GPS monitors or even something like an Apple Watch, a device that would allow you to locate her at any time. Obviously, look, this stuff is not a substitute for adequate supervision if somebody with dementia is prone to wandering or driving around, but it can certainly help.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Bottom line, it sounds like it's time to plan for your mother's future care. And Pam's advice, find an attorney who specializes in elder law and go with your sister and talk with them about your options. Then bring your mom into the conversation. This attorney can advise you on power of attorney, living wills, estate planning, future care, all of that. Pam was very clear on this point.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
It is really important that you have these conversations with your mom now, not later, now. Pam told us that when her sister got frustrated by their mom at this stage, she told their mom that these decisions will be made and that she could make them now while she still has the ability to give input, or they would make them later for her when she would have no input.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
So Pam's mom chose to make these choices herself, which is probably ideal, but not every mom is going to be open to that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Agreed. Your mom is lucky to have you and your sister looking out for her, sending you and your mom a big hug and wishing you the best. Big thanks to Pam for her wisdom and experience here. Pam now provides consulting services primarily to assisted living facilities. We're going to include her LinkedIn profile in the show notes if you want to connect with her.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Gabe, I got to say, I find it so helpful and reassuring to talk to somebody who's a couple of life stages ahead of me and has seen a lot of this firsthand. Yeah. It's so wild watching your parents age. It's such a role reversal, but it's nice to know that there are some best practices and examples to follow. I'm not there yet, right? My parents are both fine, but it's kind of a matter of time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Uh, I strongly suspect that on some level your dad knows what he did and this is sort of him reinforcing in himself, uh, yeah, I never did this, right guys?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Yeah. All right. And now for the recommendation of the week.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
By the way, Gabe, I don't know if you saw this. A show fan's child drew a graphic that says, I am addicted to lip filler.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
It's a giant pair of lips. She said, I listened to the show so much that my kid drew this in art class. So funny.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
It's called Botched. And the guy's name is Jordan. So I can remember it really easily. His name's Jordan. We should find that. It's hilarious. And I'm just so glad that this meme is so strong that the kid hears it in the car, draws it at school. Just ridiculous. My recommendation of the week, this is speaking of ridiculous, is rippedbody.com. This sounds insane. It's my friend's company.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
He's coming on the show, actually. And I always make fun of him because his Instagram handle is Andy Ripped Body. So whenever we meet people, I'm like, tell her your Instagram handle. And he's like, shut up, dude. He's like, it's a brand, not a descriptor. But it's the website and content that I used to lose 40 pounds of fat and learn how to count calories and...
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
He has these really amazing books on nutrition and calorie counting and macros and stuff, because that stuff was always really confusing for me and seemed to be just a whole lot of trouble and too precise and blah, blah, blah. So I grabbed the books from him. There's two books I recommend, The Diet Adjustments Manual and The Nutrition Setup Guide.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
They're both very reasonably priced at rippedbody.com. They're really easy to read. There's drawings in there. All the concepts are really easy. Tells you the stuff that's important. And then he's like, here's how all this other stuff works. Basically, you can forget about it, worry about this one or two things. And so I did that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Yeah, so he's somehow repressed these memories or is coming up with a story to cover them up or whatever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
And like I said, I lost 40 pounds of fat and I gained 10 or 20 pounds of muscle over the time that I was dieting. And I reread these books every year. I skim them. And if I'm gaining weight, I read that part. And if I'm losing weight, I reread that part. And I sent them to Jen and she read them. She's like, wow, I actually understand nutrition for the first time in my life.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
So I highly recommend that if you're going to try to gain muscle or you're trying to lose weight, start at rippedbody.com. He offers coaching and stuff too, but honestly, just grab the books. It'll be a massively educational experience for you. Even if you already lift weights all the time, it's not about weightlifting.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
It's about the food that you eat and how it all works in your body and why your body loses weight and loses muscle and keeps muscle. It's really interesting. And that's it. Rippedbody.com. We'll link to it in the show notes. Also, in case you didn't know, there's a subreddit for the show if you want to jump into discussions with other listeners about specific episodes or whatever.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
If there was an episode you liked, an episode you didn't like, a lot of episode-specific conversations happening there. There's also memes and funny stuff and just general conversation that I think is really cool. It's all on the Jordan Harbinger subreddit. All right. Next up.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
That's my strong hunch, because how do you forget that you regularly beat all three of your sons and took other crap going on in your life out on them? Unless he's got dementia or something. Even then, I would still wonder.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
I'm so glad that you did that, man. Way to listen to that voice telling you to stay alive. What a miracle. I am very proud of you, and I'm glad that you're with us. I'm sorry about your grandma.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
What a journey you've been on. Gosh.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
God, I love that. Man, that must have been an emotional night because I'm getting emotional just hearing this letter. Seriously.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Yeah, wow, what a story. I'm very moved by your letter. Thank you for writing in for these super kind words. And more importantly, thank you so much for taking good care of yourself and asking for help when you needed it. That takes a lot of courage, a lot of vulnerability. And look where it's gotten you. It's extraordinary.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
First of all, I'm so sorry that you went through all of this with your wife. I just can hear how painful that was to get to the point of wanting to commit suicide. Things must have been very dark. I can't even imagine watching that happen in front of your face and then have her be so cold about it and blame me for it. When I think about this, I feel my own heart just being torn into with claws.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
I can only imagine what you actually felt. Anyway, I'm so glad that you didn't go through with it. You decided to work on yourself in such an amazing way. You went to therapy, you built new relationships, you reinvested in your life. You are a case study of doing the work, man. Look where it's gotten you, how close your friendships are, how grateful you are to be alive.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Now your kids get to have their father and the people in your life get to have a friend. And this is just all very touching. So I think the celebration is incredible. It's meaningful to you and to your friends. If it stays meaningful over the years, I say keep doing it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
And keep using it as an opportunity to take stock of your life, to express your gratitude to your friends for helping keep you alive, to reflect on how far you've come. I definitely don't think it's a weird thing to celebrate. It's unconventional maybe, but it's not weird. Like I said, it's very moving. Now, it's an interesting question whether to expand it to a larger group.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
I guess my question for you would be, Where is the idea to bring new people into this ritual coming from? It sounds like you want to tell the new friends you've made how much they mean to you, the profound role they've played in your life. I love that.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
I also don't know if you necessarily need to tell all those folks about the suicide attempt in order for them to understand how much they mean to you. Maybe this anniversary evolves into a more general celebration of life that only these three people or whatever it is know the origins of. Although sharing the full story, hey, it might make this ritual more impactful.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
And if you're concerned about this feeling like an attention-seeking thing, maybe you literally say... I know the story I just told you is pretty intense. I worry that all this feels like a bid for sympathy or pity or attention, but it is not. I am just so grateful to be alive. And I'm alive because of all of you. My life has never been better. I want to celebrate that publicly with all of you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
And I just want to thank you for being a part of my journey. If you say something like that, and if you really mean it, of course, I'm confident that this is going to land the right way.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Yeah, good point. And when it comes to a story as meaningful as this, you might also want to ask yourself what sharing it widely might do to that story. It might enrich your story, bring you closer to your friends, give this anniversary even more meaning, allow your story to help other people, which I know is your other question. It could also chip away at the sacredness of your story.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
It could make it feel almost like a talking point in this context. It might make you feel like you're performing a little bit. I am also, by the way, not telling you how to feel. I have no idea. Maybe you won't either until you do it.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
But because this story of yours is so charged and so profound and so personal, it does deserve the right treatment and the right intention, whatever you end up doing.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Good point. Or would that feel like hiding in some way?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Good distinction. As for your last question, I do think there's a way for you to use your survival story to help other people who might be feeling suicidal. That is really the power of a great story. But your intentions there have to be very clear, too. If you're doing it to raise awareness among your friends, that's going to translate.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
If you're conflicted or there are some other strands in there, it might not land the way that you hope. And maybe this is a good argument for sharing your story with your friends. If they hear that you went through this and they want to talk about something similar, that could really inspire them or make them feel safe coming to you. I guess it depends on how important this mission is to you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
I think it might. Wherever you tell your story, whoever you tell it to, it's going to make an impact. All you need to do is get clear on where it feels most useful and appropriate and authentic to you and stay connected to your why. And I know that you'll hit the right note. Again, man, I'm so glad that you're alive. I'm so impressed by how far you've come.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
You are a case study in doing the work, staying connected to meaning, cultivating close relationships that can take care of you when you need it. It is honestly, it's super inspiring to hear. So keep up the amazing work. And hey, man, keep on thriving. Don't forget about Ed Helms and Daniel Levitin on the power of music to heal in a very non-woo-woo, very science-y way.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
and are out of the loop on Rwanda and scam call centers if you haven't done so yet. The best things that have happened in my life and business have come through my network, the circle of people I know, like, and trust. Sounds like some of our letter writers here on Feedback Friday are feeling the same. Our course, Six Minute Networking, teaches you how to build something similar for yourself.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
It is free. It is not schmoozy. It's not gross. It's not transactional. It's on the Thinkific platform over at sixminutenetworking.com. The drills take a few minutes a day. Dig the well before you get thirsty, folks. Build relationships before you need them. Again, 6minutenetworking.com. Show notes and transcripts on the website.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Advertisers, deals, discounts, and ways to support the show, all at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. I'm at jordanharbinger on Twitter and Instagram. You can also connect with me on LinkedIn. You can find Gabe on Instagram at Gabriel Mizrahi or on Twitter at Gabe Mizrahi. This show is created in association with Podcast One.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
My team is Jen Harbinger, Jace Sanderson, Robert Fogarty, Ian Baird, Tata Sidlowskis, and of course, Gabriel Mizrahi. Our advice and opinions are our own. And I am a lawyer, but I'm not your lawyer. So do your own research before implementing anything you hear on the show. Ditto Aaron Hoskins and Pam Dukes. Remember, we rise by lifting others. Share the show with those you love.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
And if you found the episode useful, please share it with somebody else who could use the advice that we gave here today. In the meantime, I hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn. And we'll see you next time.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Wow, what a story and what a tough question this is. Like I said, I'm so sorry you had this childhood, man, and that you're still struggling with your relationship with your father. It's truly extraordinary stuff. I can obviously hear the legacy of the trauma in your letter. The fact that you've turned out this well is a miracle. It says a lot about you.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
I know you say you've trashed every relationship and stuff like that, but look, you have kids, you love them. There's victory in that, buddy. So you're torn between authenticity and practicality, between speaking your truth and money, which is something all people have to deal with in various ways in their lives.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
I mean, this tension exists every time you want to give your boss a piece of your mind or pop off online about your true opinions or whatever. But it's especially stark in your case because the stakes are high. Gabriel, have you ever seen that show Extras with Ricky Gervais? Yeah, of course.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
So there's an episode where he's making a show or something and he wants to speak his mind because he doesn't like the way it's going. And there's this old washed up actor or creator or whatever also there. And the guy's encouraging him to like speak your artistic truth and say what's on your mind.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
And then as he looks back to the guy for courage when he's about to speak up to the director or whatever it is, a bunch of the craft services like the catering that they do it on a film shoot. A bunch of the Skittles and stuff fall out of this guy's pockets because he has just nothing and he's stealing food from craft services. And so as they bounce on the ground, Ricky's, you know what?
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Never mind. I'm fine with where it's going.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Where the guy's like standing in the corner like, go man, go do the thing I never had the courage to do. And a bunch of Skittles fall out of his pocket. I gotta say, I'm sad that your father has threatened to write people out of his will for far less than confronting him with the fact that he abused his kids.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
He clearly can't have open, honest conversations with people that might be difficult for him. But that also fits with a parent who has this narrative that he never hurt his children when he was apparently kind of a monster. Just reading between the lines here, I think we're hearing about a man who's highly defended.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Obviously, he's vindictive, which means he's actually quite vulnerable and scared underneath. a guy who hurt his children because he must have been in a ton of pain himself, he can't even begin to acknowledge that pain now. This is a really tough father to have, even if the money were not part of the equation. And I'm just sorry that you're in this position. I don't know, man.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
It's a tough one, Gabe. There's a part of me going like, hell yeah, speak your truth, call out your dad, make him confront this awful stuff he did, stop playing along with the lie, have some integrity. You're the old guy in the meeting telling Ricky Gervais to stand up. That's right. But then there's another part of me going, he's not going to take that in. He's not going to change.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
What's done is done. You need to make peace with these feelings so you can enjoy this inheritance.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
That's right. I do have an early Dark Jordan pitch that I wasn't going to say anything, but this is probably the wrong time, but I don't care. Convince your siblings to do it. That way, when they're cut out of the will, you get more money. And he's confronted. Problem solved.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
I mean, it's not a terrible idea. You do get everything. And look, you don't even have to feel that bad because then you can give that sibling some of your money. But not as much as they would have gotten. You can give him some of the stuff. You don't have to give him a fair share. You come out looking like the hero. That's right. You win in so many ways. Correct.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Anyway, no, like all jokes aside, not convincing your siblings to do it, but not confronting your dad. It's not a selfish, callous move on your part. You have a daughter to think about. And the inheritance, given the kind of person his father is, it might actually be the best thing, the only thing that his dad can give him that's positive at this point, really.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Maybe I'm trying to rationalize this, but if he protects his inheritance, he might actually be protecting the only gift that his otherwise very flawed father can offer him. And maybe that's also a way to appreciate the one thing that his dad did right, which is making a bunch of money over his lifetime. I'm sure that he would trade it all for a loving childhood.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
But in this timeline, where he did not have a loving childhood, the assets are something that will change him and his daughter's life. So maybe in a weird way, he can think of them like emotional reparations. It's one thing he can thank his father for.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Welcome to Feedback Friday. I'm your host, Jordan Harbinger. As always, I'm here with Feedback Friday producer, my dues catcher in arms, Gabriel Mizrahi.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Yeah, it's never going to happen.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Exactly. Plus, man, in that scenario where it doesn't really help, he might be written out of the will and then he really just has nothing. No resolution and no stability.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Honestly, Gabe, I know we're treading lightly here and there are some good reasons to speak up. But my gut is telling me, don't bring this to your dad. Keep the money because you're almost certainly not going to get the response you're hoping for. Gabe, I'm trying to imagine a scenario in which he's dad. I just want to tell you, you did a lot of bad stuff.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
And his dad's going to be like, you little because that's how British people talk, apparently, when they're angry and flawless accent. He's going to yeah, he's going to write him out of the will and he's just going to be pissed off. Or he's going to write everybody out. Who knows? It's just he's not going to go, you know what, son, you're absolutely right. I'm so sorry. Cry sesh.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Because if he was going to do that, he would keep you in the will.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
Yeah, that may be really sad. That was hard to hear.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
And if the deuce comes back within 24 hours, we have to catch it again for free. Those are the rules.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
All of that sounds like a reflection of that lack of confidence that he mentioned and that self-loathing, which again, just breaks my heart.
The Jordan Harbinger Show
1148: Face Father's Fury or Fund Future Fortune? | Feedback Friday
If you have no idea what we're talking about, which makes perfect sense, actually, go back. Was it a month ago? This is a reference to the professional bird catcher who wrote in. I kept thinking about that guy's intro. Just, sup guys, I'm a bird catcher. Okay, that's a thing. Oh, and with a 24-hour refund policy, I guess? Guarantee? Still doesn't make sense to me. None of it makes any sense.