0:10

Katie, I require a van life

0:13

update.

0:14

Jesse, I have to tell you,

0:16

I am not recording this from the van right now.

0:18

I am recording this. from a condo

0:21

because the van is broken

0:23

down.

0:23

Alrighty. How what was just

0:26

give me the span of time between you and

0:28

announced your new van life and your van

0:30

life ending for now?

0:32

Well, the announcement came prematurely.

0:34

The announcement came before the van life trip.

0:36

So, like, a week, but

0:39

the actual time on the road. So on

0:41

day one, on the road, Moose got attacked

0:43

by a pitbull, like, really attacked, not like

0:45

a little attacked. Like, we were at a

0:47

campground. taking a walk. And

0:49

this pitbull came out of fucking nowhere. It was

0:51

on a leash, but it was on, like, a very thin,

0:54

like, fifty foot leash thing, and

0:56

it came out of nowhere and attacked him. immediately

0:58

fell to the ground. This is what happens when there's a crisis.

1:01

You know, there's the this whole idea that there's,

1:03

like, there's, you know, either

1:05

fight or flight. Well, my instinct it

1:07

turns out is falling falling or fainting.

1:09

That's what I do in a

1:10

crisis. There are those animals that just

1:12

like immediately fade. Fainting,

1:14

bigger, fainting.

1:14

I am a fainting goat. So I immediately

1:17

got tangled in the leash and fell

1:19

down, scrap my d. While my wife

1:21

kick the pitbull in the head until its owner

1:24

came out and got it. So that was the first night.

1:26

And then on the second day,

1:29

Actually, no. The the second day was was uneventful.

1:32

And then on the third day, the van

1:34

broke down in the middle of the desert, on

1:36

the side of the interstate, and

1:38

we had to wait

1:39

six hours for a tow truck. Which which

1:41

desert was this?

1:42

Some desert in Utah. It

1:44

was very brown.

1:45

So this just isn't going

1:47

well for you?

1:47

Yeah. I might say the low point was after

1:50

waiting for six hours for for triple

1:53

triple a to come toe the van, van life.

1:54

k. You should go after the van life. I

1:57

did. Well, it also by the way, for anybody

1:59

considering van life, it turns out

2:01

that triple a doesn't cover

2:03

cargo vans because they don't

2:05

have a back seat. So what should have

2:07

been a free tow ended up being

2:10

eight hundred dollars And so

2:12

after we, you know, waited six hours for

2:14

the tow truck on the side of the highway, and

2:16

finally, we're taken into a a town

2:18

that had a that had a

2:20

mechanic.

2:21

We slept in the mechanics parking

2:23

lot. I'm most honestly, I'm most disappointed in

2:25

triple a because I

2:27

don't they're sort of the last remaining American

2:30

institution I trust because my experience has been,

2:32

your car breaks down, you call them,

2:35

cousins, friends, uncle, once

2:37

had a membership, and he'll just come and help you

2:39

out. I've actually only had good experiences with them, but they're

2:41

like, your van has a wrong number

2:44

of back seats. We can't help really.

2:45

Yeah. That was the old triple a. The new triple

2:47

a. You have to show your ID. No more of

2:49

those uncles, friendship. yeah,

2:52

they will scam you. They will take your money

2:54

and not give you a tow truck if they can. So

2:56

the best part of this trip so far has been canceling

2:58

my AAA membership The tow truck driver

3:01

also confirmed that triple a is terrible. He said

3:03

to look into a company called Good Sam.

3:05

So this is a free plug for Good Sam. Everyone

3:07

look into them and cancel your a fully membership. It's

3:09

a terrible company. Anyway, the

3:11

van is still broken down. It's

3:13

going to be very expensive to to fix. It

3:15

requires shipping parts from all over the country.

3:18

And so I'm staying in a condo somewhere

3:20

in Colorado.

3:20

I was gonna say you're you're recording

3:22

this, crawling across the desert in

3:24

patterned tattered clothes toward what looks

3:26

like a oasis, but just

3:28

a mirage.

3:29

It's my Jesus moment. Yep. Yep. Things

3:31

are going really well with Band

3:32

Life. It didn't get nearly the blanket media coverage.

3:34

Your announcement got, but the same day you announced

3:37

your van life, I announced that I had decided

3:39

not to live in a van. ever. And

3:41

that's been going really well. There's been no mechanical

3:43

difficulties. It's been great.

3:44

That's the thing about when your van breaks down,

3:47

your house also breaks down. But, hey,

3:49

at least, we didn't accidentally hit the

3:51

dog while driving drugs through the desert. If you are a

3:53

Primo, you will get that reference. And if not, hey,

3:55

join us at blockreimported

3:55

dot org. Can we can I make

3:57

a quick apology to a demographic group

3:59

before we continue? Please do. That's

4:02

not gonna really narrow it down. lot

4:04

of potential apologies. So I've been I was taking

4:06

some shots at Zumers, and I

4:09

accidentally had to spend a night with Zumers

4:12

And I was sort of worried about it. Were you babysitting?

4:15

I basically a

4:18

girl friends, friends, guy

4:21

sort of was supposed to go with

4:23

some zoomers to bat

4:25

suit, which is a live punishment based

4:27

Japanese game show in the east village.

4:30

which already that's the kind of cool

4:32

thing I just don't do, but I I

4:34

filled in for this kid because he was sick.

4:36

And I got there, and it was mostly

4:38

genuine zoomers. And I was

4:40

worried what would we talk about. Would

4:42

I understand any of the references? And the only

4:44

thing I had to do different from a normal night was

4:46

be a little bit more social and drink more.

4:48

which I was happy to do. And I had fun. So I would like

4:50

to apologize to all the zoomers I've made

4:52

fun of. Well,

4:52

also, I think we have a correction here. You

4:55

referred to trey, tracing what

4:57

grains are a trust too far as a zoomer.

4:59

He is not a zoomer. He is the youngest

5:01

millennial.

5:01

The single youngest he he checked

5:03

Kadant, really. He's the youngest millennial. Yeah.

5:05

I'm the oldest millennial, and he's the youngest millennial.

5:07

Aren't the oldest millennials already in their forties? Which we

5:09

are not yet? I mean, maybe

5:10

technically not in our forties, but

5:12

very, very close and also mentally much older

5:14

than that anyway.

5:15

Mhmm. Mentally, we're in our eighties.

5:18

So, yes, apologies to the zoomers. Kenny,

5:20

what is the name of this podcast that is

5:22

created in the desert? This

5:23

is Black and Reporting, and I'm Kate Herzog.

5:25

And I'm Jesse Single. And today,

5:28

after two consecutive shows

5:31

diving into really the mock

5:33

We're gonna get back to basics. We're gonna talk

5:35

a little bit. It's

5:38

talking about being in my eighties. As I started

5:40

that sentence, I forgot all

5:42

our segments. We're gonna talk about what, Katie. We

5:44

are

5:44

going well, I'm talking about a terrible Atlantic

5:46

article. I don't know what you're talking about.

5:48

I am talking about getting

5:50

partially debent. Like, what happens

5:52

when you're cut off from PayPal? Should we care about

5:54

people getting cut off from PayPal? But

5:57

first, Katie, I have some correction. I'm

5:59

shocked. Very surprising. Okay. So, yeah, we

6:01

talked a lot about this complicated conflict

6:04

involving a twitch streamer named Kessels.

6:07

and a website called Kiwi Farms.

6:10

Some corrections, I said

6:12

Kessels was in Iceland. That she had moved

6:14

on from Ireland to Iceland. Whereas

6:18

other corrections I've done in the past, I sort of know

6:20

what I got wrong or why I got wrong. I have no

6:22

idea why I thought she was in Iceland. I

6:24

really don't. You just made this up? I didn't make

6:26

it up. At the time, I obviously thought it

6:28

was true. I thought I had seen that she'd moved to Iceland.

6:30

I One possibility is I get

6:32

confused because there's some drama involving Ira

6:35

Kimi Farms being hosted on the dot

6:37

IS site, so that's Iceland. Iceland

6:40

sorta said no to them at least initially. I I don't

6:42

know where I got that. I apologize. I I didn't

6:44

mean to say Kaffel's was an Iceland. That's a horrible

6:46

thing to say about somebody.

6:46

I think possibly you just

6:49

Ireland and Iceland are spelled very

6:51

similarly. But you just consider

6:53

things. But that okay. That's not a very flattering.

6:56

Well, explanation? Because

6:58

that means I just need a lead or I think

7:00

that's the most likely possibility here. Alright.

7:02

Sorry. I'm sorry, Kaffles. You're you were not in

7:04

Iceland, whatever. Also,

7:06

there was this issue

7:09

with a gay an

7:11

emulation developer named David

7:13

Nir Ginder and their suicide

7:16

in Kiwi Farms alleged involvement,

7:18

I initially said that Ginder

7:21

offered Joshua Moon the owner of Kiwi

7:23

Farms twenty thousand dollars to have their page taken

7:25

down. That was actually a hundred twenty thousand

7:27

dollars. Moon

7:29

said no. Kinder did subsequently

7:31

kill himself. For what it's worth, I I did

7:33

talk to

7:33

wait, definitely, subsequently,

7:35

or allegedly subsequently. We'll

7:37

get to that. The

7:40

operating assumption is Ginder is that

7:43

there's a conspiracy theory among Kiwi

7:45

farmers that they're not that it's

7:47

interesting. I'm gonna look into it a little bit. I wouldn't

7:49

take it. You're gonna get our call listeners are

7:51

not gonna like that you call this a conspiracy theory.

7:53

I don't think our I don't think our average

7:55

listener has thoughts on David

7:57

Nir. Gidner, but as I said in the episode,

7:59

it of Iky. This person's dead, their

8:01

friends say they're dead. It's a little bit Iky to be like, I

8:03

think they might not be dead without much evidence.

8:05

Okay. Well, do you wanna have a bet here? I think

8:07

that in the comment section of this

8:09

of this show, people are gonna be

8:11

mad at you for calling this a

8:12

conspiracy theory. Well, but this

8:14

is like a a major gambling scandal

8:16

now. because you're betting on something that

8:18

you're affecting the outcome of. You could get banned

8:20

from podcasting.

8:21

Oh, is that the that's one of the fun rules

8:23

about it? It's a Pete Rose situation.

8:25

That's a reference you won't get at all. Anyway,

8:27

I did I talked to one attorney and

8:29

this attorney for what it's worth said that

8:32

he would advise a if a client got

8:34

an offer like this, I will give you

8:36

money to take down this webpage you host about me

8:38

or I will kill myself. This attorney

8:40

was like, I would tell my client not

8:42

to do you you cannot engage in any sort of

8:44

transaction with someone holding their own suicide

8:46

over you for for what it's worth. I also looked

8:48

into one aspect of this whole

8:50

Ginder isn't dead rumor, which is the

8:52

absence of his name on the local state

8:54

department report out of Japan about

8:56

deceased Americans. talk to someone in the state

8:58

department, and he just said this is nothing. There's all

9:00

sorts of reasons someone's name

9:02

might not be absent, mostly

9:05

innocent. And Yeah.

9:07

So that's that. We did when I went back

9:09

to the episode and I corrected, deleted the

9:11

Iceland stuff and the dollar amount. And

9:13

then there's also In that episode

9:15

show notes, you can get the original version of the

9:17

episode for transparency sake. I sort of marked

9:19

it as this episode has errors because

9:21

I'm such a good journalist. I don't just randomly

9:23

say people in Iceland. I am also seeing on our notes,

9:25

Katie. Do we have an update on our lucky PR

9:27

Eiffel Tower

9:28

situation? Yes. I have a correction to the

9:30

correction to the correction. I'm not gonna

9:32

explain this. I'm just gonna say

9:34

the sex act is called an Eiffel

9:36

Tower. Which sex act could that be? I don't I don't

9:38

wanna explain it. Can

9:39

I can I say my understanding what

9:42

Nigel Towers is that I go for it? I'm gonna try to do this

9:44

tactfully. This is this is what sort of

9:46

something like fourteen year old boys joked

9:48

about in I don't

9:50

know, ninety late nineties, call it. So an

9:52

interval tower, girl in the middle,

9:54

guys on two

9:56

sides. both

9:59

doing stuff. And they they high

10:01

five with both hands. It

10:03

creates the shape of the Eiffel Tower

10:05

over her.

10:05

No. I think that this is a gender

10:08

neutral act. Anybody can do an Eiffel

10:10

Tower, the point of view. Sure. Sure.

10:11

Sure. Sure. But in the version we talked about,

10:13

as teenagers. Well, in the version

10:14

that we were talking about, it was called a daisy chain.

10:16

And I believe that the person in the middle was

10:18

a columnist for mental magazine.

10:20

there's a

10:20

lot going on here. It it upsets me that we

10:22

still we've been correcting this for

10:25

weeks, presumably there'll be more talk

10:27

of it. at our live shows,

10:29

which we should tell here because we have some tickets

10:31

left. We have tickets left for

10:33

the Arlington Virginia late

10:35

show that we had to to add because the early

10:37

ones sold out. That would be

10:39

October twenty ninth, Arlington, Virginia,

10:41

Cinema Draft House. The only

10:43

other show we have remaining tickets for because others

10:45

have sold out is the Boston one

10:47

October twenty

10:49

fourth at Laff Boston. We'd love to sell

10:51

that one out or get as close as possible. It'd be

10:53

deeply humiliating think that's my hometown.

10:55

Can you imagine? This is

10:56

the benefit for me. If this show sells

10:58

out, that's great for us. It's more money for us. But

11:00

if it doesn't sell out, humiliating for

11:02

you. So I don't really know where I stand on this.

11:04

We just get

11:04

on stage and it's literally tumbleweeds.

11:07

There's no one in the crowd because I'm so

11:09

unpopular in Boston. Come

11:11

on. Your dad will be there. This

11:12

will no. I he told me he's not gonna go

11:14

because, you know, he's he isn't what he said.

11:16

Directquote, I'm not proud enough of you.

11:18

It's understandable.

11:19

this will be like Kamala

11:22

Harris performing quite poorly

11:24

in the California primaries. I just I don't

11:26

wanna be, you know, on her level

11:28

of on popularity basically, that would suck. Oh,

11:30

that's fair. That's fair. Do we have another shit to

11:32

announce? No. What I can say at

11:34

this point is that if you

11:36

live north of Boston,

11:38

two days somewhere north of Boston,

11:40

not gonna say where because we can't announce it yet, two

11:42

days before the Boston show. So this is October

11:44

twenty second. I don't know what

11:46

life is like north of Boston. It's just this

11:48

frozen uncharted wasteland, but

11:50

you should saddle up your deck

11:52

get some supplies and be prepared

11:54

to travel to come see us October twenty

11:57

second, somewhere north of Boston. We

11:59

will announce where at some

11:59

point. I'll just say this. It's Carlin

12:02

Borr

12:02

Sanco territory. Oh, my daughter. We're

12:04

gonna have to gain permission from her millennial

12:06

status. Is she gonna show up fuck.

12:08

She could show up at the show. Like, she

12:09

I would actually not be surprised if she would

12:11

show up. Maybe we shouldn't announce this

12:13

one. Yeah. Anything else before

12:15

we get into it, Katie?

12:16

I think that's it. It's the Eiffel Tower,

12:18

not the lucky peer, and not the Daisy train.

12:20

Also, there's gonna be links to these remaining

12:23

tickets in the show notes. So check out the show

12:25

notes as always. Katie, my

12:27

sense is that there's absolutely

12:30

zero evidence to suggest

12:32

that men are better than women

12:34

at sports Tell me if I'm wrong. You

12:36

would

12:36

be correct about that according to

12:38

a recent article in The Atlantic. This

12:41

article is by a woman

12:43

named Maggie Martens, although woman maybe

12:45

that's unfair. A writer

12:47

who goes by Maggie Mertens, who you

12:49

will not be surprised to learn lives

12:51

in Seattle. So Martin's

12:53

piece is called separating sports

12:55

by sex. Doesn't make sense. And as

12:57

you can imagine, this piece got a lot

12:59

of on the Internet, especially on

13:01

Twitter, and it was also picked up by a number

13:03

of conservative outlets as this example

13:05

of the quote unquote left

13:07

gone mad. That sort of

13:09

annoys me because Maggie Mertens doesn't

13:13

stand for the left anymore than QAnon stands

13:15

for the right. But then again, this was published in the

13:17

Atlantic, and I have time

13:19

imagining like the national review or some

13:21

other, you know, Republican

13:23

conservative publication. publishing

13:26

an article about how a satanic cabal

13:28

led by Tom Hanks is stealing

13:29

our children. Anyway, I'm

13:31

sure a lot of people were mad about this because

13:34

they were reacting purely to the headline or

13:36

short excerpts that were posted online. That

13:38

happens all the time. But in this case,

13:40

I

13:41

don't think that the headline was so

13:43

inflammatory, that it mass, they

13:45

compelling arguments. It

13:47

kinda the headline kinda tells you all you need

13:49

to know article right there. So what what

13:52

is Martin's argument? So the

13:54

piece starts with an anecdote about a high

13:56

school girl in New York who wanted to play football

13:58

for her high school team. but before

13:59

she was allowed to do so,

14:01

she had to compete, complete this

14:04

array of, like, fitness exams and jump through

14:06

all of these really silly hoops and

14:08

basically get judged by a panel of administrators

14:10

in sports people and a doctor

14:12

before she was allowed to join the football team. And this

14:14

was not something that the boys had to do.

14:16

According to Burton's, the reason for this is a New

14:18

York State Education Department policy that was

14:20

passed in nineteen eighty five with the aim of

14:23

protecting girls from injury. Now, I think

14:25

this is dumb. It will be

14:27

apparent to coaches if a girl or a

14:29

boy is physically able to keep up during

14:31

practice or

14:31

trials. Can I jump can I

14:33

jump in immediately? Yeah. Please do. I

14:36

I so I I played football,

14:38

seventh and eighth grade. I was at a school you had to do

14:40

sports. I I was horrible. I was horrible

14:42

at football. That's shocking.

14:44

that but I'm

14:47

not sure it is that obvious. This

14:49

is a stupid policy because there's,

14:51

like, gradations and how hard you hit in

14:53

practice. You can sort of do non

14:55

contact. You can do sort of, like, jogging

14:57

half speed. But it's like a

14:59

pretty big step. up to how how old

15:01

was this girl? High school. I don't know what it is

15:03

with high school. Yeah. Getting, like,

15:05

hit hit in a high school football

15:07

game is a whole other can of worms, and I absolutely

15:10

see, you know, maybe there's a mix of,

15:12

like, misogyny or, like, old school

15:14

tradition or paternalism, but I could

15:16

absolutely see a reason why you're

15:18

gonna let a girl on the field, you would

15:20

take some extra precautions. This is

15:22

the kind of shit like a kid could get

15:24

very severely injured. It's just it's not joke.

15:26

The difference between game conditions

15:29

and practice conditions is what I'm saying. Okay.

15:30

I'm gonna read you what she had to

15:33

go through, and tell me if

15:34

you think this is fair. And this

15:36

by the way, this is not just for football.

15:38

This is for all mixed sex

15:39

sports. Oh, oh, okay. Yeah.

15:41

So I'm gonna read you from from the

15:43

article and the girl's name is Shearer

15:47

Mendel's.

15:48

The rules which were developed

15:50

in part

15:50

to protect girls from harm during

15:51

competitions required that Mendel's this

15:54

submit a record of her past performance in physical education

15:57

class, a doctor's physical documenting her

15:59

medical history, and

15:59

assessments of her body type height and weight,

16:02

joint structure, and sexual maturity

16:04

level. Okay. I

16:04

should this is dumb. I shouldn't have talked over you.

16:06

I shouldn't a sexual maturity. Oh my

16:08

god. I shouldn't have

16:09

taken care of element measured according to a medical

16:12

guideline notice of tanner's scale. Once she passed

16:14

the fitness test, including a one mile run,

16:16

sprints, push ups, and curl ups, she sent her

16:18

scores to a closed door panel, including

16:20

physical occasion staff, other administrators of

16:22

the school's choosing, and a consulting position.

16:24

The panel then set out to determine whether

16:26

men's element Mandellis was

16:28

essentially strong developed athletic enough to

16:30

play a contact

16:31

sport. Okay. I should have if I

16:33

hadn't talked over you initially, You

16:36

would have told me that already. I apologize

16:38

for talking over you. That's stupid. That's well above the

16:40

beer. Thank you, Jasmine. small thing. I apologize, Gary.

16:42

I'm sorry. I may explain to you.

16:44

there's

16:44

no difference between men and men and women, so we

16:46

can just call it explaining at this point. Mhmm. Okay.

16:49

So Miranda and her piece acknowledges that this is

16:51

a pretty rare event. But she uses

16:53

this as a basis of her argument, which is that

16:55

it doesn't make sense to separate sports by sex to

16:57

protect women from getting hurt. And I do think she

16:59

makes a a few good points in the article and

17:01

we'll get to those of a little bit. But I wanna focus on

17:03

that basic idea right now. That the reason that

17:05

we segregate sports by sex is to keep

17:08

women safe. Now, I'm sure there is

17:10

some truth to that in contact sports like

17:12

soccer, basketball, football, etcetera.

17:14

But I also think that the that the idea

17:16

that the primary reason we segregate

17:18

sports sex is to prevent injury just doesn't I

17:21

don't think that's true. I think we

17:23

separate sports by sex just as much so that

17:25

women and girls can compete because

17:27

the truth is, most women and girls

17:30

can't compete with men due to physical

17:32

differences and what's more and this is

17:34

really key. They don't want to compete with

17:36

boys and men. And right now so I'm in

17:38

Colorado right now. I'm I'm I'm staying in the

17:40

town where my sister lives. And I was talking

17:42

to her about this. And in her town,

17:44

they segregate youth soccer by

17:46

age six. so so really young and they

17:48

do this because they found that

17:50

girls continue to participate in

17:52

soccer longer if they aren't playing

17:54

with boys. It's not hard to see

17:56

why. I'm generalizing here, but

17:58

in like in most of this

18:00

society that we live in, boys are more likely

18:02

to be close friends with boys and girls

18:04

are more likely to be close friends with

18:06

girls. Maybe this is

18:08

biological. Maybe it's cultural. Maybe it's both.

18:10

Probably it's both. It's definitely

18:12

a generalization. But I think it's one that

18:14

largely happens to be true. So it's there's that

18:16

just that element of, like, boys prefer to

18:18

play with boys, girls, prefer to play with girls.

18:21

there's also the fact that from a very early

18:23

age, boys are just more aggressive than

18:25

girls, including when it comes to sports.

18:27

And I think they're also less likely to

18:29

consider girls competent, and so they're

18:31

less likely to, for instance, pass the

18:33

ball when they're playing co ed sports.

18:35

Jesse, when you were a kid, did you

18:37

play sports? Yeah.

18:37

Soccer. Yeah. Soccer basketball is everything.

18:39

A little bit. Okay. So and when

18:41

you were playing, like, not in a league, but when you're

18:43

playing at school, like, pick up sports, and

18:45

and everybody goes, and and,

18:47

you know, to like, you do that thing where you you

18:49

choose who's gonna be on which team. You mean,

18:52

like,

18:52

captains? Yeah.

18:52

It's a captains thing. Yeah. As

18:55

a kid. Yeah. Yeah. And so

18:56

from your memory, was there

18:59

a a significant different like,

19:01

basically, I'm asking where girls always at the

19:02

last pick where they came to sport?

19:04

But for the main when I was in,

19:07

like, elementary school, it was mostly pickup

19:09

football and basketball, and there were no girls

19:11

playing with us. It was Okay. Right. So because But yeah. If

19:13

there were girls, they would've been picked last because --

19:15

Right. -- probably yeah. Right. So I

19:16

think this is so the I

19:18

I didn't talk to a woman until I was twenty five.

19:20

Have

19:20

you even talked to one yet? Game of Girls

19:22

dot com. Okay.

19:25

So, obviously, there are lots of

19:28

exceptions to this. I was personally

19:30

an exception into these roles. I was the only girl on my little league

19:32

team. I was one of two in the entire league.

19:34

I played club soccer on a co ed

19:36

team until our skill levels

19:38

were so unmatched that I basically couldn't keep

19:40

up. And I will say there is something very

19:42

frustrating about being the only girl on the team

19:44

because unless you are one of, like,

19:46

an exceptional athlete, you were probably

19:48

also going to be one of the worst

19:50

people on the team or at least that was my

19:52

experience. Granted, I'm not a

19:54

great athlete. And I could have when I was

19:56

playing, like, Little League, I could have I could

19:58

have transitioned to playing softball, which I would

20:00

have been better at, but I always hated

20:02

softball and was resentful of the fact that that

20:04

was considered old sports while

20:06

baseball was considered a boy sport. And this

20:08

is, I think, one of the better

20:10

points that Barnes makes in her piece. This is a quote

20:12

from her. school sports are typically

20:14

sex segregated, and in America,

20:16

some have even come to be seen as either

20:18

traditionally for boys or traditionally for

20:20

girls, think football wrestling, field

20:22

hockey, volleyball, And I do think that's a

20:24

shame. Why should girls play football and boys play

20:26

baseball? In fact, I think it's it's

20:28

especially stupid because softballs are so much bigger

20:30

than baseballs. Like, it's actually hard for me to get

20:32

my hand around a softball

20:34

because I have tiny hands. There's nothing

20:36

inherently male about baseball. There's nothing

20:38

inherently female. about Sapa and the same is

20:40

true of lacrosse and Field Hockey.

20:42

Although, I do think if boys are gonna play Field

20:44

Hockey, they should have to wear a

20:46

skirt. So That's the point that I agree

20:48

with. Designating some sports as boy

20:50

sports and some sports as girl sports is

20:52

inherently regressive and limiting, but

20:54

then Martin writes this.

20:57

However, it's becoming common for these

20:59

lines to blur, especially as Gen

21:01

Zers are more likely than members of previous

21:03

generations to reject a strict

21:05

gender binary altogether. maintaining this binary and

21:07

youth sports reinforces the

21:09

idea that boys are inherently

21:11

bigger, faster, and stronger than girls

21:13

in a competitive setting. a

21:15

notion that's been challenged by scientists for years.

21:18

Jesse, just react to that,

21:20

please.

21:20

I just did. That's I

21:22

mean, if we're talking about post pubescent males

21:25

versus females, I look,

21:27

I did I did a long newsletter

21:29

on this maybe a couple years ago at this

21:31

point. There's just this ongoing effort to

21:33

pretend that we don't know males and

21:35

females are different and that we don't have a lot of

21:37

information about why men

21:39

are Most measures at the competitive level,

21:41

much bigger, stronger, faster than women. That's

21:43

why women sports exist. I find this to

21:45

be a very sort of Soviet

21:48

style of revisionism. I mean, I say that because

21:50

like the Soviet Union really did reject forms

21:52

of science that didn't match up with the

21:54

party line, and that's exactly what's going

21:56

on here. Except, you know, we're not in a totalitarian dictatorship,

21:58

so we're shielded from it. It's just

22:00

bad articles and outlets. It's just it's

22:02

very scientifically ignorant, I think.

22:04

Okay. Here's how Martin's here's how she

22:07

finishes that that that

22:09

thought. Decades of research has shown that

22:11

sex is far more complex than

22:13

we think. And those sex differences

22:15

in sports show advantages for men.

22:17

Researchers today still don't know how much of

22:19

this to attribute to biological difference

22:21

versus the lack of support provided to women athletes

22:23

to reach their highest potential. Yeah. I

22:24

think this is a version of what

22:27

they called ish gallop during

22:29

the creationism fight. It's where you like you

22:31

do like just you ramble on and you jump from point

22:33

to point to point, but the points don't really match

22:35

onto the argument you're making. So

22:38

Is sex more complicated than we once thought?

22:41

Sure.

22:41

Do some

22:42

of the differences in performance maybe come down

22:44

to women not getting the same

22:46

support? Also, sure,

22:48

is there any evidence to suggest

22:50

that there wouldn't be a very large

22:52

gap remaining after you took

22:55

into account training. And I think in some areas, the

22:57

training gap has maybe narrowed a little bit.

22:59

No. No matter what, these these these are

23:01

well understood phenomena, like,

23:03

why manner bigger, stronger, faster

23:05

in most areas? Yeah. I

23:06

okay. So I have an example of this

23:08

from a sport that I I used to do. So I was

23:10

a freestyle white water kayaker And I started

23:12

paddling when I was a real little kid, when I

23:14

was twelve years old, they didn't make

23:18

boats and equipment that fit

23:20

women basically. they just didn't exist. So if you're woman

23:22

in the sport, you were Well, you said

23:23

have weird bodies. No one knows. We do have weird

23:25

bodies in shape like that. That's totally

23:27

fair. So if you were a

23:29

woman in sport until basically the

23:31

late nineties, early two thousands, you

23:34

would be in a in

23:36

a boat that didn't fit you. It would

23:38

swap you. It

23:38

has a giant slot for the penis.

23:41

Exactly. You don't have a penis. So yeah.

23:43

Right. And

23:43

so eventually, companies started

23:45

making boats and making gear that

23:47

fit women. And that did close some

23:50

of the gap when it came to

23:52

scores on in freestyle hiking, but

23:54

it didn't close the whole gap. by

23:56

any means because males have a fucking

23:59

advantage because

23:59

they are stronger than women. And that's just what

24:02

it comes down to. It has nothing to

24:04

do with with

24:06

culture. It has nothing to do with

24:08

equipment. It just comes down to brute

24:10

physical strength. And of course, there are exceptions

24:12

to this. But this shows this, this bizarre

24:14

denial of something that is obvious on its head

24:16

to everybody. Can I

24:17

can I just say, like, this this whole line of, like,

24:19

sex is more complicated than people think

24:21

is is really tired and silly

24:24

because the actual number of

24:26

people who are truly intersex where there's any

24:28

ambiguity about whether they're male

24:30

or female is tiny. It it's like saying it's

24:32

roughly equivalent to saying, like, because

24:34

being a dog or being a cat is

24:36

more complicated than than we think, which is

24:38

surely true at the by launch level

24:40

that we can't tell what's a dog and what's a cat. It's just like

24:42

people just latch onto these mantras

24:44

and and repeat them endlessly. And

24:46

the the the one goal of

24:48

all of this is to sort of

24:50

like overturn the concept of biological sex

24:53

because politically the truth has to be

24:55

people are the sex they say they are.

24:57

That's like the current orthodoxy on trans rights. All of these

24:59

articles are just working

25:01

backwards from that desired conclusion

25:03

and it's been going on for years and it's just it's

25:05

very bad science writing.

25:06

Yeah. So she does offer some

25:09

evidence. I use that in square quotes to

25:11

to support her claim. So

25:13

she talks to an expert One

25:16

of those is Oh, and an

25:18

expert. Yes. Arrives. Yes. One of

25:20

those is sorry, Van Anders.

25:22

So, Van Anders is the research

25:24

chair in social neuro

25:26

endocrinology at Queen's University. In

25:28

Ontario, Jesse, have you ever heard of the field of

25:30

social neuro endocrinology?

25:32

I have not, but I I can sense where this is likely

25:34

going. Okay. Let me

25:35

just read to you a little bit from

25:37

Van Anders website. It

25:40

is, quote, the study of hormones and

25:42

behavior in social in a social

25:44

context, which attends to socially located

25:46

people instead of interchangeable bodies

25:48

multifaceted and socially situated behaviors rather

25:50

than unitary and universal actions

25:52

and evolutionary processes is

25:55

simultaneously cross species and

25:57

human specific. I mean, that

25:58

this is, like, why I can have things are

26:00

just incapable. It sounds like what they're trying

26:02

to say is, like, there's complicated

26:04

interplay between social interactions

26:07

and and hormones and thoughts, which is just

26:09

obviously true. Why do I have to dress it up in so much

26:11

verbiage? Right. Why not

26:12

just say that? I should

26:14

note that Van Anders is

26:16

also views her work as a as,

26:18

quote, feminist in queer science. I

26:21

personally think that's a contradiction because

26:23

science shouldn't have a predetermined outcome

26:25

based on a political agenda, but this is our

26:27

expert, in this case. This is what

26:29

she has to say. Science is

26:31

increasingly showing how sex is dynamic. It

26:33

has multiple ask aspects and

26:35

also shifts For example, social

26:37

experiences can actually change levels of

26:39

sex related hormones like testosterone in

26:41

our bodies, change second to second

26:43

in month months to months away. It's so sad.

26:47

Sorry. I continue. Okay. So I

26:48

don't think the fact that because hormone

26:51

shift over time means that sex is dynamic because

26:53

sex isn't determined by hormones, it's

26:55

determined by gamifieds. I

26:57

mean, but this is what I mean,

26:58

it's so sloppy.

27:00

When you say like sex is dynamic,

27:02

do you mean your hormone levels are

27:04

dynamic? because if you said your hormone levels are

27:06

dynamic and change, Of course. Sure. It's just,

27:08

like, obvious, but then they need to sort of stretch that to

27:10

me and, like, there's something fuzzy

27:13

about but at no point, Like,

27:15

we know we've talked a lot of this podcast. I

27:17

have incredibly low tea. Right. Like, that's

27:19

why my testosterone. I'm a soy boy. I'm

27:21

still a boy. I'm not like, it

27:23

having my incredibly low t doesn't make

27:25

me not male. I'm not more

27:28

male if I have more I just it's

27:30

such bad writing and thinking. Anyway,

27:32

continue. I'm sorry.

27:32

It is. And like like, soy does

27:35

actually lower testosterone levels or

27:37

increase estrogen levels in the body. I don't

27:39

really know the

27:39

name. So I'm a little bit worried about this. I just this

27:41

is a design. I've been eating I found

27:43

a really good fake

27:46

meat ban me -- Mhmm. -- fake chicken.

27:48

And I think it's just loaded with

27:50

soy. I also regularly eat this good

27:52

salad as tofu. So and I also have

27:54

you seen those photos of the Toronto show

27:57

franchise? I thought you guys are think

27:59

that's that's me, you know, that is Your titties

28:01

or girls contribute. Yeah.

28:01

You've been even eating too much. Too much.

28:04

because

28:04

you don't think I am becoming a literal

28:06

soy boy.

28:06

Okay. Here's the second part of her quote. If

28:09

safety was a concern and there was evidence

28:11

to select certain bodily characteristics to

28:13

base safety cutoffs on, then you would see

28:15

say shorter men excluded from competing with

28:17

taller men, or lighter women from competing

28:19

with heavier women across sports.

28:21

Again, safety is probably

28:23

a part of the reason sports are segregated, but

28:25

it's not the tired story. They are

28:27

segregated by sex. Go

28:29

ahead. No. Sorry.

28:29

I keep interrupting because this is so

28:32

stupid.

28:32

the

28:33

men who are likely to get

28:36

injured out of football field will

28:37

not make the team. Right.

28:39

Right. Like they won't. Like, so so yeah. When

28:41

I was in seventh and eighth grade, very

28:44

underdeveloped late bloomer. Just

28:46

in practice, you have to sort of like grapple with

28:48

people and try to block them and try to

28:51

tackle them. And if you're weak as I was,

28:53

you just get trucked as we call it. You get

28:55

run over. And if

28:57

a kid if it was quickly clear

28:59

that a kid was there were probably kids in my grade

29:01

who could not have even performed

29:03

at my very low level. So she's right. If

29:05

someone is too small and weak, too

29:07

play football, that will be noticed they will not

29:09

play football. But it'd be Whereas,

29:11

a fairly small percentage of,

29:13

you know, boys probably couldn't even

29:15

play sixth grade football, a much

29:18

larger percentage of girl. Like, this is just it's written by someone who

29:20

doesn't seem to This is quite an accusation

29:22

for me to hurl given what a nerd I am, but

29:24

this person doesn't seem to get sports.

29:26

She

29:26

got She would see shorter men excluded from competing

29:28

with tall men. They literally are. Like

29:31

I mean, they don't

29:32

they don't if if Alan so

29:35

there's there's liars who are

29:37

amazing. basketball. This yeah. The Celtics just

29:39

drafted a short kitty looks really good, but, like,

29:41

you know, if if they were

29:43

not athletic freaks, they would not make the

29:45

team. And if they were so, like, you

29:47

could get seriously hurt playing basketball

29:49

with, like, pro players, they they would

29:51

go anywhere. Yeah. She's

29:53

wrong about that. But again, I think that this

29:56

idea that the only reason that sports are

29:58

segregated

29:58

by sex

29:59

is to prevent harm to girls. It's just

30:02

false. Like, look at title nine. The point is

30:04

to encourage women to participate in

30:06

sports and create a culture in which they're

30:08

as supported as male athletes. And

30:10

frankly, I think it's very weird that

30:12

feminists like Van Anders and Martins

30:14

and I I think considers herself a feminist probably. She's

30:16

written a ton about women in sports

30:18

pretend that women don't benefit from

30:20

having their own teams when they would

30:23

so obviously be excluded if they were expected to play

30:25

with men and boys. Martin's,

30:27

of course, she also references the debate

30:29

about trans girls

30:30

and sports. She

30:32

writes

30:32

In recent years, the question of who can play

30:34

on what team has developed into a full

30:36

blown

30:36

front on the culture war

30:38

based on large part on the

30:40

fear that transgender girls will unfairly take

30:42

over girl sports because of sweeping generalizations

30:45

about biological advantages

30:47

come the fuck on. Some sweeping generalizations

30:50

are in fact true, including the fact

30:52

that males have physical advantages over

30:54

women, not just in terms of strength and speed,

30:56

but also heart size, lung

30:58

size, bone density, wingspan, like she's

31:00

denying

31:01

reality. I just I was just

31:03

like setting aside our own views

31:05

on fairness. People just they need

31:07

to take a deep breath and realize how

31:09

potent this is. If I

31:11

just I'm convinced just from

31:14

hearing from parents that if, like,

31:16

one trans girl in a school system,

31:18

in a high school system, who hasn't

31:21

transitioned gets

31:23

on as a girl, like, it it is such

31:25

an explosive political thing. It really

31:28

attacks people's sense of fairness. And this happened in

31:30

Connecticut with two trans

31:33

track runners who really did dominate. Like,

31:35

it's you might be doing harm

31:37

to your cause in the long run by by

31:39

pretending these differences aren't real because they're very

31:41

real.

31:41

I think that's so true. And I think that this

31:43

is something that's going to come back and haunt

31:45

the Democrats during election. I I

31:47

looked at some polling yesterday. There's

31:49

a Pew survey on on

31:52

various trans issues. People

31:54

fall about where you would expect. They

31:56

broadly protect they broadly support,

31:58

you know, protect trans people from

31:59

discrimination and jobs housing and public

32:02

facing. But then when you drill down into these

32:04

other issues, like, okay, here's from

32:06

the poll require that trans athletes

32:08

compete on teams that match the sex they were

32:10

assigned

32:10

at birth. The number

32:11

of people who oppose that, so that is the

32:13

number of people who think that trans people should

32:15

be or the percentage of people who think that trans

32:17

people should should compete with their gender identity,

32:19

it's seventeen percent. This

32:21

is very low. it's

32:23

a lot a lot. And I might actually

32:25

be writing something on this for a newsletter. A

32:27

lot of these the positions

32:30

that can get you in some cases

32:32

literally fired from your job

32:34

are quite popular when you look at the

32:36

actual polling. Not not like, you

32:38

know, bay like you're saying, the basic right stuff

32:40

is different, but it's just it

32:42

gets very different and more

32:44

personal when you're like, yeah, your

32:46

daughter might just have to compete with a male

32:48

kid, which is, again, I know we're not supposed to say, but

32:50

that is what that I think what annoyed

32:52

about this is, like, attempting to rob

32:55

language from us. Like, I I

32:57

can't even describe why I think this

32:59

might potentially be unfair because you're not allowed to

33:01

use the word male that you refer male person, but it's

33:03

it's bullshit. It's like that I know the

33:05

term Orwellian gets thrown around, but that's literally

33:07

Orwellian. It's in nineteen eighty four.

33:09

It is. And if you look at the Biden

33:11

There's that scene with Transport, you know, two eighty

33:13

four, where Winston has to stop.

33:15

And if you look at the Biden

33:17

visit, the Biden administration stands on this. Like, they've said

33:19

that they support, you know, Transkin's ability to

33:21

play in in sports, and this is going to

33:23

come back and haunt them because Republicans

33:25

are going to turn this into the issue the

33:27

issue with But notice

33:28

but but notice even your phrasing

33:30

you bought into their framing.

33:32

their ability to play in sports, which no

33:34

one's question. Right. It's just which which yeah.

33:37

And and and we should add, when

33:39

you get into early puberty blocking and cross sex

33:41

hormones, this all gets much more complicated and fuzzy.

33:43

We're talking about situations where someone's already

33:45

gone through male puberty. Alright.

33:46

So Lauren's she also quotes a few

33:49

more experts, scare

33:51

quotes experts. she quotes a sociologist, but it's

33:53

never a biologist. Right? It's always a

33:55

sociologist. There's one named Mikaela

33:57

Musto who says The reason that we think boys stronger

33:59

than girls is

33:59

because of sport itself. Here's a quote from the

34:02

piece. The strict sex

34:03

segregation we've been silicon

34:05

sports at all levels gives the impression that men and women

34:07

have completely different capabilities. But in

34:10

reality, Musto

34:12

said, The relationship between sex and athletic capability is never so

34:14

cut and dried. Quote. There are some boys

34:16

who also could get really hurt if

34:19

they were competing against other boys in context. Oh

34:21

my god. Oh my god. This

34:23

is like -- Wow. -- like, do

34:25

are they dumb or do they think

34:27

where do I think Both. So so when I when

34:29

I was so seven the eighth grade, I went to

34:31

a school, like, a shitty private school, I

34:34

had youth

34:36

sports. In ninth grade, I went to a public school, public

34:38

school, high school. They didn't want to be in

34:40

high school. They care about what happened.

34:43

No. I I was debating whether to try

34:45

to play freshman football, which I think

34:47

they basically took everyone. I

34:49

can't remember. Anyway, The first, I went to the weight room. You're supposed to lift weights,

34:51

which I hate. I saw what the kind of kid I would

34:54

have been playing against who was just like a

34:56

monster. Someone who would have murdered

34:58

me and

35:00

I was pretty quickly, like, no, thanks. I'll play basketball instead. Like

35:02

That's the moment that you

35:03

decide to become a podcast. Yeah.

35:05

You actually play basketball in

35:07

high school? No.

35:07

Not tonight. So I've always had to just play like pick up

35:09

ball and parkers of Skills. I'm a

35:12

very lazy person. I never no. I'm like,

35:14

I'm fine. Like, I I can play at

35:16

a random playground usually. But yeah. I didn't I didn't play in high school sports. I was

35:18

a fuck up. Was I can play against twelve year

35:20

old girls. That's why I have in favor.

35:22

Those are the only person I do beat with. No.

35:24

But, like, literally these kids were just fucking monsters and

35:26

I felt like I would have possibly

35:28

gotten hurt. So I was like, I'm not gonna play football.

35:30

This idea I

35:32

I don't know how they can keep saying, some

35:34

smaller boys could get hurt. Yes. That's why there's

35:37

tryouts. That's why not everyone

35:39

makes a team. at the competitive levels where real

35:41

injuries are more likely to occur. Okay. So Martin's also does side of

35:43

study. Here's what she writes. One

35:45

recent small study in Norway found

35:47

no innate sex differences

35:50

when it came to use soccer player's technical skills.

35:52

The researchers hypothesized that the gap they

35:54

did find between girls and boys was likely

35:56

due to socialization, not biology,

35:59

Okay. So I looked at this study, Jesse, you're

36:01

the science guy here. What would you say

36:03

that we can conclude from a study in

36:05

which n equals sixteen boys

36:07

and seventeen girls? I mean, that's one issue. I just found

36:09

the whole study to be a I mean, do you

36:11

want me to just talk about it? Do you want to describe it? Yeah. I

36:13

mean, it was yeah. It's just basically was it a I'm

36:16

forgetting which

36:18

frigid distant. Was it Norway or Iceland? What was it? Norway?

36:20

Yeah. They're all the same. Kevin, remember, Kaffel's

36:22

went to Iceland and

36:24

then Greenland. Yeah. That's our

36:26

alternate members. Anyway, yeah, they just had these kids.

36:28

They were, I think, around seventeen or eighteen years

36:31

old, like, competitive at the club level. So, like,

36:33

pretty good players, and they had

36:35

them do this task where they receive the ball, and then they

36:37

try to sort of kick the ball twenty five meters and

36:39

get close to a cone or whatever. And

36:42

it's just it

36:44

it so far from real world competition, and

36:46

I talked to a guy who, like, reports on sports. I

36:48

don't really know soccer. This guy knows

36:50

soccer or what he would call football.

36:54

twenty five meter pass for, like, good players

36:56

is is not that long a pass. So

36:58

they basically set up a system where

37:01

they're testing their skills, but certain

37:03

aspects of the strength and speed

37:05

components are already not part of the game. They're

37:07

like sort of controlled for. So

37:09

like, I don't know, what's the equivalent of this even? Like, a

37:11

male and a female basketball player doing

37:13

tasks that don't require

37:16

shifting this or strength? Yeah. Things a lot.

37:18

So in other words, you're second a deck. So

37:20

already, you're you're ameliorating some of the differences,

37:22

but I think they

37:24

found that there were no

37:26

sex differences in how accurately they made

37:28

this twenty five meter pass,

37:30

then the guys were better at receiving the pass.

37:32

I have that right. Right? Yeah.

37:33

They were significantly better at receiving the pass, which

37:35

is apparently the more technically difficult

37:38

part

37:38

of soccer because kicking a ball is

37:40

kicking a ball. Yeah. I I

37:42

again, only knowing I I'll watch some soccer

37:44

like when the World Cup comes up, but I

37:47

just knowing what I know, I did not

37:49

find this to be evidence of anything moreover,

37:51

I remembered as soon as I was

37:53

reading this that the developmental

37:56

squad for the I think

37:58

Dallas MLS team, their fifth fifteen

38:00

and under developmental squad, beat

38:02

the women's national team in a

38:05

scrimmage. It's a scrimmage, but Obviously, the women's national team

38:07

does not wanna be beat by fifteen year old boys. It's not

38:09

like they're not trying. It was not close. It was A52

38:11

match, which is a blowout

38:14

in soccer. And

38:14

this this is the US women soccer team is the best soccer

38:16

team in the world. Yes.

38:17

So it's like again,

38:20

it's

38:20

a scrimmage, but they're they're not

38:23

I promise you these are world class athletes.

38:25

They're not trying to lose to fifteen year old

38:27

boys. And it was five too. I promise you

38:29

that that should be better evidence than a

38:31

weird contrived study in a

38:34

situation where, like, none of the, like, you

38:36

know, game time stuff is going on. They're just,

38:38

like, hanging out on a controlled

38:40

field doing these drills.

38:42

It's just It's not good evidence. Maybe it's interesting if you're like a nerd

38:44

who's into the nitty gritty of males versus

38:46

female soccer players, but it's just it doesn't really

38:48

tell us anything.

38:49

Okay. So the researcher's theory for why boys might

38:51

be better at receiving the

38:54

ball than girls is because they say

38:56

that boys and this is just this

38:58

is like a total hypothesis on their

39:00

part or speculation that

39:02

boys are more likely to engage in this

39:04

of informal self directed soccer play as little kids. Is

39:07

this true? Probably in

39:09

some places? Yes. Probably,

39:12

although I've been like, my sister lives across

39:14

from a soccer field and or from a a big

39:16

park where they have soccer every day, and I've

39:18

been watching kids all week play soccer. And there are a lot of girl I mean, this

39:20

is just totally anecdotal, but there are a lot of girls

39:22

out there just doing this sort of

39:24

informal play. that boys do as

39:26

well. But what they're saying? I I will say, like,

39:27

anecdotally, at least when we were growing up,

39:30

which could have been different. III

39:32

just it was totally normal for the neighborhood kids to play football and basketball. I

39:34

just don't remember the girls doing that. I do think

39:36

it was older when they had more structured soccer

39:38

and field hockey and stuff. They

39:41

more to it. So that that part, like, drives with me at least. Yeah. I

39:43

I would not be at all surprised if

39:45

this is true. But basically, what they're saying

39:47

is that the boys are better at soccer

39:49

because they play more soccer rather than some

39:51

biological advantage, but they don't have

39:54

any evidence to prove that

39:56

this is true. Right? They just it's the assumption. They say,

39:58

this is this is why. Because they don't

39:59

actually know that these particular that this

40:02

group of of soccer players

40:04

played more pick up soccer when they were kids.

40:06

They just have this assumption. Boys are more

40:08

likely to do this informal self directed

40:10

plays. Five and six year olds, better

40:12

receiving the ball as seventeen year olds.

40:14

It's also

40:14

it's just sort of like cherry picking and

40:16

stacking the deck. Like, if I had

40:19

male versus female basketball players, high school basketball players.

40:21

You know, if the task was dribble the ball

40:24

fifty times without dribbling off your foot, but

40:26

you can dribble as slow as you want and you don't

40:28

have to move.

40:30

They could they'd be about equal. There's ways to, like, contrive this

40:32

so that there aren't gonna be sex differences. And

40:34

I I sort of felt like this study did that, but

40:36

I again, soccer is not a sport I know

40:38

much about. I

40:39

mean, regardless, even if they're correct about this, that

40:41

there's nothing innately different about boys and

40:44

girls when it comes to skill and strength with I'm I

40:46

will not concede. But even if they were right

40:48

about this and not only reason that boys

40:50

are better than soccer than girls is because of

40:52

this informal self directed

40:54

play. Why should that

40:56

matter? Why should that like, why is that an argument

40:58

for ending sex segregated sports

41:00

like

41:00

Oh, I disagree with that because

41:02

it I mean, well, so this is a ganzo

41:05

theory that it's all I guess

41:07

she's not saying it's all socialization. But when I was when I was in college, this

41:09

was, like, two thousand five, I first encountered this view

41:11

in, like, a lip theory

41:14

seminar. that it's all socialization that men and women are biologically the

41:16

same for sports. If that were true,

41:18

it would mean we should expect

41:22

men and women to end up at an equal level of competitiveness and

41:24

that everyone thing should be funded equally would have

41:26

all sorts of policy implications including for the trans

41:28

stuff. So I I can understand why

41:32

That does matter. I mean, why what? But but the remedy to that

41:34

would be forcing girls to play

41:36

pickup games, to do this thing that they're

41:39

not naturally doing.

41:40

which I I think they should be herded into soccer camp. Of course,

41:42

to Okay. Let's say you have a

41:44

bunch of

41:44

girls who would rather play on the jungle

41:47

gym than play you know, the shot colors

41:49

or something. Oh, no. Shot colors. Okay. I see you nurturing a baby

41:51

doll. You get a shot. Exactly.

41:54

Exactly. It

41:54

just I don't think that

41:56

don't think it really matters. The fact is it might be

41:59

it might be experience. It's probably partly experience. And it's probably

42:01

large parts of it

42:03

or probably biology. I don't

42:05

think it matters really what the what the reason

42:08

for these skill differences. What

42:10

matters is that girls

42:12

have leagues in which they can compete and have fun

42:14

and in which they will

42:16

continue the sport because they don't feel discouraged because

42:18

they're the worst people on

42:20

the team.

42:21

Yeah. This is all very short

42:23

sighted and dumb. As so many things

42:25

are. Yeah.

42:25

Okay. So one thing I will

42:28

concede is I think that

42:30

oftentimes girls don't get the

42:32

support that boys do when it comes to sports and a lot

42:34

of this is very gendered and maybe

42:36

this will change as future generations

42:38

become more you know, comfortable with

42:40

the idea of gender fluidity, but there's this level of science denialism

42:42

here. The reason boys

42:44

are stronger and more physical isn't

42:48

just culture. It's also biology, including things like hormones,

42:50

and any time and anyone who has spent time

42:52

around kids could tell you that boys are more

42:54

rough than tumble than girls are.

42:57

There are tons of exceptions, of course. And

42:59

I think that's particularly true when you have

43:01

girls with older brothers who are probably end

43:03

up being more into sort of rough housing than than

43:05

girls who don't have older brothers are. It's partially influenced

43:07

by parents in society, of course, but it's

43:09

also influenced by biology

43:12

and evolution. And it seems to me

43:14

that especially, Liberals who deny

43:16

that who deny this are just engaging in

43:18

this sort of blank racism that isn't

43:20

supported by data or most people's

43:22

experience. Like, How many

43:24

stories have you heard about people

43:26

who try to raise their kids in some

43:28

gender neutral way or as gender neutral way

43:30

as possible? and yet the girls are just absolutely desperate for

43:32

for dolls and the boys end up like

43:34

making guns out of sticks and like pieces of

43:36

bread because

43:38

they just want these things that the parents won't let them have because the parents this

43:40

idea that life should be more

43:42

gender neutral than it actually is.

43:45

There are obviously lots of exceptions to these rules. I'm

43:47

one of them, but denying that boys and

43:50

girls are different and

43:52

sometimes should have their own

43:54

sports teams is just going to end up hurting

43:56

kids, and it's mostly gonna end up

43:58

hurting girls. And so it's really galling to

44:00

see arguments like this published in

44:02

places by

44:04

places like the the Atlantic and by people who consider themselves

44:06

feminists. Well, I mean, not

44:08

just sound too conspiratorial,

44:10

but I think her political movement

44:14

wants us to not be able to, like,

44:16

define girl. She doesn't think there's such a thing as

44:18

a girl. Based upon what you feel you are. So if that's

44:20

the goal, it would make sense to break down these

44:24

distinctions. I know again, I know that sounds conspiratorial, but if you asked her,

44:26

what's a girl? She would say a girl, someone who

44:28

says her girl. This is also woman who has written

44:30

out, like, I'm just looking at her Atlantic

44:32

page. the title nine loophole

44:34

that hurts n c double a women's names.

44:36

The women this woman

44:38

served the biggest wave of the year. materially

44:40

not higher pay is the WNDAs will real

44:42

win. What the US women's soccer team

44:45

needs more than equal pay. Like, She's

44:48

a woman who writes about women sports

44:50

and she's essentially arguing for the

44:52

dismantling of women sports. Yeah. She's

44:54

trying to put herself out of a job.

44:56

It's

44:56

not great. Anything else,

44:59

Jesse? No. These articles are bad

45:01

and they should be better.

45:03

Housekeeping? Yes. We're blocked

45:05

and reported. We're podcast, check us out at blockchain reporter dot org.

45:07

You can become a PRIMO where you get three

45:10

extra episodes a month for just five dollars

45:12

a month.

45:14

you'll also get to join, you know, comment on our articles,

45:16

discuss them with other promos. It's

45:18

a community that's almost at nine thousand people, Katie.

45:20

We're gonna have to do something big at

45:24

ten thousand people maybe one on one basketball or kayaking?

45:25

Yeah. Let's do kayaking. I think that's a great

45:28

idea. Kayaking

45:29

well played basketball. Well, there's that sort

45:31

of a sport. They do

45:34

have a pull up. Primos are also the first to know about our live shows.

45:36

We always give them at least an hour or two head

45:38

start before we tweet out and otherwise

45:40

announce our shows, so

45:42

another perk. We

45:44

got to subret it, block reporter dot red

45:46

dot com. You can email us at block reporter

45:48

podcast at gmail dot com. Anything else,

45:51

Katie? Written review scientists. Rate

45:53

and review us on

45:56

iTunes. Katie, what do you know

45:58

about gays

45:59

against groomers? blissfully little.

46:00

gays against rumors describes itself as a collection

46:02

of gays against the sexualization, indoctrination,

46:05

and medicalization of

46:08

children According to the website, their two main issue to be

46:10

opposition to things like drag queen story

46:12

hour and skepticism of

46:15

youth gender transition. They

46:18

sell tote bags that say okay groomer on them. We've

46:20

talked about this before. We both really dislike

46:22

okay groomer and appears to have been popularized

46:25

by James Lindsay. Alright. P. Alright.

46:27

P

46:27

from Twitter. He's not dead. I'm trying to

46:30

set off an Internet rumor.

46:32

Okay.

46:32

Groover intentionally

46:34

conflates two very different things. Like, whether in some cases kids are

46:36

being taught about gender identity in

46:38

a way that's developmentally inappropriate, and

46:42

whether they're being actually groomed in a sexual sense. There

46:45

have long been allegations against gay people that

46:47

they're trying to diddle kids. This is sort

46:49

of an ancient slander and In

46:52

my experience, folks who use okay groomer do this thing where they think

46:54

they're being cute, where they say, oh, no, no, we

46:56

don't mean grooming in that way, but

46:59

Come on. Of of course, if you call somebody a

47:01

groomer, that's what people are gonna think. If

47:03

you want to criticize people for

47:05

doing developmentally inappropriate on gender

47:08

identity, you can do that. You don't need to call them a

47:10

groomer. Anyway, our segment here

47:12

isn't about whether gays against groomers is like a

47:14

goodhearted group. but rather about

47:16

the fact that PayPal and Venmo, Venmo being owned by PayPal, cut

47:18

the group off from

47:20

raising funds.

47:22

long after that, the founder of gays against Gruber, let's

47:24

call them gag, complained that they'd

47:26

also been banned from Google. The

47:31

Ideally, they were

47:31

banned from Google seems a little fuzzier

47:34

because what they posted to Twitter seemed more like

47:36

a security concern. The

47:38

PayPal and Venmo stuff appears to

47:40

be real. And along those same

47:42

lines, the free speech union in

47:44

the in the UK, which is basically what it sounds

47:46

like, also said they'd been cut off

47:48

by PayPal. So I emailed Paypal to ask you about these cases. I

47:50

said in my email that I wanted to make

47:52

sure this wasn't some security or

47:54

technical issue. and

47:56

that in both cases the bands had to do with the organization's stances or

47:58

with the language they'd used to promote

47:59

those stances. Here's what I

48:02

got back. PayPal

48:03

has a longstanding and consistent

48:06

acceptable use policy. We

48:08

take action when we deem that individuals

48:10

or organizations have violated

48:12

this policy. per company policy PayPal does not disclose specific

48:14

account information for current or former

48:16

customers. If you go to the

48:18

acceptable use

48:20

policy, And the part of it that doesn't just

48:22

deal with the legal stuff, like you have is you can't

48:24

use PayPal to like sell legal drugs.

48:26

Section two reads that You

48:29

may not use the PayPal for activities that relate to

48:31

transactions involving narcotics, steroids,

48:33

certain controlled substances, or other

48:35

products that present to

48:37

consumer safety, drug paraphernalia, cigarettes,

48:40

items that encourage, promote, facilitate, or

48:42

instruct others to engage in illegal activity.

48:45

stolen goods, including digital virtual goods, the promotion of

48:47

hate, violence, racial, or other forms of

48:49

intolerance that is discriminatory or the financial

48:52

exploitation of

48:54

a crime. items that are considered obscene and on and

48:56

on. So, Katie, something jumped out at me about

48:58

this stuff about obscene material

49:00

and promoting hate. I'm curious if the same thing jumped

49:02

out at Well, they

49:03

don't have a definition of what that

49:05

is.

49:05

Yeah. Yeah. There's a lot of this is,

49:08

like, fairly

49:10

subjective and it seems

49:11

like, you know, as anyone who

49:13

listens to this podcast knows, the promotion

49:15

of hate is actually a very vague

49:17

concept. And in common

49:20

usage, It isn't only applied to explicitly bigoted material.

49:22

We've been accused of Promoted eight because

49:24

we tell the stories of dtransitioners or we

49:26

believe that kids desist from gender as

49:30

far fairly often, then there's items that are

49:32

considered obscene, which raises the question of

49:34

considered obscene by whom. We can safely assume

49:36

PayPal because it's run by, like,

49:39

you know, tolerant liberal types doesn't

49:42

mean considered obscene by religious

49:44

fundamentalists, but, of course, it's plainly true that

49:46

in certain parts of

49:48

the world, including some neighborhoods of Brooklyn. It's considered I've seen

49:50

to do things that wouldn't cause anyone to

49:52

bat an eye in more liberal

49:54

pockets. So Like, show

49:56

your knees. Show your knees

49:58

for example. What about wear

49:58

giant prosthetic breasts to your

49:59

shop cost? The hypothetically,

50:02

some

50:02

people might consider that obscene. Bigger.

50:06

I can't see it. But other people don't. So whenever something like this happens, people

50:08

seem to just repeat the same line of, like, well,

50:10

these are just private companies making private

50:14

decisions. But I feel like there's a case to

50:16

be made that that might not quite apply here,

50:18

Katie.

50:18

Yeah. This does strike me as fundamentally

50:20

different. And we talked about this a

50:22

little bit in the Keppel episode, but a

50:24

private company, also a private company like Twitter saying, you

50:27

aren't welcome on our platform anymore. We don't want

50:29

you a part of our community. Which to

50:31

be clear, I am I oftentimes

50:33

think that they make the incorrect decision and I think they should be much

50:35

more liberal in their application or maybe

50:38

much more conservative. I don't know at

50:40

this point. and

50:42

their application of banning

50:44

people and cutting people off from a banking

50:46

system. Howard Bauchner:

50:46

Yeah, and and, you know, it's

50:49

not quite cutting them off from a banking system. You're

50:51

not saying these people aren't allowed to have a

50:53

bank account, but PayPal appears to have, like, a

50:55

giant chunk of the market share for

50:57

online money transfers. and that's an increasingly

50:59

vital way money gets moved couldn't find good estimates on ideas, but one

51:02

estimate I saw suggested more than two

51:04

billion dollars flows through

51:06

PayPal daily. estimates

51:08

of their market share. Some of them say they have more than fifty percent of

51:10

the online, you know, money moving

51:12

around

51:12

market. And and does this

51:15

does that include Venmo?

51:17

PayPal owns Venmo. So it's it's Right. But

51:19

does

51:19

that I wonder I wonder if that's the

51:21

if Venmo also takes in a certain amount

51:23

or if that's just

51:24

the brand. Oh, yeah. That's a good question. I'm actually not sure. But

51:26

either way, it's a fucking

51:27

lot. It's a fucking lot. And you don't need

51:29

to be an expert to understand that there are all sorts

51:32

of reasons hard to launch a

51:34

new payment processor. Like,

51:36

we could not start the Barpod app

51:38

that lets you send money around because you

51:40

need relationships with banks. You need

51:43

someone to, like, Bitcoin. I was through to Bitcoin. You need a lot you

51:45

need a lot of technical expertise and

51:47

the incumbents have advantages because,

51:50

of course, they can organize to allow policies that exclude

51:52

newcomers to the market. So we

51:54

have a situation where it's technically true

51:56

that these are private companies

51:59

But but they're increasingly private companies

52:01

you can't really live with without

52:03

as a business or organization, not

52:05

without it costing you. a lot in potential donations.

52:07

Does this make sense to you, Kenny? Yeah, it does.

52:09

And

52:09

it also reminds me, I'm not sure if this

52:11

is something that you said or if this is something that one of

52:14

our listeners

52:16

said, but in terms of Kessels. The reason that people

52:18

that Kessels went after Cloudflare when she

52:20

wanted to get Kiwi firms taken off the

52:22

Internet is there's an abundance of

52:25

host. Like, you don't go after the host because you can

52:27

just hop to a different host. You go after

52:29

a company like Cloudflare because they have a

52:31

corner on the market whatever they do, this sort of digital protection, the

52:33

same thing as true of PayPal and Venmo. Yeah. Someone

52:35

did

52:35

point out to me that I also didn't explain that well because, like,

52:38

you don't really need a

52:40

host basically if you have your

52:42

own infrastructure, you can sort of host yourself. But, yeah, the same the same point applies. Like,

52:44

these are private companies. Yes.

52:48

but they're private companies without which you have to jump through a lot of

52:50

hoops to even exist as a business and

52:52

you'll probably or an organization.

52:55

So I find it

52:58

surprising that, again, that

53:00

Liberals and

53:02

Leftists who tend to be skeptical of powerful

53:04

corporations so often

53:06

cheerleaders. Do you think it's

53:10

simply that like,

53:12

I don't know, if you're twenty five or thirty or

53:14

thirty five, you've you've come up as a journalist or

53:16

an activist or an academic in

53:18

a situation where, like, all the

53:20

organizations you care about, and that have direct power over you. I'm not talking about your

53:22

state government. I'm talking about your school or

53:25

your company, your NGO. They

53:27

are all, like, political monocultures. So I guess the

53:30

assumption is, like, the good guys will always be the

53:32

ones running PayPal. Yeah. What happened

53:33

to occupy Wall Street? I thought we are under the

53:35

assumption that Banks were bad.

53:37

it's it's it's weird to me. And it it

53:39

does seem similar to the Kiwi Pharmasing. It

53:41

it feels like there's this culture where if you make

53:43

this point people oh, so you're

53:45

saying you like gays against rumors, you're defending them. And again,

53:47

just try to come up with a principle here because like

53:50

I promise you there are lefty and liberal

53:52

groups who

53:54

have said edgy things in the other direction, perhaps about police

53:56

or the military law enforcement. That

53:58

offended a lot of people, but

54:01

I'm guessing they would not get pulled down by PayPal. And if they

54:03

were, that would be bad because, like, we

54:05

just I don't know. As as power

54:07

gets concentrated in fewer and fewer hands and money

54:09

gets more and more tied up, in these giant

54:11

billion dollar corporations, we need

54:14

to have norms that that reflect

54:16

that. And one thing I don't know about

54:18

that, I'm curious And I know they're trying this

54:20

in the UK is whether and to what extent these companies can be regulated, so they're not allowed

54:22

to do that. My sense is in an American

54:24

context, it's

54:26

actually very hard to for the government to regulate

54:28

companies that aren't common carriers, which

54:31

is this legal category, like a

54:33

phone company. You're not allowed to basically say to someone, you

54:35

you can't have phone or mail.

54:38

But I think there's generally a

54:40

lot of discretion that companies have, and I

54:42

don't think that's Yeah. I

54:43

mean, part of this is the first amendment. You know, it's not

54:45

just freedom of speech. It's also freedom of association. And as

54:47

the Liberals would point out, these companies have

54:49

a right to associate with

54:52

whoever they want. So it is certainly

54:54

complicated, but I'm with you on this. I think it's really

54:56

troubling that an organization

54:59

like this is distasteful as I

55:01

find it, and I do find it really distasteful, can be cut off from

55:04

the the primary way of of making money

55:06

in this

55:08

country. Yeah. And

55:09

the free speech union case is even weirder.

55:11

Like, I I DM them. They said they they

55:13

don't even know why they were cut

55:15

off. And I I just I

55:17

don't get this. The whole thing seems so opaque and Look,

55:20

obviously, there's there's there's first amendment

55:22

concerns. But

55:24

again, I mean, the the whole thing on the left has always been it's

55:26

ridiculous to treat companies as having

55:28

constitutional rights. Like, if either

55:30

that's ridiculous or it's not ridiculous,

55:34

If that's ridiculous, it doesn't make sense to say, oh, yeah. Companies

55:36

have a first amendment right to cut off whoever

55:38

they want from these. So, anyway, I'm I'm

55:41

offering a very I don't know the legality of any of this. I'm just saying it's something

55:43

that I think people should keep an eye

55:46

on going forward. And and at the same

55:48

time, Josh Ramune has been

55:50

reporting on Telegram. He's the owner of Kiwi

55:52

Farms that there have been attempts to

55:54

basically make it so that he cannot

55:56

own his company in Wyoming. There was an attempt to cut him off from his

55:58

mailbox, although I guess that was reversed.

56:00

So it isn't really

56:02

the case that folks are just like,

56:05

oh, we just don't want bigots on Twitter.

56:07

It's a, they don't want

56:10

bigots anywhere to be able to make a

56:12

living doing anything. That is their stated goal for the

56:14

more extreme and online people and

56:16

b. And this is their definition of big hit.

56:18

That's what I'm saying. That was b. That their

56:20

definition of big hit might extend

56:22

to the free speech union or to someone

56:24

literally the segment we just did where

56:26

we said we disagree with the idea that people

56:28

should be able to play on the women's sports team

56:30

just for feeling like a woman that is

56:32

considered hate speech. They really think that's hate speech.

56:34

So they have a view of hate speech that is

56:37

wildly out of line. with, like, the US

56:39

or British public. For example, they want to enforce that by making this

56:41

stuff unsailable. And that puts I don't

56:43

know. That just puts,

56:45

like, public discussion in a precarious position.

56:47

This podcast relies on on

56:50

Stripe, not being assholes about the money

56:52

we earn. you know, because

56:54

sub stack itself can't

56:56

move money around. They use Stripe. If there's

56:58

a change in the politics of the leadership

57:00

at Stripe, just like that, like overnight,

57:03

we could go from having a very successful

57:05

business to not be able to make money. And if

57:07

people if that doesn't worry

57:09

you, it should. Yeah. I mean,

57:11

this is mostly this was a liberal value

57:12

until very recently. Very

57:15

recently, but these things shift.

57:17

Yeah.

57:17

I guess that's all I got on

57:19

this. I just that that jumped out at me as, like,

57:21

it just sort of seems to keep happening. And there

57:24

was there was a prior controversy with

57:26

Patreon that led

57:28

to folks exiting from there. That's probably not a word. Sam Harris

57:30

setting up his own shop. Maybe the

57:32

solution is folks setting up their

57:34

own systems. So,

57:36

yes, something to keep an eye on going forward. I'm sure we will return

57:38

to it. If anyone who has actual legal

57:40

expertise wants to fill me in on

57:42

the legal situation here, rather

57:45

than just a pining, no offense, send me an email. I'm curious to learn more about

57:47

it. Do you think this is all connected to or

57:48

related to or analogous to

57:52

BDS?

57:53

Is it BDS? Is

57:55

that sounds an thing? Yeah. Boycott

57:57

Boycott divestment in sanctions. Well, there's

57:59

an interesting parallel

58:02

here where some conservative

58:04

states, most notably Texas. I'll include a

58:06

link to a great video on this by

58:08

Sitch, who's a

58:11

really good YouTuber. They basically tried to make

58:13

Texas State employees