Based Camp - The Human Body is a Disposable Tool with a Shelf Life

00:00:00.000 if you didn't achieve, like I did achieve many of the things I was sort of programmed to achieve

00:00:05.340 at different parts of my life, right? But like, suppose you didn't get to sleep around a lot when

00:00:08.840 you were younger. If you then try to do that when you are middle-aged or an old person-

00:00:14.320 Which a lot of people try to do.

00:00:15.980 You will not get the validation or the happiness or the satisfaction you would have gotten. It is

00:00:20.920 really important to understand declaring bankruptcy on stages of your life and moving

00:00:26.580 to the next stage of your life. I like that. Declaring bankruptcy on certain life stages.

00:00:32.140 It just wasn't going to happen. Right. And then you can find new ways to optimize. There are new ways

00:00:38.280 to optimize and still live a life of value. If you realize that you're middle-aged or you're old and

00:00:43.340 you never had kids and you never had a family, there are new ways you can fill the role of an

00:00:47.420 older mentor in your community and stuff like that. Would you like to know more? Oh God. Yeah. When

00:00:53.640 everyone was like, you can see every single pore that I have. Everything's horrible. When I realized

00:01:00.060 what we can do to fix my eyes is I just need to buy those like Naruto contact lenses or just like

00:01:08.220 cinematic contact lenses. Like just the total black, you know, they're just completely black.

00:01:12.920 So for anybody wondering what she was talking about there, my wife is wearing sunglasses right now

00:01:17.420 because what's that thing that happened? You had like a bud vessel burst in your eye.

00:01:20.980 Mm-hmm. So I look gnarly and disgusting. I mean, more gnarly and disgusting than normal. 0.99

00:01:26.900 I think you look beautiful, but this brings us to our topic today. My wife has been recently, 0.70

00:01:33.800 you know, I was talking to her and she's like, I really do not like that. I feel like I'm beginning

00:01:37.440 to look middle-aged. You know, I'm disgusting with my body. Yeah. And I was, it really sort of shocked 0.97

00:01:44.720 me that this is still something that would be so concerning to her. The analogy I posted to Facebook

00:01:50.640 that got a bunch of angry comments as people can guess. And I think that they're really indicative of

00:01:58.140 where we are as a society. So what I said is my wife has been getting worried about beginning to look

00:02:04.980 middle-aged. A woman pregnant with her fourth kid complaining about how her body looks to a devoted

00:02:11.160 husband is like a fisherman with a pile of fish on the dock complaining about not having any worms.

00:02:18.600 And of course people were like, and you know, some of my trans friends were like, oh my gosh,

00:02:22.680 you know, it really does matter that you're okay with your body. And here I am like, no,

00:02:27.600 no, it doesn't matter that you're okay with your body. Fuck your body. Your body is a tool 1.00

00:02:32.420 that is meant to be used. And if you use it well, this is a really interesting thing. And I think

00:02:40.860 it's an analogy I will use for my daughters for their bodies. Right? The terrible young women in 1.00

00:02:50.280 our society. It's like we as parents are giving them this really nice fish we caught like a tuna or

00:02:56.760 something like that. We're like, go to the market and get the best price you can for this fish.

00:03:04.200 And, you know, some women just come back with cum all over their tuna and then nobody wants to buy it. 1.00

00:03:11.300 You know, nobody, nobody wants a tuna that, that people have had an orgy on, but that's not the only 0.94

00:03:17.200 way you can. I feel like the metaphor is falling apart. If that's what people are.

00:03:20.640 The core way or the only way you can fuck up this little routine. Okay. Okay. Go to the market 0.90

00:03:25.800 and a lot of girls are coming back to their parents with a rotting tuna and saying, nobody wanted to 1.00

00:03:33.840 give me a price that I thought it was worth, but look, I still got my tuna. The problem is,

00:03:40.940 is that the tuna rots. If you don't sell it, it's increasing in value with every second you haven't

00:03:48.000 sold it. And this is the tragedy. Like men go out there and they're all like, men have it so hard

00:03:55.140 in our society. And I'm not going to lie about all the unfairnesses of being a man, but you're not

00:04:00.420 dealing with this same ticking clock that women are dealing with. Yeah. And it's not, it's not just 0.99

00:04:06.000 appearance. It's, it's biology too. Like if one does want to have children. So even if one is totally

00:04:11.500 like, yeah, appearance should be nothing. There's still this other functional limiting factor, which sucks. 0.84

00:04:15.600 Yeah. Yeah. And it creates this, this environment where we tell girls protect the tuna, protect the 0.99

00:04:23.860 tuna, protect the tuna to the point where they forget the point was that the tuna was supposed

00:04:30.840 to set them up for the next stage of life. They sell the tuna, then they open the fish store or

00:04:34.900 whatever it is they're doing next. Right. The tuna wasn't the point. They're just supposed to protect

00:04:39.420 the tuna on the way to the market. Sorry. You hate this analogy so much. Yeah. Because everyone's

00:04:44.620 goals to become a fishmonger. Yeah. I mean, yeah, I hear you though. Yeah. And a rotting fish is

00:04:50.280 definitely a strong analogy when it comes to. Yeah. I thought it had a certain, well, and I also like

00:04:56.760 the worm analogy, like being bemoaning that you don't have the worm when you have the greater prize

00:05:01.800 that the worm was meant to catch. And so a lot of people are like, well, my white life, like my life

00:05:09.140 as a woman is not about having kids. Right. I'll come to me with this. I'll say, so therefore,

00:05:16.860 well, therefore what you're going to get old no matter what you do. Right. And you do have certain

00:05:23.800 advantages within many environments, whether it's your workplace or whether it's your, you know,

00:05:29.480 any, any, anything, even, even just like generically socially often, if you're an attractive woman,

00:05:34.440 now there are downsides to it. It actually can hurt you in female environments and women will do 1.00

00:05:38.840 things to hurt attractive women more. This is like been shown in a bunch of studies, but generally 0.99

00:05:43.720 you have an arbitrage opportunity. So then as you age, regardless of whether or not you've sort of

00:05:50.780 dedicated your life to the intergenerational game of building a family or anything else,

00:05:54.660 you can ask yourself, did I make use of this asset while it was available to me?

00:06:00.360 And if you did, then great. Okay. You, you did something that I think was pointless,

00:06:07.020 but at least you did it well, you know, at least you actually utilize the asset while you had access

00:06:13.440 to it. But what is completely feckless is not utilizing the asset at all in spending your entire

00:06:22.320 life in veneration of a decaying asset. And how does this happen in a secular society? Why in our

00:06:29.760 secular world do we end up venerating these decaying assets? Okay. Okay. Okay. So let's,

00:06:35.160 let's move to this fishmonger world, right? Okay. This is, this is a world then where on every social

00:06:41.780 media platform, it is just people holding their freshly caught, shining, glittering, untouched tuna

00:06:48.940 fish. And that's what people are rewarded for. And there are no, there's no glorification of being

00:06:55.600 a fishmonger. There's no glorification of, of all of that part of life. And so people will do

00:07:02.760 everything they can to try to look like they've just caught a fresh tuna. And some people will

00:07:08.660 take their tuna and rather than sell it, they will have it turned into taxidermy and they'll walk around

00:07:14.660 with their taxidermy tuna and hope that people don't realize that it's not there. And I can't blame

00:07:19.980 them. Right. Because you know, that that's, that's what society rewards. And some people will look at

00:07:25.000 the taxidermy tuna and be like, wow, look at them, you know, like they'll have their, you know,

00:07:28.260 they'll post their taxidermy tuna on social media and people will be like, I don't know. They seem,

00:07:33.040 it's, I don't know. It doesn't look quite right, you know, and, but, you know, but they still try,

00:07:37.160 you know, and they still get attention. I love this taxidermy tuna. Cause now I'm imagining

00:07:40.980 these horrified taxidermy tunas was like the fake eyes and everything. Well, it's, it's not. And that's,

00:07:45.540 that's what it looks like when you try to look like a 22 year old woman and you're 55 or you're

00:07:49.920 38 or whatever, if you're, you're 32 really. But, but then, you know, you're on the other side of

00:07:55.520 this, which is where I'm sitting. I'm sitting at the fish monger desk. All right. I don't have any

00:08:00.680 tuna and I'm looking out and I'm watching, you know, all these people walk by with their giant tuna

00:08:05.820 glittering in the sun. And I'm like, well, yeah, don't have, don't have any tuna. I don't.

00:08:12.320 Well, so this is the world. And I, I, I like how you've gone deeper. Was this crazy analogy?

00:08:17.060 Cause I want to go deeper too. You're freaking out. So I'm going to just make you.

00:08:22.200 So we live in fishmonger world, right? When you go on an online environment, when you go

00:08:27.960 in, in, in secular media, you are in the fishmonger world. It's not just the people who

00:08:32.660 are trying to sell tuna that are showing it off. It's the people who just bought tuna that are showing

00:08:36.400 it off. It's, Oh, look at this fresh tuna. I just bought with my life savings.

00:08:40.780 Mm-hmm. Flapping around the tuna, taking pictures of the tuna. And then they begin to forget the

00:08:46.960 purpose of the tuna marketplace. Yeah. Which is to freaking have a meal.

00:08:51.860 Was to buy and sell the tuna. Right. Yeah. Well, and to eat tuna, presumably, you know,

00:08:56.240 it's a consumable item. And keep in mind, we're not saying buying and selling women's bodies. Yeah. 0.94

00:08:59.120 It was to eventually eat the tuna. Right. Yeah. Um, uh, uh, what we, what we, what we are saying is

00:09:05.840 in the same way that you can have a marketplace, like a marketplace for employees. Like there are

00:09:10.460 human marketplaces all the time in our society. There's nothing vulgar about a, a human marketplace.

00:09:15.680 What's interesting about the marriage marketplace is that you are trying to sell yourself a tuna for

00:09:22.460 an equivalent, let's say something else puppy or something, right? You are trying to trade it

00:09:29.140 for a specific other thing, which is a male of equivalent value to you.

00:09:34.260 Well, and, and more importantly, what you're trying to explain too, is that like the human

00:09:39.200 body is meant to be used. You know, the human body is, is meant for, you know, doing different

00:09:45.500 things at different phases of life. And we are sometimes more strong and sometimes more wise and

00:09:51.320 sometimes, you know, various things in, in, in trying to do the same thing with that body all the

00:09:55.860 time, but basically using your body is a good thing. You know, if you are aging because you are

00:09:59.840 having kids and raising them and whatnot, that's not something to be ashamed of. That's means you're

00:10:04.540 actually using your body for what it's meant for. Right. Yes. And I would say that we live in this,

00:10:11.400 like the world around us, once you are successful in the fishmonger game, once you have sold your

00:10:18.400 fish and then gone home with the person you sold it to to eat it together, right? Like this is a weird

00:10:23.340 world where someone buys your tuna and then you're like the analogy for the rest of your life.

00:10:27.700 Then you start a fish shop together. You're then no longer flogging fish. You no longer have the

00:10:33.040 motivation to be showing how great your fish is. You no longer have the motivation to be showing

00:10:37.360 how great a fish you just bought is. So you are no longer signaling into the world. So then if you

00:10:43.120 look out your window, everyone is still shouting about fish, right? Because they're all desperately

00:10:47.380 trying to sell theirs and it can create a world. And this is the core problem that we're dealing

00:10:53.120 with where how shiny a fish you just bought or how shiny a fish you just have, you have is a status

00:11:00.040 symbol, right? And you begin to think, oh, this is how status is judged in society. Because when I go

00:11:07.380 and I buy a movie, right? Or when I look at ads, I'm going to see big shiny fish. And the reason why

00:11:13.640 these fish are big and shiny on ads and in movies and everything like that is me as a guy, you know,

00:11:18.300 this is seen throughout surveys on guys. Most guys prefer a woman who's 23. Like if you look,

00:11:24.360 it's really funny. Women generally prefer a guy who's like a couple of years older than them and

00:11:27.980 then about their age and a little bit younger than them if they get older. Men, if you look,

00:11:31.880 it's like always 23. No matter how old they are, 23 is the age that they want.

00:11:35.920 It's so simple, right? It's so comforting.

00:11:37.680 Well, it's simple, but what it means is that's because that's where for a guy,

00:11:43.300 you're going to have the largest biological window to have as many kids as possible.

00:11:46.840 Like if you died in my biology and I was like master of a tribe or something like that,

00:11:51.220 and I could choose any woman I wanted to, to be my next wife, I would be evolutionarily rewarded

00:11:56.760 for choosing a woman near the beginning of her reproductive window instead of a woman around 0.98

00:12:02.200 my age, right? So my body is programmed to spend a little extra time staring at those and stuff like

00:12:07.980 that. And so when people in the secular world, whether it's in movies or in ads or anything like

00:12:14.000 that, utilize these, they can very easily draw people's eyes much more than they can with women 1.00

00:12:22.000 that have moved on to this next stage of their life that have kids that are being a good wife, 0.99

00:12:26.580 et cetera. And the reason I keep saying secular world, people might be like, what do you mean

00:12:33.180 secular world versus religious world? Because some religions succumb to this after a while, but

00:12:36.500 only the new, like really soft iterations, the historic religions, which are usually like a

00:12:42.660 religious and cultural tradition, typically have prohibitions against this and typically venerate

00:12:47.920 women for entering the motherhood phases of their life. Why do they do this and the secular world 1.00

00:12:53.140 doesn't? It's because the secular world doesn't have any intergenerational reward mechanism,

00:12:57.560 rewarding and punishing iterations of it. I mean, it does now. They have very low fertility rates and

00:13:03.000 it's going to disappear soon. But I mean, like in a historic context, whereas most religious 0.57

00:13:08.040 cultural, the ones overly venerated youth that didn't venerate mothers, women wouldn't want to

00:13:14.320 become mothers at the same rates as other cultural traditions around them. And therefore they were out

00:13:18.500 competed and eventually stamped out. So it's not like a moral reason why the religious cultural

00:13:24.160 traditions venerate mothers and venerate this, this transition, but they do do it and it is useful.

00:13:31.460 And it's something that I really worry about where you even, I mean, you are a sane woman and I,

00:13:39.680 I think a totally logical woman. Well, and I'm also, I, one thing that's important to know too,

00:13:44.360 is I was never someone whose attribute was beauty. Right. So like, I never, I think this is uniquely

00:13:50.860 hard for people who grew up being the beautiful one and who grew up having that as a currency and

00:13:55.440 then they lose it. So like, this is not even something that I'm experiencing is severely because

00:14:00.980 I never felt like I was the pretty one and I never was the pretty one. Oh, you, you always wanted to be

00:14:05.220 old too. I always wanted to be old. I always like my real age is 63 and that's when I will ultimately

00:14:09.780 feel comfortable with myself or maybe 62, but yeah. So like, I think it's even harder, but even

00:14:15.400 me. So even though I don't care about this shit, even though I really look forward to being older 0.98

00:14:20.200 and looking older, and even though I never was celebrated for looks or youth or beauty in the 0.98

00:14:27.120 first place, I still regret all the little signs of aging that I see. And that's really crazy to me.

00:14:34.100 So I wonder how much of this do you think is a biological thing? Like you just want to hide this so

00:14:39.300 you can, I don't know. Oh yeah. So it's like some kind of instinct is kicking in because my body

00:14:44.360 is saying, whoa, lady, if you don't look youthful, your tribe is way more likely to kick you out if

00:14:50.420 times get lean. Right? Yeah. So how much do you think is that versus how much do you think is sort

00:14:55.000 of social conditioning and brainwashing? That's a good, I mean, I, I, gosh, it just never occurred

00:15:01.380 to me before you brought it up that this might be a separate evolutionary thing, but final, final

00:15:06.440 option. How much do you think is some genuine doubt that I will continue to find you attractive

00:15:12.420 and desirable? Like, like real logical doubt. Oh, I think it's, I never thought about the

00:15:19.760 evolutionary aspect of it, but I'm assuming that that has to be something at play here. Because if

00:15:24.260 I genuinely look forward to looking older, right? Like that's the look that I like. And I never felt

00:15:32.720 beautiful, like beautiful and youthful in the first place, then it has to be something more

00:15:38.780 than that. So like, it's so tempting to just blame society to be like, well, despite all this,

00:15:42.460 everything I see on Instagram is beautiful people and blah, blah, blah. But in the end,

00:15:46.520 maybe you're right. And so maybe there's like 80%, I would say 80%, um, evolutionary and then 20%

00:15:58.420 social and then 0% concern about you. Because if we have, you know, three, almost four kids together,

00:16:04.640 like we're pretty committed, we're pretty happy with each other. And also we have a relationship in

00:16:09.920 which, frankly, if you found me unattractive and gross, like you would be super welcome to look for

00:16:16.160 fun elsewhere. Right. Like, so in the end, like we have solutions for this that don't even threaten

00:16:21.460 the relationship. So that's not a threat to me though. It is, you know, disappointing,

00:16:25.800 but it's not something that drives my action. So this is interesting with it being partially a

00:16:34.020 biological instinct. That means we'll have to work extra hard to create an environment that helps

00:16:39.440 our daughters fight this in themselves. This shame of aging only become an issue when people are older. 1.00

00:16:49.400 But they'll need to, I mean, I don't want my daughters to be racked with mental guilt. Like I

00:16:54.540 think that some religious cultures do a good job of venerating mothers so much that it overrides

00:17:00.380 the biological sort of shame of aging. Right. Because if, if one is constantly reassured that

00:17:07.800 like, this is a good thing, this is a good thing, this is a good thing, then you think that there's

00:17:11.920 less risk. Yeah. Yeah. So, I mean, I really have to treat my wife well, I suppose, which is one of

00:17:19.480 these reasons why these fertility strategies that some, you know, pronatalists pursue, which I think

00:17:25.820 do not venerate the women who are having their children are going to be unsuccessful. There is 0.99

00:17:31.480 one iteration of them, which can be successful, which is the men who just use a surrogate and then

00:17:36.000 raise the kid entirely. And I know some men who do this and whatever, right? Like that can work.

00:17:40.920 But then there's others where they'll have a number of serial partners and that can, I think,

00:17:49.520 cause daughters to be less interested and then sons to do something that pushes their daughters out of

00:17:54.900 the cultural group, which isn't a great thing. Yeah. I mean, that kind of culture basically says,

00:18:00.880 like, I am not going to, to women, it says, I'm not going to be invested in as a long-term asset.

00:18:07.680 I'm going to be dropped as soon as I age. So either I'm not allowed to look like I'm aging or

00:18:12.060 I shouldn't bother investing in men at all. And what we were just looking at some other

00:18:17.480 unrelated to this data that really demonstrated even more so the extent to which women are really 1.00

00:18:23.640 the bottlenecks on how many kids a family has, that it's, it's more like the upbringing and exposure

00:18:30.400 that young women get throughout their lives that influences how many kids they have. Whereas like men, 1.00

00:18:35.540 their experiences, it doesn't really matter. I think it really comes down to who they marry.

00:18:39.940 It's so weird. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And I've even seen this. Well, I think the vanity of women is 1.00

00:18:45.920 especially important. I know a number of families where the man went into the relationship planning

00:18:49.640 to have like five kids. The woman got to like kid number three and said, I'm stopping now. And 0.99

00:18:54.240 that's the most horrifying thing I can imagine.

00:18:56.200 Well, and what you're, yeah. Also like these are marriages where the women came in saying, 1.00

00:19:00.400 yeah, I also want five kids. Yeah. And they're like, it's hard.

00:19:04.080 Yeah. So this is not one in which the women hadn't signed up for that to begin with, which 0.99

00:19:08.780 also happens, right? There are many marriages where like, there's, there are mismatched expectations. 0.98

00:19:13.420 And because couples didn't communicate, that's a problem. But these are ones in which literally

00:19:17.160 people entered the marriage of like, I'm going to have seven, I'm going to have five.

00:19:20.300 Yeah. No, but like, you shouldn't be shaming somebody for focusing on their body and feeling

00:19:26.440 comfortable with their body. Right. And feeling happy with their body. And this just really got

00:19:31.700 to me because we absolutely should be shaming that. I mean, secular society doesn't shame that

00:19:37.020 because the, the urban monoculture, right. It tells people do whatever you want, whenever you want

00:19:42.740 and be affirmed for whoever you want to be. And that's how it attracts people. So of course,

00:19:46.120 within its set of cultural values, it's not going to tell people that they should ever really feel

00:19:50.760 bad about any decision they make about themselves or about any, you know, way they want to perceive

00:19:55.960 themselves. However, it's doing really bad fertility rate rise. And it's doing really bad. If you look

00:20:01.500 at rates of mental health issues, like horrible mental health issues that do not exist in the

00:20:07.040 more conservative cultures, you know, there's the famous statistic of what would, what is it?

00:20:10.900 Progressive white women under the age of 30, like over half of them have a serious mental health issue. 0.62

00:20:15.140 Yeah. This is not great. Like this is not a culture that is functioning. And what I would ask is, 0.99

00:20:19.740 is I do not think there is a logical basis for your body, not being something that you were meant to spend.

00:20:25.960 By that, what I mean is God gifted you your body to play a part in this intergenerational cycle,

00:20:32.580 right? Like be fruitful and multiply, right? Like that was a commandment. If you're taking this from

00:20:37.400 a religious perspective and very few religions due to cultural evolution are going to say that that is

00:20:42.620 not the purpose of, of one's body, but then evolution, suppose you're being totally secular about

00:20:48.600 this. Well, evolution also wants you to have the maximum number of surviving offspring. And it gave

00:20:55.580 you all of the signals to show your youth to signal to potential partners with the goal of having kids

00:21:03.940 eating the fish, right? It's not about just showing people the fish, but this is so interesting when I

00:21:09.580 think about the fish analogy in this context, because it reminds me of the way we now relate to food as a

00:21:17.780 society where there's so many stores, you know, especially in cultures that are deeper in the

00:21:22.640 social media abyss that are around like Japan or Korea or stuff like that, where you can go

00:21:26.140 and like the restaurants are really optimized around being able to take pictures and post them to social

00:21:31.560 media. Right. Well, even in the United States, totally in the United States. There's some restaurants

00:21:36.500 that do this more than the food itself, right? More than the experience of eating. And this is because

00:21:43.600 our society has become warped like this. You know, a lot of young people, they will spend more time

00:21:50.380 bragging or trying to put into the world, you know, how great they are at sex or whatever,

00:21:56.260 than actually being good and getting partners and everything like that. Right. We see this perversion

00:22:02.800 throughout a society in which our value is to some extent signaled to others and thus impart to

00:22:10.340 ourselves through what we can communicate within environments in which there is no validation

00:22:17.700 happening. By that, what I mean is historically, it was harder to do this. You know, you could like

00:22:22.240 say, oh, look at this lovely snack I'm having, but other people could go to the same restaurant and be

00:22:28.000 like, that place is gross. Right. But in an online environment, it's much harder to do that. And so

00:22:34.640 people begin to genuinely believe the signal itself is what is worth living their life for.

00:22:42.160 So that's one area of corruption. But then the other area of corruption comes from being too deep

00:22:46.540 within the urban monoculture and actually believing what it tells you, that if you live a life doing

00:22:52.180 whatever makes you happy and being validated for whoever you desire to be and however you desire

00:22:59.140 to perceive yourself, that if you do that, you will achieve mental health and happiness. Even I think

00:23:05.300 if you take like an objective secular perspective and you're just looking at the psychological research, 0.99

00:23:10.240 you would immediately be like, oh, this is like a perfect way to like psychologically fuck someone

00:23:15.900 up, telling them just chase whatever makes you happy in the moment all the time and be affirmed for 0.96

00:23:23.840 however you want to see yourself. Well, but aren't you also saying that you would encourage cultures

00:23:29.840 that make people feel affirmed for not looking like they're 23 years old when they're no longer 23 years

00:23:36.360 old? Yeah. I mean, I mean, it's okay to feel good about how you look. And I mean, part of me, when I look

00:23:43.560 at comments like that, I think, well, yeah, but it's going to be a lot easier to feel good about how you look

00:23:50.320 when you're not trying to pull something off that you can't pull off. One thing I wanted to ask you

00:23:54.280 though, is do you feel any like qualms or concerns about aging? I mean, you look better every day.

00:24:02.380 I will be clear about that. It's deeply unfair. However, you are getting more gray hairs, you know,

00:24:07.480 there, there, there are signs of aging. This is a really interesting thing because it's how I relate

00:24:11.480 to nostalgia. I'll often think about things I used to do, you know, back in the day when I used to sleep

00:24:15.800 around a lot, or, you know, the little games I played back then, I don't think about sleeping

00:24:19.820 with women. Like when I look back and I am nostalgic about things I did in the past, it is not the sex 0.99

00:24:24.980 I'm nostalgic about. It's the courting process. But that was also really hard and stressful.

00:24:29.900 So what's going on there? It was hard and stressful in a fun way. You would go on a date and you wouldn't

00:24:33.880 know how things were going. And there was, and I reflect on this, like when I'm watching anime,

00:24:38.800 where like young love is courting and everything like that. But I look at this through the lens and was

00:24:44.940 a complete comfort was the fact that that was part of a previous stage of my life.

00:24:50.720 Oh, so just that it's over. Like the fact that it's over is what makes you feel nostalgic.

00:24:55.620 Yeah. To put it another way, it would be silly to be nostalgic about, you know, trying to pierce

00:25:02.540 the egg when I was a sperm, right? Or the egg being pierced when I was an egg, right? Like I was

00:25:08.940 basically a completely different type of biological entity back then. My entire optimization function,

00:25:14.920 the way my, the things that made me happy were different. The stage of my life was different.

00:25:18.060 Everything was different. And I can take solace in the things I did get to experience during those

00:25:24.120 stages of life and the things I didn't get to experience. There were types of rebellion that

00:25:28.980 I decided not to indulge in because I thought they were too risky to my long-term goals. And I can see

00:25:34.160 people in movie engage in those types of rebellion, whether it's tattoos or drugs or whatever. And I mean,

00:25:40.760 I did do, I guess, a lot of drugs, but not specific drugs that were addictive. So I never really

00:25:46.720 indulged in that sort of stuff and in that culture in a way where I can go back to that. Like as an

00:25:52.660 adult, if I went and tried that stuff, it just wouldn't be the same. It wouldn't be that experience

00:25:57.660 of genuinely doing this in an experimental time of my life. And I think that nostalgia for previous

00:26:05.960 life states can be a positive emotion when you understand that those are things that you'll

00:26:12.760 never get to experience again. And it can be a negative emotion when you try to recreate them.

00:26:18.300 Well, I think it's also a problem when you actually really did enjoy that thing and you

00:26:22.120 couldn't do it anymore. Like let's say that you really enjoyed something really, really super

00:26:26.020 athletic and then you aged and you couldn't do it anymore because literally your body couldn't take

00:26:30.740 that kind of wear and tear. Although here's the thing is I don't feel that, that, that, that kind

00:26:37.520 of nostalgia, regret, whatever is not what I feel as I age. Because first off, like if I actually were

00:26:44.000 super crazy attractive and if people gave me a lot of attention for that, I would feel one,

00:26:48.760 deeply uncomfortable because I don't want the attention. And two, like I would also very much

00:26:54.020 not respect the people who were attracted to me because if someone just likes me because I'm pretty,

00:27:01.160 that's gross. Like I just, I would find that pretty aversive and it would make me very deeply

00:27:07.960 uncomfortable. Like I was just listening to someone talking about host clubs in Japan where you have

00:27:11.600 either a male or female, like professional essentially fawning over you and being like,

00:27:16.200 oh, you're so pretty. Oh, you're so smart. And I was thinking, oh my God, I would like pay money

00:27:19.220 to not do that. So it's also not that I regret not being able to have that experience. So there

00:27:24.360 is really something different going on with women. And what do you want to be affirmed for? 1.00

00:27:30.200 For achieving things, for, for getting stuff done. Like remember when, when, when I, when I first

00:27:33.760 sort of taught you how to compliment me in a way that would make me really happy, it was never to

00:27:38.720 say something like, oh, you're pretty or you're so smart. So never to be like, oh, you are so attribute,

00:27:43.140 but rather, oh, X thing that you did was so clever, or I see you worked really hard on that.

00:27:48.980 And it's amazing how this is paying off, that kind of thing. So like compliment actions and

00:27:53.160 moments rather than apparent fundamental attributes. But I do think that if we were to

00:27:58.900 get to the bottom of like, what's solving societal problems with women not being comfortable with 1.00

00:28:05.200 aging, I don't even think it's about like raining praise on them for being beautiful and wonderful

00:28:12.300 in whatever life stage they are, like affirming them in their current body position, because I don't

00:28:16.700 even think that's it. And I don't really know.

00:28:20.520 Well, okay. So here's what I think it is. You were talking about how, well, you've got to affirm

00:28:25.920 women for different life stages and optimizing them. When I was younger, there were multiple 1.00

00:28:30.500 optimizations. I looked for in a woman, whether it's like the perfect goth woman or nerd woman, 0.99

00:28:34.960 or like artsy chic, like there are different ways that women can optimize even within that useful state 1.00

00:28:39.860 to look breathable. I guess you could say, what's the word these days? That must have been breathable,

00:28:44.820 right? Like what I was interested in. And I think that there are optimization functions that are valid

00:28:50.380 within our society as a person ages. I think that's what we're seeing with cottagecore, right? Like

00:28:55.640 cottagecore is thirst trap, but not thirsting over a woman's body, but over the environment she has 0.52

00:29:02.900 created around her. So cottagecore is thirst trap, Martha Stewart. It is an environment where a woman 1.00

00:29:13.400 is cultivated, you know, of a house and everything like that, or a family. And then I'd also say

00:29:19.500 there's like prepcore, right? Which might be closer to, but we're like a cross between cottagecore and

00:29:24.580 prepcore, right? Where you have these like Christmas photos and stuff like that, where when you share

00:29:28.900 these, I mean, if people go to your Instagram account, what's the handles? Simone H. Collins?

00:29:35.100 Yeah. I haven't posted there recently. I need to. Well, I mean, it's basically a thirst trap account,

00:29:39.280 but it's a thirst trap account for loving your husband and having kids. What were you saying,

00:29:45.040 Simone? For wholesomeness, right? Yeah. And, and it's not going to get as many likes because you know,

00:29:50.820 you're not appealing to the same audience, but I do think that you are signaling an ideal that you

00:29:57.140 have achieved at this stage of your life, that one day you are going to have to let go as well.

00:30:03.340 You know, one day it will be grandmothercore. And I'm sure people will come up with like grannycore 0.99

00:30:08.820 and stuff like that in the future. One really funny thing is I was, I've been watching Adventure

00:30:13.040 Time with my kids and there's this one character on it. I mean, I've seen it before, but I never

00:30:17.040 can text her like this, Tree Trunks, who's like this old sweet lady, but who's also like always

00:30:23.020 talking about her former, like basically sexual escapades and stuff like that. 0.94

00:30:27.700 My adventurous instincts tell me to seduce that tentacle critter with my womanly charms and elephant 1.00

00:30:34.740 prowess. What are you doing here, Tree Trunks? I'm helping you by tempting this guy with my body.

00:30:41.860 It's not a guy, Tree Trunks. It's a snake-armed ruby brain beast. Even brain beasts get lonely, 0.98

00:30:48.000 thing. Jake, you were supposed to watch her. She got past me, man. I tried to stop her, but she 0.99

00:30:54.800 overpowered me. I did it. I helped. I'm the sexiest adventurer in the world. Mr. Fine Duty.

00:31:02.860 Yes, Captain Tree Trunks. Mr. Fine Duty, pick up that mop, you bug.

00:31:12.380 Captain Tree Trunks, we're approaching a ship off the port bow. Good.

00:31:16.740 Good. Drowned all but the tightest men. 0.90

00:31:21.780 Uh, I'm Wyatt, your new secretary. These flowers are from Robot Body Mo.

00:31:29.900 Uh, again? Throw those in the trash. 0.96

00:31:34.120 I'm sorry I didn't trust you. I just know you've had a lot of adventures in the past,

00:31:38.420 and things are kind of boring now.

00:31:39.980 It's true. I sometimes miss those wild times, but back then I couldn't even tell the difference

00:31:48.080 between a good adventure and a bad one. I was just a leaf in the wind, blown about by my whims,

00:31:57.240 but now I'm on solid ground.

00:32:00.240 Yeah. And that's associated with old age, and I suspect our kids will grow up associating that

00:32:06.760 with old age, because so much of the future generations, I think, are going to move away

00:32:10.660 from that lifestyle, and only will this, like, broken older generation be these 80-year-olds

00:32:16.320 talking about all the sex they used to have, whereas Gen Z today, I think, is just looking

00:32:20.620 for a wholesome relationship, a lot of them. At least the ones that I see that look like they're

00:32:24.360 going to have kids. A final thing I'd note when I'm talking about life stages and, like,

00:32:28.920 just being able to recognize and appreciate that I cannot relive those things, and I just need to

00:32:34.200 be happy for the game I was playing when I was playing it. I'd almost argue it's like a post-game

00:32:38.520 where, like, the game is switching the score that is judging you on.

00:32:41.540 Yeah.

00:32:42.080 Is that if you didn't achieve, like, I did achieve many of the things I was sort of

00:32:47.220 programmed to achieve at different parts of my life, right? But, like, suppose you didn't get to

00:32:51.500 sleep around a lot when you were younger. If you then try to do that when you are middle-aged

00:32:56.580 or an old person... Which a lot of people try to do.

00:32:59.800 You will not get the validation or the happiness or the satisfaction you would have gotten. It is

00:33:04.380 really important to understand declaring bankruptcy on stages of your life and moving to the next stage

00:33:10.940 of your life. I like that. Declaring bankruptcy on certain life stages. It just wasn't going to

00:33:16.920 happen. Right. And then you can find new ways to optimize. There are new ways to optimize and still

00:33:22.880 live a life of value. If you realize that you're middle-aged or you're old and you never had kids

00:33:27.480 and you never had a family, there are new ways you can fulfill the role of an older mentor in your

00:33:32.160 community and stuff like that. Now, it's important that you understand, and this is especially important

00:33:36.640 with the older mentor role, is that your goal is to actually be useful within your community and not

00:33:42.800 masturbate the feeling of being an older mentor. Which some people... I remember when I was young,

00:33:47.180 I'd get these people who would try to forcefully mentor me. But by that, what I mean is give me

00:33:52.260 advice that clearly had... They hadn't thought about whether that advice was still useful in the world

00:33:57.180 or how to deliver it to a young person or how to help the young person in their goals. Just

00:34:02.920 sort of masturbating this self-image as an older mentor. So it's important within any of these life 0.90

00:34:08.260 stages. It's the same with being a parent. You could do the wholesome preppy prep core, right?

00:34:12.800 Where you are using your children to feel like you are the perfect parent. And so you are focused on

00:34:21.080 how they appear in pictures, how they appear in et cetera, right? Like how you're thought of by your

00:34:24.900 community. Rather than remembering that this is just as hollow as walking around with that rotting fish

00:34:30.800 or taxidermying that fish. The point of the fish is to be eaten. The point of being a parent is to give

00:34:36.540 your kids a good childhood and raise them to be emotionally healthy and efficacious adults.

00:34:42.340 It is not to look like a good parent. The purpose of being a mentor is not to think of yourself as a

00:34:48.720 mentor or by seeing by your community as a mentor. It's to help young people, right? Always remember

00:34:54.520 that there is the taxidermy iteration of life and there is the actual iteration of life. The actual

00:35:00.640 being an efficacious member of your community. And your biology will reward you for the true version

00:35:06.400 and it will punish you for the incorrect version. What I mean is you may be venerated by your

00:35:11.600 community. You may be liked by a lot of people on TikTok or whatever, but the happiness you gain

00:35:17.600 from that will always be hollow and evanescent and eat at your soul. You know, a soul burns on a

00:35:26.000 bonfire of vanity. And that is true. I think another thing too, in terms of like giving,

00:35:33.220 encouraging our family, kids, daughters, especially to have healthy views about this

00:35:37.620 is I think the way that we'll say like tropes of warriors in the past talked about battle scars is

00:35:46.200 probably a really good way to look at things. Like you don't see warriors in a lot of like,

00:35:52.080 and again, these are all just character tropes. This isn't like a sample of real people that I

00:35:56.540 know about, but you don't see them complaining about like, oh, you know, like my face is all

00:36:02.040 scarred or like my like pinky finger is gone. You know, it's like, oh, I lost this on this thing.

00:36:07.920 You know, like it shows signs of achievement. And maybe if we instead encourage or contextualize,

00:36:14.140 I shouldn't say encourage, if we actually contextualize signs of aging as signs of a life lived

00:36:20.280 properly and well, then also values well aligned, like not investing money in plastic surgery when

00:36:26.840 you could invest in your children's education or something like that, that, that, that being seen

00:36:31.180 as something to be proud of the same way that a warrior shows off his battle scars.

00:36:35.060 Yeah. Well, and I can't imagine, I mean, imagine being the type of person who invests in plastic

00:36:40.160 surgery rather than your children's education. A lot of people do. When you consider how much

00:36:46.700 these procedures cost, there are many, many, many, many parents who are, you know, implicitly

00:36:56.440 because they're not putting that money towards something else, investing in their looks over

00:37:02.100 that. And often it doesn't look good in the end. Often it gets botched in the end and they have to

00:37:06.800 take fillers and get dissolved, get them dissolved to get rid of them. Taxidermy looks like taxidermy,

00:37:12.020 right? You, you, you don't have your actual dog, you know, your, your, that reminds me of that

00:37:17.480 dumb and dumber scene. You sold my dead bird to a blind kid? Lloyd, that, that, you, what are you? 1.00

00:37:25.520 Petey didn't even have a head. Harry, I took care of it.

00:37:33.760 Pretty bird. Yeah. Can you say pretty bird? Pretty bird. Yes. Pretty bird.

00:37:42.020 Pretty bird.

00:37:47.480 Tomorrow on A Current Affair, inside the home of the Menendez Brothers' attorney.

00:37:52.240 And next, we'll be back in a minute with the heartbreaking story of the blind Rhode Island 0.52

00:37:57.420 boy who was duped into buying a dead parakeet.

00:38:01.800 I just thought he was real quick.

00:38:03.960 That's not a bird, right? Okay.

00:38:05.560 That is the weird thing about plastic surgery is like,

00:38:07.560 there are some plastic surgery looks that I now associate with age because I only like old people 1.00

00:38:13.880 use it and only old people have that kind of facial structure, like the puffy cheeks, the puffy 1.00

00:38:19.380 lips. Like I associate it with a sign of, of, of middle age or being elderly, which is super interesting.

00:38:28.400 What I love is when we get plastic surgery that makes you look better at being your age. Like when

00:38:32.580 you're 60, if you don't look like the perfect granny, you're like, no, no, no, no. I want, I don't want to 1.00

00:38:37.300 look younger. I want to look like a cooler. Yeah. Like I will, I will probably bleach my hair to make it all

00:38:43.280 white instead of just having gray hair. Perfect example of the correct way to alter your appearance

00:38:49.440 to lean into it. Yeah. Yeah. I can't wait for my white hair. My family has this great genetic trait

00:38:57.720 where we get pure white hair at a pretty young age. I'm so jealous. You've seen it. And our hair

00:39:03.580 doesn't like, we don't decrease the amount of hair we have. I'll just have. Yeah. It stays thick and

00:39:07.300 full and it just gets gorgeous and white. And I hate you. I hate you so much. It's not fair. 0.99

00:39:12.780 Hey, I'm looking forward to you being a granny because I know you're going to be the 1.00

00:39:16.720 sassiest mo fucking granny ever. And I love it. I am going to love it. Maybe it's this awkward 1.00

00:39:22.420 transition. I love who you are today. I love who you were when I met you. And I love who you're

00:39:25.920 going to be when you're an 80 year old woman. And don't you forget that. I'm never going to say

00:39:30.460 like, oh, Simone, I'm so worried about these changes that are happening to your body because

00:39:35.080 of fourth kid that you're producing extra blood and you got this blood vessel popping. You're like,

00:39:40.700 no, I was just listening about some Korean divorce in which the husband would get

00:39:45.000 sex workers who looked like the younger version of the wife. And oh man, like that hurts. You know, 0.99

00:39:51.260 like, I don't even know if that hurts. That's kind of sweet. I don't know. I don't know. It's

00:39:55.700 he didn't leave the wife and he still liked the idea of banging a younger version of her.

00:40:01.760 He probably, this is the thing that you're forgetting. He probably was imagining the people

00:40:07.120 he was banging other than his wife were his wife. Yeah. I mean, yeah, I guess that's sweeter than 0.51

00:40:12.160 going for a completely different look. But still, I, I understand. Also, you got to keep

00:40:17.400 in mind that aging happens differently for different ethnicities was white people. It's

00:40:22.360 more of a gradual change as they get older. Whereas with Asian people, they often undergo 1.00

00:40:28.840 especially Asian women sort of sudden transformations between life stages, which I think is a blessing 1.00

00:40:35.340 because you know what life stage you're at. Are you at Asian granny stage or are you at Asian

00:40:40.140 Vixen stage? Yeah. And like Vixen stage somehow lasts forever and then suddenly. Oh, it lasts forever

00:40:53.740 and then immediately you transform into like a short granny. Yeah. I don't, I really wonder what's 1.00

00:40:57.900 going on with that phenomenon of like, you really don't see this other transition. You don't see

00:41:03.140 middle age. It's, I don't understand it. I don't understand it. I don't know. I'm fine with it,

00:41:09.380 but, but, but, but it, I mean, except it might make it easier for them to accept when they're

00:41:14.580 granny. Yeah. To just be like, oh yeah. Cause yeah, I think it's that, it's that, that weird 0.99

00:41:19.540 interstitial period where you don't really, you can't pull off any look. You can't pull off old

00:41:26.000 and you can't pull off young. So what are you anymore? Well, I think a core thing that you can

00:41:30.140 do is look forward to who you're going to be next. Look forward to being the old lady, which you do,

00:41:35.760 but you just never look forward to being the mom. And because of that, you're sort of struggling

00:41:41.940 with the stage transition because you didn't know it was one of the stages to look forward to.

00:41:46.960 Well, I only ever knew my mom in her middle age. Like she died before she could get old and I never

00:41:54.180 knew her when she was super young. So I only ever knew her hating her body cause she hated her middle 1.00

00:41:59.560 age body just like I do. And yeah. So maybe I just like, see this as like some permanent purgatory,

00:42:07.140 but it will end. It will end. And then I'll, and then I'll get old and wrinkly and I'll be so happy.

00:42:12.460 It'll be great. I love you so much. I love you too, Malcolm.

Based Camp - January 11, 2024

The Human Body is a Disposable Tool with a Shelf Life

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