Dr. Ghaad Saad is a professor at Northwood University and a part-time troublemaker on social media. He has spent years studying and calling out the wildest ideological absurdities of our time, from radical sympathisers to open border policies, to the absolute circus of wokeism. And now he s putting it all together in his upcoming book, Suicidal Empathy. His argument: Western society isn t just making bad choices, it s actively self-destructing. Why? Because instead of using common sense, we ve embraced a bizarre, self-flagellating ideology where being endlessly apologetic is more important than survival.
00:00:00.000All right, folks, you know that feeling when you watch the world unravel and think, has everyone, of course, excluding ourselves, completely lost their minds?
00:00:11.180Well, our next guest has been saying exactly that, except with research to back it up.
00:00:16.440Dr. Ghaad Saad, a professor at Northwood University and a part-time troublemaker on social media, has spent years studying and calling out the wildest ideological absurdities of our time.
00:00:28.600From radical sympathisers, to open border policies, to the absolute circus of wokeism.
00:00:35.780And now he's putting it all together in his upcoming book, Suicidal Empathy.
00:00:41.240His argument, Western society isn't just making bad choices, it's actively self-destructing.
00:00:47.440Why? Because instead of using common sense, we've embraced a bizarre, self-flagellating ideology where being endlessly apologetic is more important than survival.
00:00:58.600Dr. Ghaad Saad, it is always such a pleasure. Thank you so much for joining us.
00:01:03.920I'm so happy to be with you and I'm happy that you are reaching new heights in your fame and stardom. You certainly deserve it.
00:01:12.660Oh, bless you. And I know coming from you that that has to be genuine because you also like to tell people you're the best looking man in the world.
00:01:23.040I mean, look at me. Do I have to say anything more?
00:01:26.780Doctor, I was just looking at your ex-feed, which is how I start all of my research before these chats these days.
00:01:33.920And you had done a post about losing a 30-year friendship because you wrote something that was semi-positive regarding President Donald Trump.
00:02:44.900It's actually my pinned post on my X feed.
00:02:47.700I basically said something to the effect of, imagine that 95 to 99 percent of my academic colleagues continue to think that Kamala Harris would be a better president than Donald Trump.
00:03:00.580Either I'm the biggest idiot or they might be wrong.
00:03:37.180Because what what he's effectively saying is that there is only one possible state of the world, and that is to think that Donald Trump is indistinguishable from Hitler.
00:03:49.780And if you don't believe that, then you are morally damaged.
00:03:57.500I mean, so, for example, what about if I'm Jewish, which I am, and I think that the Democratic Party is filled with a lot more anti-Semites than the Republican Party?
00:04:07.920Would that grant me a bit of an affordance, oh, dear, moral one to prefer the Republicans?
00:04:14.980So there are many, many ways by which perfectly rational and reasonable people could think that the Republican Party, given the issues that they care about, would be the optimal choice.
00:04:30.860Therefore, he has to break the ties with me.
00:04:32.460So that would then mean that he thinks all the people, the millions and millions of Americans, the popular vote, every swing state, they're all morally bankrupt, essentially, as well.
00:05:17.720I texted him to my neighbor and I said, well, the other black friend told me that, you know, I'm not supporting the community, meaning the black community, by being pro-Trump.
00:05:28.600So I could only assume that you are a fake black person.
00:05:32.400And then he writes back to me because he is self-assured because he's not a woke idiot.
00:05:38.400He goes, no, no, no, I'm not actually a black guy.
00:05:50.640So we joke around him and I, whenever I see him in our in our neighborhood, I will pretend as though I'm getting very, very scared because I'm seeing a black guy.
00:06:00.720So I'll pick up my phone and I'll start calling the cops.
00:06:06.060Secure people are able to make fun of themselves, make fun of others without capitulating like a little wilted flower.
00:06:14.260A current example for me is doing this very show, 69 X Minutes, with someone that some people don't like in the Jewish community.
00:06:26.980And they don't think that I should share a platform with someone they dislike, disagree with, don't think fondly of.
00:06:33.560But my take would be, shouldn't I be trying to reach the largest audience possible, particularly people who might not see it the way that we see it?
00:06:42.160Isn't that what this is all about, engaging with people who don't agree with you?
00:06:48.180So there's a great book that I cite in Chapter 7 of The Parasitic Mind.
00:06:54.780The chapter is titled How to Seek Truth.
00:06:57.120And in that, at the start of the chapter, I talk about this book by two French psychologists where they argued that the human capacity to reason did not really, did not evolve to seek truth, but rather to win arguments, right?
00:07:15.220And therefore, it doesn't, so yes, you and I might be thinking, hey, shouldn't we be reaching across the aisle because we're all trying to ultimately make sense of the world and seek some objective truth?
00:07:38.120That's exactly what causes the Democrats to not clap and be touched when a 13-year-old brain cancer survivor is up there.
00:07:51.580If you're unable to see beyond your tribal allegiance and unite over the story of a 13-year-old brain cancer survivor, that's what orgiastic tribalism looks like.
00:08:03.340What is the greatest threat, existential threat, to our world right now?
00:08:09.200Because I tend to think it could be this parasitic mind that you speak of.
00:08:13.480Well, I repeatedly keep saying, Aaron, that there is nothing in nature that is remotely as dangerous as a parasitized mind, right?
00:11:18.160It's also kind when we don't put felons who've already had 87 convictions, putting them in prison for a long time,
00:11:27.540because especially if they are felons of color, society has already damaged them because we live in a white supremacist society where they are forced to become criminals.
00:11:38.500So, what's the point of you putting them behind bars for the rest of their lives?
00:12:08.820How do we stop the world falling prey to something that will eventually kill us all?
00:12:14.280Well, so, it's actually a two-pronged attack because you really do need a vaccine against the parasitic ideas and against the suicidal empathy, but they go in tandem.
00:12:25.600So, let me give you a very concrete example.
00:12:28.160Cultural relativism is a parasitic idea that afflicts your ability to think.
00:12:33.820Cultural relativism says, who are you to judge the beliefs and the behaviors of another culture?
00:12:40.380If another culture wishes to cut off the clitorises of five-year-old girls, that's their right to do so.
00:13:13.660It's when Erin Mullen calls you to come on her show and you're sick with what looks like bronchitis, you say, I'm going to tough it and go on.
00:13:21.680And then, eventually, people do come around.
00:13:23.980I've had, I mean, literally thousands and thousands of people who've written to me and said, you know, you saved me from the insanity that I used to believe in.
00:13:33.480And so, there is no other alternative other than to win the battle of ideas.
00:13:38.020It's a long, hard slog, but it's a battle you are fighting bravely on behalf of us all.
00:13:42.960Dr. Gardsard, thank you so much for your time.