Activism vs. Hedonism vs. Youtube vs. Education… Doing the Most You Can.

this is now New Year's Eve I'm recording
this on December 31st 2016 so question came in quote is there an amount of time that you believe a person can spend enjoying themselves instead of participating in some kind of humanitarian work you know working towards political goals the stuff that up in my videos he says what kind of what percentage of one's lifetime do you believe is okay to enjoy without warrant and criticism so you guys can imagine why he's asking that if you've been watching my recent videos I think with activism and humanitarian work simply put you want to be in the position of saying I am doing all that I possibly can all you can may be very limited [Music] I remember when I was living in England living in England with my wife at the time just by coincidence these things come and go in fashions we heard a lot of this BS we heard a lot of this kind of prideful boasting from male pickup artists male I mean really what it is is on the news on the radio in newspapers you hear a lot of pop psychology and there seems to be this very popular British attitude very popular in the British Isles that men there's a saying in England keep'em keen tree to mean there were all these bizarre little social theories pop psychology theories in England about how men should keep their girlfriends interested basically by snubbing them basically by acting like they're too good for their own girlfriend and part of that there were all these theories circulating on the internet but again this was discussed on the radio and in newspapers there was all this kind of crap like men saying like you should only send your girlfriend one text message for every three text messages Seacole she says you you should only give her you know two phone calls for every five phone calls you get for the woman there were all these kind of bizarre theories about how to keep your relationship fresh or loving or meaningful or whatever for for the man in England basically these men trying to prove their their better than their girlfriend I guess basically by the man not paying too much attention to the girlfriend and not helping her over basically not being helpful as bizarre this debate I mean it's not even debate it's really just pop psychology and me and my wife at the time is now my ex-wife we saw a lot of this and some of the people we knew face to face talk to these terms also about basically how much attention the man is giving the woman how much attention the woman is giving the man and even sort of who is providing what benefits how much the man helps the woman how much the woman helps them and people were really theorizing about this way so for me sorry if in case you don't catch the Segway this really is linked to this question of being asked how much time can a person spend enjoying with them themselves as opposed to how much time can they devote to the movements how much time can they devote to humanitarian work etc and I remember saying to my ex-wife you know to me this is just totally bizarre because this whole mentality I see in England which I'd never seen in America I'd never seen in Canada is bad maybe it exists in America candles but I've never seen it this whole mentality is based on the idea that your problem is restricting yourself from helping too much that your problem is that like by nature you would spend too much of your time too much of your money too much of your effort doing things to help your girlfriend in her life or your wife in her life and that you should restrict yourself so that you seem more commanding or more it's bizarre it's totally alien to me but I remember saying we discussed this at several points I said the reality is the opposite the reality is even if you do everything you possibly can do to help your girlfriend or to help your wife it will never be enough so you have to start from that perspective if I'm doing all I can to help you it's never gonna be enough but I can say honestly I could look in your eyes and saying I am doing all I can right and a meaning in my relationships with girlfriends or my wife or what have you I have been in that position very very often you know I mean at one point my wife was living in China I had a job in Thailand so you know we were traveling back and forth to see each other and she did need help on some things including intellectual things helping her PhD thesis or something and you can say I could say honestly enough you know I am doing all I can now she's a very tough woman Mac's wife it's not like she was begging for tons of help but sure it's an issue comes up you know whether it's washing the dishes or helping someone with their PhD thesis with their research helping them design a research projects because you know a lot of the help I gave max wife was intellectual in nature was research-based with whether it's washing the dishes or doing the gardening or taking care of the baby or something really more more intellectual or related to politics or vegan activism you should be in the position of saying I am doing all I possibly can do and if that's not enough for you we have a problem it's so alien to me and so bizarre than a man and apparently in British culture this is a big thing that a man would want to put himself in the position of saying no I want my girlfriend or wife to be making three times as much effort as I'm making therefore I only pay to take her out for dinner this is like these were really the examples being discussed in the newspaper the idea that a man would only pay to take the woman out for dinner once after she's done three things for him like this like economy eternal economy within the relationship I think that's really psychologically unhealthy and evil and counterproductive and to me I just say it's it's very very very alien but obviously this fits into the British mentality the British ego and I do think a large part of the British ego unlike the American eco a large part of the British ego really seems to be based on snubbing people you're only as good as the last person you've snubbed is really a large part of life in England and people there are very very eager to insult and denigrate each other to show who they think they are by contrast so okay this elaborate allegory for me comes back to this political question which is sort of come up under a few different headings and I'll come back to vegan gains in this situation I think with activism and humanitarian work simply put you want to be in the position of saying I am doing all that I possibly can now as I've just talked about in the half hour prior to this podcast all you can may be very limited all you can do to help your wife may be limited like again maybe you have a job working in a submarine in the US Navy so while you're away in a submarine you're not doing a damn thing to help her because you're in a submarine and she's living somewhere else she's in a city or she's living on the land presumably all kinds of people have problems with that in relationship same thing with vegan activism or humanitarian work or what have you if you have a job working in a submarine working on a cruise ship very obviously your ethical and economic commitments are going to massively limit the amount of a positive difference you can make how much you can contribute how much you contribute to the movement how much you could you can do period but why would you be in the position of trying to put a percentage on it that way of trying to limit how much you can help why wouldn't you want to be in the position of saying I am doing all that I can possibly do even if that all is a very very limited sum it's very very tiny I mean like this year a few months ago I was living in the school and could Ming and one of the reasons why I wrote that children's book I was looking for what positive contribution can I make and part of my positive contribution is coming on YouTube and engaging in critique and discussion and doing book reviews all this stuff you guys know about and I decided okay I can write this children's book and try to get this children's book Illustrated and then I can say well living in China being in these circumstances being a student maybe right now this is all I can do but I still want to do that I still want to be all I can be and do all I can do so I guess it's starting from that position not of false humility but a very pragmatic realistic assessment of how limited your some contribution can be that you then move on to the pursuit of that maximum contribution that's how I perceive the answer that question and to me in many ways the question is quite alien if I regain custody of my daughter which course gonna be joint custody obviously the amount of time I would spend taking care of my daughter that will again massively reduce the scope I have to engage in even YouTube or anything else I'm not gonna feel bad about that I'm gonna feel positive about doing what I can about doing all that I can do now this relates back to the example already mentioned of vegan gains so what are the sacrifices you can make what are the strategic decisions you have to make in terms of how you spend your time so you are spending your time effectively in terms of activists and politics humanitarian work what have you well whether or not you play video games is the decision you can make whether or not you own a dog is a decision you can make and there are so many other things you don't have power over right there's so many other things you can't control you may have to take care of your grandmother you may have to take care of your parents as they get old they need more help taking care of themselves you may have to take care of your kid you may have to you know work in a submarine you may have a job that's very demanding of your time there may be so many things you can't control or have limited control over that restrict your ability to engage in you know effective activism a humanitarian work any aspirations to make the world a better place you have but then there are the things you can't control there are the decisions you make and this is only one of many many reasons why I think owning a domesticated animal owning a dog owning a cat well I think it's not just a bad idea in some ways I think it's actually in a sense an immoral idea the opportunity cost is tremendous it really is it's a lot of time if you are walking a dog twice a day and combing the dog and cleaning up the dog's hair and cleaning up the dog's poo and all this stuff if you just walk a dog twice a day that is a huge commitment of time seven days a week and the the reason why with this vegan gains is not the only one a lot of vegans are doing this and yeah on that human level of your personal economy and your potential to be effective in activism and advocacy and changing the world and supporting veganism many vegans start off with the assumption that their veganism they should be spending more time rescuing animals keeping pets I think I tell you it's the exact opposite feeding a dead cow to a cat every day feeding dead sheep to a dog every day playing with a dog he's not gonna achieve progress to the vegan movement not if you have one dog and not if you have ten it's not and you know if you didn't have that dog if you didn't have all that time going into taking care of house pets whether or not their rescue animals whether or not there are these other excuses then your horizons for making a difference in the movement they change so those are I think the strategic decisions you have to make those are the strategic decisions that shape what is the maximum amount you can do so I guess we'll my second last topic here I've had several videos just lately discussing the permanent vacation lifestyle people dropping out of school to pursue YouTube and you guys may not have noticed but actually there's a really peculiar example of this in the well-known social justice warrior vegan youtuber called a privileged vegan so a privileged vegan is also called marine she for awhile stopped using the name a privileged vegan she's the name marine and now she's back she's using the name of privileged vegan again a privileged vegan has only ABA she was enrolled in an MA program in a master's program and she actually had a video posted explaining her decision to drop out of her MA program and why is she dropping out of her MA program it's to join us here on permanent vacation on YouTube pursuing YouTube activism or YouTube advocacy whatever you want to say now that is really really bizarre you know of course it's bizarre first of all because it's a contrast to all the other people I've criticized who you know we're involved in lifestyle activism and bikinis and you know who people who have nothing in common with a privileged vegan politically or methodologically and yet of course it is still fundamentally the same thing she is not quitting she's not dropping in for me to have a full-time job she does she has not mentioned having any job at all I think you know I wish her well I don't know if she's born rich enough that she just doesn't need a job she is pursuing YouTube fame even if it is YouTube fame of an explicitly political explicitly activist form now yeah there are some comments in the in the comment section here about privileged vegan being a spoiled brat yes so you know she and I are not friends for the sake of veganism I would be entirely willing to talk to her again do a podcast with her collaborate with her because for the sake of veganism I'd be willing to I'd be willing to collaborate with freely I mean I'm I'm really trying to make something positive happen even when I have significant differences people but she's somebody you know she doesn't like me and I think in a sense I don't like her but this is about this is about saving the planet this is about saving the animals blah blah blah so we should be able to put those kinds of differences aside correct me if I'm wrong and again there are some differences you can't put aside I mean you know remember I'm still like the only guy on vegan youtube to really confront the neo-nazis and racists within vegan you know well that so somebody comments that she's only doing YouTube until the next MMA program and so that is not what she says if you actually watch your video and I don't believe that's the case at all I think it's a serious decisions you made so look I'm putting a caveat here there are many many reasons to drop out of your ma program including just that the professor is lousy that the program is lousy you know there are reasons like that or you can just say well you know it's it's a bad program it's simple enough reason to drop out or it's it's going for Li she does not cite anything like that though she really does cite her decision as being because she wants to do this YouTube thing and she wants to build up her channel and she talked in some technical detail how she's trying to attract more viewers to her channel so it does seem like she is making in many ways the mistakes that I've been warning against and I think she's probably seriously deluded as to how big the maximum size of her audience would be but it's a little bit extra bizarre for me because I am someone who has never had the opportunity to get a master's degree let alone a PhD I have quite a few videos talking about that there's one that's just titled why I don't have a PhD parts 1 & 2 and still to this day there are professors who are fans of my work because I went back to school at UVic I have one bachelor's degree I'm getting a second bachelor's degree I still do not have a single option to get an MA anywhere in the world a single positive viable option so dropping out of an MA program dropping out of a master's degree if it's a good program if it's a decent program that is quite alien and jarring to me given what my own struggle struggles in life have been and given the deplorable state of Canadian academia the incredibly poor options I've had I don't know what can we learn from example someone like like privileged vegan YouTube this is the real philosophical moral I want to put on the story guys YouTube is wonderful and powerful because it allows us to challenge other people's opinions I'll use one example myself I think as well I challenged a whole bunch of people who never really thought about what it means to castrate a dog vegans people who are already vegans people aren't supported animal rights and a whole lot of people had to sit down and really think about it holy why do we castrate dogs why do we castrate cats why do we on a hormonal level modify the behaviors of these animals so that they will be more like toys more like pets rather than having their well behaviors I was really successfully able to challenge people in a way they didn't expect to be challenged where they didn't want to be challenged within veganism thanks to you that's the positive thing about both veganism but you know I think the negative thing about veganism is that for people like myself for people like privileged vegan and me it makes it possible to live your whole life without being challenged um I think that you know someone like marine someone like a privileged vegan she is in dire need of being challenged about many of her fundamentally ignorant fundamentally self-righteous beliefs in the world and that doesn't happen through YouTube it can happen in a good university program it can happen between professor and student whether it's a masters degree program or BA it can also just have with people you know face to face it can't happen by going to conferences being in some kind of Socratic dialogue with somebody you know Maureen had a video I used this as an example because to me it's very smoking gun she had a video talking about living without soap so if you guys don't remember I had a very comedic video where I was really ranting about how much I hate vegans who either don't use soap or make up pseudoscience and excuses and myths to make it sound like a life without soap is superior to a life using soap this kind of nonsense there's a video from her totally uncritically totally unscientifically talking about a soap free life so this kind of natural hygiene pseudoscience crap about not using soap you can watch don't watch it I mean it's garbage but I'm just saying and you know I watch that video and whether you're looking at what she says about soap or what she says about politics in Israel I see someone whose tiny shred of fame on YouTube is allowing them to burrow deeper and deeper into an echo chamber where nobody is gonna educate her nobody is gonna challenge her where she is able to just be ever more self-confident in it to feel ever more unchallenged in you know her assumptions about how the world works and about questions of good and evil right and wrong but if you just think about the meaning of the word education in terms of career I've already talked about the fact I think it's sad to see someone like this destroying their career opportunities just to come on YouTube and this game that I'm playing right now but it is also really very sad in terms of Education in terms of real education in terms of the opportunity for you to be challenged in your beliefs and assumption to really learn something new to really gain a new perspective to gain a new perspective on familiar facts and have a jarring unexpected confrontation with unfamiliar facts and that happens to me that's part of my education even though I'm in my late 30s you know I went back to university I already knew a lot about the history of Laos the history of Cambodia history of China to some extent and I go back to university I wasn't planning to study the history of Russia and I studied the history of Russia Wow I'm confronted with a new perspective that really of course you know intersects with overlaps with has a dynamic connection to all those other you know historical questions and it challenges my assumptions I have heard Marines perspective I've heard her own explanation in her own perspective and what she's doing and why she's doing it and it is certainly a you know bizarre and instructive and memorable example of frankly the permanent vacation lifestyle frankly this fundamental delusion that YouTube is real activism that YouTube is a real career or that theme within the digital vegan demi-monde is real Fame because it's not it's none of those things none of those things are true and valid but what it is I mean YouTube is a way to document your own life it is a way to make friends and you know I do appreciate it I do appreciate it for what it is but it's very sad to see so many people swept up in a sort of illusion of what they imagine it is alright to end this video though this is now New Year's Eve I'm recording this on December 31st 2016 looking ahead to 2017 I've already mused on this to some extent you know I remember a quotation from a computer programmer a computer programmer who did die relatively young I forget if she died at 45 or 55 the famous quote from this computer programmer is when you're on your deathbed nobody looks back at their life and thinks I wish that I spent more time sitting in my computer alone you know it's very funny I'll just say only a few days ago I thought that my resolution for 2017 was going to be to spend less time on YouTube and to put more of my time into language research and my career here in China and maybe into starting a small business here in China you know setting up the foundation for that looking at all those career issues and options and then in just a few days things changed here including my contract for a bunch of different reasons my perspective changed because the facts changed the facts the situation changed so my perspective changed and really my perspective is now that the role the Chinese language has in my life is very questionable it's very dubious the role that this job has in my life is pretty much a dead-end job for me learning Chinese seems to be a complete dead end in terms of my career which is very sad but I can weep about that later I can't leave oh that in a separate video and you know YouTube and networking with you guys the Internet is not a dead end that actually promises something positive for my future so I feel like right now my resolution for 2017 is actually to work harder creating content for YouTube but I mean the sad fact is Chinese is a dead end this job is a dead end my university degree is a dead end I have no clear path in terms of my career for getting an MA or PhD after that university degree so when I go back to Canada I may be working at Starbucks we're still in that kind of really bleak career path situation or maybe working for the police force or joining the army etc etc but actually I do have every reason to put my energy my time and energy back into YouTube more than before and I hope I can create a higher caliber of intellectual content again whether that's through book reviews or discussions of academic papers or through collaborations with other channels who are producing quality content I don't know we'll see we'll see what we'll see what's possible of course that's why this contrast is someone like marine a privileged vegan is so bizarre if I had an MA program if I had a door open to a real career or to doing meaningful research or even higher education none of these questions would even be asked but I don't these are the cards I was dealt and in some ways they're wonderful and some ways I advantages and in some ways I have disadvantages but in many ways my career situation and even you know my legal situation so on has backed me into a corner where you know YouTube is the best bet of God so I hope you'll stick with me here on patreon I hope you'll see the next chapter that comes in my life and in a real sense my resolution for 2017 is to put even more effort and energy and originality into brainstorming how I can make more out of this opportunity for this YouTube channel that at the end of the day is a crossroads for vegans to meet other vegans for people to make connections that can lead to real-world activism even though I do not regard YouTube as a form of activism in itself [Music]