I’m hearing the statistic you touted about Jews being on the receiving end of the highest proportion of hate crimes in Australia (and other countries) bandied about a lot recently. However, I’ve struggled to find evidence of this. In fact, I asked a friend of mine, a senior researcher at BOCSAR what he knew about it, and according to him, there is no data shedding light on this from BOCSAR or ABS datasets due. This is because of legislative weirdness and because crime motive data is not systematically collected.
It’s a big claim, and honestly not one that aligns with my anecdotal experience, so would be good to have some evidence to back it up.
3min 30sec in to this episode, and I believe a conversation between Josh Szeps, expert host, and Jackson Galaxy, expert cat behaviorist, would be in my top podcast episodes of the year.
Be thankful that Taco hasn’t adopted the move that one of our cats, Spaulding, absolutely loves, which is to jump headfirst into the scoop of food as I’m transporting it from the big food bin to his dish, spilling food everywhere. Happens at least once a week. This normally startles his brother, Mr. Meowgi, who then freaks out and knocks the water dish over as he frantically escapes the whole scene. So thankful for them.
yet again a take from Josh on this that reserves the anger for the 'woke left' but gives those that started the WhatsApp threads that started all of this a little 'aw shucks aint they stinkers' when they were doing the exact same thing.
Look I do not like Clementine Ford at all and done agree with what shes doing - but the lack of balance is stark here Josh.
Love cats. Have two now as my oldest cat(16) passed away last week. My children and I found him as a tiny maybe 3 week old kitten in the road one night in 2008. He was so tiny and frail that I had to force him to drink milk replacer to survive. The remaining two are also rescues. We live out in the country where there are too many barn cats.
We have dogs too and I love them as much. I’m just an animal person in general.
My cat is 12 and a half years old. I got him when he was 6 months old. This feeding routine has been going on for about 12 years:
Day 1 first thing in the morning after starting the coffee pot, I fill his flat bottom feeding bowl with dry cat food. He starts eating.
Day 2 first thing etc. he sits in front of his food bowl looking over his shoulder at me with the ‘I’m hungry please feed me’ look on his face. He has eaten about 1/3 of the food out of the center of the bowl such that the bottom of the bowl is visible and the other 2/3 is arranged donut-like around the circumference of the bowl. I bend over and rearrange the remaining food with my fingers so that it is evenly distributed in the bowl. He starts eating.
Day 3 first thing etc. he has eaten the second 1/3 of the food such that the the bottom of the bowl is visible etc. He sits in front of his bowl giving me the ‘I’m starving and my bowl is empty this is an outrage’ look. I rearrange the food to evenly distribute it. I get the full, ears back, ‘this is unacceptable I refuse to eat this stale three day old food it infuriates me when you treat me this way’ look. As soon as I pick up the bag of food and start moving towards him to refill his bowl, he happily jumps to his feet and starts eating the remaining food in his bowl. His head mostly covers the bowl so I can’t pour more food into it. Trying to move his head out of the way with my hand is impossible. I have to put the side of my foot along the side of his body and shove him off to the side to refill his bowl. At this point Day 3 has now converted to Day 1 and the cycle starts over again.
Sorry Josh, your and Taco’s feeding routine may continue for years to come.
What has being a mum and Instagram got to do with the fact that Palestine is suffering a genocide? I’ll accept: ‘anti genocide-committed-by-Israel, socially, politically aware human’ because that’s what I am. Whether I’m a mum or on Instagram has nothing to do with my concern for the plight of Palestinians and great concern over the secret WhatsApp groups that were leaked by members of the group who were concerned about the horrible direction the dialogue was headed.
The topic of this episode is an important one – although I am certain that it is much more nuanced IRL than is being captured here. The point made regarding Peter Singer – paraphrased – that a response to something a person disagrees with should be an ongoing discussion about the substance of an argument – seems eminently sensible. Josh says that we have a bunch of platforms to jump on to express our views or our dissent. Wouldn’t it be wonderful to live in a world where we had a true contest of ideas and the most valid, evidence-based arguments rose to the top.
But. Nah. In reality, people don’t have an equal voice or equal platform or equal power. Facts and evidence are becoming less relevant. Those that speak the loudest often have the greatest conflicts – they might have financial vested interests or might be looking to be re-elected. People (and I don’t mean to infantilise here) are persuaded by arguments that trigger emotions or those that fit within their world view, and are less persuaded by evidence (particularly when there has been a concerted effort to discredit science and experts). Furthermore, bad arguments are often persistent – how can we be 40 years on from clear evidence of climate change, at least 20+ years of knowing that it is human / fossil fuel caused, and yet we can still have speakers who haven’t read the textbook and select / ignore evidence to push an opinion that climate change is crap. Worse, many of the speakers are not remotely learned in the subject.
But the kicker is…. In some cases, the mere persistence of a debate that should have ended years ago (or never been had) is harmful to progress or to society. What would the ramifications be if powerful people persisted with claims that an election was stolen? What might that do to democracy? Or that vaccines are ineffective? What might that do to the preventable cases of brain damage from measles? Or that COVID was God’s punishment for homosexuality? [sorry – all of these are probably ‘far right’ debates – I’m sure it happens both ways].
So, what to do? Continue to debate patiently, humbly, with the requisite acknowledgement of uncertainty when there are gaps in your evidence. In many cases, your opposition doesn’t play by these rules. Or, do you lobby your university to tell a flat earther to fuck off? Or dig up some evidence that the climate change denier has a couple million invested in Australian gas fracking and publicise it on twitter? The option, it seems, is to put up with slow incremental change (which is precisely the goal of some lobby groups), or to be a woke / conservative snitch and try to remove an idiot from a debate with the hope that change might happen quicker.
In an ideal world, people wouldn’t lie, people would check their own biases, and people wouldn’t believe crap that is unsupported by evidence. There wouldn’t be a stark difference in power or platform where some people can just plainly ignore a reasonable debate and continue to say the same discredited things. It would be great if people didn’t seek to discredit others by playing the person, and debate was just your logic and reason vs my logic and reason. But for that to be effective, society would have to change quite a bit.
There have always been “snitches” of an assortment of temporary societal mores of the day. Former Liberal organizations has become so leftist that liberals today are distancing themselves so as not to a part of of the “neonazi”/transcult that has overtaken much of western society, not exclusive to America. It’s the new normal but the pendulum is starting to swing back. Albeit not fast or far enough.
Until all liberals stand up to this burgeoning authoritarianism it will continue to inspire unhinged hatred.
A sad but not shocking condition of progressive policies. There are no more lines except those that they impose. The so called progressives have run so far to the left they are the oppressors.
Hi Josh,
Fellow Sydney-based Jew here.
I’m hearing the statistic you touted about Jews being on the receiving end of the highest proportion of hate crimes in Australia (and other countries) bandied about a lot recently. However, I’ve struggled to find evidence of this. In fact, I asked a friend of mine, a senior researcher at BOCSAR what he knew about it, and according to him, there is no data shedding light on this from BOCSAR or ABS datasets due. This is because of legislative weirdness and because crime motive data is not systematically collected.
It’s a big claim, and honestly not one that aligns with my anecdotal experience, so would be good to have some evidence to back it up.
3min 30sec in to this episode, and I believe a conversation between Josh Szeps, expert host, and Jackson Galaxy, expert cat behaviorist, would be in my top podcast episodes of the year.
Be thankful that Taco hasn’t adopted the move that one of our cats, Spaulding, absolutely loves, which is to jump headfirst into the scoop of food as I’m transporting it from the big food bin to his dish, spilling food everywhere. Happens at least once a week. This normally startles his brother, Mr. Meowgi, who then freaks out and knocks the water dish over as he frantically escapes the whole scene. So thankful for them.
Your cat is MR. MEOWGI?!?!?
Respect.
yet again a take from Josh on this that reserves the anger for the 'woke left' but gives those that started the WhatsApp threads that started all of this a little 'aw shucks aint they stinkers' when they were doing the exact same thing.
Look I do not like Clementine Ford at all and done agree with what shes doing - but the lack of balance is stark here Josh.
The woke are the new far right. Horseshoe 🧲 Theory…the new little brown shirts.
PS
Love cats. Have two now as my oldest cat(16) passed away last week. My children and I found him as a tiny maybe 3 week old kitten in the road one night in 2008. He was so tiny and frail that I had to force him to drink milk replacer to survive. The remaining two are also rescues. We live out in the country where there are too many barn cats.
We have dogs too and I love them as much. I’m just an animal person in general.
That's EXACTLY in a 🐈 cat's ever changing job description! You DID read their job description didn't you ?
Cat’s Resume:
1. Knocking things off the counter while maintaining awkward eye contact
2. Somehow displacing their weight when they’re lying on something you need, making them suddenly weigh 100 pounds
3. Getting up and sprinting out of a room for absolutely no reason
4. Lots of other stuff but they aren’t interested in talking about any of it because they just DGAF
😂
😺 For a fact Jack! 🤣
My cat is 12 and a half years old. I got him when he was 6 months old. This feeding routine has been going on for about 12 years:
Day 1 first thing in the morning after starting the coffee pot, I fill his flat bottom feeding bowl with dry cat food. He starts eating.
Day 2 first thing etc. he sits in front of his food bowl looking over his shoulder at me with the ‘I’m hungry please feed me’ look on his face. He has eaten about 1/3 of the food out of the center of the bowl such that the bottom of the bowl is visible and the other 2/3 is arranged donut-like around the circumference of the bowl. I bend over and rearrange the remaining food with my fingers so that it is evenly distributed in the bowl. He starts eating.
Day 3 first thing etc. he has eaten the second 1/3 of the food such that the the bottom of the bowl is visible etc. He sits in front of his bowl giving me the ‘I’m starving and my bowl is empty this is an outrage’ look. I rearrange the food to evenly distribute it. I get the full, ears back, ‘this is unacceptable I refuse to eat this stale three day old food it infuriates me when you treat me this way’ look. As soon as I pick up the bag of food and start moving towards him to refill his bowl, he happily jumps to his feet and starts eating the remaining food in his bowl. His head mostly covers the bowl so I can’t pour more food into it. Trying to move his head out of the way with my hand is impossible. I have to put the side of my foot along the side of his body and shove him off to the side to refill his bowl. At this point Day 3 has now converted to Day 1 and the cycle starts over again.
Sorry Josh, your and Taco’s feeding routine may continue for years to come.
Cats are funny people. Like all other living things no two are alike.
I’ve had cats that, when annoyed, will paw at things on tables until it falls off just to get my attention.
Watching funny cat videos on YouTube is a good pick me up to escape from the doldrums.
Anti-Zionist Instagram mums?
What has being a mum and Instagram got to do with the fact that Palestine is suffering a genocide? I’ll accept: ‘anti genocide-committed-by-Israel, socially, politically aware human’ because that’s what I am. Whether I’m a mum or on Instagram has nothing to do with my concern for the plight of Palestinians and great concern over the secret WhatsApp groups that were leaked by members of the group who were concerned about the horrible direction the dialogue was headed.
Firstly – love your podcast.
The topic of this episode is an important one – although I am certain that it is much more nuanced IRL than is being captured here. The point made regarding Peter Singer – paraphrased – that a response to something a person disagrees with should be an ongoing discussion about the substance of an argument – seems eminently sensible. Josh says that we have a bunch of platforms to jump on to express our views or our dissent. Wouldn’t it be wonderful to live in a world where we had a true contest of ideas and the most valid, evidence-based arguments rose to the top.
But. Nah. In reality, people don’t have an equal voice or equal platform or equal power. Facts and evidence are becoming less relevant. Those that speak the loudest often have the greatest conflicts – they might have financial vested interests or might be looking to be re-elected. People (and I don’t mean to infantilise here) are persuaded by arguments that trigger emotions or those that fit within their world view, and are less persuaded by evidence (particularly when there has been a concerted effort to discredit science and experts). Furthermore, bad arguments are often persistent – how can we be 40 years on from clear evidence of climate change, at least 20+ years of knowing that it is human / fossil fuel caused, and yet we can still have speakers who haven’t read the textbook and select / ignore evidence to push an opinion that climate change is crap. Worse, many of the speakers are not remotely learned in the subject.
But the kicker is…. In some cases, the mere persistence of a debate that should have ended years ago (or never been had) is harmful to progress or to society. What would the ramifications be if powerful people persisted with claims that an election was stolen? What might that do to democracy? Or that vaccines are ineffective? What might that do to the preventable cases of brain damage from measles? Or that COVID was God’s punishment for homosexuality? [sorry – all of these are probably ‘far right’ debates – I’m sure it happens both ways].
So, what to do? Continue to debate patiently, humbly, with the requisite acknowledgement of uncertainty when there are gaps in your evidence. In many cases, your opposition doesn’t play by these rules. Or, do you lobby your university to tell a flat earther to fuck off? Or dig up some evidence that the climate change denier has a couple million invested in Australian gas fracking and publicise it on twitter? The option, it seems, is to put up with slow incremental change (which is precisely the goal of some lobby groups), or to be a woke / conservative snitch and try to remove an idiot from a debate with the hope that change might happen quicker.
In an ideal world, people wouldn’t lie, people would check their own biases, and people wouldn’t believe crap that is unsupported by evidence. There wouldn’t be a stark difference in power or platform where some people can just plainly ignore a reasonable debate and continue to say the same discredited things. It would be great if people didn’t seek to discredit others by playing the person, and debate was just your logic and reason vs my logic and reason. But for that to be effective, society would have to change quite a bit.
The boxer analogy reminds me of all the bs martial artists being taken down by Xu Xiaodong. The CCP has constantly attacked him because of his bouts.
This was a great post except for the part where you gaslit us about there being a YouTube version of it.
I feel that this feature should be called "Just Joshing"
There have always been “snitches” of an assortment of temporary societal mores of the day. Former Liberal organizations has become so leftist that liberals today are distancing themselves so as not to a part of of the “neonazi”/transcult that has overtaken much of western society, not exclusive to America. It’s the new normal but the pendulum is starting to swing back. Albeit not fast or far enough.
Until all liberals stand up to this burgeoning authoritarianism it will continue to inspire unhinged hatred.
A sad but not shocking condition of progressive policies. There are no more lines except those that they impose. The so called progressives have run so far to the left they are the oppressors.