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1:01
This is a Daunted Life Man's Podcast.
1:13
I'm your host Kyle Thompson.
1:15
Let's get into it.
1:16
Alright guys, so here's the thing.
1:18
People get mad and they get mad online and when they get mad online, they like to flame.
1:24
They like to go crazy.
1:25
They like to show how indignant they are and how angry they are.
1:29
But then they just like to leave it there.
1:32
So I'll kind of back into this a little bit.
1:34
But here recently, I shared an article on my personal Facebook page and it was an article
1:39
by Life News.
1:40
So Life News is a very pro-life anti-abortion website and they basically put out something
1:46
that said that the leading cause of death worldwide in 2018 was abortion.
1:52
That 42 million babies were murdered and obviously being pro-life and this being a very anti-abortion
1:58
organization, they made sure to use the actual word, not the euphemistic word, but they used
2:03
a word murder a lot in the podcast.
2:06
And so I just shared it on my Facebook and you know, it's kind of one of those things
2:09
where there are people that like to pull the pin on their grenade, throw it in the middle
2:13
of the room and then just kind of casually walk out.
2:15
I'm not really one of those people, but I did want to make sure that people knew that
2:18
this was this was up there because everyone's concerned with cancer.
2:22
Everything's concerned with all these other things that lead to death and you know, you
2:25
have the opioid crisis and you have suicide going up in the United States.
2:29
You have, you know, the life expectancy of Americans have gone down two years in a row
2:33
and that's the first time that's happened in, I don't know, almost 100 years or something
2:37
like that.
2:38
But abortion worldwide killed 42 million people.
2:42
So I shared it.
2:43
And then, you know, you get the people that agree with you and you get the people that
2:46
disagree with you and the people that disagree with you or, you know, basically just trying
2:50
to say that you're stupid or how could you be so bigoted?
2:52
Why do you hate women, blah, blah, blah, all the normal stuff that comes up with abortion.
2:56
But here's the thing, it doesn't matter what you post about this.
3:01
In this case, I posted about abortion, obviously a very controversial topic, but when it gets
3:06
to a certain point, discussions can start online, but they're not appropriate to continue them
3:12
online.
3:13
Just like when you get these diatribes by people back and forth and you get these long, you
3:18
know, five, six paragraph responses on Facebook, that's not exactly the best forum to do something
3:23
like that.
3:24
Because you can spend hours and hours and hours crafting a response.
3:27
You get other people's input.
3:28
Some people will have other people write their stuff for them.
3:31
I know I've had people literally getting a debate with me and plagiarize literally like
3:35
take stuff from articles and then I throw it into Google and like, oh, you just jacked
3:40
this from somebody else and pass it off as your own.
3:43
But it's not an appropriate form to continue that discussion.
3:46
So what I like to do is I like to keep things very cordial.
3:48
I like to keep things very polite, but I like to invite people to discuss things with me
3:53
outside of that form.
3:55
So you know, you could post something about abortion, post something about guns.
4:00
I personally have done this about those two subjects.
4:02
Also, you know, I made some not so popular opinions of mine public about what was going
4:08
on kind of with the Oklahoma teachers going out on strike last year.
4:11
And you know, I tried to say how much I supported teachers, but hey, you know, it's their, it's
4:15
their job that they've chosen and they know that the pay sucks and it is what it is.
4:19
And just people don't like these opinions, but I genuinely like having discussions with
4:23
people that disagree with me.
4:24
As long as the goal is that we can both shake hands and part ways as friends, as long as
4:28
that's the goal.
4:29
We're both aiming for that goal that we might disagree, but we shouldn't hate the other person
4:33
that I'm always looking for that.
4:35
The unfortunate thing is, is since I've been inviting people to do coffee or have a discussion
4:42
over a drink on any one of these topics, I today have had zero people take me up on that
4:48
zero.
4:51
And I always invite them cordially, you know, I'll invite them on the same Facebook comment
4:56
string or on Twitter or whatever the thing may be.
4:59
Sometimes I'll text them if I have their number or I'll send them a private message or something
5:02
like that because I don't need to show everybody, Hey, look how cordial I'm being.
5:05
I'm inviting them to a one on one public discussion, you know, whatever the thing might be.
5:10
I'm not doing it for that.
5:11
But no one has taken me up on it because again, yeah, these discussions start online, but
5:17
it's appropriate to take them offline.
5:18
I invite them to do so and they go quiet.
5:23
And if they don't go quiet, the excuses just are flowing.
5:26
Oh, you know, I wouldn't even dares it down with someone like you.
5:30
You're just too big at it.
5:31
Oh, I couldn't possibly sit down with someone that has the opinion that you do.
5:36
You just hate women.
5:37
You just hate people of this religion.
5:39
You just hate gays.
5:40
You just hate whatever the thing is, whatever their excuse is, it's a stiff arm.
5:43
It's an excuse.
5:44
And the thing that comes to mind for me is how can people be so righteously angry in their
5:51
own minds and yet turn down an opportunity to discuss it?
5:56
Because these people treat these topics like it is be all end all.
6:00
There is nothing on this planet that is more important than this topic at this time.
6:04
And that is why they are going to spend their entire afternoon thinking of their response
6:08
to whatever it is that I said beforehand or whatever people that agree with me said beforehand.
6:12
It's just stunning.
6:14
It's astounding to me.
6:15
And it's something that I just kept thinking about and kept thinking about and wondering
6:18
why people do this.
6:20
We live in this modern outrage culture.
6:23
You know, my, my generation, you know, has been called a slow snowflake generation because
6:27
we just can't handle things.
6:29
We have Gen Zers that have their safe spaces and they just can't possibly have somebody
6:32
challenged their point of view on a particular issue without them needing to cry or run to
6:37
an adult that will help them.
6:38
But I just kept thinking about, okay, why is this the case?
6:41
Yeah.
6:42
I mean, guys, you know me.
6:43
Like I just can't just let a sleeping dog lie.
6:44
I'm just looking at an issue and wondering, okay, what are the things that we can pull
6:48
from this?
6:49
What can we learn from this?
6:50
And then obviously I'm always thinking of things that can help you guys.
6:52
So I thought of I kind of encapsulated all and distilled it down into these five things.
6:57
The five reasons why people avoid these conversations.
7:01
So somebody has invited you.
7:03
They're on two sides of a very important issue, call it for whatever, anything that we mentioned
7:07
already.
7:08
Maybe it's immigration, maybe it's about Islam, maybe it's about economics or whatever the
7:12
thing is, you know, you both disagree coming into the conversation.
7:16
Why?
7:17
What are the top five reasons for people avoiding these conversations?
7:19
So the first thing is, is they're afraid of their ignorance being exposed.
7:24
That's why people won't get into these conversations because I think some people know that they
7:29
can spout a few little pithy comments, things that they may be gotten from somebody else,
7:35
maybe someone they follow on Twitter or some sort of a talking point from their party or
7:40
some of their favorite people or their organizations.
7:43
It's just these comments that they throw out there, you know, but they don't have any backing
7:47
for them.
7:48
They don't really understand why they said such a thing.
7:51
They just know that this is something that they've heard paraded by somebody else and
7:54
then they parrot themselves.
7:57
But the thing is, is we all kind of have this general fear of our ignorance being exposed.
8:01
We don't ever want to seem like we don't know something.
8:03
If you go back to my podcast on the 15 ways to avoid being a crappy guy in 2015, number
8:08
15, remember, it was just like, don't pretend that you know about something that you don't
8:11
actually know about.
8:12
That wasn't the exact wording I'm trying to remember, but like that's essentially the
8:15
thing is most of us, we don't want to be ignorant.
8:17
We don't want to be left out, you know, FOMO, we have fear of missing out.
8:20
We don't want to be the person that doesn't understand a particular topic or know what
8:24
everyone else is talking about and you think that you, you build it up in your brain that
8:28
if you go into one of these conversations and you don't know all of the different things
8:32
that are a part of it that you can't possibly engage in the conversation.
8:35
So the first reason is they're afraid of their ignorance being exposed.
8:38
The second reason is that they're mortified at the thought of being wrong.
8:43
So this is different than ignorance.
8:44
They're absolutely mortified to the thought of being wrong.
8:47
And so what most people will do is they will literally stick their head in the sand.
8:52
They will just pretend like nothing is happening.
8:54
They will close their eyes, cover their ears and just pretend that nothing is happening
8:58
around them.
8:59
That is the easiest thing for them to do.
9:02
And so ultimately these people become frozen.
9:04
They become paralyzed with fear because if they're found out as ignorant going back to
9:09
the first one, but then also if it's found out that they're definitively wrong, it just
9:14
really cuts against everything they are as a human because their entire life they've
9:17
been right.
9:19
So think about this, I think about this for my generation millennials, but also Gen Z,
9:23
you've spent your entire life being correct.
9:26
So every time you were offended at something, someone said, Oh yeah, you're right.
9:29
You know what they shouldn't have done that.
9:31
Oh my gosh, I'm so sorry.
9:32
What can I do for you?
9:33
It's like, Oh gosh, there's probably some other ways of doing that that's going to help
9:36
build some resilience and build some confidence in these people and steal their resolve.
9:40
But you know, they don't really like to do that.
9:41
So the second reason is that they're mortified at the thought of being wrong.
9:45
The third reason is that they have no interest in knowing if they are wrong.
9:49
So this is attached to the previous one.
9:51
They have no interest in knowing if they are wrong.
9:54
So here's the thing.
9:55
I told you guys a lot.
9:57
I told you this a lot on the podcast.
9:59
The big thing is, is the thing that has saved me from a lot of these useless debates, whether
10:04
this is in person or on social media or any of these types of things, is that if I'm wrong,
10:10
I want to know it.
10:12
But I always like to ask people when the conversation gets to a point where it seems like it might
10:15
get a little bit heated, I ask someone, if you were wrong, would you want to know it?
10:21
If you were wrong, would you want to know it?
10:24
But the thing is, is these people don't have an interest in knowing if they're wrong or
10:29
not.
10:30
I'm desperately interested in knowing if I'm wrong or not on a subject.
10:34
That's why I like to research subjects.
10:36
That's why I like to challenge my philosophies by not just listening and reading a bunch
10:40
of things, listening to or reading a bunch of things that are just going along with what
10:44
I already believe the world to be like.
10:47
Because I look back every year, every five years or so, and I kind of do a little bit
10:51
of a census in my brain of the things that I used to think were true, the things that
10:54
I used to think were appropriate.
10:56
And, and again, guys, I say this all the time as well, you should always be able to look
10:59
back at who you were five years ago and be a little bit embarrassed.
11:03
You know, it doesn't mean you were a complete screw up five years ago, but you should be
11:06
getting better.
11:08
I mean, you should be getting smarter, you should be having more well thought out philosophies.
11:12
You should be sharpening your sword a little bit better in all these different areas, right?
11:18
And so if you have no interest in knowing if you're wrong or not, it becomes an issue.
11:22
And that's the thing for these people.
11:24
They don't want to engage in these discussions because they just don't have an interest in
11:26
it.
11:27
They just want to scream online.
11:29
They just want to put some statements out there and have their friends get on there and
11:32
like their comments and then everybody just moves on with their day.
11:36
So the third thing, they have no interest in knowing if they're wrong.
11:39
The fourth reason is that they don't have the foggiest idea how to comport themselves
11:44
in a debate.
11:45
They don't handle themselves.
11:46
They don't know how to behave.
11:48
These people are just emotionally fragile.
11:52
And so some of them go into a debate and they just get super nervous.
11:55
They get tongue tied and they basically contribute nothing to the conversation.
11:59
Then you have people that get into a debate and they have no idea how to control their
12:02
emotions.
12:03
I remember a few times suggesting you guys sharing or I've shared the Stephen Crowder
12:07
videos, they changed my mind segments and you see these people that once they realize
12:13
that he's not going to let them just continue moving the goal posts of their argument that
12:17
he wants to nail them down and get them to stick to one issue to where they can have
12:20
a cordial discussion about it.
12:22
Some of these people just flip out like they either cry, they run away or they start yelling
12:28
as if by, you know, by writ of volume that they would be able to make the point and win
12:35
the argument because they raise the level of their outrage and they raise their voice.
12:39
And I just got to tell you, I have no idea of a time in my life where I won a debate
12:45
and it was on the right side of the debate because I screamed loudest.
12:49
But that's the thing is these people don't know how to handle themselves.
12:52
And it's a really horrible quality to have because life is really tough.
12:57
Life is full of tough decisions and tough times in your life.
13:00
And if you don't know how to handle yourself, even with a friend of yours that just wants
13:05
to know where you land on a particular issue, good grief, you're going to have issues moving
13:10
forward.
13:11
How in the world are you going to encourage a child to not be emotionally fragile if you're
13:14
sitting there like, you know, you're made a glass.
13:18
It's an issue.
13:19
So the fourth is they don't have the foggiest idea to how to comport themselves in a debate.
13:23
And the last one is simply that they're cowards.
13:27
These people for the most part are keyboard, tough guys and gals, right?
13:31
They just, they can say all the things that they want and they can be mega confident and
13:36
mega intellectual as long as they're behind the keyboard.
13:39
They are petrified of confrontation.
13:42
The idea of sitting down in front of somebody, oh buddy, because then there, there's no,
13:47
they have to filter.
13:49
I mean, that's the thing that you see all the time.
13:51
If you look on Twitter, Twitter is especially bad for whatever reason, but look on a Twitter
13:56
account of like a famous person, even if they post something, you know, a picture of their
14:00
dog or a picture of their family going out to eat or just something really, really polite
14:04
and nice.
14:05
Just look at the comments like they are astounding.
14:09
Some of them are violent.
14:10
They're vile.
14:11
They're sexually gross.
14:13
I mean, the, the things that you see people say they would never have said these things
14:18
in person because that's the thing that we run into with the social media generation is
14:23
in 140 or 280 characters, you can just stream of consciousness, whatever's in your brain
14:28
and just put it out there into the world.
14:31
And my goodness, like most people's thoughts just need to stay in their brains.
14:36
And I just got to be honest, if there was a transcript of the thoughts that I had in
14:39
a 24 hour period, you guys would be mortified just a good, then you know, this would be the
14:44
same way with you as well.
14:45
Like we're all jacked up.
14:47
We all have ridiculous things that go on in our brain and we think of horrific things
14:51
in a day in, day out basis and it's just normal because it's in our brain.
14:55
And 30 years ago, even 20 years ago, 15 years ago, we didn't really have a forum to just
14:59
let those thoughts out.
15:01
And now we can.
15:03
And so what this leads to is if you are a naturally cowardly individual, you will get
15:08
a little puffed up at the opportunity to get at somebody, right?
15:13
I'm going to say what I got to say, I'm going to say my piece, you know, I'm even going
15:16
to confront this person.
15:17
I'm going to insult this person.
15:18
I'm going to call this person stupid, I'm going to call this person ignorant, whatever
15:21
the thing may be.
15:22
And there is a zero percent chance that you would have said that to their face, zero percent
15:27
chance.
15:28
And I feel like a lot of us have been have been there, guys, you get a little bit brave
15:33
when you're behind that keyboard, because you know that person is not waiting for you
15:37
outside your door, right?
15:40
Now you might see them that week at school.
15:42
You might see them that week at work.
15:44
You might see them at the next family reunion, whatever the thing may be.
15:47
But by that time, everyone's had a chance to cool off and maybe they'll forget what
15:50
I said and that kind of nonsense.
15:51
You're not expecting them to ring the doorbell, right?
15:54
So again, guys, to recap here, the top five reasons why people avoid these conversations.
15:58
Number one, they're afraid of their ignorance being exposed.
16:01
Number two, they're mortified at the thought of being wrong.
16:04
Number three, they have no interest in knowing if they are wrong.
16:07
Number four, they don't have the foggiest idea how to comport themselves in a debate.
16:11
And number five, they're cowards.
16:13
And so in turn, guys, obviously I'm always looking for opportunities to help give you
16:17
guys any wisdom that I'm able to espouse on any of these topics or to distill these
16:23
things down to where you can use them.
16:25
But while I was thinking through the list of reasons why people would not want to engage
16:28
in these discussions, I was thinking of reasons why we should be engaging in these discussions.
16:34
So here are the top reasons why Christian men should welcome debate.
16:40
And I know this is going to rub some of you the wrong way.
16:43
I know some of y'all really, really align with the previous five things that I just talked
16:47
about that you avoid confrontation.
16:50
You don't like taking things offline.
16:52
Maybe I'm talking about you.
16:54
So if that's you, I am describing this to you in a way to help you change.
16:59
For those of you that are this way, maybe I want to give you a few more things to think
17:02
about when you are leaning into these debates.
17:04
All right.
17:05
So number one, the early church fathers didn't shy away from public debate, okay?
17:12
So how did Christianity spread?
17:14
It's spread by people boldly proclaiming the gospel message.
17:18
And again, the people that spread the gospel initially were not people that just heard
17:22
about the gospel.
17:23
These are people that saw Jesus, saw the resurrected Jesus spent time with the resurrected Jesus.
17:30
Okay.
17:31
These are not people that just heard from a person who heard from a person who heard from a person,
17:34
right?
17:35
These are people that had direct contact with Jesus himself and or the men that he walked
17:40
around with for three years of his worldly ministry, right?
17:44
And guys read the book of Acts.
17:46
The book of Acts, I feel like doesn't get nearly as much play as it should.
17:50
The book of Acts is full of debate because these men are going into these environments
17:54
that are not very cordial to them.
17:57
These are hostile environments and they're spreading a message that was so anti everything
18:02
that was being espoused at that time because it was, it was either an atheistic worldview
18:08
or it was just basically a Jewish centric worldview that Jesus was not the Messiah.
18:14
Or it was the Roman worldview with with all these different gods that you had to worship
18:17
and sacrifice to and in all these different things.
18:20
It was such an insane time to claim that there was a singular God and the singular savior
18:26
was Jesus.
18:27
Absolutely insane time to do that.
18:29
And these early church fathers didn't give a crap.
18:32
They walked right into the lines, didn't over and over and over and had these conversations.
18:36
They didn't shy away from it.
18:38
And the thing was, is you can be bold without being a [inaudible].
18:42
Like you can absolutely do that, that you can go into these situations, have these conversations
18:46
with these individuals, change their minds, change the minds of the people that are paying
18:49
attention to you and listening to this back and forth.
18:52
And that's an incredible thing and it's incredibly powerful.
18:55
So number one, the early church fathers didn't shy away from public debate.
18:59
And this leads right into number two.
19:01
The reason why Christian men today should welcome debate is because current high profile
19:05
church leaders do shy away from public debate.
19:09
Now, I worded that very carefully because I know everyone that's listening to this probably
19:14
thought of a video on YouTube or a podcast where they heard a pastor or theologian or
19:19
somebody like that get into a debate with somebody.
19:21
Again, I've suggested a different podcast to you before and different videos to you before
19:26
where that is the case where you have people on the opposite sides of the issue.
19:30
And there's the unbelievable podcast with Justin Briarley that they constantly do that.
19:34
They usually have someone on the secular side of an issue and someone on the Christian side
19:37
of an issue.
19:38
And they do a fantastic job of showing great cordial debate, but I'm talking about our
19:42
church leaders, our pastors, our main lead pastors, they shy away from public debate.
19:48
And so I'm thinking of, you know, look at your Joel Osteen's, your Carl Lynch's, your
19:52
Steven Fertix, your Andy Stan Lee's, your Craig Rochelle's, like these, these mega church
19:58
type people and I'm lumping them into that category of mega church, they don't like to
20:03
have debates in public.
20:04
They don't like doing that.
20:06
And I think it is to the detriment of the people of God.
20:11
I honestly think that because these people are the leaders of the church, but they stay
20:18
behind their people that they're leading these people.
20:22
They're going to have to give an account for how they've adjusted themselves to lead the
20:25
flock, but they are not going out in the world and in defending Christ in a way that would
20:32
be, be exciting for us or be a time for us in their flock to learn from them.
20:39
So it's an issue for me because some of my favorite pastors and some of the pastors I
20:44
listed, I do, I do appreciate them and like some of the things that they do, but they
20:47
don't like to get into these public debates and it would be helpful.
20:50
It doesn't mean that they have to be rude.
20:52
It doesn't mean that they have to like cut people off or, or show people like the nasty
20:56
sides of their personalities or any of that, but it's just like, man, I would love to see
21:02
on the, on the news on, on some big news channel, maybe it's Fox news or CNN or MSNBC, I would
21:08
love to see one of these lead pastors be the person that is interviewed because they've
21:13
got a, an opinion on an issue and they need to share it with the world because their opinion
21:19
should directly reflect what the gospel says and directly reflect what the other parts of
21:23
the Bible says, but they don't like doing it.
21:27
Typically your pastors that like to go into these debates are not widely known.
21:31
You know, not everyone knows who Jeff Durbin is, right?
21:34
Like not, not everyone knows, uh, the, the guys from cross politic that don't mind going
21:38
into these different issues with people that are on the opposite side where it could get
21:43
a little bit nasty.
21:45
But even for me, like again, the guys that I really like, you know, Matt Chandler and
21:50
Tim Keller and all these guys that I really do like and appreciate their ministries, it's
21:54
just like, man, I would really like them see, like to see them be a little bit more bold.
21:58
I'd like them to stay outside of the church walls long enough to where they could get
22:02
into a public debate with somebody because people are going to see that.
22:06
People are going to come to Christ.
22:08
Like I love what RZIM does.
22:09
I love what Ravi Zacharias and his crew does because they're going into these hostile environments
22:14
all over the world and in America, they're going to technically hostile environments at,
22:18
at university campuses and they're challenging the way people think.
22:22
It's like, look, if, if this is what you're thinking you are wrong, it is not an opinion.
22:26
You were just flat out wrong, but then there are times where there is an opinion and they're
22:30
giving an apologetic, they're giving a reasoning behind why they think their opinion is best,
22:35
why it is more reasonable to believe in this thing as opposed to that thing.
22:40
But we're not getting that from our church leaders and I don't know why.
22:44
Like what would be the loss?
22:46
Potentially they embarrass themselves.
22:48
You know, maybe Matt Chandler gets on the other side of the stage from, you know, Stephen
22:52
Pinker or, you know, another one of the new wave atheists or something like that.
22:57
What's the worst that could happen?
22:58
A bunch of atheists in the crowd sneer at you and laugh.
23:01
They do that anyway.
23:02
Like what would the problem be?
23:04
And so this is my challenge to any lead pastors that listen to this or people that have direct
23:08
lines to lead pastors need to encourage them to do this.
23:12
There's nothing wrong with it.
23:13
Have public debate.
23:14
Make sure there's a lot of people around because you're probably going to be able to
23:16
share the gospel and get people closer.
23:18
All right, guys, the third thing here is that cordial debate is a great way to show someone
23:23
the love of Christ.
23:24
Okay.
23:25
So John 1334 35 is one of my favorite two versus one of my favorite groups of verses.
23:29
This is Jesus talking to his guys.
23:31
It's at the last supper.
23:32
He's talking to him and this is like his lean in moment.
23:35
Guys lean in.
23:36
If you don't hear anything else that I say tonight or if you haven't heard anything I've
23:38
said for the last three years, this is what I want you to take away, right?
23:42
A new command I give you.
23:43
Love one another is I've loved you so you must love one another by this.
23:47
They will know that you are my disciples if you love one another.
23:51
Here's the thing about love guys, placating someone and telling them that they're doing
23:58
it right or that everything they're doing is acceptable is not love.
24:03
That's the thing that people love to say.
24:04
I was just listening to a public forum today where someone said, why can we believe in the
24:09
God of Christianity when all that Christian seemed to do is hate people, right?
24:15
That they just don't love people even though they espouse to love people, right?
24:18
Well, it's because of your definition of hate because for you, your friend that is transgender,
24:24
you're trying to affirm that.
24:26
You're trying to affirm this, but what you're doing is you're affirming a mental illness.
24:30
This person needs help and here you are saying, no, man, you look great in a dress, right?
24:34
It's not something you should be doing.
24:36
You're not loving that person by doing that.
24:37
You're actually performing hate.
24:40
That's what you're doing in that situation.
24:42
But the way that we can show love in a public debate is by controlling ourselves, by remaining
24:48
calm, by being stern when we need to be stern, by interrupting when it's appropriate to
24:54
interrupt, by never attacking the person, but always attacking the stupid ideas.
25:00
One of the best, two of the best people that I've seen do this that I've mentioned a billion
25:04
times on this podcast are Jordan Peterson and Ben Shapiro.
25:07
So Ben Shapiro is normally in, you know, a staged environment where he is behind a podium
25:11
and people are asking him questions.
25:13
And then they have a little bit of an interaction with him on the stage and them in the audience.
25:16
So just the fact that he is on stage with the bigger microphone and they are in the audience
25:19
with someone who can snatch the microphone from them at any moment, Ben Shapiro is always
25:23
in a place of power.
25:25
So it's not exactly like a public forum debate, but he has been across the stage from people
25:30
where he has done physical, he has done actual debates.
25:32
And he is one of the most skilled debaters that we've seen in certainly modern conservatism.
25:38
But during Peterson, most of the time when he's in these debates, it's when he's sitting
25:42
down in front of somebody doing an interview, he's in several of these very, very contentious
25:47
interviews where the interviewers were just trying to get them.
25:50
They were trying to get them to say something or they took like one line out of one article
25:54
or one speech that he did and they blew it up to this large thing and they're making
25:57
him have to defend it as if it's some sort of like herculean issue.
26:01
But at the end of the day, these guys both remain calm.
26:05
Now they'll get stern at different points, they'll be a little bit more bold, but they're
26:09
still calm.
26:10
They're controlling themselves.
26:12
It's an incredible thing to watch.
26:14
And so if we're able to do that as men of God, we can show the love of Christ by showing
26:19
these people, look, you got the Amago day.
26:21
I appreciate that you were willing to sit down in front of me, but this is where we disagree
26:25
and this is where you're wrong.
26:26
I think that's a great way to do that.
26:28
All right, guys, the fourth reason why Christian men should welcome debate is it is an amazing
26:32
way to cultivate mental resilience.
26:34
An amazing way.
26:35
Because here's the deal, if you go into a debate with somebody, you should be prepared.
26:40
Don't show up to a gunfight with an unloaded gun.
26:43
Don't show up to a gunfight with a knife, then you know, it's kind of one of those things.
26:46
You got to be prepared.
26:47
And when you're going down and sitting with somebody, that doesn't mean you need to show
26:49
up with your binder with all of your points and you've got your bullet points ready to
26:53
go and you've got your script memorizing all those different things.
26:55
No, you don't need to do that nonsense, but come prepared, man.
26:59
Come ready to go because if they start bringing nonsense and you can't tell them why they're
27:04
wrong, you might as well just talk about sports.
27:07
You might as well just, you know, share recommendations of, you know, movies or something like that.
27:11
Don't talk about anything real because you are not prepared, brother.
27:15
It's kind of like showing up to the Boston Marathon when you have it ran since high school,
27:19
not going to be a good day for you.
27:21
The odds are you finishing or infinitesimally small and also you're a moron.
27:25
You wasted a bunch of money to show up and basically make it through the first mile.
27:29
Maybe it's an issue.
27:31
You should never show up unprepared.
27:32
So in the process of preparation, you're cultivating mental resilience because you're looking at
27:38
subjects that maybe you're not that familiar with.
27:41
You're looking at arguments that you agree with, but also hopefully you're looking at
27:44
arguments that you don't agree with.
27:46
You're trying to figure out how you can sharpen both sides of the sword, both sides of the
27:50
blade.
27:51
And so that's a very important thing for you to do.
27:53
And you're going to cultivate mental resilience just almost via osmosis.
27:56
It's just going to kind of happen by virtue of the process that you're going through.
28:01
But then when you follow through, when you actually sit down in front of somebody, you're
28:05
probably going to have butterflies in your stomach, understand that they probably do
28:08
too.
28:09
I mean, the entire conversation doesn't have to be this incredibly tense moment.
28:13
You'd start off just by getting caught up and doing whatever.
28:16
And then you kind of ease your way into the discussion and let it go where it goes.
28:19
And it's an amazing thing to practice when you're trying to keep somebody centered on
28:23
an issue because that's the thing that you run into because again, I tend to be on the
28:27
political right, I am conservative, and one of the best things that people like to do
28:31
in a debate, especially if you align with the political left is let's just move the goal
28:34
post.
28:35
I talked about that earlier.
28:36
So here's the thing with abortion.
28:38
So you start with, okay, when is it a life?
28:41
And when they start losing that argument, when you start showing them that scientists
28:44
completely disagree with whatever they're asserting, then they move to something like,
28:47
Oh, so if someone's raped, they should just have the baby because it's alive.
28:51
They were raped.
28:52
Okay.
28:53
And then you start talking about that about how women that are raped or victims of incest,
28:56
but that's about 1% of all listed reasons for abortions.
28:59
What about the other 99% Oh, well, so if a mom is definitely going to die, she she gives
29:03
birth, she has to go all the way, go through it.
29:05
And then you start addressing that and then it's like, Oh, okay.
29:08
So you're a man and you're going to tell a woman how to how to deal with her body.
29:11
You kind of see what I'm saying.
29:12
They constantly move around.
29:14
That is a great thing for you.
29:17
When someone starts doing that in a debate, it's because they're losing.
29:20
They're getting desperate.
29:21
They're just chucking up Hail Mary's hoping that you don't know something about a particular
29:25
subject.
29:26
You're going to be able to cultivate that mental resilience by keeping them centered.
29:29
So if you have a central thing that you want to talk about, talk about that one thing.
29:34
Okay.
29:35
But then at the same time, if you get to a point where they're just hopping around everywhere,
29:38
you can call them out on it and just be like, Hey, it seems like you're hopping around to
29:42
a bunch of different subjects.
29:43
Why is that?
29:44
Leave it open ended.
29:45
They'll just keep throwing up Hail Mary's.
29:47
They'll keep burying themselves.
29:48
It is what it is though.
29:50
But again, it's an amazing, amazing way to cultivate mental resilience and we shouldn't
29:54
try to avoid situations like that.
29:56
Our guys in the last reason for why men, why Christian men should welcome debate, it's
30:01
because if someone is wrong, they need to know it.
30:04
If someone is wrong, they need to know it.
30:07
And guys, this includes you.
30:11
I know I'm sitting here and it might seem like every time I go into a debate that I know
30:14
I'm right.
30:15
I'm just going to go in and defend the fact that I'm right.
30:18
But there are times when I've left debates and I was like, Oh buddy, I was wrong about
30:20
that.
30:21
Damn.
30:22
They just dropped some knowledge on me.
30:23
It's a problem.
30:24
I shouldn't have had that blind spot.
30:26
I'm so appreciative that they pointed that out to me.
30:29
I wish they hadn't because I wish I had just known and didn't have to have another human
30:33
being say that to me.
30:35
But the thing is, is if you're on the right side of an issue, you need to correct people.
30:40
Because here's the thing.
30:41
If you're having a debate, you're probably not having a debate about something stupid.
30:44
You know, which team should have been in the college football playoff?
30:46
Okay.
30:47
Which guy should have won the Heisman?
30:48
Like who do we think is going to get divorced in Hollywood this year?
30:50
What are the stupid thing that it is that you like to talk about with your friends when
30:54
you're getting into a debate?
30:55
It's about something serious.
30:56
Think of whatever serious thing that's going on in government or in society or any of those
31:00
types of things that would cause you to have any of that angst when you're talking with
31:04
somebody.
31:05
These are real issues.
31:06
And here's the thing, not everybody can be right.
31:10
Not everybody can be right.
31:11
I had a guy last night that I was just trying to get him to admit that there was one best
31:16
way to do this particular thing.
31:18
He's like, oh, well, you could do it this way.
31:20
And I said, no, no, no.
31:21
I'm being specific here.
31:22
I'm talking about the best way to do this.
31:24
There can't be multiple best ways because definitely that doesn't work that this is the
31:29
best way to do this thing.
31:30
And he just couldn't quite get that, but, but that's the thing is if somebody's wrong,
31:35
you need to tell them.
31:36
I mean, just think about it.
31:37
I can't really think even off top of my head of a silly example, but just think if you
31:41
kept doing something wrong your entire life or maybe shoelaces, maybe like tire shoes and
31:46
every single day your shoelaces come untied because you've been tying them wrong.
31:50
Like why wouldn't you want someone to show you a way so you can tie your shoes to where
31:53
they say tie it all day?
31:55
Like there's so many examples like that out there that don't make huge societal shifts
32:00
and changes, but some of the discussions that you might have with people can have that effect.
32:06
And you should lean forward into those opportunities as many times as you get them.
32:10
So guys, just to recap everything that we talked about, the top five reasons why people
32:14
avoid these conversations, these debate conversations are these number one, they're afraid of their
32:19
ignorance being exposed.
32:20
Number two, they're mortified at the thought of being wrong.
32:23
Number three, they have no interest in knowing if they are wrong.
32:25
Fourth, they don't have the foggiest idea how to comport themselves in a debate.
32:30
And fifth, they're cowards.
32:32
And guys, again, the top five reasons why Christian men should welcome debate.
32:36
Number one, the early church fathers didn't shy away from public debate.
32:39
Number two, current high profile church leaders do shy away from public debate.
32:44
Third, cordial debate is a great way to show someone the love of Christ.
32:48
Fourth, it is an amazing way to cultivate mental resilience.
32:51
And fifth, if someone is wrong, they need to know it.
32:55
So guys, we hope that is helpful for you and we hope you're able to utilize some of this
32:59
and enact it in some of the ways that you do life and how you walk through life with
33:03
your friends.
33:04
All right.
33:05
Before we let you guys out of here, we're going to do a quick resilience boost.
33:06
As you know, by now, we are a men's ministry and our mission is to cultivate manly resilience.
33:11
And specifically, we do that by providing content that for just spiritual, mental and
33:15
physical toughness.
33:16
So today we're actually going to shift gears a little bit.
33:18
We're going to talk about physical resilience.
33:20
So I don't know if all of you know this and if you're not currently following us on Instagram,
33:23
you can find us at undaunted life on Instagram at undaunted life.
33:28
Every Tuesday I post a workout of the week, okay, sometimes I'm showing you different
33:32
moves.
33:33
Sometimes I'm just describing different moves.
33:35
I've got a list of things that you should do there and in the description, I kind of
33:37
show you.
33:38
So I've got a link here for the workout of the week that we posted this last week for
33:42
Tuesday, January the 8th.
33:44
So this is a ladder high intensity interval workout.
33:49
I forgot about what it was.
33:50
It's a high intensity interval training.
33:53
So hit training.
33:54
So this is an insane workout and it is going to absolutely kick your butt.
33:59
But I know I've got a lot of guys that have reached out to me say, hey, you know, I've
34:02
got some things going on right now with, with cash flow and so I'm having to work out at
34:05
home.
34:06
So I really appreciate these.
34:07
So I just want to make you guys aware that every Tuesday I've tried to change things
34:10
up, do a little bit of cardio, do a little bit of stretching type stuff, do a little bit
34:14
of power stuff, but this ladder hit, basically you're going to be doing these four moves
34:19
for 60 seconds each.
34:21
And then you get a 30 second rest and then you do those four moves for 50 seconds each,
34:26
30 second rest, 40 seconds each, 30 second rest, 30 seconds each, all the way down to
34:30
10 seconds each.
34:32
And so those four moves, you're going to do burpees, jump knee tucks, mountain climbers
34:37
and jumping jacks.
34:38
So 60 seconds of burpees.
34:40
When that's up, 60 seconds of jumping tucks, 60 seconds of mountain climbers, 60 seconds
34:44
of jumping jacks and then a 30 second rest.
34:46
And then 50 seconds of burpees, 50 seconds of jumping tucks, 50 seconds of mountain climbers.
34:51
You guys get the point.
34:52
It is absolutely brutal.
34:54
If you add all the time up, it's a fairly lengthy workout, but it's one of those where
34:58
you're just going to be tempted at different points to just take a rest to just sit there
35:01
and just like, okay, catch your breath, you know, put your hands on your knees, put your
35:04
hands on your head and just try to try to get some oxygen.
35:07
But the great thing about this hit workout is you get that 30 second rest and that 30
35:11
second rest, it's the fastest 30 seconds of your life, I can guarantee you that.
35:15
But then when you get into that next round, it's a little bit shorter each time, not that
35:18
it's going to get easier, but there's really not a whole lot of excuses for you to be taking
35:22
rest and taking breaks.
35:24
So guys, if you're wanting to get out there and cultivate physical resilience, our workouts
35:27
of the week are a great way to do that.
35:29
Guys, thank you for listening into the podcast.
35:31
Please subscribe on iTunes, SoundCloud or Google Play and refer your friends to listen
35:34
and make sure you share this on social media.
35:37
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35:41
Guys, if we deserve a five star review, that is what you need to do for us.
35:44
Everyone asks how they can help this ministry out.
35:46
Give us a five star review, leave us a few sentences that's going to keep helping this
35:49
podcast grow.
35:50
I'm currently booking speaking engagements for the entirety of 2019.
35:54
So if you want to interview me on your podcast, if you want me to come speak to your team,
35:57
to your church retreat, whatever the thing is, just hit me up via email info@undaunted.life,
36:02
info@undaunted.life.
36:04
Our website is www.undaunted.life.
36:07
You can follow us on Instagram and Twitter @undauntedlife or facebook.com/undauntedlife.
36:13
Check out our free devotionals on the U-Virgin Bible app.
36:15
Just search "undaunted life" under plans.
36:16
And as always, we want to thank the band, August Burns Red for allowing us to use their
36:20
music library for our content.
36:22
The intro out to a track on this podcast is our song "King of Sorrow", which is off
36:25
their latest record entitled "Phantom Anthem".
36:27
Links to all of this are in the description.
36:29
I'm your host, Kyle Thompson.
36:31
Remember, keep cultivating manly resilience, keep forging spiritual, mental, and physical
36:37
toughness, keep seeking the Lion of Judi.
36:52
[Music]