July 20, 2021

EP262: Our Self-Obsession is Making Us Miserable / The Deeper Meaning of the Cuban Protests / Leading Our Friends Away from Conspiracy Theories / A Ton More

50 minutes

On This Episode:

OUR OBSESSION WITH "THE SELF" IS MAKING US MISERABLE (0:00-14:26)

The Western world has largely conquered the problems that plagued most of history -- hunger, security, comfort, etcetera. In the absence of those struggles, we've become obsessed with the "self" and the emotional affirmation thereof. The results of that, though, have been soaring rates of all sorts of emotional disorders. All of that is true. What do we do now?

CLINGING TO CONSPIRACIES (14:30ish - 26ish)

We all know decent people who have been convinced of various conspiracies. An email from a listener prompted me to interact with the reality that some folks still cling to a conspiracy about the most recent election. I will try to establish that all of these can be true at the same time: the mass media is a biased, corrupt institution; there are politically driven, bad people throughout the institutions of power; governments used Covid to improperly change voting procedure; AND the outcome was fair and accurate.

DON'T IGNORE WHAT'S HAPPENING IN CUBA (26ish-37ish)

Communism, its precursor socialism, and all other centralized systems are immoral systems that oppress and hurt human flourishing. Watching what's happening in Cuba got me thinking about a lot -- what it means to be free, and how Cuban-regime sympathizers in the US would take us down a dangerous path.

A WHOLE BUNCH (37ish-End)

-Why is my show experiencing a surge of growth?

-We got good news for religious liberty in court cases in both the US and in the UK

-The consequences of our Covid freakout last year continue to come into focus slowly.

-Ben Carson speaks a truth that gets him in trouble

...more