The Manosphere Problem We Can't Ignore | Ep 40

Marc (00:05) Welcome to Guys Like Us. If you're new to this podcast, this is the podcast about all the things that you start thinking about when you're in your prime, you know, midlife. You will hear about family, leadership, relationships, friendships, fun nights out, in short, the things that shape us and continue to move us. And in today's episode, we are going to talk about The Manosphere, especially in light of that hot Netflix documentary. I am Mark Winter, an entrepreneur, a self-conceived artist, a husband and father of two based in New York, and I'm joined by... Paul (00:30) Yeah, much better. Hi, Mark. You are joined by Paul again for the 40th time, because this is our 40th episode. It is. And we are exactly, our podcast is officially in midlife. That's a good one. That's a good way of starting now. Yeah. So who am I? I am Paul calling him from Vienna. Also a father, not a husband, divorced father of three, an entrepreneur, former executive, a lover of the rabbit holes. Marc (00:44) No way. Are we officially in midlife? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Paul (01:07) As you can tell, because I'm pumping out new apps week by week. Mark doesn't even have the time to catch up anymore with all the stupid shit I built. ⁓ But that's what it is. And I'm really looking forward to today, I don't want to jump the gun here. ⁓ looking forward to this. Marc (01:16) I'm so jealous. Well, we might get into it, but before we do, who are you sponsored by today? Are you sponsored by anyone interesting? Paul (01:27) No, dude, I mean, it's like 4 p.m. in the afternoon. This is the worst time to do a podcast because I mean, I can't drink and you can't drink. I mean, it's the only two hours in the day really where this is probably true. so by water and lemon, lemon water, because it's a beautiful, quite hot spring day. So I feel the, you know, I feel the lemony taste. Marc (01:32) It is. So you're sponsored by water H2O me too you Can I ask you something before we get into, well this is a slightly menospheric topic, so do you, so I drink lemon water every single morning. do you as well or no? Hmm, it's supposed to be good for the kidneys and liver. Yeah. Yeah. Paul (01:56) I know you do. Yes. No. It's very good actually. think especially if you drink it lukewarm. But of all the many things I try to do every morning, I just can't have list of 10 things to do. I'm trying to take my supplements, I'm trying to write my journal, of course, and I'm trying to do my stretch exercises, which I have restarted again last week. So here we go. So the lemon water is just not making it on that top five list. Marc (02:17) I was just about to say, are you a supplements guy? Yeah, okay, exactly. ⁓ Got it, got it. It's amazing. Of all the things that you do, the easiest thing is lemon water and you're not even doing that. ⁓ Which shows like, well no, no, it's just thinking like where it falls on your Paul (02:33) For me. You Well, thank you. Thanks for making me feel bad. It was great. Great. Let's move on. Marc (02:48) been kind of. Paul (02:48) are you doing, buddy? I mean, just quickly. 30 second check in. Marc (02:51) Gosh, you know, no, no, no, all good. It's been, the last few weeks have been an interesting one from the entrepreneurial point of view. And I'm realizing like all good things, but it's, I'm suddenly realizing the limits of lean, you know? And I was like, gosh, if I could just double myself, I could do more. And, you know, the nice thing is that, you know, lots of exciting. Paul (03:08) Mmm. Mmm. Mmm. Marc (03:15) movement and conversations and cool clients and all that stuff is fun. And I think very tellingly, when people ask me how I'm doing, I start with leading about work versus family and other stuff, which tells you kind of where it is on the front of mind bit. Paul (03:29) Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So I'm guessing you're not having a vodka soda at what is it 10 in the morning? No. Marc (03:40) No, no, but I'm killing myself because I was out for a few nights in a row, socializing and trying to be like, you know, a real human. And then my kids reminded me that that's not possible. So I was, I was really. Paul (03:53) Okay, so maybe that's a preview of the idiotic thing of the week. Let's see. Marc (04:01) You stealing it. Yes, exactly. Well, you know. Paul (04:03) No, you just did. We'll see. We'll see. Okay. So you're tired and overworked. That's that's actually Marc (04:09) Tired, overworked? shit, no, man. When you synthesize it like that, that's terrible. I like to be more joyful and overworked. I'm joyful and overworked and a little tired. What about you? So, hold on, no, no, no. You resisted on sending me some photos, by the way, I heard, from your weekend. Can you just explain why? Paul (04:13) Exactly. I love that. I love that. So cool. Let's get back into the topic. How did I resist? Marc (04:33) Because I think you're like, I'm having too much fucking fun. I cannot show this to my friends. Is that possible? Paul (04:38) No, actually I didn't send any pictures to anybody. ⁓ man, I need to send you pictures. Yeah, true. It wasn't, it wasn't, I really did forget to, ⁓ because I sent some pictures around. But it wasn't, you know, the fun man's weekend type. ⁓ It was the great reflective, deep ⁓ grounding type of weekend, which is very hard to capture in pictures. Marc (04:42) I forgot to. Paul (05:06) So that's why it was hard to send around, but we can talk about that too later. Marc (05:06) Okay. All right, all right. Okay, cool, I'm excited. Okay, well, this documentary. Paul, what are your immediate thoughts? I mean, this was like, and for those who don't know, think it's made its way already around the news cycles, but this was a deep, well-known documentary. Louis Thoreau went around ⁓ and explored the deep curiosities of what is today's Manosphere? ⁓ everyone from the Andrew Tates of the world, the BTS, like to really understand like what is happening in the rise of misogyny and who are those that are on the TikToks, on the social media ⁓ with the, you know, let's call it redefining what masculinity is for many, many young men around the world. So that's the top line of it. It's fascinating, it's an hour and a half and... Your thoughts, please. Top line, before we get into it. Paul (06:09) Very quickly, I found it hard to watch. There was a point, I don't know, 40, 45 minutes in where I had to, it was the first evening, I had to stop and go to bed because I thought, Jesus, this is so sick. I had obviously heard about, you know, the term and Andrew Tate, but I never really looked into it. I never actually saw any content on my stream, which is very good. I'm very proud of that. Marc (06:14) Hmm. Right. Yeah, exactly. Paul (06:38) And, and, and, I mean, obviously I, I knew about it as, toxic, you know, masculinity and what it stands for. And, and it was kind of also, you know, a little bit of a, impetus for us doing this podcast to actually, you know, build a different type, right. ⁓ to that and, to kind of show a middle way, between the toss toxic masculine part. And I'm sure there's another, ⁓ type of extreme on the other end of the spectrum. Marc (06:54) dissimilar reaction Paul (07:08) And as with all the spectrums, usually there is the most constructive thing is somewhere in the middle. Although I want to be very, very far away from that manuscript stuff. And I learned a lot of new things like what is the red pill because of the, you take the red pill because you want to exit the matrix. And, it is just so mind numbingly stupid and fucking crazy that it hurts. And that's kind of my top line. Marc (07:23) Yeah. Paul (07:38) And there's much more, I don't want to riff on a monologue here. Marc (07:38) Hmm. So I also found, by the way, I misspoke, it wasn't BTS, that's the Korean boy band, was H.S., H.S., Tiki Taki, yeah, yeah, exactly. And Sneak-O, and I forgot these other idiots. You know, I found it, ⁓ at first I was like, this is gonna be really painful to watch. And then I found it, ⁓ it went deeper in a way. First of all, thought ⁓ the documentarian did a pretty good job of Paul (08:14) Yeah. Marc (08:14) of kind of getting in there, pushing a little bit, different points of view, wasn't just kind of an objective capture. But to me, it revealed a couple things that are really critical and important. First of all, course, the stupidity is hard, the misogyny is hard, the whole system of it is hard. But to me, I feel like it revealed a couple things. One is the loneliness epidemic is massive. Two is the shared failure of these men. of having real father figures, which we'll get into later. Like all of them have been traumatized in some type of way, and there's a collective trauma, and totally, totally. And by the way, many of their fans, right, who they were also interviewed in there, right? You know, their brothers had committed suicide in one case, or they grew up alone, someone was homeless. Like there's a struggle that's happening. So, you know, have the trauma, you have the response to that trauma, right, which is... Paul (09:05) Absolutely. Marc (09:13) feeling, ⁓ know, puffing yourself up and feeling kind of like destructive and, you know, trying to jump the system, which is actually totally in one way understandable, you know? And then the hustle. All these guys are basically trying to rip off their fans, By like, your money on this, take your money on this, et cetera, you know, da da da da da. So it's just, it's totally disgusting. And maybe the other headline, Paul (09:24) Hmm. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, absolutely. Marc (09:42) and I'm really going deep, I wanna unpack each of these with you, is ⁓ we live in an era where they have the tools now with social media, right? To express that rage, to profit from that, right? In different ways. The snake oil salesmen, as we say in the US, they've been around since the preachers come in there that promised a way of living, ⁓ drink this tonic and you'll get muscles, et cetera. But the amplification for the social media tools right now, it just makes it so much more dangerous. those were my takeaways. And yeah, I went from being disgusted, we're watching idiots here, this is going to be the worst thing ever, to actually know this is really unpacking systematically a problem. Paul (10:21) Yeah. And it absolutely does. was maybe just to end the hot take and, and see what we would discuss. I was kind of missing a little bit the, the actual scope of the problem. If you want, want know what I mean. I found it extremely interesting, kind of business they're doing. would have loved to understand how much you're actually ripping people off. And as we researched this afterwards, Marc (10:55) Totally. Paul (10:59) I mean, Andrew Tate's allegedly making 120 million in turnover every year through his university that costs, I don't know, a couple hundred bucks a month as a membership. So that's kind of pointing in the direction of how much money is made in debt off of ⁓ people. That's one thing. And the other thing is how many young men are actually Marc (11:09) Yeah, yeah, exactly. Paul (11:25) exposed to this content and not only exposed to it, but actually actively consuming it. And now many things converge here, mean, kind of the fertility of the breeding ground of stuff like this. And you have just mentioned, you know, the loneliness epidemic. we have talked about it in, I think it was episode 21 when we riffed off of Scott Galloway's book, right? And that is a foundation for all of this. Marc (11:46) Totally. Paul (11:54) And then those guys, those snake, what snake oil salesmen come along and, they hit that algorithm. And I found that really extreme when you saw this, that this algorithm is just, ⁓ it is promoting extreme content as simple as that. Marc (11:57) Salesman. Yeah. Yeah. It's a magnet. Once you're in it, it just sucks you in into that cycle of hype, etc. Paul (12:17) That's one thing right from the listener's perspective, it sucks you into that. also what it does, it motivates the content creators to create more and more extreme content, to take more and more extreme views. And you saw this very, I think, shown in a very good way in the documentary, right? Like how these guys kind of, ⁓ I don't know, how they in front of a camera in a live feed beat a guy up. Or how this other dude was talking in the most misogynistic, awful way. We can't even repeat this here about women. And then when asked about this kind of says, yeah, but you know, you have to provoke and take an extreme position. And this HS guy always kind of using Theroux and his work on the documentary to basically, you know, do something extreme and provoke him and live stream the shit. Marc (12:47) Yeah. He was a predator. ⁓ Yeah, of course. Paul (13:14) So this whole algorithm is obviously, we all have known this, right? It's feeding off of polarity and of people hating and loving it at the same time and commenting on it and going viral. And that just makes this shit more more extreme. And I find that insane. Marc (13:22) Yep. Yep. Yeah, well look, I mean we could, this won't surprise our listeners that of course were disgusted by the content, we don't agree with it, I mean that's obvious for all of us, just as a baseline. And of course we know the problem of social. But let me ask you this, could you understand the fans of the minute? Actually that's where I wanted to start there, they're popular for a reason, they have a fan base. Can you understand why someone would be a fan? HSTickitaki. Paul (13:57) It's really hard to say yes, to be honest, because I mean, I understand the hardship that people are coming from. we talked about the loneliness epidemic and we talked about the fact that lots of those listeners have missing father figures and are growing up in a world that is missing, you know, male examples of how to be a man. Apart from an economic hardship that usually is harder for them to find jobs, etc. etc. And then all of a sudden someone comes along and puts the blame on someone else. And that is feminism or women ⁓ or everyone that is around and weak and woke. And all you have to do is take your life into your hands, go to the gym, be strong, start a business ⁓ and find a woman who cleans your room and fucks you. Marc (14:52) Yeah, so. Paul (14:52) And I don't know if that is a, you know, if you're in a shitty, I don't know. I can't relate to it because I'm not in this situation, luckily, but I find it very hard to understand how that for so many people is the only way out to feel better about their lives. I'm sorry. Marc (15:07) So I had a different reaction, funny. It's like I, as soon as they, I I agree with your empathetic, like why you would be called to this, but I think the dream that they're selling is like, funny, it's like James Bond on steroids. And what I mean by that is you can be, or yeah, maybe it's the right example, like, you know. James Bond back in the day, know, it's like a classy Brit spy, right? Who gets all the girls, who's strong, kicks everyone's ass, right? Or pick your version of an action hero, right? know, ⁓ doesn't have to do much, you know, before he, you know, he sleeps with four women in a movie, you know, and is cold and still goes on to the next thing and is the hero. And these guys, what they do is project a real life modern version of that idea. Paul (15:44) Mm-hmm. Yeah. Marc (16:05) know, of ⁓ hyper-masculinity, a bit of callousness, being entrepreneur, like, and I can see why ⁓ men who, like, it's easy the way they're projecting that, you know, like, it's just like, get your muscles going, like, you already have the tools within you, ⁓ the hard work of school is a scam. Like you can like skip all of that to go this way. What women are telling, you know what mean? Paul (16:34) Hmm. No, I hear where you're going with this. Yeah. I know what you mean. And I have to strongly object because I think this is a super dangerous trivialization of what they're actually doing. Because James Bond, as much as the way he treats women is not up to the standards of 2026. He's not even close to being as misogynist as that if you wanted to portray Marc (16:43) Okay. Mm. Yeah, no, no, that's why I said on steroids, but okay. Paul (17:03) Yeah, no, no, no, no, sorry. No, not on steroids on steroids or in one dimension. It's if you wanted to portray a cool agent that goes to the gym and makes money and sleeps with a lot of women do that. But that is not the menosphere. The menosphere has an extra thick layer of hard core hatred towards women. Hardcore. And I think that should not be missed. And I think if you talk about the menosphere in the light of Marc (17:05) No, no, no, finish it. Paul (17:32) success in going to the gym, you are making it way more harmless than it actually is. And I think that's a ⁓ huge no-no to me. Because if you listen what these people say, know, listen to what they... Marc (17:43) I acknowledge that. No, no, I acknowledge that 100%. It's more about like what I don't know. I don't know maybe how much of their, this isn't defending it. I don't know how much of their fans, because like why would someone be a fan of this was the thing I was trying to answer. I don't know how much of those fans hear that. But no matter how dangerous it is, which I think we're all unifying on, back to the hatred point, this, cut. Paul (18:08) Come, sorry, sorry, just to jump in here. Okay, I hear you. However, every one of those men who's watching this has a mother and I'm sure 30 % or daughters or sisters, right? And exactly like those guys when asked if they would ever talk about or do to women, how they talk, know, do to women, do to their, sorry. Marc (18:19) And daughters or sisters. Yeah Paul (18:36) to their mother or sister or daughter what they or how they describe what they would like to do to women on their their shows, they would say absolutely no. Right. I they're only fans pimps and on the one hand and next to their girlfriends who they pimp out and only fans say I would never do this to my daughter. This is the dirtiest things you can do. I mean, it is mind numbingly hardcore. Sick. And to not see this. I don't know. Marc (18:49) So true. Yeah. No, no, no, that's... I mean, I don't know. Well, I think, I'm not sure. I'm not sure, or maybe this is Mark being completely naive. I, or too optimistic. I feel like those young men, and it's funny when you see those fans, like they're fans when they were interviewing them, They felt more like, they didn't feel like they had hate in their heart. Paul (19:06) I really don't know man. Marc (19:30) they just felt like they wanted to be lifted up by people who had money and were banged. Which is probably all the more dangerous, by the way, because of what they're saying. And that's the word I was trying to bifurcate. Paul (19:40) Yeah, I mean, the thing that comes to my mind, I don't want to go down this route is a little bit of, you know, Germany 90 years ago, right? Not everybody who knew what was going on and so on and so on. But so and we don't know we weren't there. I agree with you. I'm not saying that everybody who watches the content is a hardcore misogynist and understands and gets this. I think most of them are very unreflected of this and a lot of the content. Marc (19:52) It's true. Paul (20:10) maybe about being successful and being in charge actually of your life. I think that's where it is. It's resonating with them and then you blindly follow that. And people follow other shit in an unreflected way as well. This one is just super, I think, dangerous because it's, it is what it is. Marc (20:19) Yep. Yep. Yeah. Do you think, so one of the big more interesting things about this, I mean, there's so many, I mean, the charlatanism of these influencers, right? ⁓ And it's crazy. And so I forgot the guy in Miami, I forgot his name, ⁓ but he's confronted like, you know, this is where I really like this documentarium because he goes to the, you know, one of the big ideas is this, it's, what is it called? One-sided monogamy. Paul (20:46) Yeah. Yeah. I was almost pissing myself. Yeah. Marc (20:58) The idea is that I was laughing my ass off. He's like, so I should get to sleep as many as I want and women inherently, they're totally okay with it, et cetera. And then when they ask the woman if she's okay with it, their face is just amazing. It's priceless. Paul (21:16) No, is priceless. Absolutely priceless. And what struck me too, is jumping a little bit, is that those, at least the influences that they showed in the show, none of them seemed stupid in an intelligence IQ type of way. None of them seemed like they are, you know, just don't getting it. These guys were unfortunately sharp. Marc (21:46) Yes. Paul (21:46) And I mean really sharp. would almost bet a lot of money that on a general IQ test they would score really high. They know exactly what they're doing. They know exactly what they're playing with. They do believe most of the shit they're saying. ⁓ But that's what struck me the most. That's actually, if you ask me, the one thing that struck me, that surprised me the most was this. I thought, fuck me, those guys. They know what they're doing. Marc (21:57) I agree. Yeah, yeah. Paul (22:16) And that is exploiting. Marc (22:18) 100%. And the other thing I would add is their intelligence makes them really dangerous, but I wanna go back to some of these, there are some gotcha moments in this, right? And they know where their muscle, their facial muscles betray a lot more than what they're saying, right? at a side job, I've been... Paul (22:35) Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yes. Marc (22:41) listening to a podcast about mentalists and why mentalists are so successful. And they talk about the science of the facial muscle, right? So when they put an idea out there and how your face triggers an answer. And these guys, they knew they were caught in all kinds of hypocrisy, right? In terms of what they're saying and what they really felt, you know? And that to me, it's just, you know, projecting that, that... Paul (22:45) Yeah. Yeah. Of Marc (23:07) out there and wearing that character and the flywheel of needing to be as outrageous as you can in order to ⁓ drive up viewership. It's incredible. ⁓ So the other thing I had a reaction to are the females in this. I would love to talk about that. So, you know, in the opening, ⁓ Paul (23:28) Yes. Marc (23:34) the documentarian goes in and he goes to Marbella to BTS Tiki Taki's house and there's a influencer in a bikini and he introduces her as his dishwasher. And she smiles and laughs and she's, well, not really the dishwasher. There's another one over here, right? And he's polite and I think she has her own, got famous on TikTok. I don't know if it was for plaster. It was something crazy like this. And now she's just, hangs around him for content. so, what was your reaction to that? Because the females are all over the place in this. They're also complicit, obviously, in amplifying that, because there's no Manosphere without women. Paul (24:12) I mean, yeah, to me, what kind of stuck out was, I mean, there is this kind of type, right? Those also influences that stuck around. Then there was this Miami guy's ⁓ wife ⁓ who really tried to rationalize all of this. And then at the end, there was HS's mother. And I found that was almost the most interesting one because what? I mean, she was, that was crazy. think that was really crazy. And then they also showed this footage of the live stream where she actually told him to clean up. It was so absurd, all of this. ⁓ but, but what you just said though is I think I want to reiterate that point a little bit is if you portray, if you, in your words, you know, the James Bond and he introduces a woman on his side as his dishwasher and, ⁓ and, and I don't know. Marc (24:49) Yeah. Paul (25:09) 23 % I think of boys in Britain have a positive view of Andrew Tate and these types of people. So 23 % of boys learn that it's okay to introduce a woman as a dishwasher. And that's the problem. And then, you know, whether they know it or not, and this is, this is what insane. Sorry, so much. So I find this, I don't know, I don't know if it's complicit. Marc (25:15) Totally. Well, yeah. Well. Well, I think they are. ⁓ The Manosphere, in my view, does not exist without women to show that the dream is there and possible, or even to reiterate. ⁓ Paul (25:45) Well, that's true. That is not untrue. Yeah, if they didn't have any of those... Yeah, that's absolutely true. Marc (25:51) To me, there's this great line in this movie, almost famous, one of my favorites, one character quips to another, all great art is about getting the girl. And I think all this in the end is, it's a little bit about that. And all this falls apart if women aren't there. That's my point of view. And there's that crazy, Paul (26:00) Mm. Yeah. Yeah. Marc (26:14) There's that crazy moment in that Miami talk show where they have a bunch of female, like basically only fans, girls and models, you know, sitting around the table. And the first thing they do is open up with them like, hey, ladies, name three countries, you know? And the one's like Portugal, then goes Barcelona, right? And you're just like, I mean, they're just there to, I mean, humiliate them, of course. They know exactly what they are. Paul (26:25) Ay, ay, ay, Meh. Marc (26:42) the guys who are booking them or the one who booking them know exactly what they are. Paul (26:42) Yeah. No, and then, and by the way, about the fans not being complicit, right? Then they're reading out comments on and people are commenting on the looks of these women and that they should leave because they look whatever, fat and blah, blah. So, I mean, it's just disgusting. think this is kind of where I had to turn off. This was the most disgusting thing they showed was this guy actually. But you know, on Marc (26:58) Yeah, right. Yeah. Paul (27:11) In closing that, you know, the female role in this, you sent me something afterwards, which I found interesting. That was the Famosphere. And maybe we should do another one on this because I mean, just very quickly, but what the Famosphere is, it's kind of a counter reaction ⁓ and is almost like, I don't know, it's not a reaction to the Manosphere, finally enough. It's a reaction to, I think, more of the broken dating scene because it kind of promotes a very drastic ⁓ Marc (27:18) Mm-hmm. Totally. Paul (27:40) approach to, to exactly it is, but let's dive into this later. I don't think it's anywhere close to being so full of hatred, but it's also nuts. What I'm really curious about Mark is, mean, you are a father of two boys. I'm a father of two boys and a girl. And when I read the stats of how many young men who are sons, I mean, all of us are sons, but also how many Marc (27:40) Make the man pay. don't put, like it's really, it's crazy. Yeah. Paul (28:09) young fathers are actually in this Manusphere rabbit content rabbit hole. That really worried me. So I'm asking you what I mean, your kids are a bit small, right to start into this, but my oldest is 12. So he's going to start, you know, being on Instagram and Tik Tok in a couple years time. What are your thoughts on all of this? Marc (28:25) No. Totally. You know, it's funny, I was talking to Vera, my wife, about this, by the way, who was totally fascinated by this documentary, and she's like, I need to finish the end. She didn't get to finish it, because she was like, fascinating. Wes turned off by it, more intrigued. For our boys, know, look, these are boys, and this might sound really simplistic, but when I go to root cause of this, like, Paul (28:51) Mm-hmm. Marc (29:03) why would you be a fan of this? Is your lonely, I think there's an absence of love, there's an absence of father figure in many cases, there's rage. ⁓ And ⁓ they haven't been taught what human decency is and they don't have the female figures to show them what respect can be for, and should be, right? So, it's not like I wouldn't go to, tactics, it's really simple. mean, think you know, this showering your children with love and wisdom and exposure, right, as much as you can, to me feels, and correcting them when things come up that are wrong. Like that to me feels it. And you will always, I think, have ⁓ boy versus girl mentality in school. Like, you know, I remember, used, this is a different thing, but I remember in the 80s, I used to like go to my, like when I was seven, you know, I'd be like, tease lady. would think I was so smart. was like, how come women and girls have never made anything? How come they never, like I almost sound like one of these menace for your kids. And, you know, like that. Paul (29:54) Yes. Yeah, but that's also Marc (30:15) That stuff is in school, it's just, as they figure out gender, if you figure out roles, like I think that's it. But I go to, ⁓ I go to that, like a dress root cause. What are your thoughts? Paul (30:29) ⁓ I think I'm again a little bit more extreme on that. And I know obviously I don't want to get into the whole, you know, social media is bad thing, but it is because I'm like my 12 year old, almost 12 year old is really into being fit. And I mean, obviously he sees that from me that I like to do sports and then obviously they are already influenced by the fact that they want to have a six pack, which is insane. They see Ronaldo, you know, all these things. So that's, that's a whole different topic to address. Marc (30:34) Mm. yeah. Paul (30:59) ⁓ And when they are on social media, which he isn't, and they look for a gym video, it's very likely that they come across some of those guys. And in they are. So I am for once, and I cannot control what they see on these things. It's impossible as a parent. So for once, I would love to be in Australia where they have banned this shit for a while. So you actually have a chance. to be there. And I think to be there more as a father than I think the male figure is more important than the female figure, to be honest, and how obviously the male figure then treats the female's figures around him. And ⁓ so on, think this is all as we know, a lack of good father figures out there. And so yes, those are the root causes, but there are some things out there which I think we also need to control the environment more. Marc (31:35) I agree. Totally. Paul (31:54) Because I can see it now. Listen, I tell you, when my son comes back after an hour of playing Minecraft, he's a different person. He's a different person. They go nuts. I mean, there's so much going on out there. that actually really, really scares me because it's hard to control. yeah, ⁓ other than, you know, moving into the forest. Marc (32:01) Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay, you're going more tactical, which makes a ton of sense, and actually the way I just was playing. Paul (32:19) I'm sorry, I'm going more tactical because I am with the root cause and I'm with all of that. But my fear is that that might not be enough. Marc (32:29) I agree, I agree. And you're making me realize that pretty quickly. I just had this image of my head of people going, looking how to get fit, right? On TikTok and then that's all you need is just all this, all these assholes show up and like say, hey, you want these muscles? you want to ask that girl out, right? know, exactly. Yeah. And then they get sucked in like that is really challenging. You know, ⁓ there's a lot of magic wand I would. Paul (32:38) Yeah. And all of a sudden. Exactly. Yeah. Exactly. Here we go. And that is it. Marc (32:58) Waving I would do around this, you know, of course we would ban social we would you know, really legislate against some of these guys I mean there but Like look the through lines to Where we are now with our our pod of politics and our and the state of this country probably also in the UK No doubt. I mean, it's so obvious and clear Paul (33:24) Yeah, it's obvious. It's yeah, it's all along the same, same dimensions. But hey, I think as you said, right, I mean, it, and that's why we chose this topic because I think it shows why it is so important to show up as a man and as a healthy man in this world for our sons, for the people around us, um, to think about these things and also to be, and that's why I'm kind of like, it was a bit. pushing against you, not trivializing this. think it's, it is obviously coming from a real problem and we shouldn't also be saying everybody who's watching this is a, is a bad person. I don't think this is the right way to go. It never was in the history of problems. It's always addressing them, trying to understand them, talk about them and so on. But it is also not a problem to be marginalized and played down as some, you know, social media ⁓ thing that is happening. Marc (34:17) no for sure not and that and that was Paul (34:18) I think it's bigger and more dangerous than that. That's kind of my two cents after all of this. Marc (34:24) I 100 % agree with you. think we also wanted to call this just to like, I mean, I people were curious to get our take, but I think also to build awareness around it. I mean, for those, lot of our listeners have kids. So ⁓ yeah, interesting. think my feeling is it won't be the last time we talk about this for sure. Nope. Yeah, it's fair. ⁓ Paul (34:34) 100 % No, it was. It's already the second time, really. Episode 21, Look at it. Very cool. Mark, on a lighter note, although my idiotic and terminator thing of the week kind of leans into this a little bit or is connected because my terminators, in this case it's plural, are all the guys that I spent a really, really cool weekend with a bit more than a week ago. Marc (34:57) Go for it. Sparking my curiosity. Go. Paul (35:11) And, I went with, together with my coach and, and, and six other guys, some of them, my friends, went to a beautiful place, ⁓ in, the Austrian mountains, and had a weekend of breathing sports, sauna, cold lunch, meditation. did a journey with some medicine, ⁓ and it was a moment, almost no alcohol, except two glasses of wine on the second day when we had a beautiful barbecue outside. Marc (35:29) God. Paul (35:40) ⁓ There were men hugging each other, crying and really being vulnerable and open. It was really, really beautiful. And all these guys, the fact that they showed up there, that they were open to this and had the courage to do this, ⁓ absolutely deserve my terminators of the week. Marc (36:00) Wow, I'm jealous. That sounds actually a lot of fun. ⁓ Is there anything idiotic you want to contribute to this conversation or are you just, that you came back? Cause you're to stay there? Paul (36:04) Yeah, it's really cool. Hmm That I came back? I mean, I can't but it's so trivial so I would wait. I'll see after yours. Marc (36:21) Well, my idiocy is just pretending that I was 25 again and went going out three nights in a row and getting completely annihilated the next day or feeling that way when my two kids kept waking up, at least my youngest. it was really brutal. And I think I really understood and fortunately projected on my family the symptoms of no sleep. It wasn't really long over. was just like not feeling. Paul (36:50) Yeah, yeah. Marc (36:51) Great. Yeah, so I talked to you yesterday. was like, I think I don't know how I'm going to make it. So ⁓ I had a lot of fun, but it was still, you know, as usual. Paul (37:00) That is kind of idiotic, right? I mean, but it's nice that you still believe you're 25. I think that's kind of cute. So what was your terminator then? Marc (37:06) I am an optimist, you know, it's helpful. So, you know, I went to a great birthday party yesterday. friend of mine got a whole Spanfac. I'm going to show you that photo. Look at that thing. And and. I just felt like it was a cool blend for of a kid's birthday party. Yeah. But in a gaming arcade, which is kind of fun. And was so like the kids were just playing like, you know, ping pong. was in a brewery. Paul (37:17) Wow, that's awesome. suckling pig. That is sick. That is a sick move. I mean, it could be sick in both ways, but yeah. Marc (37:35) No, no, I was in a brewery and then everyone just... How quickly this pig went out, you know, was finished was amazing. Yeah. Paul (37:41) nice. God, I'm so hungry. I could have that right now. I can give you a very short idiotic thing of the week. And it's really mundane, but in my trying to save money and be very efficient and economic on things, I ordered a terrace table for outside, but it's made of terraces and it basically weighs a fucking hundred kilos. So it was a pain to build and actually it came and the whole tabletop is broken. Marc (37:59) Ha Paul (38:05) So now I'm in correspondence with this shitty online shop and I don't fucking know how to get rid of this shit. Yeah, okay. Thank you very much. That's so much for that. That's my idiotic thing in a week, but it was interesting and fun to talk about. mean, let's say interesting. Yeah. Thanks, Mark. Yeah. Hey, take care. Marc (38:10) You deserve it. You just deserve it. Exactly. The cheap option. Exactly. It was. Yeah, I think we can go a lot deeper. Yeah, thank you, Paul. Cheers.