“The Monster-slayer is the i.e. G-d appointed saviour” — David Livingstone Smith
Omid Safi’s Illuminated Courses | Lee Weissman’s Find Yourself in the Psalms | Learn About Rumi’s Poetry with Omid Safi — this is a great course (I have lifetime access to it) and a good way to learn about what Islam is, from a spiritual perspective, meaning self-examination. Fun Fact: Rumi was a Sharia scholar and jurist, not just some hippie who wrote poetry for westerners to swoon over on Pinterest.
Summary :: This Conversation Lee and Roxanne explore the topic of Righteous Hatred. We begin with the telling of the Talmudic story of Kamtza and Bar Kamtza, which is believed to explain the destruction of The Second Temple in Jerusalem. The story illustrates the destructive power of small social slights and the consequences of unchecked anger and revenge. We discuss the concept of Sinat Chinam, often translated as baseless hatred, with the understanding that a reason for hatred always exists, even if it may not be rational or valid. Our Conversation delves into the complexities of labeling and cancel culture, emphasizing the importance of understanding the nuances and consequences of using such labels. We explore the concept of Righteous Hatred and the dangers of pejoratively labeling and demonizing others. We talk about the importance of self-examination and inner work for balanced, efficacious, and compassionate social and political action and human rights work. Lee and Roxanne question the the role of religion in addressing the battle against evil and the need for emotional fortitude and sobriety in activism and faith work. We touch on the distortion of discourse and the manipulation of emotions in the current political climate. Our Conversation concludes with a reminder to approach the concept of good and evil with caution and to strive for self-awareness and empathy.
Keywords :: Kamtza, Bar Kamtza, Talmud, destruction of the first temple, Sinat Ch'inam, baseless hatred, small social slights, anger, revenge, labeling, cancel culture, righteous hatred, labeling, demonization, self-examination, inner work, social action, political action, religion, emotional fortitude, sobriety, activism, discourse, manipulation, good and evil, self-awareness, empathy
Takeaways
Small social slights can lead to significant consequences and even the destruction of communities.
Hatred, even if it has a reason, should not be acted upon in destructive ways.
Labels and cancel culture can be harmful and should be used with caution, considering the nuances and consequences.
Understanding the complexities of hatred and labeling is crucial for productive and respectful discourse. Righteous Hatred can stem from fear and a sense of threat, leading to a distorted and antagonistic view of others.
Engaging in self-examination and inner work is crucial for effective social and political action.
Religion can offer guidance in the battle against evil, emphasizing the importance of love, self-development, and sobriety.
Religion can also provide a dangerously distorted view of the human discourse vis a vis the battle against evil, particularly for those individuals who struggle internally with emphasizing the importance of love, self-development, and emotional sobriety.
Activism must be grounded in self-awareness, empathy, and a focus on tangible solutions rather than emotional venting in order to help those marginalised and disadvantaged who need the fruit of the activism work.
Labeling and demonizing others can lead to their dehumanization, and this hinders productive dialogue and understanding.
AI-Generated Titles
The Destructive Power of Small Social Slights
The Nuances of Sinat Chinam: Baseless Hatred The Dangers of Righteous Hatred
Navigating the Distorted Discourse
Sound Bites
"Huge disasters begin with small social slights."
"Hatred gone amok."
"There is a difference between saying somebody is wicked and saying that somebody is existentially wicked."
“I think one of the things to remember is that the Wicked Sticker can be stuck on anyone’s forehead.”
"Ziopiggies. I thought that was really cute actually."
"People really feel like they are battling evil."
"The human world is like a matrix of threat states."
Chapters
00:00 The Story of Kamtza and Bar Kamtza
03:37 The Destructive Power of Small Social Slights
06:59 Hatred Gone Amok
14:54 The Nuances of Sinat Chinam: Baseless Hatred
33:52 Zio-Piggies and the Normalization of Labeling
36:27 The Matrix of Threat States in Human Society
38:26 The Role of Systems in Shaping Behaviour
44:18 Using Tragedy to Spread Emotional Shit
52:23 The Battle Against Evil as an Internal Struggle
57:53 Inner Work as a Foundation for Social and Political Action
01:03:29 The Upsetting Cognitive Distance
01:06:45 Activism as Emotional Venting
01:09:09 The Land's Rejection of Ownership and Stories
Thoughts for Reflection :: The Monster-slayer is the Righteous Hero. Monsters do not need Heroes. Do Heroes need Monsters? Doesn’t every Righteous Hero need a Monster to slay?
Transcript
Bad Hijabi (00:00.989)
Okay, righteous hatred!
Lee Weissman (00:05.806)
Yes!
Bad Hijabi (00:08.353)
I don't know. Yes, tell the story. Tell that story because it's a really good story. Tell it.
Lee Weissman (00:09.39)
So how should we start? Can I start by telling the Bar Kamtza story?
So I'm going to start with the Kamtza Bar Kamtza story and I'm going to start out with a take on the Kamtza Bar Kamtza story. So this is a story that's told in the Talmud and it's supposed to be the explanation for the destruction of the first temple, which means basically like the biggest disaster ever in Jewish history. It says, why did the big disaster... so the question that the Talmud asks is why did the big disaster happen?
So it says, says, me tell you a story about Kamtza Kamtza Bar Kamtza. So once upon a time there was a guy by the name, there was a guy, we don't know his name, actually. He was having a party. He was having a big party, like probably a wedding. And he invited a lot of people and he went to his servant and he said, listen, I want you to invite my friend Kamtza to the party. And the servant made a mistake and he invited his enemy,
by the name of Bar Kamza to the wedding instead. So the guy is making the wedding and he sees his enemy Bar Kamza sitting in the wedding. And so he walks up to the guy, he says, get out of here, just leave. And Bar Kamza says, listen, I promise, I'll pay for my meal, but don't embarrass me, okay? Just don't kick me out.
I'll just, I'll eat my meal, I'll go, but I'll pay for it. And he says, no, he says, get out. He says, listen, I'll pay for half of everybody's meals, okay? I'll pay for half of this entire banquet. Just don't embarrass.
Bad Hijabi (02:01.469)
Mm.
Lee Weissman (02:10.862)
No. Get out. Finally he says, okay, I'll pay for the entire, I'll take the entire banquet for the entire wedding. I'll pay for everything. Just don't embarrass me. And he says, no. And he calls a couple of goons. The goons take the guy and they throw him out.
So this guy gets very upset. Okay, Bar Kamtza gets very upset. And he gets very, very angry and he decides that he's going to take revenge on everybody. In particular, he wants to take revenge on the rabbis who were sitting at the meal because they didn't say anything, right? They saw this whole thing happening. They saw the whole thing happening and they didn't stop him. They didn't stop the guy, right?
They just let him go in and do this thing. So he goes and he does a whole bunch of things and he does a whole bunch of things. He gives sacrifices and he informs into the Romans and eventually this leads to the structure of the temple. Now, I love this story. One, because this is like so true to life. Very often, like, huge disasters begin with small social slights, right? There are whole communities come tumbling down because of small social slights like this. And...
Bad Hijabi (03:36.957)
Very much so.
Bad Hijabi (03:45.757)
There are so many examples of this story in modernity. It's a very amazing story.
Lee Weissman (03:51.502)
Right. It happens all the time. I think of the fist bump when Biden when Biden meant Mohammed bin Salman, the head of Saudi Arabia, and instead of shaking his hand, he fist bumped him. Right. It was just like that was the end of American -Saudi relations. Right. It was a fist bump. Right.
Bad Hijabi (03:55.357)
Mm -hmm.
Bad Hijabi (04:13.821)
Mm -hmm.
Lee Weissman (04:20.782)
It seemed like a good idea at the time, but that's not the way it goes. In any case. So one of the things that's interesting is that the Talmud calls this behavior Sinat Chinam, which translates as... Well, people usually translate it as baseless hatred. Okay?
Bad Hijabi (04:49.487)
I think that's a really misnomer translation because obviously there's no such thing as baseless hatred and it doesn't really mean, if you hear baseless, the word baseless in a modern, like a modern mind, they think, well, there's no, there's no basis for it. There's no cause for it. But really there is a cause from the person's perspective. It's a gratuitous.
That's how I read it when I was looking at this thing. I saw it as being like gratuitous, like in vain. Sort of.
Lee Weissman (05:24.334)
Well, okay, so that's a really good point. Obviously, there is no such thing as baseless hatred, right? I mean, there's always a reason. I mean, nobody hates, you know, I hate this guy, right? If I ask him, he's gonna say, well, really, I have no reason. I just hate him. No, there's always a reason, right? There's always something.
Bad Hijabi (05:43.293)
It might not be a valid reason or a rational reason, but there is like an emotional reason your brain stem or your amygdala definitely thinks that there's a reason, right?
Lee Weissman (05:46.67)
Right.
Right. And usually there's some rational reason. They did this to me, right? They did this to me or they want to do this to me or they hate me or they... Whatever reason it is, there's plenty of reasons. So Rabbi David Fohrman came up with a much more interesting answer to this question. And he says that, he says that Sinat -Chinam doesn't mean baseless hatred.
Bad Hijabi (05:59.997)
There's a basis for it, yeah. Like a small, yeah.
Lee Weissman (06:22.158)
Chinam means something which is set, which is free, right? It means hatred gone amok. Hatred gone amok.
Bad Hijabi (06:32.093)
Yeah, like that's sort of like how I saw it too when I looked at the because I don't know any of the language. So I looked at the when I look in the I always look at the bilingual stuff and I always search for the word and it seemed to be that like it seemed to be like like gone amok, like taken overly freely or like like, you know, an addiction or like like, yeah, gratuitous. It's like taking more than you should.
Lee Weissman (06:55.694)
Right. It happens.
Bad Hijabi (06:58.749)
…or something like that, right? That's what gratuitous means, right? It means that you've taken something that maybe there is a basis for it. Like maybe you do have some good reason to feel hurt and angry and stuff, but it doesn't mean you have to set everything on fire over it.
Lee Weissman (07:15.694)
Right, and I mean, look, what should happen is this. Okay, so if you were, so if you were a bar kamtza, okay, if you're a bar kamtza, what should happen? Bar kamtza should go home and he should talk to his wife. And he should say, you can't imagine what happened to me at this party. He says, I went to the party, he meant to invite kamtza and he comes over to me and he starts with this stuff and all this stuff. And she, and he tells the whole story and she goes, honey,
Bad Hijabi (07:34.012)
Mm.
Lee Weissman (07:44.814)
You know, these mistakes happen. You know, honey, you know, it's not a big deal. You know, your life is not, your life is not over from this. Okay, just let it go, let it go. And, and, and.
Bad Hijabi (07:46.877)
Yeah.
Bad Hijabi (07:55.613)
Like, so like, can I ask it like, because there's like, bar doesn't doesn't bar mean like the son of like, and that so like, there's that wasn't that that that detail in that original primary, like in the primary source that is not like, there's a lot of things that are provided that you're maybe supposed to know. But to me, like, that was not in the things that I read that that a few of like, like secondary.
Lee Weissman (08:03.63)
Son of yes.
Bad Hijabi (08:25.085)
whatever, talked about that. But like that, like, so is that like the, like, the host had a party and his best friend or his friend's name was Kamtza, but the son of Kamtza got invited instead. Is that what happened? Or is that, are we like, is that like an, like we're making, we're inferring something into that or?
Lee Weissman (08:41.518)
No, not exactly. Bar Kamtza... Yeah.
Yeah, Bar kamtza
Bad Hijabi (08:50.941)
if they're not related or anything. Because that to me, that adds to what I thought of it like that. I was like, Whoa, what really?
Lee Weissman (08:54.03)
Probably not related. The name is also, Kamtza is also weird. I think Kamtza means like, stingy. I think that's what Kamtza means. I'm not sure. Like a Kamtza, I think is a stingy person. But no, they're probably not related. Yes, right. The second one has the last name of Kamtza -san.
Bad Hijabi (09:08.157)
Okay.
Bad Hijabi (09:16.253)
It's just a coincidental that the two names are the same because it seems a bit weird.
Lee Weissman (09:24.046)
You know, so that's, so yeah, it doesn't seem to be that they don't have to be related, but in any case, his wife should have kissed him on the head and should have said to him, honey, don't worry about it. And that would have been the end of it, right? But he doesn't do that. He lets his anger, he lets his anger loose. And the same thing happens with the rabbis, right? The Rabbis could have stopped this, right? They saw that this guy was,
Bad Hijabi (09:37.981)
Yeah.
Lee Weissman (09:52.046)
… was letting his anger get the better of him, right? I'm saying, get out of here, get out of here, get out of here. And what they could have done is they could have walked up to the guy and this is, just leave it, okay? You're in the middle of a wedding. This is not the time for this, okay? If you've got beef beef Kamtza, Kamtza, you've got beef beef Bar Kamtza, Kamtza, take your beef out with Kamtza after Kamtza wedding. Meanwhile, enjoy the wedding, listen to the music, let him sit there half as,
Bad Hijabi (09:54.493)
Mmm.
Yeah.
Lee Weissman (10:21.358)
… and I'll have his chicken Kiev, you know, and then, I don't know, I feel like that's what they always have at weddings, right? And just, you know, it's horrible. And you know, let him have his horrible chicken Kiev, okay? And then he's done, right? Just let it be.
Bad Hijabi (10:34.557)
You're so funny.
You know what's really funny about that is because when you know the thing when the it describes them you know talking about what they should do when the Bar Kamtza shows up with the calf that he's made the blemish and all that stuff right and they're so the sages are being or the rabbis or whatever we're calling them are so concerned with this like you know the appearances and like they're so concerned with like you know, smoothing things over and shit. And like, it's really funny because they didn't, they sat there and they basically watched this happen. You know what I'm saying? And so it's such a, like, like it's a story that never like that is always relevant because that happens. Like that's basically why bad shit happens because people sit and say nothing. Right.
Lee Weissman (11:30.19)
Right, because it, because it, because it...
Right. I mean, their failure, I mean, their failure, they failed at so many levels, right? That they're...
Bad Hijabi (11:41.309)
And like, we haven't even addressed the servant who made the mistake or whatever, because, you know, right? Like, everywhere along the line, everyone who fucked up, excuse my language, whatever, everyone who fucked up did not own their shit and just, you know, then like put that on the other person. And it just became this big thing of like poop volleyball, you know, where they just kept flinging it.
Lee Weissman (11:47.438)
Right, the servant who made the mistake, okay, you know.
Yeah.
Bad Hijabi (12:10.941)
across the thing. And then like, you know, that's snowballs. Like, it's so simple, but like, it's not when you're in that moment, because we all have done that. We all seen that done in societies. And we probably have also, like, seen it in our regular, like, individual lives, right?
Lee Weissman (12:16.142)
Right.
Right, but the simplest solution, right? The time when it would have been most, what it would have made the most sense to act would have been in the very beginning. And you have two guys who are anger at each other, right? And if you had dealt with that, right? If you had dealt with that, if you had calmed these two guys down, right? None of the rest would have happened.
Bad Hijabi (12:39.997)
Mm.
Bad Hijabi (12:47.037)
Yeah.
Exactly, like if someone would have just said, hey, boys, okay, hey, Bar Kronza, let's go for a walk or something, right? And just, yeah.
Lee Weissman (12:59.214)
Right.
And this is where I get nervous about this conversation about righteous hatred. Because, so I should clarify that I think this discussion, I think our discussion about this began when we were studying the Psalms, right? And King David in the Psalms says, you know, I hated, you know, he says, he says, he says, I hated the wicked, right?
Bad Hijabi (13:27.741)
Yes.
I, and that's actually where I went down. That's the first thing I did was look at, okay, what word are they? Cause I, like, I don't know, like I, depending on the word that was used, right? Cause I didn't like, I don't speak the language. So I had to like go and do that whole thing about what word is actually being used there. And I like, yeah, that was kind of what started it for me.
Lee Weissman (13:51.758)
Right.
Right. So that's where we started. And I think I was certainly taken aback. I was taken aback because like, wow, like what do we do with that? Right? I mean, and he was presenting that as being, you know, he's talking to God and he's trying to kind of justify himself. And he's saying, look at the great thing I did. Right? I hated the wicked.
Bad Hijabi (14:09.117)
Mm -hmm.
Lee Weissman (14:24.782)
You know, and so thinking, okay, so that seems to be indicating that there is some great benefit in hating the wicked, in this kind of righteous hatred. And so I've been troubled by that.
I think I found an interesting analogy. Should I share my interesting analogy with you? Okay. So my interesting analogy comes from the Ten Commandments. From the Ten Commandments. So in the Ten Commandments, it says, do not covet. Do not covet. Okay? Now, it says, do not covet.
Bad Hijabi (14:54.141)
Sure, sure, yes.
Mm -hmm.
Lee Weissman (15:16.334)
So the rabbis look at that and they say, well, we have a problem with that. The problem with that is that it's very hard to legislate an emotion. Right. It's very hard for me to tell you to command you to feel something. Right. Or command you not to feel something. I mean, you know,
Bad Hijabi (15:35.677)
That's even worse because then when you're told not to feel the thing, it's kind of like that movie inception. As soon as they mentioned, don't feel that thing, then all of a sudden you start feeling it, right?
Lee Weissman (15:45.39)
Right? If I tell you, don't think about bears, go stand in the corner and don't think about bears. The only thing you're going to think about is bears, right? Right. You're totally going to think about bears. So that doesn't, so you can't, this isn't going to work, right? If somebody sees their neighbor's Lamborghini, right? They may have a moment where they go, hey, I wish I had Lamborghini like that. Okay. That's coveting.
Bad Hijabi (15:55.805)
Exactly.
Lee Weissman (16:15.214)
Right? And that's, and telling them, no, I can't think that. No, I can't feel that. Good luck with that. That's not going to work. Like that's not going to work. So the Rabbi said it can't be that because that, that just not reasonable, right? And God is reasonable, right? God is only can only ask you to do reasonable things. So he says, it's not the, so the Rabbi said, no, it's not, it's not the emotion itself. It's the next step, which is the plan, right? Which is kind of,
Bad Hijabi (16:20.669)
Pfft.
Mm -hmm.
Lee Weissman (16:45.518)
So the coveting is not the feeling like, well, that's a hell of a Lamborghini over there. I wish I had a Lamborghini, right? It's when you go or a donkey because those isn't Lamborghini's, right? They said, boy, that guy's got a nice donkey. I wish I had a donkey like that. It's when you start thinking to yourself, hmm, you know, I could entice that donkey over here.
Bad Hijabi (16:55.357)
Mm -hmm.
Lee Weissman (17:12.59)
and I could get it in my barn and he would never know that I have his donkey, right? Once I start making the plans or if he has a beautiful wife, I start flirting with the wife over the fence, right? That's the coveting. So it could be in this case that the feeling of hating wickedness, okay? There may be a benefit in that.
Bad Hijabi (17:31.325)
Mmm.
Lee Weissman (17:41.902)
because it helps you to clarify right from wrong, right? It's a way of keeping your head clear about what's moral and what's not moral.
Bad Hijabi (17:46.597)
Mm -hmm.
Yes.
Lee Weissman (18:01.262)
But the next step, for example, revenge, right, you're not supposed to do, right, you're not supposed to take revenge. So, acting on that hate, right, acting on that hate may be a big problem, but the actual hating might be something which is healthy and good.
Bad Hijabi (18:24.797)
Yeah, I think it's what we do with it. And I also think there's kind of like this note, like it's again with the word choices, because when we hear the word wicked or evil or bad or whatever, same thing, like we have a, we have like this definition in our modern brain, but that's not necessarily what is meant because a lot of these concepts that are being talked about in this, in these sources are
like very nuanced, you know, like there's like the thing of, you know, the person who like prays five times a day and they go or they go to church and they do all the things and they're seen and they're so they're not actually wicked. They do good things and stuff. Right. But then they like, you know, they behave like assholes in their lives or, you know, they whatever. Right. Like, so like this whole notion of like being wicked or
whatever is kind of like, you're right. It's a bit troubling to me. And I've had like a bit of trouble with it because like, what does that mean? Like, like that person. So like there's some examples in Canada because Canada's like absolutely, absolutely insane right now. So one of the things I saw recently was a group of Muslims walking through a gnome, like this is deliberate, walking through a Jewish neighborhood with like some signs. And one of the signs was like,
One that had like the Israeli flag and the magen david and then beside it had the swastika and they were like walking through the neighborhood like that And so these people think you know, these are like people that you know practice like modesty They're wearing modest dress and they do all the things and stuff But they're like they're this is they're fighting hate. They're fighting wickedness, right? They're hating the wicked, right? And so then there's like some other stuff, you know, I follow some like
Lee Weissman (20:04.558)
Mm -hmm.
Bad Hijabi (20:18.013)
… accounts on x or twitter there's one guy who is in pakistan who like tweets about like all of the radical stuff that happened in pakistan So there was this guy who was like 36 He went to visit some place and I don't know He said something and he made some people upset and so the police were going to take him in for like blasphemy against the quran But then this mob of people took him and dragged him away and he set him on fire Okay, those people like
Lee Weissman (20:38.958)
Mm -hmm.
Bad Hijabi (20:45.533)
These are people who probably go to the mosque and they probably could tell you like what to rob the Quran says what thing and they know all the things right there. That's their fighting wickedness, right? That's their hating of wickedness. So like, yes, it's like thing where, you know, you're reading in like some like important, you know, thing that date this, you know, a really like prophet or whoever he was, some really important guy is like, hey, look at this. I hated the wicked. Like it seems like almost like a.
Like it could be like taken to be a license for that stuff, which is kind of disturbing.
Lee Weissman (21:22.638)
Yeah, and listen, I think this is a theme in the Abrahamic religion, so it's no question that this is a theme in the Abrahamic religions. All three of them, yes. I mean...
Bad Hijabi (21:32.189)
All three of them, all three of them, because, you know, I could pull, I could pull, you know, examples from being a Catholic, you know, of, yes, all lives matter. no, not gay lives or, you know, and like there's examples in all three cases where they think, okay, yeah, well, that life is less worthy or this whatever, because that person's wicked. And they like, that's the interpretation that's being made. That's essentially what this all boils down to this conversation we had with David.
is also the same thing, you're not worth as much because you are a bad, right? I mean, to be, you know.
Lee Weissman (22:07.086)
Yeah, and I think we could go to the Crusades, we could go to all sorts of places. And I think this is, I think one solution is to distinguish between the wicked and the monstrous. How do I say this?
You know, our conversation last week, we were talking about dehumanization and...
You know, I think that there's a difference between saying somebody is wicked and saying that somebody is existentially wicked. Right?
Bad Hijabi (22:58.845)
I think there's gradations. Like I was trying to figure that out when I was trying to like decide, okay, this needs a definition like righteous hatred, because you and I know in our heads what we're talking about, but maybe not the whole world does, right? So I was trying to in that thing that in that document, which is a working thing, think about that. And so, okay, because David does this too in his thing, he just, he's, cause he nails down a definition of what is dehumanization.
And there's denigration and there's different things like that. So, but I think it's like a scale, you know, we start out by denigrating somebody, you know, and maybe there's also like, I was trying to figure out like there's, there's behaviors that individuals do that, you know, then become normalized, like a part of culture. And then this becomes almost like, like, you know, like a group think thing where, you know, then it, it becomes to a next level. Like, I sort of feel like it's like a bit of a soft social process. And I don't know.
I think this North American, America and Canada have had some really like weird, you know, like ideological like things that sweeping through our culture and some of that stuff like really like seems to be appropriate, you know, we're okay, yeah, all white people, you know, are colonizers or they're settlers or, you know, they're all racist or whatever, or, you can't be racist to white people. And, Jewish people are white. And like this like whole, like very subtle, like normalization of like denigrating people. And it seems fine. I mean, it's fine. It's not anything, right? But then when you like normalize that and you keep doing that and stuff, I sort of feel like, okay, this is like not really like anything, but then it does end up snowballing into something that's really terrible, you know? And I'll just add one more thing. Like, it's my I'm not a real big history person, but it's my understanding everyone keeps saying like World War One started because like some guy was shot, right? Essentially, like, so like, it doesn't take much to, like, set a whole cascade of events into motion.
Lee Weissman (25:06.958)
Yes. Yes.
Yes, well, that's right. Well, it wasn't just Franz Ferdinand. It was also that it was all this set of alliances that people had with each other. And so what happens is that everybody's loyalties get activated and soon you have everybody fighting everybody else. Suddenly you went from what was a relatively small essentially terrorist attack, like the Order of the Black Hand. Best terrorist name ever, I must say. The Order of the Black Hand, right? So the from the from... Yeah, the Order of the Black Hand. Yeah, definitely could be. Maybe it was. I don't know. Maybe it was the first punk band. But but you know, it's listen, I think one of the things to remember is that the the the the Wicked Sticker,
Bad Hijabi (25:48.413)
Mm -hmm. Mm -hmm. Yeah, okay, dude, yeah. I think that could be like a punk band, anyway. I'm collecting band names. Okay.
Lee Weissman (26:15.438)
—can be stuck on anybody's forehead, right? It can be stuck on anybody's forehead depending upon the circumstances. You know?
Bad Hijabi (26:24.285)
So I really think it's important to know what you're talking about when you say, yeah, okay, that person's bad or that person's evil or now, okay, now the modern version of that is like you're a bigot or you're racist or whatever, right?
Like, and it's easy, we throw those words around and almost oftentimes it's to like, you know, a show stopper, a conversation stopper, whatever, right? But like, I think it's kind of important now for people to like understand, to understand what they are talking about because sometimes they don't they I don't know maybe they might be they might have trouble like answering that because I think it's really easy to be like yeah you're a bad person you said that that it means you're bad but yeah like like now we're at this point like I don't know if it's that is bad in America I think you but in Canada it's really like it's like okay you have this group you have like the queers and then you have like the not queers and then you have like the wokes and you have like the not wokes and then you have like, you know, the unions and then you have like the not unions and then you have like the politicians themselves who are promoting this thing and they have like, okay, there's liberal. Liberal is like a party, not like liberal.
Okay, so just the liberal party you can have, then you have the conservative party and you have the like, there's so many factions because there's not any kind of thing uniting everybody that people forgot or leadership. One thing somewhere that I read was like that this is not like it was the hatred was of leaders hating each other. So there's one quote that's like the princes of Israel, meaning like it's not actually like the little people on the ground that are doing it, but it's like the leaders are leading their people that way. Right. Like it really seems that what.
It really feels that way, like in Canada. I'm not sure if you can say the same thing in the States, but it's very much so, like leaders leading that way, like, and feeling very, like, righteous about it and feeling like, okay, no, we're not going to investigate this thing at this, you know, level five lab, you know, that's to do with the Wuhan thing and the whole COVID and stuff. We're not investigating now because we don't want the opposition have any political points for that shit. Okay? Like how could right? How could you be so righteous to deny like a fucking investigation that the whole country needs because you feel like, the bad people like want this. Like, I don't know. I feel like that's kind of like the same thing as like this whole bar concess story.
Lee Weissman (28:48.142)
My goodness you -
I think in America we're much more democratic. You know, I mean...
Bad Hijabi (29:13.853)
You have checks and balances and shit. We don't have anything. We have one guy in fucking West Block running everything, man, and he hates the world.
Lee Weissman (29:16.686)
Well, we, yeah, yeah, we have, we're more democratic, and especially when it comes to hate, we're very democratic because here, I think that, you know, we use, we kind of hate with labels, you know, we kind of hate with labels, you know, you can be,
Bad Hijabi (29:39.325)
but you accept that everything belongs in the public discourse. And sometimes that's really uncomfortable. Well, I mean, there are some people that are like free speech and here, there is no such, we don't, we have such a different vision of that.
Lee Weissman (29:45.294)
Well, no. Well.
Well, yeah, we do have people who are free speech. But that degrades pretty quickly. Because we have two things happening at the same time. We have free speech and cancel culture, right? I posted something the other day. It was a picture. It was literally, I didn't mention this, but it was literally...
50 yards in the White House. Okay, so 50. Right. So.
Bad Hijabi (30:25.309)
I saw that, I saw that. And it was like a bunch of stuff that was scribbled out and shit, right?
Lee Weissman (30:31.406)
Right. And it was, and it was, and to me it was like free speech meets cancel culture, you know, and that's really, that's really the dilemma. Those two things are happening at the same time. You have this very strong.
Bad Hijabi (30:42.301)
… like bar Kamtza going and trying out all that shit? Wasn't this, you know, couldn't you be like, that's kind of like a cancel culture thing. Like what happened there was like the, you know, uber like most intense version of cancel culture where you, cause that's kind of what that is. He just went and he just made up a bunch of shit about, and then, you know, whoever like they got literally canceled. I mean, they literally like temple got set on fire and they got, you know, like,
Lee Weissman (31:07.79)
Literally, I can't, yeah. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. And it's, you know, and we cancel each other just by labeling. So if somebody is very conservative, they become a fascist. If somebody is very liberal, they become a communist or a snowflake.
Bad Hijabi (31:12.733)
Lake. Yeah.
Bad Hijabi (31:29.949)
Or if they're, one of my favourite labels that I've seen lately is the disobedient Jew label. The label of, you know, that some Jewish people who think for themselves happen to land on that list and self -hating Jew, or there's even the worst one, I'm gonna mention it. I'm sorry, because it's,
Lee Weissman (31:38.638)
Yes, yes.
Yes.
Right, right, there's the, right, there's the, right, the self -hating, the self -hating Jew, right, right.
Bad Hijabi (31:58.781)
I think you'd find it repugnant. The kapo Jew list. I just, I'm sorry. Like I really find that like, just like if you're, and if you like, I'm good. I've said this to you in a DM, but I'll just say it out loud now. If you're going to say that a guy who was a baby when the Holocaust was happening and so like was a victim of the Holocaust and his mother was, you know,
Lee Weissman (32:03.694)
Yeah, the kapo was, yeah, that's a...
Bad Hijabi (32:27.933)
Had to give them up and a bunch of shit like that. If you're going to call Gabor Maté a fucking Kapo Jew, I don't know. I don't want to listen to you anymore. And I like like and like it's so I know it's like, OK, it's no big deal, Roxanne. But you know what? Like the thought that people feel emboldened to like be that way. And, you know, they're not helping the discourse because these are the same people that are like. So do you think that?
Lee Weissman (32:36.366)
Yeah, I mean it's no it's
Bad Hijabi (32:56.86)
all Palestinians voted for Hamas. Like this is kind of like, these are the people that don't want solutions. They don't want, they deliberately behave this way because I don't know, they just, they, there's some thing about this whole scenario, about this whole being angry that really like is a drug to people.
Lee Weissman (33:19.918)
Right. Well, you can, you know, there's, look, there's a, I think, first of all, I think, I think literally it is a drug to people. That's a whole different thing. I feel like, I feel like there's, there's something neurobiological about these things. You know, there's some, there's some kind of, you know, great dopamine shot you get from all this. But, but, but now, but, but all these, all these labels, you know, there's the, there's the zionazi's,
Bad Hijabi (33:33.821)
absolutely. Yes. Yes.
There absolutely is, there is.
Lee Weissman (33:49.55)
There's the Islam and Nazis. It's amazing how you can be a Nazi. Everybody can be a Nazi.
Bad Hijabi (33:52.381)
there's a new one today. I saw Zio. I saw Zio piggies. Zio piggies. I thought that was really cute actually. I like.
Lee Weissman (33:58.03)
Zio Piggies, you know, and I'm sure, I'm sure next week there'll be Islamopiggies. You know, I mean, there's, you know, there's, there's every, you know, ironically, ironically it has, it has the same resonance, you know, you know, it's, it's, it's a, it's a very weird, you know, it becomes more and more like, you know, we can just, we can just sort of sling, we could just sling labels at each other.
Bad Hijabi (34:26.301)
And you know, I feel like this is a lot of this is like North Americans, like using this conflict to like emote over a bunch of stuff. And like, it's because this the way of discourse has become normalized. Like we said, you know, like, like, you know, when you have like,
Lee Weissman (34:28.43)
and
Bad Hijabi (34:50.909)
…you know, Justin Trudeau going and saying, yes, white supremacy is based on, you know, just going and start talking some absolute stupid horseshit is like, you know, imaginary problems and just, you know, promoting like, you know, every single thing is a wedge issue. There's every whatever. If there's like a wedge angle, that guy's going to find it, you know, and that's become like the normal way to have like discourse to like, you know, pick the most antagonistic way.
And instead of like trying to pick the way of peace or trying to like, you know, in the old days when you had to like negotiate something like conflict resolution, people are like, you know, union, you know, people who didn't like, you know, negotiations for like labor and stuff. They like, they know that you, when you're trying to solve problems, you have to like find a common ground, not like pick on the, you know, whatever, right.
Lee Weissman (35:42.51)
But to be fair, but to be fair, but to be fair, people really feel like they are battling, feel like they are battling evil. And...
Bad Hijabi (35:58.973)
…because they're threatened, they feel threatened. And so you are right, there's a totally neurobiological thing to this. It's just occurring to me now that, you know, when I was listening to that Stephen Porges interview with, you know, the Jewish actress, and he was saying, like, basically the human world is like a matrix of threat states. So like human society is like, just like, like a cross section of threat states. So if people are in fight state, then everything is a threat. Like if you're in that state where you're like in that mode, like you're a hammer waiting for like, and everything is a nail, right? No one is your friend, right? It's like that thing you say, okay, there's people who are my friends and there's people who are not my friends. Well, a person like that sees, okay, there's people who are my friends and there's people who are evil who I need to eliminate.
Like I feel, and there's like a whole, this is not conspiratorial, it's real because it's kind of like what David said too. There's a whole like culture or whatever of information dissemination and just leadership that is trying to get people to feel a thing. You know, like some other guy who was an intelligence said, and I've said this before, any information that makes like,
Lee Weissman (36:57.646)
Yes.
Bad Hijabi (37:26.365)
…gives you a really like powerful emotional reaction is probably created to make you feel that way. So like we have these, you know, leaders who are hateful and then we have like a whole culture of like administrative support or like digital information, whatever. Like you said, anybody can be a propaganda agent. So I don't know, I feel like we're just using the whole world as like our emotional.
our emotional soothing.
Lee Weissman (37:57.006)
Well, yeah, I mean, I've had like a recent, a kind of recent need to meditate on this because, you know, I started posting these videos on TikTok, right? I've started posting videos on TikTok. And I used to post videos a long time ago on YouTube and the same thing happened. And I get all these comments, right? And...
Bad Hijabi (38:13.469)
Mm -hmm.
Lee Weissman (38:26.094)
Typically the comments are in two camps. I either get, you're a self -hating Jew and you're horrible, right? Or I get, you must be a Zionist, how come you're not saying this, how come you're not saying that, and you're horrible. And I look at myself and I think, I'm a teddy bear. Like, I'm like...
If you're gonna focus evil on somebody, I am really a bad choice. I mean, no offense.
Bad Hijabi (38:58.205)
That because because your very simple teddy bear message makes people feel very uncomfortable and so that's why they do that because then their discomfort has to go somewhere right that's what i see—
Lee Weissman (39:14.99)
Right, but I see the discomfort. I finally decided that maybe it's reasonable because look, if you're coming from the Jewish perspective, you look, you say, look, this guy is dangerous because he's a religious guy, obviously, right? He's a religious guy, obviously, and he's saying things which are kind of off message in some respects, right? They're off, they're off the card, right? There's kind of a speaking point card that you're supposed to be carrying around. And I'm definitely off the speaking points.
Bad Hijabi (39:55.005)
Can we just point out to the class, your thing says Lee Weissman, but you know, your moniker is actually Jihadi Jew for a reason, right? So you are deliberately made this choice not to speak from the party line, right?
Lee Weissman (40:05.294)
Yes, yes, yes, yes.
Lee Weissman (40:12.27)
Anything that I say is purely me personally. I am not the Pope of Judaism, okay? I'm not herd. I'm not an herd animal. No, I'm not. I'm not at all. So, you know, that goes without saying. And then the other hand, then I get from the other side, I get sort of from the Muslim side, you know—
Bad Hijabi (40:22.301)
You're not a herd animal. Anyone who's been following you for any length of time should know that you're not a herd animal.
Lee Weissman (40:42.126)
—this guy is dangerous because he looks so nice. You know, like he seems, he seems, he seems nice. His messages, his messages is, is, you know, is inoffensive from an Islamic perspective. You know, there must be something going on here. He must be trying to trick us.
Bad Hijabi (40:58.557)
Stop because this is the thing. That's exactly the thing. these people look really nice, but you know, that's just a cover because you can't see the real thing that's underneath. Right. And the other thing, this is maybe off topic, but I just thought about this when you were talking about like how you can't really like one side is that like the Zio's
Lee Weissman (41:14.574)
Right.
Bad Hijabi (41:28.061)
… find you like bad and the Islamists find you bad. Okay. One thing that really struck me at the beginning of this thing, right after the October, I was like, you know, I hang out at the margin. So I want to know what people think. So I was in this like, it was turned out to be like a honest telegram chat group. And one thing I observed after a while was how the they were very, very okay with taking, you know, the a slaughter of people whose lives, who basically devoted their lives to Palestinians getting statehood and to like making peace with Palestinians and like Vivian Silver, like, you know, she was born in Winnipeg and she like moved to Israel and she like was like a founder of some organization and she like drove people and she worked for peace and.
Lee Weissman (42:10.67)
Mm -hmm.
Bad Hijabi (42:23.069)
You know, her son would, in an interview said, yes, we still want peace and stuff like that, right? Okay. So you're taking this and women and people like men and women and their families who believed and that's why they lived there. Okay. And so these people are the Khan is they're taking those people and being like, okay, they're starting a war and saying, no, see, look, you killed these people here. So you can't have a state.
Lee Weissman (42:39.022)
Mm -hmm.
Bad Hijabi (42:52.285)
I find that a bit disingenuous and I find it quite repugnant that the death of people who lived for peace and who took a risk and really believed it and there were people that had friends in Gaza and really made an effort and stuff and some there's stories of betrayals and people saying, doing like giving Hamas information and all this stuff, right? But some of these people, like, so these are people that really were doing the work of peace while everyone else was trotting around being, you know, like doing their tribalism and stuff. And so I find that really, really gross that we have all of these like nationalists using this tragedy. Like it's a, it's a real tragedy for the whole world because these are people that really believed in peace.
And they weren't just Israeli. Some of them were, like I said, there were some people that were Canadian or Americans and stuff. So I really, I found that really, that's when I started to see that, when they were like, they had it coming or what did they think and stuff like that. And then there would be people just making shit up, taking like someone Israeli journalist who had done some interviews many years ago with Yasser Arafat.
And they took this picture and they were like, look, see, this is Vivian Silver for when she was young and stuff like that. Right. And it's like, what is, what are you like, to me, that's like, so like when people have just become demented by like, and that's the baseless part of it. What is the point? Like, no, Kate, but like, what is the point of that? Like, what are you accomplishing by doing that? Like, you know,
Lee Weissman (44:33.774)
But I don't think I say I'm gonna.
But I'm gonna push back against, I'm not gonna say, listen, I'm not gonna say they're demented. Because I think this is so much a part of the way people think, you know, that this kind of desire, this desire to kind of overcome evil, I don't think is demented. I think that what's...
Bad Hijabi (45:03.069)
Well, I meant that like, it's kind of like, this is someone from your, like, your nation, like, because Vivian Silver was a Jewish woman, and all of these people were Jewish. And that to see, see, well, look at, you know, to the implication being, well, they were traitors. And so, like, I just found that really disturbing, like,
So I don't like demented is maybe the wrong word, but I just meant like it's really distorted. Like it's a really distorted thinking. And it was like, it really gave me pause to be like, what's like, are you okay? Like there's something like happening in that thinking that really was like.
Lee Weissman (45:31.694)
Right.
Lee Weissman (45:38.894)
Yeah. Well, the theory and practice, there's a, you know, I think sometimes the things which are, the things which make sense in theory don't always make sense in practice. And this is, I think, one of them.
Bad Hijabi (45:53.309)
And then when you ask people to explain, they get really angry. Like, and that's why people react that way to you, because you say the thing and then it's not pleasing to anybody. Muslims are mad at you, some Muslims and some Jewish people are mad at you. But I think that's just a function of the fact that it's hard. It's hard.
Lee Weissman (46:08.814)
Right.
Yes. And both of them, you know, and the other thing that's fascinating to me, I mean, just I don't mean to talk about myself, but I will anyway, because I'm a man, I like talking about myself. It comes with the testosterone. Not only would they accuse me of, but they'll also accuse me of pandering to the other, right?
So it's kind of like, well, you're just pandering to your fellow Jews. You're just pandering. Like, there's no...
Bad Hijabi (46:42.589)
What does that even mean though? What does that mean? Because like I said before, anybody who's worked in like, you know, an area where there's like workplace conflict, say, and so there's like the workers and there's the management and you have to be like a negotiator. Like, what does that even mean? You're pandering to the other side. You're supposed to find common ground. Like, you know?
Lee Weissman (47:09.166)
Right, but if by definition, so here's the problem with the good versus evil paradigm, right? In the good versus evil paradigm, there is no common ground, right? That's the, you know, once you define somebody as the wicked, right, then there's no possibility of common ground. What possible common ground could I have with them? They're completely, they're irrationally horrible.
Bad Hijabi (47:33.149)
Or if you've defined them as good. If you've defined them as good, what is good? OK. So if it is good, like, OK, he liked art. He had an appreciation for art. He was a vegan. He liked animals. Was that good? So if you do those three things, are you? Exactly! Bingo!
Lee Weissman (47:38.702)
Right?
Then Hitler was a great guy. Right? Right.
Bad Hijabi (48:00.573)
That's why I like you because that's exactly who I was talking about and you knew that shit So hey, is that you know, like like is it that easy? Can you just and so like then is this like a ledger? Is this like some like human math thing? We're like, okay, so, you know, he didn't eat, you know, he didn't like, you know slaughter and stuff like that. So this is a good it's good It's like that's why he didn't like Jewish people or something like that. Whatever, right? Like is that like is this like the accounting of good and bad now like?
Lee Weissman (48:04.622)
Right, right, right. Yeah.
Bad Hijabi (48:30.525)
Cause you know, that's kind of excuse my language, it's kind of fucked up. Like, you know, it's a bit.
Lee Weissman (48:34.83)
Well, good is often defined whether you agree with me. But it's, right. Right. And listen, I think it's also, I think that the good versus evil kind of vision of humanity is not realistic. My experience with humanity is that good people put into bad systems,
Bad Hijabi (48:40.989)
Yes, now it is. Now it is definitely.
Lee Weissman (49:03.694)
…tend to act badly, right? Good people, bad people put into good systems will act better, you know? And people live up to or they live down to the expectations of the society, of the society around them.
Bad Hijabi (49:05.245)
Exactly. Like if you put your if you put that Yeah, yeah, exactly. Yeah. Yeah
Bad Hijabi (49:20.541)
We're like plants. We're like plants. It depends what condition you put us in to grow. well, we flourish or not. I don't know.
Lee Weissman (49:27.502)
Right.
Yeah, and when people are in states of fear and, you know...
Bad Hijabi (49:38.461)
Like, I really think that this righteous hatred thing is like a function, a lot of it is a function of fear because this is like, and we had this, you know, thing with David too. Like this is, people really think that this is a threat, you know, like, like, like, you know, looking at what this is motivating people to do, you know, like I've said, told you the stories of, you know, thinking that you need to set some guy on fire.
or thinking that it's a really great idea to walk through a Jewish neighborhood with a swastika placard, calling everyone like genociders. Or like something's going on in those people's thinking, or standing in downtown Montreal and praying in public saying, okay, God, eliminate all the Zionists or whatever.
These are real stories that happened, by the way. I'm not making them up. So, but like, I don't really think that these people are like, I don't know what that means, but I don't really think these people are evil. Cause I don't actually believe that there is such a thing. Like we just said, I think that these are just people who like reached limit and they like, they don't, they have, they don't have the emotional fortitude or the whatever it is to carry this.
Lee Weissman (50:35.022)
Yeah.
Bad Hijabi (50:58.493)
…burden of anger or resentment or something that's obviously been building over a long time. And I think that some communities are better at helping people manage their emotional life practically than others. So I don't know. Like, I just think that like some religious teachings are designed for that and other religious communities are more geared towards
cultivating helplessness and making people feel like some kind of desperation. That's my perspective of being in the two imperial religions that there is a bit of an attempt to like draw people or manipulate people as opposed to what I've been reading in the Jewish stuff, which is like, this is what this means for your life. That's my personal view.
Lee Weissman (51:55.502)
Well, I think one of the religious strategies... First of all, I have to show you something. So hold on if I can show you. Okay. I have a sword. Okay. Yes. Yes. Yes, I have a sword.
Bad Hijabi (52:08.189)
Yes, I've seen that in your classes.
Lee Weissman (52:23.054)
So why do I have a sword? I have a sword because I love Turkish historical dramas. Okay? I love Turkish historical dramas.
Bad Hijabi (52:47.677)
So you've seen that one, what's it called? Ertugul, yes.
Lee Weissman (52:50.382)
Ertugul, yes. Yes, this is Ertugul. And I've, yes. Okay. Osman, I love them. Okay. Now, why do I love them? I love them because they're these tales of good versus evil. Those, you know, the horrible crusaders, you know, these horrible Knights Templar, and they kill them all. And I know it's not right. I know there's something like not right about liking all that blood. Okay, I know that.
Bad Hijabi (53:18.749)
I love this guy. He's like, he's so teddy bear and he teaches duties of the heart. He's like, I -
Lee Weissman (53:22.318)
Okay, but I love that stuff. So how do I justify that in my heart and mind? So I guess the way I handle it is the sort of Hasidic approach to handling those things, and that is by internalizing it. I understand the battle against evil as being an internal battle.
Bad Hijabi (53:25.533)
I love it.
Mm -hmm.
Lee Weissman (53:50.606)
I have enough badness inside me that I'm busy at work. I have my internal sword and I'm constantly trying to fight off the enemies inside. And I think that that's one answer that religion can offer.
Bad Hijabi (54:11.549)
Just to interrupt you, I sort of feel like that story of the Jacob wrestling with the angel, whatever the thing is he was wrestling with, I always felt like that was really like instructive or like symbolic of the thing that we all do. Like we all do that. That's what you described as like the internal battle with yourself. You know, Safi says with each choice, with each decision we make, we face a choice of choosing God over ego. Like I think these are like,
This is the ultimate decision. And so when we don't want to make that choice or when we find that the choice, the internal choice is uncomfortable, then we do, you know, we put that out onto like, you know, the the world at large, right, to a to a degree, you know.
Lee Weissman (55:00.174)
I think until you actually engage in the inner struggle, what you're going to do is you're going to project your inner struggle outward. I think...
Bad Hijabi (55:09.469)
Well, look at this, okay? Sorry to interrupt you again, but because I was a nurse, I was thinking this in clinical terms. If somebody shows up and they're like, okay, they have this infection and it's ravaging them, you can't treat that problem until you have figured out what the agent is, what the causative agent is. You have to figure out what the actual bug is or organism is, so that you can treat it. So the point of this is like you have to accept that there's a problem and you have to like know what it is before you can address it. So if you never want to look at yourself, if you never want to be like, wow, that thing there, that really triggered some internal reaction in me. I wonder what that's about. We never do that. And this is the thing that you said about your...
your guy, what was his name out? I think Shah, your your sage guy who was like, and yes, okay. So any religious instruction that doesn't advise you to do self examination isn't worth anything. Like this kind of like the main point is to be like, okay, what's that all about? Right? We forgot that, okay, we are like, you know, there's all this like pop psychology and all of these things like that. But I mean, like to me, when I've
Lee Weissman (56:09.23)
Professor Shah.
Mm -hmm.
Bad Hijabi (56:32.381)
…like just spent a few days, like that's already in there. All of this stuff, like the eight chapters and all this stuff like that, you know, I've barely read anything, but what I've read already is like an instruction of how to do that. This like how to like wrestle with your angel or how to like, you know, have a sword fight with your ego or whatever the fuck image. All of these things are just like, it's kind of like a allegory for us to figure out like, because the battle or the enemy is inside of us, but we project that out onto everyone else. And so maybe that's part of what righteous hatred is, is the fact that we, the part of us that we can't accept, you know, just becomes this thing that we turn into an enemy or something.
Lee Weissman (57:22.862)
And I think there is legitimate evil in the world. I think there are righteous causes and I don't want to ever discourage somebody from pursuing a righteous cause, but at the same time, you have to prepare yourself. In order to do that, and it's one of the things that I love, you talked about Omid Safi.
Bad Hijabi (57:31.581)
Mm -hmm.
Mm -hmm.
Lee Weissman (57:53.23)
Omid Safi has a, he quotes Cornel West very often to say that justice is what love looks like in public. And he talks very much, Omid Safi, I'm happy to be plugging.
Bad Hijabi (58:11.709)
Yes. Yes.
Lee Weissman (58:22.542)
Omid Safi. He's a lovely person, an amazing person. No, no, I'm talking about Omid Safi. Omid Safi is a writer. He's really quite an amazing person. And one of the things that he talks about is that social action, however you understand that, and political action requires a considerable amount of inner work.
Bad Hijabi (58:27.069)
You're talking about Safi Kaskas, right? You're talking about Safi. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Yes. He's good. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. He's a great.
Bad Hijabi (58:52.157)
It does. And I sort of feel like that's the missing piece with all of this activism. I sort of feel like that activism has become a way for people to use your phrase that you shared. For people to spread their emotional shit all over other people's walls. Like, I sort of feel like people take this feeling and it's very feeling -based and it's very, like, emoting -based and it's...
Lee Weissman (58:52.43)
Right? It's an.
Right, right.
Bad Hijabi (59:19.645)
Like when you ask, like there's no, like they don't know what they're talking about. Like when you're like, okay, what does that mean? And we have all these like, you know, terms and it is very much emotional thinking. And so like, and so that's unfortunate because there does need to be like, there is like a lot of human rights work to be done. But now like, I don't know, there's like a bit of, it's become a bit messy. Yes.
Lee Weissman (59:44.622)
But this is not a way, this becomes not a way to do it. And as we see, like nothing gets accomplished, right? I mean, really we need a new approach, right? And...
Bad Hijabi (59:59.645)
Well, and like I just say in Canada, just to give you an example, sorry to interrupt you again, but so Justin Trudeau is this big, like radical, he's like LGBT or whatever they call it now. He keeps changing the acronym. OK, so it's pride, you know, whatever. And so, OK, OK, so that's really great. But you know what? There are men in the Middle East who are dying right now just because they're gay. Like there are men in Qatar who like they go out with their friends and like or, you know, they try to get a date or whatever and the cops are like, you know, employing this big sting and stuff like that, right? Like there are people who like, you know, are gay, who are like really like their lives are at risk.
Okay. So like, that's really like, it's a bit disingenuous to use that whole issue against people who are like tired, you know, who are like pushing back against the gender, you know, radical thing and to like, equate that as being okay, well, I'm critical of this gender thing and be like, you hate gay people. And then it's like using this issue to like, take momentum away from that. Like, I see that as kind of almost a very subtle, like complicated form of like righteous hatred, because it's harming people that they say, like it's supposed to, like, help. And I feel like this is like the same thing with this pro -Palestinian thing. And I see a few people who are brave enough, like Palestinians, who are like, pro -Palestinians, you're not helping the cause. Like, yes, Israel's like killed 31 members of my family, but like, you're not, like, you are not helping the issue. So like, I, you know, I feel like this is like, sort of like a really important thing to talk about, because it's not just with, we're talking about religion.
But if you look at this story of bar kamtza and the whole baseless hatred or sinat chinam or whatever we're calling it, I'm going to call it righteous hatred because that's what David called it. I really think that that's what's happening. But if you unpack it, it's basically like there's a lot. There's dopamine hits. There's the social effervescence of being unhappy, you know, when you have a bitch session with your friends, except this is like now it's like a global thing and stuff. And there's a lot of incentive for whatever reason. Some need is being met by like having everyone be angry about stuff that we can't do anything about. And I really think that that's part of it. Like being angry about shit that you can't do anything about and ignoring the things that you can do something about. Because let's take the story of Bar Kamtza.
What could everyone have done in that situation? Like everyone could have like, you know, not been such a dickhead about it, right? Like he could have said, hey, well, you know, I misunderstood, you know, have a great time and left or something, right? And the host could have been like, okay, maybe I just need to like, you know, go smoke a joint and not be so like stupid about this. Or maybe the sages could have been like, hey, we're sages, we should say something.
Like everyone has a choice of what to do and people act or acting like they don't, right? Everyone's acting like, you know, they can't, they're helpless and stuff. So ultimately, you know.
Lee Weissman (01:03:29.422)
Right. And the question, you know, it's very, in any case, there's always come, you know, when should you speak up, when should you not speak up, when should they have spoken up in the beginning, should have spoken at the end, at what point do you take action, what kind of action do you take? You know, all of these things have to come from a place of...
self -development and sobriety, you know.
Bad Hijabi (01:04:01.629)
Yeah, and I think that all of these things are like we need to do it every day. So like, it's really interesting that there's so much like there's quite a bit of, you know, discourse about, okay, what is the path to evil? Because there was, you know, there are like lots of writings about this about what happened, you know, like the path to evil is, you know, having a bad thought and you know, being arrogant and you know, having an idle mind where, you know, there's, you know, the terrain of your mind is like, you know, those thoughts can get seeded. And like, there's a whole like process to that. Like there's like, that's, you know, the history like tells us what like, you know, there is like, there's a lot of writing about, you know, you know, how can a virtue become a vice or something like that, right? It's all in there. You like, it's not like, you know, you have to look for it, but.
Lee Weissman (01:04:49.71)
Yes.
Bad Hijabi (01:04:56.349)
I think it's a really help. I think it's like a topic that and it's really fascinating to me. No one's talking about it. Everyone's talking about, Islam is evil or Zionism is evil or like people are blaming like the ideas that people have, which ultimately when you blame the idea, you like it's not very far to blame the people, right? Because I really think that like blaming ideas is a kind of like blaming people ultimately then like the people who you associate with those ideas just become denigrated and dehumanized. And, you know, then we have like, yeah.
Lee Weissman (01:05:30.542)
Right, well, they cease to be people. They just become kind of, you know, they become, you know, I think, I think Chinese, I think Dao Deqing called them straw dogs. Right? They're just kind of, they're no longer, you know, they're straw men. You know, you put them up in the field to make people think that you have soldiers. You know, they're not real anymore, you know?
Bad Hijabi (01:05:35.197)
They become threats, right?
Yeah.
And people, and one thing that really fascinates me is people get really angry when you show them that they're not that different from the monsters, from the people, you know, right? They really become very disturbed by it. And so.
Lee Weissman (01:06:05.742)
Yes, well that's right, that's all.
Well, because that cognitive distance can be very upsetting.
Bad Hijabi (01:06:16.349)
They really need to, there to be monsters because then that means that they don't have to think about the fact that they could do that too. And that's one of the things that really disturbs me about this, that anybody could be like, it's very, it's.
Lee Weissman (01:06:26.766)
All right.
Lee Weissman (01:06:31.694)
How can I be St. George if there's no dragons? I mean, you know. Listen, we better stop because we're gonna, because we could go on and on and on and everybody would be falling asleep.
Bad Hijabi (01:06:34.885)
Yeah, I think we kind of probably have to like keep talking about this because I think it's like a thing.
Lee Weissman (01:06:49.902)
Okay, so stay tuned for part two.
Bad Hijabi (01:06:54.909)
Yes. All right. Okay. Any last thoughts or anything clever?
Lee Weissman (01:07:01.134)
Any last thoughts? Righteously Hate with caution.
That's my last thought.
Bad Hijabi (01:07:11.901)
That's the thoughts from the teddy bear. And yeah, if you and if you're like, if you think that Lee is like a hateful, you know, whatever, I don't know what's wrong with you. You like, do you hate your teddy bears, too? I mean, are you seriously like, like come on man this is like that's like going to build-a-bear and saying there's like a bunch of bigots or something like seriously it's you something wrong.
Lee Weissman (01:07:28.406)
Yeah, can I say it?
Exactly. I know, those build-a-bear, if you noticed, none of them are white. Good. No, I'm sorry. We'll deal with that later. I'm not gonna...
Bad Hijabi (01:07:47.133)
What does that even mean anyway? Wait, hey, you know your name is Weissman.
Lee Weissman (01:07:52.206)
I know white men, I know, don't tell anybody.
Bad Hijabi (01:07:54.781)
You know, it's really, really, sorry, we were supposed to go, but I'm being bad. And what really amuses me is that thing that you wrote about the, I am not Indigenous, and this whole image that I had in my head, because I started making this story up of this guy called Weissman claiming, like if you were claiming that he's Indigenous to any land.
Lee Weissman (01:08:04.974)
Yes.
Bad Hijabi (01:08:16.029)
It's just the whole scenario of some guy called Weissman being like, yes, I'm indigenous. I don't know. Just the whole mental imagery of that.
Lee Weissman (01:08:22.254)
Yes, exactly.
Right. I am the indigenous white man.
Bad Hijabi (01:08:31.997)
Sorry, it's so dumb. And I sort of like that, you saying that the land rejects it. And I've actually read that somewhere else too, in my readings, that the land does not want that. And I'd not read that before. And I find that fascinating of that, that the land rejects our attempts to, I don't know, own it or put a story on it or something.
Lee Weissman (01:08:32.494)
Yes. Yes.
Yeah, that's a lost story, as it were. There are many lost stories in the world. OK.
Bad Hijabi (01:09:08.893)
All right, so we are like 10 minutes over time.
Lee Weissman (01:09:12.654)
Okay, 10 minutes over time, and there's my sword. Okay. Okay. Okay. Bye.
Bad Hijabi (01:09:15.517)
Yeah, it's—okay. So stay tuned for part two next week. All right. Okay. Bye.
How Can I Be St. George if There's No Dragons?