Cultural Identity and Societal Norms in Americana

In this enlightening conversation, explore the ways conservative and traditional rural cultures, particularly Americana and Jewish cultures, resist the influence of urban monoculture. Malcolm and Simone delve into America's surprising fertility rates compared to other countries and discuss how cultural pride plays a crucial role. Discover how behaviors encouraged at home but restricted by schools create a distinction between family life and the outside world, and how this concept parallels the defensive nature of Orthodox Jewish communities. The discussion touches on a piece by Cat Girl Kulak, examining the comparisons between American conservatives and Jewish conservatives regarding cultural immunity and fertility rates. Learn about the potential causes behind Mormon fertility decline and the significance of embracing nonconformity within Americana culture in securing long-term cultural survival. The episode concludes with a lighthearted conversation about family life and the dynamics of raising kids to cherish their unique culture.

Malcolm Collins: [00:00:00] Hello, Simone. I'm excited to be here with you today. Today we are going to be discussing how you can better protect your culture, especially if you have a conservative or religious culture or in any way distinct culture from the urban monoculture. And I wanted to do it within the context of why Is Americana culture so resistant to the urban monoculture?

And it really hit me today because it is more resistant than other cultures. Like America's fertility rates, like 1. 66 now, whereas even like developing countries like Columbia, I was on a McKinsey call and on that call, this is McKinsey's sake, it had a fertility rate of 1. 02. You know, I was talking with some Italian reporters recently, and they were like at 1.

2 something. And I was like, this is just terrible. And you see this all over the world. So why is Americana culture alongside Jewish culture so resistant? And I will be pointing out that they are resistant almost in [00:01:00] exactly opposite ways. Like they both built a resistance, but that, well, there is one area in which it's a lot.

It is both fundamentally based on a pride in being different from the urban monoculture.

Simone Collins: Hmm.

Malcolm Collins: But. For Jews, this pride is in being Jewish in Americana culture, this pride is in upsetting the urban monoculture, basically an upsetting anybody who tells you what to do or who to be. That is more of it. And I see it, you know, represented in things like truck nuts.

And where this was handed. No, it is like, what's more like Trump or like real red. Well, let me explain

Simone Collins: this because I hadn't, I didn't see them until my adulthood. Truck nuts for those who are uninitiated. Literally a pair of balls that people hang from the trailer hitch of their trucks. Proceed.

Malcolm Collins: And it hit me when I had a, a tea The principal from Octavian school was talking to [00:02:00] me. And he's always getting in trouble at school. Because he does things that he's not allowed to do, like make poop jokes, make fart jokes, make guns with his hand you know, and the school is just apoplectic about all of this.

But all of this stuff is very much Americana, you know, Appalachian culture, like that's the cultural region my family's from. I'm not going to shame my kid for doing this stuff, so I explain to him the same way a Jewish family might. This type of behavior is for home and out in the world, you can't do this type of behavior.

But what's really important about what I'm doing here is so many cultures, when they realize that they can't do something at school, when they can't do something out in the world, they make bans against it at home to make lives easier for their kids out in the world. But, They maintain bans at home that they expect to also carry out into the world, i.

e. maybe a ban on being slutty or a ban on same sex marriages or [00:03:00] something like that, right? Don't, don't,

Simone Collins: don't. It's all about sacrifice. Don't, don't,

Malcolm Collins: don't. Because they're okay with adding don'ts, but they're not okay with taking away maintaining permissions that are unique to their culture.

Simone Collins: Mm hmm.

So they're inadvertently

Malcolm Collins: taking away amenities. Yeah, they're inadvertently taking away amenities. So my kids, because of this, they're learning a number of very important things. They're learning, one, that the outside world is different from the Collins family. There are things and behaviors allowed in the Collins family that aren't allowed in the outside world.

But two, they're immediately having, with the very first ways where they see the outside world as different than our family's culture, see it as more restrictive. More authoritarian and more controlling so they understand when they abandon My family's culture or like cultural groups that are adjacent to my family They [00:04:00] lose freedoms Rather than gain freedoms

Simone Collins: And

Malcolm Collins: this is core to the way americana culture has Fared so well against the urban monoculture is it highlights throughout it the additional freedoms you have By being a part of that culture that they do not have.

And here I wanted to read a piece that I thought really did a good job of explaining this. And better explaining why Mormonism is in a state of collapse. Doesn't have this feature. Whereas the Americana culture is doing so well. And it aligns with a really great study that we'll be going over later that was done by one of our fans.

That showed that being a Trump voter. Boosts fertility rates as much as being a mormon in utah. So if you are a non voter in utah You will have a slightly higher fertility rate than a non trump voting mormon and mormons are Increasingly non trump voting so we'll go over that in a [00:05:00] different video. It's so interesting.

Simone Collins: Yeah

I I would put it So there, there's this relationship researching slash coaching group called the Gottman Institute, which we largely hate. There's one good point they have, which is a really good predictor of whether a relationship stays together is if the majority of the couple's interactions are positive versus negative.

And I think that kind of goes with pretty much anything. It's not necessarily a married couple thing. It's an anything thing. If the majority of your interactions. With a religion, or a friend, or a school, or a, an employer, are negative, and about no, and no, and you messed this up, and you can't do this, and you shouldn't do that, and you, how, how dare you, instead of, oh, guess what, you get to do this, this is a perk, oh, surprise.

Then you're going to break up. You're going to leave. You're going to detract. That is absolutely

Malcolm Collins: perfect. That's what's

Simone Collins: happening with the LDS religion. No, you can't wear this clothing. No, you can't drink coffee. No, you can't drink alcohol. No, you can't watch rated R movies. No, you can't [00:06:00] You know, take all your money home and not tithe 10%.

There's so much sacrifice and then the benefits seem to start easing away. But this

Malcolm Collins: is, this is what's fascinating to, to your point. There is what we are doing with our family. And what Americana culture does is it engineers a situation where my kids have additional negative events. When they're in urban monocultural environments, so they develop an intrinsically negative view of the urban monoculture from a young age.

When they go to school, it's teachers saying, no, you can't make poo jokes. No, you can't make fart jokes. No, stop making a gun out of Legos. No, don't play this way. No. When at home, they know they have fun with their Nerf guns, you know, they know that they rough and tumble play, they wrestle and fight, because kids love to do that, or at least kids in our community do not love to do that, and at school, oh I can't fight, I have to follow all the rules, and so, and Jews do this [00:07:00] as well, you know, that's why they dress weird.

That's why they look weird, act weird, everything like that. Where weird is judged by distance from the urban monoculture. An orthodox Jew is going to have far more negative daily experiences interacting with the urban monoculture because of how they differentiate themselves than they will within the Jewish community.

People are like, why do you give your kids weird names? This is why. They're like, people will make fun of them. Well, not the type of people I want them hanging out with. Like, for example, you think Elon's kids are going to make fun of my kids for their quote unquote weird names? No, they're not. You think you're like, normal, like, intellectual.

Online person who is exploring, like, how to make culture thrive or could be a good potential mate is gonna be like, Oh, Indy, like, your name is industry. That's so weird. Like, I don't, oh, Titan Invictus. What a weird name. They're gonna be like, ah, dope, you know? Whereas The negative experiences they have within the urban monoculture are positive and you might say, oh, why would you engineer negative experiences for [00:08:00] your children?

Where they're told no or they're told whatever, right? And this hurts them or causes them not to get along with other people. And I'm like, because in the long term it helps them.

Simone Collins: Yeah. Not

Malcolm Collins: capitulating to the urban monoculture is great for your mental health. Capitulating to the urban monoculture is terrible for your mental health, as any of the studies will show you.

Whenever you want, whenever you want, and constantly seeking affirmation and being affirmed for whatever you want to believe about yourself. Well,

Simone Collins: while simultaneously pedestalizing anything negative you feel, and making it a thing, when otherwise it might have just been an ephemeral negative thing. Yeah, yeah.

Malcolm Collins: Surprise, surprise. This hypersensitizes you to negative stimuli. And then causes you to have these anxiety and depression spirals. I want to get into a paper here that I found really fascinating, unless you had any final words. This is by Cat Girl Kulak absolutely amazing writer, talked with them before really respect this person as an intellectual and they wrote a piece titled American Conservatism and Fertility.

Cult your on immunity in the cultural swamp, [00:09:00] and they have a map here that shows fertility rates around the world. And you can see, like, everywhere is crashing. And I'll put up one that I view as the more detailed modern one by McKenzie, which I found really good, which shows that America is actually doing fairly well.

This is CatgirlKolak writing now. The only subcultures that have managed to achieve above replacement fertility at average incomes above 5 to 10K, and this is true, are Jewish conservatives and American conservatives. There are some other, like, weird groups in, like, Kazakhstan or something, maybe but I don't think that they have particularly high incomes.

So the only groups In the world that I know of that are like large cultural troops are Jewish conservatives and American conservatives and American conservatives do have above replacement fertility. Everyone else, Muslims, Hindus, Orthodox, Japanese, Korean, Chinese, secular euros, Irish Catholics. Every one of them sees birth rates collapse below replacement when they become wealthy at 5 to 10k GDP per capita.

So, not that [00:10:00] wealthy, by the way. 5 to 10k per year is not that wealthy. Even Africans and South Americans see birth rate collapse as soon as they become middle to upper income. What makes these two exceptions so unique? Many notice Israel is above replacement and immediately think Conspiratorially, the people behind the media, financial, globalism, progressivism, is , making it harder to live, are somehow immune to it's anti familial poison.

Simone Collins: Hmm.

Malcolm Collins: But this doesn't explain why white Christian conservatives in America are somehow above replacement. If there's one group, media, finance, slash, globalism, progressivism, would want to die out, wouldn't it be American conservatives? And here I will note about his hypothesis about the Jews.

The Jews who actually stay high fertility are not the ones involved in this cabal. The cabal is the ones who are coming from the river to the sea and want them exterminated. I mean, when I look at, for example, my Jewish classmates in Stanford who have Capitulated to the, the, the [00:11:00] cabal you know, they don't have kids.

They support the from the river to the sea stuff. They are not on Jews side. Okay. The, the, the, the Jews, the Orthodox Jews, the real Jews are as much an enemy to the cabal as you are. I American conservative is well, maybe not as much. I'd say that they're a degree less. , The urban monoculture may hate them, but it doesn't hold the special type of hatred it hates.

It holds for rural, white, traditional, Americana Americans.

Microphone (Wireless Microphone Rx)-1: Back to the text here.

Malcolm Collins: The much despised white man, the lonesome Americana, the rubes, the flyover kulaks. No conservative slash Israel aligned Jews and white American conservatives. Aren't the only two groups above replacement rate because of a conspiracy. They're the only two above replacement rate because there's the only ones with adaptive immunity to global homogenized urban progressive is a mind virus.

All [00:12:00] cultures around the world, as they've developed partially due to American empire, partially due to the logic of globalization have adapted the same Anglo inspired monoculture more or less. Equality between, ah, he agrees with us. Equality between sex, dual income, household urbanization, contraceptions, a extreme educational investment during traditional marriage years, not getting married until financially established, which now only happens in your thirties when you're already well past Prime Child years.

Even I ran has been. Has it not been immune to this despite the heroic and divinely guided effort of supreme leader? Kamele's they're now below replacement and i'll note here before they did well below replacement for over a decade and i'll note here on the style of cool cat girl kulak's writing here It really follows this americana irreverent style where it's intentionally written in a way where it couldn't receive commendations from you're a traditional [00:13:00] intellectual who wants to look better than other people.

You know, he'll make jokes about Jewish people, he'll make jokes about, like, the Americaner, he'll make, he'll write in a way that is grammatically more fun. So when he has to choose between writing in a fun way and writing in a way that is I guess I'd say like status seeking, he chooses the fun way.

You also see this with people like Bronze Age Pervert who have risen within the New Right. And that's because the New Right and the New Right intellectuals fundamentally recognize

Simone Collins: this. Hmm.

Malcolm Collins: It is. Through showing that we are not interested in signaling to the traditional intellectual class, that we can validate our authenticity among this new community,

only peoples who are immune to this cultural virus are those that have been exposed to it since its inception, i. e. The conservative cultures who've been resisting Anglo monoculture for a hundred years, conservative Jews fought to resist modernizing liberal monoculture [00:14:00] as conservative Christians and the Amish, notably Mormons.

would have once been on this list as well, but their fertility has fallen off a cliff in the last five to ten years. And I can actually identify the culprit for why their fertility finally fell off a cliff. Oh,

Simone Collins: really?

Malcolm Collins: And I agree with this, Cissus. Okay. Mormonism is a culture that is always on the outside of mainstream American life, but always wanted to be at the center.

Mormons had historically suffered great persecution and persecution at the hands of the American state and culture, but always aspired to be the quintessential American religion. All of their founding events, revelations, religious mythology, were set within America, and they always saw their face as something that should be Americana.

Even the Mormon Ernest Singlesman, proselytizer, teetotaler, hardworking, go getter, huckster attitude is quintessentially American, and he's absolutely right about this. And tragically, they tried to make America love them back. They refine Mormonism, acts [00:15:00] polygamy, they act racial theological commitments, no more.

racially barring from the clergy, bans on interracial marriage, or theological claim that faithful blacks would become white after death. And faithfully, they sought out religious protection slash recognition and then sought to work within the U. S. government. After being a persecuted and excluded religious group, Mormons became amongst the core recruits for U.

S. security, state, and bureaucratic jobs. And this is true, they're overwhelmingly represented in the U. S. government. Having little problem with drug testing or polygraphs, Mormons were quickly becoming what Cossacks had become to the Russian czar. Oh, that's so

Simone Collins: interesting.

Malcolm Collins: to the Soviet state after the czar, a core ethnicity of regime aligned enforcers.

They had rested 180 years for respectability, their proper place as the most American of American religious groups. And then Trump appeared, the embodiment of the rejection of all respectability. The man who rallied the rage of the Americana [00:16:00] folk cultures, the man who would have challenged the state and regime openly, the polar opposite of Mormon cultivated niceness and Burgoese decency, and their ties to conservative culture, and more importantly, their remaining X.

I saw this in the Mormons I knew, the ex Mormons I knew, their horror, their restrained outrage, the indecency of the man. Famously, in 2016, the Never Trump campaign ran an independent presidential candidate in the state of Utah, Evan McMullin, who was a Mormon retired, or maybe retired, CIA officer, undergrad at Brigham Young University, then went to Wharton Business Graduate. Exactly the type of man Mormons believe should be president. Respectable, experienced, proper, loyal to the American state, and proudly confused if you ask about the distinction between church and state, the nation and the country, or whether these loyalties might conflict.

Actually, this is a really good point that distinguishes the type of [00:17:00] Christianity that is dying out versus the type that is going strong in America is the individuals and I've seen this in some of the, you know, conservatives I've been talking to recently who have no kids, , the types of people who are like, Oh, America should get rid of the separation of church and state.

these, Are the types of Christians that are dying out, whereas the types of conservatives and Christians who would immediately recoil in horror at the concept of combining the church and the state are the ones who are doing strong because they are the ones who are intrinsically suspicious of imbuing the church with that kind of power, making it immediately untrustworthy, you know, The church has value because it's something that we can explore ourselves.

If it was just something we were told, this is what's true, this is what's not true, we the bureaucrats have made this decision, then that's a church without any value. Or at least this is a perspective that is maintaining [00:18:00] strengths against the urban monoculture because it is a perspective that holds, , a suspicion of authority.

And suspicion of authority makes it very hard to force the dominant cultural value system onto an individual.

And of course, the Atlantic and other left wing magazines loved him, just like they loved all never Trumpers. Even respectable Republican figure Evan McMullin thinks Trump is the death of the Republic. And of course, once your culture and face drips into that vortex of progressive liberal urban monoculture, it's all over.

I imagine Mormon girls gasping in shock at how not respectable Trump's grab her by the pussy take was. And slowly drifting ever outwards towards progressivism. Buying contraceptive and deciding to do just one more degree. Or just get that much more established or pursue an urban career just that much further.

Recoiling in horror at the improper aggression which was Roe v. Wade overturned. [00:19:00] Or the vulgarity of conservative politics as she veers further and further. And Mormon birth rates decline further below replacement. It's tragic. Mormons spent over 180 years wishing America and American state would love them back, not understanding that the second the affection was reciprocated, it would be their doom.

Like a praying mantis finally winning the heart of a red, white, and blue female. They wanted to be quintessentially American people, was quintessentially American religion, and pursued civic duty and cultural acceptance with the earnestness to make a Roman city father proud, not understanding that if there was one thing that was quintessentially American, indeed core to its irrepressible folk culture, it was hatred of the government and an inherent suspicion of its major civil institutions.

And I would go further. It's hatred of the cultural norm. Hatred of anyone telling you what to do. And this is fundamentally what individuals like Matt Walsh We'll never understand about the standard [00:20:00] American conservative when he makes fun of things like anime, when he makes fun of things like gooners, when he makes fun of things like video game players if he's out there doing this.

Hey, I have the back of what's respectable and normal and you guys are weirdos. America has always been about the weirdos. That is fundamentally, it is us pissing you off that certifies our validity as Americans. Because I don't give a What do you think about me? And what do people like that think about me?

And that's how people know, and other Americans who were raised within the Appalachian American folk culture know, the one that's maintained a high fertility rate, know that I'm Legit or based or whatever word you want to say. Whereas you are fundamentally a cuckservative you May signal more to what you think of as standard conservative values [00:21:00] But you sold out the one thing that makes us quintessentially american which is respect For the person who bucks the system and fights against authority and that's also what mormons didn't contain and this is why individuals like matt walsh are part of the Group of conservatives that are going to be outbred and washed out was the urban monoculture.

Um In the same way that, like, pus leaves a wound after all the antigen tests. Oh, good god. Now mainline Latter day Saints is going the way of American Presbyterianism without even the whiskey to hold on to, and he has a graph here showing them disappear. Conservative Jews, and particularly Orthodox Jews, persist because their culture has existed in the urban cultural cores of the most advanced countries and adapted themselves to maximally alienate the faithful from that culture, the obsessive rituals, the bizarre maximally garish haircuts of a style reminiscence of Mongolian warlords and punk rockers that ensures one [00:22:00] cannot switch clothes.

Choose to blend in for an afternoon or a trip on the town. The intense ritualization of male slash female interaction. Everything exists to break the possibility of true cultural interface with the surrounding culture. , of course if one looks at fully secular Jews, inevitably urban, outside Israel, they fall below replacement immediately.

Often their kids and grandkids even lose knowledge of their culture, being surprised they're quote unquote Jewish, only adopting the identity like so many post Soviet Jews. Many only meet the vaguest definition when they see economic opportunity in Israel. This orthodox Jewish purposeful alienation, this embracement of cultural alienation, the cringe of a genuine cultural gap, a gap that can only be surmounted by betrayal, that is what maintains a culture.

And he is absolutely right about this. You have to be cringe to have vitalism and nuts are like, I [00:23:00] love this as a symbol of traditional Americana because my gosh, cringe, it is gooder. It is not this, this part of American culture. This new right was always there below. With the foot on them of the theocratic aristocratic right that many of these individuals like Matt Walsh represent that wanted to impose their culture on other people silently outbreeding them in the background is that aristocratic right was dying and dying and dying every generation losing more of its kids to the urban monoculture because they didn't know how to fight it.

It desperately wanted To fit in, even if it wasn't with the urban monoculture, maybe it was with their conception of what a conservative is without understanding that rebellion is the core of fighting the urban monoculture, because my kids, like when they go to school, the core thing they need to drop, the core thing the urban monoculture has to [00:24:00] get them to drop to be allowed to fit in with it.

Is not to be a rebel to not speak their mind to not curse when they feel like cursing To not like trump's where to not be vulgar when they feel Like being vulgar the urban monoculture cannot handle like when I tell my kids why the school doesn't let them play with They're hands like gun. I'm like, Oh, well, they're not like our family.

They're so stupid. They think that you could shoot somebody with your handgun. They think that this could hurt somebody, but you know, the difference between this and a real gun. And we laugh at that as a family. Cause that's so funny to us. How stupid you need to be to think a handgun could hurt somebody or a chicken nugget that was shaped like a gun.

One kid got like detention for that at one school. Oh God.

Microphone (Wireless Microphone Rx)-3: Think that this really helps understand the part of American culture that is going to go extinct was this old aristocratic branch of the conservative party that briefly held sway in America and many people, because they grew up during that time period, thought to be [00:25:00] real American conservatism. This was a branch that said, Oh, well, if you are different, you're weird.

If you're doing X, you're weird. It. Shamed people from deviation from what it saw as respectable, acceptable cultural norms, whereas the iteration of the Americana culture that is doing well fertility wise and is doing well at keeping their kids within the culture is the branch that always saw any degree of rebellion against social norms as Thank you.

validating of an individual, and so it made no sense to say, oh, this individual is weird, or this individual is deviant. , and this is, you know, the culture that, for example, J. D. Vance comes from. When you look at J. D. Vance as a kid, what are his hobbies? There's things like Magic the Gathering, right?

And I remember this from my social groups that I hung out with in rural Texas growing up, is nerdy hobbies like Magic the Gathering, that's actually where I got into Magic the Gathering, [00:26:00] those were the communities that were often most into them.

Those were the communities where if I wanted to jump into, you know, whatever, , sci fi I was watching those days, whether it was Stargate SG 1 or Farscape, that those kids would be the most likely to be up to date on those shows. , whereas I wouldn't expect that if I was talking with, like, the city Catholic conservatives.

J. D. Vance. he is the type of person who, if he was growing up today, would be an anime nerd.

The hobbies, which are seen as othering, are the hobbies that this category of conservative is drawn to.

, consider something like the MLP fandom, , that's the My Little Pony fandom, getting its start on 4chan, which is a conservative bastion. It was specifically a way to attack the normative culture within 4chan, because, okay, now we've normalized this attack everything. , culture. Well, let's choose something garishly wholesome to be the new sign [00:27:00] of rebellion.

, and that happened for a generation and then washed out, but that was what was going on with that. And I think, in part, that's why things like comics and anime and video games have always been the purview of conservatives, as we see right now in the video game fights online. The people who are repelled by, oh, this is weird.

This is nerdy. You shouldn't do it if you can use that strategy to. edit someone's behavior, then the urban monoculture is going to have an easy time editing your behavior. So if you raise your kids being afraid of defying cultural norms, you know, like a Matt Walsh might in terms of like, Oh, anime is bad.

Video games, bad urban monoculture is going to be able to take the same strategy that you use to control your kids actions, behaviors, and norms, and use it to peel them out of your culture.

Malcolm Collins: And this is what American white conservatives have uniquely developed. [00:28:00] Indeed, the progressive liberal monoculture works hard to integrate the traditions of almost every other culture, and every other cultures, not having interacted with Anglo progressive liberals, don't identify them as a threat or at least don't identify them with how outgroup hatred. It's a wonder Irish Republican Catholics and Ulster loyalist prots can still somehow hate each other and be more worried about

whether they're the Irish Republic or the United Kingdom, when both are in identical drifts towards low fertility, low gross, Euro decline, but not the American conservatives. Indeed, American conservatism, uniquely, has always been the outgroup of secular progressivism, and has always seen itself that way.

It has sought out to create new ideas of cringe. Country music culture, redneck, rock culture, of which figures like Kid Rock are just the surface. Backyards wrestling, evangelism, and even truck nuts. And when I wrote to this teacher, I was like, Just tell the kids that, like, at home [00:29:00] they act one way and at school they act another, like you would with any conservative.

I'm just like, you know, we're from the Appalachian, Greater Appalachian Cultural Group. And of course, I know when she reads that, when she reads Greater Appalachian Cultural Group, she's reading hillbilly, like, Mud pirate you know, like whatever, like, like cannibals living in the woods. And I'm okay with that.

The derision is what allows my kids to see themselves as different and where they can understand the benefits of my culture versus the urban monoculture. In a world where the urban, liberal internationalist, respects all people's sexualities, religions, and nationalities. The Americanner rural culture has worked incredibly hard to make itself intolerable.

Anti respectable.

Simone Collins: Yeah? I like the concept of anti respectable.

Malcolm Collins: Anti respectability, yes. And that's what Trump did as well. That's how he signaled to this culture, I'm really one of you. I'm a real American. And the Mormons didn't get that. They didn't get, grab them by the pussy. Showed his authenticity.

It [00:30:00] did not invalidate his position as a potentially high status person because we rank status by what you sacrifice. By me being a Stanford MBA, but doing all of the stuff that makes me unemployable. You know, I could have gone their route. I had the chops to go their route. But I would rather be authentic.

Then that inauthenticity is shown publicly through what I'm willing to sacrifice. I mean, look at our podcast. It's not that popular. It's pretty popular, but it's not that popular. So certainly not paying our bills. But it prevents us from raising another round, right? It helped that the heart of the globalist culture comprised of their direct, immediate international political enemies that they have. The animus to differentiate themselves, but the wider cultural ethos cannot be ignored. There is no reason the second american culture couldn't have been equally anti natalist in its effects instead american conservatism exhibits culturally the adaptive traits one observes in the group [00:31:00] of Parasite and disease heavy corners of the world just as the natives of various jungles exhibit unique resistances and immunities To many of the diseases and parasites found there, often allowing them to survive uninvaded until the 19th to 20th century, so too do American conservatives.

Natives of the disease laden American cultural jungle exhibit a unique immunity to its most devastating memetic disease. If you're a member of European or East Asian or Persian culture trying to improve your birth rates, one could do worse than start trying to import the Americana. Folk culture that global urbanites despise.

How does saying, thank God, I'm a country boy fair. If you haven't watched country music recently, you, you should, because it's great. And I love one of the top comments on this where somebody said, I doubt any other governments will import American redneck conservatism because they can't abide by the core belief that each individual holds.

You are not the boss of me. And that is so true.

Simone Collins: Yeah,

Malcolm Collins: and it doesn't matter who you are a group of [00:32:00] people who hold that belief make poor serfs to be ruled over but a productive businessman. Now I will note here, that this group Fundamentally is at odds Was what Mormons have because they have the central church hierarchy.

So there's always, you know, you're never supposed to say, well, who are you to tell me this? You know, and then say, wait, we treat religion,

Simone Collins: the Mormon church is super, super hierarchical. And I think that's another element that you haven't really thoroughly discussed here, which is sort of the fundamental structure of the predominant religion of these different groups.

That Judaism is not a monolithic thing like there are all these sub communities and all these different sort of rabbis and different, different groups. It is not a centrally ruled hierarchy. In fact, it's very much as we discussed in other episodes, a huge meritocracy where if you are smarter, if you are cleverer, if you can learn The, the, the sort of the, the knowledge and the, and the, and the memes better.

And you can debate better. You can get [00:33:00] to the top of the, of the hierarchy. There is no, like, you got to work your way up or you, this is your place.

Malcolm Collins: If you point out other people are wrong. And you can back that up with argument that you get status, you get done.

Simone Collins: Yeah. You are, you are celebrated for being anti establishment.

You're celebrated for questioning the status quo. And, and the similar thing exists for for the, the backwoods people who are. This combination of Calvinist which, you know, in itself is a religion that's, that's quite anti establishment at least vis a vis the Catholic Church, but also like these warring clans from Ireland and Scotland, which were also very independent and very sort of competitive with these blood feuds.

So. You have to have this lack of, of centralized hierarchy. Whereas I think it's very difficult to be a Mormon and to pull rank because you just can't. Even when you're like a really high status person like Mitt Romney, you're just given more and more responsibilities. You're given more and more work by the hierarchy of the [00:34:00] church.

Malcolm Collins: And in fact, you lower your status was in Mormonism by I was talking with a Mormon recently and they were talking about the cultural taboo they have against what they call deep theology, which is like getting into like the real nitty gritty, deep stuff of like, continued human. I forget the word here.

A great example of this is the concept of eternal progression. I have literally had two different Mormons tell me on opposite sides of this issue, one arguing that no humans don't eventually become gods, and the other arguing that humans do actually become gods, and both of them told me that no other Mormons actually had the opposite belief, and that it was actually a super fringe belief.

And they both 100 percent believed this, had gone on missions where they were around other Mormons the entire time, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Just in case you're wondering, like, what the actual breakdown of who believes what in the Mormon community, I decided to ask Claude to see if I could get a straight answer on this.

And it says the traditional, literal [00:35:00] interpretations, humans can become gods in a literal sense, perhaps 30 to 40 percent of active members, more common among older generations than those with multi generational Mormon heritage. Metaphysical interpretation becoming godlike, but not literal gods, perhaps 25 to 35 percent of members more common among younger college educated members downplaying slash uncertainty view it as speculative or non essential, perhaps 20 to 30 percent of members, including many converts.

And less doctrinally focused members and then unaware of the doctrine's historical importance perhaps 10 to 15 More common among new converts are those in international areas with less exposure to mormon theological history and I find this really fascinating like The such a major part of this isn't like a small thing like mormons will be like Oh, you know, we don't focus on the mysteries like it's not important to debate, you know I can maybe understand all of that, but this is like The core thing of what happens to you after you die there could be such diversity of [00:36:00] beliefs about this, and yet Mormons would not perceive this diversity of beliefs.

Two really interesting quotes from a Mormon fan of the show that I was talking to about this, that I'd read here, and this helps understand where Mormons draw the delineation about the type of stuff you're not allowed to talk about. Mormons are very anti mysticism in general and don't like strange ideas.

The difference between Jews and normal Anglos was coming up with cool new theories and interesting ideas is like the same distance as normal Anglos was LDS, as in ideas relating to the non material world are taboo. Let me make that distinction again. Any idea that can't be explained by science is taboo.

That may come from a strong materialist bias within Mormonism. Materialistic philoso, philosophical forms of Mormonism heavily suppressed and like to pretend that non materialist forms of Mormonism thought do not exist.

, and this really helped me when I read that to understand the things you're not [00:37:00] allowed to talk about or not encouraged to talk about was in Mormonism. I was even asking AI this. I'm like, if you're on like a Mormon. Mission with someone like what are they talking about? If not philosophy or debating, , the doctrine, because like, if I was stuck.

Given my culture on a mission with someone, and it was focused around being religious, the core thing I would be doing is debating religious philosophy, and apparently that's like, specifically called out as something you're not supposed to do within Mormon mission documents. , So they just never talk about these things with each other and thus do not realize their own internal diversity of beliefs.

, and another thing that he wrote that I thought helps understand why it's considered so heretical for me to point out that there is this diversity of Mormon beliefs. To Mormons is so finally to answer your questions about how Mormons make decisions. They make decisions in unity opposition revulsion and dissension are taboo.

You [00:38:00] don't disagree directly to someone's face. Decisions literally don't get made until everyone is on board being unanimous is highly prized in Mormon culture open internal debate and disagreement is frowned upon And this made me realize that the way that Mormon culture survives basically is through the illusion of uniformity and conformity of beliefs, it is important to Mormon identity, the belief that there is conformity in uniformity of beliefs, even though that's not true. And the way that those two things are able to exist. In conjunction with each other, is Mormons just don't talk about the things where there isn't easy and hard proof, whether that is scientific proof or scriptural proof.

, and that allows them to, , Exist with this illusion in their heads, but because they don't talk about those things, those things [00:39:00] actually drift much further apart from each other than they would within a normal religious tradition where they do talk about these things, i. e. even if there's disagreement within mainstream Protestantism, because we're regularly talking about what happens after death and stuff like that.

, we understand where that disagreement is and how vast those disagreements are. But in Mormonism, because there isn't the same discussion or picking at these particular scabs, , people are unaware of where they are and note here, I asked an AI if there was any other religious tradition in the world that could think of that had a similar sort of taboo against, , investigating the deeper, , theology of something.

And it, none Mormonism is totally unique in world history for this.

And I would also note that this is totally unique to modern Mormonism. Mormonism used to almost be the exact opposite of this. , I'd say pre 1960s where it had a lot more philosophical, metaphysical and theological investigation and [00:40:00] theorizing than other Christian denominations. , but I think out of fear of being seen as weird or individuals within the community who maybe went too far, , this taboo began to develop.

Fairly recently, but spread very quickly.

And this leads to one of the, well, strengths of Mormonism is Mormons believe like a huge diversity of things.

But they are all, like when I talk to them, absolutely convinced that whatever their personal beliefs are, are actually really, really common in Mormonism. And that the other Mormons who have the diversity of beliefs are more like, out there weirdos. When, if you're like me, because I'm really into theology and I immediately start questioning people about their weirdest and deepest beliefs.

If they actually asked lots of other Mormons about like their deep theology, then you see there's actually a huge diversity of thought about like basic metaphysical things in Mormonism, like, the nature of the soul, what happens after death, everything like that.

And I think that if you look at Mormon history, this wasn't the case.

So in Mormon history, people would [00:41:00] actually rise all the way to profit by having like really interesting theological ideas really out. Oh yeah. I think of somebody like

Orson Pratt.

Gosh, I mean like the only people I've really heard

Simone Collins: of is as leaders in thought.

where Brigham Young, young and young

Malcolm Collins: crazy ideas.

Simone Collins: I know. I know. But it was just Brigham Young and Joseph Smith, as far as I was aware. A lot of the early

Malcolm Collins: thinkers, like when I study Mormonism, I'm typically looking at that for like the Brigham Young and just after Brigham Young generation, that's where it's most theologically interesting to me.

But those are the ideas that have been most abandoned by the modern Mormon church in terms of like what they publicly will tell new members, what they do outside of their own internal study. Because it's seen as like deep theology or like the weirder stuff, the stuff that really differentiates them from other Christians.

And I think that, that, that is, if the church wants to survive, it needs to return to deep thought debate being common within [00:42:00] Mormonism. Because we have exited the era where You know, Mormons went from this population that was so afraid of being seen as like a weird cult and even when old people, when they attack Mormonism, they still say that.

Young people don't see it as a weird cult, like, unless they're like really out of touch with mainstream culture.

Simone Collins: Yeah.

Malcolm Collins: They either see it as normal, like, like, normie to the point of being boring. Like, not being particularly adventurous, maybe being a bit like It's the Disney

Simone Collins: religion. It's the Disney religion.

Malcolm Collins: Yes, the Disney religion, right? You guys could deal with a bit more spice. right now in terms of like external views and external people engaging with your ideas because they're not all terrible. Like Mormon, like weird theology actually is some pretty cool stuff if you get into it. And it's not theologically unsophisticated either.

It aligns a lot. I actually say like, when I go to old Mormon theology, when I look at old Mormon theologists, there is good as like modern rabbis. Theology rabbis live in this culture where they're constantly theologically debating and [00:43:00] everything like that. And that's part of what makes them really resistant to the urban monoculture one that they intentionally set up like this is how I'm going to be othered by the urban monoculture.

And two, they have this culture of I'm going to constantly debate like the most controversial parts of our theology and if I can prove someone else wrong. Publicly, I move up. Like, I get more followers. I get more respect. If you did the same as in Mormonism it would be seen as, I think, very inappropriate.

Especially if it was like a respected member of the church. Instead of like, oh, you know more than him about Mormon theology. That would be fantastic. But, it's difficult for Mormons to do that today. Given the way their theology is structured. And it's because they have iterative prophecy. So this means, like, whatever was said most recently trumps what was said before.

So, you have a problem with iterative theology because to truly argue Mormon theology, you need to argue from a position of logic. This is why the early Mormon theologians were so [00:44:00] interesting. Is they weren't like, let's look at the Mormon scripture, like in the way I do, it's like Protestantism, let's try to work back from there.

They'd be like, let's think how the soul could work, you know? And then they'd build a, and then let's build like moral logic around how the soul might work.

Simone Collins: Aw, that's so much better.

Malcolm Collins: Yeah. And they'd build some real, that's why their theologies were so interesting. But now if you're like, I have a bunch of people arguing online about this because the original texts have weight, but can sometimes be overridden by a more modern profit, it's harder to choose like who wins a fight other than like by and so they're really forced into this ethnic based religion.

I, I suspect see a path through this, but it is going to be difficult for them. They're gonna need to came on one of these things. Either they have to become anti authority, or they have to become more willing to engage with the sharper, more interesting parts of their theology, or they, and at least accept the amount of [00:45:00] diversity within their own believers Or they need to, like, Mormons get as mad when I point that out as Jews do when I point out how much Judaism has changed over time.

I'm sure a Jew will, like, confidently claim, Second Temple Jews were exactly theologically like modern Jews, except the Temple. And I'm like, no, they were not. Modern Mormons will be like, Every Mormon believes almost the same thing, and anyone who doesn't is a no true Scotsman. But the final point here I was gonna make was yes, it was that these two other groups also do things that intentionally other themselves. You, I, Classic Americano, even Trump does things that intentionally other himself. Well, no, no, no, I

Simone Collins: don't think it's, so it's not about intentionally, that's not how they look at it.

They look at, I'm going to show people how awesome I am. I'm going to stand out. I'm going to make my place in the world. It's not, I'm going to make myself look like a freak. Trump looks the way he does because he likes the way that looks and he thinks it makes him look distinctive. We look the way we look because we like the [00:46:00] way that it looks and we find a bunch of intentional

Malcolm Collins: counterculture in both instances,

Simone Collins: but it's, it's, but it's about standing out and being awesome.

It's not about, you're just coming at it from completely the wrong mindset from the other side's mindset, which is like everyone else is thinking, how do I fit in? How do I not fit in? And this, this culture you're talking about, is it talking about how do I not fit in?

Malcolm Collins: Because how do I not look like these stooges?

But the point I was about to make was that yes, you're right about the instinct that drives dressing in a way that intentionally causes you to Look out of place in culture, create conflicts with that culture. That's how Americana culture motivates it, but there's other ways to motivate that. Jews motivate it through a completely different pathway.

Just they have a bunch of traditions around how they dress and act that are out of line with mainstream culture and give them weird looks within mainstream culture. The Mormon problem right now No, because they're

Simone Collins: different and special and better. I don't think

Malcolm Collins: they do it because they're like, well, we want to make [00:47:00] sure we don't fit in.

Yes, but that's the, that's the consequence. Mormons right now cut off the, for example, recently they updated the garments for women so that now they can wear, like, sleeveless dresses.

Simone Collins: Like I mean, it's more, I think, about interpretations of the rules. Like, you see so many No, this is made by the church.

The garments are made by the church. Oh, wait, so they actually, they changed, they changed to the physical garments? Yeah! To be tank tops for women instead of those long, longer sleeves? Yeah. Whoa. That's crazy.

Malcolm Collins: It's like a huge and bad capitulation because it allows him to look more normal. Well,

Simone Collins: Women were already really heavily bending the rules because the rules were like, for example, if you were working out and you know, it was, it could be really difficult to work out wearing garments.

They're kind of. heavier and sweaty. You could wear just normal workout clothes, but then basically like Mormon, Mormon wives and influencers were kind of like always in [00:48:00] between a workout, you know, just about to go work out. So that's why they were all wearing like athleisure. But also there's huge amounts of plastic surgery in Utah.

Like there's definitely this desire. To fit in and homogenize and that is just the death knell of of the religion of any

Malcolm Collins: culture. Yeah

Simone Collins: Mm hmm.

Malcolm Collins: So have pride in how you're different and F the urban monoculture and When your kids are sent home from school for making finger guns be like, I'm sorry. That's my culture Like anyone from a conservative culture, whether they're conservative Muslim or a conservative Jew I hope you can respect that.

We will have certain rules at home They might be different from the rules you have at school, but it is my job to protect my family's heritage

Simone Collins: You just

Malcolm Collins: gotta teach your kid to code

Simone Collins: switch.

Malcolm Collins: Code switch. Yes. Love you to death Simone.

Simone Collins: I love you too Malcolm. Oh, what am I eating? Well, so you're having the Thai green curry leftovers, but you wanted me to put in The coconut.

Did you want me to like cut it into very [00:49:00] small like confetti? It's already cut. It's sliced into little Yeah,

Malcolm Collins: I wanted it to be like a crunch in the curry.

Simone Collins: Yes, so you want me to leave the slivers intact, or do you want me to cut it Leave the slivers

Malcolm Collins: intact, just make sure that it like boils down enough so that the, the There's not a whole lot of It's a very small serving.

That's, that's left to finish. Oh, well let's not do that, let's not do the coconut. Ignore the coconut for now. Okay, so

Simone Collins: you're just gonna have a small, and then I'm gonna make it with those dumplings that you bought. a while ago that you want to try. Yeah, you're so good

Malcolm Collins: at making dumplings now.

Simone Collins: Well, I don't know.

I've never prepared these before. But we'll see. But it's the ones that you picked out. So you sort of have an accompaniment with a small Oh, is

Malcolm Collins: this like the spicy whatever ones? It's the ones that

Simone Collins: you looked at yesterday and you were like, Oh, I want to try these. Oh, those looked good. Yeah. I think, you know, that would be a good combination.

What I plan on doing since it's the first warm day of the year is I will just put the kids dinner in their tree house and they'll eat it there and we can enjoy this. This did we

Malcolm Collins: build an actual tree house for them? No,

Simone Collins: no, no.

Malcolm Collins: That the tree, the little, the fort, which is a ladder up to where they can really hurt themselves.

No, [00:50:00]

Simone Collins: no. And the rule is of course you are free to do that, but then you are personally responsible out of your discretionary income for the hospital bills. So it is along with the trampolines. Something wrong with

Malcolm Collins: trampolines.

Simone Collins: I never said no to trampolines. I just said that it's your discretionary income that would pay for the hospital bills for any trampoline related incident.

Okay, okay, okay, okay, okay. The one thing, if you ask emergency room doctors What not to do with your kids. It is invariably do not let them play with four wheelers. Do not get a trampoline Are we how old do they need to be before we can give them pellet guns to shoot each other? You know pellet guns just don't come up in those stories, which is interesting But I think that's just because pellet guns are so unusual But we have all the ammo.

I don't know where you put the actual pellet gun But I wouldn't use

Malcolm Collins: airsoft guns for the kids But I I remember like Polygons can actually cause, like, serious injuries, you know that, right?

Simone Collins: Pretty much anything can cause a serious injury. I mean, a screwdriver, a hammer. [00:51:00]

Malcolm Collins: Oh yes, one of our kids is very good with that.

He loves finding anything sharp and just stabbing anything he can find. Pokey thing, as he says. Pokey thing? He's like, I won't do it again. It's like, you absolutely will, then why do you want

Simone Collins: the pokey thing? Yeah, I think he defines, you know, I won't stab the couch to pieces again. Because then I'm gonna stab something else.

I'm gonna stab electronics again.

Malcolm Collins: Oh my god, these kids. Wow. They, they need punishment. Like, they are wild kids, and I love it. They don't respond to

Simone Collins: punishment.

Malcolm Collins: They don't. Actually, a huge problem I've had, and people would be like, Oh, like, Malcolm, like, you, you use corporal punishment, like, you hate your kids, that's so horrible.

I'm like, Honestly, about half the time when I do it, I under correct and they start laughing. And I'm like, this is a huge problem. That's what, I said jokingly in another episode, like, how hard do you hit your kids? Just hard enough that they don't laugh? And that can sometimes be, like, [00:52:00] pretty hard to get to that point with our kids because they love roughhousing so much.

Simone Collins: They always said harder. There

Malcolm Collins: was a reporter over once where we tested, like, throwing our fist at the kids to see if they flinched. Well, because there was, yeah,

Simone Collins: you missed it. There was this whole viral thing where a parent put their, their hand close to the kid in a shopping cart and the kid flinched.

And then the whole internet was like, Proof of abuse and we were with a journalist and we're like, Oh, I wonder what our kids are going to do if we like go like this. And they just, they just look at us. They don't move at all. And they just smile and later

Malcolm Collins: in that same thing, I ended up flinching when one of the kids was doing something it's actually like, you're the, you were the child in the shopping cart.

You were hit me. No, hold Bart. Well, because I want to encourage them to be tough, you know? When I play fight with them, I never like tell them to like. They don't pull their punches, they don't pull their punches. Yeah, they, they, they're a little like monkeys. They can do damage. Monkeys are terrifying. [00:53:00]

Simone Collins: Yeah.

You see your

Malcolm Collins: face off like an angry champ chimpanzee. If you get them,

Simone Collins: they're very, very scary. I don't like, I don't like tourist attractions with monkeys.

Malcolm Collins: They're screwed. Love you to death.

Simone Collins: I love you too. I will start dinner.

I was watching this YouTube video about an eco village that had basically a

I was watching this YouTube video about an eco village that had basically a covered street with very close townhouses. So the townhouses that faced each other were connected under a covered street and it just was all sort of this one big kind of like a mall, you know, like there's shops each other's across from a mall.

That's what it felt like. They had set the design of the houses up so that your kitchen window faced Was like the storefront window of the mall and [00:54:00] I'm just thinking about how miserable it would be there. I think you can't hide from anyone Everyone knows everyone else and this woman who's touring it is being led around by this old woman who like clearly is up in everyone's business and just thinks this place is the best and like people are walking by and she's like Hi, Brian!

And, you know, there's someone, like, trying to walk by, and she's probably like, Brian! You left the vegetables out last night, and they were, you know, Oh, God, it just seems so miserable to me.

Malcolm Collins: To be there, but yet you kept watching it.

Simone Collins: I want to know about all different ways of

Malcolm Collins: living.

Simone Collins: And

Malcolm Collins: what was this way of living?

I don't understand what was unique about it. It was an eco village. No, it wasn't. It wasn't historic. It was newly built. Oh, of course. That's exactly the type of place for like a woman up in everyone's business would be. I

Simone Collins: mean, yeah, basically.