Doctor Matte lives in Vancouver British Columbia. They have a Democratic Socialist government in one of the world's most expensive and appealing cities in an America where the wealth gap makes Vancouver prohibitively expensive.
What a family! What a Dad. Tangentially, after being 100% social media free, I opened an ‘anonymous’ Instagram account two months ago. What I found crystallized everything wrong with our society. It’s a bottomless cesspool of manipulation, greed, and control. Subtle things: constant badgering to‘access my photos and contacts’ (to enhance my user experience); endless worship of shiny baubles few can afford.
Everyone should try it. It’s not enough to know how bad “social media’ is. It must be experienced. And it’s all cushioned in cute animal videos to make us forget how vile are the thinking and tactics of ruling class.
Dr. Maté's observations about the effects of our consumer culture--including the idea that happiness comes from somewhere or something outside ourselves--ring true. Also wish more docs took seriously his point about the link between physical illness & emotion.
Wonderful discussion, reminding me of the work of psychologist Alice Miller. She and Gabor Maté have a similar perspective about trauma and its long-term effects.
Such a great podcast episode, way too short! I could have listened to the two of you for a few more hours. Will you do a follow-up with Gabor Mate, please?
I just wrote a comment in an other Substack that included my theory for why liberals are attracted to scarcity policy when it is clearly destructive to the whole. I wrote:
"My liberal friends all seem to be plagued with abundant socioeconomic competition stress. I see this attraction to scarcity policy as simply supporting their interest to neuter “the others” in their community that they would otherwise feel inferior to or threatened by. Liberals are made nervous by economic dynamism because they are wired risk-averse. They seek to calm their nerves by shutting it all down."
A quote from this podcast:
"The engine of capitalism, defined by the cult of the self, thrives on the fostering of psychological and physical chronic disorders, including high blood pressure, diabetes, anxiety, depression, addictions and suicide. It rewards the core traits of psychopaths: superficial charm, grandiosity, and self-importance; a need for constant stimulation, a penchant for lying, deception, and manipulation, and the inability to feel remorse or guilt. Personal style and personal advancement are mistaken for individualism, equated falsely with democratic equality. We have a right, in the cult of the self, to get whatever we desire. We can do anything, even belittle and destroy those around us, including our friends, to make money, to be happy, and to become famous. Once fame and wealth are achieved, they become their own justification, their own morality. How one gets there is irrelevant. The consequence of this dark ethic, Dr. Maté illustrates, plays out on our bodies, severely damaging our psyches, and pushing us towards individual and social self-annihilation."
Funny, but I don't have any of these problems above. I am energized and made more calm and happy in a system of capitalism vs a system of collectivist authoritarianism to make everything "fair". My sense is that the people that would buy-in to the junk above are really just socioeconomic malcontents lacking confidence or otherwise having failed at a go in the private economy. They are projecting their own psychological dysfunction for feeling left out and rejected onto others.
Here is a bit of advice... leave us the eff alone. If you don't like the competitiveness of the private economy in a free democratic capitalist system... then please get on a jet and move somewhere where your socialist utopia is thriving. But stop the attempts to destroy what we have built just because you are a loser and looter living off the spoils of those of us that risk our savings and work 80 hours a week to build a business.
That you think we we live in a "free democratic capitalist system" and not an "inverted totalitarian oligarchy" is just as cute as a puppy.
It's also adorable that people on the right throw around Group-think like it's not their exclusive mode of operation. Your ideas are as outmoded as Tucker's old bowtie. Jesus Guns Babies... fetish anyone?
Maybe you fancy yourself unna dem newfangled libertarians? If so, was it really NAFTA that ruined US economy? Or the fact that those jobs did not require actual skill and therefore could be moved to locations with orders of magnitude lower cost basis or automated? The old dynamic marketplace dynamo-ed right out from under a generation of people who couldn't cut it and did nothing to adapt to the new reality of a tech and information-driven service industry.
I could go on... but your 'job creating' ass would just get more huffy and puffy trying to peg me on some lamentable place in your 'spectrum' (dividing the world up into acceptable vs deplorable teams and labels is the simpleton's great shortcut to life, you're well on your way to success!)
Ah yes. One of you. John Fetterman types? New fangled ideas that are just repacked junk proven failed… always. Good thing we lacked that free market capitalism otherwise what marvelous machine would exist to type your Bernie Bros demands?
Like I said, simpleton's refuge... care to provide anything remotely substantive from my actual text that would suggest this slightly left of center, would-be-Christian-Democrat-in-Germany political affiliation? Care to counter any of the actual points I made? Yeah... didn't think so... So goes the rugged individualism of the cookie cut goober.
Like most people in this country, the propaganda echo chambers have broken you. You think the 'other side', which (just like yours) is bankrupt of ideas, feckless, and completely ill-equipped to face modern problems, is the existential threat. You think 'your side' is right, has been proven by history, and all the ills in the world stem from those evil 'others'. Mostly, you think you've come to this thru some journey to truth laid out special for you. Versus believing what your daddy believed because his head was filled with the last generation's propaganda jizz (or, on occasion, believing the opposite because he was a dick.. still not very original).
Really you're just getting punched in the neck by the same people. It's a class war you dolt... you're the cannon fodder. Keep taking the simpleton's refuge tho... if someone doesn't agree (Look how smart I are! I can guess what team you are and tell you that team stinks!)
Keep at it pup... maybe try being a little more courageous with your love. Trust me, I know from experience... at the end of your days, you will judge yourself with infinite wisdom not on your words (and your 'battles' with 'enemies') but on how well and how often you loved. In the end, in an every moment, we are all fools who know very little in the grand scheme.
Maybe try a more productive tact if you want to have a 'conversation'. Jumping into a liberal substack and baiting people with half-baked commentary is kinda like farting in the elevator then asking about the weather...
And you call me the "pup"! You mistake love/hate for criticism of ideology. You see, this is a common malady of those owning the fucked up ideology. They frankly cannot escape this hell of their hair catching fire over criticism of their political identity. Frankly, they are people that cannot handle much of any criticism and that tend to be weak at self-awareness. You can criticize all the parts of my ideological beliefs and I am good with that. But what you do is go personal. that is the hallmark of a fragile political pup.
What you mean by demonstrating love is that I make them feel better about themselves and their fucked up ideology. I am here to learn. Tell me what you believe and why it makes sense... using real math and real facts... and not just your strong emotions... and if it calculates and makes sense, I am going to agree. But to be soft on you that hold the most absurd and wrong mythological media-powered memes of ideological symbolism... well no. I have to call that crap. And consider that the lack of calling that crap over the years is why you and others actually believe these radical ideas have any merit. ESG and DEI my ass.
The billionaire oligarchs through their Wall Street trillion dollar asset management companies own the media and have connected with the campus critical theory wokeist radicals and the Democrat political establishment... and all of this is connected to the WEF Great Reset cabal... are the enemy of the US and western civilization. You are either with them or against them. There is no middle ground.
We don't have a healthy system today because of the previous work of the enemy. But those that exploit the mess to advocate for more destruction and nihilism of the system because of what is broken... well they are either the enemy or they are stupidly aiding and abetting the enemy.
Nope. Not missed at all. You too have demonstrated the very traits outlined in my post. So too your liking group-think friends.
I will ask the question I always ask and always get crickets in return.
What, if the US system is so terrible, is the model we should adopt? What other country past and present do you point to as the model of utopia you think we should be?
If it does not exist, then it is your irrational fantasy.
Nations that allow citizens to live free from fear of being ruined by their medical bills (result of our perverse, profit-centered healthcare system) include not only Canada but France, Germany, England, Japan, Taiwan, etc. These have strong social democracies, unlike the U.S. where poverty & homelessness have been on the rise.
The US is now 350 million and poverty and homelessness is a direct result of massive uncontrolled immigration of poor and uneducated people at the same time the same policy makers passed job and wage-killing trade agreements. Canada makes people wait for months to see a specialist. Wealthy Canadians come to the US for those services. France requires people to have supplemental insurance. England's Healthcare system is imploding. Japan is a no immigration country. Germany is also groaning under its more recent massive immigration policies. But all of these countries laud and support capitalism.
After listening carefully to this interesting interview with Dr. Mate, It confirmed my suspicion that definitely I am abnormal. That is, above normal, because I have all I need and wish and this makes me the richest man on earth. In my youth I learned the philosophy of the Buddha which teaches that desire is the source of all suffering and I oriented my life accordingly to those principles.
British Columbia is our Pacific Coast and Quebec controls access to the Atlantic. They are Green and democratic socialist.
Alberta and Saskatchewan produce petroleum and have access thru Chicago and Galveston and no pipelines will go through either costal province.
Pompeo already claimed our Northwest passage to China and India.
Quebec and British Columbia reject American neoliberalism and Dr Matte's book is inspiring but remember British Columbia is rich. Very very rich in all that America holds sacred.
Alberta is an American colony as is Saskatchewan and Dallas and Houston have more say than Trudeau and Ottawa.
Is it not written that "It is no measure of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society."?
I like your cat.
I am a cat. The photo is a recent selfie.
Doctor Matte lives in Vancouver British Columbia. They have a Democratic Socialist government in one of the world's most expensive and appealing cities in an America where the wealth gap makes Vancouver prohibitively expensive.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vancouver
Vancouver is what China and India are most afraid of.
Canada is a federation of sovereign states and British Columbia is rich beyond imagination.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Columbia
Why would China and India be most afraid of Vancouver?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vancouver
Vancouver is filled with Vancouverites
They speak, Mandarin, Cantonese, Punjabi, English and French and look like the World and the city is incredibly prosperous and well run.
The children all play hockey, soccer and baseball together.
The city is Democratic Socialist and progressive.
It is what America was supposed to be.
The whole is greater than the sum of its parts.
Hong Kong is no more.
New York, London, Paris, and Moscow are yesterday. Yesterday is gone.
We live together or we die together.
It is 2022 and as Walt Kelly's said
"We have met the enemy and he is us"
Vancouver is the world and British Columbia was never a conquering Empire.
There are other cities that work like Seattle but Seattle is American and Vancouver is the world.
What a family! What a Dad. Tangentially, after being 100% social media free, I opened an ‘anonymous’ Instagram account two months ago. What I found crystallized everything wrong with our society. It’s a bottomless cesspool of manipulation, greed, and control. Subtle things: constant badgering to‘access my photos and contacts’ (to enhance my user experience); endless worship of shiny baubles few can afford.
Everyone should try it. It’s not enough to know how bad “social media’ is. It must be experienced. And it’s all cushioned in cute animal videos to make us forget how vile are the thinking and tactics of ruling class.
I am all in favor of ditching social media and I am opposed to exploitation of cats.
I believe my cats share the same philosophy.
Most of us do.
I trust you. I'm no going to try social media!
Two people I admire the most in the world having a conversation. Thank you. Amazing dialogue.
That was my exact reaction! I am waiting for The Myth Of Normal , should get it today.
Fascinating interview.
Dr. Maté's observations about the effects of our consumer culture--including the idea that happiness comes from somewhere or something outside ourselves--ring true. Also wish more docs took seriously his point about the link between physical illness & emotion.
Thank You Chris. I sure appreciate this report
Wonderful discussion, reminding me of the work of psychologist Alice Miller. She and Gabor Maté have a similar perspective about trauma and its long-term effects.
Such a great podcast episode, way too short! I could have listened to the two of you for a few more hours. Will you do a follow-up with Gabor Mate, please?
The reason why Gabor cried was because his diaper was full of crap, just like the practice of Psychiatry is full of crap and crappy thinking.
Tangentially related to this, is Gene's view of the Body as an Interaction, rather than something separate from the environment.
He discusses the ways in which the Body knows more about trauma and grieving and disturbances than our conscious mind does.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lvjpT2pI2_Q
I just wrote a comment in an other Substack that included my theory for why liberals are attracted to scarcity policy when it is clearly destructive to the whole. I wrote:
"My liberal friends all seem to be plagued with abundant socioeconomic competition stress. I see this attraction to scarcity policy as simply supporting their interest to neuter “the others” in their community that they would otherwise feel inferior to or threatened by. Liberals are made nervous by economic dynamism because they are wired risk-averse. They seek to calm their nerves by shutting it all down."
A quote from this podcast:
"The engine of capitalism, defined by the cult of the self, thrives on the fostering of psychological and physical chronic disorders, including high blood pressure, diabetes, anxiety, depression, addictions and suicide. It rewards the core traits of psychopaths: superficial charm, grandiosity, and self-importance; a need for constant stimulation, a penchant for lying, deception, and manipulation, and the inability to feel remorse or guilt. Personal style and personal advancement are mistaken for individualism, equated falsely with democratic equality. We have a right, in the cult of the self, to get whatever we desire. We can do anything, even belittle and destroy those around us, including our friends, to make money, to be happy, and to become famous. Once fame and wealth are achieved, they become their own justification, their own morality. How one gets there is irrelevant. The consequence of this dark ethic, Dr. Maté illustrates, plays out on our bodies, severely damaging our psyches, and pushing us towards individual and social self-annihilation."
Funny, but I don't have any of these problems above. I am energized and made more calm and happy in a system of capitalism vs a system of collectivist authoritarianism to make everything "fair". My sense is that the people that would buy-in to the junk above are really just socioeconomic malcontents lacking confidence or otherwise having failed at a go in the private economy. They are projecting their own psychological dysfunction for feeling left out and rejected onto others.
Here is a bit of advice... leave us the eff alone. If you don't like the competitiveness of the private economy in a free democratic capitalist system... then please get on a jet and move somewhere where your socialist utopia is thriving. But stop the attempts to destroy what we have built just because you are a loser and looter living off the spoils of those of us that risk our savings and work 80 hours a week to build a business.
That you think we we live in a "free democratic capitalist system" and not an "inverted totalitarian oligarchy" is just as cute as a puppy.
It's also adorable that people on the right throw around Group-think like it's not their exclusive mode of operation. Your ideas are as outmoded as Tucker's old bowtie. Jesus Guns Babies... fetish anyone?
Maybe you fancy yourself unna dem newfangled libertarians? If so, was it really NAFTA that ruined US economy? Or the fact that those jobs did not require actual skill and therefore could be moved to locations with orders of magnitude lower cost basis or automated? The old dynamic marketplace dynamo-ed right out from under a generation of people who couldn't cut it and did nothing to adapt to the new reality of a tech and information-driven service industry.
I could go on... but your 'job creating' ass would just get more huffy and puffy trying to peg me on some lamentable place in your 'spectrum' (dividing the world up into acceptable vs deplorable teams and labels is the simpleton's great shortcut to life, you're well on your way to success!)
Ah yes. One of you. John Fetterman types? New fangled ideas that are just repacked junk proven failed… always. Good thing we lacked that free market capitalism otherwise what marvelous machine would exist to type your Bernie Bros demands?
Like I said, simpleton's refuge... care to provide anything remotely substantive from my actual text that would suggest this slightly left of center, would-be-Christian-Democrat-in-Germany political affiliation? Care to counter any of the actual points I made? Yeah... didn't think so... So goes the rugged individualism of the cookie cut goober.
Like most people in this country, the propaganda echo chambers have broken you. You think the 'other side', which (just like yours) is bankrupt of ideas, feckless, and completely ill-equipped to face modern problems, is the existential threat. You think 'your side' is right, has been proven by history, and all the ills in the world stem from those evil 'others'. Mostly, you think you've come to this thru some journey to truth laid out special for you. Versus believing what your daddy believed because his head was filled with the last generation's propaganda jizz (or, on occasion, believing the opposite because he was a dick.. still not very original).
Really you're just getting punched in the neck by the same people. It's a class war you dolt... you're the cannon fodder. Keep taking the simpleton's refuge tho... if someone doesn't agree (Look how smart I are! I can guess what team you are and tell you that team stinks!)
Naw. No echo chambers for me. Why the hell do you think I subscribe here and comment… and have “conversations” with people like you?
Yes there is class war. But there is more than that. It is WWW-III and I argue against the ideas of the enemy.
There are no enemies, only things you fear.
Keep at it pup... maybe try being a little more courageous with your love. Trust me, I know from experience... at the end of your days, you will judge yourself with infinite wisdom not on your words (and your 'battles' with 'enemies') but on how well and how often you loved. In the end, in an every moment, we are all fools who know very little in the grand scheme.
Maybe try a more productive tact if you want to have a 'conversation'. Jumping into a liberal substack and baiting people with half-baked commentary is kinda like farting in the elevator then asking about the weather...
"There are no enemies"
And you call me the "pup"! You mistake love/hate for criticism of ideology. You see, this is a common malady of those owning the fucked up ideology. They frankly cannot escape this hell of their hair catching fire over criticism of their political identity. Frankly, they are people that cannot handle much of any criticism and that tend to be weak at self-awareness. You can criticize all the parts of my ideological beliefs and I am good with that. But what you do is go personal. that is the hallmark of a fragile political pup.
What you mean by demonstrating love is that I make them feel better about themselves and their fucked up ideology. I am here to learn. Tell me what you believe and why it makes sense... using real math and real facts... and not just your strong emotions... and if it calculates and makes sense, I am going to agree. But to be soft on you that hold the most absurd and wrong mythological media-powered memes of ideological symbolism... well no. I have to call that crap. And consider that the lack of calling that crap over the years is why you and others actually believe these radical ideas have any merit. ESG and DEI my ass.
The billionaire oligarchs through their Wall Street trillion dollar asset management companies own the media and have connected with the campus critical theory wokeist radicals and the Democrat political establishment... and all of this is connected to the WEF Great Reset cabal... are the enemy of the US and western civilization. You are either with them or against them. There is no middle ground.
We don't have a healthy system today because of the previous work of the enemy. But those that exploit the mess to advocate for more destruction and nihilism of the system because of what is broken... well they are either the enemy or they are stupidly aiding and abetting the enemy.
Nope. Not missed at all. You too have demonstrated the very traits outlined in my post. So too your liking group-think friends.
I will ask the question I always ask and always get crickets in return.
What, if the US system is so terrible, is the model we should adopt? What other country past and present do you point to as the model of utopia you think we should be?
If it does not exist, then it is your irrational fantasy.
"If it does not exist, then it is your irrational fantasy." Do you mean like the United States did not exist at one time?
So Canada is the model that the US should follow? Before I respond to that idea, is that the ONLY one?
Franklee the absurdity of Frank Lee's discussion illustrates why American's are divided.
Sandra was suckered (as I am now) into responding to a fight picker claiming one side is right, the Right, so fight!
Love is the answer Gabor speaks clear truth. Why divide?
Shun divisiveness people!
Reduce pain have compassion
Attempt to enjoy life collectively.
Now I'll take flight from the fight from the wrong. Ciao
Nations that allow citizens to live free from fear of being ruined by their medical bills (result of our perverse, profit-centered healthcare system) include not only Canada but France, Germany, England, Japan, Taiwan, etc. These have strong social democracies, unlike the U.S. where poverty & homelessness have been on the rise.
The US is now 350 million and poverty and homelessness is a direct result of massive uncontrolled immigration of poor and uneducated people at the same time the same policy makers passed job and wage-killing trade agreements. Canada makes people wait for months to see a specialist. Wealthy Canadians come to the US for those services. France requires people to have supplemental insurance. England's Healthcare system is imploding. Japan is a no immigration country. Germany is also groaning under its more recent massive immigration policies. But all of these countries laud and support capitalism.
After listening carefully to this interesting interview with Dr. Mate, It confirmed my suspicion that definitely I am abnormal. That is, above normal, because I have all I need and wish and this makes me the richest man on earth. In my youth I learned the philosophy of the Buddha which teaches that desire is the source of all suffering and I oriented my life accordingly to those principles.
So much that needs explaining.
Canada is federation of sovereign nations.
British Columbia is our Pacific Coast and Quebec controls access to the Atlantic. They are Green and democratic socialist.
Alberta and Saskatchewan produce petroleum and have access thru Chicago and Galveston and no pipelines will go through either costal province.
Pompeo already claimed our Northwest passage to China and India.
Quebec and British Columbia reject American neoliberalism and Dr Matte's book is inspiring but remember British Columbia is rich. Very very rich in all that America holds sacred.
Alberta is an American colony as is Saskatchewan and Dallas and Houston have more say than Trudeau and Ottawa.
It is hard to bribe Quebec or British Columbia their citizens are far wealthier than your average American serf or vassal.
Good healthcare, good education and freedom and democracy are a benefit of citizenship.