 Everybody tonight, we're debating veganism on trial and we're starting right now with Philip, our vegetarian guest who is on your right side of the screen folks. Philip, thanks for being here on the floor is all yours. Thank you James for having me. Thank you Richard for talking with me and thank you everyone that is watching. Okay, so vegans want us by virtue of being non-vegan to defend factory farming. When in reality, vegans have to demonstrate that consumers are responsible for an industry's actions. When buying a ticket to a Hollywood movie, do we ask moviegoers to defend the exploitation and sexual abuse that occurs in Hollywood? Are moviegoers now responsible for rape and sexual exploitation because they bought a movie ticket? The burden of proof is on the vegans to show that consumers are responsible for every single action that an industry partakes in and vegans have never substantiated this. Once vegans have attempted to substantiate the claim that consumers are responsible for every action an industry partakes in, then what you'll see me do in this debate is to apply that same reasoning to other areas. I will apply their own reasoning as to why it is immoral to consume eggs, to why is immoral to have a demand for a wide variety of products from clothing, to gasoline, to excess foodstuffs. You will notice that the very same reasoning they use to justify why buying eggs is immoral can be used to justify why buying unnecessary clothing, gasoline, excess calories is also immoral. Yet vegans claim that avoiding these products isn't obligatory. This is where veganism reaches a contradiction. If vegans claim we are responsible for the harms in industrial practices, then they too are responsible for the harms when they engage in hedonistic or recreational consumerism. Therefore, veganism logically leads to consumerist minimalism. But vegans believe that you don't have to be a consumer minimalist to be vegan, even when their own reasoning leads to that conclusion. So put it into perspective, if everyone in the United States cut, for example, 500 calories every day from wheat, there would be 165 trillion less calories for wheat in demand every single day. Divide that by approximately four million calories per acre of wheat farmland. You're looking at 41,250 acres of farmland that wouldn't have existed due to demand. Studies show that there are hundreds of millions of animals per acre of farmland, which come out to tens of thousands of animals that wouldn't be exposed to pesticides per person per day if everyone just cut 500 calories from wheat from their daily diet. This is just an example. The calories can be from anything, but vegans don't accept this. They don't believe it is obligatory to cook calories. The average male can survive and thrive on just 2,500 calories a day. Therefore, by vegan reasoning, anything above that level per day makes you culpable for animals harmed in pesticide use. However, I see vegans consume an absurd number of calories per day. I've seen vegans live in huge houses that consume a lot of electricity per day, electricity fueled by fossil fuels which harms animals, drive in their cars and fly planes for countless hours, vehicles powered by gasoline produced from ethanol from corn production and have huge wardrobes full of their favorite clothing they buy weekly made from cotton production. You don't need to eat, you need to eat to survive, but you don't need to eat a large excess number of calories to survive. You need shelter to survive, but you don't need a big house with large amounts of electricity to survive. You arguably need clothing to survive, but you don't need a huge wardrobe that is updated weekly. Vegans claim that unnecessary harm that comes from dairy and eggs is immoral, yet believe that harm that comes from unnecessary consumer's behaviors is morally acceptable. I don't see the consistency there. To wrap it up, the difference between me and a vegan is this, I believe that harm done in industrial practice is wrong. It's terrible. However, I am unconvinced that consumers bear responsibility for every single harm conducted by people in an industry. It's up to the vegans to prove this. The vegan believes that harm done in industrial practices is wrong and they believe they are responsible for it and yet they still continue to lead anistic consumers' lifestyles. Who's worse, you decide. Thank you. Thanks for that opening statement and we are going to kick it over to Vegans for his opening statement. Want to let you know in the meantime, folks, if it's your first time here at Modernity Debate, we are a neutral platform hosting debates on science, religion and politics and that includes juicy upcoming debates like what you'll see on the bottom right of your screen. Tom Jump and Vosh will be debating next week on the super straight debate. So you don't want to miss it. Hit that subscribe button and that notification bell so you don't miss it. And with that, we're gonna kick it over to Vegan Gains. Thanks so much for being with us again. Richard, the floor is all yours. Right, so anytime you're going to commit violence on another human or another creature, I think that violence has to be justified. I think most of us would agree that unnecessary violence committed against a human being is wrong and I think the logical extension to that is we should apply the same principle to animals. I don't see a big enough distinction or a meaningful distinction between humans and animals where unnecessary violence is unjustified against a human but it is justified against an animal. When you pay for meat, dairy or eggs, I believe you are responsible for the practices committed by the industry. I will point out that it is a straw man that you're responsible for every action committed by the industry but you are certainly responsible for what you're paying for. If the product is suffering death, murder, then you certainly are responsible for that product and the practices that go in to producing that product. And let's just kick it off there. That's my opening statement. You gotta think very much, Richard. And wanna let you know folks, Vegan Gains is linked in the description. I highly encourage you if you haven't yet, you can click on that link down below. Philip does not currently have a link and that's why it says no link at the moment but with that we're going to jump into the open conversation and so thanks so much gentlemen, the floor is all yours. Yeah, so thank you for that. I wanna start off with a question because I just want to understand since you say that consumers aren't responsible for every single harm partake in an industry, I just wanna see which harms do consumers, which harms are responsible by consumers, right? So when you buy like a cupcake, right, a vegan cupcake from a man who abuses his family, are you responsible for abusing his family? No, so here's the distinction you used like Hollywood. We know that there's a lot of sexual abuse that goes on in Hollywood. These are personal choices made by individuals that aren't directly related to the product you're buying, which is the movie. So if, let's say a Hollywood producer chooses to sexually abuse some of the actors or actresses, you're not paying for that. What you're paying for is the movie production. Now, in contrast to that, when you're paying for meat, dairy, eggs, the product that you are buying is murder. You are essentially hiring a hitman to kill these animals for you. That's literally the product. So anything related to that, like keeping these animals contained in confined cages, the abuse that's related to some of their treatment in these confined conditions, and the actual murder itself, like their throats getting slit open, that is literally what you're paying for. You're paying for this to happen. So that's the difference. The difference is in the Hollywood context where you're buying a movie, you're not commissioning for anyone to be raped, whereas in the animal agriculture context, you are. That is literally what you're paying for. I guess the best analogy I could use in a human context is paying for a hitman. If we're going to be ridiculous and say that you're responsible for every single action that's perpetrated within an industry, then I guess, oh wait, well, first of all, I want to point out this is a two-quo-quie fallacy. So claiming that one harm committed by an industry justifies another that's just a two-quo-quie fallacy, that is literally a two-quo-quie fallacy. So you're basically saying- Well, no, I never justified my actions by saying, oh, you did the action as well. I'm merely agnostic about the actions for an industry. It's up to you to prove that you're responsible for it, right? Okay, I see what you're saying. So yeah, in a human context, if you're paying for a hitman, you would say that the person hiring a hitman is morally responsible for what the hitman does, similar in the animal agriculture context. Since if you're buying a movie ticket, you're not commissioning a woman to be raped, you're just paying for a movie, you're not responsible for any potential rape or sexual abuse that happens within Hollywood. Okay, so when I buy an egg, what am I paying for? Okay, so you're paying for animals to be forcibly bred. You're paying for male chicks to be thrown into a blender while they're fully conscious. You're paying for female chicks to be kept in confined spaces their entire life. And then once they can't produce- Wait, wait, wait, I'm not done. I'm not done, I'm not done. And then once they can't produce eggs anymore, once they cannot produce eggs anymore, or not at a rate that's financially beneficial for the industry, they're murdered. That's what you're paying for. And what if I say whenever you buy a movie ticket, you're paying for an intern who just wants to have a dream in Hollywood, but she has to suck 20 dicks to get an internship, right? What if I claim that you're paying for that? Okay, well, you'd have to actually demonstrate that you're paying for that. Great, so demonstrate that when I buy an egg, I'm paying for chickens to be thrown down a blender or trapped in a cage. Because that's literally what is required to produce the product. No, you need to put a chicken in a small cage to produce an egg. Yes, if you're talking about, if you're talking, if you look at the majority of egg production, these are on factory farms. You're talking about nearly 100% of an egg production. One sec, wait a second, wait a second, you need a second in a cage. One sec, Phillip, I do wanna hear the rest of it, Richard, I promise to put it back to you. So when you're looking at animal agriculture, you're looking at nearly 100% of farming occurring on factory farming. And in order to meet industry demands, these farming practices have to be in place for it to be economically viable. So when you're buying eggs from a grocery store, yes, it is part of the product for these baby chicks to be thrown in a blender because they're not useful to the industry. If they're kept alive, it would waste money. It is necessary to keep these hens in confined spaces and it's necessary to kill these hens once they can't produce any more eggs or at a rate that's not financially beneficial for the industry. All of these things happen and they have to happen in order to produce eggs. And what I'd ask you also is would you be okay with treating human beings in such a way? If you wouldn't be in favor of treating human beings in such a way and you'd be against paying for an industry that treats human beings like this, then I don't see how you can be logically consistent being vegetarian. Okay, well, I'm gonna respond to your previous point that you need to put a chicken in a cage in order to produce an egg. You don't need to do that. You said it's required to do that. You don't need to. There's no chicken in a cage in nature when they produce an egg, right? So that's just demonstrably false. When your other justification was that nearly 100% of the time it happens, well, I guess you say the same thing about Hollywood, nearly 100% of the time it happens, if that's your justification. Please provide for it. If that's your justification for why consumers are responsible for that, then that can be also applied to Hollywood. It can also be applied to pesticide use, right? That's a more better example, right? For all the unnecessary crops that vegan dudes, right? That can also be applied, right? So there's not really any, you wanna say economically viable. Well, I'm only responsible for my own demand, right? I'm not responsible for everybody else's demand. I can agree that in order to be economically viable for everybody's demand collectively, then yeah, we should move towards eliminating factory farming from my own demand to produce that. You don't need to be economically viable at all. You just need a chicken and an egg. Now, if you then add to address your question, if it was humans, yeah, it's totally wrong. Just like I think that's totally wrong with chickens. Now, what's the argument because you've not provided an argument for why consumers are responsible for that? Because everything you've provided, it can be applied to other areas as well with movie tickets, with excess calories. It can be applied to clothing you don't need. The, your same reasoning can be applied to those areas. And unless you're willing to bite the bullet and say that I need to be a minimalist in order to be consistent, then I don't think you're gonna get anywhere. Okay, so tell me if I pay for a hitman to kill you, am I morally responsible for that? Of course. Okay, so then when you buy eggs where you know the female hens laying these eggs are going to be murdered once they can't produce eggs anymore, are you not responsible for that? Well, yeah, because I'm only paying for an egg. I'm not paying for murder or anything else. I'm paying for an egg. Whereas if you pay a hitman, you're paying for murder. You're actually actively engaging and the hitman's actions is an extension of your whip. Whereas if I pay for a cupcake and some guy rapes a girl and I'm not responsible for that rape, just because it happens. If I pay for an egg, I'm not responsible for people kicking on, kicking chicken's heads open for branding them. I'm not responsible for baby chicks being thrown out of blender because that's not entailed with the egg. I do a very simple process, right? I ask myself the question between what is consumer responsibility and what is pure industry responsibility, right? I ask myself in the process of procurement do you have to inflict harm in order to extract the item from its source? And if you have to inflict harm in order to extract the item from its source, let's say that's why I'm vegetarian with meat then you are responsible for that, right? But for eggs, for dairy, you do not have to inflict harm. This is the same with pesticide use and everything. I agree that it's terrible and we should move to eliminate that. But unless you provide an actual argument for why consumers are responsible for that, then you're not gonna convince anybody. Okay, so I could, I have like three things to say about this potentially. I'll go over two of the things, I think. Let's say hypothetically, you pay, let's say a mercenary, maybe not necessarily a hitman, to steal something from someone. Now, let's say this thing could be a car. Maybe we could use an Old West example. If you stole somebody's horse, that could potentially kill them because they need that horse to actually get around to get food, supplies, water. If you steal somebody's horse, that's essentially killing them. So if I were to pay somebody to steal somebody's horse, I am paying them to steal the horse, not to kill them, but in doing so that would kill them. So are you saying that I wouldn't be responsible for somebody's death if I were to commission somebody to steal, essential property from someone? Well, yeah, so this is where I asked that question, right? Do you have to inflict harm when extracting the atom from its source, right? The characteristics of the source play a part in it, right? So in this case, the characteristics of the source is that the man does not want this horse to be stolen from him, right? The man does not want that to happen. So in order to take the horse from him, harm is necessarily entailed with that, right? You have to inflict harm, whereas if someone is indifferent, like someone says, I don't really care if you steal that horse or not. And then I pay someone to take the horse, I don't see anything wrong with that, but in relation to dairy and eggs, in just taking dairy from a cow or taking an egg from a chicken, from what I've seen, I live near farms all the time. They don't care. They don't care. I could throw a golf ball and they protect that egg or I can take an egg from them. They don't really care, right? Cows even move towards farmers to get milked. So if they're indifferent towards taking their products away from them, then I don't see any responsibility. That's pretty much it. Okay, so wait, you mentioned harm has to be entailed? My question is in the process, do you have to inflict harm in order to extract the item from its source? Okay, well, wait, you mentioned specifically, harm has to be entailed. Well, if I said, I don't know if you're trying to go with a logical route, but my question, whenever I ask, is a consumer responsible? Is if in the process, do you have to inflict harm in order to extract the item from its source? That's my criteria for what consumers are responsible for. Okay, so when that is in fact an industry process, would you not say then, yes, it has to be done? What part of the process of an egg production has to be done in order to? Well, it happens. Like the thing is, that is what happens. So if that is what happens, well, wait, wait, wait, wait. If that is what happens, then is that not what you're paying for? Like you could say hypothetically, we could in the future create some sort of technology like lab-grown meat. So in order to buy meat, well, we already have that technology actually. So you could say in order to buy meat, I don't necessarily have to kill any animals. So you could say eating meat is totally fine because we could hypothetically create lab-grown meat. So just because hypothetically, harm doesn't need to occur in order to purchase meat or an egg or dairy. The fact is that harm does happen and you are paying for, like you are literally commissioning that harm to be done. So I don't see how you could claim that, like just because hypothetically, harm doesn't necessarily have to occur. That means it's justifiable to pay for harm. So yeah, there's a few things there with the meat. So this is what the question I asked, right? I'm gonna keep coming back to this. This is my criteria. This is my line, right? In the process, do you have to inflict harm in order to extract the item from its source, right? If the source is lab-grown meat, then there's no harm in telling from that. If you're talking about a live animal, in order to extract meat from a live animal as it is today, you have to inflict harm. If you're talking about roadkill, the source is now different, right? You're talking about already dead animal. You do not have to inflict harm in order to extract the item from its source because the source is a non-sensit item. If we're talking about a non-sensit thing, then we're not talking about animal situation. Richard, I wanna ask you a question. When you- Wait, wait, wait, we're still on this. Well, no way, we're still on this. Lab-grown, the source of lab-grown meat is a live animal. Because this is called veganism on trial, right? This isn't vegetarian. Okay, well, the source of lab-grown meat is a live animal. Okay, gentlemen, just part of my interruption, but just want to, so what we can do is, if you wanna ask a quick question, Philip, we can do it, but it is true that both basically, not only me, but also the audience, a lot of us, to keep track of all the points that once is a challenge. So if you wanna ask a quick question to vegan gains and let them have a chance to give a response to what you had just said as well, we can do that, but- Yes, my apologies, James, I'm sorry. Yeah, my quick question, you can respond to what I said and then if you can answer my question. So you say that you're paying for harm because it happens, right? What about pesticide use from crop lands that are unnecessary because people demand an excess amount of calories, right? My question would be, because it happens, therefore your reasoning would conclude that you're also responsible for that harm, right? And therefore you are obligated to abstain from doing that. If that's true. So, okay, so no, okay, the issue with pesticides is a little complicated. We can get into that later. I'm happy to answer that question, but the source of lab-grown meat is a live animal. They have to, there's different techniques. You can use embryonic stem, no, I think they used to use embryonic stem cells. Now they use a different process. There is one process where they use muscle tissue biopsies from a live animal and infinitely grow the cell line. The source is a live animal. So if you're going to claim that, oh, because the source is different, well, the source is exactly the same. So because we have this technology with lab-grown meat where we can just grow a cell line from a live animal, just take a tissue biopsy, well then therefore it's okay to eat meat because we don't necessarily have to kill an animal in order to get meat. So if we're going to use that logic, then, okay, since the source is identical, then eating meat from any source is fine. Given your reason. If you want me to, if you want me to respond, yeah. So when you're talking about lab-grown meat, right, if you're talking about a single cell, right, if you're talking about a single cell extracting from an animal, then yeah, harm is not necessary until, but when you're talking about lab-grown meat, you're also putting other things into the meat as well, right, you're not taking, you're not talking about the meat in an animal. You're talking about a single cell and then you're- No, I'm not talking about a single cell. And you're growing it, right? Because you're not talking about a single cell. I'm not talking about a single cell. You're talking about a cell in an animal and then growing it from all the sources, right? So it's a completely different, there are two different products and they have to be evaluated in two different ways. And if you can answer the pesticide use, I could also appreciate that. No, so you claimed that because the source is different, like if we're talking about lab grown meat versus animal that's killed for meat, traditionally, therefore, it's not morally justifiable to pay for an animal to be killed, eat its meat. Well, the source is identical. You're talking about a biopsy. That's a collection of hundreds or thousands of cells. And ideally you'd wanna take multiple muscle tissue biopsies in case there's an issue with the cell line. So no, the source is identical. So because hypothetically, we don't need to kill an animal in order to get its meat, its flesh. Therefore, I could justify getting meat from just a normal factory farm because I could say, oh, well, hypothetically, this company could just make lab grown meat where they grow a cell line from multiple muscle tissue biopsies. Therefore, that's the industry's choice to kill animals, not mine. I could easily say that. Well, hypothetically, I'm not talking about hypothetically. I do diabetically in the real world because hypothetically, a magic wizard can pop by, snap his fingers and you have meat. Okay, well, cool. If you care about the real world, then the reality is, every single time you pay for eggs, when you eat dairy eggs, your plants and animals could be killed. Do you need to inflate harm in order to extract an item from its source? And in this process, from a live animal, you do, when you're talking about cultured meat, you're talking about an entirely different product. You're not talking about two products. One product where a cow has grown meat is entirely different from meat grown into a lab. You're just conflating the two. It's a false equivalency. I would like to move on to the pesticide argument because this is veganism on trial, not vegetarianism on trial. Yeah, so no, we're not done with this. You claimed that meat has to be extracted from a live animal. Well, I just gave you a technique where meat is extracted from a live animal via muscle tissue biopsy. And then you claimed, you claimed what, you claimed that, no, sorry. So your claim, correct me if I'm wrong, was that if you are paying, if what you're paying for is the, is basically a hit man and somebody who's ignition to kill an animal, that is what, that's what's wrong about it? Right off the bat, right off the bat, you're wrong. All right, let's just go one sec, Philip. I do wanna, let's just let Richard finish and I promise right before Richard comes back in. So could you explain to me why it's wrong to buy meat, but it's not wrong to buy an egg? Because I'm convinced that the consumer bears responsibility when they buy meat from a factory farm. So why is it, why are consumers not responsible for the unnecessary pesticides that come from their diet, but not from milk or eggs? Okay, we're not done with this issue. So I don't know why you're switching topics. Why don't you ever wanna go on the defense? We're not done with this issue. So I don't know why you're switching topics. All right, we do have to, let's give Richard a chance to actually respond. So you haven't like, I must have misunderstood you before, but like, could you explain why the consumer is responsible for an animal being killed when they buy meat, but they're not responsible for an animal being killed when they buy an egg or dairy products. Right, I've said this about five times now. I said in the process of procurement, right? So you're now in the process of procurement, do you have to inflict harm in order to extract the item from its source? When you're talking about a factory farming an animal versus a factory growing lab culture meat, the process is different. Therefore they require different moral evaluations. So in the process of procurement, the question is in the process of procurement, do you have to create harm? And if the answer is yes, then that product is a moral? Do you have to inflict harm in order to extract the item from its source? Okay, wait, let me just write that down. Do you have to inflict harm to extract the item from its source? I'll give you like a couple of minutes on this point, but I really wanna talk about the pesticide. Okay, so if you have to extract, so if you have to inflict harm to extract the item from its source, well, the fact is if you're paying for dairy or eggs from any commercial farm, then the answer would be yes, because that is happening. Whether or not something happens, doesn't mean it has to happen. When I flip a coin and it goes head, that doesn't mean it has to be heads, it just means it is heads. You're talking about, like you're talking about a hypothetical fantasy world where, oh, this particular farm, no, you're talking about a fantasy world. Oh, well, if this particular farm chose to completely change its industry practices, then maybe you could make this argument, but the fact is they're doing this. They're doing it. I'm only talking about what the consumer is responsible for and that's what I believe what the consumer is responsible for. Do you have an actual argument to counter that or are you just gonna claim this? Yeah, well, I'm making the argument. So your question is, do you have to inflict harm to extract the item from its source? Well, if you look at virtually every single commercial farm today, the answer would be yes. Like your only argument against this is, oh, well, in a hypothetical reality where these farms completely changed their industry practices and that would be no, but the fact is they are using these practices to get the most profit possible so that their businesses are viable and that these are the practices that they chose to use to be as economically viable as possible. So all of these actions that they're doing, like killing baby chicks by calling them in some way, like blending them alive or suffocating them, keeping hens and confined cages and then eventually murdering them once they can't produce eggs, these are all things that did end up happening that you had to do to get the product. Yeah, I just don't, I've never encountered someone who doesn't know the difference between what happens and what has to happen. If you wanna move on because I just don't know where to go. Okay, well, if you're gonna use the standard, well, in a hypothetical fantasy world where our industry has completely changed their practices, then eating meat is justified, then eating meat is justified because we have technologies where we can grow lab grown meat. So in a hypothetical reality, all of these slaughterhouses, they could just switch to making lab grown meat. So I'm not responsible for these industry practices because hypothetically they can change their practices, correct? You say the same thing about Hollywood, hypothetically it's not required to use sexual exploitation, but it still happens, right? So one was the last time you watched the movie, one was the last time you ate a calorie that you didn't need to consume, right? With pesticides, maybe it doesn't have to use pesticides, but you know what happens, right? Therefore you're required to restrict your calories, right? You're required to give a bodybuilding because it requires you to eat an excess amount of calories, right? You know what happens though. How does this relate to your reasoning and like the logical contradiction that's created? Whatever your reasoning is to justify why eating meat is immoral can be used to justify all kinds of consumers' behaviors. Wait, say that again? The same reasoning you justify, the same reason that you used to justify why eating meat is immoral can be applied to other consumers' behaviors. So if it's in unnecessary consumers' behaviors and in the process there is harm, therefore you are accountable for that harm, therefore you should be a minimalist consumer. So when you eat an excess amount of calories to sustain your bodybuilding diet, we should say, hey, I'm a bodybuilder too, like I understand, but I'm not the one claiming that consumers are responsible for that, right? So if you're claiming that consumers are responsible because there's harm in the process of doing it because it happens because in some fantasy world they might not happen, but it happens therefore we're responsible for it, then you have to restrict your calories because that's contributing to unnecessary cropland in which pesticides are literally burning insects alive because of it. Yeah, so I think you're strawmanning me. I don't think that we have a moral obligation to maximize well-being or minimize harm to the greatest extent, right? So I don't see how you can even make this argument. I see it internally, I just see your reasoning internally inconsistent. If you're going to claim that, just because hypothetically harm doesn't need to... I know you said hypothetically, that's a strong rule. Well, you literally are. You're literally using, you're literally strong. You're literally using hypothetically, you're saying that because, you didn't say that specifically, but that's what's entailed in what you're saying. Say it again, just repeat your argument again because harm doesn't necessarily need to be inflicted to extract from its source. So hypothetically, because when you buy an egg, you don't need to necessarily kill baby chicks. You don't necessarily need to keep the hens in confined spaces. You don't necessarily need to kick. Yeah, so all hypothetically, the reality is that's happening and you're commissioning for it to occur. I'm sorry about that, James. I'll keep it down a little bit. Okay, I enjoy muting you as I go ahead. No, I understand, man. I appreciate it. Yeah, so Richard, I forgot, I just completely zoned out with what you're saying. So why aren't consumers responsible for the pesticide use that they contribute to unnecessary? Okay, so we have to eat some type of food. I'd say the most ethical source of food would be plants. If we don't use pesticides, we're going to have to massively increase farmland. And from what I see, pesticides are a better option. And I also don't have this idea where we have to absolutely maximize or minimize to the greatest extent possible the amount of harm we produce. I think if we're gonna have the stance where we have to minimize calories to the greatest extent or reduce travel to the greatest extent possible, do all these things. I mean, eventually you're going to have to say everyone should be a slave to one another or maybe we should all kill ourselves to minimize the harm we produce. Like I don't believe in this idea that we should minimize things to the greatest extent possible to maximize well-being. Well, I never mentioned anything about maximizing well-being. I'm just trying to apply your reasoning for how a consumer is responsible to other areas, right? So when you talk about crop land, I agree. We do need crop land to survive. We don't need as much crop land as we do to survive. Like I said, if we cut, if everybody in the world cuts 500 calories, you can reduce acreage by a lot and saving hundreds of millions of animals, right? So you would argue that that's unnecessary, right? And therefore, if it's unnecessary harm, then you're responsible for it and therefore you're obligated to cut that out of your lifestyle, right? I'm not talking about unnecessary. If it's necessary, sure, it's necessary to eat. It's unnecessary to eat 4,000, 5,000 calories a day. It's necessary to have a shelter. It's necessary to have a mansion consuming a lot of electricity, right? So where do you draw the line? Where would I draw the line on these ethical issues? Yeah, the issue I have is if we're going to take the stance that we should minimize to the greatest extent possible to maximize wellbeing, you're probably going to end up doing more harm because you're just going to massively reduce free will. Like you're going to end up in a society where everyone has to like be a slave to one another or you're going to have no sovereignty. You're not going to be able to make any personal choices. So that's why I'm against that. Where I draw the line is if you're actually paying for a Holocaust, which is what you're doing. When I, okay, so- Let me ask you this. No, wait, can I, let me respond to that. Sure. And I'll let you ask me questions. When you saying like your restricts freedoms, I mean like I've seen carnists make that same mistake, same argument over and over again. I don't even know how you can say that with a straight face. And then when you're talking about, you're paying for a Holocaust, I mean, that's just words. I can say you're paying for a pesticide Holocaust every day to even maybe even a greater extent. If we judge sentience by equals to each other, you're paying for hundreds of millions of animals to be brutally killed and pesticide. You're not even just insects, but also birds living nearby fish where the pesticides are dumped downstream, thousands, hundreds, thousands, millions of fish affected by pesticide use. I can say you're paying for a Holocaust as well, yet you're the one claiming that we were responsible, that you have nothing to do, then what's stopping a mediator from saying, oh, you know, it's justified as well because it restricts my personal freedoms. It's not a good argument. No, okay, so I make, I see a huge moral distinction between pesticide use and literally paying for a Holocaust. We have to use pesticides. If we don't use pesticides, then we massively have to increase farmland. And I'd say that would probably result in more animals being killed as opposed to saved. So this is just the best moral option we have. And if you're talking about, okay, well, you don't have to eat as much food as you do. You don't have to travel as much as you do. You don't have to like, you know, buy a computer or whatever. Like you're talking about restricting personal freedoms. To just such an extent, where I think that would just, you know, massively reduce overall wellbeing. So that's why I'm against that. But I was going to ask you before, if hypothetically we were raising human beings, so we'd forcibly breed human beings, we would like, let's just say hypothetically, humans could lay eggs, like technically we can. We can use women to extract their eggs so that we can make children or something. Let's say women just laid normal chicken eggs. So would it be ethical to have an industry, like an egg industry, but a human egg industry, where we force humans to breed. We kill all the males because they don't lay eggs. Then we keep women in confined spaces. And then once they can't produce any more eggs, we kill them. Would you say somebody paying for that? Paying for that to happen, they're not morally responsible for it? Well, I disagree with the premise that you're paying for it to happen. I don't believe paying for an item means you're paying for everything that an industry does. And if you ask me if it's more acceptable to buy a product from that industry, I would just say I'm agnostic about it until I think about it some more or if someone provides an item for it. So the answer would be, yes, you don't have a problem with somebody paying for humans to be enslaved, used for commodities and killed. This is the problem with these emotional... It's a yes or no question. It's a yes or no question. If humans were being treated like this... If humans were being treated... It's a yes or no question. It's a yes or no question. If humans were being treated in the same way where they're being raped, used for their commodities and killed, would you not be against anybody paying for that to happen? Would I not be? I don't know if I would be or not. I would have to think about it some more. You're not sure if you'd be against human slavery and murder. I am against humans, everybody, when I'm already in it. Okay, so then the answer would be yes, you would have a problem with it. James, I respect Richard. I would do not try to interrupt him. It's weird how you're having trouble answering a yes or no question and you just end up Philip Buston. So it's a yes or no question. Did you have the chance to ask the question, Philip, on the earlier one that I think you had asked, Richard, which was on the pesticides question? Right, I did ask the question. He addressed it a little bit, but he keeps trying to accomplish that one. I already answered the question. Was it a single question or is it the same one? I'm trying to go back to the pesticide use, but he just keeps trying to make me try to make a position that I don't adhere to. Okay, I'm just asking, I'm not trying to have you hold a position that you don't adhere to. I'm just asking you a yes or no question. And I'm answering you honestly. I would have to think about it because I don't really know. You'd have to think. You'd have to think about it if you would be against somebody paying for human slavery and murder. Obviously, if you're paying for it, I don't agree that you're paying for it, right? Okay, okay, I think I... If you're paying for a movie ticket, I don't agree that anybody who's... Okay, I think I understand that... Anybody who's ever bought a ticket to Pulp Fiction by your reasoning is therefore paying for Harvey Weinstein to rape a bunch of people. I don't think that's... Okay, so I think I understand... Also, if you're also buying excess amount of calories, eating 4,000 to 5,000 calories as well, you're paying for millions of insects to be slaughtered because, oh, it's my personal freedom. I think that's where your argument leads. Okay, so I think I understand the misunderstanding. Let's say you have two different scenarios. One, you buy eggs from a farm that does not kill their male chicks, that does not keep their chickens in tight confined spaces and does not kill their female hens. So realistically, the only harm that you could say that is being conducted is forced breeding, which I'm still against because it's still fundamentally exploitative. But let's say there's a hypothetical chicken farm that's being as ethical as possible, where they're not murdering any of their birds, they're just letting them live their full life expectancy and selling their eggs. Now, you have another farm that's a factory farm where they do standard industry practices where they murder the female, sorry, they murder the male chicks at birth basically by throwing them in a blender. They keep the chicks in a tight confined space their entire life. Then once they can't produce any more eggs, they murder them. Now, if you choose to pay for eggs from the factory farm where the chickens are treated horribly versus the farm where chickens are treated great, are you not supporting, are you not paying for that factory farming where the chickens are being horribly abused and murdered? I would say I'm agnostic towards it until you provide an argument that I am. Okay, cool, so let's, okay, we'll do. I answered your question, let me ask my question. No, you didn't answer my question. No, you didn't answer my question. No, you didn't answer my question. You just said, I don't know, which is absolutely bizarre. So let's put this in a human context. Let's say, no, let's put this in a human context. Let's say, let's say, let's say there's a cotton plantation that uses black slaves to produce the cotton. Let's say there's another plantation that uses normal workers who aren't forced to do labor without pay. Now, if you buy cotton from the plantation where slaves are forced to pick cotton and they're abused horribly, are you not morally responsible for promoting slavery and the way their workers are treated? I would say I'm agnostic towards it until you provide an argument. You're agnostic, okay, so you don't know either way if we should be buying from places that use human slaves. Yeah, because what's your gaming setup like, man? Like, isn't it like a one-intent chance when you buy an electronic, it's produced by child slaves in Florida Colton? I have no idea. You don't have to provide evidence. You're right. If you wanna ask me if slavery is wrong, then yeah, it is wrong. What's the argument then? Okay, so I'm just asking you, if you know full well that if you're buying from a particular place, there's a hundred percent chance you know the entire chain of production where you know that actual slaves, people who are forced to work without pay are working there, would you not be morally responsible for supporting that company and supporting slavery? I would say I'm agnostic towards it until you provide an argument that I am. You're agnostic to whether or not we should buy products that use human slavery? No, I believe that we should all collectively move towards ethical consumerism, but unless you provide an argument that consumers are responsible for industrial practices, then I'm agnostic towards it. Okay, so when there are completely, okay, so wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, when there are completely, wait, wait, let me ask you this, let me ask you this, wait, let me ask you this. All right, one sec. We're gonna jump in. Sorry, so just what we're gonna do is jump into two minute intervals, switch it back and forth. I like the energy, but it is we are having these collisions more often, so we will do this. I think there was a question, was the most recent question you had asked, I think from you, Vegan Gains. Yeah, okay, so if you have two perfectly viable options, it's not like, you know, it would affect you personally if you chose one or the other, like where one's way more expensive and it's harder to find. If you have two perfectly viable options, where if you buy from one company that you know uses human slaves or you have the option to buy from another company, that's selling the exact same product at the same price, but they use normal workers, you know, like just people who are paid, do you not have a moral obligation to buy from the factory that does not use slavery? You got two. For instance, I actually, oh, okay, sorry, is that it for me? You got two minutes to respond, unless you need less. Okay, okay, yeah, I probably need less. But pretty much, fuck, what was I going to say? Oh yeah, so in case of one instance, yeah, I believe that performing virtuous acts in one instance is a moral obligation, just like if there's a child drowning. But not at a grocery store. James, I thought I had two minutes. I got it, we're gonna give him two minutes. Okay, so just like if there's a child drowning in a pond, I believe even though you can't cause it, you are morally obligated to save that child. So if you are in a grocery store, at one instance, choosing between slavery, the product where you know the industry is a lot of slaves or versus an industry that doesn't, then yeah, I would say in that one instance, it is morally obligated, but if- Then you agree with me, cool, debate over, then you agree with me that veganism is a moral obligation, please close. You want to give a chance to finish. You didn't let me finish. If you're talking about every single day restricting your freedoms every single day to the full extent, just such as veganism for outcomes that I don't even are not convinced that you're obligated or that you're responsible for, like the harm, then I don't see it as a moral obligation. So yeah, if you're talking about maybe one day not buying a burger, but buying, or maybe one day not buying a burger, but buying a plant-based whopper, then yeah, I would say it is a moral obligation, but doing it consistently every single day restricting- You just debunked yourself. I've never seen such level of self-sacrifice. You literally just don't do it on yourself. Yeah, you literally just dunked on yourself, so it's a moral obligation for one day and not every other day. I promise we'll give you a chance to respond. There's only about 30 seconds left for Philip, and I promise we'll give you the full two minutes to kind of give the, to take the scalpel to Philip. So go ahead, Philip, you got 30 seconds left. Yeah, I just have one more thing to say. If you're talking about donating $5 one day to supporting a charity, right? I would say it is a moral obligation that one day to do it, but if you're talking about donating $5 or $10 or half your paycheck every single time you get paid, every single day, restricting your freedoms to that extent, then I would say, no, that's not a moral obligation until you prove that the actions of an industry, I am responsible for that. So yeah, maybe one instance, it is a moral obligation, restricting your freedoms, though. All right, two minutes for Richard. Right, so you literally just admitted that if you have two perfectly viable options where one option does not support slavery and one option does not support slavery, you're morally obligated to choose the option that does not support slavery. But then in the animal context, when you're paying for food, you said, oh, well only one day, like one single day, you're morally obligated to not support slavery and abuse. But every other day you're okay. Dude, you just dunked on yourself, you just created a huge contradiction. So if you're going to claim that if we have perfectly viable options and one option is supporting slavery, animal agriculture, abuse, murder, exploitation versus plant agriculture where you're not paying for, baby chicks to be ground alive in a blender, you're not paying for animals to get their throat slit open. Clearly, based on your own reasoning, since the plant option, the vegan option is totally viable, you have a moral obligation to be vegan. So you literally just dunked on yourself, dude. Okay, so you keep putting these words in like, I'm paying for slavery, paying for this, but you're not actually proving that I am, right? I'm paying for an egg, I'm paying for a t-shirt, I'm not paying for, just like when you buy a movie ticket, I'm gonna say this all the time. You know, if I buy a movie ticket to Pulp Fiction, I'm not paying for Harvey Weinstein to rape somebody, right? So, and let me ask you, this is a question, when you choose between a lifestyle between minimizing your calories to, what's only necessary to survive and thrive versus maximizing your calories because maybe you just like to eat a lot, 4,000, 5,000. One lifestyle, you have unnecessary suffering, insects and animals being killed, brutally murdered, their intestines are literally disintegrated right before their eyes. Versus a lifestyle where much of that is minimized to only what is necessary for you to survive, what's your requirement for choosing 5,000 calories, 4,000 calories versus what's minimum? Okay, I don't know why you're asking this when this issue is completely unresolved, like you won't concede. So you literally just claimed that if we have two viable options, one option supports slavery, one option doesn't, you're morally obligated to choose the option that doesn't support slavery. But then when we put this in an animal context where you could either pay for vegan options where animals don't have their throats lit open versus I don't know, eggs, dairy where animals do have their throats lit open, you claim that for one single day you have an obligation to eat vegan, can you explain like how many days, like how many days out of the year you have that obligation? Is it one, two, three, 10, 100? Can you explain to me how this works? Yeah, so this is just a complete straw man. If you're asking me that doing virtuous things is a moral obligation, then yeah, I would be. If you're walking on the street and someone is choking to death, then yeah, I would say in that instance you're morally obligated to save them, right? If you're talking about devoting your entire life, going to third world countries, restricting your entire life, saving a lot of people and then eventually just restricting your livelihood because of it. And yeah, I would say that's not a moral obligation. If you're talking about a line, I don't know where the line is, right? I just wanted people to be good people. That's a false analogy. Relax, okay. If they can be vegan for one day, then yeah, it's not convenient for them. Then yeah, I agree, it is a moral obligation. If you're talking about restricting one's freedoms to such a great degree for veganism, then yeah, especially when you have never substantiated that consumers are responsible for it, then yeah, I would say it's not a moral obligation. If you're talking about one day, two days, I can't answer that question for you. You literally just admitted that consumers are responsible for it. Everybody knows how much they can cut down and how much is severely inconvenient for them, right? You literally just admitted that consumers are responsible for it. When you're talking about 2500 calories versus a huge number of calories, where one lifestyle commits just for your own personal pleasure because you like food or you like to bodybuild, commits severe pains to millions of creatures. Whereas in another lifestyle of eating minimal calories, it only commits what is necessary for you to survive. What is your justification for not choosing one over the other? Okay, so you're just being incredibly dishonest. You literally admitted that you are morally responsible for the actions of the industry. I gave you a human analogy where there's a company that produces products that uses slaves versus a company that produces products without slavery. You said you're morally obligated to buy from the company that does not support slavery. So if you're going to claim that, then you are responsible for the actions of the industry. Like the issue, like here's the disconnect that we have here. You're claiming that just because hypothetically, in this fantasy realm, you could buy animal products where no harm is committed against the animal. The fact is harm is committed. You are paying for that harm to be commissioned. The issue isn't the intention. The issue isn't your intention. The issue is the end effect, the result of your actions. And you're just totally ignoring the actual effect of your actions and just thinking entirely whether or not you have good or bad intent. Well, your intent really doesn't matter here what matters is the effect of your action. The effect of your action is you're paying for a Holocaust, you're paying for baby chicks to be ground alive. You're paying for that to happen. So I don't see how you can claim that, I don't see how you can claim that you don't have a moral responsibility to not support that when in the human context you literally admitted that you do. So this just results in a contradiction. So the reason why I say it's a moral obligation in many, in some instances, right? Because I believe virtuousness is a moral obligation but you're not required to devote your entire life to virtuousness, right? Just like I'm gonna use the kid in a pond, right? You didn't push that kid in a pond but you are obligated to save them. That doesn't mean you're responsible for the kid being in the pond, right? So if it is very convenient to be vegan then yeah, sure, why not go vegan? If it's like so triply inconvenient for you to go vegan and yes, I can see it is a moral obligation. I do not think it's a moral obligation to restrict your freedoms for something that you have never substantiated that I am responsible for. You keep saying all these words that I'm paying for this, I'm paying for that but you've never provided an argument for any of this. And I just want the audience to know that I provided so many opportunities for him to talk about pesticide use but every single time he deflects, he dodges, he avoids the question because he knows that his entire reasoning when applied to pesticide use for restricting amount of calories is going to lead to contradiction. It's going to lead to absurdity. And I just want the audience to know that I just want them to point out that he's never, he's never, he's so scared of addressing that crazy. Yeah, so I literally already answered that question multiple times that the like, you literally just said if going vegan is triply inconvenient for you, then you have a moral obligation to go vegan. So can you tell me why it's not, like it's some sort of huge personal sacrifice for you to drink soy milk and eat tofu scramble? Yeah, it is inconvenient for me because I love eggs and a lot of things I get have small amounts of dairy in them or I don't drink dairy, like milk out of the gallon but a lot of times when I get a protein bar after the gym, it has dairy in it. And I think that vegan protein bars near here are just so fucking disgusting. And a lot of things- Okay, cool. So taste pleasure justifies all of that. A lot of things in dairy but this isn't, this is the title of this video is in what it still is life like, right? This is veganism on trial and every time I try to use your reasoning to apply to other scenarios, you try to get it back on me. You're so scared of defending your position that you always want to be on the offensive because you know that if you ever get on the defensive- So are you telling me supporting an animal holocaust is justifiable because of taste pleasure? So you're saying supporting insect holocaust because of pesticide use is justified because you like to eat a lot of calories. No, so, no, I already went over this. We have to eat- You did not. No, I did. So we have to eat food from somewhere. I'd say the most ethical sources of plant- You do not eat as much calories as you did. You have to put on source- I already answered this like three times already. We have to eat food from some source. Plant sources of food are obviously the best option. We need to use pesticides in agriculture because if we didn't, we'd have to use far more land than we do now to grow crops because we have so much crop loss. We do not eat as much calories as you do- Can you shut the fuck up so I can answer this for you for the fourth fucking time? If you're not answering the question- Philip, let's let him finish. Then if you want to give- I don't care, I don't care. I literally don't care about this bullshit. So could you explain to me why taste pleasure is justifiable? Is justified- No, tell me why taste pleasure is a justification to support a holocaust. Can you tell me why taste pleasure is a justification to support a holocaust? I don't use it as a justification because I don't say it's right or wrong, but you do say it's right. You literally just said it's wrong. You literally just said it's wrong. You literally just said veganism is a moral obligation. You literally just said veganism is a moral obligation. You literally just said veganism is a moral obligation if the inconvenience is trivial. So apparently taste pleasure isn't a trivial inconvenience. Can you explain to me why taste pleasure justifies a holocaust? Because I don't believe consumers are responsible for the actions of an industry. Okay, cool. We've proven that you do and don't support human slavery. You do and don't support animal agriculture. We've proven that you support the pesticides killing of a lot of animals. Okay, well, every time I answer this for you, you cut me off. So I don't know what the point is with me going over this for the fifth fund design. I'm literally answering it for you and every single time I'm trying to answer, you cut me off. So do you want me to explain this for the fifth time? Explain to me, yes, please. You need to survive. We need to use pesticides. Great, that's not an interesting microphone. So we need to use pesticides or else we'd have to use far more farmland. So it is obligatory to use pesticides. And I don't think it makes any sense to force human beings to restrict calories to the greatest extent possible just to minimize crop deaths to the greatest extent possible. I think that would have a negative net effect on positive utility. So I think that would, that's kind of weird. That would create more negative utility than positive utility. That's my argument. Just because of the massive effect it would have on individual wellbeing. And if you're going to use this argument that we have to somehow maximize positive utility and minimize negative utility, I mean, that would just come to the logical conclusion that we just have to kill ourselves. We have to have some amount of freedom to do things that are unnecessary that might cause some amount of negative utility. But I just see this having a net negative effect on our lives. That's why I think it's okay for me to eat 3,500 calories per day, which is what I've been eating for a while. But again, could you please explain to me why taste pleasure justifies a Holocaust? Of course I never said taste pleasure justifies a Holocaust. And the second, I wanna ask you a question. If everybody cut their calories to the minimal extent, would there be a reduction in crop lands or the same or an increase in crop lands? If everybody stopped eating as much, hypothetically, you could see a reduction in crop production. The biggest crop consumers are actually animals. Okay, I just wanted to guess from that, okay. So if you say that it would lead to a decrease in crop lands, and that also means a decrease in the lands that pesticides are sprayed upon, meaning a decrease in the animals that are killed, right? And then your justification was that for that, was because, oh, because it's my freedoms. I don't wanna restrict my freedoms. Oh, it's also because there's positive utility, whatever the hell that means. I'm not a utilitarian. So you're gonna have to convince me of utilitarianism at that point. Okay, so if you're talking about pesticide use, you're talking about mostly insect deaths. Most insects are carnivorous. They kill and eat other animals, including other insects. So I don't really see a moral issue with killing insects for the most part, because if you kill an insect, chances are it's just going to end up causing less suffering and death overall. So I don't, and they usually don't live great lives. Insects suffer quite a bit. They do feel pain. They do have a brain nervous system and no susceptors and there are studies showing that insects do feel pain. So I don't think they even live very good lives. You might be doing a favor by killing them. So I don't see a huge reduction in utility by using pesticides and killing insects. In fact, it might cause positive utility. I think the added benefit of just having more food for human beings where they can have additional freedom with their food choices, plus more food security just because we have more food available. And on top of that, killing insects, I would argue that could possibly be, again, a net benefit. So I don't see a huge moral issue with added crop deaths through agriculture, most of the deaths being insects. Again, I'll ask you, why do you think taste pleasure justifies a Holocaust? Okay, first I wanna, I'll answer that question, but first I wanna respond to what you said. So you're just trying to say about positive utility or whatever you said. The first, then you would have to concede that herbivorous animals killed or injured in pesticide use, that would be a moral and therefore you're obligated to do that. You're not all the insects or not all the animals harmed in pesticide use are carnivorous. The second, you're talking about this uncertainty. Not in many of them live great lives, well, many of them, some of them do, right? So I would just explain my point in an analogy. If there's a woman in a room and there's a spinning wheel of fate, right? And on this wheel of fate, there's like a lives a good life all the way to lives a bad life and everything in between, right? And then here comes vegan gains. He comes in and he rapes and kills her. And then I asked, what is your justification for that? Well, he says, well, there was a chance that she would have had a bad life, right? And that's, is that a good justification out of the audience society. And third, you cannot talk about positive and negative utility without respecting the freedoms of sentient beings, right? Let's imagine this grandpa, right? He has a disease. He's suffering every single day for his entire life. And let's say, but he says, in two months, I want to see my grandkids graduate. So I'm going to endure the suffering for two months, just for that sliver of happiness that I get for my grandkids, right? And here comes vegan gains, shoots his fucking brains out and says, well, net utility would have been worse if he had lived, right? Well, in reality, these insects, they are struggling to survive. They have a will to survive. They go into these forests trying to breathe, trying to eat, trying to fight because they have the freedom, because they go into the suffering for that. And here comes a vegan gain saying, oh, well, net utility would have been worse. Let me spray them and arguably pesticide is terrible. Arguably, you can say that pesticides are even worse, death. So I don't understand how you can address any of those arguments. Yeah, okay. So for one thing, with the insect deaths, most insects are carnivorous. They kill and eat other insects or other animals. So I would still argue that there's a very good likelihood that if you use pesticides to kill insects, it would end up being a net positive. You mentioned that, okay, in some of these, some of these agriculture deaths, they're going to be like mammals, they're going to be, I don't know, like mice or rabbits or something. You'd have to show evidence that more animals end up being killed in like, I don't know, a square unit of cropland versus a square unit of natural habitat. I'm not convinced that a very significant portion of animals die within a unit of cropland. I'd probably argue that there's a greater likelihood that more herbivorous animals, the animals that we might actually care about, die within a square unit of wildlife, like natural habitat wildlife. So again, I don't see like a net negative being made there. And secondly, you claim that veganism is a moral obligation if the inconvenience is trivial. You said that because you have a taste preference for animal products, they taste good. Therefore you have a justification to support a holocaust. I'd like to hear some reasoning for that. Like if we were treating human beings in the same way where human beings were forcibly bred, locked in cages, murdered, would you be in favor of treating human beings like that just because of taste preferences? Okay, so I do actually do appreciate you tackling the pesticide point. It took a while, but we finally got there. You said at the beginning of your debate that the person who causes the harm has to provide a justification for it, right? So when you say that I need to show that harm would have been less than if the pesticides weren't there, right? Well, according to your reasoning, if you believe you caused that harm, you would need to show that the harm would have been more if the pesticides hadn't been there. So you are the one who needs to provide justification. I want to, just because in the interest of time, I do want to gently press you to answer Richard's question on the alleged genocide. So if we, just because we don't have too much more time I wanna push you into that question. Right, so to answer Richard's question, I would say that I don't provide a justification for it. I'm agnostic towards it, right? So if like a theist comes up to me and says, well, I'm actually agnostic as well in terms of religion. But if he doesn't- So wait, just to be clear, just to be clear, you're saying you're agnostic to supporting a human holocaust. Well, because I don't agree that I'm supporting it, right? I don't agree that buying a product supports every single action that industry does. If you're asking me if it's, what's my justification for buying a product from an industry that, and in the industry it causes a lot of harm, I would just say I'm agnostic towards it. And my justification for being agnostic was, I don't believe that restricting our freedoms to such a high degree by virtue of being agnostic is a good idea. It's like saying, I'm agnostic towards if the sun is gonna come up tomorrow. Therefore, I should create a bomb shelter and buy night vision goggles and go out of my way to prepare if the sun isn't gonna come up tomorrow. When in reality I'm agnostic towards it, I'm not gonna go out of my way for something that I don't know about. Okay, so you're saying if there was an industry where human beings were treated the same way as animals where they're being raped forcibly bred, their children are being murdered, they're being locked in confined spaces and then they eventually get murdered, you're agnostic to whether or not it's ethical to support that industry? Well, the industry is terrible in a moral but then it would go to my criteria, right? It would go to- It's a yes or no question. Are you agnostic to supporting an industry that rapes, tortures, and murders human beings? Well, what am I buying from that industry? Like, let's say human eggs, human milk. Do the humans not want me to take their eggs or their milk? Yeah, let's assume. They don't want me to, then yeah, it's then inflicting harm, you have to inflict that harm. Okay, let's say, so let's say you you forcibly bred humans and genetically modified them so that they produce way more milk than normal and the, which causes them a lot of pain and the only way to relieve that stress is to get milked. So, thus they wanna get milked. Are you saying it's morally acceptable then? Do the humans, do the humans express that they do not want to be impregnated? Yeah, let's say they do. Then, yeah, I would say that inflicting harm is more. Okay, and like when cows, like when cows, I don't know, have to be locked in what the industry calls a rape rack so that they're like, they can be artificially inseminated when their children are literally ripped away from them and they violently scream to call for their children or because their genes have been manipulated through selective breeding, they produce way more milk than they should and they have pain whenever they have milk built up and the only way to get relief is from being milked. Like you don't think that's immoral? Well, in one case, my criteria is, let me try to think about it. In the process of prokermin, do you have to inflict harm in order to extract the item from its source? So in the cow scenario, let's say that you, oh, I just don't, I'm not convinced that you have to inflict that harm. Whereas in humans, you can actually express and go against their desire to not be raised. Whereas with a cow, you can put a cow in a bowl together, they'll have consensual sex, then the cow will produce milk, you can gather that milk, there is no harm entailed in that. Right, so there is- So when you rip a baby cow from its mother and then put it in the veal industry where it'll be locked up and chained and then killed, there's no harm entailed in that? There is, but do you have to do that in order to procure the item? Okay, let me ask you this, do you believe in supply and demand? Of course I do. Okay, so when there's a supply like this, a supply chain like this and you're adding demand to that supply chain, are you not responsible for that then? Yeah, well, first one we're talking about demand. You have to understand what demand actually means. Demand is not, I'm actually demanding you do this. Demand is the ability and willingness to pay for a product or service, right? So if I'm willing to pay for a product or service and somebody is incentivized by that to do harm, then you would have to provide an argument for why I'm obligated to do so, right? Anybody can be incentivized by anything to do all kinds of harm, right? That doesn't mean the person who is the subject of the incentive is responsible for that, right? I can say I'm incentive by you to harm somebody, that doesn't mean that you're responsible for the person in harm. Right, so you're saying, so like again to reiterate, if human beings were forcibly bred, they had their children ripped away from them or they're murdered. And then they're forced to produce milk until they can't anymore than they're murdered. You're saying you're agnostic as to whether or not you basically support human slavery in a Holocaust. For humans? Yeah, you're saying you're agnostic because of this concept that harm isn't necessarily entailed? I would have to put it through my criteria. In the process of procurement, do you have to inflict harm in order to extract the item from its source? If it's yes, then they are responsible. If it's no, then I'm not convinced that they're responsible. Of course, I mean- Okay, so you don't actually care if you're causing suffering. You only care if harm is entailed necessarily. That's the question. You have to prove that I'm causing it and not the industry, right? If I say like- Okay, let's go through this again. Do you believe in supply and demand? Yes, I believe in supply and demand. Okay, so if you know a supplier, if you know a supplier is using slavery, rape, and murder, then are you not supporting that demand? Richard, if I say, because you play video games, I'm gonna kill somebody- Answer the question. It's a yes or no question. It's a yes or no question, dude. It's how to answer your question, right? So if I say Richard, because you play video games, I'm gonna kill someone, are you responsible for the killing I performed? No. But you caused it. You caused it, didn't you? No, I didn't. Okay, that's the same thing. I didn't commission for anyone to be murdered. Nowhere in the supply chain, when I played video games, was somebody murdered. Well, you didn't claim it. So- What you're claiming is that supply and demand, right? I'm producing a demand and a supplier is unsensified by that. And this is- And this is mid-harmon, therefore I'm responsible for that, right? So if I- This is very simple. Listen, this is very simple. I think you're misunderstanding or you're deliberately trying not to understand. If a supplier, no, if a supplier in the production of a product, let's say human milk is raping humans, taking away their children and murdering their children, then forcing them to produce more milk until they can't anymore, and then they're murdered, are you not supporting that demand? I don't believe that consumers are supporting every single thing in the industry does. Just like- Okay, well, that happens. Okay, well, wait, wait. We know for a fact this happens. We know for a fact this happens in nearly 100% of dairy farms, virtually every single commercial dairy farm on the planet, this happens. So are you saying when you pay for these products, you know this is happening on the farms, you're not responsible for supporting that demand. And thus, every other thing that happens in that industry that's used to produce that product. I would have to- I'm not saying that you're not responsible. I would have to evaluate some more using my criteria. But again, as like, we can always point to you, right? You know that these happens, you know this pesticide use happens, you know they're in cloth production. This isn't a response to what I just said. Right, it's not, it's not, but I'm just approving that when applied to your own reasoning, it's gonna lead you down some weird- Okay, so you acknowledge that you're doing something that you're saying you're not responsible for it. To answer your question, I would have to say in the process, do you have to inflict harm in order to extract the item from its source? Well, you know harm is being committed. It's not whether or not you have to inflict harm in order to extract the item from its source. It may be possible for that, for in that industry with women who rip and maybe it is, maybe consumers are responsible for it. No, listen, the issue isn't whether or not harm has to be enacted to produce the product. It's whether or not it is. And since in, you're talking about virtually all dairy farms or all egg farms, commercial dairy and egg farms, this harm does happen. The fact is if you buy these products, then you are paying for that to happen. You're supporting that demand. I don't understand how you cannot understand this. Yeah, it seems like it's the other one who doesn't understand supply and demand, right? When you give a demand for a product, you demand what is necessary to procure that product. You don't demand every single thing that an industry does in the process of preparing that product, right? If I demand a cupcake from somebody, he goes and makes the cupcakes on the way to my house. He kicks a child in the face because maybe it'll give him more energy to run to my house to deliver a cupcake. That's part of the process. I'm not responsible for him kicking that child in the face, right? And of course, if we apply the same reasoning, you know that pesticide that's happened. You know that animals are harmed in every single aspect of production. You're not pointing out a contradiction. You realize you're not pointing out a contradiction? If you buy a cupcake from somebody and they just happen to kick a child, I'm not supporting a demand for that. There's no entailment that if I buy a random cupcake, a child is going to get kicked in the face. Oh, it happens. If you are buying, listen, if you are buying, okay, if I knew that if I were to buy a cupcake from some psycho asshole who is going to kick a child in the face because I bought a cupcake from him, I wouldn't buy the cupcake. I would have a moral responsibility not to do it. The issue is, you know, the issue, therefore you're obligated to abstain from buying vegan products because you're making a false analogy. Like you're making a completely false analogy. The fact is, you know that when you buy dairy or when you buy eggs, it's going to come from a commercial farm that abuses animals that murders them. You're paying for that demand. Just because you can imagine in your mind the fantasy world where this doesn't happen, that doesn't mean you're not supporting that. This has nothing to do with intent. This has to do with your actions. Your actions are supporting a Holocaust. We're going to go into the Q and A. Do want to, in the interest of fairness, Philip, I think we did give you the first opening statement I'm going to give you that gains the last word. I do know the response to that and then you can have the last word. I'm okay with that. We can give you a quick. If you're interested, it's okay with that. What am I supposed to respond to? I think it was that Philip wants to give you a quick rejoinder and then we're going to give you the last word before we go into Q and A, Richard. Sure, shoot. Yeah, so you can say the same thing about like buying vegan products from non-vegan companies, right? You know that the employees at these vegan companies are non-vegan, therefore they're going to use their money to buy meat and therefore their assholes and therefore you're giving a demand for non-vegan employees, right? Because if everybody bought from vegan companies where there's only vegan employees and there would be no non-vegan employees because they would not be able to find a job, therefore you're responsible for that, you're demanding that, and that entails a contradiction because that means that if you buy a vegan product, you're still not vegan and that's a contradiction, thank you. Yeah, so when you buy vegan products, it's not entailed that you're buying, like you're paying for somebody to eat meat or you're paying for animals to be killed. If we're going to like end up saying that, okay, for any monetary transaction you make, if somebody makes a bad monetary transaction with the money you gave them, you're responsible for it, then okay, is everyone guilty of war crimes because they paid their taxes? Like if we're going to have the standard, then I mean, you'd be morally obligated to never make any sort of financial transaction at all because eventually it's going to lead to somebody doing something bad, like none of this is leading to a contradiction. The point I'm making here is that you know that the industries you're buying from, like the dairy and egg industry, you know that they're committing a holocaust, you know they rape, torture and murder animals and that is what you're paying for. Like that's the problem here. It's not that the issue isn't, hypothetically they could have a wonderful industry where they never harm an animal. Your intent here doesn't matter. The fact is you are supporting this harm. That's the issue. We are going to jump into the Q and A. Want to remind you folks, we appreciate our guests, two things. One, they're linked in the description so we encourage you to check out their links as well as. Folks, wanna encourage you as always. Really 99% of you do a fantastic job of this and we appreciate you. Is attacking the arguments instead of the person as we really do appreciate these guys and so we're gonna jump into the Q and A. Thanks for your question. iPhone Musings says, shout out to monkey, pretzel, bunny, prismo and fin. Is that an inside joke for one of you guys? Yeah, kind of. His cats are named monkey, pretzel and bunny and then my cat is prismo and my dog is fin. That's awesome, gotcha. Standing for Truth, thanks for your comments. Keep up the fantastic work. Some of my all time favorite debates have been on this channel. Thanks for your kind words, Standing for Truth and it's all credit to the guests such as our guests that we have on today and that's why you should check out their links. And Bubble Gum Gun says, paying taxes, funds, war and murder though. Know ifs about it. They did have a follow-up one that I think that they were so they say, Philip, we know that the US government is killing, are you gonna stop paying your taxes? You like the benefits of slavery but just wanna play blind about it. It's very orange lib left. What does that mean? I'm not sure but thank you for your question or your statement, I appreciate it. I'm not the one claiming that consumers are responsible for the industry. I'm trying to grant that and then see how that leads to. So yeah, you can say that paying taxes, well you can say that paying taxes is necessary but say like donating to the government or whatever you're supporting war crimes or even just using your internet that's supporting the oil and the wars that come from oil. I'm not the one claiming that. I don't believe that consumers are responsible for war crimes or just by paying taxes or responsible for every single thing. I don't think buying a Hollywood ticket, you're paying for rape. I'm just using vegan reasoning, applying it to other standards and seeing where that leads to. So if you think that's absurd then you're arguing against the vegan, not me. Yeah, so I can respond to that too. Like unfortunately, yeah, some of your tax money does go to funding wars, unjustifiable wars or war crimes. The issue is like what's the best option? The thing is taxes do pay for a lot of good things like schools, healthcare, roads, essential services that help millions of people and save millions of people. So if I had the choice between not paying taxes and paying taxes, I think the choice that results in the best net benefit is paying taxes. Gotcha, and thank you very much for your question, Mark. Dietrich Cochran says what does vegan gains think about sustainable small family farms where animals are raised with respect and the soils are improved? Yeah, so I don't see how murder is justifiable because it's sustainable. You wouldn't agree with treating humans this way if we could have human farms where humans improve the soil quality and humans are murdered sustainably. You wouldn't agree to something like that. So I'd say name a trait, name a trait that's lacking animals that's lacking in a human being would justify the same sort of treatment with trade equalized human beings. There's also plenty of ways to improve soil quality without having to murder animals. We can use artificial fertilizers there just as good for maintaining crop yields and nutrition as manures are. Manures are actually relatively low quality usually in terms of like using it as a fertilizer. So I don't see the justification there. Gotcha, and this one from iPhone Musings says Philip, just go vegan, you have big muscles, just use them to reach that extra eight inches in the grocery store for the plant milk instead of the cow milk. Your thoughts? Thank you, I appreciate your question, man. Yeah, I mean, I do agree that we should all try to move towards veganism, just like how we should all try to move towards being better people. The question is, is it a moral obligation? And yeah, I am actually cutting down on a lot of animal products I consume. If I see a good vegan option, I'll definitely go for that. I'm cutting down how much eggs I consume. Yeah, I am working towards just how I believe everybody should work towards a better consumerist lifestyle. I just don't think it's obligatory. Gotcha, and this one from Bubblegum Guns says, morality is a scam used by the government to hold a monopoly on violence. Violence is just a necessary part of life. Just accept that we all kill, plants are alive. Okay, well, I only care about sentient life. I don't care if I kill non-sentient organisms. I think sentience is really the thing that makes a life valuable without sentience. Then you can't experience anything, including well-being, so who cares? And if he's going to claim, oh, well, morality is a scam, it's just to monopolize violence, well. Okay, does that mean we should get rid of laws? We should get rid of government? Should everybody be able to murder, kill, rape, commit tribal genocide? It's just absurd idea. Gotcha, in this question. Wait, wait, sorry, I just want to say, it's probably the only thing me and Richard are going to agree on, that how dumb that comment was. Hopefully it was a troll, but thank you for that question or the donation. Juicy, this one coming in from iPhone musings is added again, says Philip, you are almost vegan, just take small steps, start with just on, am I saying this right, trend baloney, quote unquote sandwich, a week instead of two. Yeah, thank you for your donation and I'll definitely look into that. Yeah, I mean, I've been vegetarian for like everything four and a half years now. And you know, maybe I'll go vegan one day, if it becomes very easy for me to, then definitely I will. Gotcha, in this question coming in from Sunflower, for you vegan gain said, how is taste pleasure any more gratuitous or selfish than excess calorie intake to have an aesthetically pleasing physique? Yeah, so I think things like fitness, exercise, looking good, I think it does give you a far more enriching experience, gives you activities to do, it gives you something to strive for, it can improve your relationships, it can do a lot, like it can positively influence the way you see yourself. I think doing, like eating excess calories to achieve those things, I think that's far more meaningful than just purely taste pleasure. And by the way, you can eat excess calories as a meat eater and I still disagree with the crop deaths thing. I'm not convinced that killing insects is necessarily a problem and I'm not convinced that you'd end up contributing to more death overall by eating like an excess amount of, like say, wheat or beans versus restricting calories and having more natural wildlife. Gotcha, and this question coming in from Ben Grosser says, Philip, the reason you are responsible for the bad practices is because your purchases incentivize those practices, except the responsibility. Thank you for your donation, but I don't know what the last part means except your responsibility, but I don't agree that, it's a good point, but I just don't agree that what incentivizes other people, you're like now responsible for that, right? Like what if a guy comes up to you and says, like suck me off or I'm gonna kill five people and you not sucking me off, it's gonna incentivize me to kill five people because you incentivize him, you're not responsible for that, or like people are incentivized by a lot of things, right? People are incentivized by religion, right? Does that mean if you're a pastor incentivizing someone because of your religion and now he shoots up a church, you're responsible for that? I just think you get into very weird territory, you need to elaborate on that a little bit more, but thank you. So this one coming in from, question the answer says, at any rate, I'm starving. Thank you, and then next one, AFKD says, Hale Satan 666, although spelling Satan differently, but nonetheless, we do wanna take this as an opportunity to let you know whether you be Satanist, Christian, atheist, black, white, gay, straight, you name it folks, Republican, Democrat, we're glad you're here as modern day debate is a neutral platform and we do wanna welcome you no matter what walk of life you're from, we are glad that you're here hanging out with us. And so the next question Donald Anderson says, Phil, replace the cows by humans. Is it morally obligatory to buy their milk at the groceries, yes or no? For replace the cows with humans, it would have to go through my criteria. In the process of procurement, do you have to inflict harm in order to extract the item from its source? So if you do not have to inflict harm, in many cases with a human context, humans can actually express very strong disregard in having their milk extract, right? Therefore, if a human does not want to have their milk extracted from them, then extracting their milk inflicts harm. You have to inflict that harm, right? Whereas, but if you have a human that doesn't really care, it's like indifferent towards whether or not you extract their milk from them, then yeah, I don't see, if a woman's like, yeah, I take my milk, I don't know, I'm indifferent towards it, then yeah, I don't see necessarily anything wrong with that, similar to how with cows, you put a cow and a bull together, they have sex, it actually wants you to milk it, you know? So it doesn't express any harm or any disregard for that. So I don't think you have to inflict harm and therefore you're not really responsible for it. Okay, I just wanna respond to that. He's not acknowledging the entire life cycle of these animals. If we were to put humans in this sort of context, you'd also have to agree that it's okay to forcibly breed human, sorry, it's okay to bring a human being into existence for the purpose of being milked and not giving them a choice whether or not they can choose to have free life or be milked. Like these animals, regardless of whether they want a choice or not or regardless of whether they wanna be milked, they have no option and they're also genetically modified so that they produce more milk. So it's actually painful, there's pressure that builds up in their udders. So the only way to relieve that pain is to be milked. So claiming that, oh, some cows want to be milked, they'll go like, no, they actually don't, it's just that they're trying to relieve pain that's being inflicted on them by humans by genetically modifying them. So you're not acknowledging their entire life cycle and by the way, they're also all murdered in commercial agriculture. So like, are you saying you're okay with human beings being murdered in commercial agriculture? Yeah, I'll just do a quick response to that. No, because murder is not a necessary part of that process. And so also genetically modifying them, depending, like I don't really see that harm is entailed with genetic modification. And I also don't see how bringing a cow into the world for a purpose is necessary to get its milk at all. So apply it to the human context as well. Those I wouldn't be convinced that the consumer is responsible for that. This one coming in from Damien Stoy. Thank you very much. Eat plants, not animals. Thanks James for all your hard work. Thank you and all credit to our guests as we do appreciate them. They're linked in the description. Dave Gar says, for both, please recommend a vegetable knife for me. I have no idea. I'm not a big knife guy. So I like ceramic knives. They stay sharp longer. Maybe check out something like that. Yeah, thank you for your question, but I don't know knives either. Amazing. David thanks for your question says, vegan gains name the trait that makes it okay. Keep two, keep cats and dogs as pets, but not okay to keep humans as pets. Yeah, so cats and dogs are essentially like mentally disabled, they're dumb and they also can't be allowed out in the wild. They're carnivorous animals for one thing. So especially cats, they're extremely effective hunters. So they'd end up just killing an insane amount of animals. So would dogs. Or you'd get a circumstance where they'll just end up dying. So I wouldn't say there isn't any trait. Well, I guess you could say the trait is intelligence. Yeah, I guess the trait would be intelligence, carnivore. I guess trait would be carnivore where they'd murder other things and you just have to make decisions to support their wellbeing. I kind of see pets as like mentally disabled children or adults. If you have an adult that's mentally disabled, you do have to restrict their freedoms to benefit their wellbeing and possibly the wellbeing of others. There are some mentally disabled people who are like, who are a danger to other people. So I guess those would be the traits. I'm also against the pet industry, by the way. I'm against animal breeding. If you're gonna own a pet, rescue it. Yeah, thank you very much for this question. VYBZ Cartel says, if you vegan gains, you say that coconut oil should be avoided due to its high saturated long chain fats. Would I absorb these calories if I used it as a lubricant? I'm pretty sure using coconut oil as a lubricant is fine in terms of health. I know a lot of people do use it as a sex lubricant. As far as using it as an anal lube, I know I've gotten this question a lot whether or not it'll raise your cholesterol score. I really don't know, because theoretically if you get coconut oil up your butt, it'll be absorbed. I'm not sure. I'd say maybe experiment. You can get your blood tested, see your cholesterol score, try using coconut oil as a lube for a month and then see if there's any change. Noted. Thank you. And this one, Kaz Mara says, fill up the animals that produce dairy and eggs, eat grain slash food that intiles pesticide use on the soybeans. You're responsible for a lot of pesticide use. I think that in the title for some tales. Oh, in tales, I got you. Thank you for your question. Yeah, pesticide use is not necessary to satisfy my demand, right? You can grow, you can imagine, you can grow a crop without pesticide use and then use it to satisfy my demand, right? I agree that collectively, in order to supply such a large demand for a collective, you would have to use pesticide use, but for my own personal demand, nothing is entailed with growing a crop and sending it to me that you have to use pesticide use. So under my criteria, I'm unconvinced that I'm responsible for that if you don't need to inflict that harm. Gotcha. And we have one from Dave Langer, which was for vegan gains, they said, are you against using Amazon and using smartphones like the iPhone because of the way their workers are treated at those companies? No, so there are different economic realities in different countries and boycotting certain products like, say, an iPhone because Foxconn treats their employees like crap. It wouldn't necessarily give these workers a benefit. In fact, it would probably be detrimental. Generally speaking, people choose the best job available to them that makes the most amount of money, it requires the least amount of work. If these employees are working at companies like Foxconn, that's probably the best job available to them. And if we were to, the world were to boycott iPhones or I don't know, any other technology or products where workers are treated unfairly, let's say, in your eyes, that would just make it so they probably have to do a worse job. They have fewer job opportunities and less economic opportunities, so I don't see it helping. I think if you want to help workers in foreign countries that has to start with legislation and I think a way towards that too is to give them these economic opportunities. Like the reason why a lot of workers in foreign countries are treated so poorly is because they don't have the money to treat them any better. Like they don't have the safety standards here or worker benefits they have here because they just can't afford it. Gotcha. And with that folks, as mentioned, we are pumped about a lot of upcoming debates including next week, Vosh versus T-Jump on the super straight debate. You don't want to miss it. I'm going to be back in just a moment with other upcoming debates that I'll share with you. And so thanks for coming by at modern day debate. Thanks so much, Richard and Phillip. It's been a true pleasure to have you guys. Thank you so much James and thank you Richard and thank you everyone that's watching. Folks, do check out their links in the description as we really do appreciate them. And if you haven't already, click on those links down in the description box and I will be back in just a moment. Be excited, stoked to say hello to you in the old chat before we talk about upcoming debates such as this one. Oh baby, this one next Wednesday, who? I mean, the whole barn might burn down. It's going to be crazy folks. You don't want to miss it between T-Jump and Vosh on the super straight debate. That is going to be a juicy one. But before I tell you about other upcoming debates in fact we have a political one I think you'll enjoy tomorrow. And it kind of overlapped a bit with tonight's debate but before I do, I do want to quick say hello to some of you in the old chat. As I do love to just, it's fun to get to hang out with you guys. I'm glad we do this post-credits scene now. And so thanks so much for hanging out with us at Moderator Bait. Regardless of what your background is folks, your beliefs or lack of beliefs, gay, straight, black, white, Democrat, Republican, we are glad that you are here folks. We really do appreciate you. This is a true melting pot of a channel. People from different walks of life and we like it like that. So welcome. And let me say hello. Dylan Bryant, thanks for coming by, says thanks guys. Thank you. And thank you to our guests again as they're linked in the description. We appreciate our guests so much. Thanks to Vegan Gains and Phillip for being with us tonight. It's always fun. And I always, before we start, I always say man, I'm pumped. This puts me in a great mood. So I love it. And Dave Garg, good to see you. Thanks for being here as well as Damien Stoy. Good to see you again. And Jane Casper as well as Fox Sushi and Optics first. Thanks for coming by. And then EndoXD, good to see you again. As well as Denkono, good to see you again. And Second Horizon, thanks for coming by. AFKD, glad you were here. And let's see, almost caught up with Chad. It's moving fast. So I'm gonna try to say hello to more people and then I'm gonna jump back into upcoming debates and keep kind of going back and forth just because I do want to tell you about these upcoming debates and I'm excited about Fishfrog Dolphin. Good to see you again. As well as Fox Sushi and Algorhythm as well as Plant-Based Powered. Thanks for coming by. We hope that you're doing well. And Bubble Gum Gun, good to see you as well as. Yeah, let me show you some of these upcoming debates for you guys. I'm pumped about it. So one, you guys have already talked, I've already talked about this a lot on the bottom right, namely Vaush and T-Jump. It's going to be crazy folks. But, oh baby, we've got a lot more than just that. So let me show you some of these other ones you guys. We are very excited that on the bottom right of your screen as you will see tomorrow. Dr. Michael Humer and Dr. Ben Burgess will be joining us in the evening to debate whether or not taxation is theft, period. So that is going to be a really fun one. And these are both bright guys. We are really, it's honestly, I've been so excited about the quality of guests that we've had in terms of we just keep getting all of these superb speakers. And so, you guys, you don't want to miss that one tomorrow night. It's going to be a lot of fun. And also folks, I want to tell you about this as we are absolutely pumped. Folks, you do not want to miss this in particular. So if you have been living in a cave on Mars with your fingers in your ears, you guys, Matt Dillahunty and Kenny Rhodes will be here. This is coming up fast, you guys. So this is on screen. And this is, the reason it's on screen is because you could basically call it our kind of super event is we like to do every, eh, several months and there's no real strict rule on it. But every, so often we like to basically host this absolutely epic event. And we are excited that this epic event coming up. Oh, baby, you don't want to miss it. Dr. Kenny Rose is a Christian apologist and Matt Dillahunty is a juggernaut of a debater. He's an atheist and they're going to debate and it's going to be on June 5th. So you don't want to miss that one, folks. And I want to let you know this is a crowdfund event. So what we're doing is we're actually raising the funds for their honorariums. And that link to the fundraiser is in the description. So I'll throw that in the chat as well. And I want to encourage you folks, please do consider joining us in this crowdfund. Is this a lot of fun, you guys? And I've got some sweet perks to show you in just a moment, but we are excited about it and want to say, hey, it gives us an idea of whether or not we have to have the live stream basically where last time we had it such that if you put it into the crowdfund, even if you just threw three bucks into the crowdfund, like the minimum tier, basically you'd be able to watch it live, which is awesome. And then we would release it a couple of days later for the rest of the world to see. We are like, well, we might do that, but this time we were hoping to have it such that it's just available to the public even in the live stream. And so we're planning on doing that, but at the same time, if we don't see the crowdfund continue to grow, we're kind of like, well, maybe we'll have to switch. I've got kind of like a round table of modern day debate people that I talked to. And so we might have to switch it where it's like, well, maybe we'll actually have it such that a person would actually have to throw a few bucks into the crowdfund to watch it live. That's what we did last time for this one. And the idea is, oh, we made it. Our goal last time, we crushed it and we raised with 143 different backers, 3,141, which was absolutely epic. So we've done this before folks and we're determined we're gonna make it. So absolutely this event is going to make it, but we do have to reach that crowdfund goal in order for this debate to happen as we do want to gift the honorariums for our speakers as we do appreciate their preparation. And so this folks, believe me, it's absolutely going to be worth it as it's going to be an absolutely epic event. And you might be wondering, well, it's like, how do I sign up though? Is it kind of a pain or is it kind of easy? It's really easy. So if you click on the Kickstarter link or I should say that's right, we use IndieGo now. And if you click on that link, which I have just thrown into the chat, as well as which is in the description box, if you click on it, you can actually just sign in through Facebook and join the crowdfund that way. So you don't even have to give them your email or make a password or anything like that if you don't want to, assuming you have Facebook, of course. And so really easy folks, it's actually a piece of cake. And here's some of the perks though. We're excited about this. So modern day to date coffee mug, that's actually like, I think our fourth tier, let me just lower this a little bit because right now you're seeing the perks like halfway through. So at the very top, I'm scrolling up. You can see three bucks and this is where we're considering, we might have it be such that you have to, if you put a minimum of $3 into the crowdfund, you would watch it live. We're considering doing that if we don't see like the continued growth because we're like, hey, like, you know, that helps the channel a lot as we can take bigger risks if we have this kind of crowdfund strategy work for us. And so that's why we're saying, hey, if you've ever gotten some value out of this channel, you've like, I enjoy this, it's been fun. One, I encourage you, hey, join the crowdfund. This really does support the channel a lot. And then helping us make this event huge, that's the next tier. It just gives a few extra about dollars, basically, so we can promote this event. And then your name read on screen. So that's in the ticker at the very bottom of the screen as well as it being read out loud at the end of the debate or this modern day debate mug, as I had mentioned, that's an epic one that I'm excited about. That's a brand new one we didn't have last time. Receive an embossed postcard as the next one. And then modern day debate t-shirt, I'm super happy. That's been a popular one. So that's one of the perks you can go for as well as the hoodie or the Zoom chat with James, which you can record, put it on your own channel if you want, and then meet and greet with the guests, which we are super pumped about. So you don't wanna miss this, folks. It is going to be an absolutely epic event, as I had mentioned. And so with that, I am so glad to share that with you. And let me just pin that. I can't remember if I pinned it to the top of the chat as it is going to be absolutely epic. So thanks, everybody, for your support. We, so far, you guys, I am pumped about this, that as of right now, the Crowdfund, let me show you to you on screen. The Crowdfund, as you see it, is at 16.56. And wow, super awesome. Someone actually just gave an additional pledge. So we're actually up to 16.77. So thanks so much to that person who had given to the Crowdfund. Let me just update it right now, 16.77. And that way you'll actually see it updated on screen. So really cool. As you guys, we are determined, it's absolutely going to happen. And so you can see that on the far, oh, let me fix this little overlay. Two minutes, two seconds. There it is. Oh, not that one. Chrome, all right. So as you can see on the far right side of your screen right now, only 18 days left, folks. So it's coming quick. And we basically want to kind of see that steady growth. And that's where if we see that steady growth, we're like, okay, we don't have to worry too much and we can just have it be open to the public. So I want to encourage you, please do throw into the Crowdfund early as that gives us an idea. And it's normal that I've been told and also experienced on the last Crowdfund that it'll usually be at the very start and the very end when people will throw in their pledges. And we appreciate it no matter when you do it, but it does give me like a rough idea. And especially like if we get behind, it lets me know if I have to just put on a car wash with me and T-Jump out there and our Speedos watching people's cars to raise funds to make this actually finish up. We're excited though, it's at 47%. So we're almost at 50%, which is really encouraging you guys. I'm honestly pumped. We're like, we've had a great start. So it's true that we need to reach our goal for this event to actually happen. And don't worry though, we're determined to reach that goal. So we will make it and we're excited about that. In fact, this is not this coming Saturday, but the following one we are planning on a 12 hour stream folks. Yeah, four debates within 12 hours that will be 100% epic, believe me folks, we're really excited about that as that's going to be a blast and you don't want to miss that. So really excited though. Be bad as good to see you, it says amazing. And JJ Sticks, glad you came by as well as Pancake of Destiny. Thanks for coming by. And in Hacks, good to see you again. Says I have done Get Name Red and I'm going to get the coffee mug very soon. I know I'm a bit slow. No worries in Hacks. To be honest, it is true. Like I understand if you're like me, like that's why I almost feel bad asking you guys where I'm like, hey, if you can, you know, throw the pledge in early because that way it gives us an idea of like predicting like where we are in terms of not having to worry of like, okay, is it all going to come in the last week? But I have to be honest, if it's 18 days left, I'll be honest, like I got to hold my hand up. If I was going to, like I would be the person that would usually put it in like the last day. But so it is, it helps if you do it early, but no shame. Like don't worry about it, but thanks anyway in Hacks. So don't worry and Fish Rock Dolphin. Good to see you as well as Corpse Six Rinder. Is it meant to say, is it supposed to look like Corpse Rinder? Ah, I see, I get it now. Is that a gamer thing? You guys, I'm a gamer, I'm hip. I play my Nintendo 64 games on my PC, but Sienna Mobs, thanks for coming by. And you guys, so I, what was it on Steam? I bought Shadows of the Empire, which I was super pumped about. And it gave me the most nostalgic glee, just reliving my childhood in the epic days of also Rogue Squadron in episode one, Potteracer. I'm a huge Star Wars fan. I don't know if you all know that. By the way, Star Wars is a uniting thing. It's funny how Star Wars is like it's, there are several things in there. I mean, there's probably more than several. There are things in life that unite across boundaries or tribes, you could say. In other words, Democrats, Republicans. Everybody loves Star Wars. It doesn't matter. So that's one of them. The other thing is fair debate. That's something I think all of us, and that's something we are excited about. So I can't help but give you this pitch, this excited talk about what our goal, our vision is at modern day debate, which is to provide a neutral platform for debates on science, politics, and religion folks, such that everybody gets a fair chance at making their case on a level playing field. We're excited about that, folks, and we appreciate that you guys have been so supportive of that. I wanna say for real, though, thank you so much, everybody, for all your support. This channel is so fun for me, and I'm so excited that it's been so encouraging, that it's been growing, and people are, I'm just so glad, thank you so much for people's positive feedback and just everything. I'm thrilled of what the future is. It's just been epic to see things play out as they have at modern day debate, and so Pancake of Destiny, good to see you, as well as Brian Griffin, glad you made it, and Sienna Mobs, thanks for coming by, we're glad you're here, as well as Lenny Cash, and Stripper Liquor, good to see you. Thanks for coming by as well. Mark Dietrich, Cochran, let me know if I'm pronouncing your name right before I'm not, you can be honest, sorry. And Hannah Anderson, thanks for your support in the old chat. Kevin Davis, thanks for coming by. We appreciate you being with us, as well as Bond and Sideshow Nav, as well as Jane Casper, good to see you again. Aaron Zoll, thanks for coming by, says, thanks for keeping open discussions on these topics. My pleasure, Aaron, thank you for enjoying them. And honestly, it makes it fun for me when it's like the more the merrier, when people are enjoying it. Wilmar Casper says, yes, debate over. Thanks for coming by, Wilmar, and first Rob Dolphin says, James, are you on your way to becoming vegan? Don't be a beta. That's funny. You guys, I don't know if you ever notice, once in a while I can't help but slide. I wish that I could do a good impression of Jesse saying, what the? That is like one of my favorite Jesse quotes, but Oliver Katwell says, how are you good to see you, Oliver? We hope your travels are going well. Thank you for being with us from afar. I hope it feels like home, and hopefully it's feeling like home there as well already. I'm excited that, I know it's not a full month, but it's probably close to a month now, because I think it was at the 25th of last month that you'd set your sights on the road, got on the road and started traveling, but Saitronav said, yet another excellent debate. I couldn't agree more. That was great, high energy, we love the speakers. I know it gets a little bit heated, and it's a little bit kind of like, ooh, that's true. And some people say, oh, James, oh, you have to moderate way more. You got to be so involved and make it early and nice. And it's like, yeah, or boring. That's the thing. We like it to be spontaneous, folks. We like it to be organic, where anything can happen. That's the truth. I mean, I've seen some weird stuff happen on this stream. And so that's something that I like is when it's vibrant, it's organic. If it's calm and very, very peaceful and orderly on its own, that's great. But we're not gonna try to force it all into a box every time. We like it where it is this kind of spontaneous deal. And so that was, you know, still, we've had way worse. Like tonight was actually, I would say, relatively respectful. It was energetic, passionate, exuberant, but let's see, true shoes 101, good to see you. And Pancake of Destiny says, what is the best part of the stream your facial expression, James? That's funny, I appreciate that. Did you see my face when we were talking about the, was it like vegetable oil? Oh my goodness. But Resolute of Gore, hey, I mean, we've all been there. I don't know. But Resolute of Gore says, nice one. Have you thought about having a regular guest who joined you in the after show? They could say who they thought won and you could still stay neutral. Maybe, I mean, like, I'm open to that, but I wanna be careful about it. Cause if I had one guest who comes on and they're like, speaker, hey, totally won and the other person's like, well, I kinda lean towards speaker B, but I get, you know, why you'd say speaker A, then people might give me, they might be like, hey, James, it seems like it's not that, at that point it wasn't super neutral cause one of your, you know, guests afterwards totally took a side and the other one just kind of sat on the fence. But so I don't know, maybe I'm open to it. I think it could be done well and fairly and all that good stuff. So I'm open to it, but I don't know. I cast, by the way, Casarin Smart, thank you for coming by and also for saying, enjoy your channel, thanks for the debates. Thank you, Casarin, for your kind words. Seriously, that means a lot. Apricot Sloth, good to see you. This is always fun stuff brewing here. Thank you for your kind words, my friend. That means a lot. Nah, I mean, folks, I'm pumped though and I've got other debates to tell you about. It's Oliver Catwell, thanks for your kind words. You did an awesome job moderating tonight. That means a, seriously, it means a lot. And let's see, Tuss Beatbox, good to see you. And then Cassan, am I pronouncing it right? Let me know, is it K-S-A, K-S-A-N. Glad you're here. Even if reading the critical examination made me enthused with the concept of Star Wars, I still don't think it would chance the experience of watching it, which to me is painful. Ouch, gotcha. Pancake of Destiny says, James, don't change. Keep this channel fun. Thank you, Pancake of Destiny, for your kind words. And then Oliver Catwell says, yes, in Kenya for a month now. Wow, good for you. I hope it's going well. That's awesome, man. I'm excited for you. I hope it's great. I hope the weather's great. And so that's rad, man. And yeah, Patreon meeting this Saturday, in case you didn't know Oliver. And anybody else who happens to be a Patreon, it's, I think it's like the second and third tier in our Patreon. Our Patreon's pretty simple. It's linked in the description. If you didn't know, we don't really bring it up very often in stream, but we do have a Patreon. I don't, yeah, we don't really have a lot of stuff on screen that would, that would like, you might have to, yeah. Maybe I'll like think of an overlay that has it or something. But Francisco Viega, glad you were here. Thanks for coming by. And then the guy, thanks for coming by. Pumped, you're with us. And Hannah Anderson says, you're welcome. It was fun. Thank you, Hannah. And Brooke, thank you. Says, thank you for hosting these debates. My pleasure and thank you. And let's see. Yeah, so my goal is to always be as neutral as possible. And that's to basically, I really do want to make it such that people are always feeling like, yeah, my side got a fair shot. And that's the thing is folks, we, we don't even have any sort of videos that, don't get me wrong, I'm not saying there's anything wrong with this. Like, I think it's like normal and cool and I watch plenty of channels that do. But we don't have any sort of videos that take a side. We literally only host debates. We have like an occasional like thank you video or embarrassingly once in a while, I have to do an apology video. But, but we, we have no videos though, where for example, like if I jumped on and I was like, here are the best arguments for or against this position. I don't do that at all. I think it's great other channels do. But for us, we said, we were like, nope, we're going to keep this like we're literally nothing but debates. That's all people are going to be able to find. We have one, we have one video that to be fair. We have that, we've got a psychologist at Harvard, what's his name? Pinker. Who, if you've seen Pinker's video on our homepage that talks about why we host controversial debates. Because we do, sometimes we host controversial debates. But not without good reason. I do think there's actually a great reason. And so, let's see here. Casually up with the chat as Oliver says, let's see here. Be badass as more nutrition debates. Hey, I'm open to it. We've wanted to get, what's his name? Lane. I think his name is Lane. He's on Twitter. He looks like he enjoys debate. So, I would like to have him on but I just haven't found a person for him to debate. I don't know who he'd want to debate. I don't know if he even wants to come on here but that's another person that maybe we would have. Be badass as, or that's right. Thanks for that. And one, two, three, Leo. One, two, three. Thanks for coming by. We are glad that you're with us. We hope you feel welcome too. Resoda, of course, is no coconut lube. Use the force James. And I guess Bichi Wawa as the Ewok say, yeah, I'm a huge Star Wars fan. It's crazy. You guys would be like, whoa. Cassan says I wasn't able to make it through any of the prequels so all I know is one, two, three, the originals. Huh, I wasn't expecting James to read my comment out loud and now I feel so sorry. Don't feel embarrassed. It's okay. I honestly, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to embarrass you for real. We hope you are not embarrassed that you feel no criticism. There's no criticism of you for whether you like or dislike Star Wars. And Algorithm says, let's see. Thanks for being with us, Algorithm, as well. Is there anybody I missed? Thanks for coming by. Brian Griffin says James Coons is the most legendary beta male to ever exist. That's funny. And then Cassan, I agree, says, huh, James is Sigma all the way. I'm trying to remember Alpha and Omega, so that's the first and the last. I don't know what Sigma would be. I mean, it's at least later than, oh, that means if it's further down the line, that's like being a gamma male, as Nathan Thompson would say. You're worse than a beta if you're a Sigma or a Gamma, right? But anyway, let's see. Letty Cash, good to see you. And then Tuz Beatbox says, false, James makes impeccable arguments for wearing blazers. Want to say thanks everybody for all of your support, seriously. If you're in the live chat, and this is the first time that you've ever been here, let me know, I'm glad. It's nice to get to say hi to you. And folks, we are excited, though. Want to let you know about, let's see, Jane Casper says, Sigma means you're a loner. That doesn't sound good. Louis Preciado, thanks for coming by. Thanks for letting me know about that. But yeah, Louis Preciado, thanks for coming by. And good to see you again. And what else do we have here? Two seconds here. Oh, folks, I have to tell you about this. I am excited about it. So if you didn't know, let me know if you didn't know this, because it lets me know how well our overlays work in terms of letting people know and all that, is if you didn't know, we are on podcast. So if you're watching on your phone, listening on your phone, whatever you are, or maybe you're on a laptop right now, but maybe you're like, oh, modern day debate is on podcast. Well, as you see, there we are. Those are some of the podcasts I listen to, and you can see modern day debate on my podcast addict app is my second one in there. And so I wanna encourage you folks, if you haven't yet, pull out your phone, pull up your favorite podcast app, and find modern day debate as we are excited. I'm so encouraged that we've gotten so much positive feedback that people are like, oh yeah, I use it like I use it all the time. I use it when I'm working out. I listen to the debates for all sorts of things. And so that's like super encouraging. So JC93013, thanks for your super chat says, James, are you the chosen one who will make Steven Crowder versus Sam Cedar happen? Hey, for real, that would be epic and no joke. Like if we see if the crowdfund strategy works, that's something that I would wanna do potentially even on the next one. So I don't know how much these guys charge, but my thought is this. Let's say we paid them a couple, like let's say we did a crowdfund next time. So right now our crowdfund is 3,500. Let's say the next crowdfund was 4,000 and we paid each side two grand. I would guess that might be enough for them to do it, at least on Zoom. Like maybe if it was just a dialogue and a certain like restricted topic, we might be able to get that for real. I'm very serious about that. And so that's the other thing too is that's a possibility with this new crowdfund strategy. That's why we started it is that it's true. We care about each and every debate. So we do care about this debate that you're seeing on screen. At the same time, if you're like, well, I'm not really into the religion debates, James, but man, I would love to see an epic debate like that. And this Kickstarter or this, I should say, crowdfund strategy that you're using will let me know basically that you have faith in the crowdfund strategy. You throw a few bucks in there, even a few bucks helps. And that for us, I mean folks, that's like the strategy we think is gonna open up big doors for modern day debates. So I mean, we've hosted like Michael Shermer, New York Times Bestseller last time, we're gonna host this headline event with Dr. Kenny Rose and Matt DeLonti. That's gonna be a big one. And so our goal is like the next one later this summer. We're hoping for like some big name people, maybe in August or September. So do wanna say, like we're seriously, we do have high hopes. But yes, wanna let you know as well as talking about the old podcast. If you haven't yet, folks, we do wanna encourage you. Maybe you've already found Modern Day Debate via podcast and you're like, ah, James, so yeah, I'm not even gonna pull up my podcast app. One thing I'd like to say that one thing that helps us for real is if you pull up your podcast app and then you find the podcast, Modern Day Debate. And if you're willing to give us a positive rating, that helps a ton for real. So we really do, we appreciate that. That's something that's, it's just exciting that people have found it useful and so we hope that you do. And so thanks for that. Ryan Griffin says, during that sunny day, you're looking a little more orange today. Man, it's this camera. There's something funky on it, man. But you know what? It might be because I was outside today too. I don't know, maybe I've got a little tinge of red that with my very pale skin makes me look slightly orange. Like a Cheeto. But yeah, let's see. But yeah, for real, like I really would love to host a Crowder and Sam Cedar, that would be awesome. So, you never know, it'd be pretty cool. Brandon Lee, good to see you there in the old live chat as well. And Amanda, thanks for your support. Do appreciate it. Amanda had said, make sure you guys smash that like button before you go and we do appreciate that support. So thank you for doing that, folks. We are excited about the future and Hax said there should be a setting on the camera for the color temperature of the lights you're using. I'll have to check that out. Let me see. It's like a really basic camera, but I think you're right. There's probably got to be some way to adjust it. That or even an OBS, but we are excited about the future, folks. We appreciate all of your support. Thanks for making this fun. Thanks for making it last. Thanks for everything, folks. I love you. I really do appreciate you making my life fun that I get to do this. And so, thanks everybody. Keep sifting out the reasonable from the unreasonable. We'll be back tomorrow night, as I mentioned for that epic juicy debate on the topic of whether or not taxation is theft, you don't want to miss that one, folks. Believe me, it's going to be tremendous. And so, we want to encourage you to be back for that one as well as, as you'll see in the bottom right of your screen, T-Jump and Vosh debating the super straight debate. That's going to be a juicy one. And so, don't forget, if you haven't already hit that subscribe button and that notification bell. So that way you won't miss out on that one as it's going to be a blast. So thanks everybody. Take care and keep sifting out the reasonable from the unreasonable. Amazing.