"NEW BEGINNINGS" | The LET'S CHAT Podcast

and hello and welcome to the digital free thought Radio Hour on wzo radi 103.9 LPFM right here in Knoxville Tennessee we're recording this on Sunday morning April 28th 2024 I'm Larry rhods or DJ doubter five and as usual we have our co-host wbat on the line with us hello wbat it's my party and I'll Flex if I want to flex if I want to and our guests today are Bujo dread pirate higs River and Sarah [Music] welcome oh nice digital free thought radio hour is a talk radio show about atheism free thought rational thought humanism and the Sciences in conversely we'll also talk about religions religious Faith God's holy books and sup Superstition I'll get it out and poeran ISM I'm sure if you think you're the only non-believer in your town well you're just not here in Knoxville in the middle of the Bible Belt we have a group of over 1100 of us we The Atheist Society of Knoxville or ask and we'll tell you more about us after the midow break so be sure to stick around well back what's our topic today today we're talking about new beginnings new beginnings and how to start your own atheist group why it's important tips and tricks our past successes but before we get into that I do want to say that this is our last show we've been doing this for 365 episodes over seven years seven years a lot of the early episodes weren't recorded so it didn't count them space they're broadcast onto space there's somewhere hovering around at the moment right now but I can't imagine a greater group of people coming in to celebrate this moment with us we appreciate everybody here and thank you before we get into the hysterics where we cry and oh oh buying some time buying some time nice nice nice before we buy uh get into the stair where we throw out some tips let's do our last POS aarian invocation as a group guys would you please bow your heads and wrap your noodly appendages together as we commerate this moment with our own dread pirate higs who lead us our goodly Lord who art in a candar al dante Be Thy nles Thy blood be rum thy s be yum with meat as it is with vegetables give us this day our garlic bread and forgive us our cussing as we forgive those who cuss against us and lead us not into keto ISM but Deliver us some carbs for thine are the meatballs and the sauces and the Grog whenever and ever I was loving watching Sarah's face through the entire the first time it happens it's like it's like uh you know it's like you know it just comes over you like it was a complete look of shock and then it was like like she was actually being touched by the nood L she's just like oh this is great this is great I'm feeling it I love it I love it what is going on oh I love this this is great what do I need to do how do I participate what do I gotta get done it's fantastic uh something about this I don't know Sarah I'd be remiss how you been since last week good um busy very busy busy mom stuff busy mom stuff busy new wife stuff busy marriage life stuff you got a lot of going on go I'm actually about to have my H two-year wedding anniversary nice and I got myself a present it's a mouse pad a oh congratulations okay felicitations yeah Zoom was doing a thing where it was taking the background of the mouse pad I was like is that a custom mouse pad that was cut around no Zoom is just really smart on cutting things out okay very cool very cool uh Riv always good to see you how you been since last week also please tell me about the Ocarina around your neck I need to know about it oh thank you yeah yeah well I got it year two or more ago and it's red it's purple clay in China it's a holy punks 12 hole acarina you know uh oh but uh so good for easy practice um I'm actually in the land of the book band right now on a for a family member's destination wedding W and uh you know so I'm just my background I'm actually in my in my in my car at the moment I just had this background up you know so but I've just been busy with classes coming to semester coming to an end and just very busy always learning always developing new talents and a a world a life well-lived of new experiences that you're constantly absorbing rev nice person to know Buro speaking of musical instruments what's going on with you what new things have you picked up since last time we spoke oh boy uh uh new computer I guess I wanted to ask Larry what game I need to fire up on this we have recommendations recommendations yeah we do 76 I'm playing that a little bit actually we are talking to dread about this complete sure yeah yeah yeah okay I won't be dismissive of games I haven't played but still all right continue but yeah soccer's in full swing with the kids and that's consumes most of our days we'll be heading Louisville soon um and I apologize I haven't been able to do the radio show for a long time because our Orange Theory class is smack dab right in the middle of no sweat no s no apolog moving it to 11 was great I got to join and and now I'm just sad that this is it so yeah yeah we could still always do virtual Summit meetings there's still discussions and we and we could always just decide to get together yeah yeah yeah we could do like one a month just what video games you're playing yeah yeah stuff out yeah also have you had so if you guys didn't know anything about Bujo I've been over to his place I think two years ago and uh I want to go play disc golf with him right we're hanging out and I have my discs and I have like maybe about $40 worth of disc which isn't much that's like maybe four discs total right and I pull them out and they're all sparkly sparkly shiny and new he comes out with like an old backpack of like well these are the discs I had when I was first playing pulls them out and it's like a first edition one of the most popular this of all time that have like 20 editions after the point another Edition another pre-flight number and I'm like Eric we can't I'm scar sorry for f bjo we can't throw these discs these discs are too valuable and we just pull them up on eBay one after the other each one's like well that's 600 bucks this W this one's 400 this one's 40 I'm like you have like thousands of dollars wor the plastic you don't want to be throwing around here and we's like oh I'm gonna sell them but I was like Bojo you gotta wash them first grass get the grass things off just wash them a little bit wash them a little bit take some nice pictures of them and like don't act like these are like the box of Star Wars toys you have in your closet for like ever in a day like shine them up like dress them up put a little dress on them and be like this is a valuable thing and then the collectors will come to it I I he's got a lot of cool Collectibles is my main thing so if you ever need some spare cash just boy buo he'll help you out he'll help you dread pirate higs how have you been I've been all right been all right I'm uh as you know I'm enrolled in The Paramedic program so it's full full steam ahead into uh session five of 16 so uh yeah great guns man it's lots of work but uh really really cool to learn all this kind of stuff and uh you know expand knowledge always learning right so but also on the other front the past of Varian front uh my lawyer kicked it up a notch and uh uh We've issued a letters to passport Canada and um the ministry of Public Safety who uh you know are depriving me of my security license private investigator license sure because of this photo issue right so he's essentially laid it down and said look uh you guys don't Rectify your behavior we're going to uh sue your office so govern yourselves accordingly and um nice there you go so we're just waiting for we're waiting for a long enough silence you know like a two week silence yes and or some kind of response after which we will uh submit Freedom of Information requests to get all inter office memos and emails and all that kind of stuff as evidence nice and then go right for the jugler right every letter that you send to them needs to be on Old parchment paper in sepia a water with a Jolly Roger Dolly raner on the back is just like who wom make concern this is a perfectly reasonable legal letter but it's on it's on burnt paper on the sides they like pull out like what in the world's going on it's him again with an x mark spot at the bottom yeah malicious compliance well we're we're actually we're actually looking to to sue for D to sue for damages good so there's uh five government institutions we'd be going after and we'd hit it high we'd go for like $5 million and see you know if we can if that'll shake them up enough and cause enough public debate and outrage sure that um ICBC just cavitates you know and just just delivers or performs on on the request in any way that it doesn't make your legal uh standpoint more more uh vulnerable you're welcome to record this progress as much as you want off my zoom channel on to your channel yeah I would love to see progress on this because one of my favorite things to do is watching people stand for their rights and yeah I will watch a lot of videos on YouTube about people who will record as press in public places like outside on the street on a public sidewalk and cops being like you're recording in public and they'll be like yeah and they're like you you can't do that it's making people uncomfortable it's like you're not the feelings police you're a law police and there's a I'm allowed to report in public it's like well this is too public it's like that doesn't matter it doesn't matter if people aren't upset in the same way you're doing what I imagine is a uh Constitution though it's Canadian constitutionally protected activity of expressing yourself and there is a institution clamoring down on it saying well you can you can express yourself if you're within this religious boundry and that's not the way how that system should work so I would like to see you keep fighting Larry what's up well not on that but people have to remember that protests the original protests was like the Boston Tea Party you know protests don't have to be within the bounds of the law that's my opinion by the way what I'm saying is you know when they when the police come to you know your your protest and say okay you can protest but you have to do it three blocks over there in the designated area that's not what protests are look at any of the protests in the 60s were they following the law were they um you know signing off on Charters you know for the permit to to protest no yeah I'm not advocating to break the law what I'm advocating is you have to do something um what am I trying to say that can't be easily ignored by the that can't be easily ignored I guess stand up stand up F your right to to publicly protest uh what you uh believe in if you had a designated area okay it oh you have an opinion about something okay go your designated uh protest in corner and protest that's something it works it PS the point yeah it does yeah yeah like I mean be like telling you know people with the wat towers that they can't send on street corners right right thank you for bringing exactly up I agree I support it and I also say like don't hurt people you know don't cause harm but otherwise if you got a point to make make the point you know and uh and and if you got to break the rules so that you don't do it within the boundaries of those who are you're fighting against say it's so allowable as long as you're not hurting people I say go for it let's I want to see some meaningful protests laws are meant to be broken look at the laws in Nazi Germany you know what the Nazis did was not against the law yeah because they wrote laws to support it you have to stand up against that kind of thing you got to break the W legal does not mean moral yeah right interesting interesting interesting man we got not all laws are moral yeah yeah legal doesn't necessarily automatically equate Mor yeah there are awful laws FS if you will say all right guys I want to talk about New Beginnings this is the last show that we're doing but it doesn't mean that it's the end because what I wanted to do is Showcase some of the cool things that we've each individually learned about starting our own secular circles and areas where we did not expect to find like-minded individuals and successes that we've had tips that we can offer and encouragement while not a call to action but definitely an encouragement for you as a listener to if you're listening to this and also acly reminded start your own Community because there's no reason why this should be the end of anything if anything it should spur you on to believe that you can do the same thing yourself so I will throw out mine and I'd love to hear a tip from everybody else we'll do a round table format but lar my my thing was when I moved to Knoxville for the first time the first thing I did was I started looking for an atheist community and when I say I looked for an atheist Community I mean I looked for a a don't expect me to spell it on the air but I looking for the a word Community online you got online specifically use that word to find us I wasn't looking for humanists I wasn't looking for rationalists I wasn't looking for secular groups I wasn't looking for freethinkers I wasn't looking for humanis I wasn't looking you know what I'm talking about I wanted the hard a just hook me up with the hard a guys because these are the people that I want to hang out with these are the people I want to ask questions to and I was finally at a point where I didn't want to consider myself well I'm just not uh uh non- denominational or I'm AGN or I'm agnostic I was like no I know I'm an atheist I want to meet other people who also know that they're atheists because that just saves me a lot of time and when I look for it I found one one group one group on the whole internet in my immediate area in all of Tennessee or at least general area of Tennessee East tene in Knoxville and there was this one group in Larry had his group he was like well I'm the atheist guy I'm just like are you I typed him I sent him an email I was like are you guys still meeting he's like yeah come over to this pizza place I'm like hot dog let's go yeah went over there shook his hands Larry's like you sound nice you want to go on the radio yeah yeah I need to guess for sure I need a guess I was like let's do it good job Larry thank you thank you no it 22 years ago you ask me what's your favorite anime I'm like uh where do we start he's a good guy he's a good guy that's how you know he's a good one that's know good so we met some really people I met I met buo in a similar fashion too but uh it's it's everybody has like a really interesting story for how I met them but uh Larry I want to say like my thing was if you're looking for atheist look for atheists online I you would be surprised I did not expect to find such a great group of people to fall into but and I moved around a lot right and same thing with buo when I was doing like my atheist talks like he found me just because he was looking for guy who's doing talks atheism channels that I found dread through the atheism talks that I was doing but like look for atheists specifically and you can you can save yourself a lot of time from all the other keywords if you just look for the hard a I found that to be and there a wonderful group of people to look for dread what do you got I was going to say I think you and I actually connected through the street epistemology yes um yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah so you know because I think I was a past aarian then even um so but uh you know just just developing that uh you know reliable methodology for examining one's own beliefs and the leas of others I think that's a that's a good Community to to get into nice Sarah oh same oh same same oh same same same I know everybody here now because I met utai um I'm met youat on uh the uh Street epistemology ah okay okay okay okay and then we got you into this one so you can make so whole thing is look for connection and then even from that community you can make your own Community communities and then those communities can further spread out and build but communities can make communities that's the main thing and I think I didn't I wouldn't have the opportunity to to really even discover Street epistemology if I didn't have the wherewithal to have the courage to meet other atheists and so like reaching out and finding a community is my most recommended step before you start one my recommendation is look for one because there might even be one that's available for you that you could work with get networks with bu uh build friends with and then start your own separate communities that can merge together and become like a super group of friends to hang out with but look for atheists look for them they are available they are around and I think just by virtue of you looking for one will make you realize that there a lot more around you than you ever anticipated I would have never thought there'd be over a thousand uh atheist in Knoxville when I was when I first started I was just surprised especially one in an organized group which is now um a 4013c 501 yeah nonprofit okay I want to throw out tips for starting your own groups or finding your own groups uh Bujo do you happen to have a group making tip um I I I do and and maybe my tip would be specifically not um regarding building a group but uh keeping a group because one thing I learned over the years of doing Summit and I don't many of you maybe already know what summit's all about but just kind of quick version of it uh and and TI's been to to several um just a group of people that meet in my basement um once a month and we have food we have drink we just talk about everything surrounding mostly a lot like this show um and uh and it's a good time and I usually invite my open-minded friends um and we've had occasion for two things that have happened one anyone who's extremely right or extremely left um and get they can get they because it's you know it's in person and uh uh they can get to the point where feelings get hurt and people get upset people get angry um so we've we've kind of and I hate to say it but we've kind of had to censor certain people from the group just because they don't work they they they talk they talk to one person you know it's a group of people and you have a conversation with one they're just argu all true yeah and it's just it's ugly so I've had to kind of curate a little and it sounds happens horrible but yeah and we've done it here on the show I think too um and then the other thing too is is we like have everyone having a drink having a good time but that's the other other tip I'd give you is make sure people understand you know don't overdo it because with with lots of drinking comes more of the same and we even had one one guy get a DUI on his drive home trying push so we push responsible responsible drinking and uh and again just just we we kind of have to shave off the far right and the far left and it's unfortunate but that's that's my tip if if you're doing something similar to to Summit yeah especially if it's not conducive to a good conversation right yeah I've lost two really good friends because of it too hopefully not through the DUI like oh they're locked up now it's like a dang okay well that's that's good being willing to make changes in the interests of fostering a good Community right like be able to make those moderations is a good one dread I see you what's up any recommendations yeah you know I agree with h everything budro said you know at the same time um you have to be willing I guess to cut away those people that end up being quite toxic MH um you know in that same vein um you know I there's a couple of people I've known for years and years and years and when you know we started getting into sort of more of those uh deeper conversations um it it actually unveiled some very problematic aspects of their personalities not crazy and you know as a consequence I decided you know that's probably not something I need in my life and uh and so you know it actually you know allowed me to see that um you know you have to curate curate your own friends yes um you know you have to make sure that uh uh you're not just trying to acquire friends for its own sake that you're trying to acquire quality friends um that you know can contribute uh in positive ways and not necessarily Always by agreeing but you know by being able to have uh deep conversations where you may disagree but which are constructive and meaningful and uh educational right so I wanted to throw out like in the same vein of black lives matter and they do I also want to make the point that you matter that your time matters that your friendship matters and that if you are spending your friendship with somebody it's good to get at least a net return on that investment because your friendship does have value and so if people are taking that friendship and just dumping in the trash don't waste your friendship on people like that because at a certain point you have to recognize that you matter your time matters and that your friendship most importantly matters and a lot of the times when I was doing Street of pongi it's sort of like discount therapy for a lot of people never really had opportunity to have like these meaningful talks with someone who's willing to be uh neutral or unbiased in their approach to figure out why someone thinks a certain way and a lot of people love that but a lot of people have so much baggage that they need to be responsible for getting themselves out of before they can constantly engage with me as a person for whom to resolve a lot of their issues with like I found the process for my own part resolving my own uh biases religiously and my own Dogma limitations to like being a bit more of an open-minded person be rewarding you know challenge for myself but it's not something that I would constantly call up Fred on the phone and be like Fred I got a problem figure well I don't age Fred well I don't celebrate well maybe you had some points Fred oh I don't know okay and then he hangs with the phone like I don't have time for that right Life's Too Short yeah Life's Too Short enjoy it and if you can the way I think of it is you can have two different kinds of friends ones that celebrate who you are for all of your uh different is and not because of your limitations but not in spite of your limitations but because those limitations make up who you are and your perspectiv make up who you are and they celebrate every part of you or you can have friends that don't do that and my recommendation is spend time with the friends who do celebrate who you are the real youth the authentic youth because those are the ones that value your friendship and I'm your friends are the family you choose exactly and families are the friends that you choose in a lot of way too it's great so yeah that's true that's true I've chosen some out [Laughter] thank you guys for being people that I feel like I can celebrate my real self around and and just be honest with and those are the kinds of people to Foster into a new community I do want to get like one more piece of feedback Sarah what would you recommend as far as like starting a group or finding friends oh rib did you have a comment real quick well if it's all the same I was going to say real quick at at the beginning I wanted to say that uh I met uh Larry you know through ask you know he just he's been you know just a quick note you know this is the last show he's doing and I I think that's overstated enough how he's maintained talking about maintaining groups he's uh been this buw workk you know not put on the spot there Larry but this B work for just uh keeping the crew together and is that a word to say on the radio Larry can we say that word is that yeah you got me [Music] last thank you you know through covid and everything and just keeping us all rallied together and you know got back on tap uh the tap room and I need to get back going there myself you know one semester so on so on use it up I'm planning to start going again in in may get out of the house a little bit Yeah has scared for a long time to get to get out and get people layers I mean uh then I was going to say the the tip thing is that I'm very much working that on myself uh but there just the upkeep and making sure people you know remember you know just that presence of you know hey you know um just a random invite every so often just like that little ping that lets people know sometimes that's all they need sometimes is a little reminder that you know hey I'm thinking about you just such a a small notion goes so far Sarah and I both got our heart that was nice that was nice A that was very sweet that was very nice thank you r no we're getting kind of close to the bottom of the hour I probably need to take a break sir up next we'll be right okay sure uh this is the digital free thought Radio Hour wo radio excuse me 103.9 LPFM right here in Knoxville Tennessee we'll be right back after this short break welcome back to the second half of the digital free thought radio hour I'm daughter 5 and we're on wzo radio 103.9 LPFM here in Knoxville Tennessee let's take just a moment to talk about the atheist Society of Knoxville ask was founded in 2002 we're in our 22nd year have over 1100 members we have weekly in-person meetings every Tuesday evening in Knoxville's Old City at Barley's Tap Room in Pizzeria look for a inside at the high top table or if it's pretty weather outside on the deck you can also find Us online at our home page at Knoxville atheist. org or also on Facebook and meetup.com you can just Google Knoxville atheist it's just that simple by the way if you don't live in Knoxville you should still go to meet up and do a search for an atheist group in your town don't find one start one start one where you pick want to pick up yo we are talking about New Beginnings how to start start your own groups tips for keeping those groups and all the successes that we've had just Round Up in one nice celebration episode with all our friends who've been with us over the last seven years as we've like cultivated like communities both in Knoxville in Kentucky in Canada of all places in wherever the world I'm living at right now I think south of Nashville uh [Laughter] Alaska might be Washington in a couple years but you know very true true but we've had like multiple people from all around the world on this show and we're just say England um Sweden Sweden Florida Africa you know we've had a lot of different people uh y Middle East even yeah so it's been a good show it's been a good run uh Sarah what recommendations would you bring up for tips for keeping a nice Community suy reminded of community what do you got um well um I would I I think it's difficult to find like in-person kind of things um and certainly more populated areas so if you want to do like an online search you want to go for your nearest city so if you for example um my nearest city I'm not in this city but my nearest city is Savannah Georgia so I would check that out um back in La it was easier everything was La um but yeah you're gonna find um more atheists in uh heavy heavily populated because the smaller populated there are still atheists there but they're kind of closeted you know small town closeted you know does that make sense another thing about big cities is they have universities and univers I um have a lot of people that go there as Believers and leave as atheists and they stick around true here in Knoxville that's certainly the case it happened to me dread what do you thought oh dread okay what you your comment what's up you had a comment um well I was gonna say you know respecting uh Sarah's comment there about big cities you know um I live in a very small uh City you know about 800 people and managed to come up with more than a dozen pastafarians um who uh you know enjoy sitting around and uh you know one thing I would recommend totally is uh having a you know like a communal book like a like a like a communal meal um of course pastafarians we have our go-to as you know some kind of a pasta dish but it it really does bring people together uh sharing food and enjoying uh you know essentially breaking bread together and there's a lot of good conversation that comes out of that but um you'd be surprised uh you know yes they're closed but that's only because they don't know their neighbor as an atheist or aarian and sometimes all it takes is you know someone to put an ad in the paper and say you know this is what's going on come over and check it out and all of a sudden you got half a dozen people showing up so yep you know uh and I think this was when I was in university Kentucky land so I was at least in Lexington when I started doing my uh Street epistemology or Socratic examination talks and it was largely because moving from Knoxville where I had a community that Larry had set up I felt basically really isolated because I didn't know of anybody around and I thought well let me leverage that I've been watching a lot of YouTube videos and really want to engage and see if I can find a community I'm at least going to be open with what I'm about and have an opportunity to talk to people and if anything that at least scratched my itch for social interaction given that I have a job that keeps me working on a weird day night cycle so I set up my table and I did my talks and then next thing you know buer reaches out to me and he's like oh I see the things that you're doing and I'm like oh my gosh there's someone else that like wants to talk about this but not like in a table format but just wants to sit and eat food and have a conversation and that's how we met and then eventually he invited me over to his place uh we had the summit a couple of times which was just like invited to his uh basement but invited me in like a good friend there was no weird judgment level uh like oh like I just felt like I could be very open with uh uh Bujo at all cases he was open with me we had like a really good forum that we could discuss and I think that communal event where I got to see other people interacting it wasn't maybe until like the second time when I saw brand new people who were new to the summit and I realized the shoes that I was in but from a different perspective and they were just like I don't know if I could say this like yeah you can say this button we can have these conversations and then I saw how much uh Bujo loved was it Sam Harris and the Darwin catalog I'm like a I hate these things like a Tyrone always hates these things but I like these things I'm like it's cool we have differing perspectives on a lot of stuff but like there's truly no judgment and we were we're free to like eat and share Thoughts with each other it's so rewarding to be able to do that on a face to- face level I think there is an inherent need for us to be able to do that as humans so if you are a closeted atheist I would say take an opportunity to find a community because it could I didn't even know Bujo lived like very far away from me either he was like seven minutes away from my apartment right so it's not hard to find people even like the Bedrock or the middle of America the most conservative areas that you can think of you can find people that are willing to accept you for who you are and and have some good uh chat with you um I'd also say this too here's my extra tip before we get to Larry because I I I apologize for skipping a step I would say recognize that particularly atheists I would say are like hurting a bag of cats right as Larry once told me and we are not all the same maybe if you go to like a a particular Church on a block in Georgia you might find a very many like-minded people who have been told to like a very specific thing very specific sets of Music very specific types of clothing Etc but for atheists because we are less controlled by uh a centralized dogmatic force not authoritarian authoritarian is probably the most we're not authoritarian we're not you'll find atheists that like ABC some atheists that like Hulu some atheists that love Disney some atheists that are all about anime some atheists that hate anime 10,000% they're not in this group but you'll find you'll find so many different people that disagree on like literally everything but the one thing that they all agree on is that they don't believe in a God or that they don't believe in a certain kind of God or they don't find spirituality to be very important or that they like pasta and they like talking there's room for everything what I'm saying go ahead dread I was gonna say yeah you know past aarian are like that like cat hurting yeah um and I think part of it is um is that we just come to recognize that we don't need to impress people so much with our ideas about how the world works that you know we don't have to take ourselves so seriously that we have to get into our group in order to postize our positions and our politics and our beliefs and our spirituality we can just be and just take it at that and you know so it it allows for a loer Community right um but when we do get together we have a lot of fun right right but I do want to oh go ahead ra oh I was trying to I trying to get better at timing thing I TR even in a moment to say and it might not seem like that one common thing with some variations inevitably uh might not that much matters that much maybe when you compare all these different fields of you know interest and you know World Views but it's it's interesting because once you take away once you have that one thing in common you would have more room for natural imp to command and all of a sudden not all the time but a lot of the times you have a lot more common understanding sure sure sure yeah like the differences are never the the most differing thing among us it's always the commonality of the fact that of all the things that we do like there's a lot more in that similar back than there is in difference back but I do want to highlight it's that the differences are never something that we take for granted they are something to be celebrated it's okay to be different and when you realize that everybody's different particular in like atheist circles like everyone's different you're like this is okay like no one ever looks at me and they're like you're kind of like a white guy but your Skin's just a little bit darker that's totally cool it's like don't frame me in that Concept in the same way that and I'm gonna throw this out that you wouldn't frame like a guy who's gay to being like Oh but you're kind of like a straight guy but you just like men or like uh um a person with no hair You' be like oh you're kind of like a person with hair but you just don't have hair it's like you don't have go through an extra length to frame someone in a different box so that they're more palatable to a c your worldview in fact it's just accept me on the terms that I am and that's far more valuable and you don't have to like translate me from one sense to another sense because there are things that are worth noting about different people and there are and and the way I think about it is like it's an enrichment on my culture to understand that there are different people that go through different struggles different prejudices different uh preferences maybe they have some new flavors that they bring to the table just by me learning about them and that expands the contrast or the horizons that I operate under I love knowing different kinds of people and I respect that and I think it's something to be celebrated in particularly in very diverse groups and we should always recognize that because what we do as a habit is we try to generalize our brains are always trying to generalize groups of people together and we get into this tribalistic mindset where it's like well they all think think this one thing but I think this thing it's like when you recognize that everyone's different I think it helps you do that less and that's for the benefit of both you your and that that's not bad it's not a bad thing it's not a bad thing that people are different yeah yeah yeah all right Larry I'm sorry for that for that TI what would you recommend Community growing what would you recommend to keep a a a a group together you mean over the years yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah and start one anything one thing is a simple thing and I started off by having uh monthly meetings and that would be like the second Tuesday of the month or uh on the 15th of every month but people would miss the date and they'd have to go another whole month you know just because they didn't remember that particular time I I would recommend that people pick a place pick a time and do it every week every week that way if they forget or if they miss one they can just come back the next week it's it's always there it's always the same time and always the same place it could be a ra it could be a sandwich shop it could be a bar it doesn't matter just make it consistent nice nice that and be welcoming of course yeah yeah yeah you know that welcoming thing is also a really big Point too uh the the sense of empathy is something people can immediately recognize right and so and I think it's one of the things that churches do very well like when you walk to a church they're hugging you they're shaking your hands they're welcoming you they're calling you by their name I'm brother XYZ I'm sister XYZ and you sit here next to my family and we'll all sing and dance together when we're done we'll shake hands we'll hug and we'll leave and we'll do that for the Lord and I'm like you could do that with for just for the sake of just the community just the Friendship yeah just just having an external family right right there's no mon over Community right and it will hold together better top things to stay away from I would say okay so buo you had a good ones like make sure you curtail the the the the more spicier members of your your pot anything else that you would recommend that we stay away from we'll do one last we stay away from Round Table I I that's a good one because uh in the beginning we we kind of just stayed away from politics um because that that just it just added a layer of because there was such a broad spectrum of you know generally speaking I think a lot of there are some similarities between non-believers and politics sometimes but it can get it can get wonky wonky fast so you know we we originally had kind of a leave politics off the table but gosh it's become so much more a part of the world our daily lives that we started talking about it but just just carefully yeah um don't let it d don't let it dominate the conversation maybe that's my best tip I like it works yeah I um my thing would be things to stay away from is um everyone's different everyone is different but it's also good here's my thing everyone's different but don't have just one community that you base that difference or your entire perspective off of I would say if you are able to start one atheist community half two half three like half small ones that are online half small ones that you meet with in person have ones that you meet only at work or that you're aware of have separate groups of friends that way your perspective of what what atheism or secularism or whatever that group is is about isn't just framed by those four or five people or those 1,000 people that you always have contrasting opinions so that you never generalize too much on what the way think should be and the value behind that is a lot of times I'll end up in groups that are largely even when they're atheist inspired largely controlled by people of one specific race and so like they'll have a potluck and they'll bring in their music and they'll be like I don't like cold macaroni and and what's that guy's name oh not Elton John but some some other guy who like plays music you'd expect to hear in an elevator you're like why is it always these pants this music and this food like there has to be other groups that do things slightly different so like when you go into different groups you'll be like oh finally it is different it's just the fact that these these guys like these one things these girls and guys like these different things and and my black dudes like these other things and it's nice to just know like okay they're all atheists but it's okay that they're it's they're okay that they're different I don't have to come up one one big complaint have diverse groups of friends that and it's okay for them to be separate Dre pyro higs what do you got yeah just you just along the similar lines is keep keep the conversations diverse mhm right you know uh don't don't shrink your bubble so much that uh you suffocate in it yeah um you want to make sure that your your bubble is big and uh I mean you know we inevitably get into bubbles and self reinforcing conversations but you know as long as you're having sort of overlapping topics and uh and different and people leading with their interests which are you know kind of overlapping um that really helps to keep the the life in the party uh so to speak so that it's not just dominated by one or two people who are always leading the conversation and uh doing all the stuff and then yes all of a sudden people start you know through attrition they just start dropping off and on other well said dread yeah life is a lot like you know Reddit you you can fall into holes and then you real you forget that the other subreddits are available are like a browser where you don't realize the browser's adjusting its cookies based on your preferences and when you search Apple it stops showing you the fruit and more the stock for Apple and you don't realize it because you're just so used to being hater to that when you switch to a new browser you're like why doesn't this work anymore you should have multiple browsers you should be able to force feedback or correct check your groups of friends so that one one very persuasive person doesn't end up controlling the entire dialogue Sarah what's up you know uh dread actually um you reminded me of something that is like a pitfall in a group um where yes some people are very charismatic and they kind of dominate the conversation um maybe have some kind of like soft uh leader or whatever of the group that way that person can kind of um bring it back and give everyone a chance to kind of chime in you know maybe have a central topic if that's necessary um because yeah I have seen in many different groups um one or two people dominate the entire thing and then no one else gets a chance to say anything and then people stop coming you know moderator I think yeah having a good moderator is is important yeah I would also say you know Inspire the soft leader or the people who feel like they're being left out to start their own group and have a separate group on their own terms and that way you can have a free market of groups where it's just simply hey if you want to go to the one where it's it's more led by this particular guy's ideas you have that but you also have one where it's more Community Driven and it's more in your T your taste and you have a whole shelf of different groups that you have available to you at your leisure to to make or fall into as as you want to but you never have to go full 100% into just one or the other you always have the options of making your own group you always have that power and so I want us to exercise it uh Riv anything that You' recommend that we watch out for uh yeah um actually adding on everyone's kind of points just kind of adding one little element in there is that be vigilant and observational especially in the parts right if if you know someone does seem to have forming that natural kind of Charisma and they're kind Dom things okay note them but also note the people who you know are just constantly not saying and then try to be that soft person that kind of brings them into it and then you know in not always avoid topics per se I would say I would say three times in a row um uh feel it out right if everyone has a General super sardonic sense of tumor why D that go with it but then if people are uncomfortable by it you know then that's May kind of come in there just kind of maybe passively maybe maybe uh statically engaged with some of the people making really strong claims about things but you know and and just try to get a dialogue going try to try to meet it out T you know just that's that's been my observation in general social I'm not far from an expert but that's been my general observation nice l oh go onad dread I was gonna say another thing too is um is practicing steel Manning uh other people's arguments um you know you want to you want to build up what uh somebody else is saying for the best possible inter pation uh so that they feel empowered um and then and then destroy the argument you know so rowing the time to chop it Down Right build it up to chop it down yeah exactly but I mean you know it's a skill that it takes a takes a lot of practice um but man I you know I've watched some debates like say with Jordan Peterson and and Sam Harris and uh and that's a regular exercise they practice on stage and it's a great demonstration of how a respectful um debate can happen where two people who respect each other treat each treat each other well um and don't have to Bass each other like The Flintstones with uh a couple of clubs back and forth and trying to get their points across you know a healthy debate is is great but it has to be done in a respectful manner so it's encouraging that atmosphere I think is helpful cool guys we're nearing the end of the show I did have a comment that I'd like to share this is from our last EP or second to last episode we were talking about change of plans why doesn't God just admit that he needs a new update to his plan it doesn't seem to be working very well and if he changed it not only would he demonstrate that he does exist but actually also demonstrate that he cares about us as well right and so a change of plans would actually be a good thing not necessarily A Bad Thing and um uh Evangelical Carol 5336 who's been a longtime commenter on the show said either of these two fine human beings speaking to both me and Larry thank you very much would make a much better deity and the god of Bible God of the Bible and they most people would yeah and they both have superhero vehicles uh a very cool motorcycle and a James Bond smart car also it is funny how Resurrection day goes directly to April fools why don't more people recognize that thank you Larry and Ty for another great conversation cool cool thank you guys so much let's do a round table things that you'd love to plug um uh things that you would like to check out since this is the last episode we won't say for next week but things that you should check out at least once in your lifetime uh for me um I do have my channel let's chat on YouTube uh but I would encourage you to check out the variety of good dialogue that's going on on that platform YouTube for people who are having conversations about things that are often times very difficult to have conversations with it doesn't even need to be within the scope of Street epistemology what I recommend is that you just make the search to try to find a variety of different Talking Heads and I will challenge you on something if you have a list of very profound thinkers that you know and they all have the same sex and they all have the same skin color I would challenge you to try to find different kinds of people to add to that list because they have something of value to offer to no and I've always encouraged this on like black history month or like Mother's Day learn the names and the contributions of like a of a black chemist or a female engineer because they exist they out there they contribute every day and a lot of people can name like Tesla and and and other like profound names but they tend to be controlled by history on who we celebrate but the pedestal of successes is far more diverse than what we're offered in our textbooks so make that an opportunity for you to find different kinds of people who could be luminaries for you to to have in your back pocket for for good thoughts to be expressed uh Riv I'll throw it out at you what would you recommend that people check out well uh I would shamelessly say uh Paul shapera and Matthew BRS look at them both for the musical universe that goes back like 20 years now it's fantastic that you get booked on their content is so uh great happen to be happen to be a canonical character in the universe that's aside the fact um um just great music um and also you know my tagline I always go with is be well do good think okay Larry how much time do we got do we have enough time about three minutes okay we got time Sarah what's your thing that You' plug Sarah what's the thing You' plug uh I'm not really uh plugging anything at the moment however um I am gonna stick around to find out what everyone else says okay okay buo what do you got if you everone lik in Kentucky hit me up come to a summit I'll make a summit right around your trip if you want he will he will he will he'll show you some soccer games too they're really nice really good had a good time um dread pirate hgs anything that you like the plug well you can check out my YouTube channel mine pirate m i n d py r a t i do a weekly uplifting short sermons on all kinds of interesting topics uh weekly um and to plug uh another podcast Skeptics Guide to the universe uh it they've been running for very close to 20 years now um it's an amazing podcast uh Steve Noel Dr Steve Noel is a physician and he's got his brothers and Cara Santa Maria uh who has her own podcast and every week they're they're just amazing so if there was anything I could recommend outside of my own that would be the one to check out so cool nice Larry what do you got like and just to ask Will you finally admit that souls are real and that we we can end on this level not know true this is your last chance Larry God's watching the show and he's like he cares about you he loves you if you like to listen to Prior shows and that's all there will be after this one they are available at podcast through iTunes Stitcher luminary podcast.com or iheart.com etc etc just do a search for digital freeth thought.com or Digital freethought radio hour and if you're having trouble relieving religious police behind you can get help from recovering from religion remember everybody is is going to somebody else's hell the time to worry about it is when they prove that heavens and Hells and souls are real until then don't sweat it enjoy your life and we'll see you next well I guess we won't see you next week you didn't change the script though almost didn't thank you for everything guys we've yeah thank you all for for coming to the show you bye bye y'all bye bye y'all see you