To be clear about the the below, my goal was to get Thor arms naturally — which is much harder without using the dangerous supplements that nearly all Hollywood actors make use of. That takes huge consistency, a lot of time, and working out hard and frequently.
I did that in my 40s, which I was told was “impossible” by more than one person. But I frickin’ did it. Yeah, I rule. Deal with it.
What’s the most common inaccurate health or fitness view most people hold?
That you need to work out as hard and as often as I do to see significant gains and health benefits. Realize that when I post my “impossible” celebrity workouts, I am very consciously making the tradeoff that I will work out 3-4x as much and as hard as the average person needs to — all to receive only 25-30% more benefits.
Most people don’t need to do what I do. Most people probably would not stick to it. However, I wanted Thor arms so that’s what I went for. And that’s what I got. I knew what it’d take and I did it. You can too but perhaps you should not.
(I’m reacting to journalists writing things like, “No one can work out like Hugh Jackman!!!!!111111” Well, someone can. I do. And I have no dietitians nor even a personal trainer. But it’s not at all necessary to work out like Hugh Jackman or Chris Evans to receive absolutely huge benefits. This is where the American binary thinking goes wrong. People believe not working out like Hugh Jackman == failing utterly.
However, the reality is that the average person should be doing 20-40 minutes of medium- to high-impact exercise 2-3 times a week to receive most of the benefits that I do. By comparison, I work out 5-6 times a week for 30 minutes to 1.5 hours each time.)
The first ten on today’s playlist:
Putin to remove Sergei Shoigu as Russia’s defence minister.
Sergei better watch out for windows. Heard they are nearly irresistible in Russia.
God people really really hate hate hate that Haidt is right. There must be just a fucking mountain of propaganda money spewing now to “disprove” him (and Twenge). It’s probably in the hundreds of millions if not billions.
What is your favorite “most 90s song” ever? Mine will always be Spacehog – In the Meantime.
Damn the 90s seem like such a different world now. I’m not going to bang on about it yet again, but the optimism of the time felt so great in retrospect. There is no going back, though. Only forward; nostalgia is a trap. But it’s impossible to describe to someone not there the experience of that glowing hopefulness.
Now with all that preamble, let’s get to the postamble. There is no way to choose the “most 90s” song ever as the era contained too many currents and trends and what existed in 1990 was quite different than what 1999 brought. So I am going to go a different direction and choose not a favorite song of the era, but rather a work that best represents all the crosscurrents of the 90s, all the optimism, all the zaniness, all the meta-textuality and the gonzo creativity of that time.
And that’d be Weezer’s “Undone (The Sweater Song).” As I said, this is not my favorite song of the 1990s. It’s not even in my top 50. But it holds all the 90s in a five minute package and that makes it my pick. The video was directed by Spike Jonze, the darling auteur of the 1990s, which certainly contributes to my choosing it.
(If I absolutely had to choose a favorite song of the 1990s personally, it’d probably be “Bells Ring” (Acoustic Version) by Mazzy Star. Hope sounds so amazing in that version.)
Jonathan Haidt Blamed Tech for Teen Anxiety. Managing the Blowback Has Become a Full-Time Job.
When you’re wrong there’s not massive blowback. No one cares about you when that happens. When you’re right, though, against powerful interests like big tech, there’s blowback and attempts to discredit you with flimsy but plausible propaganda. It’s startlingly obvious that smart phones and social media is an incredibly harmful combination, particularly for children and for women’s mental health and stability.
The hugely disingenuous attempt by many to conflate Haidt’s previous advocacy of allowing children freedom to roam with the “freedom” to be manipulated algorithmically by ruthless and unaccountable tech companies via smartphone — dang, I’ve heard stupider things in my life, but not very fucking many.
Of course Haidt’s main thesis is correct. People just don’t want to believe how much of a massive mistake we’ve all made, and how much we’ve harmed ourselves and younger generations. It’s a terrible destruction we’ve wreaked with no apparent end. That’s why no one wants it brought into the light and why anyone who discusses it is accused of “moral panic” and told to get with the times.
Yeah, that was always gonna be a failure. Women 100% cannot handle rejection and would do fucking anything to avoid it. They expect men to be the ones taking all the rejection and the chances in life.
I’ve had a variant of this conversation with more than one female friend:
Her: I like him but he just never seems to notice.
Me: Notice? He won’t notice. Good guys don’t presume anymore. You have to tell him. So why don’t you?
Her: What if he doesn’t like me and says no?
Me: That’s the risk a guy takes a million times in his life. And a lot of women attempt to ruin your life if you express any interest. That’s just how it goes.
Her: I’m not going to say anything.
Me: Then you’ll end up with nothing. Welcome to guy world.
Feminism for thee but not for me is all the rage the past decade and more. It is funny that women believe men have trouble with rejection when it’s pretty much our whole lives, but if an attractive woman experiences rejection even once it’s the end of the world.
Gen Z be like: There’s a woman in this photo! That’s sexualization!
They are like some weird combo of Islamic fundamentalism and Victorian prudishness. And that is very, very bad.
The future is terrible:
