Beyond Talking Points

In this episode, Matt and Matt talk about the idea of secession in modern day America. We talk about what it could take to make secession politically palatable, what secession could look like if it actually happened, and if it would make people's lives better.

In this episode, Matt and Matt discuss the role of empathy in government, policy, and politics. We both listened to an old episode of the Very Bad Wizards podcast that touched on the topic, and we riffed off there. We use the word "heuristic" so many times that the word loses all of its meaning. Generally, we discuss the disconnect between our interpretation of events and the true impact of policy or policy-making.

In this episode, Matt and Matt talk about "All Watched Over By Machines Of Loving Grace", a documentary series produced by Adam Curtis. We react to all sorts of elements covered in the series, such as Reagan, Ayn Rand, capitalism, technocracy, and central planning.

In this episode, Matt and Matt talk about the French film "Martyrs" - a movie known for some disturbing sequences and graphic content. They talk about the themes that the movie overtly touches on and other parts of the film that jumped out to them. Spoilers ahead. We both recommend the film if you can handle disturbing content, maybe not a date night movie.

Matt and Matt discuss the SoHo forum debate between Bill Kristol and Scott Horton about US interventionism. This was a fun one - if you haven't seen the debate, it's worth watching. We don't often discuss foreign policy and the thoughts/principles that inform our foreign policy views, so this is an interesting change of pace.

In this episode, Matt and Matt discuss what "is" in terms of government, society, and human action. We often argue about moral intuitions or how things "ought" to be; this time, we dug into thinking that is true regardless of more judgements that are usually tied into ideology.

In this episode, Matt and Matt talk about things related to globalism, the elite class, technocracy, international institutions, and government. A fun episode where we get to agree a lot.

In this episode, we talk about Louis Lingg and Johann Most's excerpts from "The Anarchist Handbook". We talk about revolutionary actors, martyrs, political violence, and more. This eventually devolves into a debate about the importance of political participation that references Jordan Peterson, Martin Luther King, and others.

The Matts discuss their views on the law as an institution, and whether or not politicians should concern themselves with following the law or being Machiavellian in pursuit of their goals and interests. This is a laid back episode with a fair amount of agreement, although The Rule of Law is definitely a point of departure between the two of us. This topic was pitched by Ancap Matt. There are a lot of "liberty" oriented people that have odd purity tests that are ignorant of long term strategy. This is not claiming that all of the bad politicians are good in the long run, but a good congressman's compromise might be the best for liberty under certain circumstances.

In this episode, the Matts continue to make their way through Michael Malice's "The Anarchist Handbook". They covered Lysander Spooner's essay, "No Treason", and discussed whether the US Constitution has any authority, how politicians are able to properly represent their voters, and individualist anarchism. There was a lot of disagreement over the content of this essay, what intuitions it plays into, and if the arguments Spooner make have any utility. As always we hope you find some instruction and entertainment in this conversation.

In this episode, Matt and Matt revisit COVID related public policy decisions. We discuss how our views of the policies have evolved and what to think of COVID policies going forward. Fortunately we agree on a lot on this topic (at this point) and put a lot of criticism in the government's and the public policy experts' direction.

In this episode, Matt and Matt talk about cosmic nihilism and it's implications. They talk about cultural decadence, the ways that people (maybe wrongly) use nihilism to inform their life and worldview. We argue about if there is any importance to cosmic meaning (and lack of cosmic meaning). We don't necessarily walk away in any solidified agreement on these topics, but we really do find a lot of common ground here.

In this episode, Matt and Matt discuss one of Matt's favorite movies, the 2019 A24 Horror/Drama "Midsommar". Because this movie is very bizarre, it only made sense to record our takeaways from the film and the themes it touches on. We talk about cults, feminism, culture relativism, and a little bit of nihilism.

In this episode, we discuss Mikhail Bakunin's excerpt from Michael Malice's book, "The Anarchist Handbook". We have a lot of thoughts, mostly discussing where Bakunin contrasts Marx and the ways Bakunin reminded Matt of Murray Rothbard. A fun discussion that covers a lot of ground.

On this episode, Matt and Matt discuss Chapter five of Michael Malice's "Anarchist Handbook", an excerpt from Herbert Spencer's "Social Statics". In it Spencer talks about the right to defy/ignore/withdraw from the state's authority. We talk about that as well as what secession would look like in the United States. Inevitably, we talk about if any government policy is ever good - lots of fun rabbit holes we chase in this one.

In this episode Beyond Talking Points, the Matts talk about Michael Knowles' case for censorship from a conservative standpoint, and how that relates to our ideas on free speech in general. This leads us into discussions around big tech and other hypothetical scenarios when speech could or should be restricted.

In this episode of Beyond Talking Points, Matt and Matt continue their deep-dive into Michael Malice's "Anarchist Handbook". This episode is about Chapter 4, an excerpt from Pierre-Joseph Proudhon's "The Confessions of a Revolutionist", published in 1850. Proudhon was the first person to call himself an anarchist, and is also considered the founder of Mutualism, an ideology which Proudhon thought was "the synthesis of communism and property". This brings up some meta-commentary on the differences between "left anarchists" and people like Noam Chomsky. We map out some of the differences that seem to reveal large rifts between different types of anarchists and statists.

Matt and Matt discuss chapter three of Michael Malice's Anarchist Handbook, an excerpt from Max Stirner's "The Ego and Its Own". The episode starts off with where we agree and disagree with Stirner's philosophy, and then the conversations leads to more discussion about individualism and collectivism.

On this episode, we start breaking down "The Anarchist Handbook" chapter by chapter. We begin with chapter two, which is an excerpt from "Enquiry Concerning Political Justice" by William Godwin about the social contract. Matt and Matt had different reactions to Godwin's arguments in the sense of how it should be framed and examined. We ended up getting bogged down in wanting to have different conversations surrounding Godwin's arguments. We decided to present the episode regardless (and there are a few insights/arguments that we successfully engage with), let the audience decide how much of a success or failure it was, and attempt to do better next week with Stirner!

In the sixtieth episode of Beyond Talking Points, Matt and Matt discuss the Austrian School of Economics. Matt Keck is a proponent of Austrian Economics, and Matt H is only beginning to go beyond the basics in the field of economics. Matt H, therefore, absorbs some Austrian economics content, and pelted Matt K with a thousand and one questions. We hope this gives the audience a greater understanding about these issues. We touch on several things such as scarcity, human action, interest rates, inflation, the Austrian Business Cycle, and misallocation of resources.

5/28/2021 - In the fifty-ninth episode of Beyond Talking Points, we have a conversation that sprang out of an inside joke: "Marxist" Matt will one day become a neo-conservative someday because Ancap Matt sees parallels between his co-host's worldview and the Buckleyites. This leads to a very general discussion on war, imperialism, an analysis of neoconservatism as an ideology, and the role that public intellectuals have in the many wars that the US has found itself in.

5/20/2021 - In the fifty-eighth episode of Beyond Talking Points, Matt and Matt use a video of the late psychiatrist Thomas Szasz as a starting point for a discussion on psychiatry, and the mental health field as a whole. Does mental illness exist? Is it morally permissible to hold people against their will in a psychiatric institution? These questions and more are explored here. This is not necessarily an outright political topic, but it is a relevant and polarizing topic.

5/13/2021 - In the fifty-seventh episode of Beyond Talking Points, Keegan (aka EssentialSalts) joins the Matts to discuss Universal Basic Income, an idea popularized by former Presidential candidate and current candidate for mayor of NYC Andrew Yang. But we begin with Thomas Paine's 1797 pamphlet "Agrarian Justice". In that pamphlet, Paine proposed UBI for anyone older than 21. In this way, we cover both the first principles behind the policy, the economic costs and benefits related to UBI, and the practical issues and implications that would go into implementing such a policy.

5/6/2021 - In this episode of Beyond Talking Points, Matt and Matt have a wide ranging conversation about rhetoric, language, and propaganda. We had two jumping off points: we had both read the George Orwell essay "Politics and the English Language" and we've had a long standing disagreement about the importance of political pundits using charged language.

4/29/2021 - In this episode, Matt and Matt discuss their intuitions about the value of discussing politics and policy. Is there value of discussing the issues that we argue about every week?

4/23/2021 - In this episode of Beyond Talking Points, Matt and Matt discuss an Intelligence Squared debate on the question of student loan forgiveness. These conversations are always a tightrope walk between abstract general principles and specific policy positions and the material implications of each policy. But as usual, I like to think these podcasts allows us--and allows the audience--to think more deeply and to consider the opposing viewpoint.

4/14/2021 - In this episode of Beyond Talking Points, Matt and Matt talk about their opinions related to guns and gun control. Ancap Matt is a big supporter of gun rights and very anti-gun control. Ancomm Matt is torn between philosophically supporting gun rights and also believing that certain freedoms should be limited for the greater good of the community. This discussion is comparatively civil to a few recent episodes.

In this episode, Matt and Matt begin the show by talking about their general thoughts related to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. But then we get into a broader conversation regarding the justness of political violence. This episode is very broad and isn't a substitute for knowing the history of the conflict. This is mostly our reactions to the general narratives for both sides and our reactions.

In this episode, we talk about two topics that are very different: the philosophy of Anti-Nalatism and Jury Nullifcation. he first half is very laid back, and the second half gets much more heated (even though we actually agree on both issues). This gives you the chance to see our thought process on two totally unrelated topics in order to better understand our over-arching worldview. This is a fun one because both topics aren't covered often and are worth thinking about!

After having Keegan on twice, Matt and Matt decided to have another guest on. Kohei has a very specific and interesting worldview which focuses on power as foundation for human affairs and the world more broadly. Matt and Matt actually generally agreed in our disagreements with Kohei; that is to say we agree with Kohei's general argument, but our worldviews simply do not emphasize power in the way that Kohei's worldview does. We dig into the implications of this worldview. Kohei's YouTube Channel https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCnIS3IE5cCBc9gpapMPnPIA

It has been quite a while since we discussed Coronavirus policy, and we had been meaning to do a second episode about it at some point. We touch such issues as the stimulus checks, government overreach, and being "blue-pilled". There's a lot of back and forth on this one, and we encourage people to look into the statistics related to COVID-19 and form their own opinions.

On the forty-eighth episode of Beyond Talking Points, Matt and Matt are joined by Keegan to discuss their views on whether or not the state is justified. This is a broad topic, and we touch on many different aspects of it, including how contracts are upheld, whether democracy justifies the state, and the nature of how businesses and corporations behave.

In this episode, Matt and Matt talk about gender and biological sex. This is one of the times we tackle a "culture war" issue, but we end up having a fairly substantitive back and forth that is worthy of consideration. In the end, we don't make a ton of progress, but there is a lot of nuance to unpack.

In the forty-sixth episode of Beyond Talking Points, the Matts discuss their opinions on whether or not censorship is a problem nowadays, the role of government in social media policy, and whether political correctness will have long-term effect on politics, culture, and society.

For the first time, Matt and Matt are joined by a guest! Keegan joins us to discuss a debate between Noam Chomsky and Michel Foucault. We cover several topics ranging from their view on human nature to their comments on politics.

In this episode, we have a discussion about what "political ideology" is and it's limitations. We discuss if it's possible for an ideology to actually be descriptive of the world, if it can avoid internal contradictions, and if it is necessary for an ideology to become all encompassing. We do get hung up on praxeology a bit, but eventually agree to disagree for the time being. We also talk about when an ideology contradicts itself in the context of policy and conflicting constituencies.

In this episode, Matt and Matt react to a Soho Forum debate between Walter Block and Kerry Baldwin. The debate, in simplified terms, is about a woman's right to "evict" a fetus during different points in a pregnancy. We react to some of the ideas presented and give our general takes on eviction theory and abortion.

In this one, Matt and Matt discuss the "insurrection" on January 6th at Capitol Hill. We have very different thoughts. We go through the narrative and break down our reactions.

In this one, we discuss the events around world war 2 and debate if the prevailing narrative - that US involvement in World War 2 was justified - is correct. We go through some forecasting on what could have happened if the US did not intervene and look at some of the narratives for why the US did intervene.

In this episode, we discuss a Noam Chomsky lecture about Madisonian Democracy. We discuss positive rights, property rights, and democracy. It's a fun one with a lot of the discussion you'd expect from us!

We do better staying on track in this one! We dig deeper into what it means to be red pilled, and we get into some arguments about academia. I'd note that Ancap Matt - a fan of Michael Malice - admittedly does a bad job of representing Michael Malice's views accurately and effectively through these 2 episodes. Even though Malice conveys some themes in a way that's easy to communicate, it's not easy to predict how he'd respond to some argument (part of his appeal), and Matt, regretfully, attempts to try and argue what he thinks Malice might argue. Good for discussion's sake, but worthy of the disclaimer.

This is an episode! In short, we try to discuss the idea of being "Red Pilled" using Michael Malice's definition. Unfortunately, we are quickly bogged down into a discussion of using morally charged language in political discussions. Ancap Matt is almost certainly on a watchlist if any feds listen to this episode. We try again in the next episode, so consider this a Part 1.

In this episode, we discuss the idea of "American Culture". The backstory here is that in a private conversation, Matt implied that there is a general American ethos, this triggers ancap Matt. So this conversation is the logical outgrowth of that conversation.

We broadly discuss the corporate press and their role in US politics. We use a Jon Stewart/Rachel Maddow interview as a springboard to dig into this ever-present discussion. A lot of agreement in this episode!

In this episode, we react to the outcome of the 2020 election and have a wide ranging discussion on what happened and potentially why.

Recorded in November, this is our big COVID-19 episode. Matt, the resident ancap, insisted that we discuss reasons to be angry at the government for their COVID-19 policies. He alludes to some articles that should cause doubt about some of the mainstream narratives that are used to justify our totalitarian state. And then we argue. Since this is a few months old, these arguments aren't as timely, and some of the situations references in Europe that we discuss would greatly benefit from updated info. With that said, this is a good faith argument on if the government response was justified and why/why not!

In another episode that is getting put on the podcast feed a bit late, we reacted to the first presidential debate. Watching the debate, Matt (the ancap, accelerationist Matt) was giddy, since the level of discourse was so partisan and pathetic. So we discuss!

In this episode, we talk about Karl Marx and some of our thoughts regarding capitalism and exploitation.

This was a fun one. We react to an hour long anarcho-primativist interview we listened to that featured John Zerzan. We had a lot of thoughts and it's an interesting topic to kick around. Then, we talked about the death of Ruth Bader Ginsburg and the role of the Supreme Court of the US. We recorded this a while back, so our takes are potentially a bit dated, but it ended up being a solid conversation about institutions contrasting with political expediency.

In this episode, Matt and Matt revisit the Peterson/Harris saga, tackling their fourth discussion. Once again, we somehow find ways to disagree in potentially thoughtful ways. Another discussion on secularism and the value of religion.

This one is a true battle. We end up tackling the positive rights vs negative rights debate from several angles, all of which Matt and Matt disagree. This is two hours of relatively substantive disagreements where we each try to make our case for the type of rights we lean towards.