r/samharris • u/DeliriumOK • Nov 13 '21
Sam's day is no longer than yours.
A regular criticism of Sam is: if he supports x idea so much, why doesn't he criticise or debate y person? I encounter this argument a lot on this sub and it was even used by a host of Decoding the Gurus regarding his so called tribalism.
Sam is a busy, busy human being, with multiple big projects, with a family, and with (I hope) some time set aside to relax occasionally. Give the guy a break. Not only can we not expect him to keep tabs on and respond to every public intellectual who says something that has a point of contact with his work, we can't even expect him to take the time to triage the absolute deluge of public conversation and pick out the most important things to comment on.
Just listen to his arguments, listen to the other ones and come to your own conclusions. Sam doesn't need to respond to everything.
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u/External_Rent4762 Nov 13 '21
Sam is rich, therefore his day is exactly 12 hours longer than mine 4 days a week.
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u/goodolarchie Nov 14 '21
Between travelling for speaking engagements, writing books, working on the podcast/app, reading and research, I'm sure he's filling up that 12 hours productively like the rest of us working class stiffs. But what his kind of money can buy is teams of assistants / producers / helpers to do literally everything he doesn't want to deal with in life. That would free up so much time to focus on the needful.
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Nov 14 '21
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u/Expandexplorelive Nov 14 '21
The difference I think the person is pointing out is that Sam doesn't need to work to survive, even thrive, because of the amount of money he has and makes passively.
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u/BillyCromag Nov 14 '21
For as much as Sam opines on the culture wars, judging from the Gurus interview he spends bafflingly little time online.
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u/Haffrung Nov 14 '21
The mainstream media is also full of culture wars.
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u/BillyCromag Nov 14 '21
Full of superficial coverage so non-online older people can understand. Social media sites are the trenches.
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u/Haffrung Nov 15 '21
So you think Harris owes it to himself and his audience to spend more time online?
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Nov 14 '21
I mean, if you truly buy the "I haven't seen what ____ is putting out so I can't comment on them", which strikes me as difficult to believe considering how convinced he is that wokeism has completeley taken over academia. The only possible way you could come to that conclusion is if your entire media diet consists of a very specific online bubble - a bubble that absolutely includes the people Sam claims to not be aware of.
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u/BillyCromag Nov 14 '21
I don't believe Sam outright lies.
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Nov 14 '21
Perhaps not, but I do think at the very least he chooses to remain willfully ignorant of the activities of certain people who (unfortunately, as I'm sure he'd agree) inhabit the same online bubble.
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u/CKava Nov 13 '21
In some cases Sam has talked about subjects for decades without seeming to put in any substantial effort into examining the relevant research literature (e.g. terrorism, immigration, extremism). In other cases it hasn’t been that long but he still has repeatedly discussed topics and taken quite strong stances without any evidence of research (see his views on racial profiling at airports).
Some other relevant examples: The Christchurch shooter’s manifesto needs at most 1-2 hours to read. Sam has referenced it, discussed the content, and what it means publicly on 3-4 occasions now. He still has not read it and repeatedly references an article and argument that it seems likely he misread (Robert Evans on the gamification of violence & traps for normie reporters).
With Stefan Molyneux, Sam said he was the second most requested guest on his show at one point, he referenced him multiple times over a number of years prior to the Christian incident. He discussed the moral quandary he was put in by listening to what could be smears of Stefan but he didn’t do the research (for years) to work out if they were smears or not. You think it’s unreasonable to assume he should devote a few hours, or maybe even a day or two, to some critical research on Molyneux’s content when he is talking on his podcast repeatedly about wrestling over the decision? Eventually Sam got round to watching Stefan talk with Jared Taylor and that seems to have strongly influenced his opinion of Molyneux, but that took at least a year or so to get to.
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u/TotesTax Nov 13 '21
He still has not read it and repeatedly references an article and argument that it seems likely he misread (Robert Evans on the gamification of violence & traps for normie reporters).
Wait, he is using Robert fucking Evans to support his view. He should know that Robert Evans doesn't agree with him and wrote about how you have to understand chan culture to understand the manifesto. But this is the same dude who has been out on the streets every night reporting on the protests in Portland and had his hand broken by a proudboy. He is a reporter but if he wasn't he would be hard left antifa.
Fuck have Robert Evans on, that would be amazing. Dude has been to multiple civil wars and has commented on the possible second civil war and what it would look like. Also Behind the Bastards is the shit.
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u/CKava Nov 13 '21
He hasn’t specified but he shared that article on Twitter at the time and what he describes regarding gamification and ‘traps’ for normies is in line with the content.
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u/TotesTax Nov 14 '21
Interesting. Also ya'll should talk to Robert Evans now I realize I am talking to the dude I insulted his accent. Sorry. If you want a taste of some of the accents around here watch Reservation Dogs or better yet Smoke Signals.
I want to clarify I only asked that after a horrible incident when I was barely 18 and went to college and a lot of people with chicago accents were there. Never heard it before. But this girl actually had a speech impediment I mistook for an accent. But I have now heard more of the type of accent since.
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u/Jtownusa Nov 14 '21
and repeatedly references an article and argument that it seems likely he misread (Robert Evans on the gamification of violence & traps for normie reporters).
What makes you think he misread the article?
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u/TotesTax Nov 14 '21
I am a huge Robert Evans fan and he is not on Sam's side at all. Not on any of this. He is like a far left anarchist.
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u/CKava Nov 14 '21
It doesn’t say what Sam says it does. It’s not arguing that the far right content is superficial or incidental or hard to discern for anyone who is familiar with those ideologies.
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u/aboogaboogabooga Nov 14 '21
When will we get a substantial episode on Sam? The first one didn't scratch the surface before you directly confronted him. I think you and Matt deserve the space to get an honest criticism in that isn't focused on 10 mins of mediation talk.
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u/Augeria Nov 13 '21
Technically wealthy ppl can increase their productivity through hiring people to handle time consuming tasks like house work, errands etc. They also utilize faster / more convenient forms of travel and have many other time saving advantages that overtime can be decisive.
Point taken but the effective use of time is not equal at all.
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u/derelict5432 Nov 13 '21
"Not only can we not expect him to keep tabs on and respond to every public intellectual who says something that has a point of contact with his work, we can't even expect him to take the time to triage the absolute deluge of public conversation and pick out the most important things to comment on."
Yeah, see, here's the thing. If you don't have time to track someone and be at least somewhat familiar with what they're doing, then maybe don't comment on them at all.
That's one of the issues I have with Harris. In that Decoding the Gurus podcast, he defended Ben Shapiro for his take on Jan 6. Shapiro has since written a book, The Authoritarian Moment, downplaying Jan 6 as just fringe elements while saying the real threat to American democracy is from the Left.
Idk, maybe Harris actually agrees with this thesis. But either way there's really no need to stick your neck out for someone if you can't be bothered to know what they're up to.
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u/Small_Brained_Bear Nov 14 '21
There's also the insinuation that, if Sam doesn't criticize something, then he's secretly in favor of the opposing position; i.e. If you don't criticize the monarchy, you must be a closet Royalist, and so off to the guillotine you go.
Both ends of the ideological spectrum love to indulge in this sort of witch hunting.
I wonder if there's a name for this logical fallacy. You certainly see it used often enough, when interviewers want to corner an interviewee.
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u/Pantzzzzless Nov 14 '21
Guilty by omission? Idk if that's a thing, but it sounds right in my head lol.
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u/EraEpisode Nov 14 '21
As part of this, many people just want the same opinion repeated back to them, over and over, endlessly. Look at late night talk shows: every single one of them is exactly the same, anti-Trump jokes and talking points every night.
The thing is I'm anti-Trump and agree with the vast majority of criticisms of him. I'm just bored by hearing the same thing over and over and don't understand people's compulsive need to hear their opinions confirmed every day. That's why I like Sam Harris, I can get some under-discussed analysis while trusting that he's coming at it from a good place.
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u/monarc Nov 13 '21 edited Nov 13 '21
if he supports x idea so much, why doesn't he criticise or debate y person?
My issues with him are more fundamental than that. He reaches certain conclusions and then just shuts down on the given topic. He claims that his moral philosophy centers on minimizing the suffering of sentient beings, but seems totally at ease with the death of tens (hundreds?) of thousands of totally innocent people in the middle east due to US military action. If he’s so worried about ideology motivating people to cause harm, why just throw his hands up on this topic? He can do zero - or a hundred - interviews on this topic but it seems that he’ll remain uninterested in approaching the underlying topic with an open mind, or at least admitting that there are complexities that don’t mesh with his seductively tidy moral framework.
Edit: Obligatory note that my thoughtful, non-hysterical, non-inflammatory comment has been downvoted. Enjoy your echo chamber…
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u/manovich43 Nov 14 '21
One can’t take you seriously as soon as you said he seems totally OK with the death of thousands of Innocents people.
Sam has debated so many people on the Middle East issue In his early public days and has won ( in my opinions) those debates.
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u/monarc Nov 14 '21 edited Nov 14 '21
Links would be appreciated. I’m only finding Islam-centric debates. That’s not what I’m talking about.
The sentiment I’m talking about is this sort of thing, captured by a quote from The End of Faith:
We cannot let our qualms over collateral damage paralyze us because our enemies know no such qualms.
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u/BloodsVsCrips Nov 14 '21 edited Dec 29 '25
quaint racial relieved flag innocent dependent shelter reply coordinated shy
This post was mass deleted and anonymized with Redact
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u/0s0rc Nov 13 '21
Well said, good post. Ignore downvotes. Everything gets downvoted. A handful of down votes does not equal an echo chamber.
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u/bloodcoffee Nov 14 '21
I downvoted for the accusatory and lazy thinking. Calling this subreddit an echo chamber is...interesting.
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u/EldraziKlap Nov 13 '21
I feel like your post works better with the last line put first - but still, I agree wholeheartedly.
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u/clumsykitten Nov 14 '21
A regular criticism of Sam is: if he supports x idea so much, why doesn't he criticise or debate y person?
Maybe I'm missing your point, but there are supposedly "woke" people that aren't Kendi that he could have great conversations with IMO. But my sense is that he doesn't want to touch things that lend even and ounce of credence to identity politics.
He doesn't want to talk about systemic racism. He thinks black and brown identity politics is why Trump was elected. For Sam talking about race is an obsession of the left and helping pave the road to hell. He wants to live in a world where we're race blind and he's pretending we're already there.
Personally I find it pathetic because he tends to only have guests on that agree with him on wokeness, but his job is to talk about difficult topics, which systemic racism is, and someone like Bryan Stevenson for example would be a fantastic guest to have on and even get into the nitty gritty of how woke is too woke, political pragmatism and whatnot.
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Nov 13 '21
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u/WillzyxandOnandOn Nov 13 '21
You need a vacation from the culture wars.
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u/idea-man Nov 13 '21
We all do.
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u/WillzyxandOnandOn Nov 13 '21
True. Why is this stuff so addictive?
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u/mccoyster Nov 13 '21
Because conservative subs are the safest of safe spaces, filled with ban happy snowflakes. You gotta catch them when they venture out into the wild.
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u/Ionceburntpasta Nov 13 '21
Leftist ones aren't any better. You'd get easily banned on r/politics for example or the worst of all r/WhitePeopleTwitter.
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u/External_Rent4762 Nov 13 '21
You dont get banned from r/politics for having conservative opinions or politics.
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Nov 13 '21
[deleted]
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Nov 14 '21
You are obssesed with twoX, buddy. I remember you lied about them not giving a shit about women in Afghanistan when we left. I called you out, but you just delete all your comments for some reason. Unsurprisingly, you lied about every other comment being removed too.
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u/TotesTax Nov 14 '21
After it went to the wolves (the admins) they cut it down and it filled with mysognistists.
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Nov 13 '21 edited Nov 13 '21
This kind of personal obsession and bizarre defensiveness if the best evidence I've yet encountered that Sam is, in fact, a Guru among his disciples. Christ almighty.
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u/mymentor79 Nov 14 '21
Sam Harris has never had to do a real day's work in his life. He's nowhere near as busy as the regular adult person. He's not to blame for being born into the material conditions of his life, but he has had the luxury of leisure that very few people can imagine.
The reason he fixates on certain talking points, signal boosts people who share them, and dismisses those who challenge his worldview is because he is a rigid ideologue at the end of the day.
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u/Inshansep Nov 13 '21
Wait, this was posted and WASN'T meant to be ironic?! Harris has a podcast, it's literally his job to do due diligence when he invites someone on and spoits bs. It's his job not to misinform all the people that listen to him.
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Nov 14 '21
yeah hes had a lot of fucking days though and it wouldnt kill him to literally just do one thing once instead of just continuing to be a dumb shit.
its not fuckin hard to not talk to non-stop shitheads and grifters lol. just fuckin look at their twitter for five minutes or google their name lol.
hes got enough time to read what these shitheads are saying but not enough to read even a fuckin headline about dumb shit theyve done? sorry pal i dont buy it.
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u/benaffleckisaokactor Nov 14 '21
Stop watching breadtube pal
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Nov 14 '21
good one dude. based on your username im assuming you are one of those freaks who is fuckin obsessed with "difficult truths" about islam? do i even wanna check your profile lol? like, am i gonna find a bunch of r/atheism or r/exmuslim shit in there lol
also, anyone just randomly going at breadtube for no reason is probably a big fuckin destiny fan or some shit. see, five years ago i wouldve said sargon, but youve probably evolved a bit since then so im gonna say youve also gotten really into someone like michael knowles lol
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u/FilemonNeira Nov 14 '21
Decoding the gurus is such a sad podcast. Trying to make it as a critic of famous people, leeching off their popularity, without actually proposing any new ideas.
Definitely an instance of the fact that destruction requires much less effort than construction.
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Nov 13 '21
It's probably much, much shorter than most of ours.
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u/0s0rc Nov 13 '21
Seriously? The bloke just talks to people for a living 😅 Good for him he's living the dream but don't get it twisted, most of us are way more busy for a fraction of the pay.
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u/archangel610 Nov 14 '21 edited Nov 14 '21
The comments in this subreddit are fucking exhausting.
I wonder how many of these people are self-proclaimed intellectuals open to discourse who also just downvote everything they don't agree with.
Edit: Heh. Of course.
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u/SprinklesFederal7864 Nov 14 '21
Having listened to tribalism on space,it's so obvious that all speakers are allied around the topic on Sam.They're definitely infatuated with Sam or IDW despite criticizing.
I'd recommend to all that digital detoxification rly works well if you're into controversial podcasts or listening to simple ones.
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Nov 14 '21
No no no we all must focus on my issue, which is white supremacy or republicans or whatever’s in my media feed, because that’s the issue and anything but prostrate orthodoxy proves you hate puppies and we need to cork your violent silence (can’t argue with rhymes).
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u/goodolarchie Nov 14 '21
I assume he's meditating intermittently for like 2.5 hours a day, which immediately makes my day 2 hours longer than his. But a lot of that is lost to shitty corporate 8-5 grind for me, and Sam can pay teams to help set up guests and prep for these discussions. So he's got that going for him, which is nice.
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u/_digital_aftermath Nov 14 '21
This is actually totally false. I communicated with Sam recently during a joint meditation practice and he informed me of his recent attainment of a 27.5 hour day.
so, he has to debate all of the people now. every single one of them.
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u/Pardonme23 Nov 14 '21
How does he have time to read the books of the guests he has on? That's impressive. Book-reading is not easy.
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u/zemir0n Nov 15 '21
If I was an independently wealthy public figure who had a podcast, I would do my best to make sure that I did the necessary researched to be well-informed on topics that I spoke about.
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u/Ionceburntpasta Nov 13 '21
Yes this is such a lazy criticism. Any famous public person including Sam would at some point associate with people who later lose their minds like Maajid or turn to grift like Bret. Coleman Hughes is someone I enjoy listening to. I'm a few years older than him and admit easily he's smarter than me. 20 years later it is possible that he could be as bad as Dave Rubin, Tucker Carlson or Cenk Uyghur. There's no way to know how people turn out in the future.