Join us for an intriguing exploration of “Moral Courage Revisited”, where we start by talking about the conviction of James and Jennifer Crumbley and redefine the notion of ethical bravery. From defining moral courage to unraveling its origins and challenges, we draw inspiration from historical icons and confront modern-day pressures like cancel culture. Discover how to cultivate moral courage in your daily life through self-awareness, empathy, and resilience, as we challenge listeners to stand up for their beliefs and make a difference.
Tune in to see Moral Courage Revisisted Through a Therapist’s Eyes.
Think about these three questions as you listen:
- Do you Know what Moral courage is?
- Do you think it is hard to execute?
- What are the challenges to live this out?
Links referenced during the show:
https://psycnet.apa.org/record/2009-22821-008
https://www.throughatherapistseyes.com/category/podcasts/mentalhealthtips
Intro Music by Reid Ferguson – https://reidtferguson.com/
@reidtferguson – https://www.instagram.com/reidtferguson/
https://www.facebook.com/reidtferguson
https://open.spotify.com/artist/3isWD3wykFcLXPUmBzpJxg
Audio Podcast Version Only
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Episode #269 Transcription
Chris Gazdik: [00:00:00] Through a therapist’s eyes. I am Chris, your host, and this is April the 11th, 2024. We’re going to be talking about. A topic that we have actually covered on the show before. You have probably heard it, but it has been a long time ago. This is one of the very few things that I, I like to touch on from time to time.
Love and Logic’s one of them. Emotional Focus Therapy is another one of them. And this isn’t one of what I call the trifecta. Which is also Dave Ramsey’s financial peace university. But this is just an important topic called moral courage. That is, I think, important enough for us all to be thoughtful about.
So, so we revisit it from time to time. That’s what we’re doing today. We have Mr. John Pope hanging out with us again. How are you, sir?
John-Nelson Pope: I’m doing outstanding.
Chris Gazdik: Thank you very much. And Ms. Pendergrass is hanging out with us after missing us last week.
Victoria Pendergrass: Yes. Happy to be back.
Chris Gazdik: So the game is still on and [00:01:00] we know what that means.
I’m going to make the, I’m going to
Victoria Pendergrass: talk about it. That’s fine. I’m
Chris Gazdik: going to make the statement that, that, that you haven’t gotten back on your medications that you have not. I mean, John, do you think she has, see, we’ve talked about this before. Okay. The game
Victoria Pendergrass: is, is I had to go off ADHD meds when I got pregnant and was breastfeeding and Chris and I have been talking about me getting back on them.
So that can help with my focus. And so now he’s playing a game where he tries to guess whether I told him that I would not tell him what we all are supposed to be. And so they’re all guessing whether or not I am back on ADHD meds and what is the consensus for John? I love it.
John-Nelson Pope: What are you thinking?
Well, I think that she probably has gone back on. I
Chris Gazdik: was thinking not, but she’s making me doubt myself. Okay.
Victoria Pendergrass: Why? Why? Why do you think not?
Chris Gazdik: I don’t know. I don’t want to go into all that because that’s too much. I don’t know. We can talk about it. We can talk about [00:02:00] it off the air.
Victoria Pendergrass: Neil, what about you?
John-Nelson Pope: I don’t, I, you’re, you’re not evil minded.
Victoria Pendergrass: Huh?
John-Nelson Pope: You’re not evil minded.
Victoria Pendergrass: I’m not evil minded? Yeah, you’re not impishly
John-Nelson Pope: evil or anything. I don’t want to
Chris Gazdik: spend too much time on this, but unless we are off, but what’s the answer?
Victoria Pendergrass: Y’all are wrong.
Chris Gazdik: Yeah. Oh, you’re back on?
Victoria Pendergrass: Yeah.
Chris Gazdik: Yeah.
Victoria Pendergrass: Okay. I’ve been on for about.
Two and a half, two, three weeks now. Two, three weeks? Yeah.
John-Nelson Pope: What’s the medication?
Victoria Pendergrass: What the heck? I’m on Concerta. Concerta.
John-Nelson Pope: Concerta. Okay. Now
Victoria Pendergrass: it is a low dosage because it’s been so long since I’ve been back on. So you’re ramping up or whatever? So I can see how you maybe have not seen a difference because, you know.
Chris Gazdik: Yeah,
Victoria Pendergrass: it is a rather low dosage and I have rather high ADHD, but as I’m literally sure this is not coffee. This is a coke. But
Chris Gazdik: like,
Victoria Pendergrass: So I could see that maybe as we increase my dosage, which I foresee in the future.
Chris Gazdik: How much are you on, if I may ask?
Victoria Pendergrass: [00:03:00] 25? That’s a stupid,
Chris Gazdik: stupid low. It’s one of the
Victoria Pendergrass: low.
Is it? It’s one of the low. It’s a 20 something.
Chris Gazdik: Maybe I’m thinking out of the role.
Victoria Pendergrass: You’re
Chris Gazdik: 20 something, right?
Victoria Pendergrass: Yeah, for
Chris Gazdik: sure. All right. Listen, what’s my intro stuff? The date panel, I’m all out of sorts. Now, this is where you get insights from a panel of therapists, time in your car and personal time at home, but not being delivery of therapy services in any way.
We’re building up YouTube this year. So check it out. Subscribe, make sure to tell your friends that helps us out a lot. That’s your job. If you like the content that we do, John, how many stars are they going to give us? You’re going to give. Five five stars five. Okay. He’s very particular about that. I’ve picked up about that with him contact at through a therapist eyes calm And finally, this is the human emotional experience.
We do endeavor to figure this thing out together so I want you to visualize hanging out with your buddy [00:04:00] and You’re inviting his girlfriend to hang out with you as well. If you’re a woman then you’re hanging out with with your guy, buddy, friend, not a boyfriend or dating, but just, you know if you’re a boy, you’re hanging out with your buddy, your friend we’ll call him Paul.
And Paul is, is, is talking to you and he feels a little abash. A little bashful, a little bit behind, a little bit awkward. And, you know, he gets a text and he looks kind of funny and you happen to see the text and maybe he reports this, this terrible name calling and belittling that his, his wife or girlfriend is, is, is perpetrating is, is she’s being really, really mean to him.
And you notice this in a couple more times, maybe in a restaurant, maybe at home, maybe it game night, you know, she’s She actually pokes him underneath the table and he just feels, he looks, he seems awkward and uncomfortable about this, right? What do you do? How do you [00:05:00] handle that? What would you say?
Would you say anything at all? Questions I want you to think about is, do you know what moral courage is? Do you think it’s hard to execute? And what are the challenges to living this out really and truly so we’ll get into this I think and i’m going to be very curious to hear what you guys think about this john and victoria Because it is a topic we’ve talked about long ago You should definitely definitely go to the website google the the topic you can hear what craig and I talked about it This was one of the like Early Top 15 show.
Yeah, I was gonna say,
Victoria Pendergrass: I wonder what 7 0
Chris Gazdik: 7 Neil’s telling me number seven. I wonder what,
Victoria Pendergrass: because I haven’t listened to it. I don’t know about John, but, so I’ll be interested to see like if how different our opinions and things are from Yeah, from even during, even during
Chris Gazdik: it then. Yeah. What, what we talked about back then long ago.
But we wanna do a current event, actually James and Jennifer Crumbley. John, you commented. Oh, you’re gonna do the crumbly thing? Yeah. Yes. I did. It’s a current event. What do you think about this whole deal? Have you been, have you, [00:06:00] have you guys been following Victoria?
John-Nelson Pope: I mean,
Chris Gazdik: Do you know what it is?
Victoria Pendergrass: No.
Chris Gazdik: Okay.
John-Nelson Pope: Yeah. Well,
Victoria Pendergrass: I might once you start talking about it, but the names aren’t ringing about,
John-Nelson Pope: it’s a Michigan couple. They had a son that did a mass shooting basically at a high school. Yeah. And I understand if I, if I’m correct, is that they, they did not warn. About their son, they, he, he, they also bought the weapon for the, for the son and the son had been showing and displaying behaviors that where he was kind of telegraphing that red flags, red flags everywhere.
Chris Gazdik: And we’re not a news outfit. And so we’re not, we’re not trying to report the news. I don’t want to, if everything you said, I concur. That’s what I’ve picked up on. The article that I kind of saw that popped this in my mind, highlighted the fact that this is, this is really the first parents of a U S school shooter to be [00:07:00] convicted ever, ever.
Yeah. First parents that are convicted and they were charged and found guilty with involuntary manslaughter in a criminal case. Jury trial here in the States, and they received as a conviction 10 to 15 years in prison at 10 years minimum, and then they’ll have a chance of parole. So this is a double digit prison sentence.
This is kind of a serious deal. This is not simple. This is not slight. So the judge in the article at least was quoted as saying the idea is that they’re they’re convicted for ignoring growing warning signs of a school mass shooting but not convicted due to poor parenting right quote They parents are not expected to be
psychic, but these convictions are not about poor parenting Concern acts that could have halted a runaway train.
She told the court. So I don’t know. Let’s go What do you guys what do you think about this john? Have you you’ve been following it? He said
John-Nelson Pope: Excuse me Well, I’m, you know, I’m kind of [00:08:00] interested why she said that about poor parenting. I’m, I’m thinking,
Chris Gazdik: well, I think the judge made the statement based on the criticism that would be anticipated.
You know, you, you can’t put. Parents in jail because they’re poor parents. I mean, we put a lot of different people into jail. So I think she sidestepped this by saying, no, it’s about I mean, the runaway train,
John-Nelson Pope: in other words, had clear signs, warning signs, warning signs about, about the sun.
Victoria Pendergrass: Correct me if I’m wrong.
I feel like you could say that poor parenting is that because like you can be because if I Like I would consider if I neglect like, oh, what was it? I can’t remember her name She it’s recent. She like left her baby in a pack and play for like 11 days While she went on vacation to like Miami or something and the baby died [00:09:00] Starved to death basically.
And she was just convicted and I can’t remember her name, but like, that’s
John-Nelson Pope: depraved indifference,
Victoria Pendergrass: but like, that’s all poor. I don’t know. Maybe it’s my millennial mind. I see that all as poor parenting and, and I’m not saying that like every parent is perfect because I’m definitely not a perfect parent, but like,
Chris Gazdik: well, I thought moral courage is a topic we’re going to go deep on.
Yeah. Is a, is a, is a fitting. topic with this current event. So if they had on last week’s domestic violence and sexual abuse, john, that you talked about, but I think in addition to moral courage, it has some other elements of concern that I have right. Okay.
John-Nelson Pope: All right. So the the children that were slaughtered, I think it was in Connecticut, wasn’t it?
Michigan? No, I’m talking about earlier ones that different
Chris Gazdik: mass
John-Nelson Pope: shooting, a different, Mass Junior. The mother also got who was killed by the, the, [00:10:00] the young man. Remember it was an elementary school that, that he shot Connecticut. The mob was killed. Sandy Hook. Sandy Hook. Sandy Hook was, yeah. Was in Connecticut.
Well, the mother was killed by him before he went out to Sandy. Yeah. He like went to her house. Yeah. He wouldn’t be like her house or whatever, so, but she had also bought him. His weapons, his firearms as well. So to me, that’s a kind of a, a sense that yes, did they cave in to the let’s say the, the, the pressure that the suns.
Were were doing or were they trying to be? Like you
Chris Gazdik: mean why did the jury convict?
John-Nelson Pope: No, no. Why, why did the mother or the father, why did they cave into to his demands for weapons of buying the weapon? Of buying the weapons?
Chris Gazdik: Well, I don’t think we know that, John. I mean, I, I, I think there’s, and I don’t want to get bogged down in the weeds with the particulars of the case.
I, but
John-Nelson Pope: it’s definitely not moral courage. In other words to say, this is [00:11:00] wrong. I’m not going to cave. I’m going to go ahead and, and I’m going to report my child.
Chris Gazdik: It’s terrifying. Yeah. There’s, there’s a lot, there’s a lot to it. I think one of the things, and then we’ll go over Neil, I see you with the mic that he’s got thoughts.
I mean, I, I really feel like in my view, this is a tough conviction to try to do and get, because you can’t, you know, put parents into jail willy nilly for things that their kid does. They don’t have elements of control that the kid actually does. I
know they’re a minor and they’re responsible, but how, how do you hold someone accountable for something that you, you, you know, and, and my main concern here is there, there are some elements.
I mean, there were some egregious people. Factors that again, I don’t want to get into the weeds of the case. These were horrible parents examples, I guess you could, you could make the argument, but, but the societies and other people’s [00:12:00] judgment. On a person and the ability to stop the runaway train or to see it predictable as, as this is going to be.
I need to turn my son in because they’re going to commit mass murder. I don’t know what human being could have the thought and foresight to do that. I don’t know. I don’t know when you do
Victoria Pendergrass: that. And, and Neil has something to say. There, so my favorite, one of my favorite podcasters, Patrick Hines, talks about how, he says, he does a true crime podcast, and he talks, and I agree, he talks all the time about how, like, if his daughter were to commit a crime, or commit murder, or something like that, like, he would turn her in.
Now he’s gonna go visit her every day in jail, but, like, he would turn her in. And I feel like I share that, like, I love my child, but, like, If you see it and I do, I do, I guess I do understand how as a parent and I’m understanding this now, like your, your viewpoint on your kid [00:13:00] changes because you don’t see them, how everybody else sees them and
Chris Gazdik: post to this.
Yeah. If this is after an event, okay. That’s different. But this is, this is previous to an event. How do you deal with that? It’s, it’s, it’s Well, and
Victoria Pendergrass: then how do you determine, like, Okay, well, am I just overthinking this? Like, am, is it red flags? Or is it not? There’s really not a way to
Chris Gazdik: have predictive measures here.
I don’t know any professional, skilled, master level therapist or psychologist or whatever is going to be able to get predictive measures here.
Victoria Pendergrass: Yeah,
Chris Gazdik: we don’t have them. They’re not there. We don’t, you know, we have a duty to warn It’s there’s something right field called tarasov’s case But like how do you execute duty to warn like I
Victoria Pendergrass: if you don’t know if you don’t
Chris Gazdik: know what what do you think in you?
Neil Robinson: I I think the biggest thing when you look at the case is that he was some of the things I read about it Was he was struggling with some stuff? They tried to talk to him do whatever and then they buy him a gun Like that’s [00:14:00] the problem when they go in the, he’s struggling with stuff and then they buy a gun for him specifically.
That’s when you, it goes too far. It’s not a, it’s not a neglect. It’s not seeing stuff. It’s the fact like there’s difference between, Hey, we tried to help him and he went talk to some friends or a friend’s house and got a gun from them. And, but when you legitimately give the weapon to him to do it, there’s got to be some cognizant, you know, you have to think about those pieces.
You know, so,
John-Nelson Pope: I think there’s some bank moral. Bankruptcy on their parts there because of their, I think in terms of a civilized society and, and culture. And I know that we’re not so much I, I can go on for that for a while, but there’s a sense that They’re, they were not thinking about how their son would affect and perhaps kill somebody and cause problems.
And so they weren’t [00:15:00] thinking in terms of the consequences and I think adults Irrational adults need to be able to do that and say,
Neil Robinson: well, I just want to talk about like, this could be a very slippery slope with this precedence. There’s also, there’s also the school up north where that six year old shot his teacher.
That’s what I was going to bring
John-Nelson Pope: up. That was in Virginia.
Neil Robinson: Yeah, there was an assistant principal. I think that’s getting charged now because she was warned. This kid has a gun. Someone told, said, Hey, can we search his backpack? Cause she said, no.
Chris Gazdik: It’s a slippery slippery slope y’all. I mean the thing is is I don’t think the The listening public I don’t I don’t know that you really understand What it’s like to live with a mentally affected severely affected Child that has schizoaffective disorder or strong experiences with bipolar disorder, with psychotic [00:16:00] experience, with these tormenting, realities of, of neglect and abuse to, to, To, to deal with that long before, and I mean, many, many thousands of parents are dealing with this and there is no mass shooting Mm-Hmm.
E event. And, and it, it, it just, it is a scary slippery slope that, that, that affects
Victoria Pendergrass: Mm-Hmm. ,
Chris Gazdik: I, I, I’m, I’m really anxious about this. I, I, I’m really concerned that so many people are going to be. Jailed literally that okay. So in
John-Nelson Pope: other words, in other words, there’ll be a witch hunt,
Chris Gazdik: witch
John-Nelson Pope: hunts, witch hunts.
That’s a good
Chris Gazdik: word. Yeah, you know, and, and, and it’s terrible because people are dying, but if we knew a direct answer at how to prevent this would do it.
Neil Robinson: Well, I mean, I mean, it goes back to how many things to the FBI and them know about that they don’t stop. And then if you’re going to, if you’re going to hold a parent accountable.
You know, now can you hold the police departments and those more accountable? Because if [00:17:00] you’re saying that you have warning signs and you have these tips and you don’t do it, supposedly a lot of those mass shooters have previous history or they’ve been flagged.
Chris Gazdik: Not only that, Neil, but I might even suggest in an individual case, let’s take person X, name them.
Paul, Paul goes out and has problems. And the parents pur, Tech society, if you will. I mean, if that’s the words that is that the words we want to use Paul, they work with Paul, they get Paul in admissions time and third time and a fourth time and they g
Paul goes out and commits mass murder because, you know, five years after they got him treatment and stuff.
But that’s different
John-Nelson Pope: though, because they’re being proactive and they’re actually doing something. And I think. Go ahead. Sorry.
Victoria Pendergrass: No. And just like how Neil pointed out. Sorry. I’m pointing at you like people can see you, but
John-Nelson Pope: you’re in my space,
Victoria Pendergrass: but like. I think the main issue here is that, like John said, they weren’t being [00:18:00] proactive.
They actually bought him the gun instead of, I think in a case like what you’re saying is there is plenty of proof that says, okay, the parents got this person involved in therapy, they did this, they did that, and none of it worked. Then I think you can say like, okay, it’s not the parent’s fault, but if the parents did all that stuff and then they still went and bought their kid, The gun or the weapon of choice, then, okay, maybe you could be like, well, you know, whatever.
But I think here, the main issue is, Is they’re going to prison because they supplied said weapon and then did not
Chris Gazdik: tell the school. I mean, if there was ever a case that could be found, you know, liable, it would be some, it was some of the dynamics with this, but it’s just, I don’t know where the line is.
John-Nelson Pope: Well, and I think that’s because the way we are now. It [00:19:00] seems to be that they’ll, they’ll take this and then they will go further and further. And so, so it was this a wrong decision that the jury and the judge talk about
Chris Gazdik: a runaway train, right? Yeah.
John-Nelson Pope: We don’t want it to be a runaway train. And I’m wondering if maybe there’s a sense that we can, and I, I hate to, to just legislate everything, but.
To, in order to say, this is this is common sense. We’re not going to go any further than this. We’re not going to over interpret this or, or broaden the interpretation. Yeah. I just got to wonder where the genie’s out of the bag,
Chris Gazdik: but so we got to get, we got to get off this, it it, Obviously strong feelings.
That’s why we talk about these current events guys, because there’s, there’s real things that go on and I hope that you get some insight in, in seriously, just listening to therapists, problem solve this stuff that are real problems. And I, I don’t know that we have conclusions here or [00:20:00] conclusivity, but but it’s, it’s, we need to talk about it.
You know, we need, we need to talk about these things and in with moral courage, it takes courage to talk about these things. So I’m curious if you guys think about or have talked about if you’ve worked with the issue of moral courage, is that something that’s in your sphere of thought? John and Victoria.
Victoria Pendergrass: You wanna go first or you want me to take it?
John-Nelson Pope: No, I want you to take it and then I can, I can refute
Victoria Pendergrass: you.
I would say I don’t necessarily use that exact verbiage in my sessions with my clients. Now I would say that maybe we’ve danced around the topic. Right, yeah, same. But like they present a problem, we work through like, okay.
Yeah. What’s the best, how do we best handle this, like, morally, but I don’t know necessarily if the word, if moral encouraged are actually used, I would, like, that’s not really ringing a bell in [00:21:00] my brain right now. It’s interesting
Chris Gazdik: that we don’t say the term moral courage. Courage, like resiliency training, or we used to have the phrases, John Long, assertiveness training, nobody’s really kicked up a thing with moral, like teaching and learning about moral courage.
It’s fascinating. I didn’t think about that, Victoria, but
Victoria Pendergrass: yeah,
John-Nelson Pope: one, one of the things, and I think in terms of being a counselor is the, for example, you have someone that is in an abusive situation. Yeah. And they’re, they’re afraid of their spouse or their partner. And so how do you, how do you do, how do you not overstep your bounds as a counselor, but at the same time that you want to protect, you want that your client to be protected.
Chris Gazdik: We have some ethical issues here in our profession,
John-Nelson Pope: don’t we? We sure do. Yeah. And. And I’ve also had a client that, that actually reported, made a report on me. It didn’t it, it didn’t [00:22:00] go anywhere because I had to, that he was going to harm himself and he would, and they had to, to get the police out there, the sheriff’s deputies.
Safety check. Safety check. Yeah. And, and I didn’t feel good about doing that, but at the same time I, I felt like his life was more, you know, a lot, and he’d, he was a Vietnam veteran and he had very severe PTSD and of course there was alcohol that was involved in that sort of thing.
Chris Gazdik: Well, we’re getting the cart a little bit ahead of the horse with, with this.
We want to talk about what moral courage is, but John, I think one of the premises, one of the realities, one of the questions I asked you, the listener to. To think about is do you think this is hard to execute, you know in the opening there Is it hard to say something about whatever the guy’s name is? I made up, you know about all the little Paul and his and his and his girlfriend or wife like, you know to speak up [00:23:00] on These situations is not only hard.
I’m going to maintain it is super. Yeah, I mean it is Super hard. So much so that, John, one of the things you’re talking about is we have legislated this and created codes of ethics to take the choice away from the therapist. You have no choice. It is so serious because of the fear that we have that therapists won’t report sexual or physical abuse towards children or the safety of others if we have knowledge.
We have to report that and the dangers
John-Nelson Pope: of
Chris Gazdik: suicide
John-Nelson Pope: to sell. And we as counselors and therapists don’t have the priest penitent relationship, which would perhaps, I mean, it wouldn’t, there’s a, what do you mean the priest penitent relationship? Well, in other words, you make a confession, right? And let’s say this person confesses that they have done [00:24:00] something wrong and committed a Murder.
Ringo.
Chris Gazdik: Murder. Murder. Yeah. And we have the same thing in therapy where we don’t have to report crimes, but the ethics of previous knowledge is different. Yeah. Am I correct? That clergy have ethics as well, but they have to follow
John-Nelson Pope: clergy have ethics, right? Clergy do not have it in terms of like Romans and Roman Catholic, the priest, for example, if someone confesses, I can, I committed murder.
Now, this is where as a Protestant. Clergy person. I would, I would, I would report it.
Victoria Pendergrass: You would?
John-Nelson Pope: Yeah.
Chris Gazdik: Okay. As a therapist, we are not required to report it. Huh? We are not required to report it as a therapist. I am pretty strong and correct in believing that. Do you disagree? Yeah. You do? I do. Okay. Yeah. So John,
Victoria Pendergrass: you’re saying that for you, since we’re stuck on murder, or I’m stuck on murder, apparently, if someone came and said, Hey, [00:25:00] Fifteen years ago, I killed this person, does, I mean, is time a factor for you?
Like if it’s 15 years versus like, right before I came to therapy?
John-Nelson Pope: Or I’m going to go out and kill somebody? Well, I mean that’s different though, that’s different. Very big difference.
Chris Gazdik: So. If, if, if somebody has, has, has, has done an act of, of abuse or neglect to a child, That they’re or an elderly person in the past, or an elderly person.
Yes.
Victoria Pendergrass: Elderly abuse.
Chris Gazdik: You know, if we have knowledge that that’s happening, we have to step in. Mm-Hmm. If there’s crimes that have happened in the past, well,
John-Nelson Pope: I agree with you on that.
Chris Gazdik: Okay. Okay. Yeah, that’s a big difference.
Victoria Pendergrass: Well, because is it technically in the state of North Carolina. Aren’t we all mandated reporters?
Chris Gazdik: 100 so
Victoria Pendergrass: if you don’t know what that means what that means is you do not have to be a licensed professional In order to oh,
Chris Gazdik: you mean the [00:26:00] lay public? Yeah, there’s no authority over the lay public They don’t have a board of ethics. They answer to you have priests you have teachers, I believe you’ve got Of course psychologists counselors whatnot,
Victoria Pendergrass: but people can’t like
Chris Gazdik: anybody can anybody can but we’re not Sending the police to your door if you knew something was going on and you didn’t report it.
Victoria Pendergrass: Oh yeah, no. Child care workers
Chris Gazdik: have to report it. Yeah. You have to be a professional role in order to be held accountable. If you don’t report, if you’re a regular citizen,
Victoria Pendergrass: you’re not held. I don’t mean to confuse people. Listen to Chris, not me.
Chris Gazdik: Well, not if I’m not on point. Listen, the whole point here is the reason why we have laws is it’s because it’s, it’s, it’s hard for even professionals.
To have moral courage and report these things to authorities That’s the point
Victoria Pendergrass: because I think sometimes and I could be correct me if I’m wrong. I think sometimes people are afraid of [00:27:00] backlash
Chris Gazdik: Well, let’s let’s put that on I wanted a whole segment on what makes this difficult.
Victoria Pendergrass: Okay. I gotcha. Okay, let’s back up
Chris Gazdik: What are we talking about?
When we talk about moral courage, Google says the ability to stand up for and practice that. Which one considers ethical, moral behavior and faced with a dilemma, even if it means going against countervailing pressure to do otherwise. I, I think Google’s like starting to sound like chat. DBT man. Have you noticed that?
Yeah. Have you noticed that? Yes. They’re trying to
Victoria Pendergrass: catch up. It’s
Chris Gazdik: co-pilot. I think it’s the same. I think it’s the thing, I think like it is almost like Google definitions now are like chat g pt. Yeah. It’s weird.
Victoria Pendergrass: Maybe it’s now written into the algorithm.
Chris Gazdik: I don’t know. It’s just automatically in there. It’s weird.
APA definition, American Psychological Association, is a pretty big standard bearer of a lot of things in our field. Got a cool article on this, on the show notes that Neil will have up, I hope on that. Brave behavior accompanied by [00:28:00] anger and indignation intending to enforce societal and ethical norms without considering one’s own social cost.
I thought, wow, that’s a lot. You know, that’s a lot. Examples, if you think about people that have lived this out, Mother Teresa, Cesar Chavez. Martin Luther King had incredible moral courage. Mandela. I don’t know what Aung San Suu Kyi did. Do you know that name, John? Victoria? I don’t even know who that is.
John-Nelson Pope: Southeast Asia I think. What did they do? It’s so Stood up for rights? No, no, it’s, it’s, she, I think it was Miramar that Miramar? Yeah. If I’m not correct,
Chris Gazdik: I didn’t even know that that one or I’m not
John-Nelson Pope: mistaken.
Chris Gazdik: Yeah. And the next one, Gandhi, you know, these are, these are big standards, but they showed up
John-Nelson Pope: against the, or the Tiananmen square person back in 1989.
Yeah.
Chris Gazdik: I remember that.
Victoria Pendergrass: Yeah.
Chris Gazdik: Yeah. We have these amazing examples [00:29:00] where an individual personal effort, such as Tiananmen square, literally got the world to look at what’s going on within. The entire country of China by a man imaged standing in front of tanks. That is
John-Nelson Pope: hard to do. You think about that? He lost.
Well, we don’t know what ever happened. Don’t technically, but that would also affect the children and the grandchildren, the spouses, the parents, that sort of thing. It would have, it would have gone down and affected a lot of people that were very important to that man. Right. A hundred percent. And, and I, I think that’s also going on in terms of what happened with Putin in Russia.
You’re thinking Russia. I was thinking Russia as
Chris Gazdik: you were talking too. You know, this is, this is thought of in, in these bigger ways of supporting the marginalized populations. And I think that’s where people think mostly of moral courage. And I’m not wanting to, I mean, I’m not wanting to [00:30:00] disregard that.
that. But that’s not my focus today. My focus is much more all of the, the broader scope of dealing with uncomfortable situations directly with assertiveness and, and, and the power of moral courage in you, the listeners day to day life. When you see stuff, you know, like Paul and being belittled. Possibly indicating, you know, inappropriate abusive relationship that he’s receiving from his girlfriend.
Are you going to speak up? Are you going to say something like
Victoria Pendergrass: as the friend? Am I gonna speak up? Right.
Chris Gazdik: Are you going to to have assertiveness with this? Is this how do you how do you have that conversation? What you know, how do you get out of the mindset of I got I’m gonna mind my own business This is not I’m it’s not my place to to speak out.
You know, it’s this is tough You
Victoria Pendergrass: It is. I will say it for me personally. I think [00:31:00] it, one, depends on like your relationship with said person, right? Right. Like, I hope my, she doesn’t mind me. I want to, I won’t name a specific name. I have a friend who was at my house one time and
Chris Gazdik: One time in band camp, sorry.
One time,
Victoria Pendergrass: yeah. And she was on the phone with her boyfriend at the time and he was, Screaming at her so loud I could hear from like across the room and Paul
Chris Gazdik: situation was real basically.
Victoria Pendergrass: Yeah, and I You’re struggling man over there with that water bottle. I Picked up, she dropped the phone at one point.
I picked up the phone and I said something to him and then I hung up on him.
Chris Gazdik: Wow. Did
Victoria Pendergrass: you? Yeah, like how you’re not going to talk to my friend like that.
Chris Gazdik: Right. But,
Victoria Pendergrass: now, would I do that for everybody? I know I might would pause a little bit more. Like that, I had no problem being like, because you [00:32:00] were really, really close.
Like, you’re not doing this, yeah. Like call back when you can control your Your anger better yet. Don’t call back at all Wow and like But like now if I just like see I think we would like to think
Chris Gazdik: oh Then we would
Victoria Pendergrass: do it like if I pass someone on the road who was getting like just pause the lead on the side Look, let’s just let’s just
Chris Gazdik: pause there real quick Cuz that’s a major point that I really hope the listening audience hears in what it is that you just said Yeah, say that again.
Victoria Pendergrass: I think that we all would like to think that we would do right that we would step up that we would say something that we would intervene, that we would do our part as a human in society. But I think the reality of it’s like
Chris Gazdik: the reality is a lot of people don’t.
Victoria Pendergrass: It’s like the show. Yeah, what would you do?
What would you do? I love that show. But it’s I felt like it’s just like that show where it’s like, You would want to, you, you, you [00:33:00] think in that moment, if I was in that situation in that restaurant on that sidewalk, wherever in that store that I would speak up and of course I would
Chris Gazdik: say something,
Victoria Pendergrass: but
Chris Gazdik: are you sure?
Victoria Pendergrass: Are you sure? Like, do you really know? It doesn’t, can
John-Nelson Pope: you know,
Victoria Pendergrass: right? And
John-Nelson Pope: there might be, and there might be a lot of, of things going on that. A lot of distractions there might be. Yeah. You may not even notice. You may not even notice. There may also be the fact that there might be a possibility of real physical harm if you, if you did speak up.
And so you have to make that, that choice and make a, a moral choice. Right, right. Lemme give you a, a real life example. With a, was a, a pastor of a
church. Who basically had a an older man who was actually had had a past of where he would do, he was a peeper and everybody ignored it.
Everybody at the church knew about it. And He had a painting business [00:34:00] so to speak, and he was so called harmless. Well, what happened was that he finally physically kissed a ten year old girl. Against her will boy, and he was alone with her and this was happened in the church. Yeah.
Yeah, and I think you and I have talked about this situation Did we do this on not on the show? I don’t know Now here’s the thing now the the There were members in that church said, well, let’s just let him, you know, he’s old and all of that. And that pastor had to basically had to struggle with in terms of saying what is best for the little girl.
What was best for, for the church and had to do a consultation with their their governing body, which is like a group of churches. It would be like a diocese or a presbytery or a conference. And so the point [00:35:00] was that it caused people to leave. As a result of that, it also, well like, leave the church.
Leave the church. And there was a sense that how ’cause
Chris Gazdik: it was reported or wasn’t reported. Or
John-Nelson Pope: was reported and both. Both, yeah. Okay. And so in other words, there was us there were people that were angry with the, the mother and the father of this little girl
Victoria Pendergrass: for reporting it.
John-Nelson Pope: For reporting it. Wow. Yeah.
So it and also mad at the pastor as well. Big drama. Big drama. It was. Well, there’s moral courage involved with that. A hundred percent. It’s a, it’s
Chris Gazdik: an excellent example of the difficulty in espousing moral courage and also the importance of, of encouraging moral courage. I mean, to speak up knowing that you’re going to get a lot of backlash is a, that is a, it’s
John-Nelson Pope: ultimately cost the pastor, his job or her job,
Chris Gazdik: r
John-Nelson Pope: [00:36:00] Yeah. Yeah.
Chris Gazdik: Yeah. Yeah. But you got it, but you had no, no, no choice there. I mean, as far as, you know, elective sexual with a kid, you, you, you can’t, yeah.
Victoria Pendergrass: One, I think, and we might get to this later, but I think you see a lot of it too, like, Or what maybe lack of it in the workplace? Specifically with women well, it’s funny that
Chris Gazdik: you would say that victoria because as I was poking around and I’ve I think this is one of the reasons why I like to to touch on this issue I don’t know maybe once a year or so because because It, when you Google it and when you research and you think about it, a lot of people talk about this.
Well, the few people I should say, the few people that talk about this topic, kind of talk about it in context of the workplace, right? That’s where this gets its play. And I have no problem with that. Women in the workplace. Now we have women managers and supervisors and higher ups that men are affected by this a lot [00:37:00] more.
I mean, that’s a, that’s a real, there’s a
John-Nelson Pope: lot more life than just the work situation, but that’s my point. John Ray,
Chris Gazdik: that’s, that’s what I’m talking about. Say more about
John-Nelson Pope: no, no. I, well, it could have, it could happen in, in terms of like social organizations already mentioned about the church, for example,
Victoria Pendergrass: could
John-Nelson Pope: happen in, in terms of, of friend groups we’ve, we’ve talked about it.
You’ve talked about it with your friend. So it certainly could happen in schools in terms of at the college that I taught at there was very strong rules and, and concerns about female safety. And there was sexual harassment and assault that took place and it affected a lot of people.
Victoria Pendergrass: And
John-Nelson Pope: so it wasn’t just the workplace. It was right. Yeah. No, it happens all the time. So much more than that. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it was at a party. Or, or, and I think that’s where people are struggling with some of the schools in terms of the, the [00:38:00] sexual harassment are, are saying, okay, if there’s a party of our students that take place outside of the school buildings is.
They’re a responsibility. On the school. And yeah, that’s that’s a real issue.
Chris Gazdik: My brainstorm in thinking about where does this come from? Where do you get moral courage from, you know, ethics, morals, a sense of compassion for your fellow man or people in your congregation, John, or your friend, Victoria, you know, the compassion that you have, you know, how about the opinions that you develop or the.
Opinions that form the beliefs that you have a sense of internal resiliency. Having built that up, we’ve talked about how to build some of these things. I want to skip the, I, the, the, the, the, I thought we might have an interesting conversation about. Life experiences versus genetic reality and what creates this.
But we’re going, we want to talk about how do we build the ability to have moral courage at the end. So let’s talk, let’s take a deep dive on like, why [00:39:00] is this so hard? And we’ve alluded to it. What, you know, what makes this so difficult? You said the blowback that you received.
Victoria Pendergrass: Yeah. That’s what I said. I said that people are afraid of the backlash and I hate to use like a work example, but like.
If I speak up, am I going to lose my job? Am I not going to get the raise that I deserve this year? Am I gonna, you know, have a
Chris Gazdik: quote
Victoria Pendergrass: unquote demerit on my, like, Prof on my like file am I like
Chris Gazdik: well, I bring unwanted focus Well,
Victoria Pendergrass: I now be oh, well, you know, don’t do that around Victoria because you know, she’s gonna go off it’s like tell the manager She’s the
Chris Gazdik: tattletale We have high school and middle school belief systems in our adulthood.
Make no mistake about that. It’s like those
John-Nelson Pope: hair bow commercials where they all talk in a high voice Yeah. Boys and their kids. Right. Here’s a, here’s another, there is, I know [00:40:00] the, the great, great, great majority of, in terms of sexual harassment and unwanted touching takes place. With, with more men.
Okay. But there is occasionally when a man is falsely accused and it does happen. Oh, absolutely. In a college. Yeah. And that person’s life could be absolutely destroyed by that. And so there’s, there’s the knee jerk reaction having worked in, in two institutions, three institutions of higher learning.
They don’t want to take the moral stance. They want to do the administrative stance where they don’t say, you did this, you falsely accused this person. You bore false witness. Right and moral courage both ways. Huh? Yeah, it
Chris Gazdik: takes courage both ways. Yeah. Yeah
Victoria Pendergrass: Well, I mean, it’s like when someone [00:41:00] has sticks up to the kid who’s getting bullied right right now You’re on that
Chris Gazdik: level
Victoria Pendergrass: right?
You’re exposing now risking being bullied Yourself 100 because you’re sticking up for the kid who’s already like getting the crap beat out of them or whatever That’s why it’s
Chris Gazdik: important to be bigger than they are Well, I’m gonna tell you what if even if you are bigger John the athletes in high schools and middle schools and such Really have a hard time speaking up as well because they will get the attention.
I mean people will laugh Right. People will, will join in the group think, and, and, and I know you listening might think, oh, it’s not me. I wouldn’t do that. You
Victoria Pendergrass: probably have. Yeah, you probably have.
Chris Gazdik: Yeah. I mean, I know I
Victoria Pendergrass: probably have in the past. Guilty. Yeah. I
Chris Gazdik: gotta
John-Nelson Pope: say.
Victoria Pendergrass: Yeah. I stood back and watched something happen.
Not proud of it. Right. Oh, watch a fight. Go,
John-Nelson Pope: you go and watch the fight by the bike racks. Right. Yeah.
Victoria Pendergrass: Yeah.
John-Nelson Pope: Yeah, I don’t know. Yeah,
Victoria Pendergrass: I mean we didn’t have bike wrecks in my school. [00:42:00] So there is,
Chris Gazdik: jeez, Victor. We didn’t. So there is certainly a component of groupthink that happens here. There, you know, you hear people talking about echo chambers nowadays where we all join up and make clicks and reels and feeds where everyone thinks the way we do and so you, you, you, you really get stuck.
stuck in that. And when a group does something, you can’t get outside of the group to criticize the group because you’re a part of the group. Group think is real. Echo chambers are not good. Cancel culture is a new phrase, but that’s not a new concept. It’s not a new concept at all. It’s what we’ve talked about with, you have fear of what other people
John-Nelson Pope: view about
Chris Gazdik: you.
John-Nelson Pope: What is the worst thing that could happen to a teenager? Teenager is not accepted by the group, and so if the person stands up and takes, then that person is also shunned. Let me correct you, John,
Chris Gazdik: if I may. Oh, definitely. You can differ with my [00:43:00] correction if you want to, but I don’t think you will. What’s the worst thing that can happen to a human being?
Not just a teenager. Yeah. I think we feel that way as an adult, don’t, might you? Oh, definitely, yes. Yeah. But we can identify it as blaming that on teenagers. But I think you listening that are 55 years old right there, you feel that same way. So, I, I just wanted to ask. Well, I
Victoria Pendergrass: mean, like, in therapy, that’s what I’ve talked a lot about with my clients when, like, we’re working through these things.
It’s like, what is the worst possible thing that you think could happen? And is that, sorry if I’m yelling, is that, like, a rational thought? Is that a rational fear to be, or is that something that’s irrational? Like, is that what’s obviously irrational?
Chris Gazdik: And when we work with it in therapy methods, we, we, we point that out.
But John, your, your point is on point. I mean, it’s, it’s terrifying to be outside of the group or to be isolated or be ridiculed or different than what. [00:44:00]
John-Nelson Pope: And so cult just take it. To the 10th degree in terms of that is next level. Go, go with that. What do you mean? Let’s see otherness. I was thinking about in terms of the Jim Jones cult, for example, people’s temple, I guess is what it was called officially.
But the idea was, is that, you know, you will not be allowed and you will not be accepted. You will not be able to be in touch with your family and children because threatening, scary
Victoria Pendergrass: Tell me if you think I’m going too far, but I think a lot of times in like today’s world Death is a pretty valid fear. You could get killed.
Yeah, like if I especially as a female like being men kill women for like rejecting them so like and probably happens vice versa, but I feel like more commonly meant but like that’s like or like if I speak up in anything [00:45:00] and like
Am I gonna be like physically harmed?
Chris Gazdik: So you’re adding on to our list
Victoria Pendergrass: if
Chris Gazdik: realistic or viable fear,
Victoria Pendergrass: right? Like
Chris Gazdik: it’s a thing and I think
Victoria Pendergrass: in today’s world unfortunately, like with all the protests and like all the things that have happened very You know, in the last couple of years or so, like, I don’t know.
John-Nelson Pope: Things happen. Yeah. Have you ever gotten caught up in a riot?
Chris Gazdik: Actually did a little spot on through therapist’s eyes live at a, at a protest. That wasn’t a riot though. No, I have not gotten caught up in that. I don’t think I would like that. I imagined it when we had some trouble in Charlotte, North Carolina during the, the BLM stuff.
I mean, that was very real. I mean, and it was, Close to home and it’s Mm-Hmm, . It’s scary. Why, why do you say,
John-Nelson Pope: well, I’m, I’m just saying there’s a, there’s a lot of intimidation that goes on there. Yeah. There’s a lot of shouting profanities [00:46:00] threats, physical threat threats that are made. Mm-Hmm. . And, and that is, and it, and it, and you know, you’ve seen racist do do that as well.
I, I think in Charlottesville, for example, was a, yeah. Was a good example of that that happened, but a couple of years ago, more than that, it’s about four or five years ago, but, or, or the, the January six riots you, you know, there’s sense that you could get caught up in this and you get intimidated.
You say, okay. And, and, and let’s say there was policemen. Sure that that was, that was getting beaten up. Mm-Hmm. . And you stop that or you try to stop it, you could get physically harmed
Chris Gazdik: again. It’s the threat of real danger. Mm-Hmm. . I, I had a chance of thinking about this in my brainstorm. I’m, I’m gonna add also to our list of what makes this really hard to display overcorrection.
Mm-Hmm. . And, you know. We [00:47:00] there’s almost been too much flexibility with the quote and the phrase that people think about, you know, do
what feels good. And this is not doing what feels good. This doesn’t feel good to exhibit moral courage. It’s this, this is the opposite, but still needs to be done. Risk tolerance, you know, is there a risk to speak against something that someone has already done?
Like we’ve been talking about, I want to add definitely also insecurities. Yeah. You know, one of my marriage book quotes, Hey, I have a book coming up, Victoria. Did you know, at the end of January, the end of the year, yeah. Print date, November, I can actually print it here soon. So I’m going to have them in my office to sell.
So very excited about that. One of the, one of the chapter says it’s easier to see your spouse. Then to be seen by your spouse.
Victoria Pendergrass: Yeah,
Chris Gazdik: that was a therapy moment. Think about that when, when you are exhibiting moral courage. You’re really exposing, in a very vulnerable way, your emotions, your opinions, your [00:48:00] view.
And also your insecurities could So
John-Nelson Pope: power go. Yeah. You would, you could also do that in a counseling group, couldn’t you? What do you mean? A large group? You could you could be authentic and transparent and you would say, I don’t necessarily agree with what is being said here. And there’s pressure on that group that say Absolutely.
Yeah. And it’s
Chris Gazdik: another example of moral
John-Nelson Pope: courage
Chris Gazdik: you’re saying, right.
John-Nelson Pope: I’m, that’s what I’m saying. Yeah. Yeah. And and I could see how being seen. Yeah, you’re, you’re sitting here in a group of professionals,
Chris Gazdik: like minded your livelihood, and you’re going to say yeah, I don’t agree with what’s being said.
Yeah, the group’s gonna be like, whoa, let’s crush that guy not referring clients to him or her, you know Yeah, it’s it’s they’re very real consequences So this is why I like to touch on this from time to time to see like, you know We need help in the human [00:49:00] emotional experience to manage this Cause we see things, you listening here, you see things all the time that are hard to speak out or speak up against, or ask questions and get curious is important about people and things that you care about.
So, so let’s spend some time before we’re done today on how do we build disability? Cause this is really is, you don’t just have it. It’s not genetic. It’s not just ingrained. We didn’t get to talk about that earlier today. Is this life experience or is this a genetic biological reality? It really isn’t automatic to have moral courage,
John-Nelson Pope: you know, having been in the military.
Okay. Okay. And, and you know, there’s some false bravado when somebody says they’re going to have courage, they’re going to be encouraged. Yeah, I hate that. Everybody that goes in the battlefield, if they’re truly honest with themselves [00:50:00] and they’re not a psychopath. Right. And most, and I would say the, the, the number of people that are are not in that, that position in terms of that personality disorder are very few in the military.
I would say most of them are just regular people like you and me. Right. Okay. It’s scary, terrifying, scary, scared to death.
Chris Gazdik: Hell
John-Nelson Pope: yeah. Yeah.
Chris Gazdik: You’re going into where bullets or bombs are flying and stuff, man.
John-Nelson Pope: Yeah. And so it takes courage to be able to say, I’m going to put myself in harm’s way. And I’m going to watch my buddy’s back.
I’m not going to. There’s also something
Chris Gazdik: very important about that. And you just said a word, your buddy’s back, but yeah, we’re together,
John-Nelson Pope: we’re together. You’re a team.
Chris Gazdik: You’re not alone. You
John-Nelson Pope: are
Chris Gazdik: a
John-Nelson Pope: band of brothers and sisters.
Chris Gazdik: That is probably the biggest piece [00:51:00] I want to highlight in how do you develop moral courage?
Ironically, you do not develop moral courage very effectively alone. You get some people together so that you can build each other up. And therefore you’re not alone on Tiananmen Square. One man standing in front of it. of a tank. Now, it happens too, and great for you if you’re able to do that, but boy, that’s hard.
Let’s not be alone, John. Yeah.
John-Nelson Pope: I, I think, and that’s one reason why, let’s say, the Martin Luther King and the civil rights movement, for example, is that he went the non violent route. He also did this and said we’re We’re all going to take this stand and stand by, stand by me. Great movie by the way.
So and that person, those people are stronger together as a group and they show moral courage collectively.
Chris Gazdik: True story. We had a situation in my neighborhood [00:52:00] years ago. My kids were little. I don’t know who was the point. Of concern, but there was a a developing concern. I feel like I may have been at the point, but I really don’t remember.
I don’t want to take credit if I wasn’t, but I know I was resulted in getting a group together. So, so one of the neighbors had this dog and they liked to claim that this dog was, what did he say? It was, it was such bullshit. It was not what it said. It was a pit bull. This was a pit. It’s like, okay, we have a pit bull, but you know They were just letting this pit bull out allowed running You know, without leash or, you know, control and whatnot.
It was like, yo, you know, that, that’s not the best, you know, we got several small kids in this neighborhood here. And so I remember I’ve especially got people together in a group and we went and we had a very uncomfortable discussion that I would imagine if it was one on one, you really got a [00:53:00]
confrontation about this concern that the whole neighborhood’s developing about a pit bull.
rain on you know and so we, we got a group of parents together that were concerned and went and had a very calm and appropriate conversation with the dog owner and he was good about it, but he, he, He was, he needed to be confronted. And so that was much easier to do John in a group. I would have had a hard time, you know, trying to go to him and have that conversation.
So yeah, a band of brothers or people that are together in a unit that’s easier to grow moral courage in.
Victoria Pendergrass: Yeah. But I also think that you do it by your, like, Shared life experiences, like there’s this commercial and I can’t remember What the commercial is actually for, but it’s like one person does a good deed for someone else.
Like say I do a good deed for John, right? Chris, you see me do that, do that good [00:54:00] deed. You go do a good deed for someone else. Someone else sees your good deed. And then it like comes full circle back to me. It’s like this, like it’s don’t remember what commercial it was for, but it’s kind of like that.
Like you see other sort of
John-Nelson Pope: paying it forward.
Victoria Pendergrass: You see other people. Displaying moral courage and it kind of gives you your own courage to be like, okay, like other people can do it. Again, we’re not alone.
John-Nelson Pope: But sometimes it’s difficult to have moral courage and to know that probably people will reject that courageousness.
That is a possibility, but you do it anyway.
Chris Gazdik: Well, and I think the same question, how do we grow moral courage? Is akin to the question, and we’ve talked about this on the show. How do you grow internal resiliency because it takes a certain amount of emotional resiliency to, to withstand the, [00:55:00] the challenges that, that you’re likely to face there.
John-Nelson Pope: Okay. So we’re talking about core values and we’re not born with those
Chris Gazdik: in fire, John forged
John-Nelson Pope: in fire. Okay. Right. Or as they say
Chris Gazdik: in the Navy, Forged in the sea. That’s right. They do. That’s a phrase. Have a good source. So close friends, choose your friends wisely.
There’s these expressions that we. We talk about you’re the accumulation of your five closest relationships you ever hear that You know ask good questions. You are who you hang around speak up be a leader not a follower You know forgive yourself. I told my kids many times over make Good choices, they’ve heard that many, many times because those are the things about, you know, having a good source, having a good support.
Victoria Pendergrass: Right. But like what I do with the kids I work with, sorry, I’m giving you a weird
Chris Gazdik: look,
Victoria Pendergrass: but like you have to teach them what, what it means to make a good choice. [00:56:00] Yeah. Because what I might think is a good choice, Chris, you may be like, what in the hell are you doing, Victoria? You know, like what kind of choice is that?
I think so. It’s also. Like figuring out like, okay, well, like what exactly does a good choice look like? And then how do we make that choice? How, how does that become like the forefront of our thought process?
Chris Gazdik: Right. Yeah. There’s a lot of development in there and emotional development as well as, you know, physical development.
John-Nelson Pope: Okay. Here’s, here’s a thought too. We’re living in a world where it seems, and because I’m the, I’m the old guy, okay, where things aren’t black and white, it seems like it’s moralistic, it’s relative, whatever your truth is, it’s my truth, it’s their truth, everybody has a truth, and there doesn’t seem to be a touchstone, how do you develop more [00:57:00] courage In a group wise, if no, if everybody has their own truth, yeah, and I think that’s an issue.
And I think we’re, we’ve probably gone to, we’ve say more about
Chris Gazdik: losing a touchstone. What do you mean by touchstone? Cause that’s a
John-Nelson Pope: touchstone is, is the idea. That some eternal verities, so to speak, that it is a building block of Western civilization or Eastern civilization. The great civilizations all had a sense of right and wrong commonality, commonality.
People lived by that. They subscribe to that. And it wasn’t In other words, there was accountability. People would say, okay,
Chris Gazdik: now around the world, we have divided perspectives with group thinking, eco eco chambers that go on all around the world. It’s not just American thing.
John-Nelson Pope: Yeah. Well, definitely.
Yeah.
Chris Gazdik: Yeah. How about this for a statement? Having honesty with self, that is something that, [00:58:00] that builds moral courage. Hard to be honest with ourselves. And this phrase came up in my thought process in show prep. I love this phrase. Is it fair to say, quote, Shame and guilt destroy moral courage?
Victoria Pendergrass: Well, yeah, for sure.
Chris Gazdik: Right? Yeah, if you’re feeling shameful,
Victoria Pendergrass: I’m not going to step up and do something if you
Chris Gazdik: have levels of guilt. Yeah, Victoria, I’m
Victoria Pendergrass: not
Chris Gazdik: going to step up.
John-Nelson Pope: Well, somebody said, well, they acted rationally or irrationally when they were children or young adults or kids or what adolescents and they did something that was illegal.
Then they see something else going on and say, well, I’m I don’t have any ability to step in and say, this is wrong. And of course that person doesn’t say, doesn’t say that. Yeah, I’ve had 30 years of learning from my mistakes that this is not going to lead. Well, it’s not going to turn out well. Right. So yeah, [00:59:00] so I think that would be guilt
Chris Gazdik: guilt.
Yeah, it destroys moral courage shame Destroys moral courage. It’s really hard to speak up when you’re not having a solid foundation of mental state or mental health Mental wellness if you will, you know as a foundation, you just can’t spring from that. There’s nothing to stand on. It’s so shaky learning how to handle negative feelings Feedback, you know, dealing with criticism.
That’s something that I had in my brainstorm self discipline, you know, whole practice, what you preach thing. But interestingly came up also in my brain was empathy.
John-Nelson Pope: Yeah.
Chris Gazdik: Yeah. I think you’re required to have a sense of empathy, which is defined by, you know, awareness and, and concern from another person’s perspective, if
John-Nelson Pope: they saw somebody getting accosted or somebody stealing their purse or the another person’s purse.
A person who is minding his or her own business basically and didn’t respond, would not show an appropriate empathy. Probably [01:00:00] not. Yeah.
Chris Gazdik: Cause of, you know, feel guilty that I didn’t do something bad about what I witnessed and didn’t speak up. It’s a horrible feeling. I think that we’ve made a good case that it is tough for you to do this.
And I think that we’ve hopefully given you some thoughts about how to build this up because it’s a really important thing that we all begin to develop in a community that we are living. May I interject
John-Nelson Pope: one thing? And that is one doesn’t have to be, if one is developed moral courage, that does not mean that you go and you.
Cause other people to feel less loved or, or less accepted or anything of this sort. You want to point, you want to be able to, to recruit more people to, to have moral courage and say, this is something that, that others can have, that all people can have if they, and so it’s not making yourself better than [01:01:00] anyone else.
It’s saying that you’re part of the human race and that. Did that everyone has the potential of developing courage?
Chris Gazdik: Absolutely. It, yeah, I appreciate each other’s
John-Nelson Pope: back.
Chris Gazdik: I appreciate that, John. I do because it, you know, we all live together. We all have the same resources. We all really care about, you know, each other.
And, you know, there is a level of compassion, I believe in the human spirit. It just gets destroyed by some things, you know, and, and some things that we try to speak to, you know, on this podcast. platform of through a therapist eyes to be helpful to you in your journey and what it is that you’re trying to do Victoria, do you have some closing thoughts before we get out of here?
Victoria Pendergrass: Just do it like just speak out Nike Yeah, just do it. I don’t know. I think it’s I don’t know. I feel like i’m actually at a loss of words. Yeah,
Chris Gazdik: okay Well, that’s cool. I I think we’ll stay with that go just do it You know, the idea is you know, [01:02:00] when you when you come across something, you know speak up, you know Be be brave and and just do it
John-Nelson Pope: if you’re if you’re And it’s tough.
I know that your hands may be shaking, your knees may be buckling, but just to do the right thing and, and, and just do it knowing that you’re doing something that is greater than yourself and it’s for a greater good
Chris Gazdik: and you don’t have to feel confident and secure and you don’t have
John-Nelson Pope: to be self righteous about it or anything
Chris Gazdik: people don’t, you know, how.
Much shaken in the boots. Do you think, you know, Martin Luther King had Mm-Hmm. , I, I, I would venture to guess. He was terrified most of the time that he was doing his works. Or Mother Theresa for that matter, or anybody that’s in these, when you think about Martin Luther King,
John-Nelson Pope: he, he, he knew that this was, this was an age of assassinations.
We think of it. JFK and RFK. Yeah. And Mar, MLK, Martin Luther [01:03:00] King. Yeah. All this was happening.
Chris Gazdik: Yeah. At that time. So, alright let’s get out of here. I hope you have a great week, though. And we will see you on the flip side next Thursday. Take care. Bye.