What's Worse than Having an Affair? | Male/Female Hour

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On today's episode of Timeless Wisdom.

I am about to tell you what may well be the worst thing outside of beating that a spouse can do to the other, and it is not an affair. That's bad. There is something worse. I want you all to think for just a moment.

What?

There was something— it's not beating, clearly not beating. What could be worse than an affair in destroying a marriage?

That's coming up on Timeless Wisdom with Dennis Prager.

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Welcome to Timeless Wisdom with Dennis Prager. Hear thousands of hours of Dennis's lectures, courses, and classic radio programs. And to purchase Dennis Prager's Rational Bibles, go to dennisprager.com.

I'm old-fashioned. I like 2 sexes. Yeah, and another thing, all of a sudden I don't like being married to what is known as a new woman. I want a wife, not a competitor. Competitor! Competitor!

Talk about it a bit, this crying in the morning thing, this depression, you know, let's get that fixed.

That's what men think, isn't it? What?

Unless you've got the answer, unless you can say, oh, I know this bloke in the Essex Road who could fix that, then there's no point bothering.

How do you write women so well?

I think of a man and I take away reason and accountability.

I love him. I love him, and I don't care what you think. I love him for the, for the man he wants to be, and I love him for the man that he almost is.

What do people have rows about today? Uh, money, sex, sex, money.

He wants, she doesn't want.

She wants, he doesn't want? Women have always been a big problem to me, Dr. Fussbender. Are you listening, Doctor? Yes, yes, yes, go on, go on. Hi everybody, this is Dennis Prager and welcome to the Male/Female Hour. I have been discussing, of course, the President's speech last night and the sad and ineffectual response of the Republicans. That will take place again next hour, but I have dedicated hours of this program, 3 a week, The Happiness Hour on Friday, the Male-Female Hour on Wednesday, and the Ultimate Issues Hour on Tuesday. So welcome to the Male-Female Hour. And I'm about to tell you— drum roll, please— I am about to tell you what may well be the worst thing outside of beating that a spouse can do to the other.

Oh, boy.

And it is not an affair. That's bad. There was something worse. I want you all to think for just a moment. What? There was something— it's not beating, clearly not beating. What could be worse than an affair in destroying a marriage? And again, I'm excluding, obviously, The beating of a spouse? The answer is humiliation. And humiliation generally means doing it in public because you are far more likely to— you can humiliate somebody in private, but I'm talking about humiliation of a spouse in public. For whatever reason, it stuck with me. I remember reading as a kid, I was a very young child, but I remember reading John F. Kennedy once saw, I don't even remember if it was the husband doing it to the wife or the wife doing it to the husband at a restaurant, publicly berating the person and saying to his wife at the time how he pitied the other spouse. I don't even know. Isn't that funny? The things that stay in your mind from when you are a child. There is a major, major figure. And by the way, I welcome calls now because if you would agree with me or disagree, you may say that there are things that are worse. I'd be curious. But I believe that publicly humiliating your spouse, and for that matter, privately humiliating for that matter, but certainly publicly humiliating, is the worst thing that you can do. In a marriage. And that's, uh, and I'm putting aside, of course, uh, the, uh, abuse, physical abuse. I'm putting that aside. And I am including, however, I'm not putting aside even an affair. I think you can, I think a marriage, I don't think, I am certain a marriage can survive an affair more easily than regular humiliation. Of one of the spouses, or both, obviously. 1-800-PRAGER-776. Do you agree? Do you disagree? Have you experienced it? Have you seen it in friends or neighbors or what have you? There is, again, 1-800-PRAGER-776, which is 877-243-7776. 877-243-7776. There is a major, major authority on marriage, John Gottman. Yeah, I believe he's in the Seattle area. He is so good at analyzing marriages that apparently, and this is not magic, he can watch a couple interact. Do you know the figure, Allen? Some people say 5 minutes, 3 minutes, some ridiculously 7 minutes, I don't know. But well, well under an hour, well under a half hour, he can watch a couple interact. They don't know they're being watched. So they're not on good behavior. They're on normal behavior. He can watch a couple interact and he can tell you if they'll divorce or not. Isn't that something? We have— oh, that's very funny. You're a cynic. Sean says, well, he has a 50/50 shot, doesn't he? Ooh, them's fighting words. No, no, no. Actually, I think he'll even tell you how long that marriage may last. Anyway, the point being, That I want to make is the guy is recognized. He's a psychologist, I believe, and he's recognized. He has books out. We've had him on the show. We should have him on again, actually. That's a perfect example of a guest for the— a rare thing of having a guest on the male-female hour. And he has said there is one thing that a— and I believe I have him correctly— there is one thing that a marriage cannot survive. And that is contempt. They can survive, as I said, they could survive an affair, they can survive arguing, they can survive financial problems more easily than they can survive where one has contempt for the other. And if it is shown publicly in humiliation, then it's the worst. And I'm saying this because one of the reasons for the Male-Female Hour is to help marriages. In fact, it's the biggest single reason. There are many other reasons. I think that people understanding the opposite sex gives people a much better chance to relate to them. Just yesterday, a man came by who credits me with having deeply touched his life. Oh, in fact, no, no, wasn't it? Well, that's true. He did come by. I'm thinking of somebody else, actually. A terrific man who takes my class, takes my class in the Bible that I teach in Los Angeles, and a Catholic man. And he told me that I've had a deep impact on him as a husband. And that makes it just unbelievably fills me, especially when you have such a wonderful man, with pride and joy. Anyway, that's the hope of this. The question that I have that I don't know the answer to, which you may be able to help me, is does the person, does the spouse who humiliates his or her spouse, does that spouse know what they're doing? If you were to say, do you know what you just did in the restaurant there and people heard, or what you just did at the Or, you know, at a cocktail party, you know, you were at a dinner party with people, and the way you just berated your husband or the way you just spoke about your wife. There was a man I knew many years ago. I was actually friendly with him. And this was remarkable. We were quite friendly. I won't go into any more detail because it's possible that it could give it away, and that's not my intent. And then I saw, How he treated his wife. My relations were entirely with him, and then I saw his public berating of his wife. It ended my relationship with him stone cold. It just— I stopped relating. It is not possible to be a good person and humiliate your spouse. It is not possible. It is one of the One of the handful of immediate disqualifiers. All right, 1-800-PRAGER-776, and let's, let's go to Minneapolis, Minnesota, and Dana. Hello, Dana, this is Dennis Prager.

Hey, Dennis, I just wanted to say that I think an affair is kind of public humiliation. You can kind of work things out with your spouse, but I I think the biggest thing for me would be trying to get past all my friends and family thinking, well, boy, your spouse cheated on you. That's kind of its own public humiliation right there.

Well, well, well, let me— why would it be known to everybody?

That's kind of one of those things I would think you couldn't really keep a secret.

Oh, on the contrary, I would— it's interesting you raise this, Dana, because First of all, I suspect that there are a lot of people who are having affairs of who— and almost no one or no one knows about it except the 2 people. And frankly, if you do tell a lot of people about it, you're right, then it is public humiliation. I've always said the— within affairs, since I'm a big believer in gradations of sin, within affairs there is a level of sin that is far greater than just the affair. And that is if you went publicly with the with your mistress.

Sure.

Then you're right, then that is public humiliation. But, but I, I don't think that the given in an affair is that it is publicly known. No, I mean, most affairs are quite clandestine, I would assume. 1-800-PRAGER-776. Boy, do I remember that guy, and I remember it was— it ended it. I knew this is one of the no-nos of life. Humiliating your spouse. This is the Male-Female Hour. We can— we continue, and I'm Dennis Prager.

This episode of Timeless Wisdom will continue right after this.

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Now, back to more of Dennis Prager's Timeless Wisdom.

Hi everybody, Dennis Prager here. The Male-Female Hour. And it is one of the 3 dedicated hours, as I call them, in the week of my 15-hour week. Today's subject is the worst thing that can be done in a marriage, putting aside abuse. And this is, of course, it's a form of abuse, but I'm not going to use that term because it's too large. I'm specifying the issue, and that is public humiliation of a spouse. It's worse than an affair. We think affair is the worst thing that could happen to a marriage, and it sure is bad, but it's not the worst thing. I don't know how you recover public humiliation. I think you can. I mean, if the person stops and begs forgiveness and truly stops and never does it again. But it is— that's how bad I think it is. And this notion of contempt for the other spouse, that is the one unsurvivable. Vast numbers of marriages have survived affairs. I don't say it's easy. And it's a subject we— I have talked about with you and had people who have experienced that and who have gone on to thrive. There are people who claim that their marriage is actually better since they recovered and confronted a lot of issues because one had an affair. I never heard anybody say that their marriage is better because they were humiliated. Okay, let's go to Fullerton, California, and Robert. Hello, Robert. Dennis Prager. Thanks for calling. Hi, Dennis.

Hey Dennis, thanks for having me. I just wanted to say I think really that the berater is the one with the problem, not the person who is being berated.

I don't understand what you mean by that.

Well, I mean, you're only humiliated if you allow yourself to be humiliated.

That's not true. You may only feel humiliated if you allow yourself to, but you're still humiliated. You're humiliated in the eyes of the others. That's why I keep saying public humiliation. Maybe you're—

Well, say your spouse is drunk in public and saying things about you.

Well, not drunk. Let— not drunk. If drunk, you're right, then people will ascribe it to drunkenness. But what if the person isn't drunk? What if they're sober and—

Well, then the person has some hate and they're using that hate and taking it out on you, then they're the one with the problem and they need to deal with it.

Well, what do you mean the problem?

They are—

I don't understand the words. What is the problem when you keep saying the words the problem? What problem are you referring to?

The problem of the berater.

Fine, but I'm not talking about the problem of the berater. I'm talking about what injures a marriage even more than an affair, and it is public humiliation. If you have a wife and your wife regularly at dinner parties ridicules you in front of the others, and you have somehow developed thick skin, that doesn't deny the fact that you have been humiliated. It only denies the fact that you allowed yourself to be bothered by it.

Well, who does the divorcing? The, the one with the contempt, the one that's berating, or the one that is berated and humiliated?

Wait, who does, who does the divorcing? Is that your question?

Right.

I don't know who does the divorcing. Are you asking who does the destruction to the marriage? I don't know who did. Whoever does the divorce does the divorce. I, I don't predict the future. I'm only telling you who does the destroying. The berater, the, the humiliator is destroying the marriage.

What I'm saying is, it seems to me that if somebody has hatred towards the other spouse and they take it out in public, they're going to be the ones that also file for the divorce. And so that's the real problem, not the fact that they publicly displayed that.

Okay, I don't know how we're differing. I just— it's like we're not— we're talking in somewhat parallel tracks here and not converging. I'm— what I'm saying may be wrong, but I'm not talking about who has the problem. That's not my subject. My subject is what destroys a marriage. Answer, more than even an affair, public humiliation of a spouse. Either I'm right or I'm wrong, but that's the subject. Anyway, thank you for calling, Robert. And Gilbert, Arizona, Sarah. Hello, Sarah. Dennis Prager.

Hi, I love your show. I've learned so much from the Male-Female Hour. I really appreciate being able to hear it.

Good, thank you very much.

Um, Wednesdays I'm out running errands, so it just works out perfectly to be in my car. Um, um, I agree with your point. I, um, was thinking of— I was thinking of my grandma, who my grandpa didn't treat her very well. And, you know, no physical abuse, but just, you know, spoke down to her, you know, constantly in public and in private. And, and she stayed with him. They had 8 kids and I know that there's no way that she would have ever left him, 'cause she wouldn't have had any way to support her family.

Right.

And, um, he died, uh, in 1991, and she confided in some of us a few years ago that, you know, she believes that with her religion that she's gonna see him again when she dies, and she's— and she told us that she's really dreading that day, which I just think is so sad that—

Uh, out of curiosity, what religion is that?

LDS.

Oh, yes. All right, I thought so, but I just wanted to— I wonder what LDS folks would say, because I'm a bigger, big admirer of them. I would be very curious to know what they would say, uh, because I know that it's, it's, the concept is time immemorial, correct? For, for a marriage. Yeah.

Yeah.

And so, well, ironically, if you're stuck with an abusive, uh, uh, spouse for, for time immemorial— and I'm not saying that that's the theology, whatever the theology, if one is Then that would argue for divorce. And while the LDS does frown upon divorce, it allows for it. So they would argue to me for divorce, ironically, so that you're not stuck eternally with such a person. But there's also the possibility that having, you know, gone to whatever is in the afterlife and seen truth, that one will not act that way. at that point. I mean, I don't have an answer for that, but I can only answer for this world. But your point is very powerful in that she dreads dying because she'll meet him again. That gives one an idea of how destructive humiliation is. And if you could ask anybody— why don't you ask anybody who has endured that and say, would you have preferred if the person had treated you kindly regularly, but had a one-time affair. And I— you have to be out of your mind not to have preferred the one-time affair to regular humiliation. Alrighty, let's go to Marietta, Georgia, and Marie. Hello, Marie. Dennis Prager, thank you for calling.

Thank you for taking my call. I've enjoyed listening to this. I was thinking about You made a comment earlier about whether the offending person knows what they're doing, and—

Yes, that's what I— I have no idea what the answer is. Go on.

Well, I'm sure it's different for many people, but I know that at my church, my pastor often says things about his wife that I feel humiliated for her, and I truly believe That he has no clue as to how it comes across.

Does he say them from the pulpit, or he says—

Yes, yes, yes.

Does he say it as a sort of humorously, or what?

Well, I think he's trying to make a joke, but it turns out to be very poor attempts often.

Do you have an example?

Oh gosh.

All right, think of an example. When we come back, I want to hear one. You're listening to the Male-Female Hour on the Dennis Prager Show.

Wisdom. We'll continue right after this.

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Now back to more of Dennis Prager's timeless wisdom.

You're listening to The Dennis Prager Show, and I'm reminded here to remind you that you can get all of my shows because some of you, you know, so often I hear, oh, I catch you at this time and I love it and I wish I could hear it all the time, but you know, I'm at the work, or I'm in this or that. Well, you can get every single show commercial-free, the highest fidelity. Just go to Pragertopia, which is at prageradio.com, at dennisprager.com, and even pragertopia.com. Or call 800-225-8584, 800-225-8584, and subscribe. It's a grand total of $7 a month, and you get it in the highest fidelity, and you can play it for friends. I mean, this is an example here. I have to believe that this is hitting home, unfortunately, for a number of people. My argument that the worst thing in a marriage— and I'm putting aside the obvious physical abuse issue— the worst thing in a marriage is public humiliation. I think it's harder to survive that than it is to survive an affair even. And that, that is the subject here. And I have the question that I posed, and this very intelligent caller from Marietta, Georgia— I'm gonna go back to Marie in a moment— Uh, has a— I'm very— I'm actually dying to hear her response. But I asked the question too, does the humiliator know that he or she is doing it? If I played a video for the humiliator and said, do you realize that you've just humiliated your wife or your husband in front of all the people at the dinner table, let alone imagine in front of children? Do you know the humiliation of another parent by one parent? Uh, uh, you talk about permanent, uh, injury to children, psychological injury. Uh, you know, it's funny how people, uh, speak about the, the bad consequences of divorce on children, and, and surely that's not what you wish for children is a divorce, but there are things that are worse. I, I would, I would say, and I'm sure that there will be people who will, uh, uh, be, uh, even annoyed with what I'm saying, I believe that regular humiliation of the dad or the mom by the other spouse is worse than a divorce because so many reasons. It has given the child such a terrible model of marriage. And it has, let's say, let us say it is the mother who was regularly humiliated by the father at the dinner table, let's say, or in the house generally. And there are daughters. The daughters will learn that that is the norm on how to be treated by a man. The sons will learn that that is the norm on how you treat a woman. Conversely, if the wife is regularly humiliating the husband in front of the children, then again, the girls will learn to have contempt for men. That's the norm. And the boys will be devastated as males. They will have been psychologically castrated. All right, that's how bad I think it is. And it's not come from personal experience. This is not my point. I'm just, you know, people will say, oh, well, is this, you know, it's one of the dangers of talking about personal subjects that people sometimes think, oh, you're talking about your own life. No, no, no, this one doesn't have to talk. I've talked about murder on the show. I have not been murdered, as you can probably tell, or murdered. But I have seen this. Now, Marie, back to Marie in Georgia. And Marie, you say your pastor humiliates his wife fairly regularly in sermons. So do you have an example?

Oh, I've been racking my brain during the break, and I'm having major senior moments because it's little things.

Wait, Marie, Marie, at 45, one doesn't have a senior moment, okay? You simply don't remember. I simply don't remember. But it's not a senior moment. Go on.

I'm sorry, I just know that there are times that I feel humiliated for her, and I don't know— I mean, even things— it's a— I think there's an accepted condescending attitude and stereotypes with spouses. Like, you know, wives can— it's okay for a wife to treat her husband as one of the children. Um, and that's kind of what comes across, is this condescension to how much time his wife needs to take in the bathroom before they can get to church on time, or How meticulous she is about, you know, her nails. It's— I understand it's one thing to try to meet your audience in a broad perspective, but to name—

Well, the question here, that's why I wanted to know specifically, uh, uh, uh, and if you ever remember, send me an email, I'll read it on the air. You see, there's a difference between good-natured ribbing and humiliation. And so that's, that's why I was curious to get an example. You may be a little too sensitive for her, and you may be perfectly right. There's no way for me to know. But look, jokes at the expense of one's spouse that are not good-natured are not good to tell. I'll have thoughts on that when we come back on the Male/Female Hour. This is Dennis Prager.

Dennis.

Dennis. Dennis.

Dennis Prager.

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Hi everybody, this is the Male-Female Hour. Alan says he gets a lot of email on this particular bumper music. What is it actually? Love Me Tender, Love Me Sweet?

Jamaica stopover?

That was my second choice. Welcome, my friends, Male-Female Hour. And I want to remind you as well that we have a compilation of Male-Female Hours on 16 CDs, over 30 hours, commercials deleted. And if the emails and public responses to this hour on affecting On affecting people are accurate. It's worth getting. And that's from DennisPrager.com, or just call 800-225-8584. 800-225-8584. And we are talking about something I consider more dangerous to marriage than even an affair, and that is public humiliation of a spouse. Carrie in Holland, Michigan. Dennis Prager, hi. Hi.

Hi, how are you?

I'm well, thank you.

Good. Um, yeah, I was just listening and I can relate to what you were talking about kind of, um, from a child perspective. I'm 31 now, but, um, when I was in my late teens, early 20s, my mom kind of started confiding in me. Um, I guess, um, she'd have complaints about my dad or whatever. It was just like nonstop and I can totally attest to the fact that it screwed me up. I mean, I don't want to say it screwed me up for life or anything, but I had quite a strong view about marriage. And I told my mom at one point, you know, either divorce him or, you know, stop talking about this place.

Or keep quiet.

Yeah.

Put up or shut up. Yeah. That's— you were right. You were absolutely— That's not what you do with a child. First of all, children are not your pals. You don't confide in them. That's number one. Children's status has changed in the last 50 years to peers. They're not— it's not good for a child to be the parent's peer.

They—

you are the parent, they are the child. It is a unique role. Why destroy it? One has all sorts of peers. There are 6 billion people in the world to choose peers from. There are 2 children. Don't just exclude them from the other 6 billion. Is that fair? Carrie?

Oh yeah, definitely. I totally agree. I told my mom at one point, you know, you and dad are exactly what I don't want in a marriage, and luckily I'm married And I have an awesome marriage, an awesome husband, and no complaints.

Oh, that— all right, now I— that's what I wanted to hear. God bless you both. That, that's wonderful. All righty, Allentown, Pennsylvania, Pamela. Hi, Pamela, Dennis Prager.

Hello, I really, really appreciate your show.

Good.

And I just wanted— what your topic really hit me because I actually experienced Once.

Once.

Once, which is wonderful. My husband had been brought up in a home where his parents, at least in the house, berated each other a lot. And so he really didn't realize—

What he was doing.

What my reaction would be.

Right, because it was the norm to him.

That's right.

Yes. So go on, go on.

Well, soon after we were married, um, we were on a public bus and there was something that really got him exercised, and he started to, um, tell me everything I was doing wrong in a loud voice. And I just said, stop, never do that again, never. And afterwards, I took him, you know, after we got off the bus, I said, do you realize what that was? doing to me, what that was doing, how humiliated I felt, and he didn't realize that.

Isn't that fascinating?

And so he never did it again.

And now I'm curious, if I were to ask him today, do you know what you did then, would he now know?

Absolutely. He has also worked— I am really, really fortunate. I married a man who was really wanting to Work on himself. And he has worked on himself as far as private behavior and got himself really under control before we had children, as far as berating in private. So, um, well, that's— I think that's really important because the children have to be able to respect both parents.

That's exactly right. Thank you. Thank you. That— you did exactly the right thing. The humiliated person has to stop this. And if the threat has to be that this will more than any other thing end a marriage, I think you have to say that. That's why, and I know some of you differ and I respect that, but that is why I believe that divorce, the possibility of divorce, is important for marriages, often for marriages to be good. Because if people know they can't be fired, They'll often take advantage and not do a good job at what they're doing. If you can't be fired from your work, will you work as hard? If you can't be fired as a professor, do you think that tenure has made better teachers or worse teachers? If you can't be fired as a spouse, and that's what divorce is about, then you are relying on the goodwill of the person to, to always be on good behavior. So look, life is messy, my friends, and, uh, we're trying to make it better. That's certainly the purpose of this particular hour. An, is that your name, in Monrovia, California? An?

Yes, it's An. Thank you so much for taking my call, Dennis.

Thank you for calling.

I'm really thrilled, and I really want to thank you for your heroic work, and, um, I'm glad I could get on the air and tell you that too.

Good. Thank you again.

Okay, my, my question is, um, I love my sister so much, and, and she's married to her husband for, um, almost 20 years. And, uh, often I see her a lot, almost every weekend, because she really, really good friends also, as well as sisters. And, um, I tried several times, and, you know, because they both are really nice people to other people, but as far as to each other, I think they They could be a little bit or a lot more loving to each other, and I think that's why they have issues in their marriage, and they don't want to—

And is there— there's public humiliation involved?

Yes, yes, unless I'm being overly sensitive.

Well, yeah, this is it. This, this is a tough call. Back in a moment.

This episode of Timeless Wisdom will continue right after this.

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Now back to more of Dennis Prager's timeless wisdom.

Hello, hello, hello. I don't know why you say goodbye. I say hello. I say hi.

It's always hard to interrupt this song. I have a particular love for it.

You say why and I say I don't know.

Hi everybody, Dennis Prager here, and a Quick reaction to An. This is the male-female hour. Please don't hang up. I will summarize calls if I have to.

Hi.

And An in Monrovia, that's A-N-H, so I assume Vietnamese extraction, but in any event, about humiliation that in her family, among her siblings or sibling and toward her husband. Uh, here, it's, it's a tough, it's a tough call about intervention in anybody's marriage. That, by the way, might be a great subject for another male-female hour. Can we, can we comment to friends or siblings about their marriages? It's a very— See, these, these are often subjects that can only be answered in the specific, not in the general. And I believe in the general, as you know. I don't know if Ana's— if Ana, you're being more sensitive than necessary. I just don't know. But if my sister, and I think it's easier for sisters, but if my sister were doing this to her husband, I would play her this hour. This is a perfect example because then you're off the hook in effect. Uh, uh, you know, my sister, I'd like you to just listen to this. See, people can listen to a stranger far more easily than they can to a loved one. So that might be an example, or, or any of John Gottman's works on, on, uh, on contempt in marriage and so on. All right, let's see here. When my sister and I were growing up, we saw how mom was disrespecting my dad. Now my sister does the same toward her husband, and I am starting to as well. He's 22 years old. Any way to reverse this? Well, the first way to reverse this is exactly what you're doing, David. You're acknowledging you're doing it. There's great hope for you. It's, it's the ones who don't know what they're doing that are— one has the least optimism for any possible success. You stop yourself as soon as it happens. You stop yourself. This is another subject I've said so often. The greatest battle in life is not with society. It is with ourselves. Verbal abuse can humiliate someone and turn that person into becoming the same way and doing it to others. That's exactly right. That's why I don't want children to see this in parents. That's exactly right. That is an example of where a divorce would be preferable, in my opinion. And generally, I wouldn't, I wouldn't argue that. I know you've been on a while, and I, and I, I feel terrible that I didn't have the time to take your call. John at Phoenix, likewise. This has been the Male-Female Hour on the Dennis Prager Show.

Tomorrow on Timeless Wisdom with Dennis Prager.

So, Ashley Rindsberg, welcome to the Dennis Prager Show.

Thank you, Dennis. I'm really excited to be here. Thank you so much.

What prompted you to write this book?

Well, the book grew out of a chance occurrence when I was kind of thumbing through a copy of William Shirer's great book of history on World War II, The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich. And in a footnote, Shirer just kind of noted almost casually that on the eve of World War II, the New York Times had run a story claiming that Poland had invaded Germany, which was— I was sitting in my chair and it just kind of almost knocked me out of the chair. It was such a crazy idea that the New York Times could could print something that was so wrong, so opposite to what we know is the truth about World War II. It's fundamental. And that launched me on a mission to understand how that happened, why that happened, what else happened like that. And that eventually evolved into a full book.

That is mind-blowing. I didn't want to interrupt you. I want to review this.

It really is.

Well, I remember reading that in college, by the way. It is one of the most riveting works of history I have ever read. And I think it stands up in time, don't you?

I absolutely do. And not only does his book or his books stand up, but his journalism does too. And that was really important, something that I went back and looked at how other journalists, how other news outlets were recovering— were covering events like World War II. And, you know, 'cause it's easy to say, well, looking back, it's 2020, very nice of you, you did your research great. But the reality was that people like Shire or Edward Murrow, they were reporting very much correctly. They were reporting on things like World War II or the Holocaust or many other events in history that the Times completely botched. These guys got it right and the Times got it completely wrong. So it wasn't just about hindsight.

Join us tomorrow to hear more on Timeless Wisdom with Dennis Prager. Visit DennisPrager.com for thousands of hours of Dennis's lectures, courses, and classic radio programs, and to purchase Dennis Prager's Rational Bibles. We want to take just a second to thank the team at Life Audio for their partnership with us on the podcast. Go to lifeaudio.com to find dozens of other faith-centered podcasts in their network, including shows about prayer, Bible study, parenting, and more.

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