in the ongoing big picture for the good jesse christie said it's a remark let's get back to it today the canadian supreme court struck down all all of canada's anti-prostitution laws just said all of them are violations of the constitutionally guaranteed right to life liberty and the security of a person in fact if you look at the experience of australia and most of the western european countries where prostitution is legal when prostitution was decriminalized it reduced the rates of sex crimes to reduce the rates of sexually transmitted diseases and well there's a big argument about whether it's increases the quality of life for sex workers or not i'm curious we have two women that i'm just curious everybody's take on that i have so many mixed emotions about it one i believe in less government i believe in less government in the bedroom i believe in getting less government involvement so from a less government perspective find less laws i'm fine from a woman's perspective i feel that there's so much sex trade there is exploitation

there are females that are degraded they're looking at this as a means of not using their brains or using their body i think on so many levels it's degrading to women and women themselves get sucked in for the almighty dollar and they get managed by sex trafficking people and i it's just there's so many of us and i'm going to go away so no it may not shouldn't be regulated but i don't know that you're ever going to get rid of the illegal element because the people that are practicing the sex trade are always going to take advantage of beating the law and taking advantage of people so i don't know that this is going to solve any of those problems i think that those problems are still going to be in the shadows still hidden and then the legal sex workers are going to become people that have just disengaged from it completely and i'm going to raise a daughter saying please don't become a sex track worker even though it's illegal or there's. a lot of what you're saying there's a lot of evidence that in countries where they have to criminalize. things that tom talking about has happened but sex trafficking has also increased so i would say on balance i don't know how i feel about that i think a lot of that is. is. international sex trafficking something to trade in basically

attractive young women into those into the those major cities particularly european capitals and that's you know as a libertarian marc you've got a lot of those yeah i mean as an immigration attorney i've worked on t.v.'s and cases i worked on behalf of people who have been sex trafficked into this country abroad in this country under false pretenses and forced into the sex trade you know when you're talking about prostitution certainly those things need to be combated those things need to be illegal sex trafficked coercion of any kind any kind of job that you're course to do whether it's sexual or not it's labor peonage in this form but as far as the law itself and and i understand i probably identify this differently as a man and as a female but to some degree the fact that women can choose to do this if they truly are choosing it's somewhat of an empowerment if you look at the idea that women should be empowered to use their bodies the way they want or that they have control over their bodies this exert ensure that with absolutely and i'll tell you what i'm saying i think this should be decriminalized here is where i had an argument over

that of saying and here's one that argument works and here's one that argument breaks down and it's the same and it's the whole thing with the libertarian argument is that that argument works in a society where everybody has a basic minimum where nobody is facing the force of nature nobody is facing the force of hunger nobody's facing the force of poverty nobody's facing the force of homelessness we're society's actually taking care of everybody in northern scandinavia you know northern european countries for example that are going to start breaking down when you have poverty and then you have there is a there is force there is force the pushes people into prostitution and even though it's not a physical force in my making sense of it yes exactly i mean that's that's where i have notions about this is that it seems like i mean no one really has to be a prostitute it's not what anyone grows up wanting to be it is always because of incredibly dire circumstance. that one of going to be forced in that situation and so whether it's regulated or not i don't. you know it's just it seems like we

should be working to eliminate it rather than regulate but then i just don't worry i'm sort of the laws don't work anywhere i mean it's not like the because we decriminalize it that law is really working to get rid of prostitution prostitution always been illegal it's always been prevalent so i mean decriminalizing and i think may make it safer and bring it out of the shadows more so people can't be exploited as much i'd i mean it's not like we have the last there's no prostitution we do criminalize prostitution seems to me that we should be working to limit the harm or do choose to do this though there are women in las vegas not las vegas but in nevada counties that are actually choosing to do this because the money is so lucrative and it is legal and what what i'm you know as a woman i'm disturbed that they are feeling this is a legitimate way to go but i cannot object when it comes to this is a free choice and the money is a lucrative they're doing this i mean if they were really afraid of a prostitute to write like if they if they actually had the ability to make more money doing something else when i no i don't think so there are actually women and this is sad to say there are women of that are strippers for example many of them

on drugs many of them on alcohol totally destructive lives making adequate money but then there's always that one who keeps their head clean and she's put herself through college there's always that one that rises above it so you see the one female who's actually been smart about it there are women that have been in the porn industry and then turn into sex toy items and they're millionaires and they've actually been very much market actions that prove that they're right there's that one and then there's the five thousand that don't make. exceptions that prove the rule when it when you're talking about you know long hair anything wrong. with the woods we just have it worth fifteen million dollars and live on a twenty thousand two thousand acre estate mind boggling thing though roberts of duck dynasty has raised some of the fire here he said of the this is carried by the any network which is owned by disney which. adds a wrinkle to it he said. i never with my eyes saw the mistreatment of any black

person not want so he's talking about growing up in the segregated south in louisiana where we lived was all farmers the blacks work for the farmers and i had caught with them i'm with the blacks because we're white trash we're going across the field they're saying and happy i never heard one of them one black person say i tell you what these doggone white people are word printed on pretty welfare you say were they happy they were godly they were happy no one was singing the blues so you know what he doesn't point out is that he had separate bathrooms he had separate living facilities he had separate everything during that separate schools i mean the fact that he could write a book and is literate as a function of the separate schools during that era how could anybody grow up in a circle in the segregated south and then live through the civil rights era and into this moment now and i mean in addition to his homophobic comments but and and

and say something like this i just don't i'm. speechless i don't i don't get it and i don't feel as i know lying is i wouldn't call myself a doctor i am but i'm not anti i just feel that they he has a right to say what he wants to say and i think that would add is that if he didn't why he why doesn't he have a right to say what i don't have realized here what while it's not as huge as being a first amendment does not guarantee you you're on television program he has and they can cancel the program they have the right to cancel it you're ok but i mean it's like i don't ok i know you're not only has the right to say this to g.q. but the protest from sarah palin who who by the way applauded it when martin bashir got fired from an assembly city saying that if you're on television you have a responsibility to be careful what you say the protest from her is that this is the end of constitutionally limited better than such a perfect for speak i mean the haters who do what it was and she discussing people that are in the profession now on television are lying spiritedness i think about martin maher shares this he was so lucky. about bashir and specifically to the

right when she was saying you're on television she was referring to a media person who is representing the new shares yesterday where this guy is known as an evangelical he is known as an elder white male from the south they hired him to be this this is what he is and they knew this go with they didn't want to be sure they didn't hire him to be a big that's right but then they didn't cancel the show well i don't understand home contractors but they did he found a contract obviously anybody who was on television as fair or was all agree with their pale and you know has to perform by certain standards he didn't one thing that marc and i were talking about for the show it's kind of amazing that some of the stuff that you know that you just put up here some of the stuff that hasn't been reported as much is actually much more offensive than even some of the you know the homophobic. i decided it really amazing and godling that these republican candidates including bobby jindal whatever are acting like this

guy is friends have been on defense here as i are defending with. vulnerable whatever he is well he's going to have not let any fifteen million dollars he's got a two thousand acre to twenty thousand acre estate or whatever it is that he is going to be reality t.v. has gotten to real i mean bottom line harder is maybe look you know this guy said it why do you always get fired just because you say something kind of the fire of yes does he have a legal recourse most likely not it also depends on the damages if they pay him out for his contract he has very little legal resource but the bottom line here is when we did not want to become a society where everybody is on pins and needles i can't imagine what he's saying is correct i can imagine he never saw this but what should it bring about more speech he should be criticized for it and they can fire him but nobody's going to want to give an interview if everything leaves you being fired i know you do i think you know i think. every let you criticize this let's criticize you have not martin. but you know i realize that i mean we've got. so i don't you're saying that

everybody is you don't want everybody to be on pins and needles but the fact of the matter is that this this whole duck dynasty thing these guys are representing a culture and clearly phil robertson is a proud member of it that is racist and homophobic and when eighty put him on they knew that but they said del down the racism of the homophobia let's just talk about the nice parts of the white southern christian culture and as long as he was talking about the nice parts of the white southern christian culture they were very happy with it but then when he came out with the rest of it all of a sudden. and that's where you said reality t.v. is too real but it's not reality t.v. is phony below i mean i agree the show is phony i think it's scripted to me guys react to his eyes well he's a business i mean the bottom bottom line you know to me the thing here is that the day they did exploit it when it was working for him they don't like it now i was just saying i think you have got to be fortunate i think they have a program in control to do what they're doing legally i don't think there's

a real recourse here but you know people want it up to a certain point they want to basically sort of make fun of this stereotype or characterization as to what they represent and then he says what he really believes as a person and all the sudden gets better christine if it's and jesse james if it's reality t.v. shouldn't these guys be sitting around talking about gays and the rate they actually talk about gays i think all reality t.v. is degrading our society on something like most of the car dash and have to whatever because it's giving people an imprint it's not indian and it's not real it's sad to me the whole thing is sad that's the first thing a any i agree was now upset but they knew what they were getting into who allowed this g q interview i mean come on maybe it had to have known that this was going to blow up but you know what really bothers me is that we're even here talking about it when on tuesday six soldiers died in afghanistan and i saw each one of their photos and their families and the media hasn't covered that those families but we haven't even got to tell you that although i thought i had that stuff i don't really think that i that there are as i talk to everybody it's. about

a wedding devastated by drone strike what i mean you know what let's any blood ok we twenty seconds is in favor of ending the war in afghanistan oh it's going to mean ok and so absolutely karzai is a corrupt absolutely he's. got it out yeah it was a man absolutely yeah thank you thank you for bringing that up because just again tough place to set your marker oh thank you thank you i think you're coming up to the brits his father christmas to the deniz the year old man into the russians whose grandfather frost americans call him set a clause in just five days from now children all over the country will eagerly await the president's who's going to bring on christmas eve when did the set of tradition begin and what does it tell us about the history of christianity answer to both of those questions after the break.

i got a quote for you. it's pretty tough. stay where it's about story. let's give this guy like you would smear about guns instead of working for the people both issues the beach media were pretty much on the bridegroom's days you know. they did rather well.

i would rather ask questions to people in positions of power instead of speaking on their behalf and that's why you can find my show larry king now right here on our t.v. question for. it's a. pleasure to have you with us here on t.v.

today i'm sure. so sometimes you know what you know and sometimes you know what you don't know and sometimes as the fires and theaters as if everything you know is wrong and go with it you're wrong if you're going to hear your right spirit or i'll just say things that sure don't. really mean you know what is wrong is it's christmas time so santa clause is on everyone's mind once again but thanks to meghan kelly said it has been a topic of conversation for more than the usual reasons this year fox news host unleashed a firestorm of controversy earlier this month when she said our show that father christmas is definitely one. in slate they have a piece. santa claus should not be a white man anymore and when i saw this headline i kind of laughed and i saw this is so ridiculous yet another person claiming it's racist to have

a white santa you know and by the way for all you kids watching at home santa just is white but this person is just arguing that that maybe we should we should also have a black santa but you know santa is what he is. in the days since saturday gate the media has spent countless hours analyzing kelly's comments some pundits have come to her defense agreements as white others have attacked her pointing out that the real same neck a fourth century christian religious icon is actually turkish all politics aside though the whole meghan kelly set of santa clause can controversy raises some interesting question i mean why do we associate a christian holiday with a jolly fat man who lives at the north pole and was a flying reindeer stuff all about joining me now from new paltz new york to help answer our santa questions and psychologist author founder of the center for symbolic studies dr steven larson dr larson welcome back pay to merry christmas hey stephen merry christmas let's start with the basics where does the idea of santa

claus come. will you know it's a scene critic idea it's an ancient norse scandinavian kind of seem that permeates norway sweden iceland finland parts of russia the baltic countries and the st nick is a wonderful kind of figure you're correct that he is his christian version is connected with the fourth century christian saint nicholas but this joey fat man i believe is really a kind of a transformation of the primordial showman. how so and i mean shamans from that part of the of the world. well the showman in the ancient circle older traditions the showman he is the ancient wonder worker he is the guy knows whether you've been naughty or nice he is the one who knows all your secrets he very often

dresses in a robe sometimes he appears with the staff and. he is associated with the reindeer or the caribou in the monica. cultures very interesting what about where the flying reindeer. will you know tell i laughed and laughed when i first read this in and siberian anthropological text because there's a funny story about that siberian sherman rely upon and loosen own genetic plant called the am and need to miscarry are the mushroom it's a mushroom and it's a mushroom that has santa claus's it's a red mushroom with white spots on it and it's like santa is perennial costume colors and the shamans go flying when they ingest that ceremonial mushroom and i found out of the caribou the reindeer of the northern country also eat the m.

and even the scarier now one of the things about us to poisonous mushroom so one of the ways that you can have a high effect without getting poisoned is that you. drink the urine of another shopman who has taken the hit so to speak for you and so sr sherman's pee in a glass jar and they can give to drink eight apprentice shermans but the caribou also know the same thing so they eat each other's yellow snow the shamans eat the caribou is yellow snow the caribou eat the shermans yellow snow so they all get high without getting poisoned while somebody who ever has first seen snow in a mushroom is getting poisoned by. it but they survive after after a while the body gets used to it ok that hits the liver i think it's and it's really bad so what of the whole idea of bad santa this that and the various

cultures were sad is characterized as as kind of a nasty or creepy guy. i sent some pictures along with the bad the bad santa there i don't know whether you're really i want to right now or a showing some yeah this is like a saddle with the horns i can't see the missed call that krampus and you know the idea of santa as a being that is able to inexhaustibly give gifts and good cheer and joe enos in the holiday season that's quite an amazing thing but in many of those cultures there are or ways in which the children aren't so good all year long so they have to kind of have a figure that could punish them or you know a traditionally in germany and holland coal was put in the stockings of bad children they were threatened with their sometimes center peers with the door fish helpers sometimes their black elk was called black beasts and so the idea that santa is white some of his helpers are people of color i suppose you'd call them

politically correctly and they grab the bad children only put them in a bag and santa carries them away or tortures them so he's a is a kind of a negative. figures also called the christmas so so called sinterklaas and he appears also with a beautiful sleigh and being pulled usually by a reindeer. jeez it's amazing the. racism that has slipped into this is the reason the dutch culture as far as what holland where they've got the. insanity is this is. actually i saw it in one piece his helper says his black helpers were characterized as as his slaves. yet this is tracked back to the time when when that part of our world was involved in the slave trade of course . you know so it's just a sort of the same as those black ceramic statues of people have on their lawns

holding a lantern you know to make sure that everybody can see that. is going on show you're a person of substance if you have slaves. now santa himself is a mysterious character that hovers around the north pole and i want to just call attention to the idea that the whole is the axis money the axis of the world and he's got all these magical helpers that these words and elves you know help him make the goodies all year long and then he knows if you've been naughty or nice and he can fly all over the place and eat like a showman he can make him so small he can make himself large down the chimney he goes and you know he rewards the good and punishes them. it certainly is there a connection between saturn and gandalf the wizard from the lord of the rings series well very interesting that you should ask the name gandalf comes from the

thirteenth century icelandic it is and it means wise old elf which is exactly what scent is called so gandalf was a wise elephants kind of interesting now that as people are watching. these talking movies and particularly the second part of the hobbit this coming out again else is really a pivotal figure he is the guy who knows the secret plot that is going on in force he knows that there is an evil force named so ron and so ron is like the krampus are and he's like his counterpart the evil guy just the same way as the devil is the counterpart of of god or of jesus christ so the so the gandalf and these these are the hobbits and the elves and all this stuff this is all grounded in ancient mythology it's not something that jr tolkien just patched out of his brain. well it's magical because tolkien didn't make it up from scratch

it's magical because it existed for a long long time and tolkien was very very convinced that the anglo-saxon imagination was the equal of the celtic imagination you know you find in. english folklore a mixture of from the arthurian traditions you know the map and nobody on the welsh and irish and scottish lore but tolkien wanted to make sure that the norse mythology got in there and he was eight went out of his way to do that for example the names of all the wars in tolkien are found in sin or eastern wilson's thirteenth century icelandic as now these all in all these cultures you're describing are the northern european and russian eastern and they're all northern northern cultures is that because the days get really really short there i mean is there some analog to the santa clause and christmas in equitorial cultures for example you know there isn't one and maybe that's the percent is condemned to be

white forever they don't have an equivalent figure that i know of i could be. you know they certainly have schama ignorant about a. they do have showman's but there is a whole belt of shamanism that is really around the arctic circle and anthropologists have half in jest and i have seriously said that it's because everybody in the northern hemisphere is because of the long nights in the short days in the winter time is a little bit de ranged and while when i lived in germany one of them one of the local psychiatrist actually from mine said that. the old tradition was they would see the days getting shorter and shorter shorter people start to panic around december twenty third and the priest would find a giant tree on a highest hill like that sucker on fire and salvia ignore ignite the sun and then you know the next day the days are getting longer going to go he did it again and make him you know they had

a priest for another year and that's why they had their calendar stones you know like you know. stonehenge so they'd know when that day was coming so that they could is that this is the origin of the christmas tree people of had seasonal effective disorder for a long long time and that's why you have a festival of lights starting on the shortest day of the year december twentieth or december twenty first thank god it were for electricity because up until this time everybody used to put candles on tinder dry evergreen trees and villages whole villages would burn down on christmas day because everybody is having a festival of lights on that's pretty incredible stephen with just thirty seconds or any final thoughts on on christmas some things we should know about it. will you know it is it is wonderful to give a kind of an affirmation to the generosity of spirit that goes along with this

holiday and to celebrate the children and the animals and it really does amalgamate with christ child. symbolism and the wisemen of the ship. coming in the beasts around the manger i think it's a wonderful addition to the northern traditions of santa claus and now we've got a a wonderful hybrid syncretic tradition you know stephen dr stephen larson merry christmas to you and robin and i'm watching you and we use and sean and all your wonderful staff their time it's always a pleasure talking to all our elves take his eighty five and now and now everything you know about christmas and santa claus is right. and that's the way it is that i had fried december twentieth twenty for team and don't forget modesty begins with you get out there get active tag your.

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today on larry king now one of hollywood's hottest stars adam scott i'm told that this sets a lot of fun right it's really fun i mean season six and everyone is still friends and happy to be there is a feat in itself he's the biggest flirt rob lowe. you know what else plus the whole larry is mike birbiglia and i'd like to think of my shows as like a meal as opposed to like just serving people check in a way well you do a whole bit on being opposed to marriage yeah very funny you seem for it seems well you'll never be back much. that's all ahead on larry king now.