Buddha from I Love New York season 2 and I Love Money 2 joins Lacey on Talk of Love, for a very different kind of conversation. Fair warning: this is not a typical Talk of Love episode. Ezra Masters — known to "Of Love" fans as "Buddha" — showed up for his Talk of Love interview and almost immediately made it clear that he was not particularly interested in spending a lot of time talking about the shows. What followed was one of the most wide-ranging, intellectually charged, and genuinely surprising conversations in the podcast's history.

Lacey and Buddha spent the better part of this episode doing what they both do best: saying exactly what they think, pushing back on each other respectfully, and going places many podcasts won't. Topics covered in this episode include:

• What producers and editors didn't show about Buddha's personality, that left him feel frustrated
• How he really feels about Tiffany Pollard (aka "New York")
• The I Love New York 2 contestant who was framed by police and sent to prison for six years, for a murder he didn't commit
• His career in music videos, runway modeling, and entertainment — and how reality TV was just one chapter of a much larger story
• A deep, substantive discussion on race in America: systemic racism, the death of George Floyd, the 2020 BLM protests, and why Buddha says he feels "blessed" rather than defeated
• The difference between "beautiful ignorance" and willful racism — and why Buddha says he has more patience for one than the other
• A respectful but spirited debate about LGBTQ+ terminology
• The intellectual vs. compassionate divide: Lacey and Buddha disagree on the framing but end up largely in the same place
• Why Buddha believes the real battle is between intellectual progress and willful stagnation — and what Mars has to do with it

Lacey says it herself at the end: they barely touched the reality shows. But if you want to hear two genuinely outspoken people have a real conversation about real things, this one delivers.