Russell Brand: Spiritual Transcendence and Anarchic Revolution is Praxis
Russell Brand is a hip bohemian Englishman on the path to enlightenment. And he likes the ineffable. Like, a lot. The decoders kinda like him too, despite the fact they really struggle to eff him at all. Really, Matt has no effing idea what he is babbling about most of the time, but Chris, being 'English-adjacent', seems to make a better job of it.Imagine smoking pot and talking big ideas with your precocious college room-mate at 2am in the morning. Now give him some methamphetamine, and you've got some idea of the fast-talking stream of consciousness that is Russell Brand.A pair of milquetoast moderates like Chris and Matt just aren't the right audience to properly appreciate the mystical anarchism that Brand advocates. It's probably got something to do with the limits of the bandwidth of their instruments of perception given that knowledge and wisdom are infinite and being-ness itself is.... Well, you get the idea.The lads also reveal some of the exciting progress of the podcast!In exciting news... DTG has broken into the top 100 podcasts! In the Culture and Society category... in Iceland.Regardless, come ride this unstoppable and frenetic juggernaut of mind-expanding concepts with us, and get these cosmic ideas downloaded directly into your squishy little brain!LinksJeremy Paxman and Russell Brand interview from 2013The main 'Awakening of Russell Brand' interview with Rich RollShort Video Update from Brand on 'What I think about This UK Election and Politics Today'
It's the podcast where two academics listen to content from the greatest minds the online world has to offer, and every couple of weeks we try to understand what they're talking about.
So my name's Matt Brown.
With me is Chris Kavanagh.
I'm a psychologist.
He's a cognitive anthropologist, and he is from a place that definitely isn't England.
So, Chris, are we ready to get into it?
Are we ready to get into it today?
Yeah, I also mentioned that you, Matt, are also from somewhere that definitely is not England.
Yeah, yeah.
Interesting introduction you've gone with this week.
Yeah, but you know, unlike where you're from, no one could possibly be confused about that.
That's right.
My accent means that people are often mistaking me for a high-class elite.
English man.
So you're right.
It's a perennial cross that I have to bear.
Yes.
Well, this week we have got a few introductory things to get through and then we're going to get into Russell Brand, aren't we?
He's going to be fun.
Oh, yes.
Yes, that's right.
You put the spoiler up front, Matt.
No build-up.
There he is, the big-haired buffoon.
It's not a secret, Chris.
We do advertise it beforehand.
Oh, yeah.
That's right.
It was posted in advance this week.
Good on you, Chris.
You pulled your finger out and got that done.
I seem to recall somebody saying, I'm definitely going to do that.
Don't you do it.
I'll do it.
But anyway, memory is fallible.
We can say what's real in the past and what's not.
It's lost in the midst of times now.
We'll let that go.
Okay, before we get...
Will we, Matt?
Will we?
Okay, so let's do a few updates first.
We also want to review a couple of our reviews, which we love doing.
Oh, yeah.
So we have been doing well with people.
Kindly leaving reviews as we asked, and some of them have been quite amusing.
So we actually don't have new negative reviews.
And I'm not saying that to encourage people to leave negative reviews, but just that it means that the two I'm going to discuss today are actually positive.
Don't sound so surprised.
You sound surprised.
And it sounds really good that we got two positive reviews, but it's less...
Sounds less good when we realise that one of them was from my brother.
Yes, so I think you haven't read this.
Your brother might be called Sean Brown.
Would this be correct?
That would be correct, yes.
Yes, so how do I know it's your brother?
Well, here we go.
There's a five-star review on the Australian iTunes and it says...
The title is My Brother Made Me Do It.
The review says Mafia is my brother and he made me leave a five-star review or he'd nipple cripple me.
I don't know what they're talking about.
Good stuff, though.
Yeah, that's good.
He follows instructions.
Little brothers are good for something, it seems.
I feel that that kind of spoils the point of leaving the Fiek family review when you identify yourself and admit it was coerced.
But every rating counts, right?
Every rating counts.
Like I said, just the five stars.
You can write anything you want after that.
So, yeah, good.
We had another one as well?
Yes, we did, which I have just closed down.
So give me one second.
I'll just play some elevator music.
Okay.
Yeah.
So I...
This is by someone called Natalia De Zobra.
I apologize for that, Natalia.
But the title is I Love These Guys.
So she's off to a good start.
Excellent.
But I actually can't read the intention in this next line.
So maybe you can decode it for me.
So she said...
One of my favorite things is when a simple, dull joke will sound absolutely hilarious after over an hour of exhaustive and dry analysis.
Yeah, that's a pretty good summary.
Is that Megan?
Is that Megan?
Yeah, that's a very borderline.
That's borderline praise there, Chris.
I'm not sure.
I like that.
I like that.
And she also points out that a rare review from Matt on Rutger Bregman, he should use it as a blurb on this next book.
And this is a quote from you.
I don't think this guy is a grifter.
He's not motivated by bad things.
Only a bit slack in his research and reasoning.
Yeah, there's me being very even-handed and fair.
I'm sure Rutger would be happy with that review.
I mean, you know, he knows it can't be all praise, you know.
Why do you hate him so much, Matt?
That's the thing that I'm...
I just was astonished last week, the level of, you know, passionate hatred.
It was hard to deal with, but there we go.
I think, well, you know, Rutger, if you're listening to this, which of course he isn't because he's far too important.
I think he's my favourite person that we've reviewed so far.
That's a stunning endorsement, given the people that we've reviewed so far.
Congratulations, Rutger.
So, okay.
Now we have had people sing our praises, or subtly negos.
There was one other very important thing that I think you...
I need to make you aware of.
We've broken the podcast charts.
I got a notification in the email inbox.
Oh, really?
We're in the top 100 podcasts in society and culture.
Sounds good so far.
In Iceland.
We're big in Iceland.
In the top 100, I'm not sure that's that big, to be honest with you.
Yeah, we're currently ranked 78th in Iceland for Society and Culture podcast.
So how are you going to manage this newfound level of fame?
People are going to be stopping me on the street.
I mean, well, we can't go to Iceland now, obviously.
We'll be just swamped with adoring fans.
Yeah.
That's right.
That's why I've been getting all those letters and emails from Icelandic fans.
That's the reason.
We're becoming big there.
So, yeah.
That's good news, Chris.
I mean, it's not quite as good as I thought it might have been, but it's still good.
I wanted to save it.
You know, you've got your brother's review.
You've got Breaking Iceland Top 100.
It's hard to overestimate the extent to which this podcast's success is soaring.
It's just been a whirlwind.
It's been like a dream so far.
Yeah.
So after that exciting news, I thought we would move on to our...
Well, usually after we've covered someone, we have corrections or complaints or...
Or feedback to discuss regarding the Guru that we covered.
And last week, it was Rutger Bregman.
Fair to say we didn't get as much call for corrections.
But maybe we didn't make that many misstatements.
In fact, I would say the majority of feedback we got was people quite satisfied that we had focused on him.
It seems like he's annoyed quite a lot of people, especially...
A fair amount of left-wing people as well.
So that was interesting to see.
But did we get any critical feedback or anything you want to correct the record on?
Yeah, I think people are generally pleased that we're looking at...
You know, left of center people too.
And of course, we're following that up again this week with Russell Brand.
Yeah, I think, look, the only thing I got, I think, was a little bit of pushback.
People were a little bit unhappy that I kind of agreed, essentially, with the kinds of things that Rutger was arguing for, which I think for me was a bit of an offhand kind of thing, because just to make the point that, you know, my main problem is with his...
arguments rather than what he's arguing for but yeah I don't know I think I think I didn't think it was really that controversial the kinds of things that he's arguing for I mean like like UBI is you
I'm a little bit confused though, Mark, because my impression was that you were for...
Automated luxury gay space communism.
Yes.
And I'm not sure that's what Rutger is promoting.
So there does seem to be a contradiction somewhere here.
I've clearly misunderstood where Rutger was coming from.
I thought that's what the audio was going for.
Yeah, but maybe, I think, like, if I can...
If I can speak for you, Matt, I think part of the issue is, although there's lots of things to point out where Rutger seems to be exaggerating the evidence or maybe misrepresenting the level of consensus on particular issues,
the general view about inequality as a problem Greater redistribution of wealth, higher taxes, those kind of fairly bog-standard lefty positions.
Those are the things that you, I think, agree with.
Is that accurate?
Yeah, thank you.
Yeah, it is.
Thanks for that, Chris.
The other thing, his more general point of view, that we should try to look at the incentives and stuff in society and see if we can...
Reorient them a bit so it's not all about chasing wealth and status and maybe focusing on health and well-being and trying to do things that are more meaningful.
I think it's pretty appropriate given that we're kind of moving towards, in some ways, a post-scarcity type society in many places in the West.
Yeah, so I stand by those statements.
Not one step back.
I'm okay with them.
I feel that, yeah, like you said, they're not particularly controversial for someone who's coming from a general...
Progressive point of view.
Well, okay.
You've done your best to justify your worldview, Matt.
Let's see if people buy it.
Luxury case-based automated communism for the win.
Yeah.
Remember, Matt is available on Twitter and via email for any feedback on his political views.
And actually, maybe this is a good time to mention before we have a little discussion about the state of the...
The gurus that we've covered before is that this week when we are covering Russell Brand, who has at least superficially an argument for quite a revolutionary style of politics, I think it's fair to say that you and I don't agree with his political view.
But we don't want that to be the focus.
As we've said in previous weeks, it would be impossible for us not to let our personal views and political beliefs to influence the way we respond to things.
But it isn't the focus this week to kind of argue that if you agree with a more revolutionary style of politics, that that's inherently...
Or that that's the issue, right?
I think as we'll get into, there's other points of departure, but I guess what I'm trying to say is the podcast is not intended to be advocacy for milk-toast centrist politics, even though that may be what it turns out to often be saying.
I don't know.
Yeah, that's well put, Chris.
It's an important distinction to make.
Was it, man?
Was it well put?
It wasn't well put, but it's a difficult thing to put well.
So you did your best, Chris.
That's the main thing.
Yeah, look, if you disagree with our politics and think that we're morons and not sufficiently...
Revolutionary.
That's fine.
Just listen anyway.
Five stars.
Five stars reviews.
Yeah, five star review and explain in your review why our politics are wet.
Yeah, exactly.
Look, I think your distinction is really important, which is that, yeah, you know, we have opinions just like everyone else, but we don't want this podcast to be just you and me airing our opinion about every damn thing.
Really, what we want to do is focus on...
How these people are communicating, the style of argumentation and the quality of the argumentation that they're putting forward to kind of just help tell the difference between good and bad discourse or arguments.
So when we looked at Jordan Peterson, for instance, we tried to look at what he does and how he does it, not in terms of whether we agreed or not with his socially conservative points of view, but rather...
The kind of logic and, yeah, I keep saying argumentation, but that's the only word I can think of for actually getting there.
And, yeah, we're going to try to do the same thing with Russell Brand.
Yeah, and unfortunately, as we're humans, we'll fall short, but tough shit.
Yeah, it's a free podcast.
So, you know, you get what you pay for.
That's right.
Yeah.
All right.
So enough introspective waffle.
Now let's get back to criticizing everyone else.
We sometimes in recent weeks have done the kind of state of the gurus roundup on our previous guests.
So do you have any updates worth mentioning to start us off, Matt?
Ah, the gurus, the gurus.
Oh, no, you go first, Chris.
I need to get inspired.
You need to shuffle your notes and organize your thoughts.
Yeah.
So one thing I really enjoyed, I can say this give me a deep feeling of catharsis, was that just yesterday, actually, Sam Harris released a new episode in which he publicly slammed...
The intellectual dark web and metaphorically handed in his membership card because of their rampant promotion of both ciderism and various endorsements of Trump's election voter fraud conspiracies.
So he basically called out...
Enlightened centrism takes and the notion that, you know, saying both sides have problems is in this current environment where Trump is trying to disqualify his loss in the US election as harmful.
And he didn't pull punches.
He said, you know, if you're doing that, you're an agent of misinformation and delusional.
So it was...
It was just quite enjoyable to hear somebody within that sphere just describing what's happened because, you know, in the post-election environment, we've detailed in recent weeks how James Lindsay,
who we covered on the second podcast, has descended further and further into the right-wing reactionary conspiratorial sphere.
And has recently been retweeting QAnon Count's former Infowars employees and a whole bunch of pretty extreme conspiracy stuff.
And he's not alone.
Majid Nawaz, the Weinsteins, they're all in this post-election environment revealing their stripes, I think, as fairly dubious contrarian thinkers who aren't that good at...
Critically evaluating conspiracy claims.
Yeah, I described Sam Harris' statement as surgical, very precise and extremely forceful.
I think it really does distinguish him from these other characters.
If you compare how he, not just what he said, but just the systematic way he laid out the reasons for it and how unambiguous and clear he was.
And you contrast that with Eric Weinstein, I think it was, his response to it, which was this, I can't think of a polite way to say it, this very mealy-mouthed, obscurantist,
both-sidist.
Yeah, it's chalk and cheese.
That's really not like Eric as well.
He's usually so clear and precise.
Oh, we're getting stuck.
We're getting snarky, Chris.
We've got to pull it back.
Another issue that's come up in the post-election environment, which I think reflects this kind of tendency amongst some of the more heterodox contrarian types, is that they've been focusing on this topic of the Great Reset,
which is...
Discussion and document and various policy proposals put forward at the World Economics Forum by, you know, a bunch of neoliberal globalist types.
And this is being presented very much as an attempt by the neoliberal elite to usher in a new era of social control, using the coronavirus as an opportunity.
To seize the reins of power and take control of the masses, remove all freedoms and so on and so forth.
And that framing of it, like, I mean, on the one hand, we should be very thankful that the world economic policy and leaders like Justin Trudeau have quite openly just discussed this as if it's actually just,
you know, neoliberal policy wonkery.
As if it isn't some grand nefarious scheme.
It's more just the kind of things that internationalists and governments try to organize plans to rebuild after pandemics or, you know, natural disasters.
But this is a thing that is fairly normal, bog standard.
It's sort of their fault for attaching a conspiracy attractive title to it, right?
Like the Great Reset.
But I just find the level of hysteria around this, at the same time that the Trump administration is openly trying to...
Steal an election, essentially.
Yeah, to steal an election, like, openly.
But that's regarded as something that we should just treat as a normal procedural part of politics.
Like, don't get hysterical about it.
He's just alleging massive voter fraud with no evidence.
But on the other hand, This economic policy discussion, which will probably lead to very little, is world-shattering and everybody needs to be talking about it.
Yeah.
It's just so silly.
I mean, the Great Reset is like a light version of the New World Order, which all the conspiracy theorists freaked out about based on something that...
Who was it?
George Bush Senior or Junior?
Anyway, said.
And that's just like a light version of these other things, you know, the Illuminati and the, you know, it's just so common, these conspiracy theories, where there's this paranoia, especially in the United States, about any kind of international meeting.
When in actual fact, these international organizations have so little influence.
They're just talk fests.
It's like elites getting together to pat each other on the back and come up with plans that actually will come to very little often.
Very little.
Yeah, yeah.
Anyway, so, but by the way, Chris, I like how we started off the podcast with a big disclaimer about how this isn't about just us giving our opinions.
This section is all right, Matt.
This is what this was for.
And I will also note that you mentioned the New World Order as, you know, the more extreme version.
And I've seen people sharing a video where somebody mentions the words New World Order.
And this was taken as, you know, Dramatic curtain pull.
Look, they're not even hiding it anymore.
I find this hard sometimes to deal with because a lot of it is just people saying, how can you say that's a conspiracy?
It's actually there.
They have a website.
They have documents.
You can see them.
And my reaction is, do you hear what you're saying?
This is a conspiracy, but they're producing documents where they outline it and stuff.
It isn't a conspiracy.
It's just like, if it is conspiracy, it's a pretty bad one.
Anyway, all right.
So that's what they're up to.
And I think JPCers and some of the other folks in the orbit have been talking up Parler.
But to be honest, with all these alternative networks, they get talked up a lot.
And people say they're going to leave YouTube and Twitter.
But it basically doesn't happen, right?
They go there and then they still keep their accounts open and come back.
It's only really the people that get banned that actually shift platforms.
So yeah, I wouldn't be surprised if in one year Parler doesn't exist or is super unpopular.
Yeah, yeah, I suspect you're right.
Okay, so are we going to give a little, oh, sorry, are there any more updates we want to give about gurus, prior gurus?
No, so maybe we can save the rest of it for what we've decided that we'll do is in this conspiracy-rich post-election period, have a little look around at a bunch of different guru types on how they're responding to this.
post-US election environment.
Oh yes.
And maybe release a special episode.
So maybe we can update on some of our favorite gurus then.
Yeah, I think that's going to be really fun because obviously if COVID hadn't given us enough juicy conspiratorial reasoning, then the American election was just a bonanza for it.
And so many different guru-like people weighed in on that with their hot takes, none of which seem to be...
As far as I can tell, any substance behind them whatsoever.
Surprise, surprise.
Spoiler, yeah.
So that will be fun.
So that's a special episode coming up.
Stay tuned for that.
We'll talk about the person we're going to be covering next time, our next proper episode, but we want to save that as a surprise.
Yeah, let's leave it to the end so that people are forced to listen if they want to know, or they can just, like, fast forward.
Yeah, that's right.
Who would do that?
Who would do that?
Well, yeah.
Look, if anyone on Twitter says, hey, I really like the episode, I'm going to say, okay, well, who are we covering next week then?
That will be the test.
That's good.
Yeah, so...
There you go.
That's our state of the guru union.
With a slight dose of notocentrism there for you.
Sorry, left or right wing revolutionaries.
Okay, so Russell Brand, the man of the hour.
Yes, so you're kind of English adjacent.
So you're probably more familiar with Russell Brand than me or most people.
So why don't you give us a little...
A little potted history of Russell.
You are intent this week, Matt, on annoying the Irish contingent.
The large Irish and Northern Irish contingent that we have.
You are literally English adjacent.
There's nothing offensive about it whatsoever.
It's a geographical fact.
Yes, granted.
Indeed, my origin is even within the UK, technically.
In any case, Russell Brand is someone that I was aware of and have been for some time because he actually rose to fame or became well-known from hosting an after show about Big Brother in the UK many moons ago,
the reality TV show Big Brother.
And I actually recall back in the era when house phones were a thing and corded landlines, talking to a friend from school.
And having seen Russell Brand on the TV and basically lamenting how such a person could exist and be popular, that I may have seen the most annoying person I could have possibly imagined.
So that might give some view of my initial stance on Russell Brand.
He's an actor, comedian, and now podcaster and book writer sometimes, but he's quite distinctive in appearance and the way he speaks, a bizarre mixture of almost cockney London slang with extreme flowery language and jargony academic ease almost stuff.
And he's been in a bunch of movies.
I actually like some of the movies he was in, like Forgetting Sarah Marshall and whatnot.
But he's become, in recent years, more relevant to us because in the, I think it was the 2013 or thereabouts election, where he was interviewed by a political journalist who's quite famous in the UK called Jeremy Paxman.
And he strongly urged people not to vote.
So he gave this impassioned call for people not to vote and that led to him becoming a popular figure covered in the run up to that election.
And he eventually endorsed the left wing Labour Party.
But that was like a couple of days before the election.
And that was the situation a couple of years ago.
And then more recently...
He's essentially stepped back a little bit from commenting directly on politics, although he still does.
But he's more now focused on advocating for a spiritual revolution and promoting spiritual and mental wellness.
So a bit into the J.P. Sears sphere.
Yeah.
Yeah, in listening to him, he really did strike me as someone who sort of sits halfway between JPCs and Jordan Peterson, actually, because he's got the same kind of scattergun, stream of consciousness approach.
Yeah, I think that's actually probably a really neat description of where he fits, because he is, as we'll see...
He's a comedian, and I think a better comedian than J.P. Sears.
But he has a lot of the Peterson-like stream of conscious and making references to world religions or literature or psychological theory.
So there's definitely a lot of overlap in those two kind of groups of gurus that he's in the middle of the Venn diagram of.
Yeah, look, he's definitely...
Quite well read, like Jordan Peterson, and is able to kind of cite a bunch of stuff through his streams of consciousness.
Yeah.
So, okay, maybe a good place to start would be the Paxman, the famous Paxman interview, to see the political position he was advocating a number of years ago.
And then we can go and have a look at the more recent material and how his positions have changed or not.
And I should probably say that...
The main talk that we're looking at this week is this interview with a kind of vegan health guru called Rich Roll, who is interviewing Russell Brand on his podcast.
But we also looked at this short clip that he had on YouTube about who he's voting for in the UK election.
It just happened a couple of years back.
So we're giving up to it on his political views.
Okay, so before we get to the more recent stuff, here is him laying out his view about voting and politics in 2013.
Voted in, that's how they get it.
You can't even be asked to vote.
It's quite a narrow prescriptive parameter that changes within the...
In a democracy, that's how it works.
Well, I don't think it's working very well, Jeremy, given that the planet is being destroyed, given that there is economic disparity of a huge degree.
What are you saying?
There's no alternative.
No, I'm not saying that.
I'm saying if you can't be asked to vote, why should we be asked to listen to your political point of view?
You don't have to listen to my political point of view, but it's not that I'm not voting out of apathy.
I'm not voting...
Out of absolute indifference and weariness and exhaustion from the lies, treachery, deceit of the political class that has been going on for generations now and which has now reached fever pitch where we have a disenfranchised, disillusioned, despondent underclass that are not being represented by that political system.
So voting for it is tacit complicity with that system and that's not something I'm offering up.
Yeah, so he's actually being pretty explicit there, isn't he, Chris?
I think it sums up his point of view pretty well, which is that revolutionary mindset that this sort of democratic process and incremental change just isn't working and is essentially, despite being nominally democratic, is actually subject to various corrupting forces.
of money and power and influence and so on.
So he's describing pretty clearly his revolutionary mindset, which is you actually need to upend the system rather than participate in it.
Yeah, and I think one of the crucial points that I would emphasize is the extent to which that view that he had revolved around that voting was bad.
And that by actually getting involved with the process of voting, you were hinting.
Yourself with the inequities of the system.
So this is a shorter clip where he makes that even more explicit.
But there are many people who would agree with you.
Good!
The current system is not engaging with all sorts of problems, yes.
And they feel apathetic, really apathetic.
But if they were to take you seriously...
And not to vote.
Yeah, they shouldn't vote.
That's one thing they should do.
Don't bother voting.
Because then when it reaches...
There's a point.
So these little valves, these sort of cosy little valves of recycling and Prius and turn up somewhere, it stops us reaching the pit point where we think, oh, this is enough now.
Stop voting.
Stop pretending.
Wake up.
Be in reality now.
Time to be in reality now.
Why vote?
We know it's not going to make any difference.
We know that already.
So, you know, I have more impact at West Ham United, cheering them on.
And they lost the city unnecessarily Saturday.
Yeah, so for me, that combination of criticism of the system with a disparaging of anybody participating within the restrictions of democratic voting, that's like really bad.
The thing is that he did...
Just before the election, walk this back.
And he ended up endorsing the left-wing Labour candidate a couple of days before the election.
But it was this sentiment of dissatisfaction with the political system and that they're all just the same that kind of got him the attention.
And, I mean, this view that if the system cannot be upended and revolutionized, that there's no...
No difference for who people vote for.
Obviously, especially in the current environment, that's not true, right?
Who you vote for matters.
And even if your vote is to protest by voting for a party which doesn't have likelihood to get elected, at least you can send a message to some extent.
Am I just being like a patsy of the system?
Yes, you're being a milquetoast centrist, Chris, but look, I mean, his point of view there doesn't look too good with 20-20 hindsight.
In 2020.
Sorry.
Brilliant.
Brilliant.
This is the kind of gold-tier banter you are going to get on this podcast.
Anyway, but it does remind me of the sort of right-wing or pseudo-right-wing point of view you get through a lot now.
Oh, Biden and Trump, Democrats and Republicans, they're all basically the same.
And there's that kind of flattening, which allows you to just kind of dismiss the stuff.
That Trump does because, oh, you know, the Democrats have done this corrupt thing or that corrupt thing or whatever.
And so you see it from other angles too, which really frustrates me.
And that's exactly the kind of thing actually that Sam Harris was dismantling very systematically, I thought, that kind of really weak both-siderism.
So it does, I think the same criticism can apply to...
Russell Brand's point of view there.
I know it's a fashionable kind of thing to say.
I don't know.
I mean, look, it feels trite to say that people died for the vote, for your right to vote.
But if you come from a community that is systematically disenfranchised or that has a history with not being represented, then voting does take on a kind of different valence.
I think it's okay just to say that that feels like a viewpoint which is very privileged that you don't care about voting because you can't get the exact party that you want.
And maybe a point to note here is like, so this is five years ago, right?
And like you say, there's hindsight bias.
But this is the kind of position that you would hear amongst students.
I maybe could remember.
Sharing these sentiments, right, in your teens or 20s, like, fuck the system sentiments.
But when Russell is making these arguments, he's in his 40s.
And it's the same as, like, you know, Joe Rogan is in his 50s, but people often talk about him as if he's just this, like, frat guy trying out ideas in his bedroom.
But these guys have had, like, 20 or 30 years.
Existing in the world as adults.
And yet, it feels like their politics and their image of the system is really juvenile.
Yeah.
Well, there you have it.
We've come down hard.
I'm disagreeing with Russell Brand here.
So it sounds like they're decoding the guru's official policy is that we are pro-democracy.
Yeah.
Well, okay.
We're in favor of it.
There's one last clip from this time capsule where the interviewer presses him to get specific.
And I think it makes a good job of highlighting the contradictions better than our commentary can.
What's the scheme?
That's all I'm asking.
What's the scheme?
You talk vaguely about revolution.
What is it?
I think a socialist egalitarian system based on the massive redistribution of wealth, heavy taxation of corporations and massive responsibility for energy companies and any companies that's exploiting the environment, I think the very concept of profit should be hugely reduced.
David Cameron says profit isn't a dirty word.
I say profit is a filthy word because wherever there is profit, there is also deficit.
And this system currently doesn't address these ideas.
And so why would anyone vote for it?
Why would anyone be interested in it?
Who would levy these taxes?
I think we do need to, like, there needs to be a centralised administrative system, but built on...
There needs to be a government.
Well, maybe call it something else.
Call them like the admin bods, so they don't get ahead of themselves.
And how would they be chosen?
Jeremy, don't ask me to sit here in an interview with you in a bloody hotel room and devise a global utopian system.
So one point to note here is that Russell Brown was a millionaire when having this interview, I'm pretty sure.
So profit is a dirty word, but yeah, that's a nice thing for a millionaire to opine on.
Okay, so that gives a pretty clear idea of where he was then in terms of his slightly edgy revolutionary politics, maybe not entirely thought through.
Where is he now?
Okay, so here is a clip from him.
I think this is from 2018 or...
Yeah, anyway, in the last couple of years.
And he's talking about...
He's actually comparing his position now to then.
My position since then has altered in that I feel that my focus and my connection is transcendent of the limitations of conventional politics and that I no longer want to be confined to that playing field, which was kind of comparable to the position I had then,
which was, hey, politics is much too centrist.
There's no genuine options or alternatives being presented here.
Clearly that's changed with a kind of a move to the...
Parameters, but, you know, even when you use a phrase like parameters, whose parameters, what parameters, on both the left and right.
But as I say, my focus is on a different type of politics.
By politics, I mean the way that power is shared, the way that systems are established.
And, you know, people will say, oh, these ideas that you have, Russell, they're utopian because they are ideas like questioning absolutely everything.
All of the things that are not placed on the table for discussion, consider why that might be.
Yeah, so that is him outlining that.
He's transcended the categories of traditional politics, left and right, political parties.
But also, he kind of does have a half-take where he recognizes that he's essentially saying the same thing, right?
That there is not enough options or differences and that he wants genuine politics, real politics.
Or not even politics, just change, democracy, spirituality.
So, yeah, the difference might be that he's positioning himself more in the spiritual side of things as opposed to revolutionary politics or revolutionary left-wing politics.
The revolution happens inside our hearts, Chris.
This is known.
Yes.
This is praxis.
So, okay, well, and here is one more clip of him detailing his political model as it currently exists.
I have a very different vision of how the world ought be, the way that we all treat one another.
The way that we all relate to one another and support one another.
And increasingly, I recognise that it exists outside of the conventional paradigm.
And I accept that that's not the case for a lot of people.
And I respect them.
But for me, it is different.
And my focus now is on new ideas, new vision, transcendent of national identity, transcendent of previous political identity, new, open.
Accepting, optimistic, still cynical.
But utopian.
You need not give up your cynicism to be a utopian.
You can still be circumspect, intellectual and reflective and be a utopian.
You can still dream of new worlds, true democracies, real engagement in your community, power not shuttled off to elsewhere in the hands of someone who ultimately is just like you and shares your foibles.
We have a genuine chance to explore the inner and outer world in new ways, to make genuine discoveries about the nature of consciousness, genuine discoveries about how it's possible to organize societies.
And I would not limit myself to any old idea, not when we have the imagination as our landscape of potential and of possibility.
Take.
Reactions, Matt?
He certainly knows how to string words together, doesn't he?
Yeah, so it's interesting, isn't it?
Well, maybe we should talk about his style because that's a good example.
I think we're going to be hearing a lot more examples, so maybe just a little bit.
It's very stream of consciousness and just things just kind of flow from one to the next.
He's quite quick to combine sort of questions about something like consciousness with actual...
Like politics and social organization, as well as a spiritual awakening and so on.
So it's very, you know, it's very broad.
It's very hand-wavy and very abstract and vague.
Those are my thoughts.
I noticed echoes as well of, you know, Rutger Bregman's views about being utopian is not a bad thing.
That you can combine that with cynicism and realism.
Although I'm really not sure that Russell Brandt manages that.
but the message that we can even hire and not just settle for the mundane, moderate policies of center left and center right.
And I don't think there's fundamentally any,
wrong with people holding that political sentiment you know no wanting a stronger left or or potentially stronger right although that gets me more worried style of politics but I I will say that a lot of
it reminded me of these things called Barnum statements this is this quite famous psychological
Psychological effect whereby you make a statement that says both things.
Like classic examples are, you know, you're somebody who sometimes enjoys being with people and being outgoing, but there are other times when you like to be by yourself and not be around other people.
And most people find these statements easy to endorse because everybody's a little bit extrovert and a little bit introvert.
And in this case, he's saying, you know, You can be utopian and you can be cynical and you can be reaching for transcendent politics and recognizing the limitations.
And I'm not sure that that's always true.
I think sometimes things are in conflict and it's definitely the case that things can be complex, but it feels that a lot of that is a rhetorical technique where...
He is advocating for this unrealistic, utopian, spiritual fantasy politics.
But he wants to avoid the criticism that it's not realistic or to just give a hand wave, basically to prevent the Jeremy Paxman-style questions from landing.
Yeah, I think, look, there's a super reasonable interpretation of this, which is that it is good to have to be a bit utopian.
It's good to think bigger and not just think about it in terms of, okay, are we balancing budgets and increasing spending slightly on this and decreasing on that?
Sometimes you can reach for something much larger and obviously...
The process of getting there might be a series of incremental changes.
But yeah, the way he says it, I think you're right.
It's just so vague.
And it's put in such a way that, well, of course, everyone would agree with all of that.
In a sense, but it's always going to be good to go for bigger and better things, but also to be pragmatic.
Yeah, it's just very vague.
I'm just not quite sure.
So what he doesn't talk about is how to do any of these things.
It's a little bit like some of these other gurus that we talk about, where they sort of reflect a lot on themselves about what they want to achieve and how they're going to have these conversations and open their minds up to discussing impossible ideas.
But they never really seem to get round to them in any substantial sense.
So I don't think with Russell Brand that he really spells out too many concrete ideas about how to get to that.
Yeah, and his speaking style actually reflects his appearance, which people can't see, right?
But I'm sure many people know he has this kind of bohemian...
Tramp chic kind of style.
He has crazy hair and big beard and dresses in bohemian kind of style.
So he's got a really distinctive appearance and quite a distinctive way of talking, which combines this flowery, pretentious overuse of academic-y or jargony words with a cockney twang,
which makes for a really...
Distinctive, even regardless of the content, just the pattern of speaking.
Yeah, and I don't think that's necessarily good or bad, just to know that it's definitely an engaging way of setting a brand, right?
His personal brand.
Brand's brand.
Yeah, I think we're going to hear a lot more examples of how we communicate.
Yeah, maybe I'll play one that you picked out, Matt.
This is you.
Yeah, I do work.
I make contributions to this podcast.
That's right.
Despite all the impressions that you give everybody.
Oh, here's Matt's clip, everyone.
My clip, everyone.
Russell Brown speaking style.
Chosen by me.
So we look at things from a very, very narrow perspective, even when we consider ourselves to be considering a broad gamut of political ideas.
It's a very, very narrow spectrum, in the same way I would argue that our sensory spectrum is narrow and limited.
But we're not going to start questioning whether or not there are different entities floating about or different vibrational frequencies and forces communicating with us continually.
We can't operate on that assumption.
We've got to get some dinner.
We've got to get to bed.
These are the things that seem of most importance.
Except it isn't working.
And it won't work for people to elect right-wing populist leaders.
C.S. Lewis brilliantly argues in his book Mere Christianity that the case for God is not made externally through theology, but is made in our own belly.
That we know when we've behaved badly.
We know when we're doing something wrong.
And he denies that these are acculturated ideas, that we've been taught, don't do that, do as you will be done by.
'Cause he says there is no culture in the world where, he goes, there's cultures where a man may take one wife and cultures where a man may take five wives, but there is no culture where a man is applauded for running away in battle.
But there is a sense of good
So, yeah, that's a good example of his stream of consciousness communication style, which is interesting because he's like a hip.
Jordan Peterson in the way that he sort of does it.
But, you know, if you actually, if you let it wash over you, like I found it quite difficult to select clips of this because I found myself becoming kind of mesmerized by his talk like that.
It's almost all like that where I'm not, I can't really follow what he's saying really and it just sort of washes over you a little bit like Jordan Peterson.
But just with that, I tried to stop and say, okay, so what exactly is he saying?
Well, he starts off talking about how it's bad to have very sort of narrow ideas and not sort of have that broader focus.
And he uses actual physical perception and psychophysics as an analogy to illustrate that and then says, but that's not working.
So I presume he's referring to a narrow sort of focus with ideas.
And then he says it's bad to elect right-wing populists.
And then he talks about...
The case for God is made by a kind of inner intuition coming from your belly, some sort of ineffable realisation.
And then he seems to be talking about how there's some sort of culturally invariant feelings or moral principles like being brave or whatever that are just felt by everyone.
I'm just going, well, what the hell?
What are you talking about?
We're just moving.
It's like a dream where you're just sort of shifting through these different ideas.
Do you know what he's talking about, Chris?
Because I don't.
Well, I mean, I think it all comes back to essentially arguing about the need for spirituality in all things, right?
And there are themes that recur, but I agree it's reminiscent of the alchemical lemon, which I took issue with Jordan Peterson.
There are connections that can be drawn between these subjects and topics, which makes sense.
But a lot of them are very tenuous.
And in many parts, it feels a bit like the references are there not necessarily to illustrate a point, but to bolster the profundity.
Of the guru, right?
That if they just state it in simple prose and make the point straightforward, it...
It sounds mundane or perhaps too wishy-washy.
Yeah, it comes across as very thin, yeah.
If they were to do that, which they don't, of course, you know.
So those analogies and metaphors, this flowery language, it takes on a life of its own and the metaphor kind of grows until it's a crystalline structure bursting out of the ground and then you're on to the next thing.
Screw you, Matt.
Screw you.
There was a section where actually it was very reminiscent of Jordan Peterson because he's Discussing an academic who's talking about Jungian archetypes.
But maybe it's worth having a listen just to hear the parallels.
Fairy stories, the female is an aspect of it.
As in dreams, as in folktales, the individual, the sovereign, the king, is the seat within the self.
So in this Tristan and Isolde, he breaks down this chivalric tradition where men or knights would fight for the honour of the princess or whatever, knowing that they would never be attained because they are some icon of the divine and the unattainable.
We somehow used that motif for the foundation of romantic love.
And if you look at romantic art, romantic poetry, romantic films, it's like, oh, this yearning, this terrible yearning that has no relationship to praxis.
It has no relationship.
How are we going to live this?
So I illustrate that not to take issue really with the analysis, but just to highlight the highly stylized An analytical approach, right?
A literature metaphor-heavy analysis of culture and society that this is based on.
My point isn't to say that's an invalid way of looking at things, but just that it's an inherently highly subjective interpretation.
It's almost interpreting dreams, right?
Yeah, yeah.
Like, yeah, as you say, I wouldn't take issue with the point that he's making there, which is, I think, a reasonably good one, that Western conceptions of romantic love and relationships and whatever is kind of a cultural artifact, right?
But yeah, the way it's done is very much in that rhetorical and poetic and elusive style, which, you know, like you say, is okay.
There's nothing wrong with poetry per se, but, you know, it's a very easy...
I mean, so maybe a part where he distinguishes himself from some of the other guru figures that we've looked at is that with J.P. Sears, we mentioned this approach of using comedy as a kind of shield that prevents criticism from landing because,
you know, if you're criticizing a comedian...
What are you doing, right?
Like they're just making jokes and don't you have a sense of humor?
And with J.P. Sears, it felt very, very much like the level of comedy is a thin veneer on the reactionary content.
But I will say that Russell is a better comedian than J.P. Sears.
And I also think he does have a kind of greater ability to laugh at himself.
So let me just play.
A clip where Ritual and him are talking about whether he's setting up a new religion.
With people that come in, you came in as an atheist and now you're this like, you know, you're ready to start your own religion, basically.
Working on that, yeah.
Where are we with that?
Starting the old cult.
The acolytes are, you know, everywhere at this point.
I don't know, I just need to get the right kind of blanket, work on that stare and long cuddle.
This is very good for your ego, I would imagine.
Oh, that's exactly what I go for.
The irony.
You keep pursuing these avenues that are just ripe for that.
I decided to tackle the- Yeah.
How about starting a religion or becoming this group?
I mean, there is, you know, of anything that you could enter into, like, this is feeding that monster.
So that caution, you know?
I will definitely tackle this tendency I've had towards egotism by setting myself up as a sort of online digital Jesus once and for all.
Let's nip it in the bud.
Exactly.
You should see the way I drift around after my live shows.
Yeah, that illustrates a couple of things, doesn't it?
First of all, yeah, he's pretty funny and he's definitely kind of knowing and self-aware in what he does, his shtick and everything.
But I think he recognises that he is really a performer, which is natural if your background is being a comedian.
He's a live wire.
You mentioned before about his style and his presentation.
He's an act, I think, first and foremost.
And again, there's nothing.
Super wrong with that.
And the other thing too is that a lot of the time in this interview is spent talking about sort of personal things.
So our focus is kind of more on arguments and what are they saying and so on.
And this is true of a lot of the other videos and stuff I looked at from Russell Brand.
A lot of it does have a...
A very personal slant about his issues with addiction.
And then a lot of the messages, the messages for people that people are going to derive some value from, a kind of coming out of his personal narrative, his personal story.
So, you know, he is pretty egoistic.
You know, he mostly talks about himself.
And yeah, that's just what it is.
Yeah, so there's, on the personal narrative and the role that they have in his guru
I think it's hard to overstate it because he had problems with addiction and the current program that he's promoting is one about applying the 12-step Alcoholics Anonymous program to basically your daily life in general and how that can be transformative.
But before we talk about that, I want to focus on the point that you made about his ability to weave personal narratives into his presentation.
And there's a point where Rich Roll, the interviewer, makes this explicit.
And I think he did a good job of describing how he uses personal narratives.
Yeah, well, it's the hero's journey.
And there's something about your innate humanity and your willingness to be vulnerable in the storytelling matched with this facility for language that you have that makes it very compelling.
And then you'll surprisingly kind of zing people every once in a while with...
You know, a paragraph about, like, here's how you can do this, too.
But it's done in such a way where you don't really feel like you're being preached to in any way because you're caught up in the storytelling itself and the humanity.
So he's presenting that in a kind of positive spin about the ability for personal narratives to hook into people and make...
Academic-y topics or whatever, more interesting or more abstract theories, more applicable.
But it could be framed as this is a very effective way to manipulate people emotionally, to engage with your content, that you're not just giving some theories and ideas,
but you're actually making them personally invested in your story.
Yeah, and in general, Rich Roll is spinning things in a positive light, but he does have these moments of insight where he kind of raises a possible...
critique or negative thing, but usually says, well, what about that?
And I thought it's noticeable when we are talking about the way that Eric Weinstein or others invite their audience in to be their friends and to come along with a journey.
Yeah, that's right.
It is very touchy-feely and kind of emotionally engaging like that.
And like a lot of these things, I said this before about the...
All of that poetic imagery.
It's just easily abused in that you can get people to go along with it without really processing.
What it is that you're saying, sort of taking it on faith and taking it on trust.
Yeah, it is like someone saying, you're really getting your emotional hooks into your audience and it's inspiring.
Yeah, and Rich Roll does, he recognises that a lot of it's got to do with his way of talking, which is really important.
His style is really important.
I mean, you hinted at this before.
When you take a lot of the flowery language and the evocative metaphors and you take that stuff out and you just figure out what they're saying in a very blunt, prosaic kind of way, then it's often not much.
Once you take off all those layers, there's not a great deal there.
So with Russell Brand, his style is so much of what he is.
I haven't read everything he's written.
I haven't read most of what he's written.
I haven't heard everything.
You're not a scholar of Russell Brown, Matt?
I'm not.
You're coming out of the closet?
No, but I've listened to a fair bit and I haven't heard him say very much apart from we should be more spiritual and have a spiritual revolution.
Well, isn't that enough?
Well, look, this...
Train of thought, evocative association technique that seems to pop up quite a lot.
There's a filmmaker called Adam Curtis, I think a British filmmaker, who makes these films.
He made one, The Century of Self, like a kind of critique of consumerism and modern capitalism, looking at the psychology behind it.
But he creates them by weaving together stock footage.
And interviews and little snippets and adding this voiceover to it to create the narrative.
And Russell Brand has this section where he talks about how Adam Curtis was commenting on Russell Brand's style and its narrative prose and how it reflects this postmodern or personal.
Narrative style that is popular now.
So let me just play him talking about that in case I do a bad job of summarising it.
He's brilliant, but very sort of pop in a way.
He takes on hard subjects, but he's very pop.
He said that we live in our heads.
He was kind enough to say that my writing style is beneficial.
Rather than relentlessly solipsistic, like we live now continually in the narrative of our mind, the sort of like the endlessly spiralling dialogue.
What now?
What do I do?
What happens now?
I'm going to get that.
So, I mean, the point there is, again, You know, saying positively that you're just kind of rambling on about your personal anecdotes is another way to put that.
Yeah, have you come across that kind of thing before, Matt?
Like those documentaries or movies linking together all these powerful images and concepts?
Oh, yeah.
Yeah, I have.
I think there was one called Baraka or...
What was that one called?
Sasquatchy or Parasquatchy?
We've been on this road before and we failed to identify the correct movie.
Yeah, I'm sure someone knows.
But anyway, they're nice documentaries.
There's often music going along and it's all about showing you...
Evocative imagery on a theme.
And there's usually a message.
The ones I've seen were similar to Russell Brands, really, about might be sort of an environmental theme and sort of mechanization of modern life and patterns and so on.
So it's not a logical argument that's being made.
There's an evocative, intuitive message that's getting transmitted.
So, yeah, so that's the positive spin of what Russell Brand does.
In fact, he described himself probably more accurately than we did, you know, in terms of that sort of solipsistic kind of delving into the mind.
Yeah, I don't think we're saying anything about him that he hasn't said about himself.
Yeah, and I mean, we played the clip of him addressing About his tendency towards egoism.
But in general, him and Rich Roll do have a self-awareness, like in a J.P. Searsian kind of way, about the communities that they're involved with, the spiritual, new-agey, or wellness communities, and how that they can be self-parodies of themselves.
So here's a clip of them talking about spiritual people who go a bit far.
Like because when you meet people, well, I have transcended.
Yeah.
Or the self-proclaimed enlightened person that just hugs you a little bit too long.
A bit too much staring and a bit too much hugging.
There's more to this than staring and hugging.
So, yeah, look, they're certainly aware of the sillier aspects.
And the kind of traps that people fall into in this sort of enlightened kind of game.
Yeah.
I think, you know, one of the things that we come across is that people often make these kind of points where they highlight that they're aware of what gurus do or whatever the field that they're involved in.
They're aware of the traps of them and they kind of poke fun at them.
The thing is that they don't always specify then afterwards how they're not guilty of doing that, right?
It's kind of like if you just invoke awareness of it, that's all.
You just need to show that you know there are people like that and then that means that you aren't that.
Are you saying, Chris, this is analogous to the person who says, now a lot of people will say this is a conspiracy theory, but...
It is that.
The case where we've had people talk about some conspiracy for a couple of hours and then at the end say, no, I don't know if that's true.
I don't want to advance that that's correct, but I'm just asking questions.
Yes, it's just a hypothesis we're investigating.
But I will say that there is a level of self-awareness in terms of where his specific niche is in amongst gurus, as he describes here.
The thing I think I can contribute is by Being sincere but funny by continuing to acknowledge this is ridiculous.
This is stupid.
This is happening in limitless space.
Don't take it too seriously.
That's the thing that I'm trying to stay focused on because in a world where we've got Eckhart Tolle, we've got Tony Robbins, we've got all these people that are sort of profound, powerful communicators that know how to do this stuff.
And I think, well, like any of us, I suppose, if we are authentic and true to ourselves, then it's going to get taken care of.
Yeah.
Yeah, I mean, so at times, you're right, he's quite, you know, self-aware, doesn't take himself too seriously.
He doesn't, in seriousness, describe himself as an enlightened guru or a digital Jesus.
But, you know, at other times, in going through those personal narratives, which, you know, he spends a lot of time...
Talking to Rich about his spiritual progress and how he's evolved as a human and so on.
And I've got to say, a lot of the time it does sound very pretentious and self-absorbed.
And he's not alone in that.
A lot of people do this.
He was describing this transition of how he stopped being extremely sexually promiscuous and eventually settled down and got married and had been married for a few years.
I mean, that's not hugely unusual, but just the way he framed that was as like it was stepping up to a higher spiritual plane or something.
I just found it extremely pretentious.
I mean, there is a lot of discovering that the world is not about pure hedonistic pleasure and theme.
And this being parceled as, you know, I mean...
My God, man, can you believe it?
Yeah, I can.
I can't believe it.
And I didn't need to spend 20 years as a celebrity themed for sex and drugs and rock and roll to realize that.
No, many people figure that out in their own way and don't make such a big deal about it.
So I guess what we can't say, being fair, is that his style, his presentation, His manner is a big part of who he is, and it's a big part of what he sells and what he has to offer.
And he kind of builds these spiritual narratives and weaves them around his life.
And I have seen other gurus do this a lot as well.
For instance, in Australia, there was a New Age health guru who was just cancelled just a couple of days ago.
Just cancelled.
That was a very 2020 comment.
Yeah, it was just cancelled, actually.
Oh, was it?
Yeah, just cancelled.
Oh, it's like getting a splinter or something.
Yeah, no, he was cancelled because he, look, after a long period of saying increasingly crazy stuff about, like, he was selling a $15,000 electronic cure for COVID.
Good, good, good stuff.
Yeah, like it wasn't good.
What else was he doing?
That's right.
This was after saying for a long time that COVID wasn't real and that he chose not to believe that we could be contagious.
That actually were just vehicles for a virus to transmit itself.
He said, you know, this very new agey way, I choose to think of myself as not that.
So that was, anyway, I could go on.
But long story short, when you hear this guy talking, by the way, he was cancelled, to finish the story, he was cancelled for, he eventually tweeted a neo-Nazi cartoon.
Don't they all, Matt?
Don't they all?
You know, who hasn't tweeted an accidental neo-Nazi cartoon?
In this 2020 era, it's just something you do.
Yeah, he said it was accidental.
And so he lost a lot of sponsorship deals and product placements and so on.
Maybe he gained some other interest in funds that he can monetize.
You never know.
Anyway, the point of this story is that if you hear this guy talk, it's the same kind of thing.
It's this amazingly self-absorbed talk about his journey and his learnings.
He's a celebrity chef, actually, and into the paleo diet and all that stuff.
So all the stuff that he's actually talking about, it's all woven in with his own personal transcendent journey, sitting sort of cross-legged on the couch and being
Yeah, well, at the minute, his kind of gig and why he's on Ritual's podcast, apart from just having a chat, is to promote his new book, which is focused on...
Applying the 12 steps as a more general tool of awakening rather than purely a system for overcoming addiction.
And here, he attempts to not invoke Alcoholics Anonymous, even though everybody associates a 12-step program with Alcoholics Anonymous.
And Rich Roll pulls him on this.
Yeah, how I've done it is I never say which fellowships, if any, I go to.
But it's almost like a technicality.
We're calling it the secret society.
We all know what we're talking about here.
I also like that.
Yeah, you don't need to say that.
I suppose I should just play this clip where he outlines his view about why 12-step programs are a broader philosophical system that's useful to people.
When I break down the 12 steps, it's essentially a tool for awakening, even in its own terms, having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps.
The way I've come to regard it is that substance misuse is a carapace, a holding pattern, even within the confine of the steps.
Right.
So that's just like the basic level and you can apply it much higher.
Now, I don't want to criticize Russell Brand or anyone really for advocating a program to help overcome addiction, especially one that's based on their personal experience, right?
Maybe lots of people have had help from 12-step programs and most people know there is a religious aspect to it with the higher power and whatnot.
But I will note that, you know, 12, Step programs and Alcoholics Anonymous, as far as I'm aware, they're freely available and they're systems with groups that you can join,
right?
And with literature that is freely accessible online.
So it does feel a little bit like this isn't just all about the good of humanity.
This is repackaging an existing addiction program and then selling it.
I'm not going to blame anyone for capitalizing on their insight and promoting it, but I think it's fair to say there is a motive here which is at least a little bit related to profiting.
Yeah, but that can't be right because he's in favor of a socialist revolution, so I'm sure he couldn't be thinking about that.
But the main thing I wanted to say is, are you saying that He is rebranding that AA content, Chris.
I mean, we've had me say that brand is building is brand, and now with the rebranding pun, I think we've reached peak punnage for this episode.
I think he's got competition as comedians.
Yeah, we're doing well.
We're doing well.
Yeah, so what he's been doing, I guess, is he's made that connection between this idea with Alcoholics Anonymous that you've got to find this higher power to transcend this focus on the addictive substance that is providing the focal point for life.
I think he's seen the connection there between the Eastern mystical ways of thinking, which is to see sort of all kinds of hedonic behavior as a kind of treadmill that you have to kind of liberate yourself from.
And he's, yeah, you know, he's rebranded it and given it his own style.
Well, so let's take a turn to a little bit more about his philosophical system or the insights he wants to impart.
A good clip to play for this is one where he's, you know, in previous weeks we've heard people discuss the limitations of materialism.
Jordan Peterson was big on that and so was J.P. Sears.
So here's Russell's take on that.
Yes, this seems correct to me.
And that rationalism is bloody good to understand engineering, good to understand material, good to understand science, to organize things.
But to allow it to become the preeminent philosophical perspective is dangerous because it excludes the unknowable.
And the unknowable is almost everything.
Yes.
So what he's doing is he's very charitably saying that materialistic knowledge is good, but...
The ineffable and the unknowable is almost everything.
So yeah, maybe not that important after all.
It's like that nice little disclaimer where you can say like, look, I'm not against rationalism.
I'm not against science.
These are important things.
The only thing they don't really address is everything.
That's everything that's important to life and meaning and the world.
But they can build bridges.
They can build bridges.
And bridges are good.
Bridges are good.
Yeah, so he does remind me a lot of JBP here, doesn't he?
Because he's, in the same way, Jordan Peterson is quite happy to talk about, you know, science-y things and acknowledges the material world, acknowledges it exists, but is very quick to say that that's just kind of the shadows on the cave and that underlying...
The material world is a deeper theological level of meaning, which actually drives everything.
And that's the real level that really matters.
And really, here we have Russell Brand saying almost exactly the same thing, just using slightly different language.
Yes, indeed.
Now, Matt, as we covered at the start, you are a Bregmanian in your intellectual outlook when you're not a gay space communist.
Yes.
So I want to see if you will endorse...
Russell Brandism as well and his dissatisfaction with the material consumerist world.
So let's play his musings on that and see if we can convert you.
Okay.
The material of this, he says, this is just crumbs.
Don't settle for crumbs.
I want to be at the banquet.
To recognise that anything that occurs within this limited bandwidth, whether it's sort of Lamborghinis or limitless orgies, it's nothing.
It's taking place on a pinhead, you know, but then we have access to some kaleidoscopic experience, but it does take discipline.
That's the one.
Selma?
Yeah, yeah.
Okay.
Okay, I have...
I have thoughts.
So, look, what's kind of annoying about that is that I think it's a real straw man to say that most people in modern society are concerned with orgies and Lamborghinis.
Maybe in the circle's brand moves, but I get that most of us are working to make money and pay mortgages and pay for school fees and so on.
And maybe people...
Do prioritize getting a luxury SUV a little bit too much.
But I think for the most part, people do care an awful lot about, you know, the other people in their lives and having some free time to have nice experiences and so on.
I don't think that how he's painting modern life these days is very fair.
You know, maybe it applies to people, superstars and Donald Trump and maybe Russell Brand before he found enlightenment.
I don't think most of us are in that position.
Well, what you described just sounds so alien to me, Matt.
My Lamborghini hedonist allergies are, you know, the reason I get up in the morning.
What you're describing, you know, having kids and colleagues or interest in having like some value systems and meaning in your life.
What is that?
That's an alien concept.
Can I come visit?
Because it's really boring, my life.
I've seen your pina colada pool party photos, so don't try and pull the rug over my eyes.
I know what you guys get up to in Australia.
It's true.
I've watched Neighbors.
We do.
We kick back occasionally.
So look, I don't mind people being utopian.
I like utopianism.
I like utopian sci-fi.
And I think it's actually pretty cool to use that as a bit of a guiding staff for thinking about more practical policies that might help us move things slightly more towards...
Luxury space communism.
But I don't like Russell Brand's utopianism because it is just so wishy-washy and vague to...
Especially...
It just doesn't sound very authentic coming from Russell Brand either.
Just saying, look, everyone, you're going to be more spiritual.
Everyone should just forget about...
Really what people are worried about is the practicalities in life, like having some kind of retirement, saving up for university things, or just being able to go on a bit of a holiday with the family.
I mean, the vast majority of people are in that situation.
Occasionally you might be able to go and have some pina coladas and some sexy times by the pool.
But that's okay.
You could do that too.
Well, Brad certainly had his fair share of that.
Why not me, Chris?
That's my question to you.
I got more insight into your pool party than I was.
Yeah, so there's this part in the conversation where to kind of link this spiritual talk to more earthly matters.
They do get round to politics towards the end of the podcast for the last 20 minutes or so.
And there's this section where Rich Roll is, you know, we've talked about people setting up binaries of good guys and bad guys in previous weeks and how this is useful for rallying people to your side.
And in a sort of self-aware way, Rich Roll invokes in the...
Context of Trump and the Democrats or left and right in America.
Some Star Wars imagery here.
Here we go.
It's like dark and light.
It is Joseph Campbell.
It's like Star Wars that's happening right now.
And it's a race to the finish with the ticking clock being like the environmental crisis that we're facing at the moment.
Now, the reason I wanted to play that, apart from just enjoying Star Wars references, is that Russell Brand's reaction to that, Highlights where he's slightly taking a different perspective, I think.
So let me just play that.
Yes, the fact that we are individuals is an attractive argument because we really do seem like we are individuals wrapped in bags of skin.
It's hard to imagine that it is perhaps more important and, inverted commas, more true that we are one, that the consciousness that you experience and the consciousness that I experience and the consciousness that all of us in this room are experiencing is the same phenomena merely disrupted by more superficial,
What do I want to say?
A peril.
That we're the same.
We are one.
So can you detect a slight difference there?
Yeah, I'm struggling to figure out what he's saying, though, about us.
Can you decode that for me, Chris?
Yeah, I think that's a kind of pan-psychism view about that there's a universal consciousness.
In the universe.
And it's kind of this view of we are the universe trying to understand itself.
So we are just embodiments of consciousness, temporary bags of flesh.
And that right wing or left wing, what does it matter?
We're all going to die and feed into dust.
So these petty differences that we have are just superficial dressing.
And he spells this out again in a part where he's discussing Obama and Trump and the forces that brought them into being, which maybe it will help you understand this beautiful philosophy better,
Matt, if I play that clip and then let's see how you're doing after this consciousness download for you.
Please do.
I would never belittle or dismiss people that have reverted to ethno-nationalistic.
And sort of patriotic and patriarchal, even if not explicitly so, ideologies.
Because what the...
I feel like it's naive even to look at how can you divorce Trump from Obama?
There was like one minute Obama was president, one minute later Trump was president.
So there's an obvious relationship and corollary.
And prior to that, these things are happening in relationship.
I feel this.
All things that happen on the material plane are a reflection of subtler energies that are taking place in the consciousness and being of individuals.
And these energies become systemized.
If enough people feel angry and antagonized, then they will respond to beacons or corroborate or attract that energy.
Yeah, I see it now.
Yeah, so in this kind of worldview, then things or people like Trump are manifestations of negative energy that are sort of swirling around.
He said he won't criticize ethno-nationalism.
Well, look, I may be a bit more charitable to what I think he's trying to say there, which is a little bit similar to what Sam Harris was actually saying in that talk, where, you know, sometimes people make bad decisions or what we think of bad decisions in voting for Republicans,
for instance, currently.
Yeah, so I guess you could see...
Where his spiritual kind of point of view is taken in, which is this 10,000-meter view up in the sky.
And from that kind of, you know, really elevated perspective where, as you said, we're all just spiritual beings momentarily instantiated in physical form and there's this, you know, tapping into metaconsciousness that pervades the universe, right?
When you look at things from that kind of level, then...
The idea is that all of this stuff that happens in the world of, I think they call it Maya, is that right?
Maya, that's the kind of Indian thing?
Yeah, Maya or Mara.
Anyway, samsara, right?
Kind of bad dissatisfaction, the material realm that is ultimately unsatisfying.
Yeah, exactly.
In the Western tradition, you have the eternal forms and the stuff that really matters.
Then you have the epiphenomenal nonsense that's happening each day.
It's all a big distraction from what's really important.
When you have that point of view, I get it, but it means you can't really say anything sensible about the mundane world anymore because it's all just completely...
Unimportant from that perspective.
So, unfortunately, what that can lead to is that very easy both-sides-arism, nothing matters, where Biden and Trump are just instantiations of different types of positive or negative energy.
And it just stops you from being able to have any kind of, I think, intelligent opinion about these mundane material matters.
What do you think?
Yeah, because, I mean, I think we've talked about before that you can always present these things in more defensible versions.
You can say, well, he's just pointing out that there was a reaction to Obama's presidency, which led to the rise of a figure like Trump and right-wing populism.
In that sense, there clearly was a reaction to Obama's presidency.
But I think that taking that thousand-mile view...
It kind of detaches you from the reality, which is like, what did that reaction manifest as?
And Trump was the leader of the Bertha movement, right?
Which said that Obama was not a US citizen and which many Republican people went along with.
And he's hardly changed his position on those kind of issues since he's been president.
So I'm not saying...
Therefore, anybody who voted for Trump was a racist or that kind of thing, but more that dealing with those grimy realities, the actual campaigns and talking points and policies and stuff, and the differences between political parties,
I'm not so sure that it's inconsequential for people or that it's more...
Important to view them as disembodied energies, manifestations, because there's always to be the great person of history or the product of the times, right?
Is Trump just a symptom or is he somebody that's driving society?
And you can take different perspectives on that.
But I do think that if you completely disregard individual personalities, you're missing quite a bit, right, to try and understand Trumpism.
Yeah, yeah.
And I guess, you know, on your point that there's always a reasonable interpretation, but then there's the interpretation that they're kind of hinting at and they're kind of emphasizing with the more flowery metaphors, and which is actually more in keeping with the general theme of what they generally like to talk about.
You know, this is true of the other gurus we've covered.
So there's this reasonable interpretation, and then there's the kind of interpretation that's kind of more interesting and more sexy and more mind-blowing.
What invariably seems to be the case is that the reasonable interpretation is always really trite and boring.
Like, it's true, but it's just unimportant.
So my reasonable interpretation of what he's saying is that, look, all of that political stuff, it's all a lot of fuss and nonsense.
Someone like me, I live in a small town in Australia, my everyday life, it actually doesn't affect my everyday life a great deal, whether Biden or Trump is in the White House, and I probably pay attention to Twitter and the news.
Too much, right?
Probably should pay attention to it.
So that's the reasonable one, but that's obvious, you know what I mean?
That's just not a very interesting take, but it gets spiced up.
And, you know, this is true of, I think, all of the other gurus we've looked at.
But then that sort of version, which is kind of a Martin Bailey thing, is spiced up by this, in Brand's case here, this, you know, ultra-spiritual interpretation, which is more interesting.
But it's silly.
It's not reasonable.
Yeah.
I mean, I basically agree with all that.
So I don't have anything to contradict.
But I do have a clip that risks flogging a dead horse.
That's what this podcast is all about.
That's our brand, Chris.
Our brand.
It is.
Flogging the girls dead.
Horse Corpses.
That was our title.
There's this part where he's talking about Native American activists and their view about the limitations of the Western political categories and how it relates to Brand's view.
So here we go.
This is him summarizing that.
Marxism and capitalism, these are different sides of the same coin.
Both assume that the land is something to be plundered.
Both assume an industrialized and post-industrial society.
Both of those systems are resource-based.
So we look at things from a very, very narrow perspective, even when we consider ourselves to be considering a broad gamut of political ideas.
It's a very, very narrow spectrum.
Yeah, so that's more of what we were just talking about in terms of all these things that you think are very important, that they're very big differences, are actually just different manifestations of the same thing and we need to have an entirely different perspective, a third way, a middle way that steps outside all of these.
Yeah, and I mean, I also think that it is fair to say in some ways that Marxism and capitalism are systems that are focused on the means of production or economic factors and that kind of analysis of society.
But it isn't fair to say that those are the only political parties and analysis available in a modern world, right?
There actually are.
Parties organised by religious groups and by environmental groups and libertarians.
God help us all.
Yeah, you're right.
I think it's a bit of a straw man to say that the current political landscape, especially these days, is just a simple dichotomy between socialist and capitalist free market.
And it's also a straw man to say that the political discussions are entirely focused on material strategies.
That's not my experience of tuning into the news.
It's this huge amount of debate about a whole range of things, as you said, including issues, especially in the United States.
Religion and morality and topics related to that.
Nothing to do with economics.
The environmental parties, the Green Party here in Australia that does reasonably well.
And these sort of populist nationalist parties that are all about maintaining this sort of traditional cultural values or homogeneity.
So, yeah, it's not a very accurate description.
But the other aspect of it that's a little bit annoying is that it reminds me of Eric Weinstein and people like that who dismiss the political dichotomy that exists at the moment and then positions themselves as above all of that and providing a mind-blowing new perspective that sheds all of those assumptions and tired old partisan arguments that are happening between these two sides.
But they're just very vague and insubstantial when it comes to, well, what exactly is your alternative third way?
That's the bit they never really seem to get to, apart from gesturing wildly, in Bran's case, about a spiritual reawakening.
And the other thing, the final thing that annoys me, the final thing on my rant, is that, yeah, you know, in its worst version, it's like the Wint tweet.
We talk about a lot where the wise man bowed his head solemnly and spoke, there's actually zero difference between good and bad things, you imbecile, you fucking moron.
Now, I think about that tweet a lot because a lot of these hot takes seem to fit that so well.
And in his case, he's saying there's zero difference between capitalism and communism.
And, yeah.
Yeah, you know, if I had to have one thing tattooed to my head, it might...
But to counter your claim, Matt, here is Russell outlining what his system will propose.
Okay, so maybe you're wrong.
Maybe he does have answers.
Look, I'm always open to being proven wrong.
But populism in itself, I don't think is a bad thing.
People becoming popularly interested in politics, people thinking, I can get involved in this.
People really...
The more people have direct control over the things that impact their lives, the better.
It's just a kind of anarchism.
Communities governed and controlled by the people that live within them.
Schools governed and controlled by the people that use them.
Hospitals governed and controlled.
Of course, I suppose there needs to be some kind of centrist systems.
People tell me armies, roads, police forces, etc.
But I feel that the principle should be minimized.
Decentralized, community-oriented, populist.
I think so.
Yeah.
Before I get your reaction to that, I just want to point out that I think Russell Brand does not know what populism is.
Because at the start of that, he seems to be like, you know, who could object to populism?
It just means that people are interested in something that's popular.
And I don't think that's what popularism exactly is in a political manifestation.
As far as I understand, it's...
Promoting that the elite or a specific group is responsible for the ills of society and that you speak for the people, not that elite, and that you will deliver people from this exploitative class.
I've got to say, I liked that little thing at the end with that sort of hesitant, at least I think so.
I found that endearing because, but okay, so look, in a sense that's good.
He's at least spelling something out that is different from...
It sounds like anarcho-libertarianism, no, right?
Or something like that.
Well, that's what I was going to...
Say, that was going to be my comment.
And I know that what we try not to do is get in there with our milquetoast centrist opinions about things.
But, I mean, you know, if you look at the thing that he's describing, which is this complete community autonomy, can be nice, yeah, can be good.
You know, you've got school boards and people participating in maybe electing their local sheriff or whatever, which I think they're doing.
A lot of places in the States.
But, you know, it can also go really bad, yeah?
Like, these closed autonomous communities can go very strange, can't they?
Like, they can end up with like a...
There's never been...
No, there's never been any case of that happening, Mark.
I'm not sure what you're even referencing.
No, I just...
Yeah, so this is the milquetoast centrist in me talking, but it just seems horribly naive to be talking about.
Anarcho-libertarianism with autonomous communities and so on.
Well, I did like the breath.
People tell me that we need a government and roads and police.
It's just like, well, I suppose so.
But yeah, look, you can have a revolutionary philosophy if you want, that many people do.
But I just don't get the impression that Russell Brand's version of this Is well mapped out beyond a dissatisfaction with the current system.
I think he's much more comfortable in saying what the system won't involve.
It won't involve exploitation.
It won't involve inequalities.
And what it will involve is all idealistic, fuzzy-duzzy, lovely stuff.
And not how it will deal with things like crime or exploitation or...
A minimum wage, for instance, workers' rights.
How do you fund universities?
Is there free education?
Just the list goes on.
Like you said, he's not comfortable talking about that stuff.
He does it occasionally, which is why we clipped it.
But as you say, he's much more comfortable talking about the problems with the current system and personal spiritual awakening.
That's his comfort zone, I think.
To kind of round things off, maybe we can turn and drag him down to the messy political realities of 2020 because they finish off the discussion with a rather contemporary topic regarding the platforming of people with extreme views or...
Or conspiracy theorists.
And whether that's a good thing or whether it's unfairly demonized or so on.
And I have a lot of views on this.
So maybe to start with, we can play his view of Alex Jones and his appearance on Rogan.
It's like, would you have Alex Jones on your podcast?
I sort of...
You would, right?
See, I probably wouldn't, but I understand.
Because sometimes I sort of adore something about Alex Jones.
Like, there's something about him, he's ebullient, he's kind of...
I kind of like it.
Like, you know, like that one, him on Rogue at that time.
I couldn't.
I got like a half an hour into it and I couldn't finish it because it was so bananas.
Yeah, because he's out there, isn't he?
And I've sympathized.
I've met Alex a couple of...
And I suppose I only part company when this is the thing I'm trying to do.
If you have a spiritual life, it is for you.
It's not something that you would inflict on other people.
Yeah, yeah.
I remember that statement.
So, first of all, I think anybody's saying, you know, the only place where I part with Alex Jones.
If you can say that, you've got problems.
Because there should be a whole host of areas where you...
Partways with Alex Jones.
And it's not just the conspiracy theorizing.
In some ways, that's his least objectionable part.
It's more that he's an extreme right-wing, xenophobic, racist guy.
That's like one of the main concerns.
And then also that, you know, the Sandy Hook stuff targeting the parents, that's more a symptom than the mean thing they attack Alex with.
It's the fact that he promotes conspiracies without any concern for their consequences, that he encourages his audience, some portion of which are unstable individuals, towards violence and towards harassing people.
And I feel like Joe Rogan and Russell Brand are both similar and they see him as like this funny character who, you know, just says wacky things and, oh, nobody takes him serious, except...
And he does make tons of money from his audience shilling them products, you know, supplements they don't need, which often involve demonizing things like vaccines or offering coronavirus miracle cures.
So he isn't this...
Jovial, funny figure.
If you listen to his content, it's pretty damn dark.
There's a lot of Holocaust deniers that appear on his podcast.
Yeah, yeah.
Well, you know what's going on, of course, Chris, which is that Russell Brand is a performer and he senses and respects that Alex Jones is a performer as well.
And so he likes the style from an aesthetic point of view.
And I guess the other thing that he's got in common with Joe Rogan is that he's not a very critical thinker.
You know, he likes wild and crazy ideas and to have his mind blown, and Alex Jones also provides that.
So I think you're right, and I think the issue is that it points to a very superficial understanding or evaluation of people and ideas.
Like Russell Brand's...
Is evaluating in that little segment.
And he talks about other characters too.
He talks about Candace Owens.
We'll get there.
We'll get to them, Matt.
Yeah.
At that really superficial level of, hey, I like their style and it was really entertaining and they blew my mind.
Okay.
Let me just interrupt you and play the clip so the listeners can hear his analysis of Candace Owens.
E.g.
I had Candace Owens on the podcast.
I found it to be absolutely adorable.
Yeah, so that's another good example.
And it's that, you know, you see that kind of similar theme with some figures in the actual dark web, which is more like, well, you know, never mind all that.
They raised some interesting ideas and it's really interesting to think about this.
Yeah, that can be just a really superficial cop-out.
Which just avoids any of the real problems with Alex Jones, which I thought you did a very good job of enumerating there.
You clearly have strong opinions about Alex Jones.
I have one or two.
And Candace Owens is in a similar sphere.
This focus on the interpersonal friendliness, right?
And that when you meet someone and they're not Darth Vader or they're not a snarling Nazi, this seems to be this prevalent take that people have this image that for somebody to be promoting harmful ideology or intolerant doctrine or to be racist,
that they have to be physically spitting.
At anybody who has a different skin colour.
It's this cartoon image where they expect the person to be horrific in person if they are promoting an intolerant ideology.
And that isn't true, right?
That's part of the point, is that people can be charismatic, can be interpersonally charming, can even package their ideas in such a way that they don't sound...
That objectionable.
But then when they have a specific audience or when you look into their ideas or the kind of groups that the followings that they're gathering, they're much darker than that.
And it isn't enlightened to ignore that in the favor of the interpersonal friendly interaction.
In fact, that's the shallow approach to looking at the individuals.
It's not really seeing them.
Yeah, it is shallow and superficial.
So I think it's an indication of someone who pays more attention to style over substance.
Yeah, and to his credit, Rich Roll does make this point.
This is him doing so.
But as a podcast host, that makes you rife for manipulation.
You know what I mean?
If you have a charismatic person sitting across from you who represents a point of view that is something you disagree with, it's very easy for me to become swayed by their personality.
I've heard other people say that.
And this innate character defect of wanting to feel connected to another human being.
I do want to feel connected to other human beings.
I do, I do.
Like, you just hear Russell Brando kind of reacting as if like, oh, that's an interesting idea.
Somebody could try to manipulate you, you know, by being nice.
It's like, have you not fought this through before?
You know, that's the objection, right?
I think he doesn't recognize it because he, I don't think he's manipulative per se, but I think he's a performer and I think he, interpersonally...
Very engaged and engaging.
So he does actually exist completely in that world of interpersonal engagement and impressions.
So I think it kind of blows his mind a little bit to think about, well, what else is there apart from that?
Yeah, that's a weird contradiction, right?
Because he's all about those deeper levels and spiritual realities and we shouldn't be focused on this superficial shell.
People and the substance and ideas, the point is, well, but look, they're friendly and kind, and, you know, we shouldn't judge people just by their ideologies, as if what really matters is if people shake your hand well and are polite, right?
Yeah.
Okay, so the last clip of this kind of thing is him describing Steve Bannon, and I think it encapsulates all the points that we've just made.
I keep talking about this, and I probably shouldn't.
I sort of watched Steve Bannon on the internet do an address of the Oxford Union, because I thought, right, this is that Steve Bannon that I've heard about how bad he is.
Let's watch him on the Oxford Union.
I mean, it's almost as a piece of theatre, you should watch it.
He arrives in a rain-spattered mack.
You can hear the protesters in Oxford, like, chanting, get him out of there, get him out of there.
He sort of comes in like sort of a gumshoe detective, and he just goes, and, like, for a band...
He doesn't say anything I disagree with.
He talks about the financial crash, the implications of it, the corruption, the relationships between the financial industry and Washington.
He doesn't at any point go, and that's why this group of people should be excluded, or these people should be excluded.
He doesn't talk about religions, or races, or gender, or sex, or economic classes.
All he talks about is elites.
And in it, he said one thing that I really agreed with.
Populism is the future.
All that's being decided is whether it's left-wing or right-wing populism.
That's the only thing that we're debating right now.
Yeah, it's interesting that, isn't it?
So I guess the first thing that's interesting is how the first thing he talks about is Bannon's presentation, yeah?
His style, which, as we talked about...
Brian splattered Mark.
Yeah, that's right.
So just as a performer, he appreciates that.
That's the thing that matters.
I guess Steve Bannon's ideas do intersect with Russell Brands a little bit in terms of being very much about populism, even though we're not quite sure if Russell Brand understands what populism is.
It's just popular.
And the anti-elitism point, I actually thought that was perceptive, although maybe not intentionally stated by him, but that's a lot of what connects all these people that we...
Different people that we are looking at is whether or not they're members of the elite, right?
Like we're talking here about a millionaire actor married at one point to Katy Perry, but yet he's able to be anti-elitist in the same way Trump was, in the same way Eric Weinstein, managing director of an investment firm,
is able to kind of promote themselves as anti-elitist.
Yeah, it's kind of impressive how much work that does in 2020 for setting yourself up as somebody to be heated, right?
If you can just criticize things and point out that elites are not to be trusted, then you kind of get this sheen on yourself that you are therefore not of that class.
Yeah.
And I'm not...
And I agree totally with the whole thing about basically viewing Steve Bannon as a Columbo-esque feature.
I don't think that's the point.
And I'm repeating myself, but just his inability to consider that the ideas are being packaged for a given audience.
It blows my mind.
Yeah, look, I think a lot of people are drawing from that well.
And the well is that anti-elite kind of feeling.
And the elites are this vague, shadowy cabal.
Right?
Just a slightly different definition of who counts as elite depending on who's the one making the claim.
But everyone from Trump to Russell Brand to the other gurus to whoever are all anti-elite and are all positioning themselves as a source of truth and knowledge outside of these orthodox sources,
whether it's academia or the mainstream media or whatever.
So, yeah, that's the really interesting dynamic that I see here.
And it doesn't seem to matter.
I mean, and Russell Brandt is kind of on point a little bit to say that, yeah, it's all about populism and left and right doesn't matter anymore because, in a sense, that's kind of true, you know?
It is true.
I wish it wasn't.
But I don't think that's, he seems to be viewing that as well.
Isn't that a great development?
I'm like, no, that's horrifying.
It is horrifying.
It's not good.
But yeah, I think the people who relish it are the people who are looking to cash in on that, you know, to become that source of, that trusted source of expertise.
Wisdom or spiritual guidance or whatever.
They're the ones that are definitely pushing this bandwagon of you can't trust experts, you can't trust elites, you can't trust orthodox institutions and so on.
Yeah, so they're playing a dangerous game.
I think most of them are just grifters.
Trump is obviously...
An elite, right?
He doesn't want to actually have a socialist revolution.
Russell Brand might, but I don't know.
I suspect he's pretty comfortable and would prefer to stay that way.
I think what they really want to do is cash in and build up that groundswell of anti-institutional, anti-elite, whatever the hell elite means, sentiment.
Look, I just want a flag here, Matt.
I'm supposed to be the cynical one, and that's you saying that they don't believe anything they're saying.
They just want to cash in.
So just placing a flag there for the investors to pay attention to.
So I think we've probably mined the depths of Russell Barnes' deep...
Philosophical systems for all they're worth.
But we actually usually do have a segment before we finish earlier than this where we say some nice things about the people.
And maybe we did say they're funny and particularly Russell Brand is funny.
But I do have one nice thing I can end with before we get to the summaries.
Maybe you can think of something.
There's this segment talking about conspiracies.
And I was kind of heartened to hear this.
And I don't believe in conspiracy in the sense of malevolent cabals, but I just feel that there are sort of sustaining systems and interests that won't be broken unless there is reasonable opposition, and that reasonable opposition can only come from,
I suppose, organisation, rejection, rebellion.
That's nice.
Yeah, that's good.
It's always good to be not positive and shadowy cabals.
And the message that, you know, there are systemic biases or there are structures in place that make political change difficult and we should be aware of them and not give up.
I kind of agree with that.
So that's nice.
And if I just ignore all the rest of the stuff around that, then fair enough.
Also, he's doing an MA he mentions at SOAS, which he also describes as progressive and incredibly forward-thinking and enlightened.
And just to note that I have a master's from SOAS as well.
So there we go.
There's another connection.
What is SOAS?
Tell us.
We don't know.
Yes, you're not privy to all my internal thoughts.
I'm sorry, Matt.
SOAS is the School of Oriental and African Studies, which is the most left-wing university in the UK, which I, as a die-hard far-left radical, of course went to for my undergraduate and one of the masters.
So there we go.
Cool.
Okay.
Well, nice things to say.
Nice things.
Yeah, so look, well, he's quite handsome and he's in good shape.
That's true.
Is that true?
I'm a boy.
That's true.
Yep, yep, yep.
Look, probably the best thing I can do is to qualify some of my criticism, which is that I had a couple of rants there and I don't mean to say that they're all exactly the same, that Russell Brand is exactly the same as...
I think there's a wide range of people doing it.
There is this one particular aspect which I've emphasized that I think they all have in common, and that's not good.
But I don't think Russell Brand is doing it in a highly political or malevolent way.
He's doing his job in a way, his self-defined job as an artist, as a performer, as an entertainer, as a writer of autobiographical self-help books, and as a personality, an internet or media personality.
He's doing his thing and that's how he's making his contribution, by giving his best shot at providing this novel insights.
So, you know, the problem is I just don't think there's much to his insight.
It's this spiritual, very vague, broad, spiritual awakening stuff, mystical stuff that's kind of cribbed from Alcoholics Anonymous or various Eastern religions.
So it's hard for me to pull out valuable ideas that he's putting forward.
But, you know, he seems like a reasonably nice guy.
Like, yeah, sometimes he reminds me of myself and my friends in some ways.
We're 19 years old at university, smoking pot and talking about the system, man, and higher consciousness or whatever.
But he's also like someone who's on methamphetamine at the same time.
So he's like just wild and...
Talking at a thousand miles an hour with this intensity that's a bit exhausting, but also mesmerizing.
We've got more insight into your drug usage and teenage pool party history now.
I didn't inhale, Chris.
I didn't inhale.
But I did talk shite when I was 19, I admit it.
I'm talking shite now.
Slightly less.
A different brand.
A different brand of shite.
And I don't mean that as a pun.
That's not a pun.
It's hard not to say brand, isn't it?
It's getting harder.
It's getting harder.
Yeah.
So look, that's me.
I think my nice things kind of turned into my summary there a little bit.
So we might move on to that, eh?
Yeah.
Well, I don't really have much.
I think I've ranted and reaved at various other parts.
I think I would just say in closing that I think he has a level of self-awareness and humor which can be a good thing and which is more than we've seen with the other guru figures that we've looked at.
And yes, it is used as a deflection at times and a way to kind of step back from making some quite extreme points or whatever.
But on the other hand...
Just being able to laugh at yourself is notable.
That counts for an awful lot, doesn't it?
I mean, it goes a long way to redeeming him in my eyes.
Yeah, definitely.
It makes him, you know, more likable, definitely.
And the other thing is that I think that neither of us are arguing that in the modern era or even, you know, past eras, that people seeking out meaning.
In their lives, in whatever form that takes through spirituality or political movements or, you know, by following the teachings of Jordan Peterson, whatever they may be.
I want to say that I'm not dismissing that as a motivation or as a thing that is necessarily bad for people to want, right?
They shouldn't think about grander things or bigger topics or they shouldn't be dissatisfied with the daily grind.
There isn't anything wrong with that, just like there's nothing wrong with believing in revolutionary political politics as long as it doesn't involve killing people and that kind of thing.
But the issues that I take are more with the rhetorical tools that people slip into and the way that other forms or other positions Are demonized or presented as super shallow.
And, you know, that the majority of the world, what it's engaged with is meaningless.
And the things that interest Russell Brand are the things that the majority of the world would benefit from being interested in.
I'm not sure that holds for tons of reasons.
But yeah.
He is what he is.
I don't hate him as much as the first time I've seen him on Big Brother's Little Brother.
I think he's got better from when he was encouraging everyone not to vote.
So there's some progress, you know, spiritual progress in the world.
Yeah, that's a good summary.
To summarize my main problem with him, it's a bit of a fancy term to use, but...
There's this term called ontological confusions, which is to apply a kind of reasoning that's suitable in one frame of reference or realm of things to another one.
So a classic case is applying the properties of people or living beings to material objects, right?
So that's a particular kind of delusion.
Kind of what Russell Brandt does is in doing these sorts of things where you take this spiritual thinking, And then you apply it to something like politics.
What you end up with is some just half-assed anarcho-syndicalist commune thing, which isn't really thought through.
And it's just because it's a bad application.
So, you know, lots of people are religious.
Lots of people are into doing meditation and some kind of spirituality or whatever.
That's not my bag.
I prefer, as you know, I prefer the cocktails by the pool myself, but hey, each to their own.
I guess my main issue with someone like Russell Brand is when they apply that stuff to everything and making it this all-encompassing philosophy that doesn't really help when you're trying to answer questions about society or politics or whatever.
Well, there you go.
Is Russell Brand decoded in all his many aspects and loquacious mannerisms?
So with him done and out of the way, and not a short episode, I would mention, but who have we got next, Matt?
Who have we teased earlier that we're going to address?
I have completely forgotten, Chris.
That's right, Matt.
This is just me setting up for myself.
Indeed, Matt, we are going to deal with Scott Adams, the famed cartoonist of Dilbert fame, who is apparently excelling himself in the post-election environment and became a kind of guru Trump whisperer,
decoding how his Tweets and statements were actually profound 20-dimensional chess strategy.
So we're going to have a look at him next.
And yeah, I'm sure that will be incredibly enjoyable.
Yeah, incredibly enjoyable.
Yeah, okay, that sounds good.
I can't wait.
I can't wait to listen to all his opinions about conspiracies.
Donald Trump and Democrats and race, I think.
He's got opinions about too.
He knows.
Well, yeah.
So you know what time it is, Matt.
It's the end of the podcast.
It's time to say goodbye, Chris.
And everyone's waiting for you to say it.
Well, look, I'm going to disappoint because just to fit the theme, I'll say namaste.
