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June 17, 2018 - Real Coffe - Scott Adams
19:10
Episode 49 - The Worst Advice Ever Given
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Yes, I'm a little bit later than normal.
Every now and then I have to do this work-related thing.
It gets the better of me.
So, we're going to have a little bit of a whiteboard talk this morning.
I can't predict how this will go because I'm kind of angry.
And if you've seen me periscope when I'm angry, it doesn't always go the way I'm imagining it will go before I start.
So, let's start with some background.
Sometimes people incorrectly think that rights, you know, a human right, is something that the government gives to you.
But in fact, that's backwards.
People who have spent a little more time paying attention know that the government is in the job of restricting rights.
So, for example, if the government did exist, we could all speed as fast as we wanted.
You could drive your car at 100 miles an hour anytime you felt like it.
But the government exists to take that right away from you, essentially, by making the laws punitive.
But rarely do you see a situation, and maybe I just have to think about it more, and I just haven't thought of any examples, but rarely do you have a situation where citizens will take away their own rights.
And maybe you can help me if there's somebody who's got a better sense of history.
Are there other situations where not the government, but just other citizens, conspire to take away someone's right?
Maybe some companies have done that to make profits.
Somebody said privacy.
Maybe some companies have done things that would erode your privacy.
And that feels like somebody's taking away your right.
But usually those are special cases.
They're just trying to make profits.
But with this recent Kanye West pushback, meaning mostly from the black community and a lot of liberals who were very concerned, That Kanye was willing to just have a conversation with people who disagreed with him.
I just saw a story in Vice.
If you haven't heard of Vice, it's sort of a disgraced online publication.
I don't know if they're solvent or not, but they're a highly disregarded publication called Vice.
They wrote a lengthy article describing the backgrounds of the various people that they call far-right, who were very open to Kanye's message about thinking freely and having free association.
And so I, of course, was dragged into that as one of the people that they had to say bad things about me that had nothing to do with, you know, Kanye or this conversation.
Just, oh, he's a bad person.
They tried to describe me as a guy...
Here was their description of me.
A guy who started a comic in 1989.
Well, that's technically true.
But does that feel like a...
Like an unbiased way to describe me?
A guy who started a comic in 1989?
Feels like there was an attitude there.
Anyway, the point of the article was that Kanye and anybody who is, you know, correct thinking in their views should not associate with anybody on their list of terribles.
So I was on the list of terribles along with Mike Cernovich, I think Jack, I can never pronounce Jack's last name, Prosabiak, and Alex Jones, a bunch of others.
And I thought to myself, this is really the first time I can think of where citizens are trying to restrict the rights of other citizens.
And Here's what I'm talking about.
Because the government does not restrict by law or by the Constitution who I can talk to, who I can be friends with, who I can associate with.
So the government of the United States in this story is the good guy.
I know that rarely happens, right?
Where the government is the good guy.
So the government in this story did everything right.
All the laws are just the way you'd want them.
Everybody can talk to everybody.
We got freedom of speech according to the law.
But we don't really have that according to our fellow citizens.
So there's a real serious push to restrict the right of free association.
Now, in the old days, prior to social media, society didn't have the power.
So even if somebody in society said, oh, I don't like it if that person is having a conversation with this person, I don't like that.
There was nothing they could do about it.
Maybe a newspaper could write about it back in the old days.
But for the most part, the voice of the people, the mob, if you will, wasn't that powerful.
So the pure influence of, ah, I don't like it that you're talking to that person, probably wouldn't have stopped Kanye from talking to anybody else in, let's say, you know, 19-whatever before the Internet.
But now that you've got the Internet, and now the Internet can, you know, It can shame and humiliate.
It can boycott. It can ruin reputations.
It can slander.
It can libel. It can do all those things.
So it's this big, powerful influence.
And while the government is leaving us alone, our right of free association is actually being removed.
So just consider this.
Imagine you're me.
And you look at an article online and you're lumped with a bunch of terribles.
You're described as being a terrible person or irrelevant or whatever.
And you get that for amplifying a message of love.
Right? I don't think I'm mischaracterizing the situation.
I helped amplify Kanye's message about love.
That's it. That was my crime.
And for the crime of simply associating with Kanye, the world says, I can't do that.
And now they're coming after me and coming after everybody else.
But here's why this is so dumb and destructive.
Let me give you a thought experiment.
Let's say you're an African-American male and you have two choices.
So it's just a mental thought experiment.
One choice is that you associate with other African-American men and women and you stay away from people like me.
Stay away from all contact with people in my channel, if you will.
People who, for whatever reason, have been defined as the people you can't talk to.
It doesn't matter if it's real or imagined.
They're just defined that way.
Alright, so that's one situation.
You're an adult black male and you stay in your lane.
You're just talking to other black males.
Now compare that as a life strategy with being friends with, I'm just going to use a real person here, with being friends with while disagreeing with, this is very important, while disagreeing with the opinions of Mike Cernovich.
Just pick one name off the list of terribles.
Are you better off, if you're an adult black man, if you can call Mike Cernovich and ask him for a favor, or if he can't?
Which of those two life strategies gives you a leg up?
Which one connects you to a world of people who could help you?
Do you know who can help the people who don't have power?
Well, in many cases, it's people who, you know, themselves, they'll do what they can, and other people who don't have power, and they can help lift each other up, right?
But do you know who can really, really help people who don't have power?
People who have power. And if you can't get to the people who have power, you can at least get to the people who know them.
Alright? So I'll use Mike Cernovich again as my example.
If you're an adult black male and you have his cell phone number or you could contact him and you could say, hey, it's me, whatever.
I would like to see if I can connect with somebody who knows X or is hiring this group or could tell me how to do this.
Which of those two situations gets you where you want to go?
So vice...
Man, I'm trying to control my anger because I'm right on the edge.
I'm just right on the edge.
I'm just blowing up. But I'm not going to.
I'm gonna pull it back.
Vice, I'm talking to you.
What you're doing with an article like that, in which you're explicitly saying you can't talk to these people who have committed no crimes, they just have maybe some views you didn't like, they've done some things you didn't like, etc.
You are doing a terrible, terrible human disservice.
You're taking people who could find ways to use the positive stuff and build from there.
And you're removing the greatest asset.
Well, I'm going to say it as directly as I can.
There's something that I've wanted to say that I haven't ever said.
Because I was afraid it would be misinterpreted.
And I've suddenly lost my fear of that.
And here it is.
The greatest untapped resource that black people have is that white people like to help.
Now I know this is going to be taken out of context and somehow it will turn into this big racist thing.
Some of you saw the viral video that went around of a 17-year-old African-American girl and her father had a tire blowout.
And she took some pictures of the fellow who stopped to help them change their tire.
Turned out to be a guy who was wearing a Confederate shirt, had a Confederate tattoo, and a Confederate, I think, bumper sticker on his truck.
And when she was taking the pictures, she was saying, my God, my God, you know, maybe I shouldn't have judged a book by its color, by its color.
I shouldn't have judged a book by its cover.
And, you know, we really appreciated this guy who we think should have been our big enemy because he came to help us.
You know, he stopped, he volunteered, he helped change our tire, got all dirty, got nothing for it, went on his way.
And she was surprised.
So the tenor of her tweets, in which there were several, were, first of all, amazing.
You can find them in my tweet list, but you have to see them.
Because she had such a mature and fairly sudden Change in just understanding of how the world works.
And she described it really well.
And she said, you know, this guy, the guy who helped, is great and we really appreciate him.
But he doesn't understand how much that symbolism affects us.
The context was she couldn't believe that the guy this nice would do something that would hurt her so much by wearing these offensive symbols.
So she assumed, and I think she's right, that he simply sees the symbols as something else.
He just doesn't see them or feel them the way she does, so he's a bit oblivious to her pain because a guy this nice certainly would not be hurting strangers if he understood he was doing it.
Which was insanely mature for a 17-year-old, which is partly why it's viral.
Now, when I saw the story of the guy who had a Confederate shirt on, who had stopped to help two African-American citizens who were in trouble, was I surprised?
No. Because one of the things that you get as sort of the natural advantage of being a generic white guy is that you've met a lot of generic white guys.
Generic white guys we hang around.
I know so many generic white guys.
That I feel like, you know, I have a little sense of how generic white guys think.
And like I said before, the biggest untapped resource for black people that is invisible to them.
I'm convinced they can't see it.
It's just invisible.
Is that white people like to help.
It's almost like a brand.
Not every white person.
The KKK doesn't want to help.
Or maybe they would.
They might even do.
But it's sort of baked into this white guy stuff.
Because we like to help.
And to the point where it's actually a stereotype.
You know, if your computer's broken and some white guy's walking by, hey, can I help?
No, I got this.
No, can I help? I really don't need any help.
I can help you. Maybe if you just reboot it, I got this.
I really don't need any help.
You know, white people are so, like, helpful that we're annoying.
And it's just an immense resource.
So if somebody is trying to Eliminate our right of free association.
Do you know who that hurts?
Not white people.
Today, I could call up, I could probably get on the phone within an hour, probably five different billionaires.
Now, I'm in an unusual situation, but my point is, any of the people on the list of vices, terribles, the people that should be mocked and scorned and should never be allowed to say that Kanye West's message of love is a good one, those people are really well-connected.
These are some seriously well-connected people.
So if there was something you wanted, where are you going to go?
How about the people who want to help and have the resources?
And they're connected, or they have money, they can invest, they have advice, they have stuff!
So, vice...
What you do with an article like that, where you're ignoring the message entirely, an entire article which was nothing except, these people shouldn't talk to these people because the world will explode, they're so horrible, and these people are so good,
or whatever. But you take away our right of free association with your bullshit articles trying to shame us, trying to cow us, trying to make us back up from our right of free association.
Fuck you. Fuck you, vice.
And everybody who tells me I can't talk to whoever the fuck I want to.
Because I like to be helpful.
And I'm going to talk to anybody I want to.
And if somebody needs my help, and I can do it, and it's a reasonable request, I'm going to be helpful.
Right? So fuck you, Vice, for making the world a worse place.
Fuck you for...
I told you I was going to control my temper, but it didn't work out for me.
Fuck every person who tells me who I can't talk to.
Fuck anybody who tells somebody else they shouldn't talk to somebody who can help them, who is willing to help them, has the resources to help them, and wants to make the world a better place.
Fuck every one of you.
All right?
So.
That was me controlling my anger.
Ha ha ha.
So, to complete my picture, you see over here the Kanye missile, which is taking a direct hit on this old way of thinking.
The old way of thinking is, oh, you can't talk to the people who might help you.
Don't talk to people who can make your life better.
And he's blowing the shit out of this.
All I'm doing is reporting.
I'm not the missile.
I'm not the missile.
I'm just talking about the missile.
And if talking about the missile is enough to earn national condemnation, well, fuck you and everybody who says I can't talk about or to anybody I want.
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