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March 2, 2010 - Freedomain Radio - Stefan Molyneux
19:29
1601 Statism and Blame - What Is Coming
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Hey everybody, it's Def.
Hope you're doing well. It is the 25th of February 2005, just on my way to the gym.
Won't do a gym cast, though. It's too crowded there in the evenings, because it's fairly early in the new year, so people are still crowding the gym before losing their resolutions.
But I wanted to talk about What is coming up next, not for us, but for society as a whole.
Because you see, of course, what's happening now is the whole system is beginning to fall apart, as we can see.
And neatly predicted, I might say with a tiny pat on my back, by this here show, not four years ago, where I said five to ten years.
Ah! How chillingly accurate.
Anyway, and you can see the bad family script is running its way through the body politic, right?
Bad family script. So the parents really screw up, run heavily into debt or become addicted to something or, you know, whatever.
There's something that the parents do that really, really messes things up.
And the first, there's a two-phase, I guess a three-phase system that goes into place.
The first is to blame the kids, right?
And you can see this happening politically, right?
Where, oh, you see, well, people didn't want to pay more taxes, yet they always wanted government services.
And you see, people are greedy, they're irrational, they're bad, and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
And therefore, people voted in people who made them promises, and they were greedy, and they didn't want the balanced budget because that would have meant not getting as much or whatever, whatever, right?
And that, I mean, that's just so transparently ridiculous that, I mean, do we even really need to talk about it?
Probably not. Well, maybe a minute or two.
So that's the first thing that happens, right?
Which is they will attempt to blame...
To blame the taxpayers.
And that will work on some people, but really not on very many, because it's very hard for the government to take the moral high road these days.
There's just too much information out about the government.
You can see this. The Greek government is already doing this when it comes to what's gone wrong in the Greek economy.
Well, you see, the taxpayers, they wanted more and more services, but they didn't want to pay more taxes and so on, right?
And so you see, it's the fault of the taxpayers for being so irrational and blah, blah, blah.
That's the first thing that happens.
Now, what happens next Is the endless cry for collectivism.
And what that means is, first of all, the politicians will try to blame the taxpayers.
And when that doesn't work, and I don't think it will work very well.
I don't think it will work very well.
When that doesn't work, and again, this is just following bad family script, right?
Bad parent script. When that doesn't work, what will happen is, let's not play the blame game because we all need to pull together.
I mean, we could stand here arguing for days about who is ultimately at fault, but the important thing is that we're in a crisis now and we all need to pull together.
And again, this script comes right out of the family when you have bad families and you have an adult child who's willing to Talk about the real issues, and that's one reason why it's important.
Once you've dealt with a bad family in one way or another, it's really hard to fall for government propaganda.
It's one of the reasons why I think it's important to clean up your personal relationships so that you are less susceptible to the manipulations of those in power.
Well, those others in power.
And that is going to be the next monstrous rallying cry of the political leech bastard class, which is, well, who knows who's to blame?
We could play the blame game, we could point fingers all day and all night, but that's not going to change the reality, the facts of the situation, which is that we are in a crisis and we are going to need to pull together.
Now, why is it such nonsense to blame the taxpayers?
Well, first of all, I mean, the government trains the goddamn taxpayers.
Government is responsible for the education of the taxpayers and has been for a huge number of generations right now.
So if the taxpayers want something for nothing, if the taxpayers have no understanding of economics or fiscal limitations or the cause and effect of government spending versus debt versus deficits, then the government is entirely to blame.
It's... It's so ridiculous for the government to blame the greed and unintelligence of taxpayers when the government is entirely responsible for educating and training those taxpayers.
I mean, it's just mad.
Oh, it's like getting a pamphlet from some private school.
They're bragging that their graduates are complete daltish morons, and that's why you should send your kids there.
Pay us more, because we graduate complete ass clowns who are utterly retarded.
So that's sort of one reason why it's ridiculous to blame the taxpayers as being greedy and short-sighted and stupid, because the government is entirely responsible for training them.
It's like a medical school castigating the doctors that it produces as being idiots and unskilled and brutish.
It's like you do realize that you're just insulting yourself, right?
I mean, all you're doing is saying you should be closed down if the graduates of your school of moral, intellectual, economic, and citizenry education turn out to be greedy, short-sighted fools.
All you're saying is that government education should be shut down because it's completely ridiculous, which, of course, if it weren't so destructive, it would be completely ridiculous.
So that's one thing.
The other thing is that it's hilarious for governments to blame citizens when the governments have bribed the citizens with the money of future generations and the bill is now coming due.
I mean, for over a hundred years in the West, certainly in North America, for over a hundred years, Since the creation of permanent deficits and debts, for over a hundred years, the government has negatively and openly bribed the citizens with other people's money.
And then it says, you know, I mean, the citizens are really greedy.
It's a mystery as to how they got that way, but we have to work as the government, as the helpless swains to this incomprehensible, bizarre, and who knows where it came from, greed.
Which... It's quite mad.
It's like you kidnap someone, you jam cocaine up their ass, and then you say, well, they have this mysterious addiction, and I don't really know where it came from.
Well, but it's hard to take any of this seriously, and I think that people are educated and sophisticated enough now that It really is going to be hard to take this stuff seriously.
I swear to God, I was just thinking about this the other day.
When I was 14 years old, I distinctly remember having a conversation with other 14-year-old kids in my class.
It was in a history class.
We were just actually standing outside, and we were all talking about the old age pensions.
And every single one of the kids says, oh yeah, right, like that money's going to be there when we retire.
No way in hell. I mean, Everybody, 14-year-old kids knew, clear as sunshine on a naked eye, what the future was going to hold.
And this was, I guess, coming on for 30 years ago.
It was completely clear to every 14-year-old untutored kid.
No knowledge of economics or social policy or any of these sorts of things, really, not much.
But it was all perfectly clear that that money was going to be hoovered up and there was not going to be a single penny available for us when we retired.
Everybody knew this decades and decades and decades ago.
And, of course, no one did a damn thing to avert or change it.
Oh, that is so typical of a hierarchical, violent organization.
See, statism relies on blame.
If there's no blame, there's no such thing as statism.
If there's no blame and there's no attack, there's no such thing as statism, which is why it relies on the psychological phenomenon of self-attack.
So, for instance, imagine trying to have a tax code without blame.
Imagine trying to have tax laws without such a thing as blame.
Wouldn't that be insane? So you wouldn't pay your taxes, and the government would hold you up in front of court, and you'd say, well, who's to say who's at fault?
Let's just all work together to try and sort this out, and let's not apportion blame to anyone.
Well, if blame can't be apportioned to anyone, or if blame is sort of equally spread between the tax collector and the tax victim, the prey, then there's no such thing as taxes.
Right? Because nobody would become a tax collector if you had to share your tax burden with whoever you arrested.
Or share the tax burden of, you know, you arrest a guy for an up payment of $10,000 in tax and you split it with the tax collector so you each owe $5,000.
There'd be no such thing as a tax collector.
I mean, statism relies on 100% blame of citizens for noncompliance of laws.
100%. There's no shared blame.
There's no shared blame.
If you stab a guy and the cop arrests you, you don't get to say, well, the cop and I, we should really share prison sentences, because, you know, who's to say, you know, we could sit here pointing daggers, I mean, fingers all day, and, you know, that's not going to get us anywhere. The reality is that we need to pay restitution, so let's all chip in.
I mean, you couldn't have a state unless there was 100% abortion of moral and legal blame to the victim.
100%. There's no other way that statism can exist.
But then when the state does something platonically arseholic, and the state starts to look like it's to blame, 100%, then the state suddenly pulls out the relativism.
Oh, it's blame and who knows, but we've all got to work together...
I mean, that never happens when you're on the receiving end of the state's guns.
But the moment that moral criticism falls squarely on the state, it starts squirming into this gooey, lost-island fog of relativism, and who knows who's to blame?
Well, the state knows who's to blame whenever it has the guns.
You and me, my friends, we are to blame, and we must pay, pay, pay, or go to jail.
Madness. Madness.
I mean, you cheat on a test.
You cheat on a test, and you're caught.
You're caught on camera cheating on a test.
You say, well, who's to know who's to blame?
The important thing is that the Marxi pre-apportioned equally, so I'll need some from this really good student, and I'm happy to give a few to some poorer student, but who's to say who's to blame?
It's like, no, there's a camera on you.
You're to blame. You cheated.
Oh, it's madness. But of course, this is also what, I mean, other priests do this too, right?
They're 100% certain when teaching little children that Jesus died for their sins and they'll go to hell and blah blah blah.
Then they meet an intelligent atheist and suddenly it all becomes subjective and cultural and relativistic, right?
Whenever somebody has power, it's Absolute morality that thumps down on them like a bloody sword of Damocles, but then whenever they reach someone or they meet someone of equality or even superiority, everything gets all foggy and relativistic.
That's inevitable.
That is as boring and as yawning, yawn-inducing as a laugh track on a sitcom.
So, to take one more analogy, because I just, I can't get across to my satisfaction how the state is nothing more than murderous comedy.
So, imagine that there's some judge, right?
Some judge sits on the bench, and he's always placing blame.
Because, you mean, to be a judge, you place blame.
You are guilty of this crime, and you go to jail, and judge, judge, judge, right?
And whenever anybody asks for leniency, he's like, no, you do the crime, you do the time.
You choose the action, you choose the consequences.
Security, punishment.
And then he's caught taking a bribe.
And then he's hauled before a judge and he says, wow, but judging, you see, judging is all about balance and perspective and leniency is really, really, really essential.
I mean, we would laugh at such a flaming hypocrite.
I mean, this would be, you put this in a movie, it would be too broad a comedy to be included.
People would say, oh, come on.
I mean, nobody would even believe such a character.
You wouldn't even laugh at it.
It would be so eye-rollingly bad.
But these are the moral paradigms, the mandarins, that we are ruled by.
Who will, with a straight face, after wielding the sword, axe, blade, and worship of the state for hundreds or thousands of years, throwing people in jail for non-crimes like drug use and prostitution and gambling and non-payment of taxes, after throwing people in jail 100% guilty.
No guilt on the side of the state.
All virtue on the side of the state.
No virtue on the side of the victim.
All guilt on the side of the victim.
Hundred. Zero. Percent.
That blame is essential.
It's the foundation of statism.
These cluster-ass muggah clowns Well, when they're caught in the spotlight of the moral rules that they have invented and inflicted upon millions for thousands of years, when that spotlight turns on them, oh, look, everything's become hazy, everything's become fun.
Well, we could sit here and point fingers all day.
But we have a problem to solve, and it's not really productive to play the blame game.
Jesus Christ. Millions of people in prison.
In the United States alone, two million people in prison.
Was the state not playing the blame game when it threw people in prison?
Really? Not playing the blame game?
Finding a balance? We're all in this together?
War on drugs? Well, you see, we have to end drugs in society.
There's no point playing the blame game, you see?
We're all in this together. We need to find a way to solve this problem collectively.
We all have to sacrifice a little to get through this challenge of fighting drugs.
No. Bam!
Jail, motherfucker, right?
Jail until your teeth rot out of your head.
That's how the state doesn't play the blame game.
But this is, I mean, parents do this too, right?
Bad parents do this too, right?
So they will punish you for noncompliance of rules with spankings or hittings or screamings or humiliations or whatever.
They'll punish you with absolutism, and they will say, who is responsible?
And teachers will do this.
Who did this? We're all going to stay after class until someone confesses because who is responsible is the essence of hierarchical punishment.
Ah, but you see when the slaves gain a moral weapon against their elders, oh no, you see suddenly now it's all, well, we're all in this together and everything is relative and there's no point playing the blame game.
I mean, this is sad.
Sad, sad. It is sad and pitiful how we as a species, born with the fire of such genius in our foreheads, should be so bamboozled, so bamboozled, by such ridiculous, self-serving, smarmy-ass statements from those in power.
I swear to God, there will be this.
Let's all pull together and let's not play the blame game.
Well, this is also true of the old as well, right?
It's also true of the old.
I sort of have a theory.
It's never going to be put into practice.
But if I were the king of the world to tell you what I'd do...
Well, I would say to the baby boomers who are...
Heading into retirement, right, this demographic boom that is going to be the wrinkly straw that breaks the camel's back of statism, I would say to them, hey, so you're heading into...
Into your retirement, you know that there's no money, right?
You know that there's no money. I paid into the system.
Well, you know there's no money.
And if you don't know there's no money, you've actively avoided trying to find out, because it's all over the internet.
It's all over the news.
There's no money. There's no money for you.
No money for you. Now, if people had made public statements, if old people had made public statements against Social Security, I would pay them their money.
This is all nonsense fantasy, right?
I have no power to enact any of this.
But I would pay them their money.
If... I mean, other people agreed and so on.
I think that if people spoke out vociferously against the predatory, violent Ponzi scheme of Social Security, I'd say give them a retirement.
Hey, thanks. Thanks.
It was tough. You did it.
You held your head up. You faced the opprobrium of your peers and you said it.
I would personally kick in to give these people a comfortable retirement.
But if I couldn't find any place where they'd said publicly that Social Security is a predatory, violent, bad, awful deal that preys upon the young for the expense to...
To aid in the financial salvation of the richest generation in history, if they'd never spoken out against it, and maybe it'd be worthwhile interviewing their friends or their kids or their grandkids and say, hey, what's this person's opinion of Social Security?
And if they thought, oh, it's the right.
I paid into it. It's my due.
Then it's like, eh, sorry.
Sucks to be your wrinkly old ass, but no money for you.
You get to live off your kids.
You get to live off your savings. You get to room together.
You get to keep working, whatever.
And why? Why are they so harsh?
They're old. It's like, well, but...
But the old have always taught us, you see, that actions have consequences.
The old have always said, save for a rainy day, don't expect other people to pay your way.
The old always said to us when we were younger, get a job, don't be a freeloader.
Take care of your responsibility.
Be responsible for your finances.
And if we sunk our money into a Vega slot machine or some trench coat wearing guy's marmy Ponzi scheme on the street corner, they'd say, well, a fool and his money are soon parted.
A fool and his money, you see, are soon parted.
And, boy, you know...
My great strength and my great weakness is I take people at face value.
I take people at face value.
I take the morals that they inflicted upon me as a kid and as a teenager and in my 20s and in my 30s.
I took the morals very seriously.
Very seriously. Very seriously.
I was told don't hit.
Well, I take that very seriously.
I was told don't yell as a kid.
I take that very seriously. So if there are adults around who hit and yell, well, that's not good.
The guy I knew, he kicked in the door because he was angry at his wife.
He didn't hit her. He never hit her.
He just kicked in the door. She calls the cops.
He gets arrested. Spends the night in jail.
Goes in front of a jail. He's arrested that.
He's taken straight out of the home.
Straight out of the home. He's a criminal.
He is a criminal.
By social standards, and no one decries this as unjust.
And he is mandated into anger management.
He must or he will go back to jail for a long time.
So if you throw things or break things in the home, you're a criminal.
And I was always taught that a man is judged by the company he keeps, and you should not be hanging around with criminals.
You should not be hanging around with criminals.
If people in your house, they throw and they break things, well, society says they're criminals.
Right? I take that very seriously.
I listen to the feminists.
I listen to the feminists who said that when it comes to the accusation of rape, do not interrogate, do not doubt the victim, except what she says at face value.
This was drilled into me over and over and over again as a kid, as a teenager, in my 20s, in my 30s.
See all the movies, right?
A woman should not be on trial for accusing a man of rape.
So this is what society believes.
I'm like, okay, well, And this is true of people who say child abuse, right?
How could, I mean, surely that's, I mean, they're more helpless than rape victims, in many cases, though of course not all.
So I sort of take society's morals at face value.
And all the elders in my generation when I was growing up were all a fool and his money had soon parted.
You have to take care of your money. You have to take care of your investments.
Don't waste it. You know, stay aware of things.
Be active. Be politically involved.
Learn. Understand. Be a vibrant citizen in your democracy, blah, blah, blah.
So I'm like, okay, well, did you do that?
And if you didn't do that, then guess what?
You were a fool and your money was parted from you.
And I'm sorry that you didn't pay attention to the basic realities of citizenship that was going on around you.
I'm sorry that you rejected and scorned and mocked everyone who said there was no money in the Social Security Ponzi scheme, that it was a big rip-off.
I'm sorry that you didn't listen to the 14-year-olds 30 years ago who said there will be no money when we retire.
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