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July 28, 2013 - Freedomain Radio - Stefan Molyneux

02:06:05

2440 Freedomain Radio Call In Show July 28st, 2013

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	Good morning, everybody.
	It's Defend More Than You from Freedom Aid Radio.
	Hope you're doing well.
	To our new listeners, to our new subscribers, welcome to Rationalvania and Kampistan, whatever you want to call it.
	It's the province of reason.
	This is the Sunday morning Church of Philosophy.
	So 10 a.m.
	Sunday is Eastern Standard Time.
	We do a show and...
	You can email Mike if you'd like to call in, operationsoffreedomainradio.com.
	You can go to the chat, fdrurl.com forward slash chat, to chat and to listen in.
	If you'd like, the show is very open-ended.
	I usually don't have much to say, although that's quite shocking, I'm sure.
	But you can call in and ask any questions.
	And we will attempt to turn the twin turrets of reason and evidence to bear on any problems that you're having and see if we can't find some way to have philosophy help you in your everyday life.
	I'm very much one for taking philosophy out of the ivory tower, out of the clouds, and reassembling the dust from the wind into useful fortresses against the madness of the world.
	So 10 a.m.
	Eastern Standard Time every Sunday.
	Please feel free to listen in.
	Please feel free to call in.
	And whatever topic you want to talk about, we will try to accommodate.
	So that's the brief overview of the show.
	Mike, who have we got up in the UNOS? All right, Will, you were up first.
	Go ahead.
	Hello, Will.
	Oh, you know what?
	He probably realized that free will is such a contentious topic that he is putting himself in a straitjacket and is having trouble getting to the microphone.
	Free Wooly, are you there?
	I can't hear you, Will.
	You might be muted.
	Alright, we'll move on from Will to Ty.
	Go ahead, Ty.
	Uh, can you hear me?
	Hello, how's it going?
	Hello, hello, hello.
	Good, good.
	Steph, I just wanted to say up front, I really appreciate your podcast.
	I stumbled upon your podcast a few months ago.
	And it's really kind of changing a lot of paradigms that I have.
	And I enjoy that.
	But I am new to understanding the whole concept of the non-aggression principle.
	And what I'm kind of struggling with...
	How do you deal with, as a so-called Black American in this country, how do you deal with justice versus freedom?
	Because I see, as a conservative person, I totally understand how race is used to bait people, and I'm well aware of people that have historically used race to benefit themselves.
	But I see it on both sides.
	And I only hear a conversation of those on the left that are abusing race, but not those on the right that are abusing race.
	And so, like with this Trayvon situation, I can understand that he's not the ideal citizen.
	But at the same time, for someone to even follow him and to kill him...
	When there has been structural things that have been set up where in the US it establishes that being black and being white are not treated the same.
	And so that's sort of the context that I kind of understand what President Obama is talking about that's separate from the literal facts of saying, well, Trayvon is not the – people are over-centralizing what happened with Trayvon, and Zimmerman may not be – There's a lot of facts that show that he's not the racist that they're about to be, but that still doesn't excuse, hey, there's still structural things that have been set up and people keep following those narratives.
	Like you, I felt, fell into the black criminality narrative that is falsely put out there that people talk about black-on-black crime but not white-on-white crime.
	Or...
	The theme, the narrative of blacks being criminals used right after slavery to kind of control blacks and to disenfranchise them when I understand you saying the state is not positive and it would be better to not have a state.
	I just kind of don't understand how if We do have a state and the state is saying, okay, well, we have Italian immigrants that come over here and when they get into crime and whatever, we change the definition of crime that it's only black and white, not Irish, Italian, whatever, separated from...
	makes crime look bigger in the black community than in the non-black community.
	And then when we see it in an immigrant community, what has been done is, well...
	Through the New Deal and all this other stuff, like, oh yeah, well, we gotta help these immigrants.
	But when we see Black Americans, it's like, oh, that's their nature.
	And it's like, I'm tired of that narrative, like, white people commit crimes, but Blacks are criminals.
	And I don't hear challenging that concept.
	So it makes me question, how do you deal with justice...
	When I understand freedom, I love freedom, I just don't know if there's a structural environment where the market might even encourage the injustice.
	So how does anarcho-capitalism address structural injustice If there's a market incentive for the injustice, like how colonialism created racism and went into countries and extracted the labor and went in through force, either beating up the natives or using religion to brainwash them to accept the condition.
	So how does – I know that I talked for a whole lot there and threw a whole lot.
	I don't get a chance to talk to a lot of philosophers.
	So I'm very curious as to how you would navigate through the situation.
	How do you deal with justice versus freedom?
	And I'm approaching it from a Black context, but in general, how do you approach, if the market has an incentive for certain injustice, how does anarcho-capitalism for freedom, how does that Right.
	Well, I mean, great points.
	Really well argued.
	I can't possibly try to deal with them all, but I will give you a few brief thoughts, and then I want to get your thoughts coming back.
	I think that the greatest enemy of peaceful race relations, and peaceful race relations really come out of the market, I think.
	Let's say that there are some differences between the races and some of them are cultural and some of them are biological, but can we profit from each other?
	I think that's a great question.
	Wherever you see the government interfering, With the free flow of the marketplace, I think you are going to start to see injustice and exploitation occurring for whoever is the most vulnerable in that particular environment or situation.
	I mean, very briefly, of course, the history of colonialism is not the history of the free market.
	The history of colonialism is the history of the state.
	And just looking briefly at England, of course, England, as Queen Victoria sort of famously said, the sun never sets on the British Empire, which meant I think a third of the globe was ruled by England at one point.
	Now, how was England able to do that?
	Well, because it had the biggest navy.
	It had the most powerful navy.
	Now, how did it have such a big and all-powerful navy that it was able to go around and ship all of its troops to go and take over all of these countries?
	Well, through the enslavement, the literal enslavement of the lower classes in England, through the press gang, through literally kidnapping and holding against their will members of the lower classes, In England to become sailors against their will and you know,
	more of the sailors died from scurvy than they did from war and so it was just horrendous and wretched and in many ways worse, had a higher death count than slavery itself.
	And the slaves usually were not shipped off to war because at least they had agricultural productivity.
	But the lower classes in England were free.
	They weren't even paid for.
	And they were barely fed and they lived in the most unsanitary conditions.
	And they were killed if they did not immediately follow orders, go into battle, and so on.
	In fact, when I was younger, my brother had a cup celebrating his birthday.
	I'm sure he still has it.
	And it was a...
	Like a big tin cup, a mug, and on the bottom of it was glass.
	They said, well, why would somebody build a cup with glass on the bottom?
	You could see through the bottom.
	And the reason that this became popular in England was because what would happen was some guy would come by and drop a penny into your beer.
	And then when you picked up your beer and you took a sip, You were considered to have taken the king's coin and therefore you could be taken off as a sailor and be enslaved in these horrendous colonial wars and invasions and you would be, you know, sent with no citrus across a horrible sea to go and get dengue fever and die in India.
	And so they put glass in the bottom of these cups so you could lift up your cup, look at the bottom.
	And see if there was a coin in there.
	Because then you would not drink your beer and you would not take the king's coin and that particular ruse would not work.
	So there was taxation against the lower classes.
	There was enslavement of the lower classes.
	The first aggression in colonial times is against the domestic population through taxes, through what is called, I mean, impressment or the involuntary and immediate draft.
	And so the first aggression, the first, quote, colonization is of the lower classes.
	As a result of that colonization, you go and you go and take over other countries and then you provide monopoly privileges to various companies.
	Mercantilism, of course, the East India Company and other companies.
	We're given monopoly privileges.
	Only they could go and dock in Bombay.
	Only they could go and bring the spices back and forth.
	Only they were given access.
	And as a result, they pay tax to the government for this privilege.
	They paid for this privilege.
	So massively profitable for the government because the government could force everyone to do everything.
	And so, colonialization was the result of a government action, and so I think that's all pretty wretched.
	Slavery, of course, was the result of government action.
	Could the slave masters, could the horrible human beings who transported and kept all of the slaves, Could they have made that economically viable if there was no centralized agency to catch and return the slaves?
	In other words, if you lived in a society without a government, And your slave ran off, who the hell was going to go and chase and catch him down?
	Well, nobody, really, because you needed that central government to be able to enable all of that.
	So, I mean, that's a real sketchy and brief overview, but I think slavery and colonialism and all of that.
	Now, because of all of that, you needed to justify it, right?
	And this is a very essential point, that people do evil, and that's terrible, and then they do evil to philosophy to justify the evil they're doing in the world.
	So they'll change it, and they say, well, you know, the The black man is primitive, he's like a savage, and he needs the white man to bring him to Jesus and to get him to heaven, and it's the white man's burden to take care of the black man and so on.
	None of that has anything to do with any theology or any philosophy.
	It only has to do with finding some way to justify the evils that are being done so that the morally sensitive can continue to participate in the exploitation with the cover of some kind of moral philosophy.
	But very briefly, of course, the criminality of the black man It's largely driven by, of course, the war on drugs.
	You know, I mean, you say, well, the Italian-Americans aren't characterized as criminals.
	Well, I don't know.
	I think there's quite a few Martin Scorsese films and Francis Ford Coppola films about the mob that would argue otherwise.
	And Italian-Americans have complained quite loudly about their continual portrayal.
	As, you know, flesh-eating, pizza-loving, Frank Sinatra-worshipping thugs.
	But, of course, it was government action that brought the mafia over to begin with.
	It was prohibition and then the bans on gambling, the bans on prostitution, and particularly the bans on drugs that brought the mafia over.
	There was virtually no organized crime outside the government.
	In the 19th century, early parts of the 20th century, it was the government actions of banning things that people want to participate in that created the conditions ripe for organized crime.
	And now, of course, organized crime has a huge impact on government.
	And, you know, in the same way that in Mexico, you either get the silver in terms of a bribe or you get the silver in terms of a bullet to the head to work with the drug lords.
	The drug, the war against drugs is fundamentally racist and is just an unbelievable blight upon what is already a pretty evil landscape in America.
	The the and I think one of the things that's also underrepresented in terms of its horrendous effects.
	I mean, the welfare state has been talked about quite a bit.
	The welfare state is kind of a trap for those who have the least opportunity.
	One of the reasons they have the least opportunity is the drug war, which diverts a lot of people's resources into this, what is called criminal activity, but it's just...
	I have to use the nomenclature that's around, but I think most fundamentally the public schools are unbelievably destructive to the poor.
	You couldn't design a system that would trap more people into an underclass than the public school system because of course the funding for the public school system is taken from the property taxes of those around and the poor pay disproportionately fewer property taxes and so you get this vicious cycle where there's less money available for schools.
	Which means that the federal government has to step in and top up which means that they get more control with less interest locally.
	I mean the best way that schools work It's satisfying the needs and preferences of the local parents.
	The further that the school control is taken from the parents, the worse the schools get.
	And because of the underfunding, because of a lack of property taxes among the poor, the federal government kicks in.
	And because there is a lot of fatherlessness among the poor, and particularly, of course, in the black community, and the fatherless boys in particular tend to be, let's just say, kind of unruly.
	And this is not racial specific.
	I mean, White boys without fathers tend to have particular problems with impulse control and attention and all that kind of stuff.
	And the same thing is true.
	It just happens to be that there's more black fatherless boys than whites.
	Although, sadly, the whites are catching up in that particular metric.
	So, I mean, just that sort of very briefly, like, you know, I mean, the whole thing that happened with Rosa Parks, right, where she didn't want to sit in the back of the bus.
	I mean, it was the government that said you had to sit in the back of the bus.
	It wasn't the free market.
	I mean, buses served the poor, and there were more poor blacks in Birmingham at that time.
	No, no, go ahead, go ahead.
	I was actually, that was my last point, so it's a good time to interrupt.
	Go ahead.
	Well, there's certain things that Are promoted a certain way through marketing, thinking from a business owner standpoint, like there's this marketing narrative that's put out there to the public that the public just eats, but it's not true.
	Rosa Parks wasn't, it wasn't that she was sitting, Rosa Parks was sitting in the black section of the bus, and the current rule was when a white person came in, a black person had to get up for a white person.
	It wasn't that So even the way the narrative that that's taught is not – it's more palatable to promote the way it was than what actually happened to say the system was always that – putting it in a different way.
	The way that you were describing in England where people had to have the glass cups or whatever, the glass bottom cups to make sure that they weren't – Sent off.
	That's similar to the black codes that were established right after slavery where, because of the 13th Amendment, one of the things is if you're a criminal, you do not have the rights of a citizen.
	And there were a lot of things to criminalize blacks, chise them.
	And again, so what my concern is, evidence of where When there's a system that keeps putting this message out that black is different than white...
	When we had the genome mapped out in the early 2000s that showed that there is no such thing as race.
	We're genetically all the same.
	So the differences are through so-called culture or what have you.
	But there's an economic incentive...
	For people to keep engaging in this racial stuff.
	And it's not just the U.S. It's sort of like a global type of game of risk where if England was doing it, Spain tried to do it, but Spain didn't have the same type of army, but Spain tried to have sex with the Indians as much as possible through Latin America to spread themselves out.
	When they keep promoting this message that, okay, blacks or Africans are inferior, but then Haiti is the first country that revolts against the oppression, then there's a big nationwide embargo.
	The U.S. is able to quickly buy off Louisiana from France.
	France is all upset.
	England tries to get at Haiti, and they're not successful.
	But what they do is they literally...
	We've set up an economic situation where Haiti is made to be economically.
	They're excluded from the rest of the world.
	Well, okay.
	Sorry to interrupt, but you understand everything you're talking about there is government action.
	I mean, the Haitians were rebelling against a government, and then it was governments that placed embargoes upon Haiti.
	And so everything seems to me, like this is sort of what I'm trying to point out, that every sort of piece of oppression that you're talking about, you know, after the end of slavery there was a criminalization, well that was the government that was doing all of that.
	And so what I'm pointing out is you say the system or marketing and so on, but I'm sort of inviting you to be a little bit more precise and look at what is the actual agency, the social agency, the only social agency that is able to enforce these kinds of prejudicial rules.
	It's not a private company because that's a very expensive thing for a private company to do.
	It immediately renders them economically unproductive.
	Like if you're Microsoft and you suddenly wake up one morning ahead of Microsoft and you say, you know what, I think I want to put an embargo on the British Virgin Islands.
	Well, you don't have a navy.
	You'd have to go buy a navy.
	And you'd have to risk retaliation from other navies.
	You'd have to go train a whole naval force.
	You'd have to get up your supply chain.
	It would be incredibly expensive to go and do a blockade.
	And immediately, you'd have to raise the price of all of your goods, like double, to pay for this crazy paramilitarism that you suddenly get involved in.
	And I guarantee you, if you were the head of Microsoft and you proposed to your And you said, I really don't like what's going on in the British Virgin Islands.
	So we're going to spend, you know, $500 million to start a blockade and it's going to cost us another $250 million every year to maintain this blockade indefinitely because I don't like what's going on there.
	They would immediately say, that's insane.
	There is no return on investment in that.
	That is a massive hit to our bottom line.
	It's going to alienate our customers.
	It's going to piss everyone off.
	We're going to look like some power military organization because we will be.
	We're going to have to raise the price of our goods rendering us uncompetitive and there's no possibility of profit.
	So, when you're in a voluntary situation, and I know it's not exactly voluntary with Microsoft, they've got patents and government contracts and all that, but generally, when you're in a voluntary situation, the drive is towards economic efficiency, which means not wasting money on useless military stuff.
	But when you have coercion, When you're funded through coercion, then it does become profitable to go and make up these imaginary enemies and set up all these blockades and go and invade places.
	I mean, the invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan are massively profitable to certain sections of society, but only because the government is able to print, borrow, and compel citizens through the power of law, through the power of force, through the threat of jail.
	To hand over their resources.
	If you take that away, then you trend towards economic efficiency and prejudice fundamentally is economically inefficient, right?
	So let's just say, this is an old example.
	I think Murray Rothbard came up with it.
	Let's just say I'm a business owner and I just, I really hate red-haired people.
	Of course, I could make the argument, I just hate people with hair.
	Oh, the envy.
	But let's just say I really hate red-haired people.
	And so, and let's say red-haired people are 10% of the population.
	So anytime I get somebody coming to my office who's got red hair, you know, I clip a clothespin to my nose.
	You know, I spray Lysol in the air and tell them to get the hell out.
	He's a lice-ridden Irish vermin or something like that.
	Well, all that means is that I have 10%, I have access to 10% fewer people from the pool of talent.
	And what that means is that I'm fundamentally going to end up with a 10% less talented workforce on average over time.
	Which means that my competitors who will hire red-haired people are generally going to have 10% greater quality, greater efficiency, and so on.
	At least access to that.
	And so over the long run, I'm the one who pays for my prejudice.
	So if I open, you know, a soul food shop in Harlem, and I don't let any black people into my shop, But my, you know, the guy across the street does, then I'm obviously going to pay for my prejudice through, you know, social disapproval, through not having customers and so on.
	So it's economically inefficient to be prejudicial against people.
	And so the free market works towards efficiency and punishes prejudice.
	It doesn't mean people won't be prejudiced.
	It just means they'll pay for it themselves.
	Which is generally, I think, you know, you'd be shocked.
	You probably wouldn't be shocked at how people's ideology will generally follow their financial interest.
	And if they have to pay for themselves for their own prejudice rather than getting the government to enact all this prejudicial stuff, you'd be amazed how open-hearted and open-minded they would suddenly become, I think.
	But what if the market promotes the prejudice?
	What if there's an economic incentive to have the prejudice and there's a disincentive?
	What market would promote that kind of prejudice?
	The easiest example that comes to mind is not a current example, but if we're in the 1950s and you're the first one to say, hey, I want to have a business with blacks, but other people are like, I'm not going to come into your business.
	Oh, you mean like if I have a restaurant and I want black waiters?
	Right, but the market is saying, hey, we still have this separate but unequal scenario, so blacks have to be separate from whites, and if you try to integrate, that is terribly bad.
	The whole community is in support of that.
	That's the status quo.
	So for you to try to buck the trend is not...
	Well, no, okay, but I think that's a little bit of an unfair example.
	It's sort of like saying, well, I want to sell sneakers.
	And then you say, well, what about some guy who's been smoking, you know, two packs a day for 30 years?
	He's not going to want sneakers.
	Yes, okay, that's true.
	But that's because of his prior history.
	That doesn't mean there's no market for sneakers.
	So if you're going to say, well, suddenly in 1950s, let's look at a free market scenario.
	After in the South, you've had massive destructive government involvement in race relations for like 250 years.
	And let's say that that government involvement stopped.
	Of course, there's still going to be residual prejudice and racism.
	But that's the result of previous government action.
	I mean, let's not forget.
	Okay, then let me talk about now.
	Because what you're saying makes a lot of sense.
	Okay, right now.
	There's a current governmental policy that is similar to what's been done in the past, this whole stop and frisk, to stop people that are black or brown and to see if they're criminals or whatever.
	Wait, wait.
	Sorry, I don't know a huge amount about this policy, but is it specific that they stop black or brown people, or is it just the way it plays out?
	No, no.
	Adding to it.
	I don't doubt that it might work out that way.
	I just wanted to make sure I understood the policy.
	The policy is not...
	It's basically, under the guise of stopping quote-unquote criminals, what actually ends the play out is people that are black or brown are stopped, but people that...
	It's sort of like, if a white guy's wearing a hoodie, it's fine.
	But if a black or brown person is wearing a hoodie, that person statistically is more likely to be stopped.
	And the issue that I have is, with this policy, if there's an incentive to say, you know what, I like this prison industrial complex.
	I want to have more people put into the system because I happen to break out.
	I happen to become an accredited investor.
	I have investments.
	While the general foolish public doesn't know that they're stuck in mutual funds.
	And I buy stocks that make money by having more and more criminals being thrown into the system because I get free labor.
	If that's the current system that we have right now… Where there is an economic incentive to say, hmm, which stocks benefit from the prison industrial complex?
	Sorry, I hate to interrupt you again, but you're talking about...
	When you talk about the prison industrial complex, which I agree with you, is just monstrous.
	And in fact, there have been judges who've gone to jail as a result of them sentencing people to prisons run privately, quote privately, still paid for by the government, regulated by the government.
	But you know, right, that the judges...
	Send people, send youths in particular to these prisons and they actually have investments in these prisons and so they have complete conflict of interest.
	They've gone to jail for that.
	But again, you're talking about an entirely government-based activity at the moment.
	I don't know how justice will be served in a free society.
	The whole point is nobody knows.
	That's why you can't have a government.
	If somebody knew perfectly that you'd put that person in charge and they would run everything, but nobody can know.
	But I do know that it won't be anything like what we have right now.
	I mean, it won't be throwing people in a box for 10 years and then releasing them back to basically come back again.
	Recidivism is ridiculously high in government-run systems.
	And, I mean, why, you know, violent crime has dropped 40% over the past 10 or 15 years.
	And why do we have even more people in prison?
	Because you have a whole industry that relies on government power, government force, government funding that always wants to grow and thus is continually in the process of inventing new crimes.
	People want to pay as little as possible for whatever happens to people after they're convicted of a crime in a free society.
	People want to pay as little as possible and they want that.
	Everybody wants the organizations that they pay for to get smaller and to get more efficient.
	That's what happens in the free market.
	In the government, quite the opposite.
	is true.
	I would really caution you to just remember what institution are you talking about when you're talking about the prison industrial complex?
	Well, it's all government.
	And even if there are private companies in there sucking from the government's tit, they're still funded and paid for and regulated by government and government, quote, money, which is just theft.
	Sorry, I just wanted to really point that out.
	Okay, so I appreciate that.
	So then, if I'm to understand from you that the state is basically the cause of all the problems, but And I accept that.
	So now my question is, does the market protect you though?
	If the market doesn't protect you, if I'm, to use an analogy, if I'm one of the blacks that went out and started Black Wall Street in Oklahoma and said, I'll start my own industry, start my own business or whatever, and then groups of a mob come in and burn everything down.
	The market is not protecting me.
	So I guess maybe you have an answer to it.
	Maybe I'm asking the wrong question.
	I don't know if the market...
	So you start a black investment firm in Oklahoma and then a bunch of racists want to come burn it down.
	Is that right?
	Yeah, that actually happened in the early 1930s or something in the turn of the century where...
	Because of all the structural racism, because of Jim Crow, the separate but unequal, a group of business people set up their businesses in Oklahoma.
	And, I mean, all this stuff could be verified through Google and it was burned down.
	I have no reason to disbelieve you, but in a free...
	I have no reason to disbelieve you at all.
	So in a free market, the way that I would...
	If I was...
	I've been an entrepreneur.
	I've not been a black person.
	But let's say I was a black entrepreneur and I wanted to start up an investment company.
	Then the first thing that you do, having been an entrepreneur, I do know a little bit about this.
	The first thing you need is kind of like insurance.
	Like when I was an entrepreneur, they took out a huge amount of life insurance from me just in case the plane I was flying on to go do some business deal went down or whatever.
	I got hit by a bus.
	They would need to spend a lot of money to replace me.
	And so the first thing I would do is to say, okay, well, you know, here's what I want to do.
	Here's my business plan.
	Let's just say I'm getting investment.
	Well, the first thing you'd need is insurance, right?
	And in a free market, you would go to the insurance company and say, well, you know, I want to have, you know, the All Black Investment Group.
	And they would say, okay, well, what do you want?
	We'd say, well, I want lynching insurance, or I want fire insurance, or I want, you know, mob pitchfork insurance.
	And they'd say, okay, well, where are you thinking of setting up, right?
	And they would have information or they'd go out and do the research and they'd say, you know, the safest place for you to set up is here because, you know, people are open-minded.
	They don't care what color you are.
	They just, all they care about is the color of green, baby.
	And so they would help you to locate in a place which was the safest, right?
	So you wouldn't go do it in front of Bull Connor's house in Alabama, I think he was from or whatever, right?
	And you would have insurance, and the insurance would be, you know, if we get lynched or burned down, you know, we'd get paid $5 million or something like that, which creates a huge incentive on the part of the insurance company to make sure that you're safe, which means get you in the safest place possible, get you whatever security you need.
	That would just be part of the cost of doing business, and hopefully they would locate you to a place where there'd be No prejudice or almost no prejudice to the point where you wouldn't even need a lot of security because otherwise you might end up with higher costs and make it tougher to compete.
	But there would be that.
	And of course, if you were, you know, someone did come in and burn you down or whatever, got through all the defense or got through all of the alarms and all that kind of stuff, then, I mean, you'd end up rich with enough money to hopefully start again in a place that was even safer.
	But that would be my, you know, my guess.
	It generally works around insurance in a free society.
	Because insurance is the only thing that gives the agency incentive, right, to actually protect you.
	I mean, the police have no duty to protect.
	They've said that very clearly under American law.
	They have no duty to protect you.
	you.
	If they fail to protect you, if they promise to protect you and then fail, they're never liable in any way, shape or form.
	They suffer no negative consequences for failing to protect you.
	And this is just a ridiculous, ridiculously bad incentives.
	And so insurance, at least, if they fail to protect you, they pay huge amounts of money out of the shorts.
	And that gives them an incentive that the police and the government just don't have.
	Right.
	But even with the insurance aspect, there's an economic incentive for For example, I believe it was last year, MetLife Had a big settlement that for black Americans, I think it was something like $500 million that they had to settle because they were able to, in the current market, not fulfill the promises of the insurance that was sold to black Americans versus the larger community.
	I'm sorry, it wasn't just MetLife.
	I think it was...
	It was MetLife and maybe Prudential as well.
	But even if there's a market incentive that says, hey, with this community, I don't have to fulfill all my promises.
	I could take in the premiums, and if something happens, I could kind of finance out of it.
	Oh, so you mean they – was it sort of like health insurance?
	They sold health insurance and then denied people's claims?
	No, it wasn't – it was like literally the death insurance.
	So it's like somebody's dying, and they paid all these premiums, and the estate, they failed to pay the death benefits to the heirs when they were supposed to.
	So it wasn't even – So they failed to fulfill their contract?
	Yes.
	And so it's like they're charging the same price, but – The black Americans were not – their contracts were not fulfilled, and it took until 2012 for them to have a settlement over that.
	I'm pretty sure it was MetLife.
	I'm just checking out here, and tell me if this is incorrect or right.
	So states settled with MetLife over burial insurance.
	Is that right?
	Yeah, you're right.
	$500 million in benefits on small value life insurance policies often sold door-to-door in black communities around America.
	Under agreement reached between Florida and 23 other states.
	Let's see.
	Without admitting guilt, MetLife entered an agreement with the states to settle claims that the company sold policies to customers who often paid more in premiums than the policy was worth or who died without receiving the benefits they were promised.
	So let me just see here.
	708,000 such policies were sold.
	The company expects to pay out almost $188 million during the first year, pay off the additional claims over the next 17 years.
	Oh, that's great.
	So he wrote about the burial insurance in 2001.
	Someone started writing about this and 11 years later, they've got some sort of justice, so to speak, that is going to pay out over the next 17 years.
	So let me just see here.
	OK, I mean, I have no reason to disbelieve that this occurred now.
	Now, of course, let me just point out that insurance is heavily regulated by the United States, and the barriers to entry to go into the insurance business are ridiculous.
	I mean, this is why you almost never see new insurance companies.
	I mean, was the last time you saw an ad that says, we're a new kind of insurance company.
	I mean, it's just ridiculous.
	And the government is running the system.
	The government is supposed to enforce these contracts.
	I mean, if you have a problem with your contract, you go to the government.
	So that system didn't work.
	So the government is regulating these companies.
	That didn't work.
	The government is preventing new people.
	Why is it that MetLife is going to black communities?
	Why aren't black entrepreneurs who live in those black communities going around and, you know, who've got intimate knowledge, who know the people, got all the networking?
	Why aren't the black people?
	Because it's impossible to go into the insurance business.
	There's so many regulations and such a huge amount of capital that's needed.
	So the government was responsible for regulating these, didn't work.
	Government was responsible for enforcing contracts, didn't work.
	Took 12 years for the government to deal with this, which is ridiculously long, and it's going to take a further 17 years to get payouts.
	So this is all within a government environment that is supposed to enforce justice, and I think you and I would both agree that justice has scarcely been served in this situation.
	What you want, of course, is the first time you get a complaint against an insurance company, you want people to leap into action and to deal with it in a matter of months, not years or decades.
	So then if they're – okay.
	So what I'm really hearing is that the state is the problem, and the sort of trust – and again, I love capitalism.
	I believe that it's the only viable system.
	I know it's not perfect, but it's sort of trust that the free market – and we don't have a truly free market – So I don't know, is that Singapore, I guess, is more open?
	I think that's one of the top economic freedoms.
	I agree with you.
	This idea, I know it's not perfect, just sounds like, I don't know if you know, it's a pretty old Grace Jones song.
	I won't sing it, because my voice is kind of messed up today.
	She basically sings, I'm not perfect, but I'm perfect for you.
	And I've always sort of felt that about the free market.
	It's not perfect, but it's perfect for human beings.
	Because...
	The free market is an aggregate of human choices, and human choices are not perfect.
	So saying the free market is not perfect is like saying human choice is imperfect.
	And because human choice is imperfect, we need the constant correction of the free market.
	Human choice, the imperfection of human choice is always limited in its damage in the free market, but it's unlimited when you have the power of state.
	So you and I may make bad decisions, buy something and we regret it or whatever it is.
	We pay too little for something and it breaks and we can't return it.
	It's like, damn, that was really stupid.
	But when people decide to go invade Iraq, well, that's a bad decision that has slightly more dire consequences than us buying a widget that cracks.
	So, yeah, human beings are imperfect, which is why we need the fact, why we can't have a government, because those imperfect human beings will also be running the government, but they'll have no negative consequences.
	Massive profits and power in presidential libraries will adorn their catastrophic million people plus destroying errors.
	The only issue that I have with that is it's sort of the trust.
	We have to have trust that the free market will adequately address injustice.
	I'm not saying fairness because I don't believe in fairness.
	Everybody doesn't make the same choices, so you can't treat everyone the same.
	But I'm saying when there's injustice, if there's a challenge where the free market may not adequately address that, I don't know...
	I guess I'm kind of back at the same position where I think people mean well...
	No, no, but sort of...
	No, no, listen, listen.
	I mean, I'm sorry to interrupt, but...
	There's no plan B that deals with the problem of injustice, right?
	You know, it's like saying, well, I could get up and go and wash my dishes, or I could summon Mickey Mouse and his army of invisible elves to go and wash the dishes.
	It's like, I'm sorry, that plan B doesn't exist.
	Like, you can get up and wash the dishes, or you can stay on the couch, but there's no Mickey Mouse with his army of magic elves to go do the dishes for you.
	Okay, so we only have the free market.
	Well, okay, let me just make a brief case about that, right?
	So you say, okay, well, I don't know if the free market is going to handle injustice or not.
	And the plan B is the government.
	That's the only choice.
	You either have freedom or you have coercion.
	Now, the argument tends to be, it's like, well, I got this thing in my back pocket called the government and I need to keep bringing it out and comparing it to the free market and say, well, maybe in this situation, We need the government.
	But the direct, literal analogy to that is like saying, well, some people in marriage are yelled at.
	And some people in marriage are even hit.
	So my plan B is to legalize rape and enforce rape to make sure everybody rapes each other.
	Clearly, that's not an improvement.
	Yes, marriage is imperfect.
	Yes, there are mean people who get married and they yell at each other and they hit each other and they key each other's cars and they want to be taken to the lake.
	I don't know if you've seen that video.
	Just do a search for wife tantrum car.
	She wants to be taken to the lake and she's just screaming at her husband to take her to the lake.
	The best comment on that video was because he had to go rotate his tires on his truck.
	He's like, drop her at the lake, change your tires, go home, change your locks.
	But there is no backup.
	There's no plan B called the government, because once you've got a government, then you've got a monopoly of power, you've got taxation, you have the ever-increasing power of government, which is automatic.
	Taxation is automatic theft.
	It's automatic injustice.
	It's automatic evil, because it's giving a group the monopoly to initiate force against everyone at will, almost fundamentally.
	So if you've got a problem with injustice, whatever rough spots there are in the free market cannot possibly be improved by creating a monopoly of universal violence in a geographical area.
	That is literally like saying, well, there's abuse in marriage and the solution is to force everyone to rape each other.
	That's not a plan B that improves marriage at all.
	I mean, there's lots of different ways you can improve marriage.
	I'm with you then.
	That makes sense.
	Then help me to understand what's the best way To handle injustice in the free market.
	If it's not just simply choice, if it's not simply competition, or maybe that's all we have.
	It's just...
	I'll give you a very brief answer.
	I've sort of tried to give you lengthy answers, which I get you're getting, but let me just give you brief answers.
	First is the understanding that injustice is economically inefficient.
	So, if I want to create the best dance group in the world, and I say, well, I'm not going to hire any blacks, well, I'm clearly not going to make the best dance group in the world.
	Because by excluding blacks from my auditions, I'm simply not having access to any talent.
	Right, but Stefan, a quick rebuttal to that.
	That's sort of an analogy of like the baseball, the World Series.
	We say it's the World Series, but it's just the U.S. and certain people from the Dominican Republic.
	It's not the whole world playing baseball and we find the actual best in the world playing baseball.
	It's just the U.S. Let's say I want to create the best dance group in the city or the best dance group within a 10 block radius.
	Whoever I exclude from my talent pool Is the degree to which the quality of my dance group is lowered.
	It doesn't matter if it's redhead people or black people or whatever, right?
	You know, people with wooden legs, maybe I can be prejudiced against them for a dance group or whatever.
	But my point is that prejudice is economically inefficient.
	Okay.
	I just think some people don't care whether it's inefficient.
	I'm sorry?
	I just think that some people don't care whether it's inefficient.
	The U.S. doesn't care if they have the best baseball literally around the globe.
	They just really want it in the U.S. No, but the owners of the baseball team do.
	So first of all, if it comes out that the – let's see, baseball is fine.
	Let's just say it comes out that the owners of the baseball team will never hire blacks.
	Well, clearly, these days, that would be pretty negative for most people.
	And they'd be like, you racist bastards, right?
	And they just, they would boycott, right?
	So first and foremost, there's the economic inefficiency of lowering your access to a talent pool, right?
	So I think, you know, and there's, you know, I mean, the National Ballet Company is not going to allow somebody who's 80 to come and audition.
	So there are ways in which you exclude groups from your talent pool, which is fine.
	You know, I mean, I'm not going to go sing I mean, it's fine, but where opportunity exists and an appropriate skill set exists, if you exclude people, it's economically efficient.
	And the second thing is, so that's the first thing is the economic efficiency.
	And the second thing is, is the economic...
	Damage and damage to reputation that is done by violating community standards.
	I mean, if you remember this Chick-fil-A thing where they had some problem with gay marriage, I mean, it was all over Facebook and Twitter and Reddit and there were boycotts and the guy had to back down.
	Just because he's made some comment about gay marriage which people found offensive and people organized this massive campaign and there were protests and there were...
	If you really dislike somebody's prejudice, A, they're economically harmed by it and B, you can organize a boycott which would all be perfectly fine in a free society.
	And so if you're violating community standards as a whole, then people are going to make you pay for it and it's going to be pretty significant.
	And all the shareholders and all the members of the board are going to look if the CEO said something stupid and racist.
	They're going to say, look, dude, you just lost your job.
	Because you're harming the value of our stock.
	You're harming the brand value.
	You're harming public perception of who we are as a company.
	You're violating our all-inclusive standards.
	I mean, you're fired and then good luck trying to get another job.
	You're going to pay personally as a violation of community standards.
	I mean, the way in which we share information about people who violate community standards these days is incredibly powerful.
	I mean, you can make it known that whoever said something terrible about some race or some gender or some sexual orientation.
	So it's a huge punishment that you can receive.
	Whereas if you look at something like the Iraq war, the Iraq war was preceded by the largest, most continuous, most concentrated, most passionate anti-war demonstration the world has ever seen.
	And what did it do?
	It did nothing.
	Because they get their money through coercion, so they don't give a shit, frankly, about protesting.
	And you can't ostracize the government.
	You can't organize a boycott against the government.
	You can against the private industry, which means that they have to be a lot more sensitive to community standards.
	Okay.
	At the same time, if there's an economic incentive for the injustice, if I'm a British tea company and I understand that I get my wealth by going into Africa, having the tea made in Africa, and then having the leaves shipped over to England where I access it and make the finish good, but...
	It would be more efficient for, if the tea is actually grown in Africa, to actually have the industry in Africa, but I have an incentive to follow the old colonial system where I just have the third world making raw goods and then I make the finished goods back in the home country.
	So it benefits me.
	And when people find out, hey, why is it that countries in the third world cannot compete with With the older, more mature economies, it's because from a certain aspect, we restricted the free market in those third world environments.
	We prevented them from competing with the more mature economies.
	And as a member of a mature economy, I don't know if it's in my best interest from an economic standpoint to say, yeah, I do want – if people in Brazil or Africa can grow and make tea completely – I think they should do that and then compete directly with a US company or a British company or whatever.
	I would want to say, no, let them just make the leaves and I extract it and I keep doing it.
	And I'll just say- But how would you enforce that?
	Let's say there's no governments anywhere in the world, just for a moment.
	As a tea company in England, how would you prevent a tea company in Sub-Saharan Africa or South America from making their own tea?
	As a tea company in England, what I would do is I would As having economic incentives, I would buy off the politicians.
	I mean, this is the whole...
	No, no, no.
	No governments anywhere.
	Oh, okay.
	If there's no...
	No politicians, no governments.
	How would you, as a tea company in England, your evil Earl Grey Incorporated, right?
	How would you prevent a tea company in South America from growing its own tea?
	I couldn't if there's no government.
	I guess I see what you're saying.
	Because I do believe wealth comes from a transfer of value.
	I have to give something in order to receive something.
	I don't expect something from nothing.
	And so if Africa can make tea and do it better, then my market share should go down.
	And I can't prevent other people competing in a totally free market.
	The problem is we're not in a—even in the U.S., we don't have a free market.
	We have state involvement.
	No, that's right.
	And it's sort of like jumping to a different thing, which I don't want to really go into, but having young kids, if everybody's violent, how do I have my kids learning non-aggression principles when they're going to be the victims?
	It's like, oh, beat them up.
	They don't fight back.
	Right.
	Right.
	No, I hear you.
	Look, I mean, and just to touch on, of course, I mean, Africa is a complete mess because, frankly, colonialism is still continuing.
	It's just taking the form of foreign aid, right?
	Which is taking money from the poor people of rich countries and sending it to the rich people in poor countries.
	And, of course, dumping all of the agricultural excess from terrible farm policies in the West.
	I mean, what is going on in the third world is so unbelievably destructive.
	The money is being handed to governments in the third world which use it to buy arms to oppress their people.
	A certain amount of the money then comes back.
	It's a form of corporate subsidies because they give all this money to the governments in the third world.
	The governments in the third world then buy a bunch of service contracts from companies in the West.
	It's just another way of having corporate welfare and corporate subsidies without it being quite as obvious.
	And I mean, the number of books that I've read, one is called White Man's Burden, goes into just how unbelievably hateful and destructive it is to have the foreign aid.
	Not to mention, of course, the fact that The Pope still has not lifted the ban on using condoms to stop the spread of AIDS. I mean, just a massive amount of Western interference that is completely hobbling these countries.
	It just bothers me that we can't just deal with each other as people.
	Like, oh, well, they're the third world.
	They need our help.
	No, they don't need your help.
	Get the hell out of their way.
	Stop funding their corrupt governments.
	Encourage free markets.
	Stop dumping your crops over there and let people grow their own food.
	I mean, just stop dealing with them like they're some sort of inferior group.
	I mean, just deal with them like people.
	Deal with them like you would your neighbor.
	You know, you're not going to go and shove half your rotten old food through your neighbor's window saying, here, here's a meal for you, you needy bastard.
	I mean, we wouldn't do that to our neighbor.
	This paternalism and this, frankly, racism and continentism that comes out of the West.
	Oh, we've got to go over and help these poor people in the third world.
	It's like, no, just stop selling weapons to their damn governments.
	Stop giving money to the governments to buy weapons from Western countries.
	Stop putting up trade embargoes with them.
	Allow free trade.
	Stop dumping your food there and just leave them be and they'll be fine.
	But this idea that we just have to go and save all of these dark-skinned people in these hot lands from, frankly, the consequences of our own governmental policies over the past couple of hundred years is unbelievable.
	We can't just pry this off and say they'll be Fine if we stop interfering with them, but this compulsion to go and interfere, to me, is a kind of paternalism that is just wretched.
	I absolutely agree, and I thank you again for taking the conversation and any help to please help people to not go into this narrative of the black criminal versus everybody.
	There's black on black crime, there's white on white crime, and The free market is all we have.
	It's just to do it more efficiently.
	Let it work its way out.
	There is this narrative that the poor need government resources, but there is no group that benefits from the free market more than the poor.
	And we can see that because as government has grown, the poor have become more entrenched.
	The poverty rate is now even slightly higher than before the war on poverty began in which tens of trillions of dollars were spent attempting to fix the problem of poverty.
	If you look throughout history, when you have Right now, the upper classes are making out like bandits.
	I mean, the amount of wealth that is accumulated to the upper classes is huge.
	And this is generally the result of increased government size, since when the government gets bigger, it has more resources, and the rich and powerful and well-educated and well-connected use the power of the government to get more resources for themselves, which is exactly what's happened.
	Over the past couple of generations and the poor have gotten worse off and the middle class has kind of slightly decayed.
	When you get a free market, the people at the top fall, you know, like hammers from a plane.
	I mean, they just collapse and the poor begin to rise because they have opportunities, they have entrepreneurial opportunities, they're not bound down and particularly when you get a free market in education, The poor are always frightening to the rich because the poor are willing to accept less wages.
	They're hungry.
	They want more.
	They have less to lose by risking things because they're starting with very little.
	So when you have a free market, there tends to be this big, slow, and sometimes it's quite a rapid turn of the pyramid.
	Because the people who've adapted to a semi-fascistic state like we have don't do well in the free market.
	You know, they spend all their time nurturing contacts in Washington and getting lobbyists into the right place.
	Who gives a shit about that in the free market?
	I mean, all those skills just become wasted and useless.
	And so the rich have this terror of the poor, which is why they inflict these terrible schools on them and all these regulations and they keep them down.
	Because you can't compete with poor hungry people if you're a rich fat cat who has kind of spent all his time developing political contacts, buying big houses and has a much higher standard of living to maintain.
	So there's this general terror of the poor and they use the state to keep the poor down and to keep the poor from competing with the rich.
	And in the free market, the poor, like within 14 years after the end of the Second World War, the poverty rate in the US had been cut in half because there was kind of like a free market, not just in the West but throughout the world.
	One of the things that happened during the end of the Second World War Was that a lot of the controls and socialistic slash communistic slash fascistic regulations that were put in place by FDR and others through the New Deal, certainly all of the Nazi central planning apparatus was dismantled by a very famous, at least in free market circles, German minister of finance at the end of the Second World War.
	The Marshall Plan had nothing to do with it.
	The Marshall Plan, like all government programs, showed up.
	Long after the party was underway.
	I mean, the German GDP was growing.
	All of the people who came back from the war already had jobs.
	And then, you know, the Marshall Plan sort of landed.
	There was a massive deregulation of government at the end of the Second World War.
	I hope that we won't need another war to do that again.
	And there was a whole ministry that was set up in America like, well, what are we going to do with all these millions of people coming back from the war?
	These boys, they need jobs.
	We've got to get them all assigned to jobs.
	And by the time they got their funding, everyone had come back and already had a job because people, when left alone, generally do things that are quite intelligent.
	And so this is one of the reasons why the poverty rate was cut in half.
	Cut in half.
	Hundreds of millions of people have emerged from poverty as a result of India and China opening up some of their markets to some aspects of freedom.
	And you don't see that celebrated, of course, because it's not a government program.
	It's just freedom.
	And so the poor benefit enormously, the most, from a free market system and tend to get crushed under the wheels of central planning, which are always driven by the upper classes.
	So, you know, when they say libertarians don't care about the poor, you know, they're talking out of their armpit to say it as nicely as possible.
	So thank you so much for your call.
	Please feel free to call back any time.
	Great topics, great topics to bring up.
	And, you know, I certainly do appreciate your sensitivity to these issues.
	And, you know, the last thing I'd ever want to advocate is a system wherein people are profitably discriminated from, which is why I do oppose the state in general.
	So thank you so much for your call, Ty.
	I really appreciate it.
	Thanks.
	All right.
	We're gonna try again.
	Okay.
	Can you hear me now?
	We can hear you.
	You're on, brother.
	Go for it.
	Oh, thank you.
	I'm using Skype for the first time on Windows 8, and I think that's all that needs to be said, Windows 8.
	I have a question.
	There's been something that's been bothering me for quite a while now.
	I have this recurring theme of people showing interest In my friendship, acting like they're interested, and then blowing me off or putting me aside.
	Especially at work.
	Most of the time it's at work.
	Because I can pick whoever I want to date.
	I have no problem with that, but at work I'm stuck with those people, regardless.
	And I would like to build some relationships, not all of them.
	Can you give me a brief but specific example?
	Okay, quite a few.
	Quite specific.
	We start with empiricism here, my friend.
	Always with the empiricism.
	Okay, so recently there's a big group of people that got hired, and there's a woman I kind of had a little interest in, and I do stand-up about twice a month, and I invited her out.
	I'm like, hey, you should come to my show, or something like that.
	And she goes, oh, well, I'm really busy those nights.
	I kind of dodge the question a little bit.
	And then later, I hear her making plans to go out drinking with our buddies.
	If only you could drink at a comedy club.
	They really should think about introducing that.
	I gotta think for my business brain, that would be quite something.
	Oh, yeah.
	I mean, that's the kind of way it's with everyone.
	A lot of people there.
	I mean, I've been working there for over a year now.
	Look, I mean, you've got to understand that if somebody says, come and see my amateur comedy, that's kind of risky for people, right?
	I mean, if you said to someone, come and see my main stage Vegas act...
	They'd be like, yay!
	You're, you know, if you say, come and see my Penn and Teller show, because I'm Penn or Teller, and you'd be like, wow, thanks very much.
	I'd love to come, because you know it's going to be good, right?
	But if you're like, come and see my amateur era comedy, that's a little dicey for people, right?
	Because...
	Oh, no, and I understand that, like, if it were to go bad.
	Like, what if you suck?
	Or what if she just doesn't like your comedy, and then you're like, hey, what did you think?
	And they're like, whoa.
	I don't want to lie, but it's tricky, right?
	Well, another thing is I don't even have to perform.
	I mean, it's a free show.
	You can just show up and it's...
	Oh, no.
	It's not the financial cost.
	It's the emotional cost.
	Because they might say...
	Like, if they didn't like your comedy and the odds are higher that they're not going to like your comedy because...
	You're doing it twice a month and not, you know, two times a day at Yuck Yucks.
	So the odds are higher that they're not going to like your comedy and it's going to be awkward, right?
	I mean, again, I don't know this woman.
	I don't know.
	But that would be sort of my thought.
	If that's the case.
	And sometimes people are completely wrong.
	You could be the funniest guy in the known universe.
	No doubt about it.
	Could be.
	But people sort of look at these situations.
	Like if you said, I want American Idol.
	Do you want to come see me sing?
	That's one thing.
	Where if you said, I'd really like you to come see me sing at karaoke.
	That's another thing, right?
	Because you're going to want feedback from your co-worker on what she thought of the show.
	And if she didn't like it, it's going to be kind of awkward.
	Anyway, that's one possibility as to why She may have headed elsewhere for her evenings entertainment.
	I know.
	I mean, it's just, it's kind of because I've known, but some of those people, I've known them for a year now, some of those people, a majority of them.
	And it's, I'm, it's really, I'm really angry.
	I'm really angry and frustrated because it's not just, you know, I've, it's not, it has nothing to do with the show.
	It's the fact that I'm trying to reach out to someone and do something with them.
	And do you want to date the woman?
	I mean, I'm just trying to make friends.
	I wouldn't date a co-worker, really.
	Do you want to date the woman?
	You didn't quite answer that question.
	Oh, no, I'm sorry.
	I didn't.
	No, no, I'm not.
	No.
	So you're in no way, shape, or form attracted to her?
	No, I find her attractive.
	Because, you know, for men, there's this old joke.
	It's not even a joke, really.
	But it's like, do you want to come upstairs and see my etchings?
	For men, mostly art is a sexual display.
	And, you know, do you want to come upstairs and see my paintings is a way of getting a woman to see, getting a woman into your house.
	And, you know, that sounds kind of sinister, into the pit of lust with the grease sides and the face skin bag.
	But so for men, art is a way of showing sexual value.
	You know, there's theories that Singing shows strong lungs and control.
	Of course, being on pitch when you sing and all of that shows intelligence.
	The ability to remember songs shows memory.
	It's a way of showing the brain fitness that you have as a man.
	Of course, comedy, humor is associated with intelligence.
	And that, you know, the funnier you are, generally there's a correlation between that and intelligence.
	So, and also, if you have a good sense of humor, then you're going to be easier to roll with life's inevitable punches and so on.
	So, it's possible that You have some incentive to say, come see my show as a form of mating display.
	Even if you can't necessarily date the woman because she's a co-worker, it may be a form of mating display.
	And she may be reacting to that in some way, shape or form.
	That's just a possibility.
	You know, I mean, it's, you know, when I was younger and dating, you know, one of the things, you know, I've got a book.
	I wrote a book.
	Would you like to read my book?
	Here's my poetry.
	Here's, you know, whatever it is, right?
	Come see me sing at karaoke because I think I can pull off a couple of mean songs at karaoke.
	So it could be any number of things, but they are all, you know, look at my reproductive fitness in one way or another.
	I mean, that is kind of my thing.
	I mean, that's the first thing I do.
	I mean, just man or woman, I just, hey, come see my show, or just come to this open mic.
	Because I don't really go out very often.
	For me, that's something that I can do to invite people out.
	To kind of share with them.
	Beyond that, I kind of like to play board games.
	And I think inviting someone over to play Magic the Gathering for the first time might be a little over to your apartment.
	Might be a little weird.
	Unless you are actually Penn Jillette, a magic show is pretty much a chick repellent.
	I mean, you might as well say, bring your 20-sided dice and let's go slay some orcs in the Caves of Chaos.
	Oh, there's a reference from the 80s.
	Oh, there's going to be three people who said, I can't believe you said that.
	I actually had a co-worker at a different job.
	First thing I did was invite her to play Dungeons and Dragons.
	Like, let's play Dungeons and Dragons!
	Talk about throwing them in at the deep end.
	Let's have a baby together.
	Oh yeah, she actually did show up.
	Oh yeah?
	Oh yeah.
	I assume that you were in your full thong with a hammer barbarian costume to greet her at the door?
	I don't think she would have gone if I did that.
	That was too bad.
	But I do, I have been, it's kind of frustrating.
	I can't even, I'm so angry with, I kind of, I feel this huge level of feeling of rejection and alienation.
	Now, you listened to the show for a while, right?
	Yes.
	What's my next question going to be?
	My childhood?
	Yeah, I mean, does this remind you of anything, potentially?
	Are you replaying something from your childhood?
	Self-knowledge is the key.
	Self-knowledge is the first commandment of Socrates.
	Knowing the source of your emotions is one of the keys to personal freedom, certainly freedom from this kind of frustration and anger.
	So, as far as reaching out and rejection goes, do you have any history of that?
	Oh, I mean, yeah, I've never shared many interests with the rest of my family.
	I've definitely tried...
	Because I've always had...
	Even with anyone, my parents or anything, because I was always into video games, and they just don't understand that at all.
	Well, to be more precise, I would argue it's not that you were really into video games, it's that you preferred video games to interacting with people around you.
	Yeah.
	Right?
	Yeah.
	So why did you prefer video games to interacting with people around you?
	Because the people around me were kind of not really curious about me.
	I mean, they didn't show much interest at all.
	Yeah, listen, don't get me wrong.
	I'm not saying there's anything wrong with video games.
	I like them too.
	But video games They fill a void, right?
	Like so much of what we call the free market at the moment or the market, so much of what we call entertainment is the filling a void, right?
	So people who can't talk to each other or don't talk to each other about anything important, it creates a loneliness, it creates a void, and nature abhors a vacuum, and...
	What remains of capitalism abhors emotional voids and will reach to fill that emotional void with a variety of things.
	Video games, media, pornography, online surfing.
	It could be any number of things.
	I think it's important to understand that when you pursue solitary activities, again, nothing wrong with solitary activities, but when you pursue solitary activities, it is, you know, economics is all about seeing the unseen costs, not the visible benefits.
	So yes, you're enjoying video games, nothing wrong with that.
	But when it becomes a significant part of your life, it's because there's something missing somewhere else that's going to lure you away.
	I'm aware with my daughter, she has access to iPods and stuff.
	So when we drive, it's my job to engage her in a conversation that's more fun than an iPod.
	I'm competing with the ghost of Steve Jobs when it comes to interacting with my child.
	I relish that challenge because what it does when you're competing with media As a parent, or as a friend, or as a lover, or husband, whatever, it means that you have to up your conversational game, which means I have to figure out the stuff that she's really interested in talking about, to the point where she's not going to want to play a game or watch a movie, but she's going to want to chat with me.
	And that is the case, you know, like last night, my wife and I wanted my daughter to come to dinner, and she was playing something not, if she wasn't playing a computer thing, she was playing with some stuffed animals, And I had to think of a topic that was interesting enough to get her to come and chat at dinner.
	And I relish that challenge.
	It means that I can't be lazy when it comes to being a conversationalist with my daughter.
	And so I love having the competition around of, you know, an Xbox, an iPod, an iPad and all that kind of stuff.
	Because it means I have to really work to compete with those things to have a great conversation with her.
	And that means I really have to focus on bringing quality.
	To the interaction.
	If I didn't bring any quality to the interaction, she would, I think, be drawn more and more to those things, and it sounds a little bit like that's what happened to you.
	Does that make any sense?
	Oh, yeah.
	I definitely...
	Even now, I like to do some solitary activities.
	I like to...
	Even board games, I seek out stuff that I can do for myself.
	That's because of the people around me.
	Outside of work, I'm okay, but it's at work.
	I usually feel this frustration because everyone else there is kind of not interested and don't really...
	I mean, the only thing they do is go out drinking.
	They have their little clique.
	after work they'll go out drinking and then I'll just kind of go home and not even bother but um I don't know I mean it's okay if you were to sit down if you were to sit down with your parents like I never know what people should do I'm just telling you my thoughts
	but if you were to sit down with your parents and ask them questions about you i think it would be it's always an interesting exercise i and maybe it would be something to do in person as well, to ask them how much they know about you.
	I think that's an important thing.
	I think it's an important thing.
	So they say, well, they would say, I like video games.
	They say, well, which video games do I like?
	And they may know or they may not know.
	What kind of music do I like?
	Which are my favorite bands?
	What are my favorite movies?
	What are my favorite TV shows?
	What are my favorite books?
	Who are my friends?
	So that's something that they may know.
	And then the question is, why?
	Why do you think I like video games so much?
	I mean, that's an important question.
	I mean, one of the things that I'm focusing on as a father these days, my daughter's four and a half, is to continually reinforce the value of self-knowledge for her.
	Like if she's feeling cranky, why?
	When did you start feeling cranky?
	What were you thinking about?
	And I've told her about when I was a kid, I guess I was five or six, I started doing this game.
	I probably came partly out of boredom, but I did this game where I'd be thinking of a red Choo-choo train, like a red train.
	And I'd say, why am I thinking of a red train?
	Oh, because I saw a red ball.
	And, you know, why was I looking out the window to see a red ball?
	Oh, because there's a tree outside my window that looks like a soldier taking a shot over the horizon.
	What was I thinking when I looked at that?
	Well, I was thinking about another tree monster coming over the horizon.
	And why was I thinking the tree monster was in the shape of X? Oh, because I saw a comic book yesterday which had, you know, this tripod kind of thing out of War of the Worlds.
	So I would try and figure out what thoughts led to my current thought.
	You know, following the Hansel and Gretel trail back through the woods to try and figure out why I was thinking of this current thought.
	It's actually a really great game and a great mental exercise to do and to have.
	Follow the trail of breadcrumbs back so you can figure out why you're thinking of your current thought.
	Oh, before this I was thinking of this, and before that I was thinking of this, and before that I was thinking...
	And at some point you won't remember, and that's fine.
	But it's a really great mental exercise to go through, and I'm trying to teach my daughter the value of that.
	Now, the reason that I can is because I can lead her.
	Like, I know why she thinks of certain things because I've spent so much time with her.
	I know how her mind works.
	And I said, well, was it because you were thinking of this?
	And, you know, sometimes, and most of the times, I'm right and so on.
	I'm teaching her the value of that.
	And, you know, we'll often make jokes about, you know, I will say things, oh, you're so happy about this when I know it's something she doesn't like and we'll laugh about it.
	And so she knows that I know her really well.
	Right?
	So, you know, I will list off her ten favorite movies.
	I will list off, you know, her five favorite songs.
	And maybe I'll get them in the wrong order, but I'm always correct.
	So I want her to know that I really know her preferences.
	I know what she likes.
	I know who she is.
	I know what motivates her.
	Because it's really important for me that she knows that I know who she is.
	And I think that's really important with people around you To try and figure out how much they know about you, how curious they are about you, how much they know what makes you tick, how much they know about your preferences and dislikes, and why those preferences and dislikes occur.
	I think that's really important.
	If your parents do know that, but you don't know that your parents know that, it's a great topic of conversation.
	If your parents don't know these things, then it's a great opportunity to communicate these things.
	So I think that's really important, and that would be Something I would do.
	Again, I don't know what you should do, but that would be something I would do.
	Yeah, I mean, that would be a very interesting conversation to have.
	It's not something I can have with my mother.
	My mother, she, to kind of help you understand what kind of woman she is, whenever she'd go out grocery shopping, she'd be like, here, I bought you some ice cream, and it would be her favorite flavor.
	And I'd go, well, I don't think you bought me this ice cream.
	I think you bought it for yourself because I don't like this flavor.
	I mean, it's not mine at all.
	Or for birthdays or something.
	Here, you know, I thought you would like these.
	And it'd be stuff that I have no interest in at all.
	And it's been like that my entire life with her.
	Yeah, it'd be like my wife's birthday.
	Here, honey, I bought you this dual video card for your notebook.
	Yeah, that would clearly be something that would be preferential to me.
	So I think that it's worth exploring the degree to which people who say that they love you know you.
	If you have doubts about it.
	Because again, we're an empiricist.
	So if somebody says that they know me and they love me and they care about me and so on, then I'm going to ask them at some point, you know, if I have doubts, the degree to which they know and understand me.
	If they are significantly short on answers, that's an important thing for me to know.
	Alright.
	I do have...
	I'm still not sure about the work thing about trying to connect with everyone.
	I don't know if it's just something that I should...
	The brief answer is that my guess would be that if you have experienced The feeling of rejection from your parents, reaching out for and being rejected from your parents, then you can read a metaphor from, again, the free book, Real-Time Relationships, at freedomainradio.com forward slash free.
	You can download the PDF or look at the, I think there's an HTML version, do a search for Simon the Boxer.
	The repetition compulsion that occurs, at least in my way of thinking, is that we tend to recreate things which are unprocessed within us from our childhoods.
	And if you are recreating experiences of rejection, you know, which of course comedians and actors can be accused of sometimes doing because there's so much rejection in both of those fields.
	But if you did experience a lot of feelings of rejection and so on from your parents or a lack of interest in what you're doing, then that would be something that you might be recreating in your current experience.
	In which case, you won't be able to solve it, except by going back to the root.
	Alright.
	That sounds good.
	I think I'll try to spend a little more time focusing on that.
	Okay.
	I mean, I hear your skepticism, and you could be right, but you can try it on.
	There's no problems with trying it on and see if that works for you, and I certainly wish you the best with this kind of thing, but if you do have If you do have a history of managing rejection and if that's something that you gain a sense of efficacy from when you're as a kid managing rejection, then it will be something that I think will follow you until you get to the root.
	So that would be where I would start looking.
	It certainly may not be the best place to look.
	It may not be the last place to look, but I think it's a reasonable first place to start.
	All right.
	Sounds good.
	Thanks.
	All right.
	Thanks, man.
	Best of luck to you.
	And I hope that your stand-up comedy goes well.
	Yeah, it's taught me a lot.
	It's a hell of a job.
	It's a hard job, man.
	I mean, I don't know.
	I've given it a shot at various points in my life.
	It's a hard job, and I really admire people who can pull it off, so good for you.
	Alright, thanks.
	But you certainly wouldn't be the first angry comedian who's dealing with feelings of rejection by attempting to manage and control and disarm an audience.
	So, you know, maybe you can use it for good.
	So, thanks very much.
	Let's move on to the next caller.
	All right, Freddy, you were up next.
	Ready, Freddy?
	Hello, Stefan.
	Go for it, I can hear you.
	What's up, my friend?
	I'm well, thanks.
	How are you doing?
	Okay.
	I'm fine, too.
	All right, thanks.
	I have this question.
	I thought that maybe you could give me some insight.
	I'm currently a software engineer working in France.
	I'm not a French citizen.
	I really want to quit my job and start my own company.
	Do you hear me?
	I'm sorry, do you hear me?
	Yes, go ahead.
	The only problem that I have is that If I stop working, if I quit my job and start my own thing, I would have to go back to my country of origin And lose these years where I stayed in France.
	So I lose basically the opportunity of being a European citizen and having access to the world basically where I could talk to other business partners and make my business thrive.
	Okay?
	Yes, so that's it basically.
	I spend a lot of time trying to figure out how things are going to unfold in the world.
	If there is going to be an economic collapse or not, where, what are the places that are going to be good to be within.
	And I can't really decide what course of action I should take.
	I don't know if that makes sense to you or if it's totally unclear.
	No, it does.
	I mean, I get this question a lot, which is where to hide.
	I don't know the answer as to where to hide.
	But I will say this, that the unemployment rate in the US, I don't know what it is in France, but the unemployment rate for people with good skills still remains quite low.
	So people with good technical skills, with a good education and so on, the unemployment rate remains 4.5%, 5%.
	So the best thing to do, in my opinion, When there is economic uncertainty.
	I think it's a good thing to do no matter what.
	But the best thing to do is to build up your human capital as much as possible.
	Let's say tomorrow I wake up and I don't want to do this show anymore.
	Let's just say I wake up tomorrow and I'm like, you know, six years, seven years, that's a hell of a long time to be yammering on about philosophy on the web.
	So I'm not going to do it anymore.
	Well, I've gained a lot of skills in doing what I'm doing.
	I've made a lot of contacts in doing what I'm doing.
	And, you know, I can pretty much guarantee that I'd have 20 job offers within a week or two.
	If I wanted.
	You know, either in the software field or in the economics field or in the finance field or in the media field.
	I'd go and do something else and that would be my new thing.
	And because I've gained a lot of skills in doing what I'm doing.
	And some of those are technical, like how to run a show and all that kind of stuff.
	Some of those are entrepreneurial, how to grow a show, some of those are financial, how to make a reasonable profit from a show, and all those kinds of things.
	So, I carry that wherever I go.
	And so, you know, there's lots of things that you can invest in in this world.
	You know, gold, bitcoins, real estate, stocks, bonds, you name it.
	But one of the things that I think is really important to invest in is your own human capital, right?
	That which generates value for other people.
	And so, becoming an entrepreneur is a very valuable thing.
	No matter what.
	If you become an entrepreneur and you succeed, that's obviously great.
	I mean, that's a wonderful thing.
	You can make a lot of money.
	You become your own boss to a large degree.
	I mean, you're still enslaved to your customers, but that's going to be the case no matter what.
	And that's great.
	And, of course, you develop a lot of contacts and you develop relationships with customers.
	Like, I know some of my employees who ended up working for some of the customers.
	Like, after I left the company, they didn't really want to stay, so they ended up working for some of the customers that they'd serviced.
	Great.
	Wonderful stuff.
	So, you know, contact skills.
	And one of the great things about being an entrepreneur is, you know, let's say it works for a while, then it doesn't work.
	Whenever I was a manager, I interviewed hundreds of people over the course of my career and hired probably 50, 60, 70.
	I was always interested in people who had an entrepreneurial experience, even if they had failed, and maybe even especially because they could think in business terms.
	One of the great dangers of being an employee is you think about your profit, that you think about your raise, you think about your career, and you don't think about the value of the business as a whole.
	Now, if you're an entrepreneur, a business owner, business manager, or just a manager, The employee who thinks about the good of the company is one of the most valuable employees you're ever going to have.
	So I think taking the entrepreneurial risk, if you're young and can try for it, or not young, but if you have the means and you don't have like six kids who need braces or whatever and no money, if you can take that chance, it's one of the most secure.
	Like, what's the most secure position to be in in an economic downturn?
	Well, having the greatest amount of human capital available.
	So I would...
	I would strongly suggest it because it's kind of a no-lose way to make yourself as economically valuable as possible and I think that is the best position to be in whatever the state of the economy.
	Does that make any sense?
	Yes, absolutely.
	I totally agree with the fact that the best time to become an entrepreneur is between the time where you graduate or where you decide to drop out because you have this crazy idea and the time where you get married and have kids that you're responsible for and so on.
	And the only problem that I have, I mean, I would totally have done that when I would have quit my job and started my own thing, but the problem that I have is that if I do this right now, I would have to get out of France because if I want to stay here, I need to have a job.
	I need to provide this government with the proof that I'm having the regular revenues, no risk of becoming a criminal or something like that.
	And the other option for me would be to say, hey, okay, France is done.
	There is this economic collapse and France is, although it has a lot of talents, it's not a country where I would like to live in the next decades and that returning to my country of origin is okay even though it is undeveloped.
	It's not very well developed and there are many issues.
	It's worth it and okay, I'm going to accept to have a lower standard of living and maybe if you look at it with a gloomy With a gloomy vision you could say that it's an open prison because you can't travel to other countries from there if you don't have another citizenship.
	But it's okay.
	It's worth it.
	I'm going to create my business there and thrive.
	I could make this choice.
	So right now I don't know which course of action to take if I should just quit my job and return to my country of origin and start my business or Keep up this software engineer job that is good but is not really what I want to do that I find boring to some extent and do this until I have this French citizenship where afterwards I could quit my job
	and do this.
	Do you see what I mean here?
	Yeah, so is your issue that France may not be a good place to start your business because you fear regulation, 75% taxation?
	You know, in France, you think a company with more than 20 employees, it gets kind of messy, that kind of stuff?
	Exactly.
	Yes, absolutely.
	I mean, I'm sorry, I should have started with this.
	Creating my business in France is almost impossible.
	It's impossible.
	Because if I do it as a foreigner, I would have to have customers right away.
	I would have to have customers right away in order to be able to stay, basically.
	And if I don't, they just throw me out of the country without any regards to my business potential.
	Yeah, I mean, it sounds like, again, I would pay the money and consider it the cost of startup.
	I would pay the money to sit down with a...
	An employment lawyer or a corporate lawyer in France to figure out what my options were, what the kind of hurdles would be.
	Really get a detailed layout of the options.
	It's going to cost you a couple of hundred euros, I'm sure, but it's well worth getting professional expertise in the realm to make sure that you've got a very clear understanding of the regulatory and tax environment that you're going to be in.
	I don't know the answer as to whether you should stay in France or not.
	Obviously that's pretty technical and it comes down to how to navigate the laws and so on.
	But I will say this, that starting a business is stressful enough that I'm not sure that I'd want a whole lot of regulatory pressure and being kicked out of the country pressure on me at the same time.
	So I would go to a place where I had the most capacity to concentrate.
	And of course you can always assume sell into France from somewhere else, right?
	Yes, yes, exactly.
	And I would like to say that I'm very sorry that you face these kinds of regulatory pressures.
	You should just be able to go start a business.
	I think it was John Sossel who went to Singapore, wanted to sell some hats from 2020 or whatever, and was able to set up his business the next day.
	I'd just go start selling hats.
	And then he went other places in the world and had to wait weeks or sometimes even months to just start a hat selling business.
	It's terrible.
	It is absolutely wretched.
	And of course a huge amount of human energy and entrepreneurship is all wasted and destroyed and never comes to fruition because of all of this kind of stuff.
	But it's the kind of stuff that the corporate masters really like.
	Again, as I mentioned at the beginning of the show, they really don't like competition from small startups, and so they throw as much regulatory pressure in front of small startups as they possibly can.
	And the big companies use the state to keep their dinosaurs that keep the mammals in zoos so that they don't compete with them for resources.
	And it's really tragic.
	And I'm very sorry that you faced this At all.
	I mean, you shouldn't have to face this kind of stuff, but this is the environment that we're in.
	But I would really try to get to an environment where you're focused most on satisfying your customers and growing your business and having fun.
	You know, the important thing when you're an entrepreneur is to have fun.
	It's something that I remember learning quite early on as an entrepreneur because, you know, it's pretty anxiety provoking.
	It's pretty scary.
	People who've not I've done it, don't understand how scary it can be.
	Particularly, you know, I was young and broke and had to sign huge amounts of guarantees for loans for the bank.
	It was pretty terrifying.
	And I learned, too, that, you know, You may succeed, you may fail, but the only way you can really fail is if you don't have fun either way.
	You know, if you succeed but you were just terrified and not having fun the whole time, is that really success?
	And if you fail and you weren't enjoying yourself and having fun the whole time, then that truly is a massive failure because you failed and didn't even have fun failing.
	And...
	The most important thing is to focus on the enjoyment because out of the enjoyment comes the creativity and the passion and out of enjoyment also comes, I think, the best employee relationships which you're definitely going to need to succeed in the long run.
	So if worrying about getting kicked out of the country, massive taxes, regulations and so on is interfering significantly with your enjoyment, I would say that that makes it fail no matter what happens, if that makes sense.
	Yes, exactly.
	Yeah, that makes sense.
	Okay.
	I mean, I remember years ago, I was in...
	I know it's completely relevant to the story, but I'm going to try and remember anyway.
	I was in Vegas for business, and I went to karaoke.
	And there's that song, And She Will Be Loved.
	And it's a pretty high note.
	And a guy went up and started singing the song.
	And like a lot of people, you know, the songs usually don't start off that high, and then you hit these high notes...
	In the chorus, and man, he just went for that note.
	And you could hear, you know, his vocal cords just shredding like cheese on a grater.
	But man, he just didn't back down.
	And it's like, I may hit the note.
	I may punch the note.
	I may beat the note up in horrible ghetto-style ways.
	But I'm going to get that note no matter what.
	And he actually, people cheered.
	Because it's like, yeah, you know, take on that note.
	And he failed.
	Like, I mean, this was not something he would release as a final take or anything like that.
	But he had a great deal of fun not hitting the note.
	I admired that.
	He got applause and people cheered.
	Except when I went up to sing, they had almost the most fun that night.
	Just with that guy taking on those high notes and just not backing down in the face of things that his vocals couldn't quite handle.
	And that's always a good reminder to just go for the high note and, you know, maybe you get it and maybe you don't, but, you know, commit fully and have fun no matter what and then you really can't lose.
	Okay, okay.
	I see what your point is.
	Okay.
	Okay, Stefan, thanks a lot for your insights.
	Thank you, man.
	And listen, best of luck with what you're doing.
	And if you want to use the...
	The new, improved Free Domain Radio message board to sell your wares, please let me know.
	Maybe I can do something on Facebook to help you out and start to drive some people towards your website or your services.
	I'm always happy to help out listeners.
	So just let me know if there's anything I can do to help publicize what you're doing.
	Okay.
	Okay.
	Thank you.
	Thanks, man.
	Best of luck.
	Thanks.
	Take care.
	Goodbye.
	I think we've got time to squeeze in one more.
	All right.
	Or do we have anyone?
	Michael.
	Oh, yeah.
	We have Michael up next, and then two more on standby, depending on how long you want to go.
	I don't know about two more, but let's do Michael.
	Okay.
	Michael, you're up.
	Let's do Michael.
	Let's do Michael.
	Am I coming through?
	You are.
	Okay.
	Well, good news is I'm skinny, so I should be able to fit.
	I want to talk to you.
	I'm looking to...
	I moved to New Hampshire pretty soon.
	I live in New Mexico, and that's a pretty big move.
	Not only am I having some stress about it, but it's also had a lot of good effects.
	I'm much more motivated right now, now that I have kind of a window to get out of here.
	Is it you Free State Projecting?
	Yes, that's what I'm looking to do.
	Go up there and do something a little more agorist, or if not totally agorist.
	Okay, so for those who don't know, the Free State project run by the delectable Carla...
	Is the idea that you get enough people to move to New Hampshire and you can swing the votes towards more of a libertarian idea and you know that's I don't really not too much into political solutions but the value of course is that you go there and you actually get to lick the pole of libertarianism with other people and be stuck there but you'll actually have people around to understand where you're coming from and aren't going to look at you sideways when you say that maybe the welfare state isn't the best way to help the poor And there's value in that.
	So that's just for those who don't know, that's the Free State Project idea.
	And they've got lots of ways to help you transition and get you places and get you introduced to people.
	So it's a ready-made community.
	Just add you!
	Anyway, I just wanted to mention that.
	Yeah, I've talked to Ian a couple times.
	I've called him to Free Talk Live.
	And he's given me some links to forums and stuff, which there should be people there to help out.
	That's a lot of the draw to me, to New Hampshire, is that there's going to be people up there who, just to use a quick term, don't really accept collectivism.
	I mean, they might in one way or another, but generally, I live in an area that our identity is pretty much all about football, the high school football team.
	There's 60, 70 churches to cover 18,000 people.
	We have the Federal Law Enforcement Training Center here.
	You know, it's just steep where I'm in collectivism.
	And so hence the motivation to move.
	Yeah, I saw this map the other day, everything that's wrong with America in one graphic.
	And the map was of all the states where they found the highest-paid person at a university, and in almost all the states it was a football coach or a basketball coach.
	In a few states it was the head of the medical faculty, and I think in one state it was the president of the university, but in all the other states it was the head of the sports team, the coach of the sports team.
	I mean, it's probably not everything that's wrong with America, but it's not a bad place to look at and let your cynical collectivist heart swell and feast on that kind of ridiculousness.
	And we don't even have a college team here.
	It's the high school football team, which just makes it more ridiculous.
	But I think I really need to focus more on the stresses here.
	Like I said, that's a long move, and I've never been to New Hampshire.
	The furthest east I've been is probably Louisiana.
	The furthest north is Oklahoma.
	On that side, I've been to Nevada.
	I have a sister that lives in Nevada.
	And that's even moving further away from her and her family.
	Sorry, whose family?
	My sister.
	Okay, yeah, yeah.
	Oh, did we lose you?
	No, I'm here.
	I'm not really sure.
	Yeah, listen, I'll give you my brief take on it.
	Your home is with like-minded people.
	That's your tribe.
	That's your nirvana.
	You know, that's where your home is, is with like-minded people.
	And in the realm of philosophy, when I say like-minded people, I just mean minded people.
	People who can think, people who follow The process of reason and evidence, wherever it leads, that is your home.
	Like, there's a whole bunch of people in this world who would try to convince you that your home is accidental bullshit.
	A, B, just accidental bullshit.
	That's your home.
	Where you happen to be born, the religion you happen to be born into, the team that happens to be around you in the sports arena, you know, whatever it's going to be, the race that you happen to be born into, the Whatever bullshit tribe is floating around, people will always try To get you to believe that your home is the accidental bullshit, accidental bullshit of happenstance, of mere, you know, where did your fingers run out of steam when the stalk happened to be flying over?
	Hey, look, that's the best place ever.
	That's the only place you need to be.
	That's, you know, America, where you happen to be born, is the best country.
	Islam, which is the religion you happen to be born into, is the very only true faith.
	Your sports team, which you happen to have close by, that's the very best sports team and the only one that matters and the only one that should win.
	And people will always try to convince you that accidental bullshit is your home and your true identity and I don't believe that's true at all.
	You know, the only intimacy and companionship that I think you're ever going to have is with people who can think, with people who are emotionally intelligent, with people who are mature, with people who can actually have relationships, with people who are going to be curious about you, with people who are going to really want to get to know you.
	With people with whom you can grow and change your mind with and accept new evidence, new arguments, and continue the life's journey towards as perfect a knowledge as we can distill from the random brain juice of reason and evidence.
	So I would say that you will probably feel more at home in New Hampshire than just about any place you've been since you dropped off your mama's boobs.
	That would be my guess.
	What do you think?
	Well, I agree to a great degree, because I've felt all that before, where, you know, thank God I live in the U.S. Thank God I believe in the real, true God.
	Thank God, you know, for this, that, and the other, and it's not real.
	And you do have God to thank for that, which means nobody at all, other than a collective delusion, but go on.
	And it's been over the past couple of years, really, that I've I've begun to accept atheism, begun to accept anarchism, begun to just be skeptical about what people are saying, and it's allowed me to be more me here even in Artesia, if that makes any sense.
	The friendships that I've cultivated since then, they have skewed towards anarchy or atheism.
	I mean, people don't go all the way, but they're willing to accept me and willing to Talk with me and, you know, they don't get all emotional whenever they're trying to make the universe God.
	And I'm like, but no, that's not the definition of God.
	No, that's...
	Yeah, listen, collectivism is isolation.
	In the same way that we believe somehow that drugs equals perception and insight and happiness, it's not.
	It's just scrambling your neurons, basically.
	Collectivism is isolation.
	It's The Lonely Crowd.
	It's a book that was written many years ago.
	To share a delusion is not to be close to anyone or anything.
	If you join the We Believe There Are Leprechauns Society and everyone goes there dressed as a leprechaun and talks all about leprechauns, they're not getting to know each other.
	All they're doing is reinforcing their shared delusion, which means reinforcing their isolation from each other, which is bad, but reinforcing their isolation and rejection of reality, which is even worse.
	Human beings can only meet where things are real.
	Human beings can only meet in reality.
	In shared collective delusions, there is only isolation.
	It spits you out like a cannon into the interstellar void of loneliness, and that loneliness makes people addicted To reinforcing the delusions that reinforce the loneliness, which reinforce the need to reinforce the delusions, which reinforce the loneliness, which reinforces the need to reinforce the illusions, which reinforces the loneliness.
	Repeat, repeat, repeat.
	Die.
	That is the great tragedy of people who believe.
	Like, you end up isolated because you believe in things that aren't real and aren't true, which means that you get addicted to reinforcing those beliefs because that's all you think of as intimacy.
	It's going together to gather to sing the same hymns or the same national anthem or the same sports song or whatever it is or the same song that some band is playing in a club or something like that.
	Getting together and all chanting nonsense with other people is what people mistake for A tribe.
	They mistake that for intimacy.
	They mistake that for connection.
	Connection is person to person, not two people facing a delusion and reinforcing it in each other.
	That's called enabling.
	That's like two drunk people telling each other how great drinking is.
	That's not the same as actually getting to know someone, or being curious about them in an unpolluted Uncontaminated, undiluted state of facing each other, clear, direct, in reality, not manipulating the hand puppets of delusion and thinking that you're hugging.
	That is not reality.
	That is not intimacy.
	And the shared delusion approach to trying to solve the problem of loneliness, like all addictions, makes it worse and makes the addiction stronger.
	And pulling yourself away and recognizing the fact that shared delusions have continued to isolate you, In the same way that any addiction is fundamentally predicated on isolation and all addicts end up alone if they continue.
	It's really painful, but it is an essential thing to let go of the false solution so that you can actually grab on to the real solution.
	And that's as terrifying to people as letting go of the only log that's keeping them floating in an ocean and striking out to where they hope the shore might be somewhere over the horizon.
	It is terrifying, but it is essential.
	You know, a lot of what you say there really strikes at the root.
	I'm someone who is isolated a lot, whether through my own choice or through the actions of others, both.
	Let's say I've only had these three or four brands that have really gotten to the point where they Whenever we talk to them about this, that, and the other, and they see that I'm not getting upset, and they don't get upset either, you know, whenever I'm challenging them, or even when we're talking about ways that we agree.
	And it's, like I say, it's scary, but I guess it's a point to, it's like either I'm going to stay alone all the time, or I'm going to face this.
	But I don't really want to talk about kind of where we agree.
	I mean, I really appreciate what you've said so far.
	It's good to hear, to talk about your own story and hear someone kind of agree and empathize with you.
	What I'm kind of worried about, partly, is my family.
	I told my job I've worked with them for a little while, that I'm going and they're fine with me doing that.
	They're going to support me, write letters and all that.
	But my mom, I told my mom that I want to move to New Hampshire, and she doesn't seem to really believe me.
	I mean, I've only talked to her really badly.
	What do you mean she doesn't believe you?
	I understand.
	Does she not believe New Hampshire exists?
	Does she not believe that there's any way to get there?
	I don't understand.
	Well, I think part of it is that she feels, and she hadn't really said so explicitly, but she feels that I kind of owe her to stay around.
	Not just her, I mean, I owe it to The family, you know, help out around the house, help out with her parents, my grandma and grandpa, as my grandpa is getting older.
	And it's hard really for me to argue because my mom and stuff...
	Oh, so, sorry, she's saying that it would be convenient for her if you were to help out.
	I think that's accurate, yes.
	Yeah, and I'm sure that's true.
	I'm sure it would be very convenient for her if you helped out.
	I've no doubt about that, and obviously it's going to be a loss to her if you move to New Hampshire, right?
	Yeah, and like I say, it's hard to argue, because my mom and dad divorced whenever I was like a year old.
	And like you, I didn't see my dad.
	I mean, I'd see him every now and then, but he was pretty much never around.
	And over the past couple of years, I chose, because whenever I did see them, it would be me going to see them.
	Just not to deal with that side of the family anymore.
	But the family has always been there.
	You know, one of the things that you give up when you divorce, if you divorce a spouse and you have kids, one of the things that you give up is imposing obligations on your children.
	Unfortunately, that's just logically one of the consequences of divorcing.
	And I don't know any way around that.
	I mean, is she going to say, well...
	You know, it would be better for me if you stuck around and, you know, I imagine that it would have been better for you if your parents had worked things out and you'd grown up with a dad, right?
	I think developmentally, yes.
	Oh, I know that.
	That for sure is the case.
	You know, sons in particular who grew up without fathers, and I say this from personal experience, we face a whole host of problems that are incredibly difficult.
	Geez, I had to drop over $20,000 on therapy just to become a halfway decent partner in a romantic relationship.
	Now, not all of that is due to the fact that I grew up without a dad, but it sure as hell was part of it.
	And so, for moms who divorced dads to then say to their adult sons, you have an obligation to me that you need to fulfill, it's like, well, That's not how you acted, right?
	I mean, if you didn't like living with dad, you just kicked him to the curb.
	And I never saw the guy after that, which may have had something to do with you.
	It may not have.
	I don't know.
	But I don't know how you get to say, well, I didn't like living with your dad, so I got divorced.
	Even though I made a vow and voluntarily chose him, and I assume made a vow to stay together until, for better or for worse, through sickness and health, till death do us part, I just decided to break that vow at massive expense to my children, particularly my sons.
	But now, my son, you have an obligation to me.
	I just don't know how that works logically.
	I'm not trying to be mean or anything like that.
	I just, I genuinely can't follow How that can work.
	I mean, it was better for your mom, for whatever reason, to not be married to your dad.
	It was much worse for you to not have a dad around.
	So your mom did what she wanted at your expense.
	I don't know how you're now supposed to sacrifice what you want to do for the sake of her preferences.
	Does that make sense?
	Yes, it does.
	I think to her perspective, though, the way I've turned out, which I think is It's fairly good, even from her perspective, you know, from the normal society perspective, was because of her, because she, you know, stuck around, she took care of me, she did this and that and the other.
	No, it's always better to have two parents.
	It's always better to have two parents.
	I mean, that's...
	I don't even know how to explain that.
	That's so obvious.
	It is always better to have two parents, because...
	One parent is often busy working, cooking, cleaning, maintaining, paying the bills, getting the groceries, and so on.
	And it's always better to have two parents so that one parent can play with the children, can interact with the children while the other parent is doing stuff.
	It's always almost infinitely better for a child to have both parents at home.
	And so, yeah, I'm, you know, sound like a nice guy, smart guy, listen to this show, gotta be one of the top 1% of humanity, I believe.
	But for sure, it was...
	For sure, you're worse off because you didn't have two parents, two, you know, happy, healthy, loving parents at home.
	I mean, that's just...
	I mean, that's not even to do with their personalities.
	I mean, obviously, it's better if they're nice people.
	But that's just to do with the fact that resources are limited.
	And running a household takes a huge amount of time.
	I mean, I just know this.
	You know, sometimes my wife and I play hot potato.
	You know, oh, I got to go do a little bit of work.
	Here you go, mama.
	You know, play with Izzy.
	And then my wife's like, oh, I'm going to cook dinner.
	Go play with daddy.
	And I stop doing my work and go play with her.
	I mean, there is, you know, I love to play with her sometimes more than I even love doing this, but there are times when I got to do this because, you know, I got to eat and love what I do, but having two parents is always, almost infinitely better for children than having one parent.
	parents, just a matter of time and resources.
	resources.
	I agree.
	And this doesn't mean your mom's a bad person or anything.
	I'm not trying to say any of that.
	I'm just trying to say that she divorced your dad at great expense to you.
	And that was her preference and it was better for her.
	Assuming your dad wasn't some Chainsaw-wielding axe murderer or something.
	But she...
	And I just say this because, you know, 60 to 70% of divorces in this world are initiated by women, and the number one cause is dissatisfaction.
	Just not quite happy enough, right?
	Just don't really like it that much.
	He's not abusive, he's not a drunk, he's not beating me, he's not sleeping around.
	I'm just kind of bored.
	And again, it doesn't really matter what the details are, but your mom obviously found it preferential at your expense to not be married to your father, and either she...
	Was so unpleasant in the divorce that he didn't want to come by, or she chose a guy who was so irresponsible to have children with that he just buggered off and didn't spend any time with you, both decisions of which, of course, she's responsible for, but it was to your significant expense that this occurred.
	And so I don't know that she would then get to turn around and say, well, you owe me and you should sacrifice your interest for the sake of me.
	I just, again, I'm happy to hear arguments to the contrary, but I just can't see how that would follow.
	I am back, though.
	I am back.
	You are back?
	Yes.
	What do you mean?
	Like I said, I cut out through most of what you were saying.
	I couldn't hear on the Skype call.
	Oh, yeah.
	I'm afraid I was just repeating myself.
	Don't worry.
	It wasn't too important.
	And I'm not saying, you know, go to New Hampshire.
	You can stay in chat with your mom.
	You go back and visit.
	You can go see her and all that kind of stuff.
	I mean my wife and I love each other to death and we love our daughter to death but I don't view my goal as a parent is to raise my daughter to be convenient to my chores when she's an adult Does that make sense?
	Yes, it does.
	Like, my goal as a parent is to raise...
	Like, your goal as an archer is to draw back that bow and launch the arrow.
	My goal as a parent is to prepare my child for independent living as an adult.
	To give her the skills that are necessary for her to succeed in pursuing what she wants to pursue in the world.
	She wants to become a doctor.
	Whether that is going to stick or not, I don't know.
	My goal is to prepare her to be able to master the challenges of becoming a doctor and to prepare her for the challenges of independent living and so on.
	I don't think that my goal as a parent is to then raise her to become an adult and then keep her close to me so that she can help me with my housework or my obligations as an adult.
	I just don't think that's my goal as a parent.
	and certainly not my goal as a parent, if that makes sense.
	I think Michael dropped again, unfortunately.
	Definitely.
	Alright, well, I'm afraid, well, let's just I say that I think if you want to move to New Hampshire, you should move to New Hampshire.
	Obviously, if you want to stay in touch with the parents and stay in touch with the parents, come visit, help them out as best you can.
	But I think that your goal is to seek your own bliss, happiness, connections and success in your life.
	And I don't think that it is your responsibility.
	If you choose to, that's up to you.
	But I wouldn't take it on as an existential obligation to give up your dreams, goals, happiness and community in order to help Your mom out with her chores or her responsibilities.
	I'm sorry about that.
	Maybe we can do one more quick call, if we can, before the end of the show.
	Ian has his dream.
	If you feel up to do a dream call, it probably won't be quick.
	Sorry, we've got to do those.
	Maybe we can have a separate call about that.
	Okay.
	Probably it then for today.
	Is that it?
	That's it.
	Let me finish with a brief speech that I wanted to think about this week.
	People focus sometimes on Me.
	And look, I can understand that.
	I am enormously shiny.
	And so I can understand that.
	But people focus on me about whether they agree with me, about whether they disagree with me, about whether I'm saying something that's true or saying something that's false or whether I'm making a mistake or saying the right thing or the wrong thing and so on.
	And I would like to sort of argue that that's fundamentally a mistake.
	I understand it.
	There are also people who think that I'm the best guy in the world.
	There are people who think that I'm the worst guy in the world or whatever.
	And I would really argue that all of that is fundamentally a mistake.
	Hero worship will always bleed you of the capacity for heroism yourself.
	And I say this with some experience, like when I was younger, I worshipped Ayn Rand and then I read Judgment Day and other things about her life, and I literally was desolate afterwards with disappointment and shock.
	And I wish that I had avoided that.
	I wish someone had told me about the dangers of hero worship, of elevating someone to the point where you focus on the person rather than the principles.
	It's like studying the life of Einstein and thinking that you've learned how to apply the scientific method in your own life.
	Or you can say, well, Einstein had a really bizarre marriage.
	You know, he didn't like his wife so much that she used to have to put his dinner under the door of his study and he'd never come out and eat with her.
	Isn't that weird?
	And okay, maybe that's interesting and so on and you can study Einstein if you want.
	But that's not the same as being a scientist.
	That's just studying Einstein and getting really interested and involved in Einstein and trying to figure that out.
	The way that you become a scientist is to learn the scientific method, learn your skills in science, and come up with your theories and test and evidence and contribute papers and so on.
	That's how you become a scientist, not by studying Einstein and getting angry about whether he got things right or wrong in this particular area.
	I can't believe that Einstein spent the last 30 years or 40 years of his career looking for the unified field theory!
	What a huge mistake!
	I'm so angry about it!
	Well, all of that energy and emotional investment is simply preventing you from becoming your own scientist, becoming your own genius and your own Advocate for truth and reason and evidence in the world Don't focus on people and certainly don't elevate people to To the status of angel or devil Don't focus your emotional energies on the individual on the people and certainly don't don't worship anyone and don't hate anyone to that degree either Because
	all of the emotional investment that you put Into elevating, worshipping, or demonizing others is all of the emotional energy that is no longer available as motive power for you.
	If you pour hatred into the world, you've got a flamethrower, but that's just less gas for you to drive to get where you need to go or where you want to go.
	Don't focus on the individual.
	I've always said about this conversation, I'm supremely unimportant.
	I'm completely insignificant.
	I would rather I be forgotten and the principles continue.
	If everybody forgot about me, but remembered the philosophy, remembered how to be philosophical, remembered how to work with reason and evidence, I would be overjoyed.
	If I was a lost tombstone on an ice floe somewhere sinking in the Arctic, I would be perfectly content and happy with that because I have my impact on my friends and my family, and that's what matters to me.
	But I would really strongly advise everyone out there to not focus On people, but focus on the internalization of principles, because that is going to be your motive power for bringing virtue in the world.
	The heroism or demonization of others is fundamentally a passive environment.
	Because if you hero worship somebody else, you're basically expecting the godlike powers of that person to save the world, to save The economy to save you from evil, to save you.
	And if you're waiting to be saved by the deific personalities and godlike statutes of other people, then you're fundamentally not saving yourself.
	You know, if you think a bus is coming, you ain't gonna walk.
	And no bus is coming.
	Nobody is going to save your life.
	There's nobody out there smart enough or powerful enough to save your life.
	Your life and your environment is yours alone to save, and the degree to which you pour energy into focusing on the personality or actions of another person, no matter who.
	And this could be a mere mortal, relatively insignificant like myself, or it could be a deity, and maybe you're waiting for the second coming of Jesus.
	But all of that is fundamentally passive and hero worship is something that you might think is feeding you but it is in fact Eating you and getting upset or praising or defending other people other deities other Political leaders, other religious leaders, artists, or whatever, the degree to which you pour your energies into that is the degree to which, directly, you have less energy to motivate yourself to act in the world.
	When you hero worship, you drain your own capacity for heroism, and that's what you most desperately need.
	And frankly, in the long run, that's what the world most desperately needs as well.
	So thank you so much for Listening to the show, for supporting the show, if you find the show valuable, fdurl.com forward slash donate.
	I hugely, hugely appreciate it.
	For those of you who've asked about the documentary, It is moving along.
	We are hiring a very competent sound engineer to put together the final mix of the audio narrative, the music, and the sound effects.
	And so that is going to be quite expensive and quite a challenge.
	And we are looking, of course, to get more footage to put in.
	There may be a little bit more animation, which costs money.
	It has of course been on hold for the summer as I've been dealing with health issues, but it is moving back on track and all of this stuff requires some cash.
	I think that you will be very happy with the results.
	I think I'm quite pleased with it as well.
	I think it works really well.
	So again, FDRURL.com forward slash donate.
	If you want to donate specifically to the documentary, just let me know when you donate through PayPal in the notes.
	And if you want me to include your business or your YouTube name or your own name, just let me know and we will include it in the credits of those who've helped support and donate.
	And you will be immortalized in hopefully what will be a minor footnote to a philosophical work that I think can be very helpful.
	In the world today.
	So thank you everybody so much for your support.
	As usual, have yourselves.
	Have a wonderful week.
	I will see you in one week minus two and a half hours.

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