March 16, 2017 - Freedomain Radio - Stefan Molyneux
32:13
3619 Winning the Culture War with President Trump: Survival Guide
The ongoing culture war between the dark forces of globalism and the rising tide of nationalism has seen many battles fought within the political arena of the United States of America. As the ideological battle wages on, Stefan Molyneux explains what is truly on the line and how you can survive to continue fighting the good fight. Freedomain Radio is 100% funded by viewers like you. Please support the show by signing up for a monthly subscription or making a one time donation at: http://www.freedomainradio.com/donate
So, finding yourself a little sometimes frustrated, demotivated in the fight against globalism, the left, the uniparty, all the people who kind of hang off the jugular of productive people in order to sate their own greed for the unearned, right?
I mean...
Find yourself, it can be a little challenging at times.
I'm here to give you a rousing cri de corps to say it's okay, it's fine, it's natural, it's kind of what they want to do, right?
Battles are generally fought on, well, on two things, food and morale, and of course ammo is important as well.
But here we're going to focus on the morale side of things.
Now, this is a philosophy show, so we do current events, but I really want to remind you of the bigger principles at work here.
So, in biology there are two strategies for acquiring food in general, right?
So the first is you go out and hunt it yourself, and the other is you take leftovers off what other people or other animals have hunted, right?
So the lion will go and eat a gazelle, will eat most of it, and then the jackals come along and nose their way through its ribcage and suck out the remnants that the lions didn't get to.
And this...
Parasitism off the productive is, you know, it's fine in nature because not a lot of ethics or morals in nature.
It becomes somewhat problematic in human society, especially when there's a state.
When there's a state.
Because there are the parasites and there are the productive people.
The parasites are not only among the poor and those on welfare and so on.
I mean, there are lots of honorable poor working hard to improve their state, doing the three things you need to do to get to the middle class, which is finish high school, get and keep a job for a year, and don't have any kids till after you're married.
Not brain surgery!
And if you do that, you have like a 99% chance of ending up pretty well off.
But there are a lot of poor who are dependent on the state, right?
For child support, for the sort of court-enforced alimony, welfare, unemployment insurance, and even old-age pensions.
And last but not least, of course, disability and so on.
And people say, well, we paid into these programs.
No, you didn't.
No, if you paid into these programs, why is there a national debt?
It's really, really not that complicated.
If you say you're standing on level ground, but you're 80 feet down in a hole, Jessica-style, well, you are not standing on level ground.
If you paid into these programs and that's what you're drawing your money from, why is there a national debt?
A deficit.
Why is there $20 trillion just in the US of debt?
No.
You paid into these programs.
The government spent the money, particularly old-age pensions, right?
You paid into the programs.
The government spent the money and left behind a bunch of dusty IOUs, sometimes called treasury notes, saying, oh, yeah, you know, we're taking your money.
We're blowing it on things, you know, some of which may benefit you.
But don't worry.
We're going to tax the next generation to pay for your retirement.
Oh, oh, dear.
Did you really not have any kids or not many kids or not enough kids?
Oh, has the education system collapsed in America and in the West as a whole to the point where children are coming out traumatized?
And oh, the daycare generation kind of unable to get their shit together because they were neglected and abandoned and thrown into the feral nest of daycare when they were kids and they're now hypersensitive.
And they would, especially the boys who you kind of need to be productive while the girls are having babies.
They got terrible educations, all focused on girly-girly world.
And the boys who couldn't squeeze into the corset of brain deadening, for boys at least, girly-girly world, ended up being drugged.
Because, you know, if you don't conform to a system that's not designed for you, clearly you have a mental health issue and need to be fixed biochemically.
Oh, I guess we could think of the word fixed in two ways.
So, not enough productivity from the young to sustain the greedy moors of the boomers who are retiring.
So, the imaginary answer is mass immigration from the third world.
Not really much of an answer, but...
At least it will provoke the kind of conflict that will have people forget about government debts and deficits over time.
It's what you do.
You promise the world to the people.
You spend far more than you take in in taxes so that the government produces the illusion that it's somehow contributing to the wealth of society.
And then when you run out of money and you can't pay the bills, you provoke a war.
Now, you can't provoke a war anymore internationally in the West because of nuclear weapons, but maybe you can provoke some kind of civil conflict.
Just a thought.
Just a possibility.
It's pretty typical.
Run out of money, go to war.
Run out of money, provoke conflict.
So all these things solve the problems of the elites, just not your problems at all.
So for the past 50 or 60 years, you need a big picture view of where we are.
For the past 50 or 60 years, we have had a siphoning of resources from the more productive people to the less productive people.
People say, well, you know, it's kind of weird how smarter people don't have as many babies as less smart people.
Well, not that complicated.
If you tax smart people and you subsidize the childbirths of less intelligent people, well, you're engaged in a form of dysgenics.
And it's really tragic.
It doesn't have a pretty end for the most part throughout human history.
But sure, smart people have more opportunities to exercise their minds rather than their loins.
But if you look at some cultures, a Jewish culture had a huge respect and productivity from the most intelligent, right?
The rabbis who knew a number of languages were the ones who had the most kids.
Wow.
Ended up as a pretty smart clan, I guess you could say.
And so we've had this whole process for the past 50 or 60 years, wherein the least intelligent tend to get the most money from the state, and the most intelligent tend to be taxed the most money.
Because intelligence is highly correlated with income, and you have a graduated income tax which takes more and more resources from the more and more intelligent and distributes them to the less intelligent.
And...
That is a system that has been set up, which is very tragic.
Very tragic.
I mean, the government shouldn't have any say or interference in any way, shape, or form about who marries who, who has children, how those children are funded.
This should all be the matter of private individuals and churches and charities and so on.
The government should have no giant lever.
By which to fundamentally change the composition of society, particularly in terms of wealth redistribution.
It's a completely brutal situation because it sets up this completely unsustainable situation where you have created entire classes, entire tens and tens and tens of millions of people who are dependent upon the state picking the pockets of the productive in order to feed the increasingly growing crowd of the dependent, of the parasitical.
And they, of course, wish the system to continue.
They've adapted to it, right?
This is the great horror of the welfare state.
And we'll get to the rich in a moment.
Trust me, they're in there and in some ways even more dangerous.
But people adapt and it doesn't take long for people to adapt psychologically to a particular environment.
You've got Entire neighborhoods in the West, and particularly in America, but kids, they've not seen anyone have a job for two or three generations.
What has that done?
Think of all the human capital of how you get up, how you deal with bosses, how you do job applications, how you deal with conflicts, how you save your money, how you spend your money, how you budget, all that.
Gone, baby, gone.
And people have adapted to the system, and naturally they will fight to preserve it, just as the system fights to preserve itself.
And we can see this with the populist movement or the nationalist movement that is sweeping.
Through the West, and has even hit the Netherlands, giving Heertwaarders an increase, though of course not a plurality, and the system and all those who depend upon the system fights to protect itself, just like any organism would.
Now, the wealthy have also adapted to the system.
And I have sympathy and condemnation for just about everyone involved.
And I'll tell you why that's kind of a useless exercise in a second.
But the rich have adapted to this system and they have...
Because if they have the easy access or I guess the financially accessible access to the giant levers of state power, then naturally they use those levers to benefit themselves.
And we can say, oh, well, that's really bad.
They shouldn't.
Okay, well, but if you're the CEO of, say, a tech company...
And you have become increasingly dependent on H-1B visas, right?
On people who've come in who really can't leave their jobs, who can't negotiate very much.
You've basically turned into a giant, substandard, useless typist tech farm of serfdom.
Well, if you don't take advantage of this program, then you're at a competitive disadvantage relative to...
Your competitors, right?
Other people who are willing to use this, if you're not, then you will be punished.
And you will be punished in the stock market.
You will be punished by your shareholders and other stakeholders.
And you will be replaced.
And people don't not see family and friends for 20 years and travel eight days a week in order to become CEO, in order to get fired for not taking advantage of perfectly legal companies.
Short-term incentives to maximize their profit.
You have a fiduciary responsibility to maximize profits for your company.
If the tools are available for you to do that, whether they're public or private, and you don't, you could be liable.
You could have actually harmed shareholder value.
You could get sued.
You certainly could get fired.
And people, especially if you're vested as well, like, I mean, if you have a bunch of stocks in your company or you have a sort of future option to buy those stocks at a You personally could make millions or even tens of millions or more of dollars by using particular advantage, taking advantage of particular government programs or political access that you have.
You know, the man in Washington, Hank Reardon thing from Atlas Shrugged.
And so, yeah, are you going to say no to that?
Well, you'll get fired, you might get sued, and you'll lose millions of dollars.
I mean, come on.
So, can I condemn people for making bad choices because of government incentives?
Sure.
Rich, middle class, poor, I can condemn everyone if I want.
Can I have sympathy for the decision-making process that has people take advantage of?
Government programs.
Sure.
I mean, from the rich, I can understand it.
Sure, you've got these levers of power you're going to use at a giant money spigot opens up in your gold-soaked bathtub.
Sure.
I understand why you would pull that.
Incentives matter.
People respond to incentives.
Basic law of economics.
For the poor, if you're not particularly bright.
And if endless waves of third world immigration are driving down wages, thus increasing the value of the welfare state payouts to you, right?
There's a welfare cliff, right?
A single woman with kids on welfare.
To get the equivalent amount of money she gets on welfare, she would have to earn, like, way north of $60,000 a year just to break even.
Getting there is quite a challenge.
So if you're not that smart, you don't have many job opportunities, you're not going to rise very far in the ranks.
You're going to have a bunch of, you know, low-rent jobs that aren't going to be particularly satisfying.
Or you can stay home, you know, chat on a free government phone, watch your kids, and enjoy your life for free.
It's hard to say, well, that's just bad.
I can completely understand the decision-making of everyone who takes advantage of these government programs.
It makes perfect sense as to why they would do it.
And sure, I can have sympathy, I can condemn, but it's all kind of useless.
It's all kind of pointless.
We say, oh, well, you know, these companies are forcing their tech employees to dig their own graves, train their replacements, tossing them out, and they don't have to worry about the social consequences because people go on unemployment insurance, which takes them out of the workforce, right?
So if you get a bunch of low, like let's say it was a free market, you get an influx of low-cost workers.
Well, what happens is you hire them.
And then what happens is your employees, because there's no government unemployment insurance, have to go get other jobs relatively quickly.
And they're willing to bid lower because there's no floor of welfare, sorry, of unemployment insurance or welfare that they're willing to go below.
So they go out and they bid down the price of workers.
So you actually haven't gained much by hiring low-priced workers because you displace a bunch of higher-priced workers who then bid down the cost of the job.
really didn't make any sense to hire the low-cost workers because there are language issues, culture issues, there are training issues, there's competency issues, right?
So the welfare state is driving the H-1B visa just as the H-1B visa program is driving the welfare state unemployment insurance and so on.
So in a free market, in a free society, these things are all perfectly fine, like, Like Europe is terrified of lower population because they're way below replacement levels.
What's wrong with lower population?
When I was a kid growing up, zero population growth, shrinking of the population, was supposed to be great.
Let's have fewer people in the world, particularly people in the West who have very high carbon footprints, who have very high environmental impacts.
Sure, fewer people was supposed to be the whole goal.
That was supposed to be the point of a lot of the watermelons, right?
The green on the outside, communist red on the inside.
But they said, eh, don't have kids.
It's not that great.
Have fewer kids.
Be responsible.
And so Europeans, for a variety of reasons, did that.
And now they're being told, oh, well, you see, we've got to bring in, what is it, Germany wants 8 million migrants, or 8 million immigrants over the next couple of decades to make up for population losses.
Right.
Wait a minute, so you're taking people from low-environmental impact, third-world environments, putting them in massive environmental impact, first-world environments, and then paying them to have as many kids as humanly possible?
Don't you all care about the environment at all?
You understand, it's all just a bunch of manipulation.
Population displacement.
It's hard to rule Europeans because they have a history of skepticism towards authority.
Well, they used to, whether they do or not.
Kind of up in the air this year.
So, the system is going to protect itself.
And Trump is going to try and manage certain aspects of immigration from countries with significant hostilities towards the United States who have no processes in place that can be trusted to vet people coming in.
He's going to try and resist that.
And of course, the left is going to try and block all of his attempts to control some negative aspects of immigration.
Of course, because the people who come in from the third world vote, you know, four-fifths or more of them vote for leftist policies.
Of course the left want them to come in.
They don't care about the long-term social impacts or data.
They just want power.
They want power.
They need the power.
Hungry for the power.
So the system is going to try and protect itself.
The system is designed to stall, to stagnate, to delay, to minimize any possibility for change.
These systems have been built in place and put in place for many, many years.
So sure, Obamacare 2.0 is a significant disappointment to many people who want more reforms.
But there's not enough votes in the Senate to pass a repeal of Obamacare.
Can't do it.
You can modify it to some degree, which is why they're tinkering it with it at the edges, but they simply don't have the votes.
And then you can get rid of the Senate if you want, I guess, and get to pure plurality democracy rule, but, you know, people on the left is, Hillary won the popular vote!
Well, that's like saying that the biggest box office movie should automatically get the Oscar.
That's not how the Oscars work, and that's not how the American Republic works.
So, people are frustrated.
I get that.
I mean, understand that changing this system, reforming the system, shrinking the growth of this system, It's a long process.
And you've got to pace yourself.
You're riding up and down this roller coaster of something great is being proffered.
Oh, it got squelched in the giant sticky goo web of government.
Slow down.
I have slow motion.
Can't remember those dreams.
I used to have these dreams.
I don't anymore.
But as young as I used to have these dreams, like I wanted to get somewhere.
And I take a big running starter and there'd be so little gravity that I'd float up in the air.
My legs would be kind of windmilling.
I don't have those dreams anymore because I have traction in the world now.
I'm fulfilling my potential.
But it is.
You know, it's like, okay, we got two people in a running race.
One has a jetpack.
The other has to run through Jell-O. It's frustrating because we know what needs to be done.
We know how the system needs to be reformed.
And the system is fighting back.
It's natural.
It's inevitable it's going to do that.
Of course.
And of course Trump has a mandate, and other European politicians are probably going to have a mandate, just as Brexit has a mandate.
But, so what?
I mean, the system is going to fight to protect itself, and we need to be strategic, and we need to be patient, and we need to be positive, and we need to be encouraging to those who are frustrated and who are wavering.
We need to be out there being, you know, the stern, stiff Bill Mitchell spines of the coming, or the conflict that we're in.
Because one thing that's happening is that Trump, and I'm going to focus on Trump for a moment, so Trump, in doing what he's doing, in trying to get things done, And being repeatedly blocked by the Democrats, being repeatedly undermined by the media, being symbolically shot by Snoop Dogg, I mean, anyway.
And by being continually legally blocked by activist judges, he's not losing, you understand.
Because people put Trump in because they wanted to change.
They wanted to change.
A lot of it had to do with immigration.
They're desperate.
I mean, the black community, for God's sakes, the black community in America, if you want to help the black community, and I think that's really fair and really right, you've got to stop the inflow of low-rent labor from the third world.
You have to stop the inflow of low-rent labor from the third world because it drives down the wages that blacks would otherwise be able to achieve, which raises the value of the welfare state for them, which destroys further the family, which causes more problems among the youth.
Why on earth are people in Syria more valuable than blacks in America?
Don't you care for the brothers and sisters who need the kind of inflated wages that you get without this massive pouring in?
Low rent, oh my god, it's so cruel!
Can the government stop shafting blacks in America for once in its godforsaken existence?
If it's not slavery, if it's not Jim Crow, if it's not segregation, if it's not bullshit undermining competent blacks affirmative action, then it's going to be massive amounts of third world immigration driving down the wages that the blacks need to climb into the middle class.
God help them!
Please help them!
It's quite frustrating at times.
Have you noticed that?
I have just a little bit.
But Trump is trying to get done, and Trump's administration, they're trying to get done what the American people have clearly said they want done.
His approval ratings are going through the roof, and he's not losing, you understand?
Every time he gets blocked, people's frustration and anger with the globalists goes up and up and up and up, to the point where he's going to have such a mandate that it's going to be perilous to oppose him.
I mean, politically, you understand?
So he's not.
He's not losing by being blocked.
He's raising people's frustration at gave the guy a clear mandate.
He won a huge electoral college victory.
He has the support of a significant majority of the American people.
They've told him exactly what they want him to do.
And he's being blocked, blocked, blocked, blocked, blocked, blocked, blocked.
It's inevitable.
It's exactly what was going to happen.
And all it's doing, some people, right, they hit resistance and they're like, oh no, it's windy, I'm blown over, right?
No, some people, you know, you want to get somewhere, it's windy, what do you do?
You walk at an angle.
You end up in some Russian video being blown across the street, right?
So, you double down.
You hit resistance, you don't give up.
You double down.
You act.
Evil protects itself.
Because people have adapted to this immoral redistribution of resources, to this immoral political power, and they wish to not change.
Now, you understand, it's going to be great for people if they get off welfare, if they get off unemployment insurance, if they get off disability, if they have the capability of doing that.
People in the long run, like in the short run, we want free stuff, but it rots us.
Free stuff is like the candy.
To the cavities of our future.
Oh, it tastes so good at the moment.
Oh, I can't find no teeth left.
And, by the way, I've swallowed a huge amount of bacteria and my heart is about to splody head!
Alien style.
Ooh!
Missed you, John Hurt already.
Anyway.
So, it's natural.
It's natural.
People have adapted to the system.
Their resources are dependent on the system, and they don't want to change.
They're addicted to the fruits of power, the black fruits of an evil tree.
That's what they have adapted to eating.
It doesn't taste good, but it's sustaining, and there's lots of it.
Now, getting them onto better food?
Sure.
It's like weaning anybody off a drug.
They resist, they fight, they kick, they scream, and later they say, Thank you so much!
For getting me off.
That horrible drug.
I can think straight.
My mind is clear.
I feel productive.
I'm happy.
Thank you.
I am so sorry.
For all the terrible things I said to you.
For all the abuse and insults I screamed at you.
For all of the kicking and screaming that I did when you were dragging me away from the drug that was destroying me.
I am so sorry.
Thank you.
And, you know, it may be a thankless job for half a generation.
I don't know.
But thanks will come.
We do what is right for people, what is morally right for people, even though they kick and scream, and perhaps even especially because they kick and scream.
You understand that, right?
If you're a parent, you don't...
Well, first of all, you don't provoke tantrums, but society has provoked the potential for significant tantrums, right?
If the black oily ichor of evil state cash is slowed for people, then they're going to have tantrums.
That's the setup, right?
It's like you...
A good parent...
You don't parent in a way that produces tantrums, but let's just say you end up...
Adopting a kid who throws tantrums.
Some other parent didn't do a good job and they have tantrums.
Well, you don't reward those tantrums.
You don't give in to those tantrums.
You help the child overcome the tantrums by not allowing the tantrums to have power over you.
It's natural.
And then the child, when he grows up, says, Wow, yeah, I used to have a really bad temper, but my parents, they held firm.
They cured me of it.
I am so thankful, so grateful, because I know another guy who's still got a really bad temper and he's heading to jail.
So no, we do the right thing.
We are patient, we are positive, and we do the right thing.
And Trump is helping people hate the globalists.
That the system, when people wake up to the fact that the system is not there to serve them.
If you're productive, the system is not there to serve you.
If you're productive, the system no more serves you than the farm serves the livestock.
You're a cattle.
You're milked.
Your taxes are milked, and they're handed over.
Through political power, they're used to buy the votes of people who become dependent on it.
You are a livestock in a tax farm.
The system does not serve you.
The system encloses you, it protects you, it exploits you, it rules you, it bullies you, it threatens you, and it takes from you.
Of course, if you don't have anything to redistribute, you have to get a real job.
If you can't steal from people and offer it to other people, you have to go get a real job.
And you don't want to get a real job because power is very addictive, physically addictive.
Power, political power, more addictive than cocaine.
Getting people off.
They're fighting.
Same way a coke addict is going to fight to keep his sauce, fight to keep his supply, to fight to get the money he needs for his drug.
This is addicted.
You've got to say no.
When they break the addiction and they get real jobs, many of them will be thankful.
Those that won't be, what are we going to do?
Are we going to have society run by the political tantrums, a power-addicted society?
People?
No.
Of course not.
You can't let the addict run society.
Trump now wants a budget.
Ooh, NPR. Ooh, PBS. Tis a consummation devoutly to be wished.
Tis a consummation devoutly to be wished for them to meet the government budget of zero.
Because all they've been used, I mean, they've been used by the left to troll Christians and conservatives for decades.
Finally, Christians and conservatives, well, they've wanted to get rid of it for a long time.
And, you know, the bear.
Poke away.
See what happens.
So Trump wants a budget, and the Dems are saying, no, dead on arrival, we're not going to pass it.
It's inevitable.
Of course they're not going to pass it.
Of course they're not going to pass it.
And then going to really frustrate and annoy people.
There hasn't been a budget for...
Close on a decade in America.
Because they want the free trillion dollars that they got from the bailout to continue to be spendable, right?
Of course, they're not going to.
You understand?
Don't be surprised.
This is how it works.
This is how it works.
I'm in a war.
What?
Is the enemy still shooting back?
Come on, they were shooting back yesterday.
Aren't they tired of it?
Why don't they just give us our victory?
No!
They literally believe that they're fighting for their lives.
The addict doesn't believe his life is worth living without the drug, which is why he's willing to burn his life up to get the drug, to destroy, to lose everything.
They literally believe they're fighting for their lives.
Loretta Lynch, which we talked about, former Attorney General, talked about blood in the streets, people dying.
They literally feel that they're fighting for their lives because addicted to power, addicted to free stuff.
And whenever you become dependent on a system or basically other people, the system makes you dependent on other people.
Whenever you become dependent upon the productive, you obsess about the productive, you focus on the productive, and you hate the productive, and you need the productive.
It's a very complicated, codependent, messed up relationship.
I hate you.
Don't leave me.
I hate you.
Don't leave me.
Whitey's bad.
Pay you taxes!
And this is an important thing to understand.
This imbalance of incentives and this imbalance of...
Motivation.
You know, if you're productive, you're getting up in the morning, you're doing...
Paul Joseph Watson tweeted, you know, he says, I work every day till I feel ill, physically ill.
And, you know, these reporters like one article a week, right?
So, yeah, I work a lot.
If you have the capability and you enjoy the work and you're doing good in the world, it's kind of tough to say no.
But, you see, if you're...
Out there, working.
Getting up in the morning, going off to work, doing your job, being a parent, being a husband, being a wife, whatever.
You're busy.
You're busy being productive, you understand?
So you don't have the time.
You don't have the time to protest, to write signs, to obsess, to gather, to Facebook, to group, to chat, to organize.
You don't have the time.
And you don't have the free money.
To be able to do all of this stuff.
I mean, they have An infinitely greater motivation to hound you, to control you, to manage you, to bully you.
Because you're like a 100% source of their income.
But each individual one of them is like.0000001% of your taxes.
It's like mosquitoes, right?
Mosquitoes have a huge incentive to bite you because it's life or death for them, for their babies, right?
Female mosquitoes need your blood to feed their babies.
But for you, it's like it's a minor annoyance.
And this is how the great beast of civilization is threatened.
The great magnificent Adonis of civilization is threatened by his death by mosquitoes, death by a thousand paper cuts.
Because their incentive to focus on you and to control you and to manage you and to obsess about you and to bully you and to threaten you and to verbally abuse you is huge!
Life or death for them as they perceive it.
But you're busy.
You're out there making the wealth that they want from you, that they want to take from you, but which they won't take from you physically by force, because that's risky, right?
They want the government to do it, which means that you have to feel guilty, which is why pathological altruism is a slow harikari in Western civilization.
It is a slow kneel down.
Kiss the scarf, carve out your innards, spill them on the floor, leave a giant mess for your children to find.
That is pathological altruism, where you feel guilt and obligation towards those who feel no guilt or obligation themselves towards you.
If benevolence is not reciprocal, it is suicidal, you understand?
If kindness is extended to the unkind...
Then it becomes a giant mechanism by which your interest is shredded and destroyed and your future evaporates.
Morality is reciprocal, right?
I mean, if you order something from a guy on the internet for 500 bucks and he doesn't ship it, you don't ship the money because he didn't hold up his end of the bargain.
If you're a white male, do you feel empathy towards a lot of other groups?
Well, how have they treated you?
Have they treated you?
Have they taught you how to empathize with them by empathizing with you and being kind and sweet and generous and understanding?
No.
Basically, it's a massive hornet's nest of verbal abuse, so that you can spend time warding off the hornets, the wasps, I dare say, while other people go through your pockets.
It's not sustainable.
It's not kind.
You understand?
It's not kind.
Not kind to anyone.
So, in November 1942, Winston Churchill, in a speech, the Allies had started to turn the tide in the Second World War.
They'd won a victory or two.
And people are like, oh, the war is going to be over soon.
He's like, no, no.
He said, now, this is not the end.
It is not even the beginning of the end.
But it is perhaps the end of the beginning.
Stay stable, my friends.
Stay strong.
Find joy in combat.
And most importantly, they hope to win through exhausting you, through burning out your fight-or-flight mechanism.
