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Oct. 18, 2021 - Freedomain Radio - Stefan Molyneux
01:09:47
Stefan Molyneux vs 2 Communists! Freedomain Debate Analysis
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Time Text
All right, all right. With what's left of my voice.
Hi, everybody. It's just before midnight on the 15th of October.
And yes, we are convening for...
Well, I've got to go and...
Do some weights and work off some adrenaline because it was quite an exciting debate.
And I sort of could share my thoughts, but I think you guys got my thoughts over the course of the debate.
If you had sort of comments or issues, we can just...
Do you have to ask?
Yeah, just raise your hand if you wanted to talk about it.
It'd be kind of nice if it was a bit more of a free-for-all, so just unmute everybody and share your thoughts.
How was it like, or what was it like for you guys?
I mean, I certainly understand that I'm representing, so to speak, the community, and yeah, feedback, thoughts, could have done better, could have done worse.
I'm always... Happy to hear these kinds of things, and just unmute yourself if you wanted to bring that up, or I guess click on some sort of request to talk thing, and we can take it from there.
Yes, Q, my friend.
What's on your mind?
Yeah, can you hear me?
You need to unmute, I think. Did it not take that you could speak?
All right, how's that?
Yes, go ahead, my friend. Yeah, that's working now.
Sorry about that, technical difficulties.
I didn't get to see the whole debate, but I watched about half an hour of it, and I think what I took away from it and what I laughed at was every argument the communist guys seemed to have, they somehow twisted it and tried to blame capitalism.
So I think the comment that they made about the Chinese Communist Party actually being capitalist, for example, and that being the reason that the virus was released into the world, I had a bit of a laugh at.
It is kind of easy, I guess, to, like, everything I don't like is capital.
I just have this big bag.
Everything that's dysfunctional, I could just call capitalism and think that I've achieved something.
And I was a little unclear.
Like, they were saying they don't like the state.
Then the Ukrainian guy was saying that...
Oh, well, you know, we need to be able to negotiate contracts from a position of equality.
And it's like, okay, so they were demanding who enforces these contracts in the absence of the state.
And then they were like, well, here's the contract that we need to be enforced in order for there to be equity and so on.
And I'm not sure if you're like, how are you not exploiting people if you're paying other people to do it?
Like this guy with the comic book.
I mean, that to me was almost comical, right?
That he's got this...
If you missed at the beginning, he's got this comic book that's being produced, and he's crowdfunded it, and he's raised capital to do all of that, and that's just...
I don't know. I just thought that was pretty funny that...
And, you know, I get...
I was kind of half and half about expressing how pissed off I was that these supposed communists are just trashing the working class guy and defending the actions of the big multinational corporations.
I guess it's not capitalism if it silences someone you don't like.
I guess then it's something else entirely.
Grand Beef, I think you're in with us too.
When you were talking about the state-sponsored healthcare, And it being a socialist system, of course, they rebutted and said, oh no, no, any healthcare that's provided by the state couldn't possibly be socialist healthcare.
I had a laugh to myself just because the reason, I don't know how they can possibly arrive at that as a logical conclusion.
I find that tricky.
I find that a little tricky to follow.
But I think generally anything that's dysfunctional is capitalism.
And was I unclear about the whole IDF thing?
Was I sort of missing something about that?
Like, they're saying the IDF is necessary for capitalism, and I said, well, the IDF, like, they wouldn't even answer whether it was funded voluntarily or coercively, and that became rather baffling.
Well, I guess not that baffling, but they say the IDF is necessary for capitalism, but capitalism is private property, but the IDF, of course, only exists as all government Things in this nature do.
They only exist through violations of property rights.
And look, I don't mind.
This is tricky stuff to think through.
I don't mind that I'm asking some tough questions and they may have good answers, they may not.
It's just that, oh, the arrogance.
That's the thing that I find really probably my toughest thing because I view intellectual humility as a pretty important thing in life, a pretty important skill to have.
And just this arrogance.
It's so easy to answer.
I can't believe you're asking this question.
It's just like, oh man.
And I really dislike it when people can't respond without characterizing your argument first.
They can't just give you an answer.
When I was answering the Mises thing, the price thing, I was like, okay, this is an argument from Mises and blah, blah, blah, as opposed to, I can't believe these idiots have never dealt with this price.
Like, I really dislike it when people can't answer a question without characterizing it or insulting the – like, they can't just answer.
That's why I got mad at the guy after a while.
It's like, just answer a question, man.
Like, what's with all these insults?
And, oh, this is so stupid and this is so ridiculous and only – it's just – I don't know.
Honestly, I would never think of looking these guys up and, oh, did someone say something bad about them in the past and starting off with that.
I just like yeah I don't know It's just bizarre. Dylan, I think you had something else.
Go ahead. CJ already said what I was thinking, but I didn't realize that capitalist China and capitalist socialized medicine in Canada was our worst enemy, but also that currency's not real, and it just made me think of Norm MacDonald, like a joke from him, like, I hear money's not real, but it sure bought me this cool motorcycle that I do wheelies on every day.
Right, that old Pink Floyd thing, you know, they say money is the root of all evil, but you ask for a raise, they're not giving any away.
Yeah, right. Oh, God, it was brutal.
It was fun. I actually had a good time listening.
It was wild. And JF was kind of quiet.
I mean, I know I'm kind of fiery and all animated, and maybe that was sort of part of it, but yeah, he seemed pretty restrained.
He had some... I'm obviously not a big fan of the Jeffrey Epstein thing, to put it mildly, but for me it's like, do you want to have a debate?
Yeah, it's been a while. I'm happy to have a debate.
Oh, it's with JF. It's like, okay, I have disagreements with the guy for sure, but at least they get to have a debate and hopefully smack some sense into the audience listening to this stuff.
Yeah, I wasn't aware of the Epstein thing.
Yeah, I'd heard about it before. I think he took a grant from Epstein way back in the past, and I don't know.
I mean, to me, it would be like, you know, give the money to charity or something or whatever, right?
But, you know, so he's got his arguments about it, and that's pretty unsavory.
I think this was before the Epstein stuff really became noticeable, but it's also fascinating to me.
Stalin is an idiot. Stalin was, you know, whatever.
They just... They can't seem to use the term good and evil, except you're an ethno-nationalist or whatever it is, right?
It's like, that's always a warning flag to me.
Or the deaths in the Soviet Union were excessive.
It's like, oh man, that's brutal.
I mean, can you imagine saying that about the Holocaust?
It'd be monstrous. Oh, yeah.
Yeah, it's a ridiculous argument and it's a ridiculous non-argument.
Oh, it's a confession.
It's a confession. I mean, or, you know, the problem was this one guy, he had propaganda.
And it's like, don't you want a system where one guy can't make propaganda and cause the deaths of 40 million people?
I'd like that system. I'd hate for my life to be dependent upon some bureaucrat getting things right in some other country.
That would be mad. Oh, yes.
Well, you see, the things in China, the starvations in China happened because of this guy.
And it's like, no, no, we want a system where that doesn't happen.
It doesn't work that way.
I mean, you mentioned several times that people can't handle power, which is obvious.
And they would always, within, I don't know, less than two minutes, say, well, it wouldn't be like that in my system.
Right. Like, it's so lost.
It's just so lost. That's one of the things that's always frustrated me about arguing with communists and socialists, because they always tend to be moral nihilists or moral relativists or moral subjectivists, blah, blah, blah.
But then they're like, nationalism!
That's so... You're racist!
It's like, oh god, you're acting out all this moral disgust and hate and feelings.
Like, fuck off with this nihilism and...
It's always driven me nuts to argue with them.
They act so passionate in moral directions, but then also, like with a straight face, try to tell you that there's no such thing as morality or that it doesn't matter.
It's a subjective or relative or all this shit.
Well, and they were accusing JF of hate speech or me of inciting violence.
It seemed to me that a Ukrainian guy got pretty close to, yeah, you got to do evil to get communism.
If not, you know, like he was like, well, you can't be virtuous to get this stuff.
It's like, okay, well, then what evils would you do to enlighten me?
What would you do? Yep.
Yep. And they're serious, though.
Like, they... These are the principles by which they live their lives.
They would do these things. When you understand that, you take that seriously like it's not just a thought experiment.
Society makes a whole lot more sense how it is the way it is.
They go to Marxist professors that tell them these things like, oh yeah, you're going to have to participate in the capitalist system and do these things and blah, blah, blah.
It's just your role in society and who cares if it's evil or it doesn't matter.
People go on and live that way.
Yeah, why was it hard to get them to say that they think that progress and freedom is better?
That just seems...
I mean, that I wasn't really expecting.
It's like, well, of course communism is better.
They just wouldn't get there.
And I just... That was a little baffling to me.
Like, why? Why?
Why? Why?
Why is that such a big problem?
Hmm. Yeah, when you said that you incited violence, you just mentioned that you interviewed the 17 experts on IQ. And he immediately jumped to, you're being violent.
Yeah, like, what is that?
And he claims everything he does is scientific, but when I actually quote scientists, it's like, that's violence.
Well, he's making the claim that you're putting this information out there that other people are going to use as a cause to be violence, and that somehow, like, that's indicative of you, that that's A, even true at all, and then beyond that, you know, that that's somehow...
Something you're responsible for, if someone were to do something like that.
Well, what about calling me an ethnic nationalist and a racist?
Is that going to make people feel violent towards me?
We know that it has, in fact.
It does, in fact. So, yeah.
I did want to say this, Steph.
I appreciate it. There was a moment there where, of course, I tuned in to watch you tear some commies apart, and I was not disappointed.
I really appreciate that.
I don't want you to be Too reasonable.
I want to see them squirm.
But also, there was a moment where, I don't know if I can say you held back, but you also dropped the combativeness for a moment and was like, hey, look, I'm really interested.
I'm really curious. Let's figure this out.
Let's work on this. And I really appreciated seeing that dynamic where you were giving it back to them.
You were kind of making them pay for it for a bit.
But also that you came, I guess for the sake of the audience, that you could bring it back to a, I don't want to say a more reasonable, because it's not like you were unreasonable to defend yourself or to be passionate about what you're speaking about.
But there was a moment there where, I guess to me, it opened the door more up for the audience and you...
I guess, I don't know. I don't quite know how to put it.
Do you understand what I was referring to?
Was it around some of the, hey, I've got a way of helping you guys achieve a great society that doesn't require you to do evil?
Like you, we can...
Or was it like, I'm genuinely curious about...
Yes! That one.
That one. Right then.
No, I was. I'm genuinely curious about how they answer these questions.
These questions and it doesn't really seem to work out too well.
Yeah. I would like to know.
I mean, I know that they have a very tough time answering these questions, and it's mostly going to be obfuscation and insults.
But yeah, you can smell almost, and particularly with the comic book guy, I mean, I can't imagine what his childhood was like just in terms of how he was treated verbally, that he just has to be that vitriolic and abusive in his language.
That's rough.
Yeah. He's got this deep belief that, like, my sense of – how did he describe it?
My sense of, like, I – that my – the way – I know the way he put it.
He puts it hyperbolically, like, I'm the only thing in the universe that matters.
Of course, that's not the way normal people function or capitalists.
But it's something like my sense of ego, my sense of self.
Like, I guess the Randian, like, no, I fucking matter and I have preferences, you know, and the crowd, the – The collective does not get to put them on me.
And the way he described that as being like the pit of darkness, I'm like, holy shit, man, what was your childhood like?
What were you guilted and twisted around?
Yeah, and the Buddhist thing I found quite surprising.
I've never met the Marxist-Buddhist before.
I guess it's kind of a trope, right?
Yeah. It's not surprising at all for me to come across like a socialist, Buddhist kind of thing, because Buddhism is kind of pretty, like, morally gooey.
Well, it's socialist, yes, but, you know, outright Stalin was just misguided kind of stuff.
That's not to me in that camp at all.
Well, he is notably, like, a Western Buddhist.
I think there's something special to that, because...
I thought the Buddhism was like, change comes from within and fix yourself, and he's like, that doesn't seem to be quite such a thing.
I'll have to say I was slightly disappointed when you didn't have a 15-page text in front of you for your opening statement.
Oh, the guy auditioning for Microsoft Sam?
Yeah, no, that was not the most...
He's like half off the screen with a crackly mic.
I mean, that's just technical presentation stuff you've got to get worked out.
I'll say, I have a broken pinky toe right now, and I was still kicking the floor, trying not to storm.
That was absolutely brutal.
I felt bad. I was excited for the debate, and that really...
Killed it so quickly, even though it got exciting.
You should see how friendly they were, how friendly and chatty they were before the debate, and then they go straight into ethno-nationalist, racist, you know, and it's just like, oh, that's okay.
All right, let's do this shit then, right?
Yep. Okay, so that's one of the things I especially really appreciated.
I was really like, even like, holy shit, Steph, how you could retain your patience through all of that.
Like, don't get me wrong, like you did.
Like, you gave them a tongue lashing here and there, which again was very great to see, but also like how you could keep your attention and patience on their...
Droll, monotonous, insane shit.
Yes! Oh, God.
Like, how do you do it, man? How do you do it?
Okay, but tell me what would it look like to lose my patience?
How would you know? Or how did you know I kept it?
Oh, that's true. That is true.
That's true. I didn't see any snot coming out of your nose, so...
Wrong camera angle.
Yeah, maybe. Yeah.
Yeah, fair. Fair.
No, I mean, I'm genuinely, like, how would you know?
Like, would I scream it? Like, what would it look like to lose my patience to you?
Okay, so to me, like, the inner me, like, what I would have done, I'd be like, this is a fucking joke.
I've got better things to do.
I'm out. Peace. You know, sorry.
Like a rage quit kind of thing?
Yeah, kind of like that. You're like, look, this is just an utter joke.
These guys are so, like, not even worth engaging with.
It's a waste of time to be here and then just cash out.
You know, like, that was my internal, like, drive.
Like, oh man, if I was in Steph's shoes, I'd be like, oh, no thank you.
Do you not care about the children?
No, Jared. Because that's what it's all about, right?
That's why I would understand.
That's why I would understand. You're absolutely right.
You're absolutely right. I mean, if I rage quit, then, you know, 20 more kids get beaten up at some point, at least, right?
And it's like those 20 kids are like, please don't rage quit.
Please don't rage quit. Please make it through.
Yes. Yes. Thank you.
Okay, so when you're in a debate, are those the kind of things that are coming through your mind?
Is there a part of you that shows up and is like, you've got better things to do, man.
You could be scrubbing the toilet right now.
And there's a part of you that's like, come on, let's get out of here.
This is not worth it.
And then you've got to be like, nope, the kids.
Is that something that goes on for you in somebody's debate?
Well, no.
So have you ever had someone in your life you hear terrible things about and then you meet them and like, he seems like a reasonable enough guy.
And so in the circle of venues that they move in, they hear these terrible things about me.
And yeah, I mean, I don't think I talked about a whole bunch of stuff here that you guys haven't heard before.
Maybe a couple of new arguments, but I just – it helps to discredit the people who lie about me when I have – you know, passionate, empathetic, reasonable debates and they get to actually hear what I say from my own mouth rather than through other people's slice and dice selective editing stuff.
Yeah. Okay. That makes sense.
Yeah. Well, I think, too, like, you know, your previous debates, you've had, you know, your rationality rules and your Peter Josephs, they were far more intellectually challenging, I think, for you.
These guys, relative to them, came across as quite amateurish and, obviously, the appeals to authority and the insults, etc.
I think you could see through Oh, no.
To me, it's way easier to keep my cool when I'm really being challenged.
Because, like, if you think if you're like, because otherwise your mind wanders, you get kind of distracted, you get annoyed, and it's just not really as, like, if you've ever listened to some kid tell a really long rambling story, it's, you know, time passes slowly and you're more aware of your own sensations than if you, you know, you're listening to a really interesting story.
So I actually find it easier to keep my cool when somebody really sharp is going at me.
And that makes sense.
And I mean, I didn't get that these guys were particularly sharp, personally.
That was my impression.
A lazy socialist, never.
And this smalminess, I think, that bothers me as well.
I was trying to think of the best adjective to describe the guy with long hair.
And, you know, you were talking about, you know, like you made a comment about a rise to violence before.
Tell me that isn't a face that you would look at and just not want to slap.
Someone in the chat called him the comic book guy.
I thought that was pretty apt. Yeah, I mean, so it's always my question sort of when debating this kind of people.
Like, do they have a genuine desire to help the world, but they've just been told the entirely wrong way to do it?
Or... Do they just want to have power over people and this is the fastest way to get there?
And those two, I don't know at the beginning which way it is.
You can a little bit tell by looking at people, but yeah.
So the 100 million dead, if you say, oh, that number has been debunked, it's like, okay, can we cut it in half?
That's why I said, do you want to cut it in half?
Is it 50 million? I mean, is that okay then?
And all of this kind of stuff.
And he was right. I think the 18 seconds with the doctor is before...
I just made a mistake on that one.
It's before you get interrupted rather than the prescription is written.
Although in my experience, after you're interrupted, it's pretty much it.
But yeah, I mean, other than that, it's just a minor little mistake.
But yeah, this minimization stuff is pretty wild.
It's pretty wild. You couldn't get away with it in any other context.
Like, you can't minimize the Holocaust, and you shouldn't.
And you can't minimize, you know, other atrocities that have happened around...
Like, you can't... Oh, well, Pinochet only threw a couple of communists out of helicopters, right?
But in this particular context, you can say, well, the hundred million is too high an estimate.
Okay. Is that your major issue?
I'm sorry? I was going to say, do you think they justify it because in their minds, you know, the communist utopia is the ultimate argument for the means to justify the ends?
So, you know, unlike, I suppose if you're looking at fascism as not having that supposed ideal end state for everyone, do you think it's because of the means justify the ends is the reason they do it?
Well, I don't know what their ends are.
That's always my question with this mindset.
Again, is it like they genuinely believe that they're going to make the world a better place?
You know, you've got to break a few eggs to make your omelet kind of thing.
Or is it just like, look, I want power.
I'm a frustrated, angry person, and communism gives me a lot of power.
And so I'm just going to say whatever it takes to advance the cause that's going to give me the most power.
Do they genuinely care about the poor?
Now, of course, my answer would be, look, I mean, they took the sides of major corporations in silencing a working class person.
And that's why I said the worst fucking communist I've ever seen in my life.
Because you may believe that, but you don't start off by saying that.
Like, are you crazy? What is the matter?
That's the worst possible outcome.
That you could have.
I mean, that would be like me as an anarchist cheering on the state, smashing up Someone I disagreed with on an intellectual level, right?
That would just be like that's the worst anti-statist attitude.
And the fact that they were cheering on giant corporations for smacking down and perfectly legitimate legal speech on the part of the proletariat, I mean, that to me is like, okay, you guys are not interested in making the world a better place.
And they didn't sit there and say, you know what?
You got a point there.
And I think I let my...
Anger at you or my disgust at you, Steph, to get the better of me.
And you're right. I shouldn't cheer that on.
That is me taking the sides of major multinational corporations against a working class guy.
And that's not the way we should start things.
And that would be like, hey, man, we all let our tempers get away with this.
But man, they did not address that argument once.
And after that, it's like, okay, well, then I don't have to be nice at all, right?
Treat people the best you can. First time you meet them after that, treat them the way that they treat you.
Well, comic book Brent already used his power to tell us all to get vaccinated, so that was nice.
Yeah, I guess he doesn't mind Big Pharma in that standpoint, right?
Yeah. But of course, the communists do want the destabilization that comes from this kind of COVID stuff, right?
Yeah. I couldn't help but notice that the comic book guy was rather overweight.
Pretty certain about vaccinations, though.
Yes, well, I mean, I assume that his friends and family are probably overweight as well, and maybe that had something to do with it.
I mean, I think Scott Adams was saying the other day, I'm sort of paraphrasing a little, but it's like...
Yeah, so somebody dies from coronavirus, and sometimes that's because they've just made every bad decision beforehand, right?
Like they're overweight and no exercise and bad eating or whatever it is, right?
So, yeah, I would assume that he's probably at higher risk, and I assume that, you know, overweight people tend to hang together, and I assume that, you know, friends and family are also overweight, and maybe that had something to do with it.
Still a horrible loss, though, but yeah.
Yeah, that's pretty rough.
Any suggestions?
I'm obviously happy for improvements.
It may be a while after this until I get invited.
They seem to get more and more spaced out, which is kind of like the invitations.
But any suggestions or things that I could have done differently or better, in your opinion?
I'm obviously happy to get that kind of feedback, too.
Hmm. I prefer when it's you and one other person, the moderator myself, because I feel like if there's too many other chefs there, you lose your train of thought a little bit and or you are cognizant of the fact that you have to share the mic.
So I don't think you necessarily go as hard as you could.
So I find that when you have the chance to really drill into arguments with someone, the chats are more engaging.
So that would be my feedback. I agree.
Now, we were actually supposed to do this last week, and the two original communists backed out, or at least one of them did.
So I agree with you.
I would much rather it be a one-on-one, but I figured, you know, I hate to say beggars can't be choosers, but there's a little bit of that at the moment.
I actually had a different perspective on this one.
I thought JF, I'm usually pretty critical of him.
I think he did a good job of letting you largely take the stage and then just jumping in here and there and helping out.
It seems like I heard you talking 80% of the time and that was great.
That's kind of what I wanted. So from my perspective of it, it wasn't too much of a detriment to have two on two.
Yeah, I wasn't sure where he was going with this, you know, birth rate stuff.
And to me, if you're going to bring it up, be clear.
And if you're not going to bring it up, don't bring it up.
And I don't really get I didn't really, I honestly didn't really get what he was going with that.
But it seemed like he was kind of Dancing around an edgelord topic and all that.
And so to me, it's like, okay, if we're going to do the IQ stuff, yeah, we'll do the IQ stuff.
I'll be as clear as I can.
But I try not to drop things in that are edgy without fleshing them out, if that makes sense.
That's a really good point.
Yeah, JF can be a liability in that area.
Well, ultimately, it was you versus the comic book brand.
That was the meat of the debate.
JF and... Yeah, I mean, I don't know why you don't test this stuff before, man.
But anyway, he did have that issue.
I mean, I've certainly had my own technical issues from time to time, but usually there's some decent backup for it.
All right. Sorry.
I'm sorry. I wasn't looking at the screen.
Somebody else wants to jump in.
Sorry. I'm just going to give you the permissiony thing here, but go ahead.
Yeah, Steph. So I thought it was interesting how he didn't want to use the word good around you.
And then I thought that was like a compliment because I think he was afraid that if he used, like said that the reason why they were doing something was because They wanted to pursue the good.
Then, because of your work on UPB, you would be able to tear that down with strong arguments.
Well, I wouldn't have torn him down.
I would have just said, okay, so define the good, right?
Because they didn't want to do definitions, right?
What is capitalism?
Capitalism is a protection of private property that apparently is completely simultaneous to violating a private property for a government.
So no, I mean, define it and then see if you can universalize it, right?
And they were not very good at that.
So yeah, if he just said, this is the good, right?
Okay, well, how do you define the good and how do you justify it?
So yeah, maybe that was why.
I mean, of all the people in the world, I mean, you're the person who can probably go down that logical road better than anybody.
And then, so he's like, I'm not even going to use the word in front of this person, I think.
And when they start insulting my boy Thomas Sowell, I mean, dude, dude, I mean, I'll take some trash.
I'll even trash talk Ayn Rand, but I mean, Thomas Sowell has such a special place in my heart as a thinker and particularly his arguments about culture and slavery.
And I mean, I don't know, when there's just some comic book guy trashing the great Dr.
Soul, I'm like, oh, not just dismissing him contemptuously.
It's like, what does Buddhism say about the Dunning-Kruger effect?
Because I think you might want to reread that part.
I also had a thought about when he was talking about how he was a Marxist-Buddhist.
Like, I think there's a strain of thought in Buddhism that denies the individual.
And then, so, you know, you're like, you believe in a lot of individual rights.
And then, so he's kind of saying from a religious perspective, he doesn't recognize that.
Yeah, I always thought, like he's saying, that the collective is always smarter than the individual.
I'm like, so why am I speaking to the least intelligent of you?
Like, why am I just speaking to one of you?
If the collective is so much smarter, why don't I get to talk to the collective?
Oh, that's right.
That can't possibly happen because you need one vocal cord to make an argument.
And you've also been talking about how communism is the state plus like women.
Or feminism. And then I thought it was interesting that that guy had long, beautiful hair.
Right, yeah.
May not be blessed with an excess of testosterone.
All right.
Let's see if there's anybody else who has any comments.
What I thought about how Swole was going on, just the word came to my head, just sophist came to my head.
Do you think that...
I'm sorry, I'm kind of nervous right now.
No, it's fine. Did you think that you got anything in particular that made him appear that way to you, or...?
The good thing, where he wouldn't have anything straightforward, any answer.
Because if you conflate...
Not conflate.
If you overcomplicate an answer, you can't really...
You can, like, twist it any way you want, make some parts of it.
It's a part of the reply, like, you just forget...
From the listener, like the listener would get some parts of your reply, and then you could overemphasize the parts that you'd want to manipulate the audience to knowing.
Right, right. If that makes sense.
It is, yeah, and it is, the definition stuff, starting with, like, the real question for me is, like, what's the problem with starting from a blank slate?
That's always like, what's wrong with just starting from a blank slate and saying, okay, let's pretend I know nothing.
How am I going to make sure that I end up knowing something?
Something of value.
And when people have this...
Oh, um...
When people have this idea...
That they're starting with the conclusion, then always my question is, okay, well, what is it that's driving this?
Like, if you don't want to define your terms for yourself, if you don't want to start with a blank slate, if you don't want to make sure as much as possible you get it as right as possible, what is it for?
It's got to be for some particular emotional need.
And, you know, I couldn't help but think with, I think it was Swole, right?
The guy who was half Irish and half Ukrainian.
I mean, communism killed your ancestors, and it wasn't even that long ago.
Three generations ago, like, half of your ancestors were wiped out.
You know, it gives me a little bit of pause.
Like, you know, one of the reasons that, you know, I don't like what's going on at the moment is, you know, half my ancestors bled and died so that we could have a Nuremberg Code.
You know, which is like no forced medical experiments, no bribed medical experiments.
I feel a little bit of an obligation to them, like, don't just fold, you know, because, like, they all bled and died in ditches for this stuff, which is actually pretty important.
And I guess I don't really quite understand how you just kind of like, oh, no, it wasn't a genocide and this and that.
And that's like, how on earth do we know?
We don't know. What the mindset was of people on the other side of the world a hundred years ago?
We don't know what their plans were.
Well, the documentation is like, yeah, but the Nazis shredded as much documents as they could come across and they're not going to write this stuff down.
And I don't know.
It just seems really sad when we're sitting there trying to say, well, why were 20 million people killed?
What was the mindset of the people who were killing them?
It's like, I don't care.
How could we possibly know for sure?
And what the hell does it matter?
I mean, I think the only thing, this might be like guessing at what they might be thinking, but the end just by the means, that's the kind of mindset I think they have.
Whatever right now, whatever they're saying right now, might not even be what they really feel, but they just want to do it just to get to the means, which is whatever they think their utopia is going to be.
Like, yeah, like they'd prefer the war to end slavery in America, like all bloodshed and all that.
Whether it's, if it's voluntary or not, over the, like, economic way.
Slavery was over in the UK and all that.
So they don't care about what's going on right now.
They just want the ends.
Okay, but what's the ends?
Like, what do you think the ends are for them?
What do they want? Yeah, like the communist communal.
Like, they think that, yeah, like the...
I think it was two days ago.
It was one of the shows you did.
When the first American sellers came in from Europe, they did the communal thing.
They think that's the way to do it.
They think that's the better way to form a society.
I get that, but it's also kind of funny to me that writing a comic book is the least proletariat thing that I could possibly imagine.
You know, the proletariat are like, you know, hardscrabble laborers and, you know, that's like the most bourgeois thing that I could possibly...
It's just not a huge argument or anything.
I just thought it was kind of funny that I, who've done a huge amount of manual labor in my life and worked in proletariat occupations for many, many, many years, and this guy, I mean, maybe he has some proletariat credentials in the past, but it's like...
I'm making a comic book for adults.
It's like the least...
Proletariat used to have this kind of macho thing, like big muscled guys with hammers building tanks and stuff, and it's just like I'm penning a comic book, and I'm in my 20s or however old he is, and it's not a particular argument.
I just think it's kind of... It's about as far from Proletariat as you could possibly be.
Maybe it was the news of Superman being gay that made him all excited about getting into the comic book space.
Another fantasy. I think what they want is the opposite of what you say.
What they want is the paradigm of knowing what people want and what you say is let it happen.
Let it be spontaneous. I don't know what they want and they want to know what you want.
Yeah, I mean, that thing is like, well, we're going to get rid of the state and then we're going to make sure no one has any money.
It's like, what? Yeah.
Who are you to say how the hell people should organize themselves in the absence of a state?
I mean, talk about what I said, you know, meet the new boss, same as the old boss.
You know, it's like, well, if we finally got rid of this oppressive, oligarchical, coercive regime, and now if you use money, we're going to shoot you.
And it's like, I don't think that's the freedom and progress I was promised.
I don't think they're conscious of what they want.
And this, I know, like, as I go down this road, like, I hesitate with it because, like, I'm going to say it's their, the whole socialism, communism thing is their, like, messed up childhood stuff.
And they're not really conscious of what they're after.
They're after something, you know, there's something deep down that's motivating them that they're just not aware of.
But at the same time, I also don't want that to be the grab bag of every, you know, It is kind of the case that the world's problems are early childhood trauma in a sense, but it does seem to be like that can be taken too far in prescribing people's errors.
Does that make sense? Yeah, and you do have to be careful with pathological altruism.
You're like, oh, the poor wounded child within.
It's like, oh, these guys are pretty dangerous.
I mean, communists are pretty violent, right?
Once you're an adult and you're acting it out, it's the laws of reciprocity.
They're very conscious of what they want and they can't admit that they can't put those wants on other people.
Because in a free society, you're not conscious of what people want, but they are hyper-conscious of telling people what they need or want.
I'd guess they were listened to when they were kids, so the only kind of power they'd have is they have their own fantasy and if anything hostile tries to contradict that fantasy, they have a primal instinct to defend it even if it's wrong or right.
Yeah. I think the lack of definitions is very interesting, too.
And I'm going to use an analogy around sort of the temptation of the devil.
So, you know, what does the devil do?
He parades in front of you a whole bunch of things to see which one tempts you.
You know, like if you want to do a honey trap for some guy, you have to find out if he's a boob man or a leg man or a butt man, and then you just got to get some big boob, long-legged, big butt woman or whatever.
And you just parade...
Things. Is it money that you want?
Is it power? Is it sex?
Is it drugs? Is it gambling winnings?
Is it prestige? Like whatever your Shakespearean kind of weakness is, the fatal flaw that's going to grind you down.
And I think almost it's like the lack of definitions is like, well, I want to be able to keep promising you stuff until I figure out how to pick the lock to get you to like this stuff.
And I think that the definition stuff would be like, okay, here's what I have to offer.
Do you like it or not? And I used to have these fights in the business world.
I'm sure people in software or other, they have these fights all the time.
And the fight is something like, don't sell what we don't have.
I always have to have these fights with the...
With the salespeople, because the salespeople, the customer would say, does it do this?
And they'd be like, sure, yeah, totally it does, right?
And it didn't, right?
And then they'd say, well, just build it in.
And I used to say to them, look, your job as salespeople is not to just...
Anyone can promise anything and call themselves a great salesperson.
I can give you a Lamborghini for a dollar.
And people are like, wow, I'll take 10 of those, 100 of those.
Like, wow, what a great salesman I am.
It's like, no, you're not. You're just promising stuff for virtually free.
And... So, rather than, like, I sell what I have, right?
This is a non-aggression principle, peaceful parenting, UPB. I sell what I have, right?
And these guys would be like, okay, do you hate the rich?
Okay, well, okay, if you don't hate the rich, do you love the poor?
Do you think that the poor are great?
Okay, do you hate colonialism?
Okay, that's capitalism. Do you hate the military-industrial complex?
That's capitalism. Did you get a really bad education?
Yeah, that's capitalism, too.
I think they just keep changing what it is that they're offering to people, just like Someone trying to fit it, you know, got a bunch of keys on a ring and you're trying to figure out which key opens the lock.
And I think that's why there's this lack of definitions.
They need to keep things flexible so that they can figure out what triggers people to want what they think these guys are offering, if that makes sense.
You know what that kind of reminds me of?
Oh, sorry, go ahead. Oh, you go ahead.
What that kind of reminds me of is a mother trying to, like, motivate her kid.
Oh, it's like, why should I get up and go to school?
Do you like this? Do you want that?
No, okay, we gotta try this.
How about this? It's just, it's molding it to whatever to get the person motivated and on their side.
Like, it's a very early childhood kind of thing.
Like, I don't know.
That's just what... Well, especially if the answer is foreordained.
You know, like, if the kids...
Like, you have to go to kindergarten.
You know, oh, you liked it there?
You liked that teacher?
They have candy. There are all these wonderful other kids.
Like, when it's preordained, it's like, okay, what do I have to do, in a sense, to just shut you up because I'm dragging you there anyway?
It's happening no matter what.
And that's the same thing. Like, a communist is going to happen, but I can just...
Get you kind of on board so you don't resist it too much by offering you something that triggers you.
Yep. Yep. Oh, yeah.
Why would you define things to be...
Why would you define words when you could just make it convoluted and switch it and make it flexible, just like you said, to how they want you to think?
Well, and especially if you're just like...
You really don't care about the truth or the value of the thing.
You've got this foregone conclusion and whatever it takes to get there.
That's the only mindset you have about it.
Well, and Bitcoin is the last bloody hope of the lower classes to stop getting themselves raped by inflation and war.
And these guys are like, yeah, but it uses a lot of energy.
It's like, okay, so we're back to not caring about the poor anymore.
Is that what we're doing? And money doesn't exist anyway.
Of course, Steph, come on.
Well, I mean, he's right about fiat currency, of course.
I think when he said that, I think he means like the fiat money isn't real, because of course it isn't.
But he hated Bitcoin too, so...
I don't know. I mean, I kind of disagree with that because it exists.
It's just, it's with a gun to my head.
It's me fleeing from something to create this void of value.
You know, there's definitely something there.
It's just a negative value.
It's not a positive value.
Hey, man, fans don't use electricity.
Right. Well, he was all very big on industrialization, right?
Like, oh, the Soviet Union industrialized and took on the Nazis and the massive industrialization is like, you don't think that uses a lot of power?
But Bitcoin using power is really bad.
It's like, can you pick a fucking lane?
This is all I have. I shouldn't say it's bewildering.
I guess it's by design.
But it's like, pick a lane?
For God's sakes, you know?
Bitcoin is really bad because it uses electricity and it's bad for the environment.
But you know what was really great?
Soviet industrialization.
That uses a lot of power.
I don't know. It's just wild.
Again, there's no particular consistency.
They're just trying to figure out which key fits, right?
Yeah, so when they say, oh yeah, fake money, the average person would first think about fiat money, right?
But as soon as you bring up crypto, of course he wants to shut it down real quick by some propaganda about some environmental BS. Because he's like, oh, that's the antidote to the virus that I want to keep going on, which is the force and state.
So he'd want you to first think about, oh, fiat's bad, so of course imaginary money isn't real.
And then when you bring up crypto, he just wants to shut that down.
And I think he's right that there's more than enough land for everyone.
I mean, I think that there is.
But who prevents you from going to build on the land?
Who prevents you from using the land?
It's the government. The thing is, if there's more than enough land for everyone, then why are you warbling on about borders and boundaries anyways?
It's just like, then we'll never have that problem.
These people will never... So why are you worried about me enforcing my border if...
That's never the case.
What happens is a group of people build a valuable society and then other people try to show up into it and gain the value from that society without necessarily having to have built it.
Right. Yeah, I like the argument myself, just about, you guys are really against borders, but you know that they shot anyone trying to leave the Soviet Union.
At least I'm not talking about shooting people trying to leave the country.
But that was capitalism.
I feel like America, you can just leave.
Right, right. Yeah, where?
Oh, and the wonderful, don't you know, just how wonderful the healthcare system is in Cuba?
Don't you just know how wonderful the healthcare system is in Cuba and how terrible it is in Canada?
Well, that's not real universal healthcare.
You know that. It's capitalism, don't you know?
Yeah, so you could keep thinking capitalism is bad by just putting it with whatever.
That's bad as capitalism. Yeah, whatever people don't like is capitalism.
It's like, wow, you're a political genius.
Oh, the other thing, too.
Oh, gosh, what was it? Oh, yeah, that the state wants to keep people healthy.
What? Yeah.
It just made no sense to me.
Sorry, there were a couple of people who had their hands raised I had just noticed until just recently, so feel free to join in, too.
Yeah, go ahead. The guy with the bad microphone...
His mask really slipped off.
At one point, he said something to the effect of, like, well, we're not interested in morality or something to that effect.
And then the other guy, the comic book guy, saying, at the end, you know, when you beat somebody in sports or, like, a board game or something, and he's just totally compensating at the end.
Okay, Steven, hey, I'll send you those eggs, by the way.
It's like, you guys have no argument.
He got this mail, so now he's trying to build himself up at the end.
These guys have no morals at all.
Communist gobbledygook, as Norm MacDonald would say.
Huh, yeah. Was he anti-commy?
I guess so, right? Yeah.
Yeah, Norma's a good guy.
One of my favorite lines is right after O.J. was acquitted, he said, California just legalized murder.
Yeah, that was so good.
Yeah, wasn't that what led to his end at SNL? That was one of the last.
Such a good bit. Now, tell me what you guys thought about, like, I came in pretty hard and hot about the sort of them defending the YouTube and Twitter and MailChimp bans and all that kind of stuff, right? And I was kind of half and half about that, because, you know, you can ignore that stuff and, you know, just sort of patiently and reasonably explain stuff.
Or you can come in kind of hot, which seems more emotionally authentic, but I wasn't sure how it came across.
I thought his opening statement was the best he did, and then once you made any arguments at all, it just totally crumbled into, you're an F-Nationalist.
Well, he said he knew why you were banned, because you were F-Nationalist and anti-Semitic, all this buzzword bullshit that didn't mean anything.
So I guess he was defending the platforms.
Well, I think the anti-Semitic stuff, I don't know much about JF's arguments, but I think that the anti-Semitic stuff was more pointed at him than me.
I don't know why they kept bringing it up, because it's not really something that's a big thing on me.
Okay, yeah. The beginning part where he just did all that BS about all the eggs, like he's a five-year-old.
I think it's all just like shaming, like toxic feminine shaming.
And you were 100% right to just shut it down.
Because if you don't, they're just going to keep...
Keep repeating it. He got a little bit at the end, but that's just him not taking any information.
Yeah, I really just, as I said earlier, just dislike this so much that you just call everything stupid before you rebut it.
It's like, hey, look, if it's a good rebuttal, you don't need to call it stupid.
And if it's a bad rebuttal, calling it stupid won't help at all with anybody with half a brain.
Of course it's stupid if it disagrees with me because I have to keep this fantasy or else I don't have any power.
It goes back to when they were kids.
I got to look up some of this supposed Spanish anarchism that went on in the 1930s.
My vague memory of it, it turned into the usual collectivist shit show and show trials and struggle sessions and all the usual shit.
But I just know that they trot this out like, oh yeah, but it worked perfectly in Spain in the 1930s.
And I think that's not the case, but without more facts, I can't really rebut it.
I mean, if we were talking about whataboutism, that was like kind of whataboutism because there's always like they bring up, oh, in this geographical location, the same thing happened, but it was good.
But if you try to, if you even spend any time looking into it, it'll just turn out like every other case of communism.
Or not real commenting. Oh, it's just coming to...
I say strychnine kills people and they're like, oh no, this guy didn't take strychnine.
And then I say, no, no, it was strychnine.
Here's the proof. And they say, well, it wasn't real strychnine.
And it's just like, oh, forget this.
Because the purpose is power.
Yeah, just distracting you.
Trying to gain power over you.
Was it a worthwhile thing to do, do you think?
I mean, it kind of like...
You have to stop and do research on it, right?
If you just bring it up. So it would just like stop what you were...
Oh no, sorry. I meant...
Sorry, I was unclear.
I meant the debate as a whole. Doing this debate.
Was it worthwhile and entertaining? It's a fun audience, yeah.
It's fucking a bit entertaining. I thought it would be accurate.
It's very... It's fun.
It's... It is fun.
Done. I think it was worthwhile to the audience.
I don't think they got anything from what you were saying.
Well, yeah, I wouldn't say that.
I tried to go in assuming that I was neutral, which lasts for about five minutes.
But it's exciting and it's kind of fun to think, like, if you had no idea what's going on, what side are you going to land on?
That's a fun way to go into it.
But that's a really hard thing to actually pull off.
But if you can do that, I think it's totally worthwhile.
It's like way more exciting than watching an MMA fight or Super Bowl or something.
I mean, really, it's so fun because it's a type of fighting.
You know? And y'all are...
And I thought they were the best communists that you have debated even though...
I mean, they were really...
I thought they were the best ones that you debated so far.
So it was a good fight to watch.
Good, good. Anyone else?
I think it was definitely valuable for the audience perspective.
I think they were largely a lost cause, but it was definitely worthwhile.
You got to bring up peaceful parenting a lot in a really great context, and hopefully it was very valuable for the audience.
I think it's good for your audience It's kind of like, oh, put Stefan on his feet.
It's really fun to see.
Like, you know, it's pressure for you, but it's fun to see you kind of thrown into a little bit of a battle.
But it's a little bit for your audience.
It wasn't a little bit of a battle, but yeah, okay.
Well, yeah, I'm just saying, like, throw you in the ring and let your audience enjoy it.
And it's entertaining.
I wouldn't say you have to do this, you know, once a week or something ridiculous, but it's fun to see once in a while, and it kind of reinforces...
I mean, I speak for myself, but it reinforces that it's so clearly...
Like, what you say is so clear...
Oh, God, I'm...
It's just nice to see you flex your muscles a little bit and to watch it and enjoy it.
But it's kind of, it's like a movie where you already know the ending, which, you know, you kind of know how it's going to work out.
But you kind of hope for a really strong battle.
You'd hope for better opponents.
But it's still very entertaining.
The thing that would make these play a Little League team, and you hope the Little League team puts up a good fight, and you say, oh, well, they try.
They're just on there to raise their profile.
You can tell he's just thrilled to be in the Bay.
He's happy to be there.
He didn't really have much arguments.
I don't think his goal was to have strong arguments.
His goal was to be as confusing as possible.
Sorry, was that the comic book guy?
Yeah. To me, I thought...
That I just thought like someone said that they had the thought sophists come to mind and I had that thought too.
I was like these guys are master sophists.
They they're very good at being confusing and not not allowing the other person to form like valid concepts or like every time you had a really good point I noticed that they were the first people to change subjects like they didn't But people get that as a concession unconsciously,
right? The fact that they never replied to my first argument about supporting giant corporations, smashing working class guys' access to the means of production, the fact that they never addressed that, it comes across whether it's unconscious or not.
Yeah. Yeah, it kind of reminds me of all the communist propaganda from...
Yeah, like in the Western world now, like all started from like the 60s or past then.
Like I think they learned a couple lessons from that.
Oh, 30s, yeah. 30s, they were cranking out the pro-Soviet movies and all that.
It's been close to a century, really.
Yeah. Well, that's kind of the bummer is I go into these debates kind of masochistic, like, yeah, change my worldview.
I'm so excited to just like get wrecked right now.
And then they just drive an RC car with a firecracker in it and then blow it up and it's just total shit, which is kind of a bummer.
The thing that would have left me speechless would be to see these guys have some input.
I think one of the reasons why they have to be confusing is because communism exists in confusion.
So they can't be rational.
Like... If communism is their goal, then they can't be consistent.
Well, they said very clearly you can't be moral to achieve communism, which means that they don't have to act with integrity and honesty in the debate.
They very much confess that in the debate, that they don't have to be virtuous, they don't have to be good.
And so they can lie, they can make things up, they can obfuscate, because they're very much confessing that there's no honor in the debate for them.
For me, that was, if for anything, the debate was worth just for that moment when you touched on the morals and how they strangely avoided defining good or admitting that they have some values that they follow because otherwise they wouldn't be interested in doing anything.
So especially that brand guy, he had that weird contradiction.
So on one side, he was kind of determinist.
About the state, about everything.
But on the other hand, he was clearly believing in some kind of free will because he believed that the right people would go to power if they believed his morals.
So it's a weird contradiction.
I don't know what you think about it.
But you don't know anything that he really believes.
All you know is what he said, I think.
Yeah, well, yeah, we can only suppose, right?
But that's definitely a contradiction.
Well, they said that, I mean, they clearly confessed that there was no moral definition or consistency that they were interested in pursuing.
But they were interested in something, right?
Well, power, power, I would assume.
Exactly, exactly.
But they're also admitting in the debate that they're willing to lie.
In the debate. Because that's not a thing they won't do.
I mean, honesty is good.
And they said they could even define good or their pursuit or what they believe.
Is it even part of morality?
Yeah, to the audience, if someone's hearing what they're saying, they're like, oh, I'm not getting any answers.
Oh, this guy...
They wouldn't really know it, but if Steph wanted to...
Make like a logical course, like a Socratic course.
They just say, oh, well, make it complicated.
I mean, to anyone who's looking for answers, where would they go if they want to look for answers?
They just go to the state, right?
If all the information is all confusing and they have a willingness to want to know what is good and how do I... Do better at what I'm doing right now or how do I improve stuff?
If no answers are in front of you, of course you'd go to some malevolent state, just like how people go to God for answers.
Yeah, and I think that the recommended best steps forward that you put forward versus what they put forward couldn't possibly be more opposite.
So they're saying we need to have a violent Like, revolution.
And then you're saying we need to raise our kids more peacefully.
Like, those couldn't be more opposite.
Well, it's also fascinating that the violent revolution guys are perfectly welcome on Twitter and YouTube, but not me, right?
It's like, well, okay.
Yeah, because they support the already in place communist propaganda.
Right, yeah, yeah, of course.
Alright, if you haven't jumped in, jump in now if you wanted to get something in.
I think part of the tactic that I noticed is being very vague.
So that kind of makes it harder for the opposition to attack anything because They're always so vague about what they believe in and they really mostly reacted to what you said.
They haven't really proposed anything of their own.
It was very reactionary.
The whole, like, basis of, like, Marxism is sort of, isn't it, like, moral relativism is one of the pillars of that.
It kind of reminds me of the debate with Gary Eppie, where it's like, there's always some way to weasel out of some sort of definition and a way to basically, you know, appeal to everyone's biases by saying, oh, it can be this, and it could also be this, and it could also be that.
So it's like, The person who's listening, the audience, can then interpret that.
And rather than having their ideas stand on merits because they don't have any merit, they do that in order to deceive people into seeing what they want to see and taking away from that.
I think that's the whole basis and the whole goal and strategy that they apply because their ideas don't stand on merit alone.
Yeah, exactly. Because if they don't stand on anything, you can't really pick and choose.
You can't really perceive what they're about.
So sometimes, for some listeners, it might seem like they're winning or something.
I mean, for me, it was clearly they lost the debate, but some people might think otherwise.
If you don't have anything concrete to stand on, you're just standing on a sinkhole and you're not going to stand on a sinkhole.
You're going to sink down To whatever evils is down there.
Because you have to go somewhere, right?
Right, but I think it's just part of the strategy, right?
Like, I know we talked about, like, softness and stuff, but, like, part of the strategy is to deceive people into thinking that, like, you know, two people see the same movie but come away with a different interpretation, right?
And the reason being is because they have their own biases and their own thoughts and their own way, and so it's like they're purposefully, like, Making things murky, so that way people will go away and interpret things the way how that they want, rather than like...
Yeah, yeah. Yeah, if everyone has their own thoughts about something that should be objective, like morality, the...
Oops, I just lost my train of thought, sorry.
Damn, it was going to be great too, I could tell.
Yeah. I was sniffing it.
It went out. Another reason why I liked the debate is because they're advocating for confusion and you're advocating for clear thinking.
I also have that in my own head where I have a confusing part of how I think and a clear thinking part of how I think.
Watching YouTube battle it out kind of Also is similar to the conversation inside my own head, if that makes sense.
Yeah, you can't really argue against ideas that you've never positively entertained.
You have to give them the best hearing in your own mind.
And they have to be as convincing as possible, otherwise you can't really debate against them.
That's not the mistake.
I mean, they needed to absorb my arguments and argue as strongly as possible for them in order to argue well against them.
But because they just dismissed me with ad hominems, they're showing up without any ammunition, so to speak.
I mean, if I was up against somebody who'd wrote an entire book on debating, I'd spend at least a week preparing.
No, I just make it confusing.
I wouldn't let your questions be answered.
I just make it all confusing.
I don't have to prepare if I can just destroy the building instead of building on top of it.
Alright, any last thoughts or comments?
I think the most interesting post-debate I was in was...
Am I mistaken?
Were you ever on Blue Politics, Stefan?
It's been a...
I don't think so.
Oh, maybe. I don't know. It's been many years.
It was something like that, where I left the debate and got on the opposing side voice chat, and it was very...
It's just funny to hear, like...
It's like you said, trying to change people's opinions.
A debate's not trying to change opinions, necessarily.
It's stating your argument and letting people watch and hear that.
It's not about winning or losing.
But going on an opposing post-chat debate, it's all the same stuff, too.
It's just like, oh, Stefan just fell flat on his face.
Like, oh, this is terrible.
What a joke.
What a joke. It's just kind of funny to see that.
Oh, you mean like everybody, every side thinks they won, right?
Oh, of course. Every time.
Every single time. Every time.
Yeah. And so my thought is it's more important for the silent viewers that don't participate, that are actually listening and want to understand.
Because like you said, you'll have people on both sides go, oh, that person won or that person won.
But at the end of the day, what really matters is the people that are actually paying attention and want, like, have an open mind and, you know, basically, you know, Pareto disparition, you know, you've got, you know, a small number of people who are going to participate and be vocal and speak out, but you're going to have a large group of people who are going to be silent.
And those are the people that I think benefit the most.
Yeah. Well, man, at the end of the day, You can't say, like, Stefan, oh, like, you destroyed those people, but it's like, wow, you did such an amazing job of standing up for our side, and I appreciate that so much.
Because it doesn't matter, like, nobody's, like, on that, maybe, you know, there's probably a few people that change opinions, but on that side of the argument, they're all saying the same stuff, but I think you did such a great job of standing up for this side of the argument, and I really appreciate that.
Oh, thank you. I mean, I'm aware that you guys are supporting what I'm doing, and it certainly matters to me that I'm doing a good job, which is, of course, why, you know, if there's anything that crosses your mind, like even if it's later or whatever, just drop me a line and tell me things I can do better, because, again, I get that I'm representing.
Yeah, I'm so happy that I'm here, and just that You're representing the stuff that I care about.
It's such a pleasure.
I really appreciate it. Fantastic.
All right. Well, listen, thanks, guys.
I should probably try and get some kind of sleep in tonight, but I wanted to do a bit of decompress.
It was also bloody long, too.
My God, it was almost three hours, which I thought was a bit excessive, but I guess that was the deal.
All right, Steph. Night-night.
Sleep well. Yeah, you too, guys.
Thanks, Bill, for the feedback, and we'll talk soon.
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