Kind: captions
Language: en
the following is a conversation with
michael malus an anarchist
political thinker author and a proud
part-time andy kaufman-like troll
in the best sense of that word on both
twitter and
in real life he's a host of a great
podcast called
you're welcome spelled y-o-u-r
i think that gives a sense of his sense
of humor he is the
author of dear reader the unauthorized
autobiography of kim jong-il
and the new right a journey to the
fringe of american politics
this latter book when i read it or
rather listened to it last year
helped me start learning about the
various disparate movements that i was
undereducated about
from the internet trolls to alex jones
to white nationalists and to techno
anarchists
the book is funny and brilliant and so
is michael
unfortunately because of a self-imposed
deadline
i actually pulled an all-nighter before
this conversation
so i was not exactly all there mentally
even more so than usual
which is tough because michael is really
quick-witted and brilliant
but he was kind patient and
understanding in this conversation
and i hope you will be as well today i'm
trying something a little new
looking to establish a regular structure
for these intros
of first doing the guest intro like i
just did
second quick one or two sentence mention
of each sponsor
third my side comments related to the
episode
and finally fourth full ad reads on the
audio side of things
and on youtube going straight to the
conversation so not doing the full ad
reads
and as always no ads in the middle
because to me they get in the way of the
conversation
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to support this podcast as a side note
let me say
that i hope to have some conversations
with political thinkers including
liberals and conservatives anarchists
libertarians
objectivists and everything in between
i'm
as allergic to trump bashing and trump
worship
as you probably are i have none of that
in me
i really work hard to be open-minded and
let my curiosity drive the conversation
i do plead with you to be patient on two
counts
first i have an intense busy life
outside of these podcasts
like it's 4 00 am right now as i'm
recording this
so sometimes life affects these
conversations like in this case i pull
on all nighter beforehand
so please be patient with me if i say
something ineloquent confusing
dumb or just plain wrong i'll try to
correct myself on social media or in
future conversations as much as i can
i really am always learning and working
hard to improve
second if i or the guest says something
about
for example our current president donald
trump
that's over the top negative or over the
top positive
please don't let your brain go into the
partisan mode try to hear our words in
an open-minded nuanced way
and if we say stuff from a place of
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nuanced conversation can only happen if
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at lex friedman and now here's my
conversation
with michael malus there was a simpsons
episode where he starts mixing like
um sleeping pills with like pet pills
and he's driving his truck and i like i
want to see what happens with this red
bull and nitro
there's a lineup of drugs this is gonna
be so fun
yeah let's start with love yes
yeah so one one thing we'll eventually
somehow talk about it'll be a theme
throughout is that you're also russian
yes a little bit less than me but how
loud
why because i'm from ukraine oh you're
from ukraine
okay wow no because you came here a
little bit when you were younger
yeah i i i came here when i was 13 so i
saturated a little bit of the russian
soul
i i marinated in there so a little
deeper i haven't told anyone this but
i'll be glad to tell you
davidish um i haven't been back since
i was two and next summer it looks like
me my buddy chris williamson who's also
a podcaster he's british modern wisdom
he looks like apollo
we're we looks like we got a
videographer which apollo the god
so we're going to go for the first time
to see where i came from
which is ukraine we're going to go to
level and either st petersburg or moscow
probably st petersburg or both
it's going to be intense it's going to
be a lot of panic attacks i feel
and your russian is okay
no you can't talk russian ukraine or
it's like they get offended yeah but
then you also want to go to russia
yeah i don't know
for me there's several people in russia
i want an interview on a podcast
okay so one one of them is uh guerrilla
promon which is a mathematician
and the other person is putin you know
my favorite food and story is
do you know this no when he had merkel
with him do you know this story no
merkel's scared of dogs like petrified
of dogs so he brings in his like
like like uh black lab it's a labrador
it's like the sweetest animal
and it's all over her and there's
pictures and she's sitting like this and
she's terrified and he's like what's
wrong angela
it's just completely trolling her yeah
he's aware of the sort of uh the
narrative around him
yeah and then he plays with it yes he
enjoys it it's a very russian thing
my friend wanted to film about me he
goes i realize you guys aren't like us
at all you just like like
look at us and then i started telling
him stories about the upbringing
and he's like oh my god and as i'm
telling them like wow this stuff is
really crazy like what
how we are wired who's the we your
friend is the russian the friends
american i'm saying the way russians are
brought up
and the way maybe i don't think it was
just my family i bet you had similar
things like
here's an example i i was i had a buddy
staying with me he had a problem with
his roommate so he crashed in my place
fine
i went to the gym and i come back
and he goes oh there was and my
apartment buildings has four four
apartments so it's not like a huge thing
he goes oh there was someone knocking at
your door
so you know i i told him blah blah and
and
for me and i wonder if you're the same
way
if i'm at someone's house that's not my
own and someone knocks on the door
i wouldn't even think to answer it like
if i had an apple here might be i'd eat
it i'd
cut it whatever i'm not gonna it just
doesn't enter my head to smash into my
face
the the thought of answering the door if
it's not my house
it would never enter my head would it
enter your head no but why but he's an
american so someone's at the door he
goes and opens it even though it's not
his house
i would never do that i would never
think to do that
that is so strange you pick some very
obscure thing to
delineate americans i don't think that's
obscure because i think it speaks to how
we perceive strangers
with americans everyone's friendly and
with us it's like no no
like you have that moat and i think
that's a that
percolates into many different aspects
of how we relate to people and i had to
undo a lot of that that's true
you're right there's uh the relationship
i formed there were in russia
or very deep yeah close and then there's
the strangers the other
that you don't trust by default it takes
a long time to go over the moat
of trust for a long time until recently
whenever i said anything to anyone my
brain
ran a scan that said if this person
turns on you
would this can they use this against you
and i would do everything i said with
strangers
and after a while it's like you know
what maybe they will but i'm strong
enough to take it but
this is not how americans think well
here's another one let me ask you this
sorry i'm taking over the interview
people asked about like
advice for work right like i had this
there was this party i went to and
basically everyone had their own
problems and everyone else gave their
advice right
and someone was having a problem with
the co-worker and the advice these
dupoy americans gave them is oh sit down
and have a talk with them
and to me this is like the last case
last
resort like first you have to see what
you can without showing your hand
sharing your vulnerability only when
everything hasn't worked out or you're
like all right let me sit down with you
and try to have it out with you probably
but for them the first thing is like sit
down and be like oh you're causing me
problems and blah blah
so i perceive that right away as a
threat that this person sees an
antagonism between us and also as a
weakness that i'm getting to them
so my reaction isn't um how do i make it
better my reaction is to reinforce
my position and see what i can to
marginalize
them usually i haven't worked in a
corporate setting in a long time
but it's not i don't approach it the way
an american would like i'm glad you came
and talked to me now i probably would
because it's gonna be a friend
so you attribute that to the russian
upbringing as opposed to you have deep
uh psychological issues i think those
are synonymous
wait am i would you think differently
maybe a few years ago
um i don't know i i i think you lost me
at the
because you kind of said that you're
kind of implying you have a deep
distrust of the world
like the world does i think the default
setting would be distrust yeah
but
i would put it differently is i almost
ignore the rest of the i don't even
acknowledge it i just uh savor
i save my love and trust for the small
circle of people
i agree but when that person is being
confrontational or as they perceive it
as being open
now there's a situation how do you how
would you handle that
like like a cold wind blows he's just
kind of like yeah but it's not like
this is an opportunity for us to work
out our differences it's a cold wind
it's not a hug that's my point
you're so suspicious what it really is
is a cold wind
i'm so inhumane to be scared of it's a
cold wind
person but it's not this is great
but it's not a source of like i'm not
suspicious of
like i'm not uh anxious i would say or
like living in fear of the rest of the
world
anymore oh i agree but you're not
receptive to that person right
that's all i'm saying and they are got
it so speaking of which
let's talk about love yes which requires
to be
receptive of the world yes of strangers
i agreed
how do we put more love out there in the
world
especially on the internet one mechanism
i have found to
um increase love and that's a word that
has many meanings and is
you know used in a very intense sense
and it's used in a very loose sense
can you try to define love sure love is
a strong sense of attraction
toward a another person entity
or place that causes one
to tend to react in a disproportionately
positive manner that's off the top of my
head disproportionately
yes so for example if why not
proportionally
because like if you're someone's about
to who you love
is about to get harmed you're moving
heaven and earth
to make sure uh or like a book you love
you know like i love this book like
you're going through the fire to try to
save it
whereas if it's a book you really like
it's like huh i'll get another one
i don't you know and a book's a kind of
a loose example but
so you're going with the love that's
like you're saving for just a few people
almost like romantically like love for a
close family but it's also
just love to even the broader like the
kind of
love you can put out to people on the
internet which is like just kindness
sure i would say in that case it's
important to make them feel
seen and validated
and i try to do this when people who i
have come to know on the internet and
there's a lot
i try to do that as much as possible
because i don't
think it's valid how on social media and
i do this a lot myself but not towards
everyone
it's just there to be aggressive and
antagonistic
you should be antagonistic towards bad
people and that's fine
but at the same time there's lots of
great people and
especially with my audience and i would
bet disproportionately with yours
there's a lot of people who are because
of their psychology and intelligence
are going to be much more isolated
socially than they should
and if i and i've heard from many of
them and if i'm the person who makes
them feel oh
i'm not crazy it's everyone else around
me who is just basic
uh the fact that i can be that person
which i didn't have at their age
to me is incredibly reaffirming you mean
a source of love but i mean love in the
sense of like
you know you care about this person and
you want good things for them not in a
kind of romantic way but i mean you're
using in
a broad sense now yeah but you're also a
person who kind of
i mean uh attacks
this power structures in the world by
mocking them
yes effectively yes and uh
love i would say requires you to be
non-witty and simple and fragile
which i see it as like the opposite of
what trolls do
trolls are if i if there is
someone coming after what i love
there's two mechanisms right at least
two
i go up and i'm fighting them and in
which case
you bring in if you are getting hurt and
i fight even if you win the knife fight
or if you disarm them and you preclude
the possibility of a fight
and you drive them off or render them
powerless you
can you keep your person intact as
yourself
and you also protect your values so how
do you render them powerless
as you just said by mocking them one of
the most effective mechanisms for those
in power
we're much closer to brave new world
than 1984. the people who are dominant
and in power aren't there because of the
threat of
you know the gulag or prison they're
there because of social pressures look
at the masks i was on the subway not
that long ago in new york city
um no one cared who i was until i put
out the mask i was in the subway that
long in new york city there was and i
put this on my instagram i've told this
story before
there was an asian dude in his early 30s
he was like in western clothes it's not
like he had a
rickshaw or something an older man in
his 50s
stood up over him on the subway screamed
at him
said go back where you came from you're
disgusting i'm going to get sick
if you think this guy is a vector of
disease which is your prerogative why
are you coming close to him why are you
getting in his face
and what that was sorry so it was
because
he was asian it was both it was
the not having a mask gave him the
permission
to act like a despicable aggressive
person toward him right
and the point being a lot of these
mechanisms for social control are
outsourced
to low-quality people because this is
their one chance to assert dominance and
status over somebody else
so the best way to defuse that isn't
with weaponry or fighting
it's through mockery because all of a
sudden their claims to authority are
effectively destroyed
so let me push back on that what about
fighting that with
with love with um
patience and like kindness towards them
i i don't think kindness
is i think that would be uh a mismatch
and inappropriate
there's superman is batman okay and
superman's job is to help the good
people and batman's job is to hurt the
bad people
and i will always be on the batman side
than the superman side
both work the silly tight costumes one
has
pointy ears both are ridiculous so it's
uh it was a billionaire who gets
you know he's swimming in trim which one
is the best batman
okay i'm uh i'm undereducated on um
okay on the superhero movies i apologize
okay but
but you're just saying you your
predisposition is to be on the batman
side is to uh fighting
the bad guys yeah and that's what i'm
good at
that's what you're good at but just to
play devil's advocate or actually in
this case i am the devil because that's
what i usually
do watch the devil here the other angels
advocate exactly
to be the to be the angel advocate yeah
it's like
i feel like mockery is
um is a as a path towards escalation of
conflict
yes in many ways yes so you're not
i mean it's kind of like guerrilla
warfare
it means you're not going to win i am
winning we're all winning
we're winning on a daily this is my next
book we're winning we've won before i'm
not joking
the net the topic of the next book yes
is the white pill
the white pill is that we're gonna we
are winning
the most horrible people are being
rendered into laughing stocks on a daily
basis social media this is glorious
i so disagree with you i disagree with
you because there's side effects that
are
very destructive it feels like you're
winning but
we're completely destroying the
possibility of
having um like a cohesive society that's
called oncology
what's that mean curing cancer no your
concept of a cohesive society
is in fact a society based on oppression
and not allowing individuals to live
their personal freedom
oh so your your utopian view of this
you're the utopian you're saying
cohesive society
i'm saying i don't need that i'm saying
there's going to be conflict right
there's going to be conflict
you and i are disagreeing right now
that's not cohesive doesn't mean we like
each other less doesn't mean we respect
each other less
cohesive doesn't it it's just a
euphemism for like everyone's submitting
to what i want
no i mean cohesive could could uh could
be that it could be
um it could be like enforced with
violence all that kind of stuff sort of
the uh the libertarian view of the world
but it could just be
being respectful and kind of each other
and kind towards each other and loving
towards each other
i mean that's what i mean by cohesive so
when people say free
it's it's funny like freedom is a funny
thing because
freedom can be painful to a lot of
people
it's it's all matters how you define it
how you implement it how it actually
looks like
sure and i'm just saying it feels like
the mockery of the powerful
leads to further and further the
divisions it's like
it's turning life into a game
to where it's always you're playing
you you're creating these different
little tribes and groups
and you're constantly
uh fighting the groups that become a
little bit more powerful
by undercutting them through guerrilla
warfare kind of thing
and that's what the internet becomes is
everyone's just mocking each other
and then certain groups become more and
more powerful and then
they start fighting each other and into
basic they they form
groups of ideologies and they start
fighting each other in the internet
where the result is it doesn't feel like
the common humanity is highlighted it
doesn't feel like
that's a path of progress
now like when i say cohesive i don't
mean like
everybody has to be you know enforcing
equality all those kinds of ideas
i just mean like not being so divisive
that's like so it's going back to the
original question of like
how do we put more love out in the world
than the internet i i want
divisiveness oh you see you think that
this is that's that goal it's very
interesting it's the goal
so you we started this conversation with
you talking about you have love for that
small group
uh i think we both would agree to have a
bigger group be better especially if
that love comes from a sincere place
um i think our country specific i wrote
an article about this four years ago
that it's time to
disunite the states and to secede this
country has been held together with at
least two separate cultures
with thumbtacks and string for over 20
years uh there's an enormous amount of
contempt
from one group toward another this
contempt comes from sincere place
they do not share each other's values
there's absolutely no reason
just like any unhealthy relationship
where you can't say you know what it's
not working out
i want to go my own way and live my
happiness
and i genuinely want you to go your way
live your happiness if i'm wrong prove
me wrong
i'll learn from you and and take lessons
and vice versa
but the fact that we all have to be in
the same house together is not coherent
and that's not love that is the path
towards friction and tension especially
do you think there's
concrete groups like is it as simple as
the two groups of blue and red
no it's it's it's it's also very fluid
because you and i
are allied as jewish people as russians
as males
as podcasters uh you're an academic i'm
not there so there's
there we're different but we each are a
venn diagram
even within ourselves and i can talk to
you about politics and then we can talk
about russia stuff and then you could
talk about
your your work which i don't know
anything about so that would be where
you're way up here in our way down here
so there's lots every relationship with
just between individuals
there's it's very dynamic so how do we
succeed like how do we form individual
states
sure there's a little bit more cohesion
sure
the and voluntary cohesion so the first
step is to
uh um eliminate and the concept of
political authority as legitimate
and to uh denigrate and humiliate those
who would put themselves in a position
in which they are
there to tell you how to live your life
from any semblance of
validity and that's starting to happen
um if you look at what they had with the
lockdowns cuomo and de blasio new york
uh we have i was uh tired a couple weeks
ago
and i said to my friend oh just click
maybe i've covered and he goes it's not
possible like what do you mean
and he goes we haven't had any deaths in
like two months
and there's only 100 cases a day for
like two months and i go
you're exaggerating because everything
was still closed and i looked at the
numbers and he wasn't exaggerating
and there's no greater american dream to
me
than an immigrant family comes to the
states forms their own little business
maybe mom's a good cook it's a
restaurant dry cleaner fruit stand
and those people aren't going to have a
lot of money those are the first ones
who lost their
companies because of these lockdowns
they cuomo who's the governor of new
york opened up the gyms he said you're
clear to open up
de blasio said and we don't have enough
inspectors you're gonna have to wait
another couple of weeks
uh to regard that as anything other than
literally criminal
is something that i am having a hard and
harder time
wrapping my head around you said i mean
that's something i'm deeply worried
about as well which is
like thousands it's actually millions
of dreams being crushed that amer
american dream of starting a business of
running a business
what about all the young people who you
and i have in our audiences
who are socially isolated at best and
now they can't leave their homes
uh isolation and ostracism are things
that are very well studied in psychology
these have extreme consequences i read a
book called ostracism
and this wasn't scientific but basically
the author was a psychiatrist at college
whatever
and he had one of his colleagues they
did an experiment let's for a week
you ostracized me completely we know
it's an and he goes
even knowing it's the experiment the
fact that he wouldn't make eye contact
with me and the fact that he ignored me
had an extreme emotional impact on me
knowing full well this is purely for
experimental purposes now you multiply
that by all these p
the suicide the number of kids were
thinking about suicide was through the
roof
during all this uh and my point is until
these people
it's gonna i would predict like 2024
that's where we're going to have to
start having conversations about what
personal consequences have to be done
for these people because until then
they're going to do the same thing
so you think there's going to be
society-wide consequences of this that
we're going to see like ripple effects
because of the social isolation i i know
i mean we also need to talk about
consequences or cuomo de blasio
because if politicians respond to
incentives and the incentives are there
for them to be extremely conservative
because if you have to choose as cuomo
said a press conference between
a thousand people dying and a thousand
people losing their business it's not a
hard choice and he's right
but at a certain point it's like all
right you're losing
both you're losing not losing the you're
making these decisions
um and not having consequences for it
and you're going to do it again the next
time
so we need to make sure you're you're a
little scared okay and i don't know what
that would mean
but you're laying this
problem this this incompetence i don't
think it's incompetence i think it's
very competent
i think they're just they're jobs yes
but
what but you're laying it not at the the
hands of the individuals but the
structure of the
of government it's both yes
how would we deal with it better without
centralized control
well we didn't really have centralized
control because every country and every
state you know handled it in a different
mechanism but a city has centralized
control just yeah
right i mean no that's not true so cuomo
de blasio they had a lot of
disagreements over this
over the months and this was actually a
source of great interest and tension
um de blasio wanted at one point was
talking about like quarantining people
in their homes
home was like you're crazy uh something
same thing with the schools same thing
with the gyms
um and there are other such uh examples
but the point being this was an
emergency this is world war one
i talked about some timpool show um was
very dangerous
because it gave a lot of evil people
some very useful information about what
the country put up with
and what they can get away with under
wartime and this set the model for
things like the new deal and the other
things of that nature
it is undeniable you're a scientist so
you understand this perfectly well
um that this lockdown gave some very
nefarious people
some very valid data about how much
people will put up with
uh under uh pressures from the state
so fundamentally what is the problem
with the state that's existence
okay well but but uh uh to play angel's
advocate again
you know government is the people
so come on you don't you you you're do
you do you really think this
at as best i think it's possible to have
represent representation
can you imagine if you have an attorney
you're like oh you can't have the
attorney you want you're gonna have this
guy who you absolutely hate who you
share no values with why
because he drives i mean leaders
political leaders and
political representation drive the
discourse like we you know
uh the majority of people voted for him
or whatever
however however he defined that and
now we get to have a discussion well
was this the right choice and then we
get to make that choice again in four
years and so on
first of all the fact that i have to be
under the thumb of somebody four years
makes no sense there's no other
relationship that's like this including
a marriage
you can leave any other relationship at
any time number one
number two is it always impeach but they
did that part of it i'm
in just saying yeah that there's yeah
the mechanisms
are uh flawed in many ways yeah yeah
right and and
so that's number one number two is it
doesn't make sense
that if i don't want someone to
represent me
that because that person is popular that
they are now in a position to so having
uh
um representation and and having
citizenship based on
geography is a pre line technology
in a post-cell phone world there's no
reason why
i have to just because we're physically
in between two oceans
we all have to be represented by the
same people whereas i can very easily
have
my security be under someone and switch
it as easily as cell phone
providers so okay but it doesn't have to
be geographical it can be ideas
sure i mean this country represents a
certain set of ideas yes it does it
started out geographically
it still it was just it started off as
ideas as well but like there's a it's
it was intricately i mean that's the way
humans are there's
i mean there was no internet so
it was you were geographically in the
same location and you signed a bunch of
documents and then you kind of debated
and you
wrote a bunch of stuff and then you
agreed on it
okay so you understand that no one
signed these documents and no one agreed
to it
as lysandra spooner pointed out over 150
years ago
the constitution or the social contract
if anything
is only binding to the signatories and
even then they're all long dead
uh so it's it's this fallacy that
somehow because i'm in a physical place
i have agreed even though i'm screaming
to you a face that i don't agree
to be um subordinate to uh some
imaginary invisible monster that was
created 250 years ago
and this idea of like if you don't like
it you have to move that's not what
freedom means
freedom means i do what i want not what
you want so if you don't like it
you move okay just to put some i don't
like words
and terms one one one zero one one one
zero yeah exactly is that what your
language is it is
i'm translating it all in real time but
uh
would you call the kind of ideas that
uh you're advocating for and we're
talking about anarchy yes anarchism yes
okay so let's get into it can you can
you try to
paint the utopia that
an anarchist worldview dreams about
the only people who describe anarchism
as utopia are its critics
if i told you right now and i wish i
could say this factually that i have a
cure for cancer
that would not make us a utopia that
would still probably be expensive
we would still have many other diseases
however we would be fundamentally
healthier happier and better off all
of us than democracy so that democracy
sorry i jump back from the cancer no
that democracy or
government so it's only curing one major
major life-threatening problem but in no
sense
is it a utopia so what can we try to uh
answer this question same question many
times which is
what exactly is the problem with
democracy the problem with democracy is
that those who need leaders are not
qualified to choose them
those who need leaders are not qualified
to choose them so that's the central
problem of democracy not all of us need
leaders
right
what does it mean to need a leader are
you saying like people who are
actually like free thinkers don't need
leaders kind of thing
sure that's but like take a wave but
like you don't
okay so do you acknowledge that there's
some
value in authority
in different subjects so what what that
means is i don't mean an authority
somebody who's in control of you
but you're doing the definition switch
because i am i am you're right you're
right it's unfair okay those those bad
but that's what they do that's their
trick yeah and it's this is one of the
useful things by the way less is total
sidebar
if people ask me for advice i always
tell them if you're going to raise your
kids raise them bilingual
because i was trilingual by the time i
was six and that teaches you to think in
concepts
whereas if you only know one language
you fall for things like this because
using authority in the sense of a
policeman
and someone is an authority in physics
it's the same word conceptually they're
extremely different
but if you're only thinking in one
language your brain is going to equate
the two and that's a trap that people
who only speak one language have
for sure but even if you know multiple
languages you can still use the trick of
using your c or convenience
yeah absolutely to manipulate the
conversation you weren't trying to do
that but you
you fell in i accidentally did it yeah
right we all tend to do that if you only
speak one language and think of one
language
but if i guess let me rephrase it i
are you against do you acknowledge the
value
of like offloading your own
effort about a particular thing to
somebody else
absolutely like an accountant a lawyer a
doctor
absolute a chef infinite isn't that
ultimately what
a democracy is broadly defined like
you're basically electing a bunch of
authorities using the word you in two
senses
using the word you meaning me as an
individual now using you as a mass
yes as a math not use an individual so i
have i would absolutely want someone to
provide for my security i would
absolutely want someone to negotiate
with me for foreign power or something
like that
that does not mean it has to be
predicated and what lots of other people
who i do not know and if i do know them
probably would not respect
think about it's of no moral relevance
to me
nor eye to them so do you think this
kind of there could be
a bunch of humans that behave kind of
like
ants in a distributed way there could be
an emergent behavior in them that
results in a stable society like
isn't that the hope with anarchy is like
without
an overarching uh but answer
i i mean answer the worst example here
because ants have a very firm authority
the queen yeah and they're all they're
all drones they're all clones of each
other
yeah but so if you forget the queen
their behavior they're all
well from your perspective from your
human intelligence perspective but from
their perspective they'll probably see
each other as a bunch of individuals no
they don't
ants are very big on altruism in the
sense of self-sacrifice
they do not think the individual matters
they routinely
kill themselves for the sake of the hive
in the community but they
see that's from the outside perspective
from the individual perspective of the
individual they probably
they they don't see it as altruism
right but they they view and they're
right because the aunt's life is very
ephemeral
and cheap that it's more important to
continue this
mass population that that one individual
ant live
like bees are another even better
example the honey bee when they sting
they only
sting once and they die and they do it
gladly because it's like okay
this community is much more important
than me and they're right
yeah okay so fine let's forget i'm being
pedantic but it's important i think i'm
not
just being for the sake of being fed but
there's something beautiful that
i won't argue about because i do there's
an interesting point there about
individualism of
ants i do think they're more individual
but like
let's let's give your view of ants that
they're it's their communists okay
let's go with the communist view of ants
okay yeah uh
but there's still a beautiful emergent
thing which is like
they can function as a as a society and
without i would say centralized control
so is that the hope for anarchy it's
like you just throw a bunch of people
that voluntarily want to be in the same
place
under the same set of ideas and they
kind of like
the doctors emerge the police officers
emerge
the uh the different necessary
structures of a functional society
emerge
do you know what the most beautiful
example of anarchism is
that is just beyond beautiful when you
stop to think about it
i'm not being tongue-in-cheek language
there's infinite languages language the
things that language can be used for
are bring tears to people's eyes quite
literally
it's also used for basic things no one
is forcing us
we speak two languages each at least no
one's forcing us to use english
no one's forcing us to use this dialect
of english uh
it's a way and and despite there being
so many different languages
uh lingua franca emerge you know people
the language that everyone is in latin
even in north korea they refer to the
fish and the different animals by the
latin
scientific uh no one decided this sure
there's an organization
that sets a binomial nomenclature but
there's no gun to anyone's head
referring to uh seamoth as a pegasus
species
and when you think about how amazing
language is
and someone other context would say like
well you you need to have a world
government
and they're deciding which is the verbs
and you have to have an official
definition
and an official dictionary and none of
that happened
and i think anyone even if they don't
agree with my politics or my worldview
cannot deny that the creation of
language is
one of humanity's most miraculous
beautiful achievements
absolutely so there there you go there's
one system where
a kind of anarchy can result in
in beauty stability like sufficient
stability and yet
dynamic flexibility to adjust it and so
on
and the internet helps it you get some
something like urban dictionary which
which starts creating absurd both humor
and
wit but also language and syntax and
jargon immediately you size people up
if you use if you say vertebral i know
you're a doctor because that's how they
pronounce it the the spinal column
uh i'm sure in your field there's
certain jargon right away you can know
if this person's one of us or not
i mean it's infinite i mean i don't need
to tell you and it's emojis
too yes there's so much there to study
with language it's fascinating but
do you think this applies to human life
the
the meat space the physical space yes so
these there's that kind of beauty can
emerge without
uh without writing stuff on paper
without laws you could have rules you
don't need
you don't have to be laws so enforced by
violence
like that's what what's a law a law is
something that is unchosen
a rule is something if i go to my pool
and i i sign up to remember a pool
on the wall lists certain things it's
like you know certain number of people
in the pool
no peeing in here good luck enforcing
that one um and so on and so forth well
that's the problem
aren't you afraid that people are gonna
pee in the pool that's not as
my biggest concern is mass incarceration
as the fact that the police can steal
more money than burglars can
the fact that innocent people can be
killed with no consequences
the fact that war can be waged and with
no
uh consequences for those who waged it
the fact that so many
men and women are being murdered
overseas and here and the people who are
guiding these are regarded as heroic
so you think there might that in an
anarchist system
there's a possibility of have of having
less wars and less what would you say
corruption
and uh less abuse of power let's talk
yes and let's talk about corruption
because and i made this point on rogan
you and i
again this the russian background we
realize
that when it comes to corruption
american is very naive
corruption they think is oh i got my
brother a job and he's getting money on
the table
that's not when we're talking about like
state corruption
things that are done in totalitarian
states and even to some extent in
america like jeffrey epstein julian
maxwell
things that stalin did things that
hitler did you know when the cia was
torturing people at gitmo
they had to borrow kgb manuals because
they didn't know how to torture
correctly because they never thought of
these things
we it's very hard for us to get into the
mindset of someone who's like a child
predator
someone who uh let me give you an
example from my forthcoming book there
was a guy who was the head of ukraine
in the 30s i forget his name now these
old soviets they were tough
i mean they pride stalin means steel you
know they pride themselves in their
cruelty
and how strong they were and this was
the purge you know stalin is trying to
you know killing lots of people left and
right
and his henchman beria had the quote
uh find me the man i'll find you the
crime you know they would accuse someone
and they would torture him
until he talked and confessed and then
he had to turn people in
and they took this guy in like beginning
the year i think it's 36 38 he was had
ukraine
by may he's arrested and they take him
to the le blanca the basement in the red
square where they're torturing people
and they put they did the works on him
and he was a good soviet he stood up
and he who knows what they did to him he
didn't talk
so they said okay one moment they
brought his teenage daughter in
raped her in front of him he talked so
when we talk about corruption we
would never in a million years think of
this that's not how our minds work
um so when you're talking about states
and people
where you don't have ease of exit
where you are forced to be under the
auspices of an organization
creating a monopoly that leads to
in extreme cases but in not as extreme
cases
really uh nefarious outcomes whereas
if you have the option to leave as a
client or customer
that would have a strongly limiting
effect
on uh how a business and what it can get
away with so
but don't you think maybe i don't know
who the right example is whether it's
stalin
i think hitler might be the better
example of
don't you think or jeffrey epstein
perhaps
don't you think people who are evil will
will find ways to manipulate human
nature
to attain power no matter the system
yes and like the the corollary question
is
do you think those people can get more
power
in um in the democracy in a you know
in when there's a government already in
place they can it's easily they get more
power more dangerous they have a
government place
first of all sociopaths are known for
their charm and for their
warmth here's the two situations
in in a free society i'm a sociopath i'm
an evil person
i'm the head of macy's in a state
society i'm an evil person i'm a
sociopath i'm the head of the us
government
which of these are you more concerned
with it's like night and day
so you would have far more decentralized
military you would have far more
decentralized
security forces and they would be much
more subject to feedback from the market
if you have an issue with macy's or any
store with a sweater
look at that transaction if you have an
issue with the state
to you hiring a lawyer costs more than a
surgeon to even
access the mechanism for dispute is
going to be exorbitant and price poor
people out of the market for um
conflict resolution immediately so right
away you have something that's extremely
regressive and even though this is
touted as some great equalizer it's
quite the opposite
so in current society there's a deep
suspicion of governments and states
they're not that's not really like just
your example of macy's i mean
don't you think a hitler could rise to
be at the top
of a social network like twitter and
facebook okay let's suppose hitler ran
twitter
okay let's take this thought experiment
seriously
literally what could he do so all the
only tweets are gonna be about how much
the jews suck
right okay fine okay all the cool people
are leaving
there could be some compelling like you
said
um evil people are charming there could
be some compelling narratives that could
be with conspiracy theories
uh untruths that could be spread
like propaganda every criticism of
anarchism
is in fact a description well the
strongest criticisms of anarchism are in
fact description of the status quo
your concern is under anarchism
propaganda would spread and people would
be taught the wrong ideas unlike the
status quo
that's not even a criticism of anarchism
i'm not actually criticizing
it's an open question of
it's an open question of in which system
will
human nature thrive be
be able to thrive more and in in which
system would the evils
that arise in human nature would be more
easily suppressable
there that's that's the question it's a
scientific experiment and i'm asking
only from our perspective
of the fact that we've tried democracy
quite a bit recently and we i don't
maybe you can correct me we haven't yet
seriously tried anarchy in a large scale
well we don't need to try to
so anarchy isn't like a country right
it's like it's you can't
i'm not it's like saying well if anarchy
works how can we've never had an
anarchist government right
so anarchism is a relationship and
language is an example of this it's a
worldwide
and our system you and i have an
anarchist relationship there's almost no
circumstances we'd be calling the police
on each other i mean it's i'm asking the
same question in
a bunch of different directions out of
born out of my curiosity
is why is anarchy going to be
better at preventing the darker sides of
human nature which
presumably your criticism of government
because it's this because of
decentralization
so the darker side of human nature is an
extreme concern
anyone who says it's going to go away is
absurd
and fallacious i think that's a
non-starter when people say that
everyone's going to be good human beings
are basically animals we're capable of
great
beauty and kindness we're capable of
just complete
cruel and what we would call inhumanity
but we see it on a daily basis even
today
uh and what's interesting is the
corporate press
won't even tell you the darkest aspects
because that's too upsetting to people
so they'll tell you about atrocities and
horrors but only to a point
um and then when you actually do the
homework you're like oh it's so much
worse than
like that thing about stalin right so we
know in a broad
sense that stalin was a dictator we know
that he killed a lot of people but it
takes work
to learn about the hall of demore it
takes work to learn about what those
literal tortures were and that this is
the person who later
fdr and harry truman were shaking hands
with and taking photos with and
was being sold to us as uncle joe you
know he's just like you and me
um so when you have a decentralized
information network as opposed to having
three
media networks it is a lot easier for
information
that doesn't fit what would be the
corporate america narrative
to reach uh the populations and it would
be more effective
for democracy because they're in a much
better position to be informed now
you're right it also means well if
everyone has a mic that means every
crazy person
and with their wacky views and at a
certain point yeah it has to become
then there's another level which is then
the people have to be self-enforcing
and and you see that on social media all
the time when someone says this the
other person jumps in
you think but isn't social media a good
example of this like
so you think ultimately without
centralized control
you can have stability like
what about the mob outrage and the mob
rule the
the power of the mobs that that emerge
power of the mob is
is a very uh serious concern uh gustav
labon
wrote a book in the 1890s called the
crowd and this was one of the most
important books i've written because it
influenced both
mussolini and hitler and stalin and they
all talked about it and he made the
point
that under crowd psychology human
lynching is another example this
none of those individuals or very few
would ever
dream of doing these acts but when
they're all together
and you lose that sense of self you
become the ant and you lose that sense
of individually
you're capable of doing things that like
in another context you'd be like
i should kill myself i'm a monster so
you're worried about that but like
is in the mob doesn't the mob have more
power under anarchy
no the mob has much less power on
anarchy because under anarchism every
individual
is fully empowered you wouldn't have uh
um
uh gun restrictions you would have
people creating communities based on
shared values
they would be much more collegial they'd
be much more kind
as opposed to when you're forcing people
to be together in a polity
when they don't have things in common
that is again like having a bad roommate
if you're forced to look at jails if
you're forced to be
in locked in a room with someone even if
you at first like them
after a while you're going to start to
hate them and that leads to very
nefarious consequences
so as an anarchist what do you do in a
society like this
thrive i think i'm doing okay
[Laughter]
i mean i mean there's an election coming
up there's uh as as you talk
uh you're welcome is one of the
15 shows that you host
it's
you talk about libertarianism a little
bit yeah i mean
is there some practical
political direction like in terms of we
as a society should
should go i don't mean we as a nation i
mean we as a collective of people should
go
to uh to make a better world from an
anarchist point of view sure
uh i think politics is the enemy
uh and anything i need to find politics
so anything that lessens its sway on
people
anything that delegitimizes it is good
i wrote an article a few years ago about
how wonderful it is that
trump is regarded as such a buffoon
because it's very very useful
to have a commander-in-chief who's
regarded as a clown
because it's going to take a lot to get
him to convince your kids to go overseas
and start killing people and making
widows and orphans
as well as those kids coming home in
caskets whereas if someone is regarded
with prestige
and they're like oh we need to send your
kid overseas oh absolutely
i mean this guy's great so that is a
very healthy thing
where people are skeptical of the state
but there's a lot of people
that uh regard him as
as one of the greatest leaders we've
ever had yeah
dinesh d'souza he's another lincoln i
when you talk shit about trump or talk
shit about biden
i think i'm trying to find a line to
walk where you they don't immediately
put you into the
this person has trump derangement
syndrome or they have
the other the alternative to that i i'm
more than happy
when people are preemptively dismissing
me because then i don't have to waste
time engaging with them because those
people will be of no use to me
when i was on tim pool recently tim
poole's show uh tim poole's known for
his little
like hat i got a propeller beanie
motorized and it was just spinning the
whole
two hours like the 1950s thing the point
being i wore it
because there's lots of people who would
say i can't take seriously someone who
wears a hat like that
and my point being if you are the kind
of person who takes your cues
based on someone's wardrobe as opposed
to the content of your ideas
you're of no use to me as an ally so i'd
be more than happy you preemptively
abort rather than
waste our breath this is the deep