Order of Man


Is Capitalism Manly？ Short Answer, Yes. Here's Why... ｜ FRIDAY FIELD NOTES


Episode Stats


Summary

In this episode, I discuss the link between capitalism and manliness, and why we as men need to embrace the idea of capitalism as a system of economic and political systems. I discuss why we should all be champions of capitalism, and how we can all benefit from it.


Transcript

00:00:00.000 You're a man of action. You live life to the fullest, embrace your fears, and boldly chart
00:00:05.000 your own path. When life knocks you down, you get back up one more time, every time.
00:00:10.420 You are not easily deterred or defeated, rugged, resilient, strong. This is your life. This is who
00:00:17.200 you are. This is who you will become. At the end of the day, and after all is said and done,
00:00:22.760 you can call yourself a man. Gentlemen, what is going on today? My name is Brian Michler.
00:00:27.780 I'm the host and I'm founder of the Order of Man podcast and movement. I want to welcome you here.
00:00:33.560 I want to welcome you back. Really honored that you're here with us. Guys, it's my goal to build
00:00:39.060 a resource, an advocacy, a brotherhood, camaraderie, whatever you want to call it,
00:00:45.480 the order, if you will, fraternity, where men can band together and learn from each other,
00:00:50.800 grow from each other, and improve in every facet of our lives, from our homes and our businesses
00:00:56.820 to the communities in which we serve. It's evident to me that masculinity and manliness is needed more
00:01:02.820 now than ever. To that end, we're doing this podcast and we're really working to give you
00:01:10.600 the tools and resources and conversations that you need. This is your Friday Field Notes.
00:01:14.940 In the Friday Field Notes, I discuss some ideas and some thoughts that have been bouncing around
00:01:20.840 in my brain and some things that I've been thinking about over the past week or so.
00:01:26.000 Now, we had a conversation or a question on our Ask Me Anything, which is a podcast that we release
00:01:31.100 every Wednesday. Somebody was asking about the idea of capitalism and manliness and whether or not
00:01:38.400 they are synonymous, whether or not they're intertwined. I've got some thoughts about this because I
00:01:44.540 wanted to expand on it a little deeper. Before we get into that, I do want to discuss with you
00:01:50.980 one thing that you can do to support the show, and that is to pick up any Order of Man swag that you
00:01:57.060 may see that you like. I've got our legacy shirt. I don't think this one's actually in the store,
00:02:02.300 but we do have our Order of Man hat. We have two brand new shirts out. Number one is King Card.
00:02:09.380 It's literally the king with the Order of Man axes, and it says protect, provide, preside.
00:02:15.300 And the second one that we have is hoist the black flag. I'm not going to ruin that one for you. Just
00:02:20.520 go to store.orderaman.com. You can pick up a shirt. You can pick up a hat. You can pick up our
00:02:26.140 best-selling battle planner. It's a great way to support what we're doing, but also have some
00:02:31.000 utility in the process. So with that said, guys, really what I want to do today is I want to get to
00:02:36.720 the reasons I believe that capitalism and manliness are connected. And I'll start by saying
00:02:45.860 this, is that number one, if you look at socialism, you look at communism, those things are not manly.
00:02:53.500 All right. If you look at both of those, it's about taking from one party or one person and giving to
00:02:59.620 another who is less deserving. It always produces an inferior result. There is no time throughout history
00:03:06.360 where any system or any country that has been dictated through market ideas of capitalism and
00:03:15.180 socialism, that it's actually worked out and been more advantageous than capitalism. Capitalism is
00:03:21.160 quite literally a social construct. A lot of people talk about gender or masculinity or femininity as being
00:03:29.040 socially constructed. They aren't. Okay. They're biologically constructed. And then they're supported
00:03:35.180 societally and they're supported societally for good reason. They actually work. And it isn't until
00:03:41.360 the relative ease of modernity within the past 30, 40, 50 years that we've even had the luxury
00:03:47.020 of calling into question what makes a man, a man, what makes a woman, a woman. And so these are first
00:03:53.500 world problems, but if we don't address them and talk about them realistically, they will become more
00:04:00.000 severe problems that at some point down the road, we're going to need to address. So what I wanted
00:04:05.740 to talk with you about today is the idea of capitalism, what it means at its foundation,
00:04:12.020 what it means at its root and why it's so important that we as men embrace the idea of free markets and
00:04:19.900 capitalism and how this system has produced more wealth, more prosperity, more abundance,
00:04:26.620 more medical advancements, more technological advancements than any other system in history
00:04:32.580 and why we as men ought to be champions of the idea of capitalism. Now I'm going to start by saying that
00:04:38.760 there are some faults with capitalism in that people can take advantage of the system, right?
00:04:44.420 We have greed and we have corruption like crony capitalism that gets in the way of us being able
00:04:50.120 to trade freely. But let me say this very clearly, that isn't capitalism. Crony capitalism is a
00:04:57.320 misnomer. It's an oxymoron. You cannot have crony capitalism. Now I know that's the term we use and words
00:05:03.620 are important. So it illustrates a point, but the whole concept that because people are manipulating the
00:05:10.640 system or using their government positions to dictate and to narrate and to manipulate the free market,
00:05:19.740 that is the antithesis of capitalism. Capitalism at its core is about free markets. It's about
00:05:26.820 voluntary exchange. It's about me having a good or a product or a service or an idea and then going out
00:05:33.720 into the marketplace and voluntarily exchanging that with you. Crony capitalism is not by any stretch of
00:05:41.100 the imagination that when people are greedy and they manipulate people or they lie to people or they
00:05:48.500 abuse the system, they abuse the system. That is not capitalism. So I'm not here to tell you that
00:05:53.620 capitalism is perfect. In many ways it can be exploited, but capitalism at its core is a very
00:05:59.560 manly thing. And I'm going to explain four reasons that is, but please don't ever believe that just
00:06:06.460 because the system can be exploited or manipulated that somehow it's not as advantageous as these other
00:06:17.820 systems. We want prosperity. We want growth. We want independence. We want free thoughts and
00:06:23.240 exchange of ideas. We want people to be able to make their own decisions. So let's break this down.
00:06:27.900 Number one, the reason why capitalism and manliness go hand in hand is it promotes the idea of rights
00:06:34.240 and responsibilities. Okay. Everybody is familiar with, at least if you live in this country, and even
00:06:38.800 even if you don't, you're familiar with the idea that there are certain God-given unalienable rights
00:06:46.640 that we have life, liberty, the pursuit of happiness. And there isn't a single person that should be able
00:06:52.680 to dictate to us how we live our lives, how we lead our lives, how we communicate the products and goods
00:06:58.460 and services that we offer, what we find valuable. And that's a very manly idea that you have a right to
00:07:05.820 these things. But in addition to that, and here's what most people overlook is you also have a
00:07:10.540 responsibility. I think it was Peter Parker's or Spider-Man's uncle who said, so Stan Lee essentially
00:07:20.080 said that with great power comes great responsibility. So the freedom that we enjoy as Americans is very,
00:07:28.900 very powerful. Like I already said, it created more freedom, more prosperity, more abundance,
00:07:33.080 more technological advancement than any other time in history. That's a very powerful idea.
00:07:39.320 But we also have a responsibility and everybody wants to talk about rights. I have a right to do
00:07:43.220 this. I have a right to do that. And maybe you do, but that right needs to be defended from time to time.
00:07:48.520 And it might actually cost you your life to defend those rights. And that's the responsibility that
00:07:54.060 we have. If there's one core fundamental of masculinity, it's that, or manliness, it's that
00:08:02.340 we have a responsibility. Now it's on my hat, protect, provide, preside, right? We talk about this
00:08:08.140 often. Protect, provide, preside is responsibility. We need to make ourselves capable of defending
00:08:13.800 ourselves, defending other people, standing up for people who can't do it themselves, providing for our
00:08:18.520 families and our communities and our neighbors and our neighborhood. And then being able to
00:08:24.220 live the life that we want through our own actions. But you can't have rights without
00:08:29.480 responsibilities. And responsibilities, conversely, always lead to more rights. Because it's very,
00:08:35.860 very important we understand the connection between rights and responsibilities and why we as men
00:08:41.600 cannot just rest on our laurels or cannot just live on the backs of our forefathers,
00:08:46.540 but realize that we at some point may need to fight to defend and preserve the rights that God
00:08:51.700 has given us. Number two is that capitalism promotes innovation. If there is no incentive,
00:09:00.700 and this is what socialism does, this is what communism does, is it disincentivizes you for producing.
00:09:08.880 Because what happens if you produce? You get taken from, right? If you learn to produce more than the
00:09:16.080 other person, it gets taken from you and given to somebody else. There was a famous research or a
00:09:22.680 study, and maybe it's just anecdotal, but it talks about a teacher who decides that they're going to
00:09:27.680 implement socialism or communism into their classroom. And rather than basing kids' performance
00:09:34.740 on their own merit and worth and study habits or intelligence, they're going to base it on just
00:09:40.520 making sure that everybody averages out and equals out the grade. So about the first time they did a
00:09:46.260 test, the students who got A's, they looked at their scores and they were a little bit disheartened
00:09:52.500 because they saw that, well, instead of an A and I worked my tail off to get this A, I actually got
00:09:58.200 a B because the kids who didn't do anything got D's or F's and that rounded out the score and propped
00:10:04.520 those D's and F's up. So they were happy about it, but the A's and B's were ticked off, rightfully so.
00:10:10.520 So the next time they took their test, the kids who would normally get A's and B's got B's and C's
00:10:16.180 because they thought to themselves, well, why work hard when it's just going to be taken from me?
00:10:21.840 The D's and the F's got maybe C's and D's. The third time they take the test, the kids who got A's and B's
00:10:29.500 and B's and C's got C's and D's and the kids who got D's and F's got D's and C's, right? So when you
00:10:36.500 compromise and you don't incentivize people properly for production, you end up diminishing
00:10:47.520 the results you could have otherwise experienced. Now, here's the problem. Some people will say,
00:10:53.340 well, what about those kids who have D's and F's? They'll get left behind. They might, but the A's
00:10:58.600 and the B's, if you allow them to be A's and B's and produce and give them an incentive structure
00:11:04.980 for performing, then they're going to go out and they're going to help the D's and F's who can't
00:11:10.120 possibly do it for themselves. This is the beauty of capitalism. A lot of people say, well, you know,
00:11:15.640 capitalism is greedy. Not necessarily. I don't consider myself a greedy individual. Now, I believe in the
00:11:23.280 incentive structure and I want to continue to add value to your life so that when there's opportunities
00:11:28.160 for me to serve, I can take advantage of it. I've been thinking about coaching my oldest son's football
00:11:34.300 team, at least helping out in some capacity. I would like to give back to the community. I would
00:11:39.700 like to serve in the community. I would like to donate to politicians who I believe in. I would like
00:11:44.900 to donate to causes that are important to me. I need money to do that. And so this concept of
00:11:51.160 innovation, creating new ideas and concepts and merging different thoughts and different ideas and
00:11:58.340 different sectors of the market together to create something that has never been created before
00:12:04.460 and to reduce costs and to create solutions to problems that we've always been dealing with
00:12:11.140 is a by-product of free markets, of a capitalistic society and something that I believe is very manly.
00:12:18.160 Let's get to the third point. The third point is that there's this concept of merit, right? I know we live
00:12:26.100 in this participation society. I know that you believe that showing up is half the battle. Maybe you don't
00:12:32.440 believe that, but a lot of people do. I know we believe that we don't want people to feel bad. And I
00:12:37.640 certainly don't want people to feel bad either. But the reality is, is that some people haven't earned the
00:12:42.380 results that they're experiencing. And if I want to incentivize people to earn results, then I need to
00:12:48.200 make sure there's a reward system in place to incentivize, to promote exceptionalism, not at the
00:12:56.740 expense of other people. This is what so many people get wrong. Capitalism is not at the expense of other
00:13:02.260 people. Let me tell you why. If we want to do business together, let's say, because I talked about
00:13:07.780 our order a man store earlier, let's say you wanted this hat, this, this very specific hat that I'm
00:13:12.920 wearing right now. And I think this hat sells for 22 or 25 bucks. And you go to store.orderman.com and
00:13:19.320 you jump on and you find this hat and you're like, okay, there's that hat's $25. Two things need to
00:13:24.460 exist simultaneously. Number one, I need to believe that your $25 is worth more than the hat that I paid
00:13:34.120 for. And that's usually true. Cause I paid maybe 10, 12, 13, $15 to have the hat created. You pay me
00:13:40.640 25, I make $10. So that's the first condition that needs to exist. The second condition that needs to
00:13:47.340 exist in order for this to take place is you need to believe that this hat is more valuable than the
00:13:54.160 $25 that you're going to give to me, right? You think that it's going to help you look good,
00:14:00.820 or it's going to spread a message, or maybe you just want to support or whatever your reason is,
00:14:05.940 you believe that the hat is worth more than $25. If both of those conditions did not exist,
00:14:12.460 a transaction would not take place. This is all voluntary. It's very interesting. How can that
00:14:18.620 exist? How can that be? How can it be that I think your money is worth more than the hat and you think
00:14:25.100 the hat is worth more than the money you're going to give me? Value is subjective. It's as simple as
00:14:31.300 that. And we're all grown men who can make decisions based on what we think is important.
00:14:39.380 And what I think is important is not necessarily what you think is important. And what you believe
00:14:45.220 is important may not be as important to me, but the whole idea is that we're, we're building
00:14:51.660 ourselves up and we're serving others based on merit. Now who gets to decide that? Well,
00:14:56.720 the consumer does. Now we should always have a high sense of worth, right? But at the end of the day,
00:15:02.640 you as consumers need to decide that what I'm putting out into the world is valuable.
00:15:07.860 You as a consumer of, of vehicles, for example, if you're in the market for a new truck,
00:15:12.720 gets to decide what is valuable. The GMC dealership, the Toyota dealership, the Dodge, the Chevy,
00:15:19.400 the Ford dealership, they don't get to decide what's valuable. You do. Collectively, we as 300
00:15:25.480 plus million people in this country, seven plus billion, maybe even close to 8 billion people
00:15:31.000 get to decide what's valuable. And what that does is that drives merit that causes us to do better,
00:15:40.120 to be more competitive, to be more efficient, to do things right, to hire the right people,
00:15:45.240 to be innovative, to, to have a healthy sense of competition with other people. These drive down
00:15:53.280 costs, these build up innovation, and ultimately gives us responsibility to live our own lives.
00:15:59.580 Now, guys, the last point that I wanted to make with you, and this is very important is that the
00:16:03.360 idea of capitalism and being manly is that it promotes a personal ownership, personal property,
00:16:11.900 that we have a right to the property that we own. The government doesn't own it. Another party doesn't
00:16:21.680 own it. Another business doesn't own it. Another individual doesn't own it, but I own it. And isn't
00:16:26.700 that an amazing thing that I own my computer, that I own my intellectual property, that I own these
00:16:32.240 cameras, that I own the website, that I own the clothes that I have on my back, that I own this desk,
00:16:37.740 that I own this house? Isn't that an amazing thing? Again, this comes back to the incentive
00:16:42.560 structures. It's so crucial that we as individuals have rights to personal property. If somebody else
00:16:52.620 has those rights, are we really free? Are we really free to do what we want? Are we really free to
00:16:58.820 utilize my camera, my computer, my microphones, my clothes, my intellectual property in a way that I
00:17:05.100 think will serve people? No, of course not. We're indentured. We're slaves. Unfortunately, this is
00:17:11.340 true when it comes to, for example, property rights. We think we live in a free market society and in
00:17:16.300 some ways we do and in some ways we don't. I pay taxes on this property every year. Well, do I own
00:17:21.380 it or not? Well, the answer is no, I don't. It might be written that way on paper, but if I'm having to pay
00:17:27.480 somebody else, in this case, the government, every single year because I own land, is that really
00:17:33.860 ownership, I mean, we're really shifting far away from this idea of personal property and individual
00:17:39.640 rights and ownership rights that we have. It's a real travesty. Now, guys, I'm going to close out
00:17:44.940 with this and then we'll recap, is that there are some pitfalls potentially of this idea of capitalism.
00:17:54.140 Essentially, you're letting people go out into the world and you're assuming that what they're going
00:17:57.980 to do is right and just and noble and true, but there's always going to be people who manipulate
00:18:03.760 the system, who take advantage of the system, who mess with the system. But again, that isn't
00:18:09.880 capitalism. That's an abuse of the system that's available and you're always going to see that.
00:18:15.900 Some people will say, well, you know, we need this third party, this arbitrator to come in and this
00:18:21.100 moderator to be able to ensure that people are doing right. Well, everybody is flawed. You're flawed.
00:18:26.440 I'm flawed. Government elected officials are flawed. And so why do you think that that individual is
00:18:32.560 going to be less flawed than you? People will say, well, capitalism takes, gets, gets taken advantage
00:18:39.260 of. Yes. Agreed. So does socialism. So does communism. Okay. And those systems have literally killed
00:18:48.320 more people than any other system of trade and governance and free markets and economies out there
00:18:55.320 at all. Are there, are there downfalls? Sure. People can manipulate the system, but that doesn't
00:19:00.280 go away just because capitalism goes away. In fact, all you're doing is you're consolidating power for
00:19:05.660 a few at the expense of the many I'd rather 300 million. If we're talking about this country or almost
00:19:12.860 8 billion people, if we're talking about the world collectively decide what I am worth, what you are
00:19:18.520 worth. I'm not talking about worth as a human or your self-worth. I'm talking about worth of the goods
00:19:23.280 and the products and services that you offer. Should there be checks and balances in place?
00:19:29.440 Absolutely. I want to ensure that every human being has a level playing field. And I want to
00:19:35.600 ensure that the rains are taken off of us so that we can go out and we can innovate and we can be
00:19:41.380 creative and we can think of new things and we can see things in a different light and we can bring
00:19:45.700 them to market. The market will say that's a good idea or the market will say that's a bad idea.
00:19:49.500 And if it's a good idea, we double down on it. We invest more in it. We get better at it. If it's
00:19:53.900 a bad idea, we nix it. We go back to the drawing board. We fix, we manipulate, we change, we tweak,
00:19:58.960 we adjust, and then we introduce something to the market that's going to serve people more effectively.
00:20:03.600 Guys, capitalism is the most manly system of governance and trade that's ever been created.
00:20:10.940 It has opportunities for exploitation, excuse me, but that doesn't mean it's a bad system in and of
00:20:19.280 itself. You cannot show me a better system that's created more wealth, more abundance, more
00:20:24.260 individualism, more freedom, more prosperity, more medical advancements, more technological
00:20:29.760 advancements than what capitalism has done. And if you don't believe that, then I got to admit that
00:20:36.520 you're either ignorant or an idiot. Now, I know some of you guys might say that's harsh. It isn't
00:20:42.420 harsh. You either don't know what's happened throughout culture and societies when we start to
00:20:47.720 implement socialism and communism, or you just are oblivious to it, which makes you
00:20:53.920 kind of ridiculous. Guys, capitalism, this is what we need. Now, we don't want people to abuse it.
00:21:01.840 I'm not saying that at all. I'm not saying I want people to exploit others. What I'm saying is that
00:21:06.820 I want you to create products and goods and services and value into the marketplace and other
00:21:13.340 people to create value and goods and products and services into the marketplace so ultimately we can
00:21:20.640 create the most prosperous, the most abundant, the most healthy, the most free society that we can
00:21:26.960 possibly create. So again, as a recap, and then we'll close things down. Number one, capitalism
00:21:32.180 promotes rights and responsibilities. They're connected. Number two, it promotes innovation
00:21:38.860 through competition and drives down prices. Number three, it's a meritocracy. It's based on what you do and
00:21:44.360 how you perform, not anything else. And by the way, if it does, if you are promoted through any
00:21:52.100 other form other than meritocracy, let's say nepotism, for example, well, that's not capitalism.
00:21:59.380 Okay. Some of you guys will say, well, you know, people get promoted that don't deserve to be
00:22:02.960 promoted. That's not capitalism. That might be nepotism or playing favorites or politics,
00:22:08.880 but it's not capitalism. And then the last thing is individual property rights. I hope that helps. I
00:22:14.600 hope that serves you. If you guys agree, share. If you don't agree, let me know what you don't agree
00:22:18.840 with and we can hash it out. Very important. We have these discussions. So if you have any questions,
00:22:23.820 comments, concerns, ideas, thoughts, whatever future topics, let me know. We'll keep putting
00:22:28.740 this content out there. You guys keep sharing, you keep following, and we'll keep doing what we need
00:22:34.060 to do. Now, remember guys, if you want to support and on the topic of capitalism, what we're doing
00:22:38.660 here, go to store.orderofman.com, pick up our King card shirt or our hoist, the black flag shirt,
00:22:45.020 pick up a hat, pick up another shirt, pick up a decal or patches, or our number one bestselling
00:22:50.460 battle planner to help you get your things on track. All right, guys, we'll be back next week
00:22:55.780 for an interview. Until then, go out there, take action, and become the man you are meant to be.
00:23:00.960 Thank you for listening to the Order of Man podcast. If you're ready to take charge of your life and be
00:23:05.840 more of the man you were meant to be, we invite you to join the order at orderofman.com.
00:23:15.020 Thank you for listening to the Order of Man.