Ep 274 ｜ Kanye 2020, Working for Liberals, & the 1619 Project
Episode Stats
Words per Minute
178.5976
Summary
In this episode of Relatable, I answer some of the questions you guys sent in about how to deal with working for a liberal employer and having liberal co-workers. I also talk about the importance of being a contrarian in the workplace and how to speak out when it comes to controversial topics.
Transcript
00:00:00.000
Hey guys, welcome to Relatable. Happy Monday. I hope everyone had a wonderful weekend. Today
00:00:17.060
we're going to do something a little bit different. We're going to do a Q&A this Monday.
00:00:21.800
There will be some theological questions, some practical questions, asking for advice. Those
00:00:27.160
are my favorite kind of questions. I love giving you guys like real relationship advice and things
00:00:31.760
like that. But we're going to talk about a variety of things. I might touch on a couple news stories
00:00:37.100
that I didn't get to last week. If you missed the Culture War episodes, really all last week was
00:00:41.780
about Culture Wars. Monday we talked to a journalist about the transgender contagion. On Wednesday we
00:00:49.140
talked about Black Lives Matter and the ideology behind that organization. And then Friday we
00:00:54.100
talked about another part of the Culture Wars, the deconstruction of objectivity and how we can
00:01:00.000
push back and continue to try to create a republic where we do have free and open debate, which is
00:01:07.380
so important for progress, no matter which side of the aisle that you're on. Today I'm going to answer
00:01:12.420
a few of the questions. Some of them have to do with that. Some of them are totally unrelated,
00:01:18.920
but if you're more interested in a deep dive on those, definitely go listen to those as well.
00:01:22.680
Today is a really fun episode. And then Wednesday we will talk about some new stuff. Friday I'm really
00:01:28.320
excited about the conversation that we're going to have. I'm going to be talking to an expert on
00:01:34.720
critical race theory, and it's just going to blow your mind. I'm so excited for you to listen to it.
00:01:40.100
This guy is, I would say, the foremost Christian expert on this stuff, and you will just be blown away
00:01:45.520
by how this idea and how this thinking tool, if you want to call it that, this critical analysis tool
00:01:54.480
is infiltrating not just the world at large, but also the church specifically. So I'm really excited
00:02:02.140
about that conversation. But today, today we are going to talk about some of the questions that you
00:02:07.320
guys sent me via Instagram. And one question that I got repeatedly is, how do I deal with working for a
00:02:14.620
liberal employer and having liberal co-workers during this time? I have friends who ask me
00:02:21.840
the same question, who I try to give advice to. But let me just say, I have never, well, I can't say
00:02:29.240
I've never been in that position. Maybe one time I've been surrounded by people who don't have most of
00:02:35.140
the same views that I do. But for the most part, I mean, I've only been out of college for six years
00:02:40.460
now. And for about four of those six years, I have done what I'm doing now. And so I don't have the same
00:02:49.040
challenges necessarily. I have different challenges, but I don't have the same challenges as someone does
00:02:54.160
who is working in a, you know, a normal corporate job or in a job where most of the people around you
00:03:01.720
are liberal. I have friends who are dealing with the same thing where they'll be on a conference call
00:03:06.060
and someone will mention some random social or political issue that maybe didn't have anything
00:03:12.340
to do with a work-related conversation. And they just feel uncomfortable. They're not sure,
00:03:17.340
should I push back on this? Should I say something? Is it, am I going to risk my job to say something?
00:03:22.880
And I do think it's really difficult. And there are so many different factors that play into what you
00:03:27.420
should do and having these kinds of disagreeing conversations. And if you should have these kinds of
00:03:32.480
disagreeing conversations. So I don't think it's productive and probably not best for you in so
00:03:40.080
far as keeping your job and things like that to be the constant contrarian that is looking for an
00:03:45.920
argument, that is looking for a fight, that is pushing back on everything that your fellow employees
00:03:52.660
or your coworkers are talking about when it comes to social issues and politics. But I do think that you
00:03:59.600
can pick your battles. For example, if they're talking about how, oh, pro-lifers are so ridiculous,
00:04:05.520
they only care about life before birth and they don't care about people after that at all. They're
00:04:09.460
so hypocritical. And that's an issue that's close to your heart. And you know that that's not true,
00:04:14.460
then it might be a great opportunity for you. And I would argue, especially with something that's
00:04:19.200
a matter of life and death, it is worth you speaking up for it. You know, repercussions come what may
00:04:25.180
for you to say, hey, you know, I know this is really uncomfortable for me to say, but I actually
00:04:32.020
am. I am pro-life, like I'm against abortion. I would love to share with you my thoughts, or maybe
00:04:38.520
it's just asking them questions. This is a method that I find to be really very productive
00:04:44.740
to be able to say, okay, why do you believe that? And I think it's very difficult to not come across
00:04:54.040
when we're asking questions like that as presumptuous or kind of on the attack, particularly
00:05:01.040
because a lot of the people who are in the mainstream culture who are typically on the left
00:05:07.860
are not used to getting their views challenged, especially depending on where you live. And so they
00:05:12.800
might not like your questions, but if there's a way that you can strike a tone of curiosity
00:05:17.260
and ask the people around you why they believe what they believe and ask them just, you know,
00:05:24.760
to try to get a better understanding of where they're coming from, it might cause them to think
00:05:30.220
a little bit more deeply about the things that they believe and for you to then offer what you believe.
00:05:37.140
And I think that this can be very difficult and you kind of have to use wisdom and use discernment
00:05:42.740
to decide which situations merit you speaking up and being that unpopular voice. And I think
00:05:50.220
that goes, that's the same for your conversations with your employer, with your employer, which are
00:05:57.320
even more, I would say, dangerous, even more precarious because you don't know if your employer
00:06:02.640
is going to fire you, is going to mistreat you, is going to not give you a raise because they know
00:06:09.020
that you're a conservative, but you know your employer obviously better than I do. And if there
00:06:13.980
are policies coming down the pipeline or statements being made to represent your company that you think
00:06:20.240
are destructive, that you think are wrong, that you think are deceitful, and you think that they would
00:06:25.560
be willing to have a conversation with you, then I do believe that that dialogue is worth happening.
00:06:31.340
And like we talked about on Friday, you never know. You never know which conversation
00:06:36.520
is going to be the tipping point or is going to just lay the foundation for whatever is the future
00:06:43.500
tipping point. Again, I think it is so powerful when we just decide we're not going to capitulate.
00:06:49.620
We're not going to go along with this. Like we're not going to pretend like objective truth is subjective.
00:06:56.300
Like we're not going to pretend like facts don't matter. We're not going to stop bringing up
00:07:00.580
different perspectives. And I understand it's very sensitive in the workplace, but if you are able
00:07:05.600
to have a productive dialogue, for example, I talked about on Friday, this woman who works in STEM,
00:07:12.480
she successfully changed a statement on anti-racism that her company was going to put out
00:07:17.860
because she just kind of respectfully and curiously poked holes in the statement to ask,
00:07:24.000
okay, what does this phrase mean? We're apologizing for racism. Can you give me specific examples of
00:07:29.540
how our company has been racist? They were unable to provide examples. And so the end product for
00:07:37.220
the statement about injustice actually did end up as something that was substantive.
00:07:44.260
I think it's important also for you to make sure that people know that you care about a lot of the
00:07:51.120
same goals that people on the other side of the aisle do that, hey, you care about equal opportunity
00:07:56.340
as well. You care about justice as well. You care about opportunity and you care about liberty and
00:08:03.020
you care about compassion and all these things as well. Start with what you agree on, maybe back up
00:08:09.600
from there and try to ask questions and present in a respectful way some of your concerns and your
00:08:14.440
perspectives. Of course, if you feel like it's not possible for you to do that without losing your job,
00:08:20.180
and if you lose your job, you're not going to be able to provide for your family, then I would ask
00:08:25.600
God to give you wisdom, to help you share the gospel and glorify Him in every way that you possibly
00:08:35.440
can. That might be He might convict you and press you to speak up about a particular issue, or that
00:08:44.300
obedience and glorification of the Lord might manifest itself in different ways. But remember, ask God for
00:08:49.880
wisdom. In the book of James, God promises to give wisdom without reproach to those who ask for it.
00:08:55.660
So seek God and ask Him for wisdom. He is never, never going to shirk the responsibility or shirk the,
00:09:03.400
yeah, shirk the responsibility that He has or the desire that He has to give you opportunities to give
00:09:11.040
Him glory. He always wants His own glory and His glory is our good. So if you ask for those opportunities
00:09:17.000
to glorify Him in whatever way He desires, He is going to give you those opportunities, He is going to
00:09:22.560
give you the wisdom to empower you and enable you to do those things. And so that is very good news.
00:09:28.780
Remember, I was just reading in the book of Luke, I think it was, I think it's Luke 6, that Jesus says,
00:09:36.580
woe to you, who have everyone speaking well of you, because basically, you know, you have your reward is
00:09:45.440
what the other woes in that segment, in that segment talk about. So it is not a good thing if
00:09:51.500
everyone is speaking well of you and thinking well of you, because He says, so our forefathers spoke well
00:09:57.720
of false prophets. And so everyone speaking well of you is not our goal. And it's not an indication of
00:10:04.240
righteousness and obedience to the Lord. We have to make sure that we are obeying God. And it doesn't
00:10:09.720
matter what other people say about us. And when we're not, when someone properly calls us out or
00:10:14.880
rebukes us for something that is in disobedience to the Lord, whether it's a view or something that we
00:10:18.780
do or say, then we should, and this is very difficult, including for me, we should be able to
00:10:23.460
take that rebuke and to repent and to apologize and seek forgiveness for the things that we have actually
00:10:31.940
done. Now, next question that we have. Someone said, tips for a non-shopper needing maternity clothes.
00:10:41.080
I have none, LOL. I totally understand. I totally understand that. So it depends on your makeup. If
00:10:47.040
you're like me, like my belly got huge when I was pregnant. And so I needed maternity clothes in that
00:10:55.140
third trimester. Some people, I have a friend that's pregnant right now. She's like full-term pregnant.
00:10:59.280
She's just has like, she's tall and thin. So she has like a smaller bump. I don't know. Maybe she
00:11:04.920
doesn't even need maternity clothes. Some people will never need maternity clothes. Like you can
00:11:08.880
just, if you're someone who, you know, maybe you don't gain a whole lot of weight and your belly just
00:11:13.920
gets to a nice, small, formidable size, you might not even need maternity clothes. You might just be able
00:11:19.240
to take your jeans. And this is a hack that people have used and take a hair tie and you loop it through
00:11:28.340
the loop of the buttonhole of your jeans. And then you loop the other side. I don't know exactly how
00:11:36.380
to explain this without showing you. And I don't have a hair tie on me. You put the other side on
00:11:42.280
the button. And so it expands and you've got these makeshift maternity pants. That's what a lot of
00:11:48.280
people have done and told me to do. And so that can work. There are a lot of good, just like flowy
00:11:57.340
dresses at Target. Like I was wearing a flowy dress on Friday on the podcast, not a maternity
00:12:03.980
dress. But I wore a lot of things like that, that weren't necessarily maternity, but they weren't
00:12:08.880
very fitted clothes. And so just go to Target, go to Gap, get things that are more loose fitting.
00:12:14.980
You don't have to spend a whole lot of money. Now, I don't know how far along you are, but if you're
00:12:20.000
pretty far along and it's going to be hot until you have the baby, like if you're due in September,
00:12:24.180
just don't even wear pants. Like just wear a dress as much as you can. That is the good thing about
00:12:30.420
being big pregnant in the summer months is that you don't have to worry about wearing super
00:12:35.720
uncomfortable pregnancy pants. Now, if you're due in like January or something like that,
00:12:39.840
then that's a little bit of a different story. And you might have to splurge on some good maternity
00:12:44.460
jeans. A lot of people like the panels on the side rather than the like band. I know this is really
00:12:51.700
boring for all of you who don't care about this, but for those of you who are pregnant or maybe who
00:12:56.740
will be pregnant soon, maybe this will be helpful. Um, people like the, like the stretchy side panels
00:13:02.400
on the pants rather than like the band around the pants, because those fall down. I never found
00:13:08.760
maternity pants that I like. Um, but hopefully that was a little bit helpful. You don't even have
00:13:14.940
to, you don't have to go to maternity segments in order to find a good maternity clothes. That's the
00:13:20.380
moral of that story. Congratulations, by the way. Um, thoughts on Kanye running for president. So I
00:13:26.260
don't think that he can actually run for president. And I'm pretty sure that the time has come and passed
00:13:31.040
for him to be able to do that. Maybe he runs in 2024. Look, more power to Kanye West for saying
00:13:39.940
things that are unpopular and has been saying things that are unpopular for a long time. He is
00:13:45.380
obviously a very brilliant artist who has, uh, who in a lot of ways changed the game for his industry
00:13:53.420
and for his particular genre. And I do think that he has a lot of talent and a lot of knowledge in,
00:13:59.500
uh, you know, multiple spheres. Do I think that he is an expert on foreign policy? I don't know. Like
00:14:08.840
it's, you know, it's funny because Donald Trump, I probably would have said the same things about
00:14:14.480
him. I probably would have said, well, he's a celebrity. He's a reality TV star. He's a real
00:14:19.760
estate mogul. What does he know about being president of the United States? And he is president
00:14:23.900
of the United States. And I know a lot of people disagree with me, but policy wise, he's done a
00:14:28.100
really good job. And so who knows, who knows, maybe Kanye West would be able to just surprise us all.
00:14:35.400
I do really appreciate the things that he has been saying about, uh, being pro-life and how unborn life
00:14:42.140
is human life and therefore is deserving of human rights. I mean, that's a very logical view,
00:14:47.960
but it's radical to a lot of people. He said he would run as a Republican if Donald Trump wasn't
00:14:54.120
running as a Republican, but he would run as an independent. Again, I don't know if that's possible
00:14:58.300
this time around. If he runs in 2024, I just don't know. I mean, who knows what could happen? Who knows?
00:15:05.640
I'm just trying to picture like debates, but maybe we won't even have debates by then.
00:15:10.740
I, it's, it would be, I just can't even imagine what a president Kanye West would be like. But
00:15:18.660
again, I'm not saying that anything is impossible because if anything has been proven in this past
00:15:26.980
year is that things are unpredictable. And even Donald Trump himself is very unpredictable president.
00:15:32.540
So we might have a president Kanye West. We will see about that. Hey, I'll tell you,
00:15:37.640
he would be a lot better, a lot better. I would vote for a Kanye West any day over anyone in the
00:15:45.400
Democratic Party right now. Uh, that is just, that's just a fact. Someone asked thoughts on empathy.
00:15:52.640
Have you covered it already? So this is a conversation that's been going on in reformed theological
00:15:56.820
circles for the past, I don't know, a few months, a year, maybe longer than that. That's at least
00:16:01.960
when I started noticing it. And I haven't really talked about it, but there's a lot of interesting
00:16:06.380
dialogue around this concept of empathy and even the dangers of empathy. Now here is my nuanced
00:16:13.020
view of empathy. And I always want to give this caveat that I am not in pursuit of nuance. I'm
00:16:19.640
always in pursuit of truth. Sometimes the truth is nuanced. Sometimes it's not. In this case, I'm not
00:16:24.520
saying that I have all the answers or that I, uh, that I know everything about the subject,
00:16:28.660
but my view of empathy is that there are some people who would say we shouldn't be empathetic
00:16:34.720
at all. That empathy is actually bad, that it's counterproductive because you end up validating
00:16:39.340
people's emotions that are not based in reality. And it actually causes them to go into more anxiety
00:16:45.180
and even affirming, you know, sinful thoughts and things like that, which I do understand.
00:16:51.320
We talked about this. There's an episode of Relatable that I did a few months ago titled
00:16:56.040
All the Feels. Maybe it was even a year ago now where we talked about this idea that all your
00:17:01.320
feelings are valid. That is a very popular phrase nowadays in the, in the world of self-love.
00:17:07.740
And I actually talk about this in my book that's coming out August 11th, that everyone should
00:17:11.640
pre-order You're Not Enough and That's Okay, Escaping the Toxic Culture of Self-Love. But this idea that
00:17:17.660
all your feelings are valid is very popular. And I think it's important for Christians to distinguish
00:17:23.060
between valid feelings and feelings that exist. So valid means legitimate or true. So grounded
00:17:30.360
in reality. Existent doesn't necessarily mean that they are valid and true. So while I do believe that
00:17:38.260
we should take note of all of our feelings and that not all emotions are bad at all, and that emotions
00:17:45.060
are part of human nature and part of what makes us made in the image of God, God himself expresses
00:17:51.540
feelings and emotion throughout the Bible. And we reflect them in that way. And emotions are,
00:17:57.060
are wonderful. They can be very good, but we subject our emotions to the word of God, to the
00:18:03.460
standard, uh, standard morality, standard of morality that he has given to us in his word. And we tell our
00:18:13.000
feelings to subject themselves and obey and bow down to Jesus Christ. So this idea that all your feelings are
00:18:20.940
valid, meaning legitimate or true is simply not true. If you have feelings of jealousy or feelings
00:18:28.600
of not measuring up to, you know, X, Y, Z person because she's skinnier, or you are envious of her
00:18:36.220
life because it looks like it's much more glamorous and better than yours, or you desire her husband or
00:18:41.340
your feelings of lust for someone, your murderous feelings of hating someone, of wanting something that
00:18:47.060
is bad for them. They're not rooted in truth. And very often they're not even rooted in reality at
00:18:52.560
all. Like how many times have you gotten angry at someone, maybe your spouse for, um, doing something
00:18:59.040
that you thought that they did, or you assumed that they meant that they actually didn't do, or they
00:19:03.840
actually didn't mean at all. Your feelings were existent. And so they were real, but they were not
00:19:10.480
valid because they weren't rooted in truth. And if you had acted on those invalid feelings,
00:19:15.820
then you would have caused a fight. You would have caused tension where there didn't need to be.
00:19:21.400
When we should be saying, okay, I feel this way. Let's subject my feelings to reality and to the truth
00:19:28.500
of God's word. So what that has to do with this idea of empathy, um, empathy is different than
00:19:36.040
sympathy. Sympathy is feeling for someone and empathy is feeling with someone putting yourself
00:19:42.180
in their shoes. Can empathy in the same way that saying that all of your feelings are valid,
00:19:48.000
uh, be harmful because it affirms, uh, people's, uh, perspectives that aren't always true. Yes,
00:19:56.220
it can be harmful when it is used in that way. If someone says, well, this is my truth,
00:20:01.940
or this is my experience. And therefore I'm going to project my experience onto everyone else and
00:20:07.440
call it reality or call it objective truth. Or when someone believes something or feels something
00:20:12.780
that is not true and is not glorifying to God or leads to actions that are not glorifying to God,
00:20:18.900
uh, then our empathy, our constant affirming of their feelings rather than redirecting them towards
00:20:25.060
truth can obviously be harmful. That's not loving to them. It is not loving, uh, to sacrifice the
00:20:31.760
truth for empathy because it's like, for example, if your child comes downstairs and says,
00:20:39.880
I am, I'm not sleeping upstairs and not sleeping in my room ever again, because there's a monster
00:20:45.620
in my closet. Well, you could empathize with them completely and say, yes, all of your feelings are
00:20:53.360
valid. And you know what, if you say that there's a monster in your closet, there is a monster in your
00:20:57.420
closet and you never have to go in your room again. You have every right to feel that way.
00:21:01.760
And you know what, you should feel that way. And who am I to say, there's not a monster in your
00:21:05.180
closet. That would not be the loving thing to do. The loving thing would to do would be to show
00:21:10.040
empathy and say, Oh, I totally get why you're scared. You know, I was, I was scared like that
00:21:14.680
when I was little too, when, you know, the, the lights turn out, things look different. That is
00:21:19.180
totally understandable, but let's go back upstairs and let's turn on the lights and, uh, I'll show you,
00:21:23.960
see, there's no monster in here. You just saw, you know, your, your dress hanging on this
00:21:28.240
hanger or whatever it is. And you can use that as an opportunity to say, yeah, things look distorted
00:21:32.660
in the darkness. But when you turn the light on and you see things clearly, you know, that they're
00:21:37.120
not there and you have to remember the light when you are in the darkness. And so, you know, you can
00:21:41.500
use it as spiritual metaphor and all that good stuff, but you have to, in order to be loving, in order to
00:21:47.720
allow your child to grow and develop and to see things rightly, which is what you want and to have
00:21:53.400
wisdom and to not be living in fear and to, um, not be just following her emotions. Even if they're
00:22:00.640
not grounded in reality, you have to turn the lights on. Like you have to be able to show them
00:22:05.940
truth. You have to be able to show them reality. That doesn't mean that you get mad at them for
00:22:10.980
being scared. That doesn't mean that you chastise them for being frightened. No, you can still empathize
00:22:17.320
with them. And this is where I disagree with the people who say, you know, we're not called to
00:22:21.180
empathize. I disagree with that. I think mourning with those who mourn and rejoicing with those who
00:22:26.700
rejoice is a form of empathy. You are putting yourself in someone's shoes. You are loving your
00:22:32.460
neighbor as you love yourself. You are treating other people the way that you want to be treated.
00:22:39.080
I do think empathy is important in that way, to be able to relate to someone's fears and to relate to
00:22:44.960
someone's feelings and to not automatically shut those feelings down, but to listen to someone,
00:22:50.440
to try to understand why they feel what they feel, and then to redirect them to the refreshing and
00:22:56.420
the liberating truth of God's word. Or to, if you're just in a conversation about, you know,
00:23:01.400
something political, for example, like an emotional argument is that human beings inside the womb aren't
00:23:07.200
people, therefore they can be terminated. That is an emotional argument tried to, you know,
00:23:12.620
make abortion sound better. Well, the loving thing to do if someone feels that way, if they feel that
00:23:18.700
abortion isn't wrong, is to point them to embryology, to point them to the truth, to point them to logic.
00:23:24.060
You can understand how they feel, especially if they have that experience in their past, and you
00:23:28.760
can love them and treat them with compassion while still saying, okay, but your experience doesn't speak
00:23:34.320
to objective reality. Here's the scientific reality of what human life is inside the womb. And so it is
00:23:41.960
loving to pair, in my opinion, empathy with truth and speaking the truth in love. Someone asked me what
00:23:49.820
I think about the 1619 Project being turned into curriculum for schools. So obviously that's
00:23:54.600
problematic because, as I've said, there are people across the aisle who have critiqued the 1619 Project
00:24:00.560
for really being about narrative and not being about historical analysis. It's not about historical
00:24:05.740
analysis. And I don't think it's harmful to listen to things that might offer a different perspective,
00:24:13.700
but it bills itself as a serious historical project. And it is simply not that. It makes the
00:24:21.800
argument that everything in America goes back to racism, that the reason we don't have universal
00:24:26.860
health care is because of racism and white supremacy, and that we founded the revolution was actually
00:24:33.820
primarily about slavery and not about independence at all. And that emancipation and how we've learned
00:24:39.120
about emancipation and Abraham Lincoln and the Civil War is all wrong. And so it is driving a particular
00:24:45.000
narrative about what America was founded on and what the principles of America are that are based on
00:24:51.540
this idea of racism being our origin and being a part of everything that America is and does. And that is
00:25:02.100
simply not true. The revolution was not about slavery. Were there people who believed that slavery was
00:25:09.200
okay and even moral and even necessary? Yes. Did we have founding fathers who were slaveholders? Yes,
00:25:17.080
we did. But the complex parts of history that are not talked about in the 1619 Project, first of all,
00:25:23.400
it doesn't even really talk about the Civil War that hundreds of thousands of men gave their lives
00:25:29.120
because they believed that slavery was a moral travesty. Like, there's no other culture that sacrificed
00:25:35.220
that much because of the cause of the abolition of slavery as America did. And of course, this would not
00:25:43.920
have happened. Abolition, emancipation wouldn't have happened without African Americans that were speaking
00:25:50.000
up about this, like Frederick Douglass, for example. But there were white Americans, there were black Americans
00:25:56.120
who partnered together, who advanced the cause of abolition and emancipation. There were, you would
00:26:04.040
consider the people who were white in America, who lived in the North, who led the cause, the union cause
00:26:10.780
of the abolition of slavery. You would call them today the religious right. The 1619 Project hardly talks
00:26:17.520
about the Civil War and hardly talks about the abolitionists. I mean, the abolitionists of that day,
00:26:24.500
some of them, the white abolitionists and the black abolitionists, but the white abolitionists as well
00:26:30.160
were Christians. Like, they were motivated by their Christian faith to end slavery. And the 1619 Project
00:26:37.360
gives no credit whatsoever to the fact that there were people of all races that were coming together
00:26:44.060
to end slavery, hundreds of thousands of them. I mean, William Lloyd Garrison, the guy who started the
00:26:49.460
abolitionist newspaper, the Liberator, he had a huge impact. And he spurred a lot of the debate surrounding
00:26:59.320
slavery that created the conversation that sparked a lot of the conflict that the Civil War was about.
00:27:09.060
The 1619 Project doesn't give credit to things like that. They don't give credit to William Wilberforce,
00:27:14.960
for example, who, of course, was across the pond, who helped bring the abolition of slavery. It is a very
00:27:23.720
narrow, narrative-driven, so-called analysis, if you can even call it that, of American history.
00:27:32.860
And there's a goal in mind. Like, Nicole Hannah-Jones, the lead essayist of the 1619 Project,
00:27:37.940
you can go back and you can read a lot of the stuff that she has written over the years,
00:27:41.580
since college until now. I mean, she believes, really, that white people are incapable of morality
00:27:47.880
and basically incapable of goodness, and that white people are the cause of all of the problems
00:27:53.340
throughout the world, and that America and American imperialism is the cause of all the problems
00:27:58.800
throughout the world. And so these ahistorical ideas, which, again, you can read in The Atlantic,
00:28:04.480
you can read in The Washington Post, you can read in various outlets the critiques of the 1619 Project.
00:28:11.120
John McWhorter and Glenn Lowry have both talked about some of the problems with the 1619 Project
00:28:17.000
and why, historically, it's just inaccurate, and it's driving a particular side of the story,
00:28:22.720
if you can even call it that, that is trying to shape the public consciousness about what we think
00:28:27.280
about America and capitalism and all of our systems. And so that kind of ahistorical nonsense,
00:28:33.680
it's infiltrating our schools. It already has, by the way. Like, public institutions have been
00:28:38.340
teaching this kind of thing for a long time. And I'm not saying that public institutions shouldn't
00:28:42.420
teach the bad parts of our history. I think we should. I feel like my education did a really good
00:28:46.420
job growing up of telling us about some of the brutal parts of American history and history in
00:28:51.360
general, while also making sure that we know that we are privileged to live in the freest and most
00:28:56.760
prosperous country in the world, and that the vast majority of the world will never be able to enjoy
00:29:01.800
the liberty and the prosperity and the opportunities that we enjoy. And also, we learned about a lot of
00:29:07.600
the progress that we have made. The 1619 Project, again, doesn't give any credit to. But this is all
00:29:13.380
part of the plan to indoctrinate children and to make them hate the country so that they too can be
00:29:20.020
revolutionaries that push for the toppling of the systems and the installation of Marxism,
00:29:26.800
which Marxists believe will finally create some kind of utopian equality. But they don't really
00:29:34.680
want equality. They really want retribution. They really want revenge for people who they believe
00:29:41.620
have been at least a part of groups that have traditionally oppressed the groups that they
00:29:46.280
have been a part of. If it sounds nonsensical, that's because it is. If it sounds like that could
00:29:51.000
lead to conflict and violence, that's because it does and it will. Now, here's a question that I
00:29:58.440
think kind of goes off of what we were talking about. And I touched on this on Friday. It's hard
00:30:04.800
for me to see if these are the two worldviews that are represented, or at least the two major worldviews
00:30:11.620
that are represented. One, that America is completely and totally bad. That we were founded on a farce.
00:30:19.160
That there is nothing good about our foundation at all. That the ideals of liberty and justice for
00:30:25.320
all, the Constitution, the Declaration of Independence are bad, which, by the way, Frederick
00:30:28.700
Douglass certainly did not believe. He believes the Constitution created a basis for anti-slavery,
00:30:35.340
which I believe as well. If we have that side of the country who believes that all freedom basically
00:30:42.020
is bad if it creates any kind of environment for the fostering of ideas that they don't like,
00:30:51.260
or what they would call intolerance or bigotry. If they believe that capitalism is bad, if the free
00:30:57.060
market, that the free market is bad, that freedom of religion is bad, they believe all dissent is bad
00:31:05.720
and should be stifled out. Like, that just cannot coexist with a group of people who believe that
00:31:12.340
you should be able to say what you want to say. You should be able to worship what and how you want
00:31:16.720
to worship. You should be able to, you know, petition the government peacefully, protest no matter what
00:31:23.760
your opinions are. And we believe that capitalism is good. We believe in equality of opportunity,
00:31:30.700
not equality of outcome. We believe that we were given certain rights that were endowed to us by a
00:31:37.860
creator, among them being life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness that cannot be taken away
00:31:42.660
by the government. Like, we just disagree, not on too much, but on too many fundamental foundational
00:31:49.740
values that I don't know that we can ever come together. And it really goes back to the idea of who do
00:31:57.940
you believe gave you your rights. Is it the government or God? If you believe the government
00:32:01.780
gives you your rights and they have the right to take them away whenever they want to. And that's
00:32:06.340
typically what people on the left believe. If you believe that God gave you your rights and the
00:32:09.780
government has no right to arbitrarily take them away. So that is the different mindset. And if you
00:32:15.840
believe that God exists, that he is the objective moral standard bearer, like if you believe that he
00:32:24.040
sets the standard for what is and what isn't, what's right and what's wrong, what's good and what's
00:32:27.820
bad, what's fair, what's unfair, what's just, what's injustice, then how you shape your society,
00:32:34.420
how you shape your laws will be founded on that knowledge that all people are created equal and
00:32:40.520
all of that. And your desire will be to get as close to that as you possibly can. If you don't
00:32:46.260
believe in God and you just believe that we're all here by random chance, that people are not made in
00:32:51.800
the image of God and that the government basically is your God, the government is supposed to take care of
00:32:57.540
you. And the government is supposed to give and take away your rights as they see fit. And freedom
00:33:03.340
is not good if it allows for what they view as bigotry. Then again, like, I don't know. I don't
00:33:11.380
know how we are going to be able to have a unified country. So people ask me, do I think that we're
00:33:16.040
headed for a civil war? Well, gosh, I hope not. I really don't. Like, I am a proud American. I
00:33:21.740
want to preserve the union. I don't want a civil war. I certainly don't want violence. I don't care
00:33:29.680
if I disagree with you or not. I don't want your life ruined. I don't want you to be hurt. I don't
00:33:34.260
want you to be harassed. I don't want you to be threatened. I don't want to go at war with you.
00:33:38.740
I don't want that at all. And I don't want even a country where I agree with everyone, where everyone
00:33:46.520
is on the same ideological page. We have all the same political opinions. We've never been like that
00:33:52.160
in this country. Our founding wasn't like that. I am OK with having disagreements, but I want us to
00:33:57.380
have some kind of base foundational agreement that I'm going to respect your disagreements, that we all
00:34:02.640
agree that America's founding ideals are good. And even if we disagree on how they manifest itself,
00:34:08.200
that we believe that America is good and that freedom is good and that our constitutional rights
00:34:13.480
should be secure because they're given to us by at least some higher power. Like if we can agree
00:34:19.280
at least on those principles, then I think that we can have a unified country. Now, that's going to
00:34:24.280
mean pushing back against cancel culture. That's going to mean pushing back against mob tyranny. That's
00:34:29.080
going to mean pushing back against this ridiculous notion that we have to tear down union statues and we
00:34:35.580
have to tear down Mount Rushmore and we have to tear down any monument to our founders or even
00:34:41.320
Frederick Douglass has happened in Rochester, New York in order to move forward. We cannot agree on
00:34:46.700
that. Like we we can't come together and be unified. If you've got Marxists versus capitalists or a
00:34:53.000
tyrant versus freedom fighters like we're not freedom appreciators, whatever it is, then we're not going
00:35:01.320
to we're not going to be able to come together. And I don't know what the outcome is for that.
00:35:06.360
Like, I don't I don't know. I don't know. I don't know if this country is going to split up. It
00:35:11.700
certainly seems like that is the inevitable outcome. I hope not. I really do. But it's hard
00:35:18.880
for me to see how it is any other way. And if we do, I would love to take Hong Kong and all the people
00:35:27.140
in Hong Kong that have now been taken over by the Chinese Communist Party who no longer have freedom
00:35:33.520
of speech, who by their way at their protests were waving American flags because everyone else who
00:35:40.220
wasn't blinded by their own privilege, like America hating liberals in the United States are people
00:35:46.760
around the world. They understand they haven't bought into the propaganda. They understand that
00:35:51.880
America is the place for liberty and justice for all. They understand that America is the freest and
00:35:58.340
most prosperous country in the world. That is why more immigrants come here than to any other country
00:36:04.140
by far every year. And this, of course, I mean, a lot of times, not all the times, but a lot of times
00:36:10.580
white liberals are the most like condescending towards minority groups than anyone else. And
00:36:16.400
actually, there are a lot of people on the left, even Robin D'Angelo agrees with that. There was
00:36:20.260
someone who commented on my Instagram saying, you know, the immigrants who come here are duped and
00:36:26.980
they're duped into thinking that America is a great place and then they're thrown to the wolves.
00:36:31.840
I'm sorry that you think that lowly of immigrants, that you think that they're naive fools who get
00:36:38.140
here and are just wallowing in self-pity and failure. Have you actually looked at the success
00:36:44.460
rate of immigrants in this country, especially for particular groups? It is really high. You can come
00:36:50.840
here as an immigrant. And if you work hard and you take opportunities, there is a really, really good
00:36:58.020
chance that you are going to do well for you and your family. That's why they come here and they
00:37:03.040
don't come anywhere else because they haven't been brainwashed by the anti-American propaganda in
00:37:09.080
places like Hong Kong and other places. They realize that no matter what America hating leftists say,
00:37:14.860
America is the land of opportunity. And so anyway, if America splits up, which I hope it doesn't,
00:37:22.380
but if it does, because we just cannot agree on anything, which is what it seems like, we can't
00:37:28.540
agree on anything foundational, then I would like to take Hong Kong, who is now being oppressed under
00:37:34.040
the communist dictatorship. I would like to bring them over here, people who love freedom and who,
00:37:41.520
you know, can offer a lot of awesome perspectives for us. I would like to bring them over here.
00:37:45.820
And then everyone who wants communism, we can do an exchange program, voluntary, voluntary exchange
00:37:51.320
program for all the Marxist communists here who think communism is great. We'll do a little
00:37:55.340
exchangey exchangey. We'll just take the Hong Kongers and we'll give the communists over to Hong Kong
00:38:02.020
and then they can see what it's like to live under a communist regime. And they can tell us what they
00:38:07.320
think about it. And when they're like, Oh no, please take us back for capitalism. Uh, we'll say,
00:38:13.260
okay, but before we do that, you have to pass this. You have to, you have to pass at least a civics
00:38:20.000
exam because unfortunately there are too many communists over here who don't even know the
00:38:24.820
basics of American history. So if there is a voluntary Hong Kong exchange program, that is what I am
00:38:32.120
proposing for the design of it. I think it could be, I think it could be very good. I think it could be a
00:38:37.100
very interesting experiment. I'm not interested in sharing a country with people who look like
00:38:43.260
me. Don't care about that. I don't care about sharing a country, uh, with people who have all the
00:38:49.040
same political opinions as me, or even who have all the same theological opinions as me. Uh, that's not
00:38:54.300
what I'm looking for in a country. I'm looking for a country who, uh, could be diverse in all of those
00:39:00.640
things, but is unified and basic and foundational values. And that is what we are lacking today. And that is
00:39:06.600
what I want. I hope it doesn't take any kind of splitting up or a major conflict for that to
00:39:13.060
happen. Um, but that is the kind of country ideally that I am looking for a diverse, uh, society
00:39:20.900
ideologically, politically, uh, ethnically to have all the different perspectives, but united
00:39:27.400
in our love for Liberty and, uh, in the foundational constitutional values that America should hold dear
00:39:35.220
because it's made us the greatest country in the world, even with all of our flaws and failures.
00:39:39.360
Okay. I kind of went a long time on all of those questions and I have a lot more questions that I
00:39:44.560
could answer, but you guys ask good questions and they require good answers and long answers and
00:39:51.360
thorough answers. Anyway, I'll be back here on Wednesday. Let me know if there are particular
00:39:57.320
things and stories that you guys want me to talk about, and I will be glad to touch on them. I'll see you