Russell Brand is joined by Tulsi Gabbard and Jordan Peterson to discuss Elon Musk's new kitchen sink, Kanye West's new album, and much, much more. Plus, a special bonus episode of Stay Free With Russell Brand, exclusively live on Rumble, hosted by Russell Brand and hosted by his good friend Jordan Peterson. Stay Free with Russell Brand is available on all good podcasting platforms, including Apple Podcasts, Podchaser, and Stitcher, wherever you get your favourite podchips. To find a list of our sponsors and show-related promo codes, go to gimlet.fm/sponsorships and use the promo code stayfree to receive 10% off your first purchase when you enter the discount code: STAYFREE10 at checkout. To buy tickets to Jordan Peterson's live show, visit jordanpeterson.eventbrite.co.uk/liveconversation and enter code: stayfree at checkout to save 10% on tickets for Jordan Peterson s live show on October 18th at the White House Ballroom at Union Pool in LA. Tickets start at $99.99 and include a free VIP membership for VIP access to the show. You can also buy tickets for the live show by calling in at 800-RUMBLE-LAUNCH and receive a discount code STAY FREE at 866-RUNNER. to save up to $99 and get 10% OFF your first month with discount code StayFree with Russell. at . at checkout and get a FREE VIP membership! to get 20% off the entire stayfree Stay Free Stay Free. To find out more about Jordan Peterson, visit stayfree with Jordan Peterson and stayfree.org/jordanpetersen and stay free with him on the show, use promo code: Stayfree with Russell at +1#randellandrews and learn more about him on Stayfree With Russell in a live show at 844-828-976-4137. Stay free with me on social media and find out how you can join us on the Stay Free podcast. and more at stayfreewithrusscrane on my insta and much more! at . and keep up to date on socials and more on this episode of . . . and , and more on the future of the show at Stayfree.
00:00:36.000In this video, you're going to see the sea surface.
00:00:48.000Hello, thanks for joining me for a very special edition of Stay Free with Russell Brand, exclusively live on Rumble.
00:00:56.000I'm being joined today by Tulsi Gabbard, former Democrat and presidential candidate, political maverick, We've got some great stuff to tell you about over the course of the show.
00:01:18.000I'm going to tell you how you can join me for a live conversation with Jordan Peterson.
00:01:21.000But first, let's get into some actual news.
00:01:26.000Loads of you will be aware that Elon Musk turned up at Twitter with an actual kitchen sink.
00:02:11.000I want to tweet Elon and I want to say, now that you, could you please come on our show and explain what you're doing with that sink and could you, that's it really.
00:02:33.000As you know, if you're a regular viewer of the show, and I hope you are, you can join us every day, you'll know that me and Elon are in contact, but that I, at the moment, am very much the junior partner.
00:02:44.000If it was a love affair, I'm doing the pushing and I put in.
00:02:47.000Yeah, so I'm not sure telling us what you're doing with that sink is necessarily the right approach.
00:03:12.000um careful again i think we should love what you've done with the sink baby i can wash you in 140 characters no elon yeah um oh all right but by the end of the show we are going to send that tweet but before that we'll be talking to maybe people could give us suggestions You send us in the chat what you think we should say to Elon in our tweet.
00:04:20.000Wait a second, you wait... No, Niora, I will... Elon, I will bathe you in that sink, like in 1940s wartime Britain, when you don't need, like, when your grandparents did.
00:05:51.000That first bit, you think, oh, that's just a rocket, and then it just engulfs the entire picture, and you're like... And the beep, beep, beep, that's just like, could be a garbage truck reversing.
00:07:13.000His demeanour... Like, if you... Right, consider this.
00:07:16.000If Joe Biden's political power is diminishing, if for example you don't think he really has the authority to exert real control over financial and corporate America, then his power is symbolic.
00:08:45.000We were joking before about the built-in obsolescence.
00:08:48.000We were joking before about the ludicrous machinery and accoutrements that Putin surround himself with.
00:08:52.000And you see that sort of like that fax machine thing in the background when they were administering their last set of threats about our bluffing.
00:09:00.000But I believe that's because they've not been on the trajectory of consumerism and commodification.
00:09:08.000So they don't need to update phones every 10 seconds to keep people happy because they're simply Ready to destroy planet Earth at a moment's notice when it comes to it.
00:09:16.000There's nothing very fancy about this switchboard of kill buttons, but I bet they do the job.
00:09:22.000They look like they're off a 1995 Bosch washing machine, but they could Bosch planet Earth into oblivion.
00:09:29.000Somebody who left the Democrat Party denouncing them as warmongers, giving us new insight into bipartisan politics in the United States and the apparent, what do I want to call it, moral posturing of the Democrat Party.
00:10:00.000Tulsi, at a time where it appears that we are on the precipice of a potential war, already engaged in a proxy war, your denunciation of the Democrat Party as a warmongering party seems even more damning than it ordinarily might.
00:10:19.000Are we in a proxy war right now with Russia?
00:10:22.000And I say we as a meaning sort of like the West, And how high do you regard the potential that this could escalate into something even more serious?
00:10:34.000We are absolutely in a proxy war with Russia, with unfortunately the people of Ukraine being the ones sacrificed in this proxy war.
00:10:44.000This is not a war that has the United States' efforts to go to war with Russia, to remove Putin from his regime, didn't start with his invasion of Ukraine.
00:10:55.000This is something that's been building and going on for years and years.
00:10:59.000This is why I ran for president in 2020, because I saw the writing on the wall of this new Cold War building, these tensions growing, and where a Cold War leads, a Cold War very quickly can turn into a hot war.
00:11:12.000And when we're talking about two nuclear-armed countries, the two most powerful, nuclear armed countries in the world, Russia having over 6,000
00:11:21.000nuclear warheads, the United States having over 5,000 nuclear warheads.
00:11:26.000We are talking about the existential threat of nuclear war.
00:11:56.000Instead of doing that, the Biden administration has instead chosen to escalate this war at every opportunity, throwing tens of billions of American taxpayer dollars towards Ukraine and through weapons and trying to escalate this war, pushing us to the point where, you know, the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists and other experts say that we are at a greater risk of nuclear catastrophe now than ever since the Cuban Missile
00:12:22.000Crisis. We're seeing, as you showed, Russia is testing their nuclear capabilities. The United
00:12:29.000States has just, I guess, had a show of force with their hypersonic ballistic missile
00:12:37.000capabilities. Both sides put edging and rushing closer and closer towards the brink of nuclear disaster,
00:12:44.000which doesn't just affect people of This is why I've been talking about this everywhere I go.
00:12:49.000We, the United States, you there in the UK, people around the world, are the ones who will be directly affected by a potential World War III and nuclear war.
00:12:59.000It really exposes how potentially hollow the humanitarian support of Ukrainian suffering is, and how little investigation there has been into the geopolitical reality that that might lead to.
00:13:13.000It seems implausible even to imagine, Tulsi, that the modality applied in Conflicts like the Iraqi wars of a decade or so ago or the until recently ongoing conflict in Afghanistan could be applied in a situation where the opponent is able to respond with nuclear force.
00:13:37.000Is the power of the military-industrial complex over congressional politics so serious, so severe and so absolute that they would Take the action that, you know, against Iraq or Afghanistan seem risky, ridiculous, inhumane, but at least not ultimately apocalyptic.
00:14:02.000How little insight and how little reflection is there and how great is this power that is external to Congress and actually Where does that boundary lie?
00:14:12.000Is there a boundary between the military-industrial complex and the Democratic Party?
00:14:15.000Is this what you fundamentally meant with your accusation, or I suppose diagnosis, that they were a warmongering party?
00:14:24.000Yeah, the proof is in the pudding, as they say.
00:14:27.000The relationship between the military-industrial complex and Congress right now is exactly what President Eisenhower warned against.
00:14:38.000The revolving door that we see in the halls of Washington, both with former members of Congress, people who leave Congress either as members or as staffers, people who leave the Pentagon and the DoD either uniformed military leaders or civilians, then immediately
00:14:54.000going and working within the military industrial complex, profiting essentially off of their
00:15:51.000You know, we have to do this to save democracy and freedom.
00:15:55.000But again, at every opportunity, going all the way back to March, about a month after
00:15:59.000the invasion of Ukraine happened, it was the Biden administration that told Zelensky and
00:16:03.000the Ukrainian officials, walk away from the negotiating table.
00:16:06.000In April, there was an off-ramp that looked to be opening up to say, hey, we could bring about an end to this war.
00:16:13.000In a negotiated agreement, nobody walks away getting everything they want.
00:16:17.000That is the definition of a negotiation and compromise.
00:16:21.000But there was an opportunity then to end this war.
00:16:23.000It was Biden and his administration, once again, who shut that door completely and instead chose to escalate it.
00:16:30.000Now, just a few days ago, we see how in control the Democratic Party is of the warmongers and um uh the military industrial complex when we had these you know 30 or so so-called progressive democrats in congress write a letter to the president saying uh just the truth diplomacy exercise diplomacy because if this war continues on it will only continue to bear a heavy cost on the people of ukraine and the people of the united states and i want to um i want to just read a quote from that letter because
00:17:10.000They wrote in this letter, a war that is allowed to grind on for years, potentially escalating in intensity and geographic scope, threatens to displace, kill, and immiserate far more Ukrainians while causing hunger, poverty, and death around the world.
00:17:26.000The conflict has also contributed to elevated gas and food prices here at home, fueling inflation and high oil prices for Americans in recent months.
00:17:33.000They wrote this letter on October 24th.
00:17:37.000On October 25th, after getting a huge backlash from their warmongering Democrat leaders and their cohorts in the mainstream media, these so-called progressives could not retract that letter fast enough, could not completely change their position to say no diplomacy.
00:17:57.000And the quote in their letter on October 25th that jumped out at me was Pramila Jayapal, a congresswoman from Washington state, said, every war ends with diplomacy and this one will too after Ukrainian victory.
00:18:12.000She clearly doesn't understand what diplomacy means, how a war, a negotiated end to this war can come about, It's a nonsensical statement.
00:18:22.000They are cowering in fear of the backlash that came from these warmongers controlling the Democrat Party.
00:18:28.000This is one of the main reasons that I left, and I think it's a reason why more and more people in this country are recognizing that this party and those who are in control, this elite cabal of warmongers, are putting all of our lives and the world as we know it at risk.
00:18:46.000We appear to be alighting into the monomaniacal language of absolute tyranny in so many ways.
00:18:54.000A figure like you, a voice like yours, in this homogenized landscape always stands out.
00:19:00.000At this moment you are, as I understand, independent, but there is a sense that you are moving towards a kind of Republican position and affiliation.
00:19:11.000This ultra-political position that you currently occupy, a condemnation of systemic corruption, the alliance between the political state and the corporate and financial world, the support of globalist agenda, the inability of ordinary people to have their voices heard, do you think that you can maintain that position In the Republican Party any more than you could within the Democrat Party.
00:19:39.000And what does it say about our systems that these outlier voices such as yours and obvious notable ones in both the Democrat Party and the Republican Party are emerging?
00:19:50.000And how will these voices ever be ultimately heard?
00:19:54.000How will these voices become anything other than rhetorical with the intransigence that currently exists within US politics?
00:20:03.000Oh, first of all, I'm an independent and I don't have any plans to join the Republican Party.
00:20:07.000It's not something I'm thinking about.
00:20:09.000I've always been a very independent minded person, and I will continue to be that way.
00:20:17.000I've always Made sure that as I looked at policies and positions that I've taken, my interest, my objective, my goal is to put the interests of the American people in our country ahead of any political interest, for that matter.
00:20:31.000I have been even-handed in my criticisms and praise of, while I was in Congress, of both Democrat presidents and Republican presidents, Democrat leaders and Republican leaders, because that's what we need.
00:20:43.000We need leaders in both political parties Who have integrity and who can speak the truth.
00:20:50.000Who aren't just thinking about, well, what's my next political step and I will do anything and everything to get there.
00:20:57.000This was something, and I was elected in 2012 to Congress and it really struck me when within just the first few weeks of being there, we had, I think it was 84, 85 new members of Congress, a mix of Democrats and Republicans.
00:21:12.000We were there talking about meeting each other and how do we start solving problems?
00:21:16.000How do we work together to start solving problems?
00:21:18.000Well, very quickly, unbeknownst to us, our group would be separated into two.
00:21:24.000Democrats went into one room, Republicans went into the other room, and we were both essentially given the same message, which is You have to put party first.
00:22:56.000The more we do that, then the more we can get past empty rhetoric and empty words and actually bring about change through leaders who have their priorities straight.
00:23:09.000You think that you can make a significant difference in this tribalized and entrenched system independently then?
00:23:18.000Do you, as people, have I suppose, reflected, imagined, speculated, consider it a possibility that you could form an alliance with Donald Trump.
00:23:30.000Is that something that you've thought about?
00:23:33.000Is it something that you would consider doing?
00:23:37.000It's not something I've thought about.
00:23:38.000I don't know what he's doing or what any other political official is doing in the coming years.
00:23:44.000What I'm 100% focused on is finding fellow Americans who share my love of country, my goal of being of service to the American people and putting their interests first.
00:23:56.000And upholding the Constitution and protecting our God-given rights and freedoms that are enshrined in the Constitution from those who seek to undermine them.
00:24:05.000You know, there are a lot of voices in the mainstream media here and in our politics whose goal is to try to divide us and distract us By being one group against the other, just as President Biden did in his speech in Philadelphia, where he basically said that anybody who voted for Donald Trump are an extremist threat to our country.
00:24:31.000Many of his supporters saying that these people are a greater threat to our country than the Al Qaeda terrorists who attacked us on 9-11.
00:24:41.000They are doing this Not addressing the substance of the real challenges and struggles that we are facing, not addressing the fact that their policies and actions have gotten us to this point where we are closer to the brink of a nuclear war than we have been since the Cuban Missile Crisis.
00:24:57.000Instead, they're just focused on trying to silence those who are dissenting voices.
00:25:03.000Smear the character of anyone who dares to take a stand for peace, to take a stand for the people, anyone who dares to challenge whatever their narrative of the day is.
00:25:13.000And this is why I left the Democrat Party and why I'm speaking out so forcefully, calling on other Democrats, my fellow Americans, to take a stand With me, because regardless of party, we as Americans, we need to take a stand to protect our freedoms before they have been so eroded and so far gone that it will be very difficult to get them back.
00:25:34.000If within the limitations of Congressional, or in our country, Parliamentary democracy, it seems that there is no possibility of real change, it seems that the parameters of neoliberalism, which are extraneous to party division, are what truly defines political discourse, are what truly defines policy, when it seems that more than ever the edicts that we see expressed in Parliamentary or Congressional democracy are coming from Supernational agencies such as the WHO, IMF, even WEF.
00:26:09.000How is it possible to, within these institutions, instantiate real change?
00:26:14.000Are we not, at this point, looking at a type of politics that truly is grassroots, that truly is about the mobilization of ordinary Americans and indeed ordinary people around the world?
00:26:26.000We've seen now that there is this ongoing tendency to use crises, whether it's the pandemic or the current war or the 2008 crash, to create division among people and to utilize these times of crisis to bring about measures of regulation, opportunity for big tech.
00:26:48.000We know that there was a wealth transfer during that pandemic.
00:26:52.000Is it possible, Tulsi, to bring about change within these institutions, or ought we be looking now at the creations of systems that are outside of conventional and traditional politics?
00:27:04.000Essentially, something that is, you know, when you talk about mobilizing American people, It's pretty clear that with the influence yielded over both the Democrat Party and the Republican Party by their lobbyists and donors, no meaningful change can take place within that framework.
00:27:28.000Are we not in fact therefore talking about entirely new and genuinely democratic political movements that are outside of Congress rather than changes from within it?
00:27:41.000Look, I think, you know, I think we need to pursue change across the board.
00:27:46.000I've been spending the last, gosh, week and a half or so, and I'll be on the road for the next couple of weeks until our elections, looking for those who have stepped up courageously to go and try to bring about change within the existing system.
00:28:46.000She was killed by ISIS in Syria, leaving him to raise their two young sons together.
00:28:53.000He is taking no money from any corporate PACs or lobbyists.
00:28:58.000Every dollar that he has raised has come through those grassroots donations.
00:29:03.000His, in just a few examples, his entire staff, everyone from his campaign manager down to, you know, the college kids who are knocking on doors trying to get out the votes in the final days of this election, every one of them has refused to take any pay from the campaign
00:29:18.000during this final month so that they can use every one of those dollars
00:29:22.000to continue to get their message out to voters in the district.
00:29:56.000It's not the majority yet by any means, but it's people like Joe who I'm supporting to bring about that exact change from within the system now.
00:30:06.000I'm curious as to whether Joe Kemp, forgive my ignorance, I've not heard of him before, is running as a Republican or a Democrat.
00:30:16.000My assumption is that what the emergent political force or energy appears to be internationally is a kind of anti-elitist, pro-populist sensibility that currently need not be necessarily conventionally right-wing or conventionally left wing, that there is a sense, in my opinion, Tulsi, a
00:30:41.000kind of fusion of libertarianism and decentralization, that ideas around community, whether
00:30:49.000they are progressive or traditional, appear to be more important than ever.
00:30:55.000Can I ask, what do you think is the significance of Elon Musk's potential takeover of Twitter
00:31:18.000And what are your concerns around the subject of free speech?
00:31:22.000And do you think that what we're witnessing is a curation of new public spaces in order to manage the discourse around power and to ensure that grassroots movements cannot compete on a level playing field?
00:31:40.000Yeah, gosh, there's a few points, really important points that you brought up there.
00:31:44.000The first one, you talked about populism and how there is this growing anti-elite sentiment
00:31:51.000by people both here in the United States, people who are from across the political spectrum,
00:31:57.000who are just sick and tired of being seen as the subjects of our rulers, the elite,
00:32:04.000the permanent Washington here in our case.
00:32:07.000But we're seeing similar kinds of energy and I guess movements building in other countries
00:32:12.000in the world as well because as you mentioned, there's a number of these multinational globalist
00:32:17.000entities who are seeking to exert their mandates on us as a people in this world.
00:32:24.000And they are very directly tied to, you know, the corporations who profit based on based on their edict.
00:32:42.000I remember I had a conversation with someone when I was in Congress in Washington and I don't recall what organization they were with, but they were sitting in my office and they were talking about the rise of populism as though it was one of the greatest threats to society as a whole.
00:33:00.000And I smiled and I just asked them why.
00:33:03.000Why is populism such a dirty word in your mind?
00:33:07.000And they didn't really have a good answer, but the subtext was very clear that with the rise of the people and the power of people's voices challenging the few, the powerful, the elite, of course they feel threatened, which should just empower us even more, which goes to your next point about Elon Musk and free speech.
00:33:31.000It is because they are so threatened by a free people who can think for ourselves, speak, you know, speak our mind and our views and our beliefs, very robustly engage in this marketplace of ideas that scares them, that scares the power elite who are in charge.
00:33:49.000So of course, and this includes some of these billionaires who are so afraid to stand up and take a stand
00:34:17.000What's dangerous about what's happening here is with Elon Musk continuing to forge ahead very correctly in his commitment to free speech and how he wants to change Twitter to be a truly free marketplace of ideas.
00:34:31.000The power leader so threatened by it that they are launching the muscle of the federal government against him, basically saying, well, we're going to just start investigating Elon Musk.
00:34:42.000We need to start looking at what rules he may have broken or what regulations he may not be following.
00:34:47.000Not because they've got evidence of any wrongdoing, but here's a guy who poses a threat to them because they want to be the ones to say, well, these are the only voices we want heard.
00:34:58.000This is what we deem to be information versus disinformation.
00:35:06.000They're afraid of a free people with free voices and a free society, and that's why it's dangerous as we are seeing how they're trying to take down people like Elon Musk, who has the means and resources to actually join the people in standing up and fighting to uphold those freedoms, obviously here in the United States, but with Twitter it affects People around the world.
00:35:33.000From this position of my love of God, I am confused at times by the ferocity of the current cultural war.
00:35:44.000Believing myself that whether these arguments are approached from the libertarian right or the socially justice-oriented left, that individual freedom And a continual undergirding and recourse to principles, undergirding by and recourse to principles such as compassion, kindness, tolerance and forgiveness would seem obvious on both ends of that spectrum.
00:36:10.000It confuses me that there is so much vociferousness, angst and antipathy, particularly in American culture, but across the world now, around these cultural issues.
00:36:22.000You've spoken about some of these ideas at the moment, recently at least, and I wonder what it is that informs your opinion and how you align them with what I would understand as spiritual principles that amount to love and unity and acceptance.
00:36:42.000You know, I do my very best to please God and to love God with all my heart every day.
00:36:49.000He is the center of my life and I have dedicated my life to service because what better way to make God happy than to work for the well-being of God's children and our planet.
00:37:04.000One of the things that I talked about in my statement of leaving the Democrat Party is because these people, the leaders of this party, are so hostile towards anyone who is a person of faith or those who have their own spiritual practice.
00:37:22.000They are directly undermining Our constitutional principle of freedom of religion.
00:37:30.000It is freedom of religion for every one of us to develop our own personal loving relationship with God in whatever way we choose or not at all.
00:37:39.000And you can directly link this hostility towards people of faith and towards spirituality really with their own desire to see themselves as God.
00:37:51.000to see themselves as controllers and rulers of others, of the people.
00:37:57.000And so it's no wonder that we hear such hatred and vitriol coming from them, rather than allowing God, who sits in every one of our hearts, to inspire that kindness and compassion and understanding and forgiveness that really comes from His unconditional love for every single one of us as people.
00:38:20.000As the culture appears to continue to disintegrate and become more and more defined by tension and conflict, it seems to me that centralised power, whether it's government or corporate, seems less and less legitimate and less and less valid and less and less tenable.
00:38:42.000For there to be real change, is it not clear that what we need is a type of new confederacy?
00:38:51.000More ability for people to organise their own communities along the lines of their own values?
00:38:57.000And doesn't this principle negate the necessity for this ongoing cultural conflict?
00:39:03.000Isn't true freedom the freedom for each community to decide what their values are?
00:39:09.000Outside of what would seem to me to be some pretty obvious Sesame Street values around kindness, compassion, tolerance, not killing one another, that kind of stuff.
00:39:17.000What are your views on decentralization and how decentralization might diffuse much of this current cultural conflict?
00:39:29.000You know, I think that with many of the things here that we've seen play out over the last few years,
00:39:35.000especially, but really over a longer period of time, more and more people are opening their eyes to,
00:39:42.000you know, big brother, big government, intruding into just about every parts of our lives
00:39:49.000and dictating to us what we can and can't do, what we can and can't read or see or hear or believe
00:39:58.000with the force of law and really serious consequences coming behind it, forcing compliance.
00:40:08.000Just one example that we're seeing happening here now is with the Biden administration
00:40:12.000taking this transgender ideology and rather than changing the definition
00:40:19.000or basically going to Congress to try to make the changes that they want to make,
00:40:24.000they're instead backdooring them through executive branch rule changes to our schools and telling our schools that.
00:40:34.000You know, are charged with teaching our young kids that unless you implement what they call gender-affirming care, I know you've talked about this, which essentially is this very harmful gender ideology that they're imposing on our kids, unless these schools allow, you know, young boys to go into young girls' bathrooms and locker rooms just because they say, well, you know what, I'm identifying as a girl, putting these girls at risk, If schools don't comply with that change, the federal government, the Biden administration, is saying, well, we are going to yank federal funding for kids who qualify for free and reduced lunches.
00:41:15.000It's a designated category for kids who are living in poverty, who don't have money to be able to come and afford to buy their school breakfast or lunch.
00:41:23.000Putting at risk the most vulnerable among us so that they can force compliance amongst parents and teachers and our society.
00:41:33.000So I think a lot of people seeing this sort of thing play out,
00:41:37.000people who may not have been involved with politics before, are waking up to how dangerous these policies are
00:41:45.000specifically, but really looking at limited government in a whole new way
00:41:50.000and promoting the self-governance that our founders had for the United States of America.
00:41:58.000I would certainly advocate for any young person to express themselves and their identity however
00:42:05.000I feel that what I'm hearing you say, Tulsi, is that you don't believe that this is something that should be legislated for or enforced, imposed or engineered at a governmental level.
00:42:15.000But my understanding of individual liberty would certainly include the liberty to freely express yourself as you want to.
00:42:25.000Is that basically where you see that line as being?
00:42:29.000Parents have the right and responsibility to raise their own children in the way that they choose with their own values and their own principles.
00:42:36.000Parents should not be under the situation we are now to send their kids to school
00:42:42.000and have these different values and ideologies and principles being imposed on their kids,
00:42:48.000oftentimes without their knowledge in our schools.
00:42:52.000Of course, people should have the freedom to express themselves,
00:42:55.000but when we're talking about kids who are being fed propaganda and lied to
00:43:02.000and put in a situation where at 10 years old, 11 years old, they're being given puberty blockers
00:43:07.000and told to get irreversible surgeries, that is something that is actually harmful to our kids
00:43:14.000because they're not in any kind of position to be able to make a life-changing decision at that age.
00:43:20.000Tulsi, I wonder if this aspect of the culture war is yet another way that people are being divided, that divisions are being stoked, and could it not be said that this also serves as a way to distract us broadly from our general Unity and our necessity to come together wherever we are on the cultural spectrum to focus on the true challenge that we have facing centralized elitist power that responds not to the democratic will of ordinary people but to edicts that come from a kind of collusion between a co-opted state and corporate and financial interests.
00:44:07.000How can we galvanize people who may traditionally ...have regarded themselves as being at odds.
00:44:15.000If we continue to stoke these kind of arguments, how do we categorise the significance of these various strata of challenges, from centralised financial power, military-industrial complex, and these cultural issues, which I recognise bring about a lot of energy and bring about a lot of division, but by my reckoning are an area that we I think that the word culture war is often thrown about without it having a clear definition.
00:44:50.000I'll tell you, Russell, what I hear from parents as I'm traveling across the country as we speak.
00:44:57.000I'm here in Salt Lake City, Utah today.
00:44:59.000Parents are concerned for the well-being of their children.
00:45:02.000They're concerned about what kind of education their kids are getting.
00:45:06.000Families who live along the southern border are worried about their safety and security.
00:45:12.000So a lot of these different things that are often labeled as culture war issues
00:45:16.000that are being used to tear people apart, well, if you go and actually talk to people
00:45:20.000who are being impacted and affected by a lot of these things,
00:45:23.000it's not some fancy rhetorical debate that's going on.
00:45:29.000These are very real things that are impacting their lives.
00:45:32.000And I think these are the things that we need to be able to unite around, making sure that
00:45:38.000our kids are safe and are able to be kids and grow in a free society, making sure that,
00:45:45.000you know, our loved ones are safe in the communities that we live in, making sure that we as people
00:45:51.000are free to make our own decisions for ourselves and our families.
00:45:55.000So I don't think you can separate the two as well.
00:46:00.000Neither of these issues fall in the bucket of culture wars, whereas these other issues,
00:46:04.000which are very important, that have to do with our governance and the systems that we
00:46:09.000have in our society that are not working for the people.
00:46:34.000Are they making us more free or less free?
00:46:37.000Getting back to the basics, I think, is the key for us to be able to start to move forward, to come together as people, and to figure out how we actually start to solve some of these problems together.
00:46:48.000Tarsi, thank you for being such a vital voice in this new, hopefully transcendent phase
00:46:57.000where it's no longer considered malignant to have a conversation, where it's no longer
00:47:03.000considered toxic to speak to people from across a variety of potential political and ideological
00:47:55.000I want to add one last thing because you ended that perfectly on a beautiful note, which really encapsulates what we in Hawaii know and call as the Aloha spirit.
00:48:07.000I know you've been surrounded by Aloha, but that's really what Aloha is.
00:48:11.000It's not It's not just hello or goodbye, it doesn't mean that at all.
00:48:14.000The reason why we in Hawai'i greet each other with aloha is because it is a recognition that no matter where we come from, our background, our views, our politics, or any of these things, it's a recognition that we are all connected, we are all children of God, and when we can engage with each other in that space, anything is possible.
00:48:35.000I've known that when I was in Hawaii because what I actually felt was that I was there for three months and I was on one of the islands which I think was near an Air Force base and I was making a movie there and I felt a little bit trapped there and anywhere where you're contained for a little while can become a bit like a penitentiary.
00:50:54.000Well, she liked that as well, I thought.
00:50:56.000You're much more safe with an American with the old I love God announcement.
00:51:01.000You know, like you try it sometimes with an atheist, like we've had great people like Sam Harris on the show, Ricky Gervais, you know, and you start proudly announcing you love God to them.
00:52:01.000I think we need to have it so they can, because I'm doing some pretty good eye contact, and like when Eckhart said it, so I think that's another thing we need to sort out.
00:52:11.000The tech thing we should sort out so that they can see me, because I want them to be able to see a lot more, because I'm doing some great faces.
00:52:17.000Oh, I thought James just meant Elon's tweeted.