Episode #11： Badasses with Ben Thompson
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Summary
Ben Thompson is the author of Badass: A Deliberate onslaught of the toughest warlords, Vikings, samurai, and military commanders to ever live. In this episode, Ben talks about the history of badassitude and why he decided to write a book about it.
Transcript
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Hello, Brett here. Before we get to today's show, got a quick favor to ask of you. If you've been
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enjoying the Art of Manliness podcast, I'd really appreciate it if you take one minute to give us a
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check out a particular episode if you think they'd get something out of it. Thank you for
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your support and now on to the show. Brett McKay here and welcome to another episode of the Art of
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Manliness podcast. Now throughout history, great men have risen that single handedly built empires and
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destroyed armies. Their deeds have become legends. In short, they were badasses. Well, our guest
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today has become an expert on the history of bad assitude and has written a book about it. His
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name is Ben Thompson and he's the author of the book Badass, a relentless onslaught of the toughest
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warlords, Vikings, samurai, pirates, gunfighters, and military commanders to ever live. Ben, welcome to
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the show. Hey, Brett. I just want to say thanks for having me on today. Yeah, it's our pleasure. So Ben,
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badass. How did you get started with this badass project? Well, it's, uh, it kind of came from,
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from my dad in a lot of ways. You know, my dad was really into history and, uh, and the way that my
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dad was able to explain history to me, you know, he was a memorabilia collector who had all these like
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really cool, you know, samurai swords and, and, uh, you know, night swords and muskets and stuff like
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this. And, uh, you know, and he would break this stuff out and he would give me these really
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awesome descriptions. It was like an action movie, the way he would explain like Leonidas
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or, you know, Washington or whoever he was talking about. And it was like really intense
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the way that he explained this. And then I went off to college and, or even in high school,
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and I would learn these same stories. It would just be completely boring the way that they were
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pretending. So, you know, I wanted to be like, okay, well, you know, I'm not really super
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interested in Washington's agricultural reform. I want to know about all the people that he, uh,
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kicked ass, you know, what did he do that was like so awesome? Uh, I just kind of wanted to find a
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way to tell like the action movie story of these guys and make some jokes and try to make it kind
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of funny and lighthearted. And, uh, uh, you know, that's sort of what I was hoping to accomplish
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with this. Definitely. And so before, uh, you did the book, it actually started as a website. So
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you're one of these bloggers turned authors, right? So tell us about the, the, your website.
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Well, the website was started in April of 2004. Uh, it was just kind of something that I,
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it's called bad-ass of the week. Uh, and then, you know, basically every Friday I just write a
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story about some bad-ass from history or, you know, on the website, I have some fictional
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characters, stuff like that. You know, and I just kind of started as a joke. I was really bored at
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my old job and, you know, I just started typing these things up and just doing it as kind of a joke
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for my friends. And the next thing I know, I'm starting to get a lot of hits and, you know,
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the counter's going up a hundred thousand, 500,000. And she's like, Oh my God, this is insane.
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And so, you know, I was kind of lucky to get, get on with the deal with Pepper Collins to try to
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get this thing published as an actual book. It's been a great ride so far. Awesome. So you've been
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doing the, the bad-ass of the week since 2004. When you decided to sit down and write the book,
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how did you decide which bad-asses to include in the book? Were like, were there criteria you had
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or, I mean, what was it? It was a, it was a grueling, painful process.
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It was the short version. You know, I basically had this list of like 150, 160 guys that I thought
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were going to be really great for a book like this. I ended up just through a very painful
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bloodletting. It was like, you know, killing your own children, trying to figure out who I was going
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to put in and what I wasn't going to put in. So I ended up coming up with 30 guys who weren't in
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the book. And then the great thing about doing the website is that, um, but yeah, 30 guys that
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weren't on the website. Uh, and the, the great thing about doing the website is that I've already
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got, you know, articles up there that people have liked. They get a lot of hits. People have
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been doing positive feedback about them. So I was able to just basically take a top 10 from the
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website and then supplement it with some, some guys that I hadn't written about before.
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Awesome. So, uh, who's your favorite bad-ass that you've written about?
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It's tough to say. It's tough to say, you know, sometimes I'm really into Vikings,
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sometimes I'm into ninjas, you know, uh, it's really difficult for me to pick a, pick a number
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one. Uh, when I'm trying to talk about the book, the guy that I usually reference is, uh,
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uh, an Irish warrior named Wolf the Quarleson. And, you know, I just love the name more than
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anything, you know, Wolf the Quarleson. It's like, Bladdy and Taylor is another good one.
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But yeah, Wolf was a, uh, an Irish, an Irishman who, um, was around in, I think the ninth century.
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And these Vikings were invading his, uh, his homeland. And, you know, we don't know anything
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about Wolf the Quarleson because epitomizes the guy that I like to write about, because we don't
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know anything about this guy, except that he killed a bunch of Vikings at this battle. He almost
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single-handedly turned back their army. And then when there, when the Viking commander killed the
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Irish king, this guy hunted him down, uh, punched him in the throat, cut out his, uh, cut open his
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abdomen, pulled out his entrails, tied one of them to a tree, and then like forced the
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guy to walk around the tree in a circle, pulling out his own entrails until he died from it.
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So it's like, you know, he doesn't really serve a whole lot of, he doesn't have a whole
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lot of historical significance, but he was kind of a badass guy. And those are the kinds
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of stories that I want to, that I want to be able to hit with the book.
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Insane. So, uh, uh, who's the most badass U.S. president you think?
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There's so many good ones. You know, I mean, the big, the big three you would think would
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be, you know, you think are, uh, you got George Washington, you got, uh, Andrew Jackson, you
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got Teddy Roosevelt. Those are the three that are, you know, are really some of the toughest
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guys that have been in office. I like to talk about, uh, Zachary Taylor when we're talking
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about badass presidents, because he doesn't get as much publicity or as much credit as some
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of those other guys. But Zach Taylor was kind of a badass guy also. He was a war hero from
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the Mexican-American War. He had, uh, fought off an Indian attack at the fort with just
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like himself and two other guys. And, uh, and they made him president for the Whig party
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because he was so successful and because he kicked so much ass in the Mexican-American
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War. Uh, but then, you know, he wasn't the kind of guy who was just going to be a political
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puppet. You know, the Whigs put him up thinking that, oh yeah, we'll just write his credibility
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to the White House and then make him do whatever we want. Uh, but once he got there, they
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started giving me these orders and he was like, yeah, I don't want to do that. You're
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going to have to make me. And then, you know, so he just didn't give a crap about anything.
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Uh, didn't basically wasn't the Whig in any way. Uh, and when they kept trying to get him
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to, uh, to put his, to put their policies forward, he just told him to get lost.
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Wow. So yeah, he did some, some political, uh, uh, huevos there.
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Yeah. Yeah. And like, yeah, it's funny you mentioned, you know, Andrew Jackson and Theodore
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Roosevelt. There's a, those are two presidents actually had assassination attempts on them,
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but the way they handled it was like really bad-ass. I mean, this is before secret service.
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Um, and I, once I, I mean, yeah, one story that comes to mind is Andrew Jackson. He was
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like in a duel or like, no, he, there's actually an assassination attempt and the guy, the gun
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misfired. And then Andrew Jackson, like, he's like this old guy goes and chased down the
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guy and beats him with his cane. I mean, right. Beat him up with his cane and then build a
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statue to himself on the site where he was almost as fascinated. Yeah. Uh, he was a tough
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guy. This is what his body used to rattle because he'd been in so many duels. He had
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so many gunshots in him. Uh, and there's a famous story about him being in this duel and, uh,
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you know, he faces off against this other guy who had such a, uh, interjected his wife or
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something like that. Uh, another guy was just really talented, really, you know, bad-ass
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duelist. Uh, and they, they turned, they, you know, 10 page turn fire or whatever. And, uh,
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Andrew Jackson just basically stands there and lets the other guy shoot him first so that he
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can take his time when he's aiming. It's just like, I mean, that's like balls of steel right
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there. Yeah. It's crazy. And then, uh, Theodore Roosevelt, uh, you know, this was after he's
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president, he was running on the progressive party, uh, the bull moose party or whatever. And
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some guy shot him. And instead of going to the hospital, he gets up and gives a 90 minute
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speech and shows the audience. Yeah. It shows the audience's wound is like, you can't keep
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a bull moose down. I mean, that's just, you, I don't think you'd ever see that happen today.
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No, no, not a chance. I mean, standing outside and it's like freezing cold, I believe at the
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time. And, you know, in front of all these people. Yeah. Unbelievable. Unbelievable. Very cool.
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So in your book, uh, Ben, you're, you're, you're an equal opportunity, uh, badass appreciator
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and you also include some women in the book. So can you, can you give us an example of a
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badass woman and her exploits? Uh, yeah, one of the, one of the toughest ones in the book
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is, uh, is Anne Bonning. And Anne Bonning was a, uh, a pirate. She, you know, was living,
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living in Nassau. She was the wife of some small time pirate. Uh, and then that pirate that
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she was married to started selling out other pirates to the local government for money.
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And, you know, she really thought that this was BS. So she escaped and like made off with
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some other pirate guy. And the two of them just basically sailed around, you know, did
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all the good pirate things, plundering and pillaging, all this good stuff. And, uh, you
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know, she was dressed as a man for the first little bit of their voyage. Um, but eventually
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people caught on that she was a woman, but she was so tough. And, you know, it was really
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bad luck at this time to have women on board pirate ships, but she was so tough. And she
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was some of the, one of the mean people on board that they, you know, they didn't care.
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She dressed as a woman the whole time and nobody really should have a problem with it. Uh, and
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then when the pirates eventually got captured, she, you know, was the only one, like most of
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them were really drunk and they were ambushed by the British Navy. Uh, and, you know,
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there was a small battle and it was basically Anne Bonning and like this other woman,
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Mary Reed, who was the other woman on board. Uh, and they were the only two who fought
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back. All the other pirates were just like, whatever, I'm wasting, I don't care. Uh, and
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so, you know, these two women fought back for a while. They eventually were, were, were
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captured and as they were being dragged off by the British, they turned the guns on their
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own men for being cowards. Wow. So, you know, they didn't, they didn't have any tolerance
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for, uh, for people who, who didn't, uh, didn't want to fight. Yeah, no tolerance for
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wussies. Yeah, exactly. Exactly. You know, and all the, you know, they, they went to
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trial and, uh, they eventually were able to get off from being hung and vanished into
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history. Uh, you know, we don't know what happened to Anne Bonning afterwards because
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she, she escaped. Uh, but you know, during a trial of all of the people who testified
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against them basically said that she was like the most evil person they'd ever met.
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She was like the worst of all the pirates on board. It was great.
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That's funny. Um, you also have a section about badass animals and, uh, one of the, one of the
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things I thought, the stories I thought was really cool and funny was, uh, about a bear
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that the Polish army recruited. Tell us about this bear.
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Yeah, the bear is on the website. You can look the bear up. His name is Wojtek. Uh, and he
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was a Syrian brown bear cub that was rescued by the Polish as they were traveling through,
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uh, the Middle East towards, uh, towards, you know, going to get ready for their invasion of,
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uh, from their invasion of Italy. And, you know, they kind of raised this bear from birth. They
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wrestled with him. They, he smoked cigarettes. He drank beer. Uh, you know, he, he marched like
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on his hind legs along with the men when they did like parade stuff, you know, just crazy. And,
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uh, you know, the bear first distinguishes himself by, you know, the bear used to like to take baths
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in the bath houses that they would set up in their camps. And he found a German spy in one of these
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bath houses and basically just growled at the guy until the guy like basically wet himself and
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surrendered. Uh, so, you know, that was cool. And then there are reports at the battle of,
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uh, Monte Cassino. And this is one of the things in the book that looks so insane. You wouldn't
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believe it, like, unless you're able to find, you know, six to eight corroborating sources for it.
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But at the battle of Monte Cassino, he carried artillery shells, you know, walking on his hind legs,
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carrying artillery shells in his hands from the trucks to the guns. Wow. It's like ridiculous,
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right? Yeah. I mean, uh, you know, that's unbelievable that he was, you know, he's on the,
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all the heraldry of the unit now. He's on their official logo and everything like that. And, uh,
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he was in Edinburgh Zoo after, after the war and his old buddies used to come visit him and like
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jump down into the enclosure with him and like horrify everybody that was around because it's
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like jumping to the enclosure and wrestle with him like they used to. Crazy stuff.
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Wow. So an artillery shell carrying, cigarette smoking, beer chugging bear.
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That's pretty, that's pretty badass. That's definitely badass.
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So, yeah, yeah. You know, it's, it's sort of humbling writing this book because I'm like,
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this is a bear. He's more badass than I am. How is that possible?
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Yeah. It's, it's, it's Stephen Colbert's worst nightmare.
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Yeah. So, uh, Ben, most of the people you include in the book are long dead. Um,
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do you have any, do we have any bad-asses living among us today?
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Yeah, we do. We do for sure. I, uh, I didn't include any in the book. Uh,
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everybody in the book is currently dead because, um, I don't get sued.
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I have a lot of present day people on the website because, you know,
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people don't like it. Somebody reads it, you know,
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they're obviously bad-ass if they're on the website. Uh,
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and they come to me and say, I don't want to be up there.
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It's easy to pull it down off the website, but this is in print.
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there's a lot of really bad-ass people doing stuff right now. You know,
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you've got, you know, you've got firefighters, you've got, uh, you know,
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the soldiers, you've got so much bad-ass stuff happening every day. Uh,
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the story that I like to tell is, uh, a couple of years ago,
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there was a guy who was a master of arms on a cruise ship and the cruise ship
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And this would have been basically a complete nightmare if these pirates had
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gotten on board a cruise ship. Uh, and this guy was, you know,
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he was master of arms, but he didn't have access to weapons or anything.
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They didn't have any guns on board or anything like that,
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fight off two boatloads with full of guys with AK 47s and RPGs.
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So he grabbed the freaking deck fire hose for the cruise ship and then just
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hoses these guys down while they're shooting AK 47s at him, uh,
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and fights them off with a frigging fire hose, uh, to, you know,
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like 12 guys with bazookas. It's crazy stuff.
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That's awesome. That's awesome. So Ben in your book,
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you don't make any bones about this kind of being an over a top,
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you know, hyperbolic and it's, it's really humorous, the writing you do. Um,
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but were there any real life lessons you took after researching about the,
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the people and the men you include in your book that has helped you become a
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And I do try to do a little bit over the top of it, you know? Uh,
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and that's something that I think is kind of a good flavor for,
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he drives over somebody's head with a riding lawnmower, you know,
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I'm trying to do some funny stuff or do some cool stuff with it. But, uh,
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the one thing that will tie all of these characters together where you have,
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you know, a Leonidas on the one hand, who's defending his homeland.
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you've got an Anne Bonny who's making people walk the plank or Vlad the Impaler,
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the one thing that kind of ties these heroes, villains,
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human beings together is that they're all determined. They have this,
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and they have this one thing that they want to accomplish, whether it's,
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you know, conquest or, um, freedom or whatever it is. And,
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you know, they don't want anything standing in their way.
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They just will knock down anybody who gets in their way.
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They'll break the enemy door. Uh, and they just,
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they don't do a crap. They're going to do what they want to do and nothing's going to
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that's the one unifying factor among all people who are bad-ass.
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Awesome. Well, Ben, thanks for talking to this, talking to us today.
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Yeah. Yeah. It's been great being on. Thanks a lot for having me.
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and you can pick up his book at amazon.com or any other major bookstore and make
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Badass of the Week to read about more bad-asses from history.
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Well, that wraps up another edition of the Art of Manliness podcast. For more manly tips and advice,
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check out our website at artofmanliness.com. And until next week, stay manly.