00:00:59.420We point and mock at the unemployed polycule, the emotional instability, the theatrical rage, and the childish demands to abolish police, erase borders, and destroy capitalism.
00:01:11.440But guess what? That mockery might be usually deserved, but the dismissal, it's not.
00:01:17.260You know, those people might be ridiculous, but you know what those ridiculous people do?0.99
00:01:20.900They keep showing up. They organize. They make art. They join committees. They staff bureaucracies.1.00
00:01:27.600They run non-profits. They enter the classrooms. They write rules.
00:01:31.900They decide what your children learn and what your employees can say and what your business must obey.
00:01:38.900The joke is on conservatives who laugh while losing.
00:01:42.500Conservatives build businesses, raise families, and grow churches.
00:01:45.900These are all really important achievements.
00:01:49.240They're more honorable than spending one's life screaming slogans outside a courthouse
00:01:54.000or enforcing ideology from a human resources department.
00:01:58.060But honorable work can become an excuse for political and cultural surrender.
00:02:03.940Many conservatives tell themselves that activism is merely a symptom of liberal dysfunction.
00:02:10.000They imagine their own reluctance to organize proves some kind of superior health.
00:02:15.300Politics has become religion for the left, they say, while conservatives seek salvation elsewhere.
00:02:20.780All true, but none of it excuses the shocking lack of action.
00:02:24.820The author Alexis de Tocqueville identified the American habit that once prevented private life from collapsing into absolute selfish isolation.
00:02:34.940In Democracy in America, he praised Americans for their nearly compulsive desire to form associations.
00:02:40.940They founded churches, schools, hospitals, libraries, fraternities, unions, charities, and local organizations with their own money and labor.
00:02:51.520Their institutions created a dense web of civic life.
00:02:55.140They restrained individualism, solved local problems, and reduced the need for distant government.
00:03:02.040Americans didn't retreat from public life because they had families and businesses.
00:03:07.020They entered public life through their families, businesses, churches, lodges, and communities.
00:03:13.520That habit has largely fallen by the wayside.
00:03:16.880Just a few decades ago, it was very common for the average right-leaning businessman to also belong to his local Elks Lodge,
00:03:24.700the American Legion Post, and the Rotary Club, or even a local church committee.
00:03:29.320These associations provided mutual aid, mentored young men, and supported local institutions along with connecting families across generations.
00:03:39.700They were also political and cultural centers.
00:03:42.700Men decided they were going to support their friend for city council while sitting at the Elks Lodge meeting.
00:03:48.200Couples organized fundraisers for the orchestra, hospital, or school because they met at some kind of social event.
00:03:55.480Veterans discussed local problems over beer.
00:03:58.180Business owners pooled money and influence.
00:04:01.540Neighbors formed habits of trust before a crisis demanded them.
00:04:05.940Almost every great political and culture movement began with passionate, like-minded people bonding over a drink.0.98
00:04:13.520The left's version is uglier because the left is uglier.
00:04:17.360Progressive organizations often produce coercion, resentment, and ideological fanaticism.
00:04:23.680Conservatives are right to reject these ends.
00:05:15.820Conservative mockery has become a coping mechanism.
00:05:18.800It allows the right to transform defeat into evidence of superiority.
00:05:23.400The progressive may control the school board, but at least the conservative has a successful landscaping company and grills excellent barbecue.
00:05:32.620Look, I am very sure that in the vast majority of cases, the guy making excellent barbecue is probably happier and saner.
00:05:39.720But the school board still controls what his children learn, and that's ruled by people who hate him and want to destroy him.
00:05:47.120birth rates provide another excuse that conservatives often fall back on when they
00:05:52.520say they don't really have to do anything their victory is inevitable conservatives correctly know
00:05:58.280that they're having more children than liberals they assume demography will eventually deliver
00:06:03.560political victory but while there are significant studies showing that children generally adopt the
00:06:10.080politics of their parents they don't inherit politics just like their eye color two obstacles
00:06:15.680destroy the fantasy of automatic triumph. First, Democrats import loyal new voters faster than
00:06:22.160Republicans can raise children, and many immigrant populations have higher birth rates even than
00:06:27.180native-born conservatives. Second, the left controls the institutions that shape those
00:06:32.460children. Schools, universities, entertainment, music, social media, and corporate culture bombard
00:06:38.560young people with progressive assumptions all day long. A weekly church service and a few family
00:06:44.740dinners are great, but they can't compete with 16 hours a day of ideological formation unless
00:06:50.900parents build strong institutions around their children. Conservatives can fill houses with
00:06:56.900children and still lose every one of them to politics. I personally know stalwart conservative
00:07:02.840parents with five children who all became progressives. Their parents provided food,
00:07:08.260shelter, discipline, and love, but the culture supplied the worldview.
00:07:12.080Having children is not a political strategy. Raising them inside a durable culture, that is.
00:07:19.440The same principle applies to business. Building a successful dealership, construction company,
00:07:24.840or restaurant is admirable, but building a fourth company while ignoring the city council,
00:07:30.580school board, local art institution, and state legislature, that's strategic negligence.
00:07:36.640politics will eventually enter the business whether the owner enters politics or not
00:07:42.620the left understands this it doesn't separate cultural production political organization and
00:07:48.000economic power it coordinates them conservatives must recover the same seriousness without adopting
00:07:54.620the left's fanaticism that means forming associations funding artists supporting schools
00:08:00.680mentoring young people running for local office attending meetings building media and creating
00:08:06.480networks that survive one election cycle. Look, it is totally understandable that not everyone is
00:08:12.800going to become a full-time activist. Everyone with something to conserve must contribute to
00:08:19.080the work of conservation. The task is difficult, time-consuming, and often thankless. It'll
00:08:26.640interfere with leisure. It may cost money that would have been able to purchase another boat
00:08:31.960or vacation or business expansion. Progressives understand that power shapes the conditions
00:08:37.720under which private life unfolds. Conservatives keep hoping private success will somehow
00:08:43.260neutralize public defeat, but it's not going to. The people you mock are organizing the world
00:08:49.880your grandchildren will inherit. Build something capable of stopping them.
00:08:55.440thanks for watching guys if you enjoyed this video go ahead and click like if you haven't
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00:09:15.760or review it really helps with the algorithm magic if you want to watch this show on rumble
00:09:21.560or odyssey if you want to follow me on twitter or gab or substack or instagram the links to do all
00:09:27.560of that are down below in the description and don't forget my book the total state is in its
00:09:32.140second printing it's in paperback with an extra chapter so if you've been waiting for the paperback
00:09:37.140or the extra chapter in that second edition you can pick it up now on amazon and of course you
00:09:42.760can read all of my columns and watch all of my shows over at the blaze thanks for watching guys
00:09:47.540and as always, I'll talk to you next time.