The Jordan B. Peterson Podcast - The Crisis of Masculinity

00:00:00.000 Oh, Maya. Maya. She loves being cool. 21 degrees is her favorite number. God, she's the coolest, especially at night. So I raise the temp at 10 p.m. because she gets chilly when she sleeps. Maya loves using less energy. And I love Maya. We're basically besties.

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00:00:30.000 Hey, everyone. Real quick before you skip, I want to talk to you about something serious and important. Dr. Jordan Peterson has created a new series that could be a lifeline for those battling depression and anxiety.

00:00:42.600 We know how isolating and overwhelming these conditions can be, and we wanted to take a moment to reach out to those listening who may be struggling.

00:00:50.340 With decades of experience helping patients, Dr. Peterson offers a unique understanding of why you might be feeling this way in his new series.

00:00:57.580 He provides a roadmap towards healing, showing that while the journey isn't easy, it's absolutely possible to find your way forward.

00:01:05.540 If you're suffering, please know you are not alone. There's hope, and there's a path to feeling better.

00:01:11.960 Go to Daily Wire Plus now and start watching Dr. Jordan B. Peterson on depression and anxiety.

00:01:17.640 Let this be the first step towards the brighter future you deserve.

00:01:21.140 Welcome to Season 2, Episode 30 of the Jordan B. Peterson Podcast.

00:01:34.340 I'm Michaela Peterson, Dad's daughter and collaborator.

00:01:37.700 This is a podcast done in Manchester, recorded on October 25th, 2018.

00:01:43.320 If you haven't signed up for ThinkSpot, the social media platform Dad's involved with, please check it out at least.

00:01:49.000 You go to ThinkSpot.com and enter the promo code LIONDIET, one word, to be invited in sooner.

00:01:55.200 It's still in the early stages and will be more informed in January, but it has great functionalities built in.

00:02:00.400 You can annotate podcasts, videos, basically have online book groups, and interact with the content providers you want to interact with.

00:02:07.940 I'm on there, hence LIONDIET code, Dadis, Jocko Willink, Greg Hurwitz, and more.

00:02:13.860 I've named this podcast The Crisis of Masculinity.

00:02:19.000 The Crisis of Masculinity, a 12 Rules for Life Lecture, done by Jordan B. Peterson.

00:02:24.500 Oh, thank you.

00:02:47.000 That was very nice of you.

00:02:52.480 So, I've had an interesting day in Manchester.

00:02:57.760 Not that that's surprising in any way.

00:03:00.620 My wife and I, we had an interesting time getting here, too, because yesterday morning we were in Oslo,

00:03:13.620 and then we flew to Stockholm and did two newspaper interviews and a podcast and then a TV talk show there,

00:03:23.760 and then we made it to the airport to fly to London with, like, 20 minutes to spare.

00:03:30.360 We're supposed to fly in this morning, but we thought that was risking it because my publicists at Penguin had cooperated with BBC to set up a radio interview this morning at 10,

00:03:40.840 and we figured if we flew in, you know, if there was a flight delay, then that would be not good.

00:03:48.040 And so we flew to London last night, and we got in about midnight, and then we drove to Manchester, and that took about three hours, and so that was yesterday.

00:03:56.760 And then this morning we got up and we went to this BBC radio interview, which was very interesting, and I thought I might talk to you about it a little bit.

00:04:07.200 And I'm going to talk to you tonight about three rules.

00:04:10.820 I'm going to talk to you about rule 11, which is don't bother children when they're skateboarding,

00:04:18.020 and rule 10, which is be precise in your speech, and rule 8, which is pursue what is meaningful.

00:04:28.280 Sorry, that's rule 7.

00:04:29.900 Pursue what is meaningful, not what is expedient.

00:04:32.340 And I want to, I want to, what would you say, weave those together, and also do that in a way that's relevant to what happened today,

00:04:42.600 because what happened today was quite cool.

00:04:44.700 So, I went to this boxing club that's in Moss, yes, Moss Side, Moss Side, yes.

00:04:56.440 And it was run by a gentleman named Nigel Travis, and so he's taken part of an old fire station there and turned it into a boxing club.

00:05:06.520 And so, and he did that to help primarily young men in the Moss Side area develop some discipline and to bring their aggression,

00:05:20.960 I wouldn't say under control, I wouldn't say under control, but to learn how to use it in the most appropriate possible way.

00:05:27.240 So, and then at the boxing club, there was nine people, nine people other than me.

00:05:35.160 There was the person who set up the interview, someone that I had talked to a year before.

00:05:46.380 And then there were two young guys, 18-year-old guys, who had learned to box and had ended up doing very well at it.

00:05:55.980 One of them is the current ABA National Youth Champion.

00:06:01.880 Another one was a Somalian kid who has disciplined himself as a consequence of interacting with this group, 0.56

00:06:09.980 and is now mentoring young people.

00:06:13.200 And there was a young guy from France, and his name is Kevin Munga.

00:06:18.560 He was an ex-gang member, and he turned his life around and finished his law degree,

00:06:23.800 and he just wrote a book called, Young Black Males Have Potential, Your Color Does Not Determine Your Future.

00:06:31.160 So, that was really interesting.

00:06:33.320 And a guy named Rhodes, who, studying for a PhD from Cyprus,

00:06:38.540 who did military service and learned during his military service that he was not only capable of accepting a certain amount of discipline,

00:06:46.740 but that he was capable of thriving in the chaos that was part and parcel of the military training.

00:06:53.200 And so, we had a really good conversation.

00:06:55.920 There were some other people there as well.

00:06:57.620 I won't mention them at the moment.

00:06:59.460 But it was a really good conversation, you know, because, well, because it was a real conversation.

00:07:07.740 That was the first thing.

00:07:08.700 It was each of these guys had come from a background that was rough in its own way.

00:07:15.340 One of them, I think his name was Niall, had developed type 1 diabetes when he was a kid,

00:07:21.260 and he talked about how he had learned to, I wouldn't say overcome that,

00:07:25.600 because I don't really know if you overcome a very serious illness like that,

00:07:31.760 but you can confront it and do everything you can to accept it without bitterness

00:07:41.080 and to move forward despite the fact that you're impeded in some important way, you know,

00:07:48.100 an important, dangerous, and frightening way.

00:07:51.280 And so, that was good.

00:07:52.720 He started a business, and that's thriving, and so he's pretty happy with that.

00:07:56.300 And so, we were talking about all sorts of things,

00:08:00.780 and so I wanted to sort of weave those together a little bit

00:08:03.160 to think about what we were talking about.

00:08:05.880 You know, a couple of the guys had joined gangs when they were kids and adolescents,

00:08:11.060 and, you know, we're not very happy about young men joining gangs,

00:08:15.480 but actually, here's what's interesting.

00:08:19.360 It's like, it's one thing to join a gang, and maybe that's not the best thing,

00:08:23.420 but it's another thing not to be able to join a gang.

00:08:27.640 You see, that's really a bad thing.

00:08:30.120 Because it means if you're 12 or 13 and you can't find a gang,

00:08:34.000 that means that you haven't become socialized enough so that people will accept you.

00:08:39.700 And so, joining a gang, being able to join a gang,

00:08:42.600 is actually a marker of a certain degree of maturation, you know,

00:08:46.840 and you need a gang if you're male, let's say. 1.00

00:08:55.120 And maybe you need a gang if you're female, too, 1.00

00:08:57.080 although we don't seem to see roving gangs of females. 0.99

00:09:00.060 So, well, right, I mean, that's not something that happens, right?

00:09:02.660 And I would say that's actually worthy of note.

00:09:05.400 There's a reason for that.

00:09:06.580 I think it might have something to do with the fact that because

00:09:10.660 women mature sexually earlier than men, 0.98

00:09:14.580 that, you know, girls 13, 14 start going out with guys that are older than that,

00:09:19.400 or maybe 14, 15.

00:09:20.520 They start going out with older guys,

00:09:22.020 and so they don't have that time where they aggregate together

00:09:25.160 in, as I said, roving bands of teenage girls,

00:09:28.280 whereas younger guys, 14, 15, 16,

00:09:32.240 they're not necessarily that attractive as potential mates,

00:09:35.060 and so they have to do something with their time,

00:09:37.220 and maybe what they do is second best 0.99

00:09:38.920 and hang around with other losers like them, whatever. 0.98

00:09:42.440 I think there's more to it than that. 0.97

00:09:44.460 I think that joining a gang is actually a stepping stone

00:09:49.120 to full adult socialization, right?

00:09:51.820 Because what you have to do is move away

00:09:54.500 from your primary dependence on your parents

00:09:58.280 and into a peer group,

00:10:00.640 and then you have to learn how to interact with the peer group

00:10:03.460 in a manner that makes you a desirable part of that group

00:10:06.600 and maybe a respectable part,

00:10:08.280 and then you also have to be able to hold your own in that peer group,

00:10:11.620 right?

00:10:11.880 Because a male gang has a fair bit of contentiousness in it. 0.99

00:10:16.000 There's a lot of poking and prodding that goes on,

00:10:18.520 often in humorous guise to see if you can,

00:10:22.180 well, can you take a joke, you know?

00:10:23.920 Can you take some hassle?

00:10:26.520 Are you good for something?

00:10:28.680 Are you at least, you know,

00:10:29.780 are you someone that could be relied on?

00:10:31.500 Are you honest?

00:10:32.220 Are you someone that could be talked to?

00:10:33.780 Can you be relied on in a scrap if necessary?

00:10:38.060 You know, can you take a blow in your life

00:10:42.360 or even an actual blow without falling apart as a consequence?

00:10:46.180 All that testing goes on.

00:10:48.100 And that's all necessary.

00:10:49.420 It's part of, see,

00:10:50.620 because I think the way that human beings develop

00:10:52.760 is that, well, first of all,

00:10:54.480 they're children and they're dependent

00:10:55.720 and they have their childhood friends and so forth,

00:10:58.340 but fundamentally they're within the confines of the familial group.

00:11:02.440 And maybe that's even a matriarchal organization, 1.00

00:11:04.740 that initial familial group.

00:11:06.460 Maybe it's not, but maybe it is.

00:11:08.520 Anyways, you're certainly under the primary care

00:11:11.300 of your mother and your father.

00:11:12.980 And if you have only a single parent,

00:11:15.720 and many of these young men did,

00:11:17.660 that's often the mother. 1.00

00:11:18.700 And so primarily you're under the care of your mother.

00:11:20.660 And that's fine,

00:11:21.680 except you just don't want that to be the case 0.97

00:11:23.840 for your whole damn life, right? 0.97

00:11:25.780 I mean, at some point, enough of that. 0.99

00:11:28.260 And really that point's got to be somewhere around 12, 13,

00:11:32.720 where, you know, you move out into the world

00:11:35.840 despite the fact that you don't know what the hell you're doing. 0.55

00:11:38.260 And you take your risks and you take your blows

00:11:40.280 and you meet your mates and you join a gang.

00:11:43.680 And then, of course, the fundamental question is,

00:11:47.640 well, what sort of gang is it going to be?

00:11:50.080 That's really the fundamental question,

00:11:51.760 not whether or not it's going to be a gang,

00:11:53.400 is what sort of gang is it going to be?

00:11:55.740 And the gentleman who started the boxing club,

00:11:58.740 in some sense, has produced a gang.

00:12:00.560 And he tried to make one that was predicated

00:12:03.260 on the ideals of discipline and respect,

00:12:06.920 at least in part.

00:12:07.940 And that's not so much an antidote to the gang

00:12:12.440 as it is a much better gang.

00:12:15.640 And so what you hope is that as you mature as a male,

00:12:18.900 that the gang that you're part of

00:12:21.260 gets more and more and more sophisticated and worthwhile,

00:12:24.340 not that you don't have a gang.

00:12:26.320 You know, like when I went to university,

00:12:28.080 it was a relief to me to go to university, actually,

00:12:30.520 because I was always interested in intellectual matters.

00:12:33.920 And when I went to university,

00:12:35.780 so were the people at the university,

00:12:38.140 although that seems to have changed substantially since then.

00:12:41.440 And, you know, and I found my gang.

00:12:44.800 And it was twofold.

00:12:46.720 It was other people who had a similar background to me.

00:12:50.560 I come from a working class community.

00:12:52.960 And the friends that I made when I went to college

00:12:55.300 were working class guys.

00:12:56.680 A lot of them had worked on the oil rigs or in lead smelters.

00:12:59.360 They're relatively tough guys.

00:13:00.700 And they decided that, and they were smart, you know,

00:13:03.540 although I wouldn't say necessarily classically intellectual,

00:13:06.260 but they had decided that they were going to go to college

00:13:08.040 or to university and try to educate themselves, you know,

00:13:11.240 because, well, because they had the capacity for it.

00:13:14.100 And so that was part of my gang.

00:13:16.780 But then the other part were the people,

00:13:18.780 some professors I met who were really interested in teaching.

00:13:21.320 I had some great professors,

00:13:22.460 especially at a small community college that I first attended.

00:13:26.120 And they were great mentors, you know.

00:13:28.580 They were actually interested in teaching

00:13:30.760 and interested in opening up the remarkable gang of intellectuals

00:13:37.580 whose work has spanned the last 2,000 years

00:13:40.500 that we've collected and aggregated and put together

00:13:43.720 in university libraries

00:13:44.840 so that people can join that club if they want to.

00:13:48.960 And I really did want to.

00:13:50.880 And so I spent a lot of time at university

00:13:54.220 reading great books,

00:13:56.520 which is what you should do if you go to university.

00:13:58.860 And the reason you should do that

00:14:00.220 is because great books aren't great

00:14:02.460 because some bloody, arbitrary patriarchy

00:14:05.240 decided to elevate those writers above all else

00:14:08.300 for reasons of power and tyranny,

00:14:10.600 but because those books contain information

00:14:12.840 that, if you know,

00:14:14.680 will save you an awful lot of misery and trouble.

00:14:18.520 And maybe everyone else as well

00:14:20.080 because they contain wisdom.

00:14:21.600 And it's not necessarily the case

00:14:23.180 that it's easy to extract the wisdom out.

00:14:25.920 You have to contend and grapple with the books, right?

00:14:28.800 You have to push yourself beyond your current intellectual ability

00:14:32.580 and you have to discipline yourself

00:14:34.260 so that you can do the reading

00:14:35.420 and understand the concepts.

00:14:36.760 But then that enables you to join this amazing gang

00:14:40.020 that's the gang of those who have used books

00:14:43.940 to conduct a conversation

00:14:45.720 about what constitutes civilized reality

00:14:48.400 across the last 5,000 years.

00:14:50.920 And I tell you, man,

00:14:51.920 that's a hell of a gang to join.

00:14:54.480 And so if you can do it,

00:14:56.020 then that's what you're supposed to do

00:14:57.840 if you go to university,

00:14:59.340 especially if you go to university

00:15:00.680 and take a humanities degree.

00:15:02.520 Because that was the whole bloody point.

00:15:04.400 It's like,

00:15:05.000 can you join the gang

00:15:06.460 of those who engaged in this

00:15:08.540 centuries-long civilized discourse

00:15:11.820 about the way the world should be structured?

00:15:15.080 Okay, so we can talk about that.

00:15:17.360 And these guys today,

00:15:19.600 I know they were talking about

00:15:20.560 what elevated them beyond the trouble

00:15:24.140 that was part of their more unsophisticated gangs.

00:15:27.000 The problem with getting young guys together 0.90

00:15:28.640 if they're 14 or 15,

00:15:30.180 they all bunch together,

00:15:31.180 is like,

00:15:31.820 well, first of all,

00:15:32.400 what the hell do they know?

00:15:33.700 Not much.

00:15:34.700 And what do they have at their disposal?

00:15:36.320 Like, I'm not putting them down.

00:15:37.640 It's just like,

00:15:38.120 well, what do you know

00:15:38.760 when you're 14 or 15?

00:15:40.700 Your time horizon isn't very long.

00:15:42.900 You haven't got a lot of experience

00:15:44.260 with the world.

00:15:44.920 The probability that you're going to

00:15:46.980 orient yourself

00:15:48.400 in the optimal direction

00:15:51.020 is very low,

00:15:51.680 especially if you're only looking

00:15:53.000 to each other for guidance,

00:15:54.620 you know,

00:15:55.000 and then maybe you're more swayed

00:15:56.860 by the tougher guys,

00:15:58.500 maybe the guys who are more like bullies,

00:16:00.640 and maybe not too.

00:16:01.860 But there is something to be said

00:16:03.280 for being tough over being weak.

00:16:06.440 You know,

00:16:06.680 even if it isn't manifested

00:16:09.060 in its most sophisticated form,

00:16:11.440 you know,

00:16:12.220 there's nothing,

00:16:13.720 there's something to be said

00:16:15.060 about people who can stand up

00:16:16.360 for themselves.

00:16:16.980 You know,

00:16:17.560 and that can all obviously

00:16:19.340 tilt into unfair domination of others,

00:16:22.880 and that's its more

00:16:23.800 unsophisticated manifestation.

00:16:26.200 But that doesn't mean

00:16:27.040 that weakness is to be preferred.

00:16:29.240 It's not to be preferred.

00:16:30.960 And there's a reason for that, too.

00:16:32.520 It's like,

00:16:32.860 well,

00:16:32.980 what's the problem with weakness?

00:16:34.380 Well,

00:16:34.880 here's the bloody problem

00:16:36.060 with weakness,

00:16:36.780 is that

00:16:37.200 there's going to come

00:16:38.800 hard times in your life.

00:16:40.720 And not just your life,

00:16:42.140 but the lives of your family,

00:16:43.740 the people that you might

00:16:44.580 be responsible for.

00:16:45.660 There's nasty things

00:16:47.140 coming your way.

00:16:48.520 And if you're strong,

00:16:49.680 then maybe you can

00:16:50.440 pull your family

00:16:51.580 and yourself together

00:16:52.560 when those terrible times come,

00:16:54.360 and you can get through them

00:16:55.560 with a minimum

00:16:56.680 of absolute destruction.

00:16:58.620 And that's good for you,

00:16:59.600 and it's good for your family,

00:17:00.700 and hopefully it's good

00:17:01.400 for your community.

00:17:02.420 And that's the real core of strength.

00:17:05.120 It's the ability

00:17:05.760 to contend with adversity

00:17:07.440 without it taking you down.

00:17:09.880 Or not only

00:17:10.720 without it taking you down,

00:17:12.340 but without it taking you down

00:17:13.720 and making you bitter

00:17:15.140 and resentful

00:17:16.080 and cruel

00:17:16.780 and troublesome.

00:17:19.060 And so strength

00:17:19.880 is the antidote to that.

00:17:21.200 It's not the ability

00:17:22.160 to dominate someone else,

00:17:23.660 even though those things

00:17:24.680 can be allied

00:17:25.720 because,

00:17:26.560 well,

00:17:26.920 because good things,

00:17:29.920 when they first develop,

00:17:31.400 aren't as sophisticated

00:17:32.600 and differentiated

00:17:33.820 as they might be.

00:17:35.260 You know,

00:17:35.520 and then we talked about

00:17:36.380 the idea that maybe

00:17:37.560 there's a crisis

00:17:38.380 among young men,

00:17:39.600 and they need help.

00:17:40.540 And I didn't really

00:17:41.840 like that idea,

00:17:43.280 either of the crisis

00:17:44.380 or of the help.

00:17:45.500 And the reason

00:17:46.200 I didn't like the crisis idea

00:17:47.660 is because it's like,

00:17:48.860 well,

00:17:49.120 what else is new?

00:17:50.820 You know,

00:17:51.220 like,

00:17:51.520 life's like bloody crisis.

00:17:53.580 And so,

00:17:54.400 I was speaking

00:17:55.140 with some reporters

00:17:56.060 backstage

00:17:56.680 just before

00:17:57.600 I came out here,

00:17:58.800 and they were asking me

00:18:00.840 about the crisis

00:18:01.780 among young men

00:18:02.940 and a crisis of masculinity.

00:18:05.580 I don't like the phrase.

00:18:07.000 There's something about it

00:18:07.780 that sort of puts me off.

00:18:09.540 There's a victim-y thing

00:18:10.720 about it

00:18:11.140 that I don't like.

00:18:12.860 And, I mean,

00:18:13.340 look,

00:18:14.440 young men,

00:18:15.240 it's like,

00:18:16.140 well,

00:18:16.720 you didn't have to go to Europe

00:18:19.140 and spend four bloody years 0.51

00:18:21.320 in the trenches,

00:18:22.940 you know,

00:18:23.260 so that was a crisis

00:18:24.760 and you didn't have to go

00:18:26.300 fight the Nazis.

00:18:27.700 Hey,

00:18:28.100 that was a crisis

00:18:28.860 and there was no war in Korea

00:18:31.300 and there was no war in Vietnam

00:18:32.660 and so we've had,

00:18:33.640 you know,

00:18:33.920 a couple of decades

00:18:34.780 of comparative peace

00:18:36.500 and so,

00:18:37.380 by historical standards,

00:18:38.920 it's like,

00:18:39.600 well,

00:18:39.820 really,

00:18:40.160 it's not that much of a crisis.

00:18:41.360 It's like,

00:18:41.720 oh,

00:18:42.060 I've got to play video games,

00:18:43.820 you know,

00:18:44.500 and I'm obviously making light of it

00:18:48.860 not because there isn't

00:18:49.960 something serious going on

00:18:51.280 because there is,

00:18:52.040 but compared to how serious things can be,

00:18:54.640 they can be so serious

00:18:55.780 that it's just bottomless,

00:18:57.540 you know, 0.98

00:18:57.900 and so you kind of feel foolish 0.80

00:19:00.320 about talking about the crisis of masculinity, 0.68

00:19:03.480 you know,

00:19:03.800 compared to,

00:19:05.140 well,

00:19:05.920 God,

00:19:06.360 you know,

00:19:06.600 I read George Orwell's book,

00:19:09.080 Road to Wiggin Pier,

00:19:10.060 which I would highly recommend.

00:19:11.460 It's on my,

00:19:12.100 I have a list of recommended readings

00:19:13.640 on my webpage.

00:19:14.920 Some of you might be interested in that

00:19:16.480 or even know about it,

00:19:17.660 but Road to Wiggin Pier

00:19:18.660 describes the lives of coal miners

00:19:21.020 in the northern UK in the 1930s,

00:19:23.580 and I mean,

00:19:24.260 my God,

00:19:25.240 it was just,

00:19:25.780 just brutal,

00:19:26.700 you know,

00:19:27.620 Orwell,

00:19:28.560 who was no,

00:19:29.280 no weakling,

00:19:31.780 you know,

00:19:32.020 he'd spend a lot of time

00:19:33.060 tramping around,

00:19:34.000 he worked in rough restaurants

00:19:35.500 in the UK and Paris,

00:19:37.420 and like,

00:19:37.880 he did the working class thing 0.96

00:19:39.200 even though he wasn't

00:19:40.100 a member of the working class,

00:19:41.640 he'd kind of put himself

00:19:42.660 in that milieu,

00:19:44.040 and he was a reasonably tough guy

00:19:46.580 for an intellectual type,

00:19:48.280 and,

00:19:49.320 you know,

00:19:49.580 he went into the coal mine

00:19:50.940 one day

00:19:51.600 just to see what these guys' lives

00:19:53.380 were like,

00:19:54.480 and they had to,

00:19:55.560 like,

00:19:55.920 walk through a tunnel,

00:19:58.400 I can't remember how long

00:19:59.560 the tunnel was,

00:20:00.180 it was like three miles,

00:20:01.320 it was like some insane,

00:20:03.140 it took them like two hours

00:20:04.540 to,

00:20:05.360 like,

00:20:05.920 walk through the coal tunnel

00:20:08.440 that was way underground

00:20:09.440 just to get to work,

00:20:10.360 and it was only like

00:20:11.020 this high,

00:20:13.540 so not only did they have to walk

00:20:15.500 to get to the coal face 0.98

00:20:17.500 to work,

00:20:18.000 but they had to walk like this,

00:20:19.800 and he said,

00:20:20.400 well,

00:20:20.580 he had gone like,

00:20:21.740 you know,

00:20:22.720 half a mile like that,

00:20:24.360 and he was done,

00:20:25.280 that was the,

00:20:25.680 that was the end of him

00:20:26.660 for the day,

00:20:27.700 and that was just where,

00:20:29.000 that was just the morning,

00:20:30.220 that was half the morning commute

00:20:31.900 for the coal miners,

00:20:33.860 and,

00:20:34.120 you know,

00:20:34.320 and by the time they were 30,

00:20:35.640 they were 35,

00:20:36.900 they were pretty much done,

00:20:37.860 they had black lung,

00:20:38.700 they didn't have any teeth,

00:20:39.700 like,

00:20:39.880 they were just done,

00:20:41.700 and of course,

00:20:42.180 they didn't get paid anything

00:20:43.180 for it either,

00:20:43.980 it was absolutely brutal work,

00:20:46.560 and I mean,

00:20:46.940 that was the characteristic

00:20:47.960 of,

00:20:48.460 well,

00:20:48.580 not just men,

00:20:49.980 you know,

00:20:50.300 here,

00:20:50.560 here's another thing

00:20:51.360 that,

00:20:52.020 that's worth thinking about too,

00:20:54.200 you know,

00:20:54.780 and this touches on another issue

00:20:56.400 that just drives me,

00:20:57.960 I don't know,

00:20:59.440 it outrages me,

00:21:00.560 I guess,

00:21:01.080 in a very deep sense,

00:21:02.400 you know,

00:21:02.600 and this also came up today

00:21:04.680 when we were talking about

00:21:05.560 the crisis of masculinity,

00:21:07.900 you know,

00:21:10.600 we have this idea that,

00:21:12.580 that everyone is supposed

00:21:13.500 to accept now,

00:21:14.720 sometimes,

00:21:15.600 I talk to people,

00:21:16.460 and I object to this idea,

00:21:18.020 and they look at me like,

00:21:18.840 there's something wrong with me,

00:21:20.000 it's like,

00:21:20.680 because it's not an idea I accept,

00:21:22.260 and the idea is that,

00:21:24.760 well,

00:21:25.260 what we live in,

00:21:26.040 our culture,

00:21:26.780 Western culture,

00:21:27.720 which you,

00:21:28.380 UK types are,

00:21:30.440 in large part,

00:21:31.260 responsible for creating,

00:21:32.840 and as far as I'm concerned,

00:21:34.280 thank you very much,

00:21:35.940 I sincerely mean this,

00:21:37.760 I think that English common law

00:21:39.200 is God's gift to the world,

00:21:42.020 it's such a remarkable creation,

00:21:44.060 and so much of the idea

00:21:45.860 of individual sovereignty

00:21:47.040 and freedom

00:21:47.620 was established

00:21:48.440 in great difficulty here,

00:21:50.560 and promoted all over the world,

00:21:52.120 and it's an amazing achievement,

00:21:54.080 and I see threats to it

00:21:56.040 emerging in your land

00:21:57.620 that just hurt my heart,

00:21:59.460 I saw yesterday,

00:22:00.760 someone sent me pictures

00:22:02.180 of posters

00:22:02.820 in the Scotland subway,

00:22:05.020 asking citizens

00:22:06.380 to turn each other in

00:22:07.700 for hate crimes,

00:22:08.820 and to see that emerging

00:22:10.060 in the UK,

00:22:10.860 just,

00:22:11.100 it's just so,

00:22:12.280 it's so appalling,

00:22:13.360 it's so horrible

00:22:14.280 to see that happening here,

00:22:15.960 in the closed camera TV systems

00:22:17.720 that are everywhere,

00:22:18.660 and I really hate

00:22:20.060 to see that happening here,

00:22:21.520 because I think

00:22:22.140 this is the center of,

00:22:24.460 the idea of individual sovereignty

00:22:26.180 and democratic rights,

00:22:27.440 that it's the dead center

00:22:28.800 of that throughout the world,

00:22:29.900 and it's been

00:22:30.400 an amazing achievement,

00:22:31.660 and I hate to see

00:22:33.060 that threatened,

00:22:34.200 in any case,

00:22:35.480 we have this

00:22:36.300 misbegotten notion

00:22:38.740 generated by a tiny minority

00:22:41.120 of resentful,

00:22:42.260 and extraordinarily

00:22:43.960 well-organized activists,

00:22:46.200 who have proclaimed

00:22:47.440 very loudly,

00:22:48.700 and with plenty of help

00:22:49.820 from government subsidy,

00:22:51.660 for the last five decades,

00:22:53.400 that the best way

00:22:54.100 to characterize

00:22:54.720 Western society

00:22:55.840 is as a tyrannical patriarchy,

00:22:58.440 and, you know,

00:22:59.320 that is,

00:22:59.980 it's so wrong,

00:23:02.060 you don't even know

00:23:02.780 where to start,

00:23:04.000 I mean,

00:23:04.600 first of all,

00:23:05.320 we could look at it

00:23:06.240 psychologically,

00:23:07.460 so,

00:23:08.300 we'll do that,

00:23:09.080 we have a tendency

00:23:11.260 to view our world,

00:23:13.560 the world we experience,

00:23:14.940 in personified form,

00:23:17.260 and it's a very

00:23:18.240 powerful tendency,

00:23:19.480 we tend to see things,

00:23:20.760 human beings,

00:23:21.340 we tend to see things

00:23:22.100 as if they're animate,

00:23:23.620 which is why,

00:23:24.240 you know,

00:23:24.460 when you read a book

00:23:25.060 to a kid,

00:23:25.860 and it's Thomas

00:23:26.620 the Tank Engine,

00:23:27.960 and Thomas has a big smile on,

00:23:29.800 and the son has a face,

00:23:31.180 and everyone's perfectly

00:23:32.220 happy about that,

00:23:33.140 you read that to your kids,

00:23:34.220 and you don't notice

00:23:35.500 that it's rather absurd

00:23:36.760 that Thomas is an animate character,

00:23:39.300 and part of the reason

00:23:40.180 for that is because

00:23:40.900 we're deeply social primates,

00:23:44.140 deeply social animals,

00:23:46.000 and our cognitive structures

00:23:47.920 have evolved

00:23:48.640 in a primarily social environment,

00:23:51.700 and we tend to see

00:23:52.540 the world first and foremost

00:23:54.220 as if it's characters in motion,

00:23:57.000 and it's been with great difficulty

00:23:58.780 that we could pull ourselves away

00:24:00.520 from that viewpoint,

00:24:02.000 and produce something

00:24:03.260 like an objective science,

00:24:04.820 where we're looking at the world

00:24:05.860 as in some sense

00:24:07.000 as if it's dead material.

00:24:09.040 Now, it's been very useful

00:24:10.000 to do that,

00:24:10.540 but it's not natural for us,

00:24:12.520 which is why we didn't

00:24:13.360 really manage it

00:24:14.160 until like 500 years ago,

00:24:15.880 right?

00:24:16.120 It's a very new,

00:24:17.300 I mean,

00:24:17.500 maybe you could push it

00:24:18.280 back to the Greeks, 1.00

00:24:19.180 but they weren't really scientists,

00:24:20.580 even though they laid

00:24:21.540 some of the groundwork

00:24:22.460 for what became science

00:24:23.540 later on.

00:24:24.620 Well, so,

00:24:26.420 it's easy to personify,

00:24:28.940 to see culture personified,

00:24:31.540 and often as male.

00:24:32.660 That's very typical,

00:24:33.700 symbolically.

00:24:34.220 I laid that out a bit

00:24:35.200 in Twelve Rules for Life,

00:24:36.340 and also in Maps of Meaning,

00:24:38.100 drawing primarily

00:24:38.900 from the work of

00:24:39.740 the Jungian types,

00:24:41.140 like, well,

00:24:41.600 Carl Jung himself,

00:24:42.580 and Mircea Eliad,

00:24:43.520 and the great symbolic investigators

00:24:45.760 of the 20th century,

00:24:46.940 Joseph Campbell among them,

00:24:48.680 who laid out quite clearly

00:24:50.080 the idea that,

00:24:51.120 well, culture tends to be

00:24:52.360 symbolized in mythology,

00:24:54.660 and literature,

00:24:55.220 and art,

00:24:55.600 for that matter,

00:24:56.220 as masculine.

00:24:56.960 And there's two elements

00:25:00.540 to the masculine,

00:25:03.180 insofar as it's representative

00:25:05.440 of our cultural hierarchy,

00:25:07.180 and one is the archetype

00:25:09.020 of the wise king,

00:25:10.660 and the other is the archetype

00:25:12.000 of the tyrant.

00:25:13.560 And every society

00:25:14.860 is an amalgam

00:25:15.660 of those two things.

00:25:16.800 Every organization

00:25:17.620 is an amalgam

00:25:18.680 of those two things.

00:25:19.740 And we all know that,

00:25:20.760 because, you know,

00:25:21.740 if you go to work

00:25:23.480 in a small hierarchy,

00:25:24.940 maybe you have a small business,

00:25:25.940 you know,

00:25:26.680 there's some things

00:25:27.440 about the business

00:25:28.200 that are going very well,

00:25:30.100 assuming that it's

00:25:30.840 a thriving enterprise,

00:25:32.760 and people are awake

00:25:35.080 and working hard

00:25:35.880 and interacting

00:25:36.980 with one another honestly,

00:25:38.460 but then there's a tendency

00:25:39.860 for that to go astray,

00:25:42.200 for power to dominate

00:25:43.980 the relationships

00:25:44.860 in the hierarchy

00:25:46.140 instead of confidence,

00:25:47.120 or for crookedness

00:25:49.280 and deceit

00:25:49.960 to enter into it,

00:25:51.220 or for people to steal

00:25:52.600 and become blind

00:25:53.660 or willfully blind.

00:25:54.640 And so, we have this battle

00:25:56.740 in every hierarchy

00:25:57.860 between the wise king

00:25:59.060 and the tyrant.

00:26:00.140 And you see that expressed

00:26:01.500 in popular tropes.

00:26:03.440 So, most of you have seen

00:26:04.620 The Lion King, for example,

00:26:06.700 which is a remarkable thing

00:26:08.540 in and of itself

00:26:09.340 that most of you

00:26:10.120 have actually seen that

00:26:11.280 and worth thinking about,

00:26:12.940 given that it's an animated movie

00:26:14.440 about, like, lions who can talk,

00:26:17.280 and that's all fine with you.

00:26:19.120 So, strangely enough,

00:26:20.820 but, you know, Mufasa,

00:26:22.440 who's the wise king

00:26:23.780 and who's at the top

00:26:26.300 of the hierarchy,

00:26:27.240 perched on top of Pride Rock

00:26:29.640 and master of everything

00:26:30.800 he can survey,

00:26:31.760 has an evil brother.

00:26:33.000 That's Scar.

00:26:34.020 And Scar has obviously

00:26:35.100 been damaged by life,

00:26:37.140 hence Scar.

00:26:39.120 And he's a little bit

00:26:39.960 too intellectual

00:26:40.680 for his own good

00:26:41.640 and not much

00:26:42.220 of a physical specimen.

00:26:43.820 And he's very,

00:26:44.900 so he's a representative

00:26:46.140 of the arrogance

00:26:47.040 of the rational mind,

00:26:48.560 fundamentally,

00:26:49.060 and it's opposition

00:26:50.420 to wisdom.

00:26:51.680 And he's constantly

00:26:52.700 conspiring to take down

00:26:54.380 the king.

00:26:55.440 And that's a very,

00:26:56.340 very old story.

00:26:57.340 It's an unbelievable,

00:26:58.240 well, it's Cain and Abel.

00:26:59.440 It's that old.

00:27:00.620 It's a story

00:27:01.500 that was reflected

00:27:02.180 in Egyptian mythology

00:27:03.640 far before Christianity emerged.

00:27:05.920 When the Egyptians 0.95

00:27:06.740 figured out that

00:27:07.680 every hierarchy

00:27:09.380 that emerges

00:27:10.140 as a consequence

00:27:11.340 of natural human activity

00:27:12.780 is threatened

00:27:14.000 by its evil shadow.

00:27:16.620 And that shadow

00:27:17.600 is partly a consequence

00:27:18.760 of the fact

00:27:19.420 that, like,

00:27:20.160 if you make a business

00:27:21.160 and it works

00:27:21.860 and then you don't

00:27:22.980 change it at all

00:27:23.920 for 20 years,

00:27:25.320 then it dies.

00:27:26.800 Right?

00:27:27.080 Because everything

00:27:27.600 around it changes.

00:27:28.920 So even if you produce

00:27:29.980 something of great value,

00:27:31.960 if you're a heroic

00:27:33.500 entrepreneurial type

00:27:34.980 and you produce

00:27:35.460 something of great value

00:27:36.460 and then you allow it

00:27:37.640 to become static

00:27:38.760 and stultified

00:27:39.660 and unchanging,

00:27:40.740 then it will deteriorate

00:27:41.800 and die of its own accord

00:27:42.960 because the environment

00:27:43.820 changes.

00:27:44.800 And so things

00:27:45.460 fall apart

00:27:46.340 of their own accord.

00:27:47.880 One of the great

00:27:48.900 mythological messages.

00:27:50.520 And that's sped along

00:27:51.980 by the blindness of men.

00:27:54.280 That's the next

00:27:55.040 great doctrine.

00:27:56.720 And so that's the doctrine

00:27:57.720 of the flood,

00:27:58.600 for example.

00:27:59.680 You know,

00:27:59.960 that the catastrophe

00:28:00.840 is coming,

00:28:01.860 the flood is on its way,

00:28:03.440 always the case in life,

00:28:04.720 but it's going to be

00:28:05.600 a hell of a lot worse

00:28:06.440 if you're blind

00:28:07.160 and not ready.

00:28:08.360 And so those are

00:28:09.020 mythological truths.

00:28:10.380 You have the wise king,

00:28:12.380 always,

00:28:12.980 always threatened

00:28:14.300 by the evil brother

00:28:16.820 and who's conspiring

00:28:19.080 through deceit

00:28:19.960 and willful blindness

00:28:21.740 and sheer entropy

00:28:23.200 to demolish the state.

00:28:25.700 And so in Egypt,

00:28:27.140 for example,

00:28:27.680 there was a god

00:28:28.420 associated with each

00:28:29.580 of those conceptualizations.

00:28:32.160 The god Osiris,

00:28:33.240 who was god of the state,

00:28:34.560 a great hero in his youth,

00:28:36.280 the founder of the

00:28:37.140 Egyptian state,

00:28:38.500 but old now

00:28:40.300 and willfully blind,

00:28:41.820 willfully blind,

00:28:42.700 will not pay attention

00:28:44.160 to what he should

00:28:44.820 pay attention to

00:28:45.700 and archaic,

00:28:48.580 like things that are old

00:28:49.800 are archaic.

00:28:51.060 And that's our culture,

00:28:52.160 right?

00:28:52.340 Our culture is

00:28:53.120 the construction of the dead,

00:28:55.340 the past, the dead.

00:28:56.820 And so it's blind

00:28:57.740 and it's out of date.

00:28:59.660 And then it's threatened

00:29:00.540 by a malevolent force

00:29:02.380 and the malevolent force

00:29:03.400 is, well,

00:29:03.860 malevolence itself,

00:29:05.060 the willful blindness

00:29:06.200 of people

00:29:06.740 and the desire to do harm.

00:29:08.600 And so it's reasonable

00:29:10.680 to note

00:29:11.400 that any hierarchical

00:29:12.940 organization

00:29:13.600 can be properly

00:29:14.680 conceptualized

00:29:15.520 in these two ways.

00:29:16.680 There's a wise king element

00:29:18.000 and there's an evil tyrant element.

00:29:20.780 And then the question is,

00:29:22.160 well,

00:29:22.520 which has the upper hand?

00:29:24.700 Now,

00:29:25.140 what's happened

00:29:25.820 with the radical types

00:29:27.780 is they've just

00:29:28.640 taken the wise king

00:29:30.580 out of the equation

00:29:31.460 altogether

00:29:31.960 and said,

00:29:33.060 well,

00:29:33.520 what Western culture

00:29:34.920 constitutes

00:29:35.480 is nothing but 0.97

00:29:36.500 the evil tyrant. 0.87

00:29:38.160 It's like,

00:29:38.660 well,

00:29:38.920 okay,

00:29:39.200 first of all,

00:29:40.300 no,

00:29:41.600 wrong.

00:29:43.180 It's wrong psychologically.

00:29:44.860 It's like,

00:29:45.140 well,

00:29:45.220 you're missing a character there.

00:29:46.720 Where's the wise king?

00:29:48.240 Well,

00:29:48.340 you say,

00:29:48.480 well,

00:29:48.580 there's no evidence

00:29:49.260 for the wise king.

00:29:50.400 It's like,

00:29:51.120 yeah,

00:29:52.160 actually,

00:29:53.100 there's plenty of evidence.

00:29:54.800 And so,

00:29:55.320 what's the evidence?

00:29:56.440 Well,

00:29:56.840 here we are,

00:29:57.640 there's 3,000 of us,

00:29:59.080 none of us know each other.

00:30:00.120 Well,

00:30:00.240 some of you know each other

00:30:01.240 a little bit,

00:30:01.820 but fundamentally,

00:30:02.880 you're among strangers.

00:30:04.720 I mean,

00:30:04.980 they're within your own culture,

00:30:06.260 mostly,

00:30:06.880 but you're among strangers

00:30:07.940 and look at you all.

00:30:09.400 You're all peaceful.

00:30:10.700 You're all sitting down

00:30:11.720 the same way.

00:30:12.560 You're all eyes front

00:30:14.180 the same way.

00:30:15.260 You know what the rules are.

00:30:16.780 You're participating

00:30:17.520 in a complex political discussion

00:30:20.000 that could be contentious

00:30:21.220 with no hint whatsoever

00:30:22.940 of violence.

00:30:24.180 We're in this lovely theater.

00:30:25.920 We don't think the roof will fall

00:30:27.480 because the engineers

00:30:28.400 who built it

00:30:29.400 weren't corrupt

00:30:30.240 and they actually used concrete

00:30:31.740 instead of sand,

00:30:33.300 which is what they tended to use

00:30:34.720 in the Soviet Union,

00:30:36.160 right?

00:30:36.340 If it wasn't radioactive sand,

00:30:38.600 which it often was

00:30:39.660 because that's how you got rid

00:30:41.260 of the radioactive waste,

00:30:43.300 right?

00:30:43.740 And so that's not happening

00:30:45.000 and probably the floor

00:30:46.200 is going to maintain itself

00:30:47.380 while you sit there

00:30:48.240 and your chairs

00:30:48.800 aren't going to collapse

00:30:49.600 and the lights aren't going

00:30:50.880 to go off

00:30:51.400 and the PA system

00:30:52.340 is going to work

00:30:53.160 and all of this

00:30:54.260 and it's warm.

00:30:55.360 It's warm in here

00:30:56.140 and you notice the roof

00:30:57.260 isn't leaking

00:30:57.880 and like there's a lot

00:30:59.260 of really good things

00:31:00.480 happening in this room

00:31:02.300 and most of you,

00:31:03.320 not too many of you,

00:31:04.600 don't look like you're starving.

00:31:06.340 Quite the contrary.

00:31:09.180 Well, you know,

00:31:10.020 there's more overweight people

00:31:11.380 in the world now

00:31:12.140 than there are starving people.

00:31:14.120 It's like there's a reason

00:31:15.440 for a party.

00:31:16.320 We should be having

00:31:16.920 like a two-week party

00:31:18.080 every summer

00:31:18.820 all over the world

00:31:19.660 where the banners say 0.95

00:31:21.120 more fat people

00:31:22.680 than starving people

00:31:23.920 because it's such

00:31:24.980 a massive accomplishment

00:31:26.920 that one of our problems

00:31:28.440 now is,

00:31:29.240 oh my God,

00:31:30.100 we have too many

00:31:30.940 good things to eat.

00:31:32.280 You know,

00:31:33.140 and that's unparalleled

00:31:35.540 in human history.

00:31:36.580 That's for sure, man,

00:31:37.660 that that's a problem.

00:31:39.040 You know,

00:31:39.260 and last month,

00:31:40.240 apparently,

00:31:41.400 we hit the point

00:31:42.660 for the first time ever

00:31:44.040 that there are now

00:31:45.440 the majority of people

00:31:46.520 in the world

00:31:46.960 are working class.

00:31:48.460 So it's like,

00:31:49.260 well,

00:31:49.800 that's a good thing

00:31:51.040 and you know,

00:31:51.940 between the year 2000

00:31:53.260 and 2012,

00:31:54.580 we halved

00:31:55.280 the level

00:31:56.100 of absolute poverty

00:31:57.200 across the world.

00:31:58.480 Fastest economic development

00:31:59.920 in the history

00:32:01.040 of the world.

00:32:01.980 You know,

00:32:02.200 and you might say,

00:32:02.800 well,

00:32:02.960 we put the level

00:32:03.760 of privation

00:32:04.700 pretty low.

00:32:05.500 It was the UN

00:32:06.060 that did this,

00:32:06.720 so,

00:32:07.220 you know,

00:32:07.520 now people are making

00:32:08.720 more than a dollar

00:32:09.620 a ninety a day

00:32:10.840 by in today's money

00:32:13.100 and, you know,

00:32:13.940 that's not very much money

00:32:15.360 and, well,

00:32:15.940 fair enough,

00:32:16.660 you know,

00:32:16.980 it's not,

00:32:17.640 but it beats the hell

00:32:19.000 out of starving

00:32:20.000 and it's also the case

00:32:21.280 that in 1895,

00:32:23.120 even in places

00:32:23.820 like the UK,

00:32:25.300 the average human being

00:32:27.020 lived on less

00:32:28.020 than a dollar a day.

00:32:29.460 In today's money,

00:32:31.120 right?

00:32:31.280 And that was only

00:32:31.780 130 years ago

00:32:33.280 and so,

00:32:34.160 you know,

00:32:34.640 we've moved away

00:32:35.700 from that level

00:32:36.360 of privation

00:32:37.060 with unbelievable speed.

00:32:38.800 First in Europe 0.89

00:32:39.920 and North America,

00:32:41.420 let's say,

00:32:41.940 first there,

00:32:42.740 but it had to happen

00:32:43.580 first somewhere

00:32:44.820 because everyone

00:32:46.160 wasn't going to get

00:32:46.900 instantly rich

00:32:47.720 all at once.

00:32:48.920 That just can't happen.

00:32:50.520 Some people have to

00:32:51.460 have it happen first

00:32:52.660 and that's something

00:32:53.540 to think about

00:32:54.140 when you're jealous

00:32:54.780 of rich people.

00:32:55.800 It's like,

00:32:56.340 well,

00:32:56.480 someone has to buy 0.99

00:32:57.340 the damn new things 0.99

00:32:58.440 when they're hyper expensive 0.99

00:32:59.700 so that the price

00:33:01.020 can be driven down

00:33:02.040 so that everybody else

00:33:03.020 can afford them.

00:33:03.820 It's like,

00:33:04.420 the good things

00:33:05.140 have to come

00:33:05.740 to some people first

00:33:06.920 and if it's not you

00:33:07.900 and it is you

00:33:08.840 because,

00:33:09.600 by the way,

00:33:10.040 you only need to make

00:33:10.960 $32,000 a year

00:33:13.040 now

00:33:13.700 to be in the top

00:33:15.140 1%

00:33:16.200 of income earners

00:33:17.300 worldwide

00:33:18.000 so you're all

00:33:19.320 in the top 1%

00:33:20.520 or virtually all

00:33:21.520 of you

00:33:21.780 so you should be

00:33:22.700 guilty about that

00:33:23.820 and be ashamed

00:33:26.280 of your privilege

00:33:27.180 regardless of what

00:33:28.040 color you are

00:33:28.780 by the way.

00:33:30.700 And so,

00:33:31.900 none of this

00:33:32.600 speaks to me

00:33:33.360 of a patriarchal tyranny.

00:33:35.920 Not by any

00:33:37.520 real world standards.

00:33:39.060 It's like,

00:33:39.460 okay,

00:33:40.540 compared to what

00:33:41.580 exactly?

00:33:42.320 Is this a patriarchal

00:33:43.700 tyranny?

00:33:44.040 We've already said

00:33:44.760 that you've got

00:33:45.540 to watch the system

00:33:46.520 because it tilts

00:33:47.620 towards blindness 1.00

00:33:48.640 and stupidity 1.00

00:33:49.620 and corruption 1.00

00:33:50.280 but you've got

00:33:51.200 mechanisms for

00:33:52.040 dealing with that,

00:33:52.880 right?

00:33:53.260 Most large companies

00:33:54.680 only last about

00:33:56.020 30 years.

00:33:57.220 They turn over

00:33:57.740 quite quickly.

00:33:58.440 That's the typical

00:33:59.080 lifespan of a

00:34:00.300 Fortune 500 company.

00:34:01.920 Most family fortunes

00:34:03.200 only last three

00:34:04.160 generations.

00:34:05.420 That's not

00:34:05.820 a thousand years.

00:34:07.140 You know,

00:34:07.380 it's really

00:34:08.160 something approximating

00:34:09.920 a single lifespan,

00:34:11.080 a single total

00:34:11.740 lifespan

00:34:12.200 and politically,

00:34:14.260 well,

00:34:14.500 you know,

00:34:15.060 if your politicians

00:34:16.540 sit in office

00:34:17.320 too long,

00:34:18.240 they tend to get

00:34:19.300 corrupt,

00:34:20.320 right? 0.57

00:34:20.540 Because their

00:34:21.260 networks of power

00:34:22.360 and influence

00:34:22.920 grow too great

00:34:23.880 and they start

00:34:25.000 to be able to

00:34:25.780 exercise control

00:34:27.080 and power

00:34:27.640 where they shouldn't.

00:34:28.640 And so what do you do?

00:34:30.340 Well, 1.00

00:34:30.620 you kill them 1.00

00:34:31.340 ritually 1.00

00:34:31.900 every four years,

00:34:33.640 right?

00:34:34.160 But you don't 0.77

00:34:34.660 actually kill them

00:34:35.580 because you've 1.00

00:34:36.100 figured out

00:34:36.520 how to do it

00:34:37.300 ritually

00:34:38.200 and you just

00:34:39.140 defeat them

00:34:39.780 at the polls

00:34:40.520 and you say,

00:34:41.120 well,

00:34:41.620 you know,

00:34:41.920 you guys have

00:34:42.560 done,

00:34:43.640 you've been,

00:34:44.480 what would you say?

00:34:45.980 You've been

00:34:46.540 approximately 1.00

00:34:47.440 as stupid 1.00

00:34:48.620 on average 1.00

00:34:49.700 as we would expect

00:34:51.180 half-decently

00:34:52.560 competent 1.00

00:34:53.180 morons like us 1.00

00:34:54.640 to manage, 1.00

00:34:55.700 but you've had

00:34:56.740 your kick at the cat

00:34:57.700 and now it's time

00:34:58.680 for another pack 1.00

00:34:59.460 of imbeciles 1.00

00:35:00.180 to make their mistakes, 1.00

00:35:01.680 right?

00:35:02.240 And that's democracy,

00:35:13.360 right?

00:35:13.860 I'm dead serious,

00:35:15.460 I'm absolutely

00:35:16.140 dead serious

00:35:16.820 about this.

00:35:17.460 It is not

00:35:18.460 a utopian system.

00:35:20.880 You know,

00:35:21.120 and it's interesting

00:35:22.120 to look at how

00:35:22.760 the Americans

00:35:23.340 managed this

00:35:24.140 and as a Canadian,

00:35:25.620 I regard Americans

00:35:26.880 as Englishmen

00:35:28.600 who more fully

00:35:30.580 articulated what

00:35:31.620 was already

00:35:32.140 implicit in the

00:35:33.300 English common

00:35:34.000 law system,

00:35:34.900 you know,

00:35:35.160 and so because

00:35:35.780 basically the

00:35:37.320 American revolutionaries

00:35:38.520 were Englishmen

00:35:39.300 who were demanding

00:35:40.640 their rights

00:35:41.460 as Englishmen

00:35:42.260 and so,

00:35:43.460 and you know,

00:35:44.200 the Americans

00:35:44.700 tend to look at it

00:35:45.640 slightly different

00:35:46.500 than that,

00:35:47.440 but not so much,

00:35:49.680 you know,

00:35:49.980 they're certainly,

00:35:50.980 they certainly know

00:35:52.000 that their tradition

00:35:52.980 emerged from

00:35:53.880 the broader

00:35:54.480 background tradition

00:35:56.140 that I speak of,

00:35:57.100 you know,

00:35:57.580 and the Americans

00:35:58.400 were very wise

00:36:01.560 and non-utopian

00:36:02.840 in their,

00:36:04.000 in the way they

00:36:04.620 set up their

00:36:05.260 political system.

00:36:06.280 They assumed that

00:36:07.040 they didn't think,

00:36:08.260 well,

00:36:08.520 human beings

00:36:09.040 are perfectible

00:36:09.920 and the perfectible

00:36:11.260 issue is an

00:36:11.780 interesting one.

00:36:12.620 It's like,

00:36:12.940 well,

00:36:13.080 what do you mean

00:36:13.520 perfectible exactly?

00:36:14.960 By whose standards?

00:36:16.600 Well,

00:36:16.820 the answer to that

00:36:17.360 is always,

00:36:17.760 well,

00:36:17.860 by my standards.

00:36:19.360 I'd like to make

00:36:20.040 people perfectible

00:36:21.080 by my standards.

00:36:22.140 I'd like them to be

00:36:23.160 the way I think

00:36:24.060 they should be

00:36:24.840 and then,

00:36:25.480 if I'm political,

00:36:26.140 minded,

00:36:26.600 I can gerrymander

00:36:27.640 the political structure

00:36:28.620 so that we end up

00:36:29.560 with the modern

00:36:30.640 human being

00:36:31.500 of the future.

00:36:32.400 They certainly tried

00:36:33.400 that in places

00:36:33.940 like Nazi Germany 0.79

00:36:34.920 and in the Soviet Union

00:36:36.020 and I wouldn't say

00:36:36.960 it went that well

00:36:37.920 and that's mostly

00:36:39.220 because,

00:36:39.800 well,

00:36:40.060 you don't know

00:36:40.540 what the perfect

00:36:41.140 human being is

00:36:41.980 and neither does

00:36:42.460 anyone else

00:36:43.040 and besides that,

00:36:44.180 it changes with time.

00:36:45.520 Like,

00:36:45.680 sometimes you need

00:36:46.740 compassionate people

00:36:47.800 at the helm

00:36:48.320 and sometimes you need

00:36:49.300 dreadfully tough-minded

00:36:51.020 people at the helm

00:36:52.080 and sometimes you need

00:36:53.340 to listen to people

00:36:54.100 who are worried

00:36:54.780 and nervous

00:36:55.260 and sometimes you need

00:36:56.460 to listen to people

00:36:57.180 who are confident

00:36:57.920 and secure

00:36:58.500 and you don't know

00:36:59.740 when because

00:37:00.280 the tide changes

00:37:01.800 and the earth shifts

00:37:02.980 and so what's right

00:37:04.340 one day

00:37:04.840 isn't necessarily

00:37:05.880 right the next

00:37:06.640 which,

00:37:07.300 by the way,

00:37:07.680 does not mean

00:37:08.300 that there's no such thing

00:37:09.400 as right or wrong.

00:37:11.200 That's not a sophisticated

00:37:12.260 way of looking at it.

00:37:13.420 And so what the Americans

00:37:14.780 did in their attempt

00:37:17.200 to regulate their society

00:37:19.460 possible was make

00:37:20.900 the following humble

00:37:22.520 assumptions.

00:37:23.860 Most people are flawed

00:37:26.180 and error prone

00:37:27.920 and we're not really

00:37:29.740 going to be able to do

00:37:30.380 much about that

00:37:31.220 and so what we want

00:37:32.060 to do is produce

00:37:33.120 a political system 1.00

00:37:34.060 that idiots 1.00

00:37:35.120 as foolish as us 1.00

00:37:36.400 can't screw up 1.00

00:37:38.080 too badly

00:37:39.080 and so that's what

00:37:40.760 they did.

00:37:41.200 That's why they put in

00:37:41.860 the checks and balances.

00:37:42.920 That's why we have

00:37:43.620 cycling elections.

00:37:45.540 That's even why

00:37:46.020 there's an electoral college

00:37:47.260 and you elect representatives

00:37:48.480 instead of dabbling

00:37:50.580 in direct democracy

00:37:51.900 which is too dangerous

00:37:53.720 perhaps with regards

00:37:54.800 to unbridled rule

00:37:56.580 of the mob.

00:37:57.740 And so it's a very

00:37:58.380 cautious system

00:37:59.260 and it's never been

00:38:00.060 predicated on the idea

00:38:01.160 that we'll make society

00:38:02.920 perfect in some

00:38:03.880 final utopian sense

00:38:05.320 or that we'll bring

00:38:06.440 about the new man.

00:38:08.040 It's more like

00:38:09.000 well,

00:38:10.160 we don't know what to do.

00:38:11.200 We don't want to let

00:38:12.100 anybody get too much

00:38:13.020 of an upper hand.

00:38:14.160 We want to balance

00:38:14.860 the system out

00:38:15.620 and then we want to let

00:38:16.620 all these peculiar

00:38:17.780 creatures that we are

00:38:19.740 go out there

00:38:20.600 and have their kick

00:38:21.700 at the can

00:38:22.340 and more or less

00:38:23.300 see what happens.

00:38:24.600 And of course

00:38:25.100 that's not perfect

00:38:26.000 and it can take

00:38:26.700 a nosedive

00:38:27.360 and it produces

00:38:28.220 a fair bit of inequality

00:38:29.460 like every other

00:38:31.180 social system

00:38:32.440 ever produced

00:38:33.380 on the planet

00:38:34.240 but it does allow

00:38:35.680 people to strive

00:38:36.940 genuinely forward

00:38:38.940 to some degree

00:38:40.620 and that makes it

00:38:42.220 a miraculous system.

00:38:43.840 And one of the things

00:38:44.460 that I actually

00:38:45.180 I absolutely

00:38:46.200 despise

00:38:48.040 about

00:38:48.640 the radical

00:38:49.840 left identity

00:38:50.740 politics

00:38:51.440 collectivist types

00:38:52.520 who generated up

00:38:53.620 this tyrannical

00:38:54.440 patriarchy narrative

00:38:55.480 is that

00:38:56.220 well number one

00:38:57.160 they have no sense

00:38:58.400 of historical proportion

00:38:59.680 whatsoever.

00:39:00.940 Like to think that

00:39:01.720 to think that

00:39:02.760 what we have

00:39:03.800 isn't better

00:39:04.480 than anything else

00:39:05.620 that's ever been produced

00:39:06.780 just means

00:39:07.420 that you don't know

00:39:08.240 anything at all

00:39:09.540 about what history

00:39:10.720 was like.

00:39:11.620 It's like

00:39:11.860 I read an article

00:39:13.160 a while back

00:39:13.980 I don't remember

00:39:15.680 who published it

00:39:16.360 and unfortunately

00:39:16.940 he was comparing

00:39:17.880 the lot of

00:39:18.720 Nelson Rockefeller

00:39:20.220 in like 1915

00:39:22.080 1916

00:39:22.880 to the typical

00:39:24.100 modern middle class

00:39:25.580 person

00:39:26.240 stating

00:39:27.160 quite forthrightly

00:39:28.820 that

00:39:29.420 there's no way

00:39:31.080 if you had any sense

00:39:32.520 you would change

00:39:33.500 that position

00:39:34.380 for that of a billionaire

00:39:35.540 a hundred years ago.

00:39:36.780 I believe one of

00:39:37.660 Rockefeller's kids

00:39:38.580 died of an

00:39:39.440 infectious bacterial

00:39:40.620 disease.

00:39:41.700 It's like

00:39:41.940 well you actually

00:39:42.480 don't have to worry

00:39:43.140 about that

00:39:43.780 well unless we keep

00:39:44.740 abusing antibiotics

00:39:45.880 which we're

00:39:46.460 you know

00:39:46.760 hell bent on doing

00:39:48.500 but right now

00:39:49.640 if you have a

00:39:50.520 potentially fatal

00:39:52.540 infectious disease

00:39:53.600 you can just

00:39:54.340 go to the doctor

00:39:55.420 and take pills

00:39:56.500 for three days

00:39:57.240 and then you're

00:39:58.060 not dead

00:39:58.960 and you know

00:40:00.360 a billion dollars

00:40:01.340 a hundred years ago

00:40:02.180 wasn't going to

00:40:02.700 buy that for you

00:40:03.720 you know

00:40:04.060 and you have

00:40:04.400 amazing technology

00:40:05.560 at your grasp

00:40:06.420 and you have

00:40:06.860 central heating

00:40:07.520 and you have

00:40:07.920 you have plumbing

00:40:08.940 plumbing man

00:40:10.120 plumbing's a really

00:40:11.380 good thing

00:40:12.240 you know

00:40:12.800 and virtually

00:40:13.300 everybody has it

00:40:14.200 refrigeration

00:40:15.200 that's

00:40:15.900 you should

00:40:16.320 every morning

00:40:17.000 when you walk

00:40:17.540 into your kitchen

00:40:18.240 you should bow

00:40:19.360 before your refrigerator

00:40:20.540 I'm serious man

00:40:22.380 because that's

00:40:23.020 a major deal

00:40:24.320 you know

00:40:24.980 you can store

00:40:26.200 food in a refrigerator

00:40:27.600 and then you actually

00:40:28.720 have the food

00:40:29.520 to store

00:40:30.200 and you know

00:40:30.960 you don't notice that

00:40:31.980 because

00:40:32.300 well that's

00:40:33.340 what's even more

00:40:34.060 miraculous

00:40:34.540 is that

00:40:35.080 that's so

00:40:35.680 taken for granted

00:40:36.680 that you don't

00:40:37.320 even notice it

00:40:38.280 and so

00:40:39.160 there's no gratitude

00:40:40.260 in that

00:40:40.900 in that view

00:40:42.060 of our culture

00:40:43.280 and it's not like

00:40:44.560 it's not flawed

00:40:45.640 I mean

00:40:46.180 human history

00:40:47.060 is an absolute 0.71

00:40:47.960 bloody nightmare

00:40:48.940 there's no doubt

00:40:49.920 about it

00:40:50.340 and there's no

00:40:51.280 culture that you

00:40:52.660 can

00:40:52.900 whose history

00:40:54.100 you can investigate

00:40:54.980 without just

00:40:55.680 shuddering

00:40:56.580 at what it means

00:40:57.660 to be a human being

00:40:58.780 it's so bloody

00:41:00.460 brutal

00:41:00.920 but you know

00:41:02.360 at least

00:41:02.880 it seems to me

00:41:03.780 that we've

00:41:04.300 struggled forward

00:41:05.600 to some degree

00:41:06.880 modifying misery

00:41:09.440 and suffering

00:41:10.140 to some degree

00:41:11.180 and that we're

00:41:11.580 actually getting

00:41:12.120 better and better

00:41:12.780 at that

00:41:13.260 and so some

00:41:14.200 gratitude for that

00:41:15.120 is clearly in order

00:41:16.600 and the idea

00:41:17.440 that fundamentally

00:41:18.560 what we have

00:41:19.260 is a tyrannical

00:41:20.220 patriarchy 0.85

00:41:20.840 is absolutely

00:41:21.920 abhorrent

00:41:22.640 message

00:41:24.140 in my estimation

00:41:25.460 and then

00:41:26.240 with regards

00:41:27.700 to these young men

00:41:28.680 so back to the

00:41:29.780 crisis of masculinity

00:41:31.020 I tried to put it

00:41:32.740 into some

00:41:33.280 historical context

00:41:34.360 so there is a

00:41:35.920 there is a crisis

00:41:36.900 of sorts

00:41:37.780 and I would say

00:41:38.500 it's more of a

00:41:39.020 psychological crisis

00:41:40.120 than anything else

00:41:41.040 that doesn't mean

00:41:41.940 it's trivial

00:41:42.600 one of the guys

00:41:45.040 I was talking to

00:41:45.820 today

00:41:46.160 this was a good

00:41:46.960 he made a good

00:41:47.660 comment

00:41:47.980 he remembered

00:41:48.620 that when he was

00:41:49.700 a kid

00:41:50.020 he was sitting down

00:41:50.840 reading a picture book

00:41:51.900 looking at a picture book

00:41:53.100 when he was very young

00:41:53.960 and his dad

00:41:54.500 took the picture book

00:41:55.860 out of his hand

00:41:56.600 and cuffed him

00:41:57.300 across the head

00:41:58.060 with it

00:41:58.380 and said 0.95

00:41:58.700 what the hell 0.89

00:41:59.420 do you think 0.99

00:41:59.840 you're doing

00:42:00.220 with that

00:42:00.700 and you can imagine

00:42:02.080 what would motivate that

00:42:03.280 like maybe his father

00:42:04.680 hadn't been educated

00:42:06.240 very well

00:42:06.820 or maybe wasn't

00:42:07.640 very prone

00:42:09.340 to education

00:42:10.180 and maybe he had been

00:42:11.220 harshly treated

00:42:11.940 by teachers

00:42:12.660 and maybe he became

00:42:13.780 very skeptical

00:42:14.500 about any kind

00:42:15.340 of intellectual endeavor

00:42:16.380 and was extraordinarily

00:42:17.320 angry about that

00:42:18.420 because of the

00:42:19.260 opportunities

00:42:19.820 that had been

00:42:20.440 denied to him

00:42:21.220 and so he decided

00:42:22.300 that he was going

00:42:22.900 to hate that entire

00:42:24.120 end of the enterprise

00:42:25.460 or maybe he was

00:42:27.060 jealous of his son

00:42:28.060 because he showed

00:42:29.640 some signs

00:42:30.400 that that might

00:42:31.140 be an aptitude

00:42:32.020 whatever

00:42:32.540 and that manifested

00:42:33.720 itself in that

00:42:34.500 little bit of

00:42:35.020 cruel behavior

00:42:35.760 not so little

00:42:37.080 and something

00:42:37.900 this gentleman

00:42:38.640 still remembered

00:42:39.480 25 years later

00:42:40.740 it's like well

00:42:41.680 I mentioned

00:42:43.060 when that came up

00:42:43.980 that the claim

00:42:45.440 by the philosopher

00:42:46.440 Friedrich Nietzsche

00:42:47.300 that if you really

00:42:47.980 want to punish someone

00:42:49.160 you really want

00:42:50.460 to hurt them

00:42:51.020 you think

00:42:51.300 well you want

00:42:52.260 to hurt someone

00:42:53.320 how do you do it

00:42:54.000 you don't wait

00:42:55.120 for them to do

00:42:55.720 something wrong

00:42:56.600 and then punish them

00:42:57.640 that's actually

00:42:58.360 kind of a relief

00:42:59.420 you know because

00:43:00.360 if your conscience

00:43:01.940 is reasonably

00:43:03.140 well constituted

00:43:04.580 and you do

00:43:05.420 something wrong

00:43:06.460 and you don't

00:43:07.420 get caught

00:43:08.060 then that actually

00:43:08.760 kind of destabilizes

00:43:09.900 your whole world

00:43:10.780 because you're

00:43:11.340 kind of hoping

00:43:11.780 the world is a

00:43:12.480 just place

00:43:13.360 at least to some

00:43:14.300 degree

00:43:14.640 and if you can

00:43:15.420 get away with

00:43:16.020 murder

00:43:16.500 let's say 0.94

00:43:17.440 well then

00:43:17.900 where's the

00:43:19.180 moral order

00:43:19.880 you know

00:43:20.420 and that's the

00:43:21.660 great theme of

00:43:22.360 Dostoevsky's

00:43:23.160 Crime and Punishment

00:43:23.940 there was a

00:43:24.540 British movie

00:43:25.060 made about

00:43:25.540 20 years ago

00:43:26.320 that dealt

00:43:28.100 with the same

00:43:28.580 theme called

00:43:29.140 Shallow Grave

00:43:30.120 which was an

00:43:30.640 absolutely terrific

00:43:31.580 movie which I

00:43:32.260 would highly

00:43:32.640 recommend

00:43:33.160 showing the

00:43:35.080 negative consequence

00:43:36.060 of doing something

00:43:37.060 criminal and not

00:43:37.980 getting caught

00:43:38.560 for it

00:43:39.020 well in any

00:43:40.140 case

00:43:40.460 punishing someone

00:43:41.660 for their crimes

00:43:42.520 it's like that's

00:43:43.220 like an act of

00:43:43.900 mercy

00:43:44.200 you really want

00:43:45.020 to hurt someone

00:43:45.520 you punish them

00:43:46.160 for their virtues

00:43:46.900 you wait until

00:43:48.280 they do something

00:43:48.860 good and then 0.92

00:43:50.000 you nail them

00:43:50.740 right then and

00:43:51.400 there and that's

00:43:52.500 pain

00:43:52.920 that's for sure

00:43:53.600 and that's what I

00:43:54.860 see as the

00:43:55.600 crisis of

00:43:56.700 masculinity

00:43:57.400 and it's not a

00:43:58.480 crisis of

00:43:59.000 masculinity because

00:43:59.840 it hurts women 1.00

00:44:00.520 just as much

00:44:01.280 because it turns

00:44:02.200 out that women 1.00

00:44:02.760 need men and 0.93

00:44:03.900 men need women 1.00

00:44:04.820 and that's why

00:44:05.760 there are men

00:44:06.260 and women

00:44:06.680 you know the

00:44:07.320 whole human race

00:44:08.140 is actually

00:44:08.620 well God

00:44:10.420 it's of course

00:44:11.880 you know

00:44:12.260 we're the same

00:44:14.540 creatures

00:44:15.300 we've been

00:44:17.360 cooperating together

00:44:18.700 culturally and

00:44:20.260 biologically for

00:44:21.260 well ever since

00:44:22.180 sex itself was

00:44:23.280 invented which is

00:44:24.200 hundreds of

00:44:24.860 millions of

00:44:25.400 years ago

00:44:25.920 to think of us

00:44:26.820 as separate in

00:44:27.740 some sense in

00:44:28.800 our interests

00:44:29.540 except in the

00:44:30.340 most trivial ways

00:44:31.400 is a very shallow

00:44:32.540 way of looking at

00:44:33.360 the world and so

00:44:34.000 there can't be a

00:44:34.880 crisis of

00:44:35.680 masculinity without

00:44:36.860 there being a

00:44:37.460 corresponding crisis

00:44:38.940 of femininity

00:44:39.900 here's one way it's

00:44:41.220 manifested

00:44:41.880 the Pew Research

00:44:44.380 Foundation has been

00:44:45.880 tracking the desire

00:44:47.380 of young women to

00:44:48.400 enter into stable

00:44:49.600 long-term monogamous

00:44:51.300 relationships

00:44:52.060 that's that enforced

00:44:53.440 monogamy thing 1.00

00:44:54.500 that Dave Rubin was

00:44:55.660 talking about

00:44:56.260 marriage for lack

00:44:57.700 of a better word

00:44:58.480 and the desire for

00:44:59.840 marriage among young

00:45:00.780 women has been going 1.00

00:45:01.640 up precipitously over

00:45:03.140 the last 25 years

00:45:04.500 at the same time

00:45:05.820 that the desire for

00:45:06.660 marriage has been

00:45:07.260 going down

00:45:08.320 precipitously among

00:45:10.020 young men

00:45:10.740 well that's not

00:45:12.000 what would you call

00:45:13.960 a recipe for

00:45:15.680 peace

00:45:16.460 productivity and

00:45:18.360 happiness

00:45:18.780 it's not good

00:45:19.820 and so there's no

00:45:20.380 such thing as a

00:45:21.120 crisis in masculinity

00:45:22.420 there might be a

00:45:23.880 crisis in relationship

00:45:25.300 between the genders

00:45:26.740 and there is to some

00:45:27.900 degree

00:45:28.220 and there's lots of

00:45:29.200 reasons for that

00:45:29.960 the birth control pill

00:45:31.280 probably being foremost

00:45:32.480 among them

00:45:33.180 but in any case

00:45:34.620 the crisis seems to me

00:45:36.280 to be

00:45:37.160 to the degree that it

00:45:38.180 exists

00:45:38.680 to be

00:45:39.620 fundamentally

00:45:40.720 associated with this

00:45:42.260 viewpoint

00:45:42.960 that I already

00:45:43.540 described

00:45:44.120 and that viewpoint

00:45:44.900 is that

00:45:45.560 fundamentally

00:45:46.720 the west

00:45:48.560 is a

00:45:50.440 patriarchal

00:45:51.720 tyranny

00:45:52.180 okay

00:45:52.880 and so there are

00:45:53.660 implications of that

00:45:55.240 and that's like

00:45:55.780 that's the axiomatic

00:45:57.340 view of the radical

00:45:58.560 left as far as I can

00:45:59.780 tell

00:46:00.020 and the feminist 0.91

00:46:01.440 variant of that

00:46:02.200 but more particularly

00:46:03.060 the radical left

00:46:04.040 and by the way

00:46:06.300 that's a view

00:46:06.960 held by a very small

00:46:07.980 minority of people

00:46:08.840 much smaller

00:46:10.220 than

00:46:10.780 was thought

00:46:12.220 there was an article

00:46:13.240 last month

00:46:14.800 in the

00:46:15.120 Atlantic Monthly

00:46:16.220 last week

00:46:16.820 reviewing a new

00:46:18.440 political science study

00:46:19.460 looking at

00:46:20.060 political polarization

00:46:21.140 and viewpoints

00:46:21.940 across the US

00:46:22.800 I suspect it's

00:46:24.040 somewhat similar

00:46:24.600 in Britain

00:46:24.960 it would be

00:46:25.420 in Canada as well

00:46:26.320 showing that

00:46:27.220 about 8% of people

00:46:28.900 held radical

00:46:29.700 leftist viewpoints

00:46:30.780 and a smaller

00:46:31.660 percentage

00:46:32.120 held radical

00:46:33.200 right wing viewpoints

00:46:34.400 so it's a small

00:46:35.400 minority on both ends

00:46:36.440 that are the radicals

00:46:37.340 and then

00:46:37.620 they described

00:46:38.400 everybody in the middle

00:46:39.260 as the

00:46:39.760 what would you call it

00:46:40.760 confused and relatively

00:46:42.520 silent majority

00:46:43.860 sick to death

00:46:45.480 of the polarization

00:46:46.420 and

00:46:48.440 then they also

00:46:49.700 asked

00:46:50.480 the

00:46:51.660 polling group

00:46:53.480 what they thought

00:46:55.640 about political

00:46:56.320 correctness

00:46:57.000 and this was so cool

00:46:58.060 it's so comical

00:46:59.540 it's so deeply comical

00:47:00.800 first of all

00:47:01.900 on average

00:47:03.160 about 80%

00:47:04.240 of Americans

00:47:05.240 believed that

00:47:06.200 political correctness

00:47:07.340 had gone too far

00:47:08.260 and so that's a lot

00:47:09.720 you know because 10%

00:47:11.060 of the people

00:47:11.820 didn't understand

00:47:12.780 the question

00:47:13.380 so 80%

00:47:16.020 is a lot

00:47:16.700 but they also

00:47:18.220 broke it down

00:47:18.960 by race

00:47:20.260 and by age

00:47:21.140 and by gender

00:47:21.980 and so

00:47:23.180 here's what's

00:47:25.180 really funny

00:47:25.780 the

00:47:26.560 people who are

00:47:28.960 most likely

00:47:29.640 to think

00:47:30.260 that political

00:47:31.060 correctness

00:47:31.740 has gone too far

00:47:33.100 are those

00:47:34.580 who have been

00:47:35.520 termed so

00:47:36.560 abysmally

00:47:37.240 people of color

00:47:38.560 so it's the

00:47:39.940 beneficiaries

00:47:41.060 hypothetical

00:47:42.280 beneficiaries

00:47:43.100 of the politically

00:47:44.280 correct identity

00:47:45.180 politics culture

00:47:46.120 who believe

00:47:47.040 most strongly

00:47:48.260 that it's gone

00:47:49.180 too far

00:47:49.620 it rises to

00:47:50.500 almost 90%

00:47:51.540 among American

00:47:52.440 Indians

00:47:52.920 so that's 0.97

00:47:54.100 deeply comical

00:47:55.340 deeply comical

00:47:56.500 and what's even

00:47:57.500 more comical

00:47:58.120 is that

00:47:58.620 the most

00:47:59.560 racially

00:48:00.400 homogenous

00:48:01.140 political group

00:48:02.200 in the entire

00:48:02.780 spectrum

00:48:03.280 is the

00:48:03.920 politically

00:48:04.280 correct

00:48:04.840 they're almost

00:48:05.700 all white

00:48:06.460 and not only

00:48:07.820 not only

00:48:08.880 are they

00:48:09.520 almost all

00:48:10.380 white

00:48:10.700 they're

00:48:11.200 disproportionately

00:48:12.000 likely to have

00:48:13.100 a graduate

00:48:13.640 degree

00:48:14.160 and to make

00:48:14.960 more than

00:48:15.300 a hundred thousand

00:48:16.020 dollars a year

00:48:16.820 and so

00:48:17.800 okay

00:48:18.200 and so this is

00:48:18.820 what I think

00:48:19.280 about that

00:48:19.880 so a couple

00:48:20.660 of things

00:48:20.960 the first thing

00:48:21.560 is

00:48:21.760 here's what

00:48:23.020 you want

00:48:23.560 if you want

00:48:24.060 to have your

00:48:24.520 cake

00:48:24.860 and eat it

00:48:25.460 too

00:48:25.780 okay

00:48:26.320 because just

00:48:26.900 having your

00:48:27.380 cake isn't

00:48:27.920 good enough

00:48:28.340 for you

00:48:28.760 and neither

00:48:29.420 is eating

00:48:29.880 it

00:48:30.040 you want

00:48:30.500 both

00:48:31.040 and so

00:48:31.740 what you

00:48:32.060 want to do

00:48:32.500 is you want

00:48:32.940 to be part

00:48:33.800 of the patriarchal

00:48:35.020 elite

00:48:35.460 so let's

00:48:36.140 define that

00:48:36.800 I hate to

00:48:38.140 define it

00:48:38.600 this way

00:48:38.980 but we're

00:48:39.460 going to

00:48:39.640 play the

00:48:40.020 game

00:48:40.320 well you're

00:48:41.000 white

00:48:41.360 you're rich

00:48:43.780 and you're

00:48:45.100 highly educated

00:48:46.240 okay so that

00:48:47.040 really makes

00:48:47.720 you the

00:48:49.380 exemplar of

00:48:50.500 the tyrannical

00:48:51.200 patriarchy 0.85

00:48:51.840 now maybe if

00:48:52.780 you're female

00:48:53.220 it doesn't

00:48:53.800 but I can't

00:48:54.420 tell like

00:48:54.920 if you're a

00:48:55.640 successful female

00:48:56.720 in the patriarchal

00:48:58.480 tyranny

00:48:58.880 does that make

00:49:00.160 you a patriarchal

00:49:01.040 tyrant

00:49:01.420 or not

00:49:02.280 I don't know

00:49:03.580 I haven't been

00:49:04.160 able to sort

00:49:04.740 that out

00:49:05.280 so it seems

00:49:06.600 to me

00:49:07.000 that the answer

00:49:08.480 is probably

00:49:09.100 yes if it's

00:49:10.080 the hierarchical

00:49:10.900 structure that's

00:49:11.600 the problem

00:49:12.200 unless it's

00:49:13.040 just the

00:49:13.460 problem that

00:49:14.080 it's men 0.80

00:49:14.840 but that doesn't

00:49:15.840 make any sense

00:49:16.540 because if a

00:49:17.480 man and a

00:49:17.920 woman are 1.00

00:49:18.240 acting the

00:49:18.760 same way

00:49:19.420 in the same

00:49:20.400 structure

00:49:20.900 then it seems

00:49:21.580 to be the

00:49:21.980 structure not

00:49:22.680 the gender

00:49:23.220 but well

00:49:24.540 but logical

00:49:25.260 consistency and

00:49:26.200 coherence isn't

00:49:26.920 actually part and

00:49:27.940 parcel of the

00:49:29.080 postmodern ethos

00:49:30.480 so those sorts

00:49:31.980 of questions

00:49:32.460 never get asked

00:49:33.440 let alone

00:49:34.180 get addressed

00:49:35.140 so okay

00:49:36.220 so now

00:49:36.820 you're rich

00:49:37.760 and you're white 0.62

00:49:38.400 and you're

00:49:39.220 let's say

00:49:39.700 educated beyond

00:49:40.820 your intelligence

00:49:41.660 because I think

00:49:42.360 that's the right

00:49:42.940 way of formulating

00:49:44.140 it and you've

00:49:45.260 decided that

00:49:46.100 that's not good

00:49:47.900 enough for you

00:49:48.500 it isn't good

00:49:49.260 enough for you

00:49:49.760 that you actually

00:49:50.660 occupy a position

00:49:52.040 we'll say of

00:49:52.860 power because

00:49:53.960 there's no

00:49:54.440 authority or

00:49:55.120 competence in

00:49:56.100 the identity

00:49:56.600 politics way of

00:49:57.620 looking in the

00:49:58.020 world it's just

00:49:58.480 power and so

00:49:59.600 you've got that

00:50:00.360 but that's not

00:50:01.100 good enough

00:50:01.620 it isn't

00:50:02.020 you're not

00:50:02.780 satisfied with

00:50:03.660 just being a

00:50:04.540 successful tyrant

00:50:05.720 although you'd

00:50:06.440 think that would

00:50:06.860 be enough for

00:50:07.440 you even if you 0.83

00:50:08.040 were narcissistic

00:50:08.860 it's oh no

00:50:09.680 you want another

00:50:10.820 crown

00:50:11.360 you want a crown

00:50:12.700 of the compassionate

00:50:13.740 so not only do you

00:50:15.000 want to be on top

00:50:15.860 of things

00:50:16.420 you want to be a

00:50:17.580 leader of all the

00:50:18.360 people who are at

00:50:18.980 the bottom of

00:50:19.640 things because then

00:50:20.680 you can have it

00:50:21.220 both ways

00:50:21.960 right you can have

00:50:23.200 your cake

00:50:23.920 you can have your

00:50:24.620 position of power

00:50:25.500 and all of that

00:50:26.500 and your position of

00:50:27.340 privilege using your 1.00

00:50:28.460 own damn terminology 1.00

00:50:29.520 and you can be 1.00

00:50:30.760 hyper moral champion

00:50:32.260 of the oppressed

00:50:33.160 it's like no

00:50:34.560 sorry you don't get

00:50:37.280 it both ways and

00:50:38.220 it's one of the

00:50:38.940 things that horrifies

00:50:39.920 me about watching

00:50:40.840 ivy league students

00:50:42.080 complain about the

00:50:43.320 one percent it's

00:50:44.360 like i taught at

00:50:45.240 harvard for six

00:50:46.000 years harvard was

00:50:47.300 an interesting place

00:50:48.240 they treated their

00:50:49.320 undergraduates so

00:50:50.240 well you can't

00:50:51.040 believe it and they

00:50:51.740 had their reasons

00:50:52.660 and one of the

00:50:53.500 reasons were they

00:50:54.540 knew and this was

00:50:55.220 back in 1990 that

00:50:57.340 forty percent of

00:50:58.300 their graduates would

00:50:59.100 have a million

00:50:59.640 dollars by the

00:51:00.380 time they were

00:51:00.880 forty so they

00:51:02.040 didn't have

00:51:02.500 undergraduates they

00:51:04.240 had baby

00:51:05.120 millionaires right

00:51:07.720 and that's how they

00:51:08.500 treated them and the

00:51:09.420 reason they treated

00:51:10.180 them that way well

00:51:11.220 was partly because i'm

00:51:12.400 not going to be

00:51:12.840 cynical about this is

00:51:13.780 because they'd

00:51:14.520 carefully selected

00:51:15.360 these students and

00:51:16.100 most of them were

00:51:16.780 truly outstanding

00:51:17.900 people really they

00:51:19.180 were and so you

00:51:20.640 know to the degree

00:51:21.420 that the the

00:51:22.720 university was wise

00:51:23.780 king and not

00:51:24.680 patriarchal tyrant

00:51:26.680 everyone was

00:51:27.800 working hard trying

00:51:28.620 to educate these

00:51:29.460 people as in the

00:51:31.000 best possible manner

00:51:31.980 but there was

00:51:32.860 something else which

00:51:33.780 was well we're

00:51:34.680 definitely going to

00:51:36.000 make this a

00:51:37.380 worthwhile experience

00:51:38.260 for you because in

00:51:39.300 ten years we're

00:51:40.080 going to come

00:51:40.360 knocking and say

00:51:41.260 well you know got

00:51:42.600 a spare hundred

00:51:43.360 thousand or so and

00:51:45.240 you're very likely to

00:51:46.160 say yes which is why

00:51:47.240 harvard i don't know

00:51:48.500 what their endowment

00:51:49.240 is now but back when

00:51:50.780 i was there it was

00:51:51.440 something like 50

00:51:52.240 billion dollars and

00:51:53.700 so that's very

00:51:54.440 effective and and

00:51:55.720 very and very

00:51:56.700 intelligent but then

00:51:57.940 you see these ivy

00:51:58.760 league students so

00:51:59.460 you go to an ivy

00:52:00.240 league school any

00:52:01.280 top tier university

00:52:02.500 for that matter i

00:52:03.600 don't care which one

00:52:04.300 it is it's like i

00:52:05.420 don't care how old

00:52:06.240 you are or what

00:52:07.260 your political

00:52:07.880 position is you are

00:52:09.200 now part of the

00:52:10.520 patriarchal tyranny

00:52:11.820 now you might not

00:52:12.960 you might be an

00:52:13.760 unsuccessful part but

00:52:16.080 that doesn't redound

00:52:17.000 to your credit but

00:52:18.840 you're certainly on

00:52:19.860 the track forward to

00:52:21.320 being that and the

00:52:22.200 fact that it's going

00:52:23.160 to be delayed for ten

00:52:24.340 years means nothing

00:52:25.680 and so to also take

00:52:27.560 to yourself the

00:52:28.820 moral stance of

00:52:30.080 advocate for the

00:52:31.300 oppressed whom you

00:52:32.540 whom you've already

00:52:33.680 dispossessed by the

00:52:35.440 mere fact of your

00:52:36.520 existence at that

00:52:37.580 institution is a form

00:52:39.360 of moral corruption

00:52:40.320 that's really quite

00:52:41.500 incomprehensible and

00:52:42.840 one would you say

00:52:44.100 what would you say

00:52:44.800 one um encouraged by

00:52:47.740 any number of

00:52:49.460 ideologically corrupt

00:52:51.200 resentful and bitterly 0.95

00:52:53.280 underpaid sociology

00:52:54.960 professors for example

00:52:56.940 i've often thought that

00:52:59.140 if you wanted to

00:53:00.020 eradicate political

00:53:01.500 correctness among

00:53:02.280 sociology professors all

00:53:03.900 you'd have to do is

00:53:05.000 quadruple their pay and

00:53:07.040 it would probably be

00:53:07.940 worth it because a

00:53:09.020 tremendous amount of

00:53:09.900 it i've seen the

00:53:10.560 antipathy that

00:53:11.860 university professors

00:53:12.840 has for business

00:53:14.100 people and vice versa

00:53:15.360 by the way because i've

00:53:16.780 worked in both domains

00:53:17.700 and the the university

00:53:19.820 professors are often

00:53:20.820 extremely annoyed although

00:53:22.380 they won't admit it that

00:53:24.060 with their level of

00:53:25.260 intelligence which

00:53:26.160 admittedly is often

00:53:27.340 very high had they

00:53:28.840 been working in the

00:53:29.640 private world they'd be

00:53:30.820 making three four ten

00:53:32.220 times as much money and

00:53:33.820 so their attitude to

00:53:34.760 that is well there must

00:53:35.900 be something corrupt

00:53:36.760 about all those other

00:53:37.620 people that are making

00:53:38.420 that money rather than

00:53:39.740 well i made my choice i

00:53:41.600 have a very secure job i

00:53:43.000 have a tremendous amount

00:53:43.880 of freedom right because

00:53:45.200 as a university professor

00:53:46.320 you have a very optimal

00:53:47.680 balance of security and

00:53:49.620 freedom it's quite unique

00:53:51.100 you're the most protected

00:53:52.420 human being that's ever

00:53:53.800 existed on the entire

00:53:55.220 planet you know and

00:53:56.700 you're supposed to and

00:53:58.000 you're supposed to work

00:53:58.920 diligently what would you

00:54:00.420 say in gratitude for

00:54:01.620 that and many do but not

00:54:03.140 all and to be bitter about

00:54:05.800 the fact that you know

00:54:06.880 that isn't doesn't also

00:54:08.300 accompany the almost

00:54:09.900 unlimited capacity for

00:54:11.420 material success that's

00:54:12.700 characteristic of the

00:54:13.560 business world strikes me

00:54:14.980 as slightly ingenuous just

00:54:16.840 to put it mildly but to

00:54:19.500 see these these ivy league

00:54:21.840 students supported in

00:54:23.640 their endeavor to play

00:54:24.860 both games simultaneously

00:54:26.680 is something that's just

00:54:27.980 beyond comprehension to

00:54:30.000 me okay so back to the

00:54:31.620 young men and i said well

00:54:33.660 you best punish people for

00:54:35.040 their virtues so let's walk

00:54:36.260 this through um oh oh

00:54:38.500 yes i i wanted to finish

00:54:40.520 with the demographics that's

00:54:41.960 right so the atlantic monthly

00:54:43.220 article so it's eight

00:54:44.500 percent radical leftist

00:54:46.420 viewpoint identity politics

00:54:48.060 types thirty percent of

00:54:50.520 those people think political

00:54:51.920 correctness has gone too far

00:54:53.400 so that's down to five

00:54:55.540 percent who don't so that's

00:54:57.120 like one in twenty and

00:54:58.360 that's not very many people

00:54:59.460 they obviously have a

00:55:00.600 disproportionate impact but

00:55:02.000 here's what's so absolutely

00:55:03.180 comical it's so completely

00:55:04.780 and utterly bizarre and

00:55:06.660 shows you what sort of

00:55:07.340 upside down political world

00:55:08.860 we live in so here's the

00:55:10.060 reality of the situation the

00:55:12.820 very people who decry the

00:55:15.040 patriarchal structure the

00:55:16.980 tyrannical patriarchal

00:55:18.000 structure and its neo

00:55:19.440 colonial attitudes let's say

00:55:21.700 and it's uh are those who

00:55:25.620 are foisting a neo 1.00

00:55:27.980 colonial doctrine of

00:55:29.820 victimization on racial

00:55:32.520 minorities that do not match

00:55:34.940 their demographic despite the

00:55:37.440 fact that those people do not

00:55:39.680 want that to happen now how can

00:55:42.080 anything be more comical than

00:55:43.920 that it's you couldn't make

00:55:45.600 that up it's like a deli

00:55:46.980 painting or a monty python

00:55:48.840 sketch from the life of brian

00:55:50.840 you know so so that was that

00:55:53.940 was gratifying to see and very

00:55:56.140 fun to read and entertaining to

00:55:58.040 think through and all of that

00:55:59.780 okay so back to the patriarchal

00:56:02.100 tyranny narrative and the crisis

00:56:03.700 of young men all right so well

00:56:05.940 what's the crisis well this is

00:56:08.020 what it is and i talked to these

00:56:09.660 young guys today about this it's

00:56:11.220 like well what do young men need

00:56:13.580 well they don't really need

00:56:14.440 help it's not the right way of

00:56:17.440 thinking about it because help

00:56:18.700 sounds like look let's say you

00:56:22.920 work in a nursing home okay and

00:56:25.320 and and you need to work in

00:56:27.400 nursing homes because they're

00:56:30.080 necessary and people get old and

00:56:32.060 so then you say well are you

00:56:33.060 offering them help and you have

00:56:36.940 to be precise about your words

00:56:38.560 that's rule 10 i said i would

00:56:40.300 mention rule 10 you have to be

00:56:42.200 precise about your words well is

00:56:44.180 it help you're offering in a

00:56:45.500 nursing home it's it's no it's

00:56:47.700 it's it's it's you're offering

00:56:49.240 what's necessary if you're

00:56:50.940 sensible you know to forestall

00:56:53.140 exceptional suffering and misery

00:56:55.220 and maybe you're doing that in

00:56:56.620 part because you know you're

00:56:57.900 going to get old and so it's

00:56:59.900 definitely the case that the way

00:57:01.440 you treat old people now is the 1.00

00:57:04.960 way you're going to be treated so

00:57:07.000 that chicken will definitely come

00:57:08.580 home to roost and so it's part of

00:57:10.600 the intergenerational compact let's

00:57:12.940 say but then again there's a rule

00:57:14.600 if you're in a nursing home it's the

00:57:16.320 same rule that you should use when

00:57:17.720 you're dealing with your own

00:57:18.680 children and that's partly don't

00:57:20.900 bother children when you're

00:57:21.960 skateboarding don't do anything for

00:57:24.940 the inhabitants of the old folks 1.00

00:57:27.120 home that they can do for

00:57:28.300 themselves don't interfere with

00:57:30.840 their autonomy leave them to

00:57:33.340 practice what self-care they can

00:57:36.180 practice let them maintain their

00:57:38.160 ability and their dignity and that's

00:57:40.040 going to be one of the things you

00:57:41.620 can do to aid them in their

00:57:44.160 transition through old age and

00:57:45.960 that's not exactly help it's it's

00:57:48.420 judicious interaction you know it's

00:57:51.020 like well lend a hand when that's

00:57:52.600 necessary but I'll stand back and let

00:57:55.260 you struggle forward as an

00:57:56.740 autonomous being to the degree that

00:57:58.400 that's possible just like I will if

00:58:00.560 you're my child because what you

00:58:02.560 should do if you have a child and and

00:58:05.380 you see them taking necessary risks

00:58:07.580 is encourage them for that it's like

00:58:09.980 kid man the life's rough get ready and

00:58:14.380 I'm not going to be able to protect

00:58:15.800 you I'll do my best when you're this

00:58:17.340 tall and I can kind of put a wall

00:58:19.000 around you and hypothetically you know

00:58:21.320 protect you but soon with any luck

00:58:24.000 you're not even going to allow me to do

00:58:25.900 that right you're going to be the 13

00:58:27.440 year old gang member who says hey

00:58:28.960 sorry mom I'm out of here I'm going to 1.00

00:58:32.080 go join my idiot peers and enter the 1.00

00:58:34.200 world you know and and cause a certain 1.00

00:58:35.940 amount of trouble and as a mother

00:58:37.500 that's there's going to be grief in

00:58:39.180 that but it's also a sign of success

00:58:41.060 the old psychoanalysts they always said

00:58:43.260 the good mother fails right if your 0.96

00:58:46.820 13 year old is still in your basement

00:58:48.600 that's just not success even if the

00:58:51.140 alternative to that is that he's out

00:58:52.600 causing a certain amount of trouble

00:58:54.040 well life is a certain amount of

00:58:55.800 trouble you know and you have to

00:58:57.220 experiment with a certain amount of

00:58:59.240 trouble to find your way well so okay

00:59:03.420 so back to back to the crisis of

00:59:06.660 masculinity yet again well so we live in

00:59:10.740 a patriarchal tyranny okay well who's

00:59:13.740 responsible for that well men and how

00:59:17.240 long have they been responsible for that

00:59:19.140 well forever now of course it's not true

00:59:22.300 because the truth of the matter is 120 0.88

00:59:25.160 years ago everybody was bloody dirt

00:59:27.260 poor and barely scrabbling to stay

00:59:28.960 alive and men and women bonded

00:59:30.860 together to the degree that they could

00:59:32.640 under their intense privation to

00:59:35.100 cooperate somewhat fractiously so that

00:59:37.900 we didn't die and that's the proper

00:59:40.280 narrative of history not a one-sided

00:59:42.900 oppression and also the insistence the

00:59:45.480 strange insistence what okay it's a

00:59:47.160 patriarchal tyranny what that mean

00:59:48.660 women had nothing to do with the 1.00

00:59:50.240 construction of our culture it's like

00:59:52.080 all you women you were just sitting 1.00

00:59:53.400 around being oppressed for like 10,000

00:59:55.360 years you didn't do anything useful at

00:59:57.200 all socially until like 1960 when

01:00:01.520 Jermaine Greer appeared on the scene and

01:00:04.960 all of a sudden you know women entered

01:00:07.480 the world it's like it's such it's such 0.99

01:00:13.880 absolute appalling rubbish and it wasn't 1.00

01:00:16.380 Jermaine Greer and the damn feminists 1.00

01:00:18.720 anyways it was the birth control pill period 1.00

01:00:21.960 because that emancipated women enough so 1.00

01:00:24.400 that they could participate much more not

01:00:26.540 period there was other things well it was

01:00:31.100 the primary mover you know sanitation

01:00:33.920 helped sanitary napkins helped tampons 1.00

01:00:37.680 helped all of that those base level

01:00:40.320 technological innovations domestic equipment

01:00:43.840 helped you know it used to take a long

01:00:46.140 time to wash clothes in the creek you

01:00:49.380 don't have to do that anymore and so

01:00:51.420 there's time freed up and you have a

01:00:54.460 certain amount of voluntary control over

01:00:56.220 your reproductive functions these are 0.99

01:00:57.900 biological revolutions that's what's

01:01:00.180 enabling women to move forward in the 0.99

01:01:02.140 world and thank God for that we need all

01:01:04.140 the talented people we can possibly manage

01:01:06.060 but to think about the fact that that

01:01:08.220 hadn't occurred you know a hundred years

01:01:09.900 ago as a consequence of oppression by men

01:01:12.300 men it's like only in university could you 0.99

01:01:15.240 learn something that foolish and that 0.99

01:01:17.720 well articulated so okay so now you've 0.99

01:01:21.220 got men and we know what men are like

01:01:22.940 they're patriarchal tyrants so what are

01:01:25.860 boys like well that's obvious they're baby 0.61

01:01:29.700 patriarchal tyrants in training and so

01:01:33.420 then what do you see them doing well you

01:01:35.400 see them playing boisterously and you see

01:01:37.380 them putting up their hand assertively and

01:01:39.020 you see them talking out of turn and and

01:01:41.700 doing the assertive dominant masculine

01:01:44.520 things that a certain proportion of

01:01:46.400 young boys do and you don't think oh great

01:01:49.400 you know there's a force that can be

01:01:51.320 harnessed for good in the world if we can

01:01:53.300 socialize it properly which is precisely

01:01:55.740 what you do for example if you take young

01:01:57.620 men and you produce a boxing arena for

01:02:00.720 them so that they can get the hell off the 0.96

01:02:02.380 street and they can meet some older guys

01:02:04.020 and they can get a little disciplined in

01:02:06.040 their ability to express aggression and

01:02:08.320 they can start to see a higher order good

01:02:11.380 than what's offered to them by their their

01:02:14.840 gang which is better than nothing by the

01:02:16.900 way right to show them a pathway for the

01:02:20.040 future that's worth sacrificing for that's

01:02:22.560 what you do that's education you don't say

01:02:24.900 oh well all that manifestation of masculine

01:02:27.580 energy is associated with nothing but the

01:02:30.440 power that our entire tyrannical patriarchal 0.98

01:02:32.980 structure is based on and then either damn it 0.94

01:02:35.700 with faint praise which is bad enough or

01:02:38.620 positively discourage it out of existence

01:02:41.180 it's like what the hell good is that going

01:02:43.440 to be exactly what do we want what do we

01:02:45.420 want women what do we want a generation of 1.00

01:02:47.640 useless men is that the idea well maybe 1.00

01:02:50.460 they'll be harmless like your neutered cat 0.98

01:02:53.400 that little overweight that warms itself on

01:02:56.080 your television set you know it's like well

01:02:58.740 you know he's not good for much but if i feed

01:03:01.520 him a bit he doesn't do any damage it's

01:03:03.720 like hey there's a mate for you it's like and

01:03:07.500 the women i know that are worth their salt they 1.00

01:03:09.540 want someone to contend with and this is quite

01:03:11.980 clear if you and this is biology and so forgive me for expressing some truths

01:03:17.560 about biology i know that that's damn near illegal now and likely soon will be

01:03:22.320 that um women across the world including in egalitarian societies by the way tend to

01:03:30.600 mate across and up hierarchies and so what they do is they look for men who

01:03:36.360 occupy positions of authority and competence that are above theirs well why okay let's think

01:03:44.240 this through it's not that complicated well the first thing is well why not right why not look

01:03:51.800 look look let's say you're a woman and you you have to you have to you have to figure out i got to 0.65

01:03:56.160 find a man it's like oh my god that's a horrible problem it's like and then look at all those men

01:04:02.060 how am i going to sort through them well i don't know how about if i put them in groups and let

01:04:08.140 them fight and the ones that come on top well we'll just call them the best men

01:04:12.320 well that's a good strategy it's like well it's the men

01:04:16.060 who are making the hierarchies at least in part and

01:04:20.140 some men rise to the top of them and if the hierarchy is worthwhile then

01:04:23.980 those men are worthwhile at least by the judgment of other men and

01:04:28.000 how else are you going to judge men except by the judgment of other men

01:04:31.320 and so the women let the men sort themselves into hierarchies and then they peel from the top 1.00

01:04:36.700 down and that is exactly what they do and you think well why is that well how about

01:04:41.200 because they're smart how would that be how about because that's a really good strategy now

01:04:46.160 there's a bit of a downside because that might be might mean that there's a hierarchical imbalance

01:04:51.580 in the relationship but here's the payoff for that well why do you select a partner well partly

01:04:58.520 partly large part if you want the whole race to survive is because well you want to have kids

01:05:05.200 and so what's going to happen when you have kids if you're a female well a couple of things is first 0.95

01:05:11.220 of all you're going to take an economic hit so you know the vaunted wage gap it's like it's not a gap

01:05:17.960 between men and women it's a gap between mothers and everyone else fundamentally and we should get that 1.00

01:05:23.800 straight and so and it's and the reason there's the gap is because it's actually really expensive to

01:05:28.740 have children and we don't know what to do about that it's like first of all well they're expensive

01:05:33.600 you know you have to buy things for them you have to have room for them you have to take care of them

01:05:38.340 and then they take you out of your life especially the first few years especially the first year it's

01:05:44.360 like man that's a full-time job a new baby the whole it's more than a full-time job it's like 80

01:05:49.980 hours a week the first year and then and then even right up to the age of four or five when they

01:05:55.980 enter school it's tremendous amount of effort to regulate the behavior of small children especially

01:06:01.220 they have more than one of them you might think well you could hire another woman to do it but 1.00

01:06:05.200 that doesn't really solve the problem it doesn't make the expense go away so we don't know what to

01:06:09.420 do with the fact that children are expensive you could say well we could pay mothers to take care of 0.99

01:06:14.680 them but the problem with that is that the children aren't worth anything till 25 years later well

01:06:19.980 they're not economically so we don't know we don't have a mechanism for figuring out how to

01:06:25.820 monetize an investment that has that much delay if you're a bloody venture capitalist you know you

01:06:31.620 want a 10 to 1 return on your investment within five years it's like good luck with that with a kid

01:06:36.620 you know even if you even if you sell the kid that's not going to work

01:06:40.780 so so the other thing that women do is well they know they're going to take the primary hit and 1.00

01:06:49.280 there's a couple of reasons for that and one is well women are actually better at taking care of 1.00

01:06:53.660 infants i mean you know below the first year than men and and there and and it's also not it seems

01:07:00.160 not as terrifying to women you know when when my wife and i decided to have kids i thought it through

01:07:05.340 we were quite young by modern standards and i wasn't fully in what would you say placed in my

01:07:12.040 career and i thought okay she wants to have a baby it's like well what about that i said well jesus i

01:07:16.900 don't know what i'm going to do about that first year because i don't really know what to do with

01:07:20.100 infants that well and i mean i'd worked in daycare and i really liked kids and i said okay look look

01:07:24.880 no problem you can have a baby but look you gotta more or less take care of that baby the first year 0.98

01:07:29.740 and i'll try to take care of you and we'll see how that goes and it's not like i ignored the damn baby 0.96

01:07:34.440 you know but i didn't breastfeed it you know and i didn't want to so and i did help her and i i tried 0.93

01:07:42.200 to see when she was too tired and then i'd step in and all that and and but i also facilitated let's

01:07:48.720 say or at least didn't interfere with that tight bond that's produced between mother and infant and

01:07:52.960 you know one of the things we lie to young women about is because we tell them oh career is going 1.00

01:07:57.920 to be everything for you it's like no that's a lie first of all most people don't have careers

01:08:03.840 they have jobs and those aren't the same thing and second even most people who have careers find that

01:08:09.680 when they have a family especially when they have children that they end up liking their children a

01:08:14.100 hell of a lot more than they thought they would i had one lawyer i used to work with female lawyer 1.00

01:08:19.040 tough cookie man and unbelievably competent and she said well you know when i was when i was going for

01:08:25.880 partnership i always thought the children were just sort of they were just sort of decorative you know

01:08:30.340 because she let's say suppressed her maternal attitude until it came out in full force at around 29 which

01:08:36.340 is you know absolutely typical and then she had a baby and it was like it was just a shock to her

01:08:42.400 it was like i really love this baby it's like you know because the thing about a baby that's so weird

01:08:48.380 and i think this is especially true for mothers is you know you see a baby on the subway and you think

01:08:53.020 oh there's a baby and it's sort of like a generic baby and and like because you just can't get too

01:09:00.280 involved with every baby that comes along first of all people think you're peculiar and that's not good

01:09:05.300 and second well you you just can't take on that responsibility right so you just you don't really

01:09:11.680 see the baby you just see your kind of one-dimensional animated version of the baby and you glance and you

01:09:19.220 walk away but when you have a child it's like no no you get the whole creature right there like that's a

01:09:24.200 real person right from the beginning and it's your real person and all of a sudden it's someone that

01:09:29.240 you're as close to or closer than anyone you've ever been close to in your whole life and if that

01:09:37.220 doesn't change you well then there's something wrong something's gone wrong and so then the

01:09:42.420 priorities shift and as they should shift and that doesn't mean we know how to balance that with like

01:09:47.760 long-term career we don't because it's complicated but you know women end up bearing the primary 1.00

01:09:55.400 responsibility for extraordinarily dependent infants and so they tend to look for men who can provide

01:10:00.880 the resources to balance that out to some degree so they're looking at productivity and generosity

01:10:07.540 let's say as markers for a suitable mate now that's not the only thing there's other elements that go

01:10:13.240 into mate choice but those are two very important things and those are those are relevant and important

01:10:18.000 and so well what do you want to do well you want to encourage young men to what to grow the hell up

01:10:25.060 right to take on responsibility and so one of the things i talked to these young guys

01:10:31.360 tonight today about was what where they'd found the meaning in their life and they all said well it was

01:10:37.640 a consequence of taking on more responsibility the two young boxers they were only 18 you know one of

01:10:43.520 them really talked about the fact that he had disciplined himself and that he wanted to go to college he

01:10:48.340 ended up wanting to go to college and it was a boxing college and there's like only four of them in the 0.98

01:10:52.300 country and he hadn't been doing so well academically but he wanted to go to the damn boxing college 0.94

01:10:56.980 because he had a talent and it was being encouraged by some older guys around him and you know he was 0.96

01:11:02.040 having some attention paid to him so he buckled the hell down and did the best he'd ever done

01:11:06.420 academically and got into the college it's like good work man way to be and then the other kid

01:11:12.140 he said well he'd started boxing and that it kind of toughened him up and made him more confident and

01:11:17.020 then he started teaching other young guys around him about how this worked and that really helped

01:11:21.900 him out because you know one of the ways that you can sort of determine if you're valuable and and you

01:11:27.180 are but the one of the ways you determine that is to see that reflected back to you by other people

01:11:32.860 and if you lend out a hand and like people love doing this this is another part about the rubbish about

01:11:38.600 the patriarchal tyranny i know lots of powerful men you know and most of them aren't powerful they're

01:11:44.580 bloody competent and that makes them powerful and one of the things they really like to do like

01:11:50.000 one of the things that's intrinsically rewarding about occupying a position in a hierarchy is that

01:11:55.540 you get to look around and some young people come along and you see wow that person's got potential

01:12:00.460 that person's got potential and that person's got potential and god i can open up a door for this

01:12:05.660 person and that'll help them develop and i can offer an opportunity to this person and that'll help

01:12:10.200 them develop and maybe you're lucky and you can do that with 12 people and you see these people

01:12:14.460 grow and expand under your tutelage and you don't take too much credit for it you think wow that's

01:12:20.300 it's so intrinsically rewarding to do that you think well that's not like two lines of coke on a naked 0.98

01:12:27.260 supermodel on your goddamn yacht you know it's it's much more fundamental it's much more profound and 0.96

01:12:33.480 it's much more realistic and lasting and it's a much more accurate reflection of the way things work 0.99

01:12:38.800 at least among reasonable people and so what you do is you encourage you encourage young boys

01:12:45.780 literally you don't help them you don't make them safe you don't bother them when they're skateboarding

01:12:51.800 you watch them take their risks and you stand back and you think yeah kid you're gonna bruise yourself 0.56

01:12:57.060 man you're gonna cut yourself you're maybe you're gonna break a damn arm but hopefully only once and 0.94

01:13:01.540 you'll smarten up a bit as a consequence of that but you know you're you're you're preparing yourself 0.98

01:13:06.300 because there's tough things coming down the pipeline in your life and there's people you're

01:13:11.300 gonna bloody well depend on you know and you better be there for them and you're gonna have to be tough

01:13:16.880 not safe give up safe what the hell safe life 100% fatal there's no safety the best you can do is to

01:13:27.420 confront that courageously and to pursue something that's deeply meaningful right that's rule seven do what

01:13:33.580 is meaningful and not what is expedient you look for meaning in your life you find that through

01:13:38.720 responsibility you put that up against the tragedy and the malevolence of existence right you grow up

01:13:45.280 responsible and respectable and awake and wise and you take your place in the world and you act as a 0.96

01:13:51.580 cornerstone for your damn civilization and that's what you encourage and the lack of that 0.98

01:13:58.100 that's the crisis of masculinity 0.99

01:14:00.420 i'll be right back thank you

01:14:19.300 these are some chairs they are they are they're some some weird uk thing happening here

01:14:36.240 you were funny tonight well thank you yeah you went from a comedian you mean purposefully funny

01:14:43.260 i don't know that's the best kind yeah i think you were purposely funny i hope so yeah yeah feeling

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01:17:40.160 all right let's get to it in 50 years will students be referencing the joe rogan experience podcast

01:17:50.960 as reliable sources

01:18:01.660 well they are reliable sources i mean one of the things that's great about about the youtube media

01:18:12.380 explosion that you're part of is that they're not edited you know and and so they are reliable because

01:18:23.220 you get to see exactly what's happening and so that's a big plus and you know you and i have both

01:18:30.780 had this experience it's it's quite odd now for me increasingly odd to do network television

01:18:37.400 because i've done a lot of network television and i've done a lot of youtube and podcast interviews and

01:18:43.160 i'll tell you the to step into a television studio feels like stepping 30 years into the past

01:18:49.660 and the reason for that is that you just can't have a conversation with someone

01:18:55.460 in a tv studio it's very rare because everything's so tightly scripted and the person you're talking to

01:19:03.080 isn't a person they might as well be a simulacrum right there because they're not them they're the

01:19:09.240 voice of the show and so everything they do is scripted and so you have this conversation it is it's like

01:19:16.800 talking to a chatbot and not and not necessarily a very sophisticated one because you say something and

01:19:23.140 you expect that a person would carry that forward in a sort of melodic playful way and riff on it and

01:19:32.700 that isn't what happens as you say something and you get a kind of um not exactly a blank stare but

01:19:39.960 uh like i'm an attractive mannequin look that would be the right way of thinking about it and then they

01:19:45.820 ask whatever questions on the list it's like oh i see i guess none of what we just talked about had any

01:19:52.460 content and so you know be better just to provide pre-prepared answers to the pre-prepared questions

01:19:59.280 but the illusion is of a conversation whereas if you do a free-form interview like rogan it's like

01:20:06.760 you don't know what the hell is going to happen that's for sure and there's some real potential for

01:20:11.720 catastrophe there but whatever it is that's happening is it's it's honest in that everyone gets to see

01:20:20.900 all of it there's no a priori goal except let's try to have an interesting conversation and so

01:20:29.220 that is a reliable source so but god only knows what people will be referencing in 50 years i mean

01:20:36.680 jesus i don't even know what we'll be like in 50 years i've been watching the boston dynamics robots

01:20:41.500 there's some new videos have come out have you seen the everyone go look at the boston dynamics robots

01:20:47.100 everyone you got to see them they have one now god it's unbelievable it's this little thing about

01:20:52.780 the size of a dog weighs 35 pounds it can run around for an hour and a half on batteries they 0.89

01:20:58.000 had the damn thing dancing to and and twerking which is first time i've heard him say twerking 0.96

01:21:06.380 and it even it has an arm that kind of looks like a head and it can open doors and pick up cans and so 0.99

01:21:12.700 forth with it but it's so sophisticated now that it can do they call it chicken necking and so like

01:21:18.360 if a chicken this is true of all birds if if a chicken has its it holds its head up and then it

01:21:23.620 moves its body its head stays in the same place so it's sort of like this people kind of do the same

01:21:28.760 thing but you know we don't have such long necks so it's not as obvious this robot could do that

01:21:33.660 it could dance to music like really frenetically and hold its head in exactly the same position

01:21:38.700 go through doors they have one man a man-sized robot that can do backflips you can push it over

01:21:44.620 and it can get back up it's like that these robots they're coming fast and and and and we're making

01:21:51.260 our technology so spectacularly intelligent and god only knows what where we're going to be in 50 years

01:21:57.080 we better get ready because we're getting powerful man we better have our act together because it'll go

01:22:02.040 seriously wrong if we don't so i don't know what the hell people will be referencing in 50 years

01:22:06.960 as long as we're talking rogan next time i have you in studio will you smoke a blunt with me

01:22:13.120 only if you come to canada is it legal in california oh yeah it's now completely legal in canada

01:22:20.560 so that's good so now our completely inadequate prime minister can be stoned out of his gourd all the

01:22:27.680 time maybe that was the problem to begin with all right let's go political here recently a conservative

01:22:39.920 mp was forced to apologize for saying in the eu that the nazis were socialist were they socialist and

01:22:48.240 should the mp have apologized well they called themselves national socialists it's like yeah well

01:22:55.760 look it's it's complicated i'd actually thought about a research project to sort this out you

01:23:00.560 know because here's what you'd have to do to sort it out because it is complicated because um there

01:23:05.920 were the international socialists right and those were the russian communists essentially and there

01:23:10.560 were the national socialists and the national socialists were named in antithesis to the international

01:23:16.880 socialists and part of the reason the nazi movement emerged was as a response to the threat of

01:23:24.640 communist takeover in germany and that was a real threat because germany was in rough shape after

01:23:29.200 world war one i mean you think about it first of all there was all those brutalized men who'd spent

01:23:34.000 all those years in trenches and like that's not good for your mental health and you know they they were

01:23:38.880 they were in rough situation and then the treaty of versailles knocked germany down really hard and and

01:23:45.840 made the country labor under the necessity of reparations and so then they hyperinflated the

01:23:50.880 currency in the 1920s to blow out the debt and what that meant was like hyperinflation is really

01:23:56.480 hard on on good people right because you know the the idea is well you should save some money

01:24:04.400 you know that that's sensible forego gratification um and and and save for the future and and but then

01:24:12.400 if hyperinflation comes along it wipes out your savings and so it wipes out the savings of the

01:24:16.560 people who played the game most honestly and it rewards everybody who spent every cent they had

01:24:22.800 you know so that was depressing i mean you just can't imagine how depressing it would be to

01:24:27.760 you know to see your hard earned pension fund just completely evaporate and they had they had

01:24:34.480 hyperinflation of a magnitude that that maybe it was seen in zimbabwe i think zimbabwe had it worse but

01:24:40.560 it was terrible and so the national national socialism emerged and there was a lot of the policies that

01:24:47.440 were socialist not only in look but also in intent and in advertising so there's a strong socialist bent

01:24:55.920 but what kind of makes it right-wing in some sense is that it was also an ethno-nationalist movement and

01:25:02.400 it seems to me that one of the things that characterizes pathology on the right is over

01:25:09.920 enthusiastic identification with one restricted identity group so it would be ethnic or racial and

01:25:16.400 that was definitely a strong part of the platform of the national socialists that wasn't part of the

01:25:22.320 hypothetical doctrine of universal brotherhood that was put forward by the international socialists

01:25:27.840 so it was an amalgam now i think the way to sort this out and i would love to do this i'd even do

01:25:33.120 it at a university if it wasn't so difficult to do research at universities now um all you'd have to

01:25:40.000 do is take all the imagine you took a set a random set of doctrines from from the soviet union you know

01:25:46.720 policies and transform them so that they were made up to date but kept the the the meaning intact and

01:25:54.240 then do the parallel with the nazi doctrines you know you would eliminate the ones that would

01:25:59.520 this would be a bit tricky that would make it obvious that it was nazis and that would make

01:26:03.440 it a bit tricky and then what you do is make a questionnaire out of both and then you'd administer

01:26:09.280 the questionnaire to people who have identified political belief left or right and you'd see

01:26:13.840 who agreed most with what and if it turned out that the right-wingers were more likely to agree with

01:26:19.520 the national national socialist policies then you could make a fairly strong claim that that

01:26:24.000 was primarily right-wing and if it was the lefties that agreed with say the international

01:26:28.640 socialists and the national socialists then you could say that it was primarily left and i think

01:26:33.680 that's i really think that's an experiment like that's an experiment that a survey that could be

01:26:38.720 done that should be done see one of the things that happened after the after the second world war was

01:26:45.760 that there was an insistence among social scientists took me like four decades to figure this out because

01:26:50.720 it's such a mess i had to do a tremendous amount of reading that insisted that there was only

01:26:56.800 authoritarianism on the right and that was the predominant view in the social sciences from 1947 1948 right

01:27:04.800 till probably 2005 2006 my students started to put together an authoritarian leftist measurement instrument

01:27:16.480 but nothing like that had ever been created because there was an insistence especially by the uh

01:27:21.200 the the the uh what the hell do you call them it was horkheimer and his group and and

01:27:29.600 it's named after a city in germany frankfurt group there was an insistence from them that

01:27:35.280 authoritarianism was only a right-wing phenomena and so then there was an attempt to paint what happened in

01:27:40.160 nazi germany as purely a right-wing movement and um and that was definitely part of the desire to

01:27:49.360 absolve the left and so so there's a lot of intellectual crookedness about that and it hasn't

01:27:55.280 been sorted out properly and that was actually one of the things that i was trying to do with my students

01:28:00.800 before i stopped being stopped working as a university professor like my my student christine brophy

01:28:08.240 who's working on a high school version of the future authoring program um that was her next

01:28:12.880 project was an authoritarian leftist measurement instrument we'd already made some good measurement

01:28:19.200 instruments for assessing conservatism and looking at its underlying structure and so on so the

01:28:24.400 psychometrics haven't been done properly so the answer is we actually don't know and i think it's an

01:28:29.040 amalgam it might be an amalgam of the worst of the left and the worst of the right but they define

01:28:35.200 themselves as national socialists and the idea that you can be pilloried for noting that that was

01:28:41.520 a self-description and there were certainly socialist elements in their in their platform i mean they

01:28:46.880 were the nazis weren't libertarians by any stretch of the imagination they wanted a very powerful

01:28:52.320 centralized state and so the degree how that that's certainly not what like north american conservatives

01:28:59.360 want they want a small state and so it really is something that has to be sorted out and it's

01:29:04.800 something i'd like to do if i ever get time to do it so apparently you got a bunch of other things

01:29:12.400 going on these days huh oh i like this one i consider it a curse to be an intelligent and independent 0.99

01:29:20.880 thinker i feel my life would be happier if i were quote stupid 0.99

01:29:27.440 oh yeah that's the old ignorance is bliss oh yeah that's the old would you rather be i think was this 1.00

01:29:32.480 spinoza might have been spinoza might not have been well would you rather be a happy pig or an 0.95

01:29:38.320 unhappy philosopher right so that's basically the question and

01:29:42.080 i'm trying to remember exactly i gotta gotta remember this properly

01:29:53.120 i think it might have been in candide

01:29:58.400 i can't remember i'll just have to paraphrase it

01:30:02.320 dostievsky wrote about this too it's like well what makes you think you'd give up your misery

01:30:07.280 you know like people are self-conscious and that was presented in genesis the development

01:30:13.360 of self-consciousness is presented as a cataclysm right an absolute cataclysm an event that shattered

01:30:19.520 the structure of reality when people became aware of their own nakedness and mortality and the scales

01:30:24.800 fell from their eyes and woke up and discovered death and and suffering you know and it's tainted life

01:30:31.360 and that's exactly the complaint here it's like the complaint is something like i find my

01:30:36.480 expanded consciousness unbearable it's like well yeah no kidding look at what you see

01:30:42.640 around you you know you see limitation and suffering and maybe you see that even more intently

01:30:47.920 think well wouldn't it be better to just be as unconscious as an animal well

01:30:55.520 that ship sailed a long time ago you know and it's not like we don't regress that's one of the

01:31:01.600 the things alcohol does you know alcohol is definitely a drug that invites the flight into

01:31:06.800 unconsciousness partly because it works as an anxiolytic um so one of the problems with being 0.98

01:31:13.120 self-conscious is that you're aware that stupid things you do will hurt you that's very annoying 0.94

01:31:18.640 it's one of the terrible things about being awake it's like oh god that would be fun oh yes but then i'd 0.99

01:31:24.320 have to suffer for it oh no that means i can't have fun better go get drunk

01:31:31.440 then the fact that it might hurt me won't bother me and i can have some fun and that that is exactly

01:31:36.880 what alcohol does and it's a it's a it's a negative transcendence which is how aldous huxley described

01:31:42.560 alcohol and it's very tempting and no bloody wonder it's like people are rushing all the time to escape

01:31:48.400 from the burden of their self acute self-consciousness like self-consciousness as a phenomena

01:31:54.560 phenomenon loads on trait neuroticism so you know because to say well i got self-conscious when i

01:32:01.600 talk it's like well that's an elevated form of consciousness but it's very painful because it

01:32:05.600 makes you aware of your inadequacy okay there's a great book about this by the way it's a very hard

01:32:10.400 book but it's a great book called the origins and history of consciousness by a man named eric neumann

01:32:15.680 i was just talking to camille pellia yesterday um she just wrote a new book and she wrote an essay

01:32:22.400 about 20 years ago suggesting that the best thinker for english for for literary critics to have chosen

01:32:31.200 as an alternative to derrida and foucault would have been eric neumann who was a student of jung's and i

01:32:36.480 agree with that origins and history of consciousness is a brilliant book and one of the things he points

01:32:41.520 out is that there's a struggle in human beings self-conscious consciousness has to struggle

01:32:47.360 upwards and it's pulled downwards by the desire for unconsciousness that's part of the oedipal

01:32:53.200 catastrophe of freud it's like because an over-dependent mother can say look kiddo going out in the in 0.81

01:32:59.520 the world and challenging yourself and developing that self-consciousness is going to introduce you to

01:33:04.000 a world of pain and agony as you become more and more aware it's like i can pull you back and shelter

01:33:09.840 you from all that now the problem is is that there's a crippling that goes along with that

01:33:14.320 but it's in see jung characterized that oedipal relationship as a as a conspiracy between mother

01:33:20.080 and child it's not something the mother imposes it's like a it's like a pathological invitation it's

01:33:25.600 like just stay with me and you'll never have to face the catastrophes of the world it's like well that's

01:33:31.360 a potent invitation given the catastrophes of the world you see this reflected as well i wrote about

01:33:37.360 this in 12 rules that famous statue by michelangelo the pieta right where you see mary holding the

01:33:44.000 broken body of christ in her arms it's like that's the female crucifixion in some sense it's like because

01:33:50.160 what a woman has to do with her son is offer him up to be broken by the world and he has to take that 0.90

01:33:56.480 responsibility onto himself and so that's a dreadful thing and so then the question is what do you do

01:34:02.000 about it and see this is part of what struck me so hard about christianity in as a as a philosophical

01:34:08.160 system and it's it's judeo-christianity more broadly speaking and maybe even the sum total of

01:34:14.560 the searching for human wisdom across all of the time that we've been self-consciousness what's the

01:34:20.160 antidote to self-consciousness well one is a return to unconscious oblivion and that that's a suicidal

01:34:28.960 desire it might even be a genocidal desire you know it might underlie our desire to drive ourselves

01:34:34.960 to the brink of nuclear destruction saying that it would be better if being itself didn't exist

01:34:40.240 because of its suffering that's one way out it'll obliterate everything because of its suffering the

01:34:47.200 other way out is more consciousness more attention more of what's more of what's poisoning you

01:34:55.280 because that's the way out is to become more conscious and the so here i'll give you an

01:35:01.120 example this is one of the most brilliant things i've ever seen there's this painting that was done

01:35:05.360 in the middle ages it's in it's in my book maps of meaning and it's a tree and it's the tree of the

01:35:11.360 knowledge of good and evil and and and and and the tree has has uh on one half of it it it's it's

01:35:23.440 okay it's okay it's all right i'll just finish i appreciate it but it's it's okay you were just

01:35:27.920 going to show me the picture i believe but i'll just go on with it so all right so on on half of the

01:35:33.840 tree there's apples and the apples are skulls okay and so you see um eve picking the apple skulls and

01:35:43.600 handing them to humanity and so that's the discovery of death and that's a catastrophe right if that's

01:35:49.840 the emergence into self-consciousness and that that is portrayed in our most fundamental narratives as us

01:35:55.840 as a split in the structure of reality itself and given the importance role that consciousness plays

01:36:01.280 in reality i think that that's a reasonable statement something broke when we became

01:36:05.680 self-conscious we became aware of our own mortality and that's when evil entered the world because

01:36:10.720 you can't be cruel until you understand your own vulnerability you can't know how to hurt other

01:36:16.480 people until you know that you can be hurt so when you discover your own limitations the knowledge

01:36:21.280 of good and evil enters the world okay so there's the tree and on one half of it are the apple skulls

01:36:27.440 and eve is distributing them and then on the other half there's there's a there's a skull at the top

01:36:32.720 of the tree and the other half there's a crucifix with christ in the tree and then there's other

01:36:37.040 apples but they're the wheat and hosts that are part of the transformation mass right so that's the body

01:36:42.320 and bread of christ and so the church a female it's the negative and positive female the church is handing 0.97

01:36:49.200 out these hosts to other human beings to invite them to be cured of what the apple how the apple poisoned

01:36:58.320 them and so there's an idea there and the idea is it's a very complicated idea that's why it's expressed

01:37:03.840 in this painting and we've been trying to figure out what this idea means for thousands and thousands

01:37:07.840 of years it's so complicated it means that if you take on the burden of mortality and you and you face

01:37:16.880 that completely that will produce in you a series of transformations that are somewhat akin to deaths

01:37:22.880 and resurrections and that will elevate your consciousness to the point where you can transcend

01:37:28.320 the catastrophe of self-consciousness and so that's the meaning of the eating of the body and blood of

01:37:34.320 christ that's the idea it's an unbelievable unbelievably profound idea that more consciousness is

01:37:41.440 the cure for what half consciousness poisons you with and that that requires this burning off of

01:37:48.320 dead with dead wood and constant re-transformation then you might say well is that only psychological

01:37:53.920 right because you could read it only symbolically but you might say well you don't know because

01:37:59.280 if you if people turn around and and accept the full catastrophic reality of their existence and that's

01:38:06.000 this terrible self-consciousness and decide that they're going to struggle forward admirably despite

01:38:11.920 that then they actually start to contend with it and fix it and here's an open question you know

01:38:18.480 there's this idea of the genie and the genie is genius and the genie is infinite potential

01:38:23.600 constrained in in something very tiny and that's us you know we have this terrible constraint but there's

01:38:30.160 like an infinite potential within us that's what makes us akin to deity in some sense and makes us

01:38:36.800 makes us made in the image of god and and is the foundation for our value our intrinsic value

01:38:43.600 before the law we we treat this very seriously that potential lies within you what would happen if you

01:38:51.120 revealed it fully well maybe we would not only dispense with our cowardice in the face of suffering

01:38:57.200 it's maybe we would overcome and i don't even know what this means precisely maybe we would

01:39:02.000 overcome suffering itself maybe we would overcome malevolence itself we don't know what we're capable

01:39:07.680 of and so that's the answer to that question it's like no you don't shrink backwards all that does is

01:39:14.320 make things worse it turns you into an animal but that doesn't even work because it's too late for that

01:39:18.880 you can't go back there's no going back there's only going forward and and going forward in the full

01:39:27.040 sense means it means full acceptance of the entire catastrophe of existence and then forthright attempt to

01:39:34.400 do everything you can to rectify it so

01:39:45.440 so

01:39:47.840 i feel like we should we should roll with this so what tools

01:39:52.560 to peep should people use to actually do that i mean if you were if you were in a clinical practice

01:39:57.680 with somebody and they were coming to you with this what would you tell them

01:40:01.360 well if you look at the sermon on the mount for example the sermon on the mount is a very

01:40:06.000 interesting psychological document because it's a meditation on what constitutes that which is of

01:40:12.160 central value and so it's part of so what happens in the old testament in some sense is that human

01:40:17.840 beings watch each other act and then they conjure up a set of rules that approximately encapsulates

01:40:24.080 civilized action and so that would be the expanded decalogue the the law

01:40:29.920 right and and the law wasn't imposed from the top down

01:40:33.680 it it emerged it's like

01:40:35.920 moses the mythological moses

01:40:38.560 let's say observed

01:40:40.560 the structure of morality and then said okay well here's

01:40:43.840 what it would look like if you made it into rules

01:40:46.560 you know it's like a wolf pack watched what it did and said oh here's wolf pack rules

01:40:50.560 you know and they're not rules to begin with they're just patterns patterns become rules

01:40:55.840 and then you can follow the rules but then you have the problem of the rules it's like well the

01:40:59.520 rules conflict with one another so like what's the greatest rule this is what happens in the new

01:41:03.840 testament a lot because christ annoys everyone by pitting one rule against another so he heals on the

01:41:10.160 sabbath it's like well is that good or bad well he's trying to point out that you have to produce

01:41:15.520 a hierarchy of rules so that you can produce what constitutes the highest value and in the sermon

01:41:20.720 on the mount the idea is that it's something like this it's a bit of an oversimplification but it will

01:41:26.240 do is that you want to orient yourself towards the highest good that you can possibly conceive of

01:41:32.640 and that gives your life purpose real purpose and that that that orientation would be something like

01:41:39.840 the constraint of suffering and and but not in just a merely compassionate manner because that

01:41:46.080 doesn't solve the problem right it's a serious problem to address suffering and the constraint

01:41:50.560 of malevolence that's partly why christ meets the devil in the desert right you have to you have to

01:41:55.920 transcend evil and you have to you have to you have to face suffering those are those are the

01:42:01.680 part and parcel of developing that that ultimate vision and that vision is something like well it's it's

01:42:08.080 it's whatever is going to stand for you as the highest value and that'd be the relationship with

01:42:12.800 god if you put it religiously it's to live the best life you can possibly imagine and that's going to

01:42:18.480 change a bit as you get wiser but that's what you're aiming at right it's like i often tell people you

01:42:23.600 watch the movie pinocchio you know and geppetto wishes on a star and that starts the transformation

01:42:29.360 process of his creation the wooden headed puppet who's nothing but a marionette manipulated from behind

01:42:35.280 the scenes geppetto raises his eyes above the horizon looks to that which glitters in the

01:42:40.800 darkness and makes a wish it's a transformation wish and that gets the ball rolling and that's what

01:42:45.600 you need in your own life you have to decide that there isn't going to be anything that takes the

01:42:50.400 place of you aiming at the highest possible good then you concentrate on the day and that's and then you

01:42:59.600 stumble forward that way you know and rule four is compare yourself to who you were yesterday and

01:43:05.680 not to who someone else is today it's like okay you're not everything you could be you bloody well 0.66

01:43:10.240 know it and maybe you're too resentful and miserable and bitter and burdened by your self-consciousness to

01:43:15.600 wanting to do anything about it but that's not helpful it it's a road it's the pathway to hell for all

01:43:22.560 intents and purposes you orient yourself and you stand up straight and face things courageously and try to

01:43:29.520 find the highest value because what what do you have that's better to do than that and then you move

01:43:35.520 towards it and you focus on the day and you do everything you can during the day to act responsibly

01:43:40.720 and truthfully and to set things right and that atones that that brings things together and that

01:43:47.840 that's in that manner you partake in the creation of the world i would say in the creation of the world

01:43:53.360 that's good and that's your ethical responsibility and in that there might be sufficient meaning to

01:43:59.360 justify the suffering of life i think that that's accurate it seems to me to be that that works and

01:44:06.080 you know i have people they come and talk to me all the time these guys that i talked to this morning

01:44:10.320 many of them they say you know look i was miserable and doing a bunch of bad things by their own

01:44:16.560 definition you know and they decided they were going to take on some responsibility and bear a heavy

01:44:22.640 burden and try to and try to make things better and to be more honest and what they report is well

01:44:31.840 everything is way better it's like yes well then you ask yourself how much better could we make things

01:44:39.200 i had this vision once of heaven you know it's a very powerful vision and heaven was a place where

01:44:44.880 where everything was it was like a place where you were eternally playing like a child in in a in a place

01:44:52.640 that that a father who loved you had prepared for you there was that joy in it but the joy was of a

01:44:58.240 very particular sort because it was a joy that was aimed at producing the next level of joy so it was

01:45:04.480 like a heaven that would reveal another heaven within it and then that would reveal another heaven within

01:45:09.280 that and that there was no limit to that and maybe that's our destiny to do that and maybe that's what

01:45:15.520 we're struggling to do now i mean we're we're at a pretty low level heaven at the moment but but it

01:45:21.520 could be it could be much better and i think that that's what music expresses to us you know when i listen

01:45:26.480 to a box say a third brandenburg concerto it it it it there's a pattern that emerges it's beautiful it's

01:45:34.720 like an architectural motif you know like like a flower that's opening up and out of that comes

01:45:40.320 another one and it's even greater and out of that comes another one it's this continually on continual

01:45:45.520 unfolding of crystalline beauty you see that in your great cathedrals there there are expressions of that

01:45:51.840 in stone and lattice this beautiful tapestry of structure and and light that that's a representative

01:45:59.520 of well it's a representative of the heavenly city essentially it's a representative of what we

01:46:03.920 could be striving to create and so and that's what you do with your terrible burden of self-consciousness

01:46:10.800 you know and you do that in the day-to-day struggles that you have and you start small

01:46:14.400 and humbly because that's where you start there's plenty to fix up around you you know and and and

01:46:22.400 there's no limit to that and i really believe that i don't have any idea this is the problem with 50

01:46:27.520 years in the future is god only knows what we could create and and what we're what we're destined to

01:46:32.880 create we're on the cusp of a new age and if we if we aimed properly maybe we could tilt everything so

01:46:41.520 that it would get better and better and better and better and better you know what do they say

01:46:45.360 to those who have more will be given and from those who have nothing everything will be taken and

01:46:51.360 so maybe we could decide that we would like to be those who have to whom more would be given and we

01:46:56.800 start by giving to ourselves you know and and and participating in the process of creative

01:47:02.240 production and and and and the amelioration of suffering and the combat with malevolence within

01:47:08.240 ourselves and that's this that's look it's a central message of our culture to do that what are we wrong

01:47:14.880 about that look at what we've built because of it it's no time to give up faith in that it's time to

01:47:21.120 redouble the faith and as nietzsche said there's never been true christians

01:47:35.680 and that ladies and gentlemen is how you end a show so i am going to get out of the way and make

01:47:41.360 some noise for jordan peterson everybody

01:47:43.200 if you found this conversation meaningful you might think about picking up dad's books

01:47:49.520 maps of meaning the architecture of belief or his newer bestseller 12 rules for life an antidote

01:47:54.080 to chaos both of these works delve much deeper into the topics covered in the jordan b peterson

01:47:58.320 podcast see jordanbpeterson.com for audio ebook and text links or pick up the books at your favorite

01:48:04.320 bookseller i really hope you enjoyed this podcast if you did please leave a rating at apple podcasts a

01:48:09.760 comment to review or share this episode with a friend if you didn't keep it to yourself we're

01:48:14.640 still at five stars thanks for tuning in and talk to you next week follow me on my youtube channel

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01:48:28.480 at jordan.b.peterson details on this show access to my blog information about my tour dates and other

01:48:36.720 events and my list of recommended books can be found on my website jordanbpeterson.com my online

01:48:44.000 writing programs designed to help people straighten out their pasts understand themselves in the present

01:48:50.000 and develop a sophisticated vision and strategy for the future can be found at self-authoring.com

01:48:56.160 that's self-authoring.com from the westwood one podcast network

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The Jordan B. Peterson Podcast - October 13, 2019

The Crisis of Masculinity

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