The Attack on Super Heroes ｜ Eric July
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Summary
On this episode of The Michael Knowles Show, host Michael sits down with conservative commentator Eric July (YoungRipa59) to discuss his thoughts on the current state of the comic book industry, and the influence of radical leftist writers.
Transcript
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I'm Michael Knowles, and this is The Michael Knowles Show.
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Everywhere I go lately, people tell me that I need to interview Eric July. It doesn't matter
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what state I'm in. It doesn't matter what we're talking about. I was at Tim Pool's place not so
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long ago. He said, you got to talk to Eric July. I said, okay, I got to learn about this guy. So I
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look up Eric July, also known as YoungRipa59. I had already reserved YoungRipa58, which is why he
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had to go to 59. He's got some really, really terrific commentary, in particular on the
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entertainment media and specifically about comic books. But this guy is a man of many, many talents.
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You also may have seen him in the Thomas Sowell documentary, which is really terrific. Thomas
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Sowell, common sense in a senseless world. So we're going to try to make sense of this senseless world.
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Eric, thank you for coming on. I appreciate you having me, Michael. Thank you so much.
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So I need you to educate me about a topic on which I am entirely ignorant. And this is the topic of
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comic books. I won't say that I'm entirely ignorant. Here is what I know. I only know what
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I read in the news that all of a sudden comic books, which I thought it's just a fun thing that
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people, you know, either people with a very specific interest or, you know, people growing up,
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they read them. They keep hiring radical leftists to write them. In particular, there's that guy,
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Ton Nahisi Coates, who I think may be the single most overrated writer in America today. I'm the guy
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who wrote a book without any words. And I think that this guy is way, way over overrated. So tell me,
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I mean, is this just some strange coincidence? I mean, what, what is going on behind the scenes
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in the comic books? Yeah, it's not a coincidence at all. It seems like within the last decade,
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I would say more so in the middle of the, of the 2010s, you started to see this big time,
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like cultural shift and in terms of who were writing these books. Now, often you'd get people
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that were already part of like the comic book culture, like you mentioned, kind of, it is niche.
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It takes a certain kind of person to even write and be knowledgeable on these,
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on these characters, definitely though, of the Marvels and the DCs and mainstream comics.
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And at some point, like the 2010s, they shifted and rather seem to focus on hiring people that were
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more so fitting a particular social or political view. And this is why you got guys like Ton Nahisi
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Coates writing, unfortunately, Black Panther, one of my favorite characters. And he had no business
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being anything near that project, that intergalactic Wakanda or whatever weird thing they'd call
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himself doing. To me, it's the worst run of Black Panther that we've ever got, but you can check
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the receipts on that. Ton Nahisi Coates, there's no evidence even that he was, was even like into
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comic books prior to being hired as a writer for, for Marvel comics. So those are the types of hires
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that, that we're getting guys like Ton Nahisi Coates. It's a literal award with the Harriet Beecher
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Stowe War for social justice. I'm pretty sure that has something to do with why he fit that position.
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And they seem to try to cater to people and bringing people on to write their projects,
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writing for people that don't read books, right? It does have a specific demographic,
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an already established demographic, and their sales are really, really hurting. And you're
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seeing that because of that, because they have focused on social views and political views as
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opposed to actually entertaining their audience. And this is why right now, for example, in America,
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in the West for the first time, I believe ever, the NBD book scans read that the Japanese comics,
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the mangas had, the top 20 were all mangas in America. The top 20 sales were all manga because
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that's where people are going to get their more like kind of comic book hero based sort of material.
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They have just completely dumped a Marvel and they should be embarrassed, but it doesn't seem
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Well, this is one of the problems that I think conservatives are grappling with right now.
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So you look at the numbers, you look at book scan, Americans are not buying the American comics
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anymore. They're buying the Japanese comics. So what I think a lot of conservatives, what we've
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told ourselves for the past few decades of insane leftist aggression on the culture wars is we'll say,
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look, eventually the almighty dollar is going to win out. They're going to put out really bad
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stories. And eventually, because they're not going to have any sales, they're going to be forced to go
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back to producing entertaining, normal content. And I keep waiting and I keep waiting for it from the
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movies. And I don't read comic books, but I would be waiting for it from the comic books. And it just
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doesn't happen. So is it, are they just willing to take the financial loss to push the woke ideology?
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I think that's exactly what it is. And I think, look, they did cater to a really flaky audience.
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I think that stuff kind of works a little more for the like the I guess the movies, film, TV shows
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way more than it works for something like the comic books. But they are more, I guess maybe it's
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Twitter, maybe it's the Instagrams of the world. And they're more like signaling to that kind of weird,
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bizarre audience, which does not even represent a significant portion of the population, at least
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not of actual customers. And yeah, they just when you think they can't get worse, you see again,
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and I was believe that was April top 20. You think these comic pros would be looking at that? Like,
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okay, we got to pivot. We have to pivot. We cannot just keep putting out this dog crap. And then I was
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just reading the other day, they put for one odd reason, they made Electra Daredevil. Now,
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Daredevil is no longer a guy. Electra is Daredevil. And she's being lectured by some like trans person
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about other bull crap that has it's so out of character for not only Electra, but just that's
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what they're doing is Pride Month. They're trying to signal and do all of that stuff. So yeah, they
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keep doubling down. So I do think at some point, the pendulum is going to swing. But what will it
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take? It's hard to say. But things like DC, and this was what a lot of comic book fans feared,
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not myself necessarily, people that are way smarter than me. They feared once it went
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mainstream, mainstream, I use that in quotes. And I guess they got tied to these mega corporate
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entities. They could take that loss a lot more than what they could back in the past. So they're
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willing to take it. Probably guys at the top aren't even seeing it. We know they're not making
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money, but you know how Disney works. Disney can do 10 projects. One of them can succeed and
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it'll fund the rest of everything it is that they do. So they can take the hit because they're not
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necessarily answering directly to the customers like other, like more smaller entities have to.
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So that's the one benefit that they have. They can continue to take those losses because they're
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able to make up for the losses elsewhere. But it'll be interesting to see. There's been plenty of
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rumors and that maybe, you know, it was AT&T, I believe owns DC. Now they're talking about selling that
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stuff off and we'll see how long Disney keeps a hold of it because the only thing that they can
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make money off of it is maybe the movies. And even those are starting to take a downturn in the
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merchandise. But that's about it. As far as the books, don't be surprised if at some point even
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Disney or AT&T say, you know, we're not even going to put these out. We're going to do reprints or
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something like that. But you guys aren't making any money. But it doesn't sound like they're in the
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business of actually making money. This is a problem throughout the corporate media. It's true in the
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news media. It's true in the movies. You know, these entities are very often owned by much larger
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corporate entities who don't really care. You know, if the wokesters in the executive suites
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want to push a message, they just don't really care about the relatively small amount of money
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they're going to lose. And I do think it's been a big problem that conservatives basically have
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thought that the most important issue to people, they wake up in a cold sweat in the middle of the
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night thinking about some marginal tax cut and an occupational licensing reform. I like those
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things. I'm not against them. I'm just saying other, other impulses move men's hearts and minds.
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Now, so I'm totally on board for fighting in the culture, taking back the culture, using our
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political power to do it. The thing I can't get that into is the comic books. I just, just as a
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personal, Matt, it's just a preference thing. Do I need to pay attention? Is the fact that these
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comic book characters are going totally woke, is that actually going to have tangible effects
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on our society? Or is that one area that I can just ignore? It's a niche interest and
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I'll focus elsewhere. That's a great, great question. I think when you look at, for example,
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what, like for example, Hollywood in the last 10 years, I think you, you can't really ignore it
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because you look at the Marvel Cinematic Universe. For example, they were just pumping out billion
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dollar films like it was going out of style. And that is, that's, that's influential. And you're
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right in terms of conservatives, libertarians. This is something I've been trying to shake their
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shoulders on, not necessarily with the comic books, but also with the other things that I do,
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whether it be with the music stuff and everything else. I'm saying, yeah, we have the arguments on
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our side, but is that good enough? I don't think so. And this is what a lot of the left
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give, I have to give them credit. They played the long game and there was nothing off limits for
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them. Nothing. I say if it was the more, more influential that it was, they were like, all
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right, let's get ahold of it. And they played the long game. And I think what you're seeing now is
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the, the effects, especially over the last, last year, when you can't turn on, I can't even turn
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on a video game without seeing black lives matter, uh, on freaking soccer game or something like,
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or like FIFA. It's nonsense. Like I don't, I don't play video. I'm supposed to get away with that.
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But I think the left had benefited from both libertarians and conservatives thinking that
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those are trivial things. Like we don't, people don't care about that type of thing,
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but it's a very influential thing, especially when it comes to like younger generations,
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that stuff that they're, they have their nose in. So often that's something that they're intrigued by.
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And, and I'm like you in a sense that there are other subject matters that I simply do not care
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about, but I can't deny if they are important and if they are influential, definitely. If someone is
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able to be more like they can communicate in whatever subculture it is that they are in.
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And I think that's, if there's going to ever be a tide shift towards Liberty, people that actually
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value Liberty and private property rights, that's where it's going to happen. It's not necessarily,
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I believe politics, I believe that's more so on the downstream.
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You change this and people's minds and hearts starts to change. And then maybe that manifests
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itself in other ways. Maybe it is in a political sphere, maybe it's somewhere else, but the left,
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they have everything because for a very long time, both libertarians and conservatives neglected a lot
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of that. And we just simply didn't think it was as important as what it actually was. And this is why
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so many of these, like these younger folk there, they, they got them in. I mean, it doesn't matter
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what it is that they pump out. They walk right hand in hand with them. And, uh, yeah, they listen
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to them. That's right. You, you may not care about the culture, but the culture cares about you. And
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I, you know, people do this a lot with the pronoun issue. We'll say, should I call Bruce Jenner,
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he or she, and we, everyone gets into big debates about this. And, uh, some of the more squishy
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conservatives, they'll often say, who cares, right? It's the same thing on the comic books. It's the
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same thing on all these aspects of the culture. Oh, who cares? Uh, the left cares. The left seems
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to care quite a lot, which is why they're losing a lot of money, pushing these messages. They're
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hiring these radicals like Ta-Nehisi Coates. They're hot. They're really focused on it because
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they know that the culture can carry whole premises through to it. But I wonder, I wonder if part of it
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is conservatives have just, and libertarians have just ignored it and they just don't really care that
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much. But also what would we do with the power if we actually knew to wield it? But by that, I mean,
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the left has a very specific vision of society. America is evil, racist, sexist, whatever, you
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know, it's all sorts of terrible stuff and we got to tear it down and pull down statues of Washington.
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Okay. What is the conservative response? What is our substantive view of things? Do we have one
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or is it just that we can't really agree on anything? So the only thing we do when we have power is
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temporarily cut taxes a little bit? Yeah, see, that's always the question that I think is very
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difficult for people that, again, no matter what it is you call yourself, it's just if you value
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liberty, like what's next? Obviously you brought it, I mean, I believe that stems from obviously the
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Marxism it is that they advocate where it's just anything that exists. They want to make sure they
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tear it down and build it up in a way or build it back up in a way that they envision it, this sort of
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anti-property rights, more radical, egalitarian, I use that term loosely, egalitarian sort of approach
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where we're all like equal robots when we know that's absolutely not the case, but let them tell
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it that's what they believe. I think this is why I was focused so much on decentralization so much
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because if anything, if there's anything else to focus on, because you're right, I do believe that
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there's a lot of people that value liberty that are on different sides of just different subject
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matters. They differ so much and it's like, okay, I just want to be left alone, right? The left doesn't
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want to leave you alone and this is why they get the power and they're like, look, we're here to
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destroy and they're pretty blatant and pretty honest about it. We just want to be left alone and we want
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other people to just be able to go about their life without being able to either be aggressed upon
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and obviously them not having the right to use aggression upon peaceful people. And this is why that has to
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stay at the top. If you are in any sort of advocacy position or really in any position of influence,
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it has to stay at the top and you have to be loud. And unfortunately, a lot of conservatives seem to
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lose sight of that. Even the ones that focus a lot on, okay, I just want to own the libs and stuff like
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that. I mean, I get it, but is that actually going to work us towards a more freer, a more prosperous
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society, right? And this is why decentralization is such a focus of mine because it's like, we're not going
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to agree on how this power needs to be willed. So at minimum, if we can try to like get, I don't
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know, get rid of it. So where we don't have Nancy Pelosi and these other quacks out of that there
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and Washington, I've made this argument on the blaze every day that I'm there. I'm less about
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arguing with Nancy Pelosi about who should be in her position. I want to pull the rug from up under
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her so she doesn't have any sort of influence. So they can't make the decisions that it is that more
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so impacts our life. This is why we get so up in arms. So maybe we have to change that part of
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the power structure as opposed to just wielding it and just focusing on, yeah, we may get a tax cut
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here, we may get a tax cut there, but it has to come with mountains of corporate welfare and all
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sorts of things that we're funding. They compromise. Definitely, we see this with a lot of even the
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conservatives, they'll compromise on, or the Republicans compromise on certain things. Okay,
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we'll give you this, this and that port field bill, $2 trillion. Let's devalue your money in
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the first place. And we don't really work towards liberty. And that's what has to be kept in mind.
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I wish I would, I would love to hear or see rather Republicans actually keeping that at the forefront
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of what their advocacy actually is. The term that I like to use is that they tend to campaign like
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libertarians and then govern like Democrats. I would love to change that.
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Well, there's this strange paradox. I don't know if it's really a paradox, but it is a strange
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circumstance that at least since Reagan, at least since Republicans have really embraced,
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as you say, the kind of libertarian language on the campaign trail, they actually have put forward
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some policies in that direction. You know, they've focused a lot on economic deregulation. Okay. And
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the Democrats I find, since around the same time, maybe a little earlier, have focused a lot on social
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deregulation. You know, you can sleep with whoever you want. You can kill a baby in the womb. You can
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kind of do whatever you want. And so, you know, in a weird way, they've both kind of deregulated.
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And yet, as you rightly point out, we seem to be in the most centralized, powerful government,
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you know, maybe in the history of the world. So how does that happen? I mean, how has a process that
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I don't think is just totally disingenuous, I think they actually have deregulated in certain
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pretty noticeable ways. But how has that deregulation then led to a more powerful,
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centralized government? I can't make sense of it. Right. And it is, I think it's because they're
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not focusing on the, I guess, the power more so in itself. It's more so, okay, I'll take this slight
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victory here. I'm on this. It's more topic to topic. And I'm not, I'm not against like single
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issues or focusing on people have their expertise and stuff that they, they actually value. And I think
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that's a valuable thing that people focus on, whatever it is that they find as the strengths
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or something that it is that they care about. But what happens is they lose sight of what the
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actual like core principle is. And that's liberty. For example, this is why I don't take leftists
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serious when they complain about, let's say things like police brutality. That is not anything to take
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serious from them because they have no problem with the cops whooping up on you in the event,
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in the event that it's for something that they want to, to advocate for, which is why they're
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like non-existent in the event. Or there'll be like, contradict themselves. Like we saw with the
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whole January 6th thing, they're doing vigils and all of this for that lie of Brian Sicknick being
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beat over the head with a fire extinguisher, which was of course turned out to not even be true.
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But that's the type of stuff that they do because for them, it's, it's less, it's not necessarily
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about the deregulation. It's more about what can we do to destabilize, uh, let's say what exists
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right now so we can actually capture that power. So this is why, even though they claim to be okay,
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like even with the drugs, they like to think that they're the party against the war on drugs,
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which is bull crap, but they like to think that, but it seems to always lead like to what you said,
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more centralization. That's because liberty isn't really on their focus. It's more single issue,
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single issue. What do I have to do? Or what do I have to advocate to become prominent and to get
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the power? And when you don't focus on the private property right element of what it is that we're,
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we're discussing, then yeah, you're going to lose sight of that. And this is what we have right now,
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big bloated centralized, uh, uh, mess. And unfortunately it's ruining a lot of people's
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lives. Well, and you've totally hit the nail on the head on this power struggle. I notice even
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on the issues where they talk about liberty, you'll notice they never really mean liberty in the way that,
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you know, a conservative person would talk about it. They mean, they mean licentiousness. The only,
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they're not really interested in the liberty to tamp down your appetites and govern yourself and
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exert political control. They only talk about liberty and like shooting up dope or something.
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Liberty is the kind of degrade us and take us out of our heads. And so.
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That's right. Yeah. I mean, these, and these are things, by the way, the founding fathers
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explicitly said, they said, do not abuse liberty to licentiousness. That's a bad idea. You're
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going to lose your self-government if you do that. So, so they do this all the time. But then I wonder,
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do conservatives need, and I wonder this, I, you know, this is sort of a thesis that I've put out
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there. I know it's very controversial, but do conservatives need a substantive vision?
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Meaning what we've tried to do, I think with the best of intentions is, is nothing. And what I mean
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by that is, you know, you get power and you say, I'm not going to regulate. I'm not going to do this.
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I'm not going to, we're going to let people make their own decisions, leave them alone. And then the
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left won't leave anybody alone. And the left won't let anybody be left alone. And it's just
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not going to happen. So, you know, a Republican wins and, and we basically freeze the culture and
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we say, okay, we've got sort of a break for the next two or four years. And then the Democrats win
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and they push the culture to the left. And then maybe a Republican wins and we freeze it again.
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And so, you know, if you, if you follow that process, we're going to be over the cliff on the
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left and not, not too far into the future. So how do, how do we reverse it? How do we,
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how do we go in the other direction? Right. And this is why, you know, I know Malice and other
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guys use the whole, well, this is what they are like progressives going to speed limit is more so
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what it is that you're, that, that, that you're saying. And this is what, what frustrates me so
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much, probably the most about a lot of Republicans that are in the positions of power because often
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they're never on the offense, right? Always on the defense, always on the defense. And even when it
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comes to something as fundamental, like, which is where libertarians, conservatives, we all agree,
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we value the, uh, like gun ownership, gun rights, the second amendment. They only get on offense when
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they think that a Democrat is taking it to them. So we got, for example, I'm out, well, I'm out in
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Texas and you know, we got governor Abbott who calls himself trying to basically make Texas a, a, a,
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a sanctuary, a city in terms of the second amendment. What took you so long? Like why,
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why all of a sudden are you now on the offense and we've seen it? It's more so when that, like I said,
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they're more about owning the, the, the, the libs. It's more so taking it to them and being
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against them. And this is what I called about the election. I said, don't be so frightened to
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really think that they're just going to get this power and do whatever it is that they want.
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They'll attempt to do, but what you're going to see is a more offensive Republican party,
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uh, or at least the ones that, you know, semi value Liberty. You're going to see a more
00:21:10.800
offensive Republican party because now they can at least make the excuse that, well, we're trying
00:21:14.400
to stop them or we're trying to take it, take it to them, uh, in some way. So what the, what people
00:21:19.840
that if you desire any sort of political power or whatever it is, you have to be on the absolute
00:21:25.400
offense, but just sitting there and thinking, well, I'm in this position will be in the, on the defense,
00:21:30.080
uh, for as long as my term is, isn't an effective thing. And you've seen that leftists get in power
00:21:36.480
and they're like, I'm implementing whatever it is that I can. And maybe this conversation,
00:21:40.800
maybe it won't happen right now, but I at least get the conversation started in four or five years,
00:21:44.820
uh, from now, something gets implemented and we know we're moving. It's not moving towards
00:21:49.680
Liberty. It's moving to the absolute opposite way. So they have to get on the offense and stop,
00:21:54.360
uh, more so being reactionary and waiting for them to do something. The leftists do something. And then,
00:21:59.880
uh, people that are in power, uh, libertarians or conservatives or whoever, they're like,
00:22:04.220
okay, now I'm going to do something. How about do something all the time?
00:22:07.480
You know that you've hit the nail on the head here, especially with this pun offensive. And I
00:22:13.500
think of Trump who goes on the offense and he is offensive. He says offensive things, but it is
00:22:20.920
important. I'm not saying people need to be impolite. I'm not saying they need to be cruel
00:22:24.780
or anything like that, but Trump calls it like he sees it. And he doesn't engage in these sort of
00:22:29.760
abstract ideological things from a, in a think tank somewhere. And he in crucially doesn't
00:22:36.540
accept the left's premises. He goes, he launches his campaign. What does he do? He comes down the
00:22:41.560
escalator and he says, look, we've got foreign nationals pouring into our country with crime
00:22:45.580
and drugs and it's ruining communities. And people hate this country now. And I'm not going to let you,
00:22:50.320
I'm going to hug the American flag. He literally would hug it. He'd kiss the American flag. He'd say,
00:22:54.700
look, I don't care about your kooky theories. We're going to stand up. We're going to get better
00:22:58.020
trade deals. We're going to bring manufacturing back. You think we can? I think we can. Looks like
00:23:02.140
we can. And you know, it's, it's such a, he always had the Democrats on the back foot. He always had
00:23:07.900
them reacting to whatever he tweeted. That's why they had to kick him off Twitter is because he was
00:23:11.960
setting the narrative. And I guess this actually brings us right back to our first topic.
00:23:17.040
The left with few exceptions, maybe Trump is the one exception. The left sets the narrative,
00:23:23.520
right? The left decides the terms of, of what we can say, of how we behave, of even what we think.
00:23:33.300
That's, that's a, I mean, you put it about as perfectly as it, as it could be. And that's why I've
00:23:39.000
said about the Trump phenomenon. It's less about the policies with him, whether you feel like,
00:23:44.540
you know, obviously me not being a big, not being a fan of him or others. I said, that doesn't matter.
00:23:49.820
The thing to focus on with him, that anybody of any, uh, that, that is in a political sphere
00:23:56.000
can take from that is the fact that he at least controlled the conversation probably for the
00:24:00.940
first time. If we want to be realistic, you mentioned since Reagan, maybe since then that
00:24:05.560
they actually control the conversation. So the leftists were reacting based upon everything it
00:24:11.840
is that he did, as opposed to what they had been doing classically and back to really what they're
00:24:16.500
doing right now. And that's being on the complete defense. So that's something that people can learn
00:24:21.540
from what I love for those policies to be at. I mean, top Liberty, more than everything, of course,
00:24:27.760
that's what it is that we want. And that's the perfect storm or rather the perfect world. We have
00:24:32.420
someone that a hundred percent values, uh, Liberty. I'll take 90, uh, 90% values Liberty, but is also on
00:24:39.820
the offense in trying to bring about that in our world and really within our lifetime. Cause this is
00:24:45.640
something that, that, that we want. So we have to stop reacting based upon what the, what the left
00:24:51.500
is doing. This is what I've been saying with, for example, people that value Liberty, like say in the
00:24:55.940
cultural space, the number I've thrown out there is 51%. 51% is all I ask of people to go out of their
00:25:03.180
way and search for people that are in these subcultures. Cause we're here, we're in these subcultures
00:25:08.900
and use 50% of your time, uh, money, uh, the, the good stuff, not the corny stuff that, yeah,
00:25:16.120
there's people that are making alternatives that aren't really good, but think they should be
00:25:19.040
supported just because they create an alternative. No, there are people that actually do good stuff.
00:25:23.400
And I think with 51% of people just going out their way looking instead of being reactionary,
00:25:28.420
go out of your way and look for this material that's out there. And then you'll start to see the
00:25:32.620
pendulum, the pendulum swings. Cause right now really they're able to get away with what it is
00:25:37.140
because well, and everything it is that we do, we accept them as like the norm. That's why they
00:25:42.940
have the entertainment sector and we accept it has to be star Wars. It has to be DC. It has to be
00:25:47.840
Marvel. It has to be star Trek. And they've ran all of those into the ground and they control them.
00:25:52.580
And we have to, unfortunately, we got to say, look, they got them. They have them. Maybe we should
00:25:57.400
be looking to a certain alternatives to try to get the pendulum to swing back.
00:26:01.220
That's great. I love your point that we can't make corny stuff. You know, there's so much
00:26:05.940
corny stuff on the right. And I think I can't watch it, man. Yeah. It's, you know, really we're
00:26:11.580
here, you know, at Daily Wire, moved to Nashville basically to make movies because there was so much
00:26:16.220
less regulation. Taxes were a lot lower. It'd really give us the freedom to make stuff. And I
00:26:20.280
think so many of us just want the freedom to make stuff. And, you know, you've reminded me in your
00:26:25.240
discussion of Liberty, the left always redefines the words, right? They always pervert the language.
00:26:30.140
That's how they redefine the culture. And they nowhere is that truer than on Liberty. They define
00:26:35.340
Liberty. You know, the founding fathers had a pretty decent definition of Liberty and people,
00:26:40.680
John Locke for that matter, had a real, it was a lit, his Liberty, you know, you had Locke,
00:26:45.940
you had John Milton, sure. And Burke, I think expressed it the best, you know, this kind of
00:26:50.420
ordered Liberty that lets everybody flourish. And it's just a really civilized, great way to live.
00:26:55.400
And the left has just totally perverted that flipped it on its head as they have so much of our
00:27:00.140
language. They have so much of our culture. And so, okay, we've thoroughly depressed everybody.
00:27:06.220
Is there any hope? I mean, in a really nuts and bolts way, how do I walk into Marvel or DC tomorrow
00:27:13.240
and I say, hey, I have no idea what your product is, but I want to, I want to write it now. I want
00:27:18.000
to take it back. How do we reclaim these institutions that the left has taken from us?
00:27:23.260
I think there's, there's two ways to attack this great question. First and foremost, there are a lot
00:27:28.020
of people who reach out to me definitely because comic books are the main thing that, that, that I
00:27:32.060
cover. I cannot tell you the amounts of, of artists, writers who have reached out to me. A lot
00:27:39.240
of the prints that you see, one's on my wall. I won't even point to which one it is, but a lot of
00:27:44.360
the prints that I get are directly from the artists. It was like, I love that poster that is of this.
00:27:48.820
What did you get that? It was signed and everything. The artist sent it to me, the artist sent it to me.
00:27:52.940
And they're like, well, this is more like an undercover thing because they don't want to
00:27:56.460
end up like Gina Carano. And it's like, well, I, I, I agree with a lot of what you say. It's crazy,
00:28:02.280
this industry, but I can't see it. I get that with music, my band backwards. We go on tour
00:28:07.000
and we see drummers and whatever of other bands, man. We love what it is that you guys say.
00:28:12.380
We can't say that. And until y'all do it, nothing changes. Now the other side is I guess on the,
00:28:20.040
on the customer because we got people that valued Liberty got too comfortable and we,
00:28:24.820
we neglected it. And we were just like, okay, if I like it, I see it. I'm, I'm, I'm not even going
00:28:29.140
to be mindful of who's creating it. I don't care. And unfortunately they make money off of, off,
00:28:33.960
off of the people that value Liberty because of that. And then they win awards and then they get
00:28:37.540
on award show and tell you how much they hated you because you didn't vote for the right person.
00:28:40.860
So this is why I'm not as though I know I talk about the bad a lot. I'm not necessarily pessimistic
00:28:47.900
because just as quick as it got bad, it can get better. But what it does require is a conscious
00:28:52.300
effort for people to go out of their way and seek this, this, this information instead of just relying
00:28:58.240
upon what the people that have already gained the control, what they put out there. We've talked
00:29:03.020
about Twitter and the trending topics. All of those are fake bought, all of that stuff. It's not
00:29:08.200
organic or anything like that, but they'll put it in your face and have you thinking that it's
00:29:11.580
legitimate. So what people have to do is go out of their way. This is why I said 51%. I can't expect
00:29:17.240
you to just stop altogether. Wouldn't that be nice if people just said, okay, if it, if it's a homebody's
00:29:23.440
crazy leftist, I'm not even going to support it. That'd be fantastic. But I think that's a little
00:29:27.860
unrealistic. This is why I just say just slightly over half of your money, time and effort and revenue
00:29:34.120
investments going towards people that are involved in these, these, uh, these subcultures
00:29:39.360
that it's not about them. Let's say being a libertarian, being a conservative or something
00:29:44.000
like that. It's more of them. I don't know, not hating you, you know, instead of, instead of
00:29:48.440
supporting the ones that do so just as quick as it did get bad, it can get better, but it just requires
00:29:54.800
the customers to think differently. And I know because we have the ideas on our, on our side, we'd love to
00:30:00.600
be in a perfect world where that didn't matter, but they have already drew the line in the sand and
00:30:05.680
it is what it is. They've made it abundantly clear that they will take your money and investments and
00:30:10.580
then tell you how much you suck. So let's try to change that and go seek out those people who,
00:30:16.120
who are the actual creatives and the people that are the creatives that are already, let's say,
00:30:20.960
maybe with those mega entities, out yourself, out yourself. And it's gotta be on the customers to go
00:30:26.180
catch them. That's right. That's the, that's the key. It's not enough to say, Hey, Eric,
00:30:30.440
Hey, I, I like what you said, but I can't, I don't want to, you know, no, you know what,
00:30:35.360
you know what is even better than getting invited to the fun party or getting the promotion at your
00:30:40.380
woke corporation. You know, it's even better than that. Integrity, having integrity is good and having
00:30:45.140
a good, thriving, flourishing, free country with good, a good way of life. That that's important too.
00:30:52.200
You can find me of course, uh, YouTube, young Ripper five, nine. Um, also Eric DJ live. You
00:30:58.380
want to get links to everything. I know I do a million things at once. So you can catch me of
00:31:03.160
course, over there. And we do for Ken and, uh, sake, let's say every day, 12 PM, uh, on the channel,
00:31:08.620
you can catch that as well. And obviously doing news and why it matters and everything over at
00:31:12.400
blaze has been awesome by the way, uh, Michael, and I appreciate, you know, you, you having me on,
00:31:17.020
like I said, I already, we cross paths a lot. And I think it's important that we do have these
00:31:21.660
conversations. So they, they know that we're locked in.
00:31:24.000
Oh, pleasure is all mine. I'm so glad you could come on. Don't forget. You can find me
00:31:27.880
at young Ripper 58. And then because that one was already taken, you can find Eric July at
00:31:38.000
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