When Should Women Work?

Stefan Molyneux

Friday Night Live 2 August 2024  Stefan Molyneux engages with his audience, sharing insights on children, business, and health priorities. He delves into the significance of providing value in relationships, discussing truth, beauty, and personal struggles. Stefan explores the pursuit of happiness, societal expectations, and gender roles. The conversation shifts to women in the workforce, work-life balance, and family dynamics. Stefan emphasizes cross-disciplinary skills, mentorship, and prioritizing excellence over financial gains, urging listeners to embrace continuous improvement and personal growth.  Join the PREMIUM philosophy community on the web for free!  NOW AVAILABLE FOR SUBSCRIBERS: MY NEW BOOK 'PEACEFUL PARENTING' - AND THE INTERACTIVE PEACEFUL PARENTING AI AND AUDIOBOOK!  Also get the Truth About the French Revolution, the interactive multi-lingual philosophy AI trained on thousands of hours of my material, private livestreams, premium call in shows, the 22 Part History of Philosophers series and much more!  See you soon!  https://freedomain.locals.com/support/promo/UPB2022

Transcript

00:00:00Good evening, good evening, good evening. Hope you're doing well. This is Stefan Molyneux from

00:00:03Freedomaniacs and we are live on a wide variety of platforms and I

00:00:14invite you, if you would like, to have a call. We can do a wee chitty chat

00:00:20and don't forget tiktok.com slash atfreedomain.com tiktok.com forward slash atfreedomain.com. You

00:00:30should check it out. We've got some great shorts going up there. A little clip is from the show

00:00:35which are very nice. Take that down a smidge and it's Friday night live. Love to chat with everyone.

00:00:43Call in. You can send messages. You can use text. You can use voice. Whatever

00:00:49your heart desires. I would appreciate that. All right.

00:00:59Hello, hello. So, of course, tips are welcome. You can tip on the apps here. You can tip at

00:01:04freedomain.com slash donate. That I would certainly appreciate. Thank you, Adam. I

00:01:10appreciate that. Loved you in Bioshock. All right, move to press. Don't forget, of course, if you

00:01:18donate, you get a link to my almost 12-hour presentation, The Truth About the French Revolution,

00:01:24which is magnificent. I'm not even going to pretend to be modest about it. I'm not even

00:01:30going to pretend. False modesty is just another form of hypocrisy. It's really, really tragic.

00:01:39Now, don't forget to check out

00:01:42onewebsiteover.com. You know, because I've always said, I'm one website over. Onewebsiteover.com

00:01:49is where you want to send people. It's passive-aggressive, but in this case, it is allowed.

00:01:56What's there for today? Chatty stuff, ranty stuff, angry stuff? I don't come in with preconceptions.

00:02:01I just surf as it goes. I try not to force anything. I try not to make things happen.

00:02:07I just surf as it goes. All right, so while we are waiting for messages or calls, whether we get

00:02:17those or not, we shall see over the course of the evening. What are your questions? What are your

00:02:21comments? What's on your mind? How can I help? How can philosophy help you today? Passive-aggressive

00:02:28stuff. Well, we try not to have passive-aggressive stuff show up too often. Not impossible,

00:02:34but I had a chat with a fellow this week about kids and interruptions.

00:02:46And I'll give you the speech that I

00:02:51gave him. And the speech goes a little something like this. Children are never an interruption,

00:02:58never an interruption, certainly to your marriage and to your work. Why do men work?

00:03:04And why do we get married? Why does excess labor exist? Why is it that men are trained in strength

00:03:11and speed and agility to produce more than men themselves immediately need to consume?

00:03:19Well, because we take about 90% of our output and hand it to who? To what? To which?

00:03:28To ye old wife and ye old, or not so old, children. Children! You donated. Thank you,

00:03:37I appreciate that. So, why are we bigger, taller, sometimes smarter, stronger? Because

00:03:51we go out there, we wrestle with blank reality, we withdraw resources, and we hand them to our

00:03:56gene pool, right? We don't have to suffer through endometriosis, we don't have to suffer through

00:04:01periods, we don't have to suffer through hormonal swings, we don't have to do any of that,

00:04:05we just have to be big, giant, grazing tanks of ultimate productivity. That's what we do as the

00:04:14men bots, that's a fact. Now, why are we stronger? Why are we taller? So that we can provide excess

00:04:20resources for our children. We are adapted for that. So, children are no more an interruption

00:04:33to your marriage than customers are an interruption to your business.

00:04:38So, I had a job in a hardware store. When I was in my mid-teens, I learned a lot, actually,

00:04:51and found it a very valuable experience. I made $2.50 an hour. Forty bucks, baby!

00:04:57Monday to Thursdays. Sorry, Tuesdays and Thursdays, 5.30 to 9.30 p.m. Saturdays,

00:05:049.00 to 5.00. Now, occasionally, though, we would come in to do inventory. Now, the

00:05:10store was closed on Sundays, because back in the day, you couldn't open on Sundays. The store was

00:05:14closed on Sundays, so we'd be in there doing inventory, and God forbid you got plumbing

00:05:18or nuts and bolts, because, oh, how many washers are in the bucket? Put the washers in the bucket.

00:05:25So, the reason we did it on Sunday was because doing inventory is just part of what you have

00:05:34to do to run the business, so you know what to reorder and what you're selling. This is,

00:05:40of course, long before electronic cash registers and so on. Slightly after abacuses, abakai,

00:05:45and slightly before modern cash registers, so you had to do that by hand.

00:05:48Now, we did it on a Sunday because everybody was in there counting stuff rather than helping

00:05:56customers. So, when I worked in the hardware store, I was always told the same thing.

00:06:02Drop whatever you're doing and help the customer.

00:06:08Drop whatever you're doing and help the customer. Hit me with a why if you had somebody

00:06:13who gave you some good business advice about that. Maybe a boss, maybe someone,

00:06:18business owner, maybe an uncle who ran a business. That is just all about the business.

00:06:24I mean, I lied my ass off to get a job at another hardware store in my mid-teens saying,

00:06:28oh, yeah, I know how to fix screen doors, and I was avoiding fixing the screen doors because I

00:06:34didn't know how to fix them. I was cleaning and tidying, and the guy's like, that's not making

00:06:38me any money. I got to pay you pay with something, so go make me some money. So, I said,

00:06:43oh, just remind me, and it took me, honestly, about four and a half minutes to figure out how

00:06:47to fix screen doors, so we did all of that. Great things to do when working at a hardware store.

00:06:57Nostalgia time. Number one, breaking up boxes. I didn't mind it because everything gets delivered

00:07:05and in the basement and all these boxes, you got to break them up and take them out

00:07:08and toss them out. Breaking up the boxes, I quite enjoyed. Cutting keys was great fun.

00:07:15Cutting glass was great fun, but the Cinquanon, the Everest, the peak of joy, was, in fact,

00:07:23mixing paints. Oh, it doth give my heart a little butterfly thrill even low these many moons later.

00:07:30So, mixing paint was a great deal of fun. One of my co-workers, you got keys, you put it on one

00:07:40side and the other, and you, right, the blade cuts the key according from one to the other.

00:07:46If you put them round backwards, though, a friend of mine was working there, shaved a key down to

00:07:50nothing, which normally would be just a hassle, but this was a complete disaster because the guy

00:07:55had his family flying in because he was opening a house they'd bought. This was the only key they

00:08:00had and he nuked it. So, then we had to pay for a locksmith to go out and all of that. So, yeah,

00:08:06if you got time to lean, you got time to clean. Look busy. Look busy. That was brutal because you

00:08:11weren't allowed to socialize and there were no phones back then, of course. Well, there were

00:08:15phones, but they were rotary dial and wound in tight cords to the wall. I have lots of fond

00:08:23memories of working retail in the 90s. What else I used to do? Another thing I used to do,

00:08:28I used to figure out. Yes, I remember this. I used to figure out. I had a little calculator watch

00:08:36and I would go, okay, my computer I want is $750. Divide that by $2.5 an hour. That's 300 hours.

00:08:44Divide that by 18 weeks to find that by four months. So, in six months or so, I can get a

00:08:58computer. I would check that out. How much progress am I towards getting a computer?

00:09:05Because that's what I wanted. That's what I wanted.

00:09:08So, the purpose of the business is to make money. The purpose of the business is not

00:09:15to hire people. The purpose of the business is not to be busy or to be clean. All the things

00:09:21that are done have to serve the customer. Why did we do inventory? So that we could

00:09:25figure out what customers wanted and get those. Do those. Do that. So, that's what was going on

00:09:36with that. So, when people say, hey, I'm talking to my wife and my kids keep interrupting me,

00:09:43I'm like, I do not think you understand the purpose of the marriage.

00:09:48The purpose of the marriage is the children. Children are no more an interruption

00:09:56to your marriage or your life than customers are an interruption to

00:10:00your business. And there's a funny thing that in order to be happy, right? So, in order to be happy

00:10:11in your relationships, in order to be happy in your relationships, what is the one key thing

00:10:20you need to do to have happy and sustainable relationships? What do you think? What's the

00:10:26one, if I could give you just one piece of advice, I mean, I've been happily married for

00:10:3122 years and so on. And I have good friendships going back many, many years. So, what is the one

00:10:40thing that you need to do to ensure your greatest chance of happiness in a relationship? What do

00:10:50you think? What is the one thing that you need to do? What's the one metric that you need to measure

00:10:55in order to know whether

00:11:01your relationships are going to work and are going to sustain? What do you think? What's the

00:11:06one thing that you need to do to achieve that? Tim says, you can only make money long-term by

00:11:17providing valve. I think he means value. Look at that. He's trying to provide value with his

00:11:23comment and he types the essential word wrong. You can only make money long-term by providing

00:11:28value for a reasonable price, i.e. quality must be the highest value. From that, profit follows.

00:11:33That is not true. That is not true. That is not true at all. Value, quality is not the highest

00:11:42metric. Quality, Tim, is not the highest metric. Because if quality was the highest metric,

00:11:50there'd be no such thing as economy in airlines, right?

00:11:59Everything would be first class because you've got legroom, you get your own hot towels. I think

00:12:04I've only flown first class once in my life and that's because someone else was paying,

00:12:10but it was pretty nice. So, you know, quality is not the highest value.

00:12:14What is the highest value?

00:12:22Let's get, we'll come back, I haven't forgotten the other question. What is the highest value

00:12:29in trading? Because business is trading, relationships are trading. You say,

00:12:33well, quality is the highest value, but that's not the case. There are dollar stores,

00:12:37you know, like my daughter, she's going out of that phase now, but she absolutely loved

00:12:44this catching things with nets, right? And so what happens is you go to the dollar store

00:12:50and you buy these absolutely craptastic nets that are put together with balsa wood,

00:12:56prayers, hope, and human spit. And they're crap. And they last maybe half a summer,

00:13:03and then they just break. And they cost a buck and a quarter, or a buck fifty, or two bucks,

00:13:08or something like that. And so quality is not a value there.

00:13:20So, in the business world, what is the highest value? What do you guide yourself by?

00:13:29What is the highest value in the business world?

00:13:33Trick question. Is it a trick question? If quality was the highest metric, there would be no Node.js

00:13:39backends. I don't know what that means. Getting a good deal, profit. No, profit is the effect of

00:13:46the highest value. You're profit margine? You're profit margarine? Are you paid in fake butter?

00:13:56You're profit margarine? Are you paid in fake butter? Oh, there's snarky Steph. It's been a

00:14:03while. It's been a while. What is the highest value in business?

00:14:13Getting a good deal? Getting a bit more than you paid for? Well, that's right, Ben,

00:14:20you have got it. Boom! Whatever the fuck the customer wants is the highest value.

00:14:26I mean, assuming it's legal and blah, blah, blah. Whatever the customer wants is the highest value,

00:14:32because there is no objective value economically. Morals, yes. Economically, what is the highest

00:14:38value? I was just having this conversation with my daughter, introducing her to the depths,

00:14:42complexities, and gorgeous, crystalline Northern Lights beauty of Austrian economics.

00:14:48No, the highest value is whatever the customer wants. That's the highest value.

00:14:57Because value is subjective, economic. And she's like, well, but if someone's starving,

00:15:03food is their highest value. It's a perfectly fine argument, except it's not true. It's not true.

00:15:13If you're on a hunger strike, if you want to die, if, you know, whatever,

00:15:16you're trying to lose weight, the fact that you're hungry doesn't make food the highest value at all.

00:15:25There is no objective value.

00:15:33Monks go on hunger strikes, yeah? Why am I in love in stereo? Okay, so,

00:15:39people say, well, people want health care because people care about health.

00:15:50I don't know that that's true. In fact, I would say, okay, let me ask you this.

00:15:59How many people in your life have health as one of their top three priorities?

00:16:06How many people in your life have physical health as one of their top three priorities?

00:16:15Doesn't have to be their very top priority, but how many people in your life have physical health

00:16:22as one of their top three priorities? Or we could say, what percentage of people in your life,

00:16:30what percentage of the people in your life have physical health as one of their top three

00:16:34priorities? In other words, they organize their life around it, they exercise

00:16:39eight to ten hours a week, they don't overeat, they're not overweight, they try to get a

00:16:45reasonably healthy amount of sun, they prioritize sleep and hydration and all kinds of things.

00:16:52Somebody says three out of like 30 people I know. One, me, three, four off the top of my head,

00:17:00one, two, most are all fat, the obesity rate would contradict that most people care about health.

00:17:05Right. So, even something like a good health, you say, well, you know, good health is a real value,

00:17:14but it's not, it's not, it's not, good health is not a big value for most people.

00:17:21About two percent for me, zero then, 70 percent. One, myself, I know a lot who claim it, but none

00:17:27act on it. Right. Right. So, you say, well, good health is the highest value, and it kind of is,

00:17:39right? You know, there's that cheesy old saying, but it gets, it's very true as you age in

00:17:43particular, if you've got your health, you've got everything. Your good health is worth a million

00:17:49dollars, easy. Good health is worth every dollar you have in savings, because if you were struck

00:17:58with some fatal disease that was going to kill you next week, and the only way you could survive

00:18:03would be to empty out your bank account, you would empty out your bank account, right?

00:18:07So, good health is worth everything that you own, right? Would you rather die in a penthouse

00:18:20or live temporarily under a bridge? Well, I mean, I don't, I would live temporarily under a bridge

00:18:24rather than die in a penthouse. So, good health is everything. Good health is everything,

00:18:32and everybody knows exactly how to achieve it. Good sleep, good food, good exercise,

00:18:38good movement, good sunlight, all that lovely stuff.

00:18:50And I respect people's choices. I respect people's choices. If people want to be lazy and fat and

00:19:00sedentary and eat too much and smoke or whatever, it's like, yeah, okay, I don't want to pay for

00:19:07your health care, because you don't care really about your health. That's fine. But I don't give

00:19:14people sympathy who then get sick, because that would be to disrespect their choices, right?

00:19:20So, the way that you have good relationships is you provide value to others. Are they better

00:19:42off for having interacted with you? Are they happier? Are they wealthier? Are they wiser?

00:19:46Why are you people coming back? Why do you come back night after night? Because I'm providing you

00:19:51something that's of great value that you can't get elsewhere. And you like the thrill of the live,

00:19:56which I like the thrill of the live and so on, right? So, because, you know, the first, I don't

00:20:00know, 14 years I just did pre-recorded stuff, so doing it live is much more fun in many ways. I

00:20:06don't know what's happening. What the hell's going on? So, just make sure you provide value

00:20:17and keep asking and keep asking and keep asking. Am I providing value? Am I providing value? Am I

00:20:22providing value? And then you have to trust that you will also, because you don't give one percent

00:20:28and wait for one percent, you're just generous and see what comes back. And if something doesn't

00:20:32come back, if something doesn't come back, you'll notice it. All right, I think we have a caller,

00:20:43which is cool. I'm still excited by it. I think that's still excellent. All right, let's see if

00:20:51this works. All right, Rico, are you with us, my friend? What's on your mind? Do you want me to

00:21:00read your question or do you want to read it? Can you hear me now? Yeah, yeah, go for it.

00:21:06Hey there. So, yeah, I recently saw your video where you discussed the utilization of history.

00:21:15Essentially, my understanding was, the point you were trying to make was, it was

00:21:22ultimately a method of extracting resources from another party. Overall, love the video.

00:21:30One random thing that struck me as interesting was, I think you threw out a specific example of,

00:21:37I think you were trying to illustrate unverifiable statements that people throw out.

00:21:42I think the example is something along the lines of, you know, you're going to hell if you look

00:21:45at someone lustfully. And I was just curious, was there any particular reason that example came to

00:21:52mind or was that just some random one that popped into your head? Sorry, are you asking me for my

00:21:58motivations for an analogy or an example that I used some weeks ago in a spontaneous speech?

00:22:05Yes, whether or not... Well, how on earth would I remember why that popped into my head?

00:22:13But I mean, I'm certainly happy to be, I mean, I have no problem with you asking the question.

00:22:17It's a fine question. I'm just not sure. Like, if I were to say to you,

00:22:21okay, this analogy that you used a couple of weeks ago when you were spontaneously talking to someone,

00:22:27why did that come up in your head? Would you, I mean, unless you were holding some horrible guilty

00:22:32secret, would there be some reason why you would remember these things? Oh, I guess not.

00:22:38No, again, I'm not criticizing. I'm just curious why the source of the analogy, whatever that might

00:22:47be, would be the case. Now, I would imagine, I'm sorry, I don't want to interrupt if you wanted to

00:22:53say something else because I have more to say on it, but I don't want to interrupt you because

00:22:56there's a call, right? Right, right. No, I guess that's the long and short of it.

00:23:03Pretty much, I guess that struck me as an interesting example in the context of the topic.

00:23:09Do you suffer from excessive lust?

00:23:15Personally? No, not particularly.

00:23:17Okay. So, I would imagine that the reason it came up with me was because I would want something

00:23:26that most people would not consider a sin even if they were secular. So, for instance,

00:23:33if I said, if I use the example of murder, right, well, you're going to hell if you murder someone,

00:23:40people would say, okay, well, maybe I don't believe in hell, but it's bad to murder someone, right?

00:23:45So, I was looking at something that could be considered wrong by some, certainly would

00:23:53probably be wrong in excess, but which is impossible to avoid as a whole.

00:24:00So, I went to dinner with my family tonight, picked up my daughter from work, and then we

00:24:07had a quick bite before I did the show, and we had an attractive waitress. Now, am I supposed

00:24:16to not notice that the waiter is attractive, the waitress is attractive, right? And she was

00:24:21nice, and we chatted, and everything was nice, and so on. Now, did I look at her like,

00:24:29damn, I wish I wasn't married because I'd ask her out or something like that? Well, no.

00:24:33Did I notice that she was attractive? Yes. Did I lust after her? I did not.

00:24:40But if I looked at her and noticed that she was attractive, is that a sin? Well, I think for most

00:24:49people it wouldn't be a sin. I do understand that you don't, if you're married or in a monogamous

00:24:55relationship, you don't want to start down that path of, oh, that person's really attractive.

00:25:00I'm going to come back here alone, and I'm going to order some food, and I'm going to try and

00:25:05engage her in conversation, and I'm going to hide my wedding ring, and I'm going to, you know,

00:25:09like whatever you'd come up with, that you don't want to take those steps. So, I think the injunction

00:25:14against looking at other women with lust in your heart is to say, don't take those steps. Stop it

00:25:20right at the beginning. Don't wait for momentum. Because, like, you know how people have affairs,

00:25:25usually. Here's bit by bit. I mean, this is how almost all sins occur, is bit by bit, right? So,

00:25:33there's a little bit of flirting, and people say, oh, well, that's kind of harmless. And then there's

00:25:36a little bit more flirting, and people say, oh, that's really harmless. And then you daydream

00:25:40about that person, and then it becomes invasive. And then you go back, and you try to chat that

00:25:50person up a little bit more, and you say, oh, it's just for fun. It's just play. It's not a big deal.

00:25:54It doesn't really matter, and so on. You still consider yourself loyal. And so, bit by bit,

00:25:59right? It's incrementalism is how bad things happen, and we can see this happening all over

00:26:04the world at the moment. So, I would imagine that I came up with the example because,

00:26:12and I don't know, because I'm not a theologian, of course, right? Theologian. So,

00:26:17if there are more knowledgeable people there. So, if I look at a woman, and I register her

00:26:23as very attractive, is that the same as looking at a woman lustfully?

00:26:31Right? Because I'm not sitting there fantasizing about her. I'm just like, oh, that's an attractive

00:26:35woman. And I can also look at a man and say, that's an attractive man. Right? I mean, but I'm

00:26:42not looking at him lustfully, unless it's the mirror, of course. Right? So, I would imagine it's

00:26:49something like that. Does that make any sense in terms of, yeah, the slippery slope thing is very,

00:26:54the slippery slope is very real. It's not a fallacy at all. But I would imagine it would be

00:26:58something where it could be considered a sin, but you'd have to be religious in order for it to be

00:27:05considered a sin, whereas rape, theft, assault, and murder, even if you're not religious,

00:27:09are considered evil. And I guess in that context, sinful. So, it would have to be something that

00:27:15would require religion in order to be considered immoral. Right? Because the idea is that if you

00:27:22look at a woman lustfully, then you have already cheated in your heart. Like,

00:27:29looking at a woman lustfully is the same as cheating, which I don't think people would say

00:27:33is the case. So, I think we would want to say something that would be a sin,

00:27:37but you would need religion in order for it to be considered sinful, if that makes sense.

00:27:41**Matt Stauffer**

00:27:46Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. I think a lot of people, they hear that and they think,

00:27:53have that problem of just any kind of experience, any kind of feeling,

00:27:57that's, they think that's the bad thing. But really, there's a difference between

00:28:01appreciating beauty for a thing and thinking that's a wonderful, like,

00:28:07appreciating the goodness in someone or something in that way.

00:28:10And coveting that thing.

00:28:12**Lucas** Listen, man to man, if you look at a woman and you notice she's very sexy,

00:28:17you're not appreciating an abstract beauty. You know, it's not like, what a lovely sunset

00:28:23in a bra, you know? That's not, come on, man. Let's be blunt about these things.

00:28:29**Matt Stauffer** True.

00:28:31**Lucas** What a lovely carving by Michelangelo. Oh, and she happens to be playing beach volleyball

00:28:38in the Olympics at the same time.

00:28:39**Matt Stauffer** Right.

00:28:42**Lucas** Right. So, you know, it's not just abstract beauty, right? Is it? I mean, you're

00:28:46looking, you know, we as men are programmed to note fertility symbols, right? Fertility markers,

00:28:55right? Youth, beauty, physical beauty and sexiness and all that kind of stuff, right?

00:29:00**Matt Stauffer** Right. And at the end of the day,

00:29:07while you have to, at the end of the day you have to ask yourself, are you, is your appreciation for

00:29:13this quality in someone causing you to respect them less as a person and start viewing them

00:29:20more as an object? And I think, I don't know, I think there's a nuance to that a lot of people

00:29:27miss and they go to these extremes of...

00:29:29**Lucas** Sorry, and I'm really interested in what you have to say, so I don't want to interrupt,

00:29:33but I just want to make sure I understand what you mean by not seeing the person but

00:29:38seeing them as an object. What do you mean? **Matt Stauffer** Right. So, you have people,

00:29:44they have qualities, there's a certain beauty to all people, but...

00:29:48**Lucas** Okay, now I'm even more confused. There is a certain beauty to all people?

00:29:54**Matt Stauffer** Well, sure. People naturally are inherently beautiful. All people have beauty.

00:30:00That is like an inherent property to what they are.

00:30:03**Lucas** Why, why, why? Then the concept of beauty simply means

00:30:07humanity. Then I don't know why you need the concept beauty, because the concept beauty

00:30:11is an exception, and if you're saying everybody has the exception, it's no longer an exception.

00:30:15So, again, I'm not disagreeing with you, I'm just not following what you're saying,

00:30:19and I really want to understand what you mean.

00:30:21**Matt Stauffer** Well, I'll be honest, I kind of forgot where I was going with any of this.

00:30:25**Lucas** No, no, honestly, I'll stay with the beauty thing.

00:30:27**Matt Stauffer** So, right. So, there's a common, in

00:30:37some theological circles, this concept of three transcendentals, truth, beauty, and goodness,

00:30:43and it's thought that these are the ultimate properties of all of existence.

00:30:51**Lucas** Let's see if I got my thoughts straight on this. We naturally seek those

00:31:03three transcendentals everywhere in life, and sometimes the search for those things

00:31:16that gets twisted, gets messed up, that's where things go bad. For example,

00:31:22you appreciate a beautiful woman, and you think, wow, that's beautiful. And

00:31:29almost all evil that occurs, it started from a good intention. Like, you see food,

00:31:35you're hungry, you wanted to fulfill that hunger. You see, you want to get something right.

00:31:43What does two plus two equal? If you come to the conclusion four,

00:31:46then you're hitting the target. But if you come to the conclusion of five, then you're

00:31:50missing the target, even though you wanted to come to a good conclusion of four.

00:31:57**Matt Stauffer** So, I don't mean to interrupt you if you're in the middle of something.

00:32:04**Lucas** Oh, go ahead.

00:32:05**Matt Stauffer** Okay. So, we started off with, you don't want to treat people as objects,

00:32:09and I was trying to understand that. And then we went to, everyone's beautiful,

00:32:14and I tried to understand that. And then you say, everyone is drawn to truth, beauty, and goodness.

00:32:20And all evil starts with good intentions. I mean...

00:32:24**Lucas** I'm going off the rails here.

00:32:26**Matt Stauffer** No, no, no. Listen, I appreciate the conversation. I appreciate

00:32:30the conversation. I'm thrilled that you're talking about these things, because I find

00:32:33them very interesting. So, as a guy who's been attacked, bomb threats, death threats,

00:32:40chased through the streets, de-platformed, and so on, I know that I speak the truth.

00:32:48And I believe that virtue is beautiful, and we should pursue it. And I certainly have

00:32:55focused a lot of my efforts on goodness. Do you think you might have a certain amount of difficulty

00:33:01convincing me that the world is very keen on truth and beauty and goodness, given how it's treated

00:33:08me, say? And I'm not trying to make that as an argument. I'm just, I'm not sure that you're

00:33:13fully conscious of the difficulty you would have in convincing me of these things as if they're

00:33:18self-evident. Well, you know, everyone loves truth, beauty, and goodness. It's like, but

00:33:21that's what I was delivering to the world, and look what happened, right? So, I'm not sure that

00:33:25we're both in the same headspace for the conversation, if that makes sense.

00:33:30Right. So, there is an inherent longing for these things that everyone has.

00:33:40But, obviously, some people get it wrong, completely, or they...

00:33:47Some people.

00:33:48Yeah, that's...

00:33:50Even people who like what I did, 95% of them wouldn't go one website over.

00:33:54So, if we're talking about a very minority of a minority of a minority,

00:33:59then you have to explain to me how you get everyone... You know, I used to live stream to

00:34:10six to seven thousand people. You can see the numbers, right? This is a tiny percentage of that,

00:34:15less than one percent, right? So, help me understand how most people want what they have

00:34:26attacked, rejected, or ignored in what I provide. Now, maybe you can make the case that what I

00:34:31provide is not truth, and beauty, and goodness. Fine, okay, we can make that case, but let's just

00:34:37talk about truth. So, the stuff that I talked about, even the most controversial stuff, was

00:34:41either put forward tentatively as a hypothesis, was put forward with data and sources. You know,

00:34:46with the IQ stuff, I talked to 17 world experts on the subject from both the left and the right,

00:34:51and people who were politically indifferent. I got the argument from environment, I got the

00:34:55other cultural arguments, I got other kinds of arguments. So, it was true.

00:35:02So, if people are drawn to the truth, and that's essential, that's the default factory

00:35:08settings for human beings, why does just about everyone attack the truth like a rabid animal?

00:35:15Well, everyone's broken. Nope.

00:35:18Okay, but you can't say everybody loves the truth. Well, no, actually, nobody does,

00:35:24really, or very few people do. Well, that's because people are broken. Okay,

00:35:27so is the essence of human beings to love the truth, or is the essence of human beings to

00:35:32be broken and hate the truth? I'm not sure you can have it both ways.

00:35:37Well, you can't have it both ways, because either one is true or the other is true.

00:35:46So, someone who is overweight maybe doesn't want to be overweight,

00:35:51but they also don't want to have to put in the work in order to stop being overweight.

00:35:58So, they can appreciate, oh, I could probably feel really good about myself if I put in the effort to

00:36:05make the choices that would get me to that state in life, but making those choices require me to

00:36:13completely change course and be uncomfortable and experience things I don't want to experience.

00:36:21And so, in order to come to this higher state of not being overweight anymore,

00:36:27I'm going to choose not to do that, because I feel like the choices I have to make

00:36:38in order to get to that state are just not worth it.

00:36:44So, in that case, the truth, goodness, and beauty,

00:36:48in this case, in this example, would be not being overweight, being fit.

00:36:53Okay, so, sorry, let me just interrupt you for a second. I apologize for that.

00:36:59So, help me understand what's wrong with being overweight. Now, of course,

00:37:04we understand the health issues and so on, but what's wrong with it?

00:37:08So, for instance, if you were condemned to death and you have a last meal, you're not going to worry

00:37:15about the fat and salt content, right? You're just going to stuff your face

00:37:19with whatever your favorite food is. I think they've got a cap now of 25 bucks on something

00:37:23because people were ordering Kobe steak flown in from Japan on the wings of hummingbirds or

00:37:27something. So, you wouldn't care about that, right? And so, I assume that the people who are fat

00:37:34are saying, I'm getting the maximum pleasure I can out of life, I'm not particularly happy,

00:37:41and I don't want to live for a long time without the food that makes me happy.

00:37:49Right? So, it's almost like they have a last meal and every meal is their last meal. They don't want

00:37:56to live to an old age. You know, like the people who are the influencers, right, who just eat

00:38:02like crazy, right? And then they often will die in their 30s or their 40s or their 50s, right?

00:38:08Now, I assume that they're aiming for the maximum happiness they believe they can achieve,

00:38:15which is the happiness of eating a lot of food that tastes good, rather than living more

00:38:22moderately and longer. So, if somebody, let's say somebody has a happiness level, let's go minus 10

00:38:28to plus 10, minus 10 totally suicidal, plus 10 orgasmic bliss. So, let's say somebody has

00:38:34a happiness level of minus 3, you know, generally dysthymic or negative or whatever it is,

00:38:40and they just don't want to live in that state, right? So, what they do is they say,

00:38:45okay, well, if I eat a lot of food, I get to a happiness level of 5,

00:38:49but I'd rather have 10 or 20 years at 5 than 50 years at minus 3. And so, I don't view obesity,

00:38:58again, we've got all the issues of making other people pay for your healthcare and so on, but

00:39:02aside of all of that, because that's the result of corruption in the political system,

00:39:06but is it objectively wrong or evil to maximize your happiness by overeating as opposed to

00:39:18being unhappy without the food and living longer? See, I think that's a fundamental mistake that

00:39:23people make regarding addicts or people who are overweight. Let's just talk about being overweight.

00:39:29So, you say, well, I'm a happy guy. So, I want to live for a long time and I will

00:39:34not eat too much because I want to live for a long time. So, I'm a happy guy and I'm generally

00:39:42cooking at 7 or 8 happiness, which to me is the maximum I can do before wobbling, right? I mean,

00:39:47I get higher, I get lower, but in general, I'm 7 to 8 in terms of happiness. So, I like being

00:39:53alive, I enjoy living, and so I want to live for a long time. I want to live for a long time,

00:39:59so I'm willing to deny myself the pleasures of eating so that I can maintain maybe another 20

00:40:11or 30 years of plus 7 or 8 happiness. Now, of course, I'm not guaranteed that could be things

00:40:15that make me unhappy, but I think I'm old enough now to recognize that that is my general level

00:40:21of happiness and whatever I deviate from, that's where I kind of reset to. So, I want to live

00:40:27longer and I'm willing to eat less, which is sometimes uncomfortable. I want to live longer

00:40:32because I'm a happy guy doing good things in the world. If I was an unhappy guy and my only real

00:40:38chance of happiness in my perception, and again, we can argue these things, but yeah, I mean,

00:40:45they're like, you know, it's better to burn out than fade away, you know? Live fast, die young,

00:40:52leave a good-looking corpse. And we can say, oh, that's so nihilistic, that's so terrible,

00:40:56but I don't, I don't, if somebody wants to just smoke cigars and eat, you know, the James

00:41:02Gandolfini guy who was the, he played Tony Soprano in The Sopranos, I mean, I don't think that guy

00:41:09made it to 60. I mean, he ate like a horse, he didn't really exercise, he's big and fat and

00:41:16coarse and, you know, very Southern Italian and so on. Now, am I going to say to him,

00:41:24he lived large, I mean, metaphorically, literally, you know, he was a huge character on screen,

00:41:31he lived large, I think he died in an Italian restaurant with his face full of creamy pasta

00:41:36or something like that. Now, am I going to look at that guy and say, he just lived terribly?

00:41:41Well, I don't know. You know, there are some people who say, if you eat salads and exercise,

00:41:50you don't live for forever, it just feels like forever. And maybe their social circle is just a

00:41:56bunch of muckbangers who love to stuff their faces, and if they don't have that, they don't

00:41:59have a social circle. And, you know, so, I don't have a functional foundational problem with people

00:42:10who say, I want to eat what I want, I find exercise makes me unhappy, I don't like it,

00:42:16my social circle is this. I mean, James Gandolfini, I don't know the guy, but I would

00:42:22imagine his doctor probably said on more than one occasion, this is not a healthy lifestyle,

00:42:28like you're overweight and so on, right? And you're probably not going to make it to a ripe old age,

00:42:35right? So, did he live in the wrong way?

00:42:42All right. So, I just realized I stood someone up for a prior appointment, so I got to go

00:42:49fix that. But I will say before I head out, it sounds like the flaw you pointed out is the

00:42:57premise that, you know, in that example I gave, truth, goodness and beauty is feeling good,

00:43:02living a long life. Because if you're like, the one example you gave, for example,

00:43:06if someone's going to die, like the next day, like, why would I care if my health or my weight

00:43:13is even there? And that is a valid point, and it brings us to the question of what

00:43:21then should the ultimate value be? On that note, got to dip out. Appreciate your time.

00:43:30No, no problem.

00:43:30I love this conversation a lot. And, hey, have a great rest of the night, all right?

00:43:35All right, thank you. Thank you very much. So, I just looked it up here.

00:43:43So, he took his own family on a trip to Italy, was having a marvelous time in Rome. His son Michael

00:43:51had just finished his junior high school and won a soccer championship, making it an all-around

00:43:56celebratory excursion. On June 19th, this is 2013, at around 10 p.m., Michael, his son,

00:44:04found Gandolfini passed out on the floor of their room at the hotel, etc.

00:44:09The family had a marvelous day together, and when he returned to the hotel, Jimmy Gandolfini,

00:44:13James Gandolfini, went to the bathroom, and that is when something happened, his assistant said.

00:44:18The 13-year-old called the reception desk for help, and when workers failed to revive him,

00:44:22an ambulance was called. Gandolfini was alive, and he was taken to the hospital at around 1040,

00:44:27but he died soon after his arrival. An autopsy later confirmed that Gandolfini had suffered a

00:44:33major heart attack, cutting his life short at just 51 years old, robbing his family of a loving

00:44:37father in the world of a major talent. So, yeah, absolutely, he was a living large guy, and he

00:44:46wasn't super obese. He was not super, and he was a fantastic actor, you know, a powerhouse of an

00:44:55actor, a courageous actor in many ways, in terms of the malevolence that he was willing to portray.

00:45:00I mean, it's a bit of a cursed set, but the woman, Melfi, who played, the woman who played

00:45:05his therapist also ended up, I think, in horrible debt, and so on, right?

00:45:11Yeah, so she looked like she was living the dream with an Academy Award nomination,

00:45:14starring in the hit series The Sopranos. She was fighting depression. That's interesting, right? Oh,

00:45:19she was in a long-term relationship with Harvey Keitel. Oh, God, Keitel. Well, that would be

00:45:25pretty monstrous. And they were in a relationship for 11 years. Wow. There we go. And then she got

00:45:40into a custody battle, of a custody of their daughter, Stella Keitel, then only eight years

00:45:46old. The custody battle was to cost Lorraine Bracco over two million dollars, and became a

00:45:53horrific nightmare when it was alleged that her new husband, actor Edward James Olmos, had fondled

00:45:59Stella's 14-year-old babysitter. The marriage was short-lived in 2002, Bracco and Olmos were

00:46:04divorced. Bracco was bankrupt, and her daughter Stella was diagnosed with systemic juvenile

00:46:09rheumatoid arthritis. Oh, that's terrible. That's very tough. A five-year custody battle.

00:46:22Wow. And then she divorced Olmos. He was a Hispanic actor, I think, in Stand and Deliver,

00:46:28kind of a famous creator face, and he played Admiral Adama in Battlestar Galactica, if I

00:46:34remember rightly. She ended up winning the custody, but of course, after five years, it is

00:46:43pretty rough. It's pretty rough. Oh, she was originally going to read for Carmela Soprano,

00:46:48but she wanted to play the therapist. Interesting.

00:46:54So, yeah. She had it pretty rough. Pretty rough, indeed.

00:47:05All right. I'm arriving late, but still erect for philosophy. Excellent. The president erect

00:47:14has arrived. A lot of my dad's friends died in the late 40s to early 50s. Yeah. Apparently,

00:47:20a lot of my father's uncles died in their 50s as well, but I heard it was Pennsylvania coal

00:47:24minus black lung sort of things. Yeah, yeah, for sure. He died with cancer and type 2 diabetes and

00:47:30hypothyroidism, but died of a massive heart attack. Is that right? Oh, okay. Oh, that's not...

00:47:36Okay. Dad's friends. Not Captain Adama. Admiral Adama? Yeah, the admiral, the commander of, right?

00:47:45Yeah. So, you know, I don't have any particular issue. Now, of course, some people,

00:47:52they regret. They have regrets later, and I think it's important to not give people the luxury of

00:47:58regrets for things that they have voluntarily chosen. You know, if a woman chooses to kind of

00:48:06sleep around and not settle down and then ends up kind of on the ash heap of the post-war 40s

00:48:11without being able to get a good guy on her side, but you had your fun. I mean,

00:48:18I can't give people sympathy for the voluntary actions of their own free will.

00:48:26By the way, if you do want to call in, I'm sorry this guy had to dump. It was a very interesting

00:48:30topic which we can get into again, but if you do want to call in,

00:48:33I will put the link in just in case you have arrived in a more recent fashion or in a more

00:48:41recent way. I will give you the link. I think it's fdrurl.com slash call in,

00:48:55but you can do that. Steph, now that you're doing private call-ins,

00:48:58would you be open to other forms of paid content? How much would it cost me for you

00:49:01to review a five-hour show? Well, I think that would be quite a bit. I think that would be quite

00:49:07a bit. fdrurl.com forward slash live call. fdrurl.com forward slash live call. All right.

00:49:16Sorry, I missed the comments over here on Rumble. Somebody says, I've never been that way until

00:49:26recently because the doctors tell me I have a high blood pressure and gout. I have a young son I must

00:49:31raise, so now longevity is an issue, parental responsibility. Right. Right.

00:49:40Jesus made that statement to point out God's absolute standard for morality as opposed to

00:49:44our natural human standards. We reason we cannot live up to the standards of absolute faithfulness

00:49:48to our wives. Can actions be beautiful? Can actions be beautiful? Yeah. I mean,

00:49:59certainly dance is an action and dancing can be beautiful. Not everyone is drawn to truth

00:50:05and beauty. There are many with perverse outlooks who love ugliness and chaos.

00:50:10What matters is a person's ultimate ideas about the nature of reality. Without God,

00:50:14we can't determine whether gluttony is objectively wrong, yet God has declared

00:50:18gluttony to be wrong, so yeah. Is it easy to tell who's happier without being in another's head,

00:50:25or is it very speculative? As libertarians, we acknowledge we each own our own lives and

00:50:33are responsible for our own choices. That is why freedom is essential. I would certainly agree

00:50:39with that.

00:50:48All right, let me just get to your comments here. So yeah, live calls are available if you would

00:50:53like to call in. So let's look at some of the theological issues that were coming up

00:50:58from the previous caller, because I do find them very interesting. I do find them.

00:51:05Obsessing about physical health is also gluttony. Oh, so it's just kind of,

00:51:08I'm not sure what gluttony then means. It's just an excess? Is that just what it means, an excess?

00:51:12But saying an excess is bad is not a very helpful statement. It's like saying overthinking. Well,

00:51:18what does that even mean? I mean, what is the right amount of thinking? There's underthinking,

00:51:21there's overthinking. How are you supposed to know, right? So he said,

00:51:24we don't want to treat people as objects. So this is a Kantian thing, which means we

00:51:31should treat people as ends in themselves, not as a means to our own ends. So the typical example

00:51:38would be the man who treats a woman, but lies to a woman just to have sex with her, and then dumps

00:51:44or ghosts her, that he's treating her as an object with which to satisfy his own lusts.

00:51:49He's not treating her or interacting with her as an end unto herself, but rather he is

00:51:59treating her as a mechanism or a means or an object by which he will satisfy his own lusts.

00:52:07The politician who promises all kinds of goodies to people are not treating them

00:52:12as ends in themselves. He's treating them as objects to be manipulated in his own lust for

00:52:18power, his own pursuit of power. A salesman who sells you a shoddy good while pretending it's

00:52:24better than it is in order to make his money and move on to somewhere else, that person,

00:52:29what is it they always F you in the drive-thru, says, I was in one of the lethal weapon movies,

00:52:35right? But as far as how we interact with people as a whole, we are interacting with people

00:52:44as objects. That's 99.999% of our economic life is treating people as objects.

00:52:53You know, I don't particularly care about the waiter's inner life. I just want my food brought

00:52:58to me when it's still warm. I can't stand cold food in restaurants. I don't have a lot of things,

00:53:06but getting cold food is definitely one of them. I like a nice steaming plate of food.

00:53:11So, I care about the waiter for his or her ability to bring me my food accurately and on time and

00:53:19warm. So, am I treating the waiter as an end in herself, or am I treating the waiter as a means

00:53:29to my end? Well, we're both treating each other as objects, and there's nothing wrong with that

00:53:34that I can see. I'm happy to hear the cases. Is she treating me as someone she just wants

00:53:38to feed me so I can go and do good philosophy at 7 p.m. Eastern Standard Time, Wednesday nights,

00:53:44Friday nights, and 11 a.m. Sundays, Eastern Standard Time? She's not. She doesn't care where

00:53:50I've come from. She doesn't care where I'm going, or if she says she does, it's just because she

00:53:54wants to establish a more personal relationship in order to get tips, to get better tips.

00:54:03So, she is treating me as an object. She needs pay. She needs to pay her rent.

00:54:07The person she's paying rent to is treating her as an object, doesn't care about her as a person.

00:54:11So, this idea that we should not treat each other as objects, I find a little incomprehensible.

00:54:20I mean, we care about each other, I think. I mean, certainly, I've been very privileged to

00:54:25look inside the lives of thousands and thousands of people over the course of

00:54:29almost 20 years of doing this show and the call-in shows and other things.

00:54:32This is an unusual business, but for most people, for most of what we do,

00:54:43we don't care about the people, we care about the utility they can provide us.

00:54:48You know, the electricity that is powering this show, I don't care about the people running the

00:54:52electrical grid. I don't. I don't. And they don't care about me. They want to get paid when I pay

00:55:02my electricity bill, and I want electricity. When I pay my electricity bill, I don't particularly

00:55:10care about the person. I care about what they provide me, and most people don't care about me.

00:55:17They care about what I provide them. So, an example that's sort of very practical and tangible here

00:55:24is when I stopped about four plus years ago, I stopped covering politics.

00:55:29Now, a lot of my audience was there not because they cared about me or my mission or my virtues

00:55:36or even the children that I could help for the better with peaceful parenting. They didn't care

00:55:40about that. They cared about me delivering political analysis to them. That's a fact.

00:55:50Because when I did not provide political analysis to them, which is what they wanted,

00:55:57they went elsewhere. They either gave up on getting political analysis, which I assume

00:56:02would be quite unlikely, or what they did was they got their political analysis elsewhere.

00:56:09Obviously, not as high quality, but no, I appreciate, I care about you, and I love the

00:56:14fact that we got this jazz club, and we know each other, and there's more caring here, right?

00:56:18Absolutely. You know, if I'm doing, if I was doing a live stream, and I'm having six or

00:56:227,000 people watch the live stream, then if one person, I don't know, said, I'm feeling really

00:56:29unwell, I've got to go, I barely even noticed it, but you know, it's a smaller, tighter group here,

00:56:33so we care, and there's more sort of interpersonal stuff and all of that, right?

00:56:41So this idea we shouldn't treat people as objects, I have absolutely no idea how to

00:56:47survive economically in a world without treating people as objects, I have no idea,

00:56:53because when you think of the things you consume over the course of every single day,

00:56:58the things that you consume, thousands or tens of thousands of people have touched them.

00:57:04I mean, think of how many people it takes to just bring electricity and water to your house,

00:57:10or gasoline to get into your car, to think of thousands of people all have to work in coordination

00:57:17and history and management and physical labor and planning and engineering and ships and sailing

00:57:23and captains, and like, thousands of people have to interact in order to give you what you want,

00:57:31and you're one of the thousands of people who interact to give them what they want.

00:57:35Now, if I just want electricity in my house, how am I supposed to care about the thousands of people,

00:57:41oh, so-and-so's got a twinge in their foot, and so-and-so's not having a great marriage,

00:57:45and so-and-so is really worried about their child, and so-and-so thinks that they should

00:57:49change careers but don't really know, and like, am I supposed to care about the

00:57:55people individually when I just want some electricity for my house and I'm willing to pay

00:58:00for it? So, this idea that we shouldn't treat people as objects, that we should treat them for

00:58:06the people themselves, I don't know, there's something odd about it,

00:58:17there's something odd about it. Okay, we'll get back to that. Let us go to a

00:58:21Rrrrrrr, rah, rah, rah, rah.

00:58:24All right, yes, my friend, you are up.

00:58:31R-R, who wants to talk about family structure?

00:58:35Can you hear me?

00:58:40Going box, yes, go ahead.

00:58:43How you doing?

00:58:44Good.

00:58:46Okay, so I quickly got on.

00:58:48Let me formulate my question for you.

00:58:55When we think about the past,

00:59:00family structures, traditional structure,

00:59:05the man, the husband,

00:59:09his role typically was to protect and provide

00:59:12the woman nurture and take care of the household

00:59:15and the children.

00:59:19But that worked primarily during a timeframe

00:59:26when there was less technology,

00:59:32men had to go out and work and produce and provide.

00:59:34Now times have changed.

00:59:39You have air conditioned offices,

00:59:41you have technology and women are in the workforce.

00:59:49With that structure, when you have children,

00:59:53children overall, in my opinion,

00:59:58with the traditional family structure

00:59:59will have more connection and attachment with their mother

01:00:03because they're just more present

01:00:06where the father may be out of the home.

01:00:09So Warren Farrell talks about men show their love

01:00:12by being a way for the family, that sort of thing.

01:00:17But now women can go out there and they can work.

01:00:21And I know that you have a great relationship

01:00:22with your daughter and you stay at home, dad,

01:00:26you work from home.

01:00:28So I guess I'm assuming that you're able

01:00:30to be more present with your daughter

01:00:32and you have a great relationship,

01:00:34I'm assuming because you was able to be more present

01:00:38with your daughter.

01:00:40So in modern times,

01:00:47what's your opinion about perhaps having a shift

01:00:53from the traditional family model where women can work,

01:01:00men can take their foot off the gas

01:01:03in terms of being productive.

01:01:05So they can be more available and have more attachment

01:01:09with their children as well

01:01:12versus a traditional family setting

01:01:18where fathers just don't have that level of connection

01:01:22with their children.

01:01:24When you have this circumstance where men are producers

01:01:27and providers, you have the potential where,

01:01:32the kids don't know you because you're not around

01:01:34and sometimes the wife resents you because you're not around

01:01:38but the trade-off is maybe if both parents are working,

01:01:45then you don't have the communication,

01:01:49you don't have the development.

01:01:50So the kids will suffer to a certain degree

01:01:52but men have a better relationship potentially

01:01:57with children since they're able to be at home more

01:02:02or work less because women work more.

01:02:05Right, okay.

01:02:06So what makes you think that women can provide

01:02:11for a family better than men?

01:02:14I mean, and I know that say, oh, well, women work

01:02:17but do they really?

01:02:18I mean, as a whole in the modern world,

01:02:21I mean, wasn't it the biggest single hirer of women

01:02:25is the government and employers have to be forced

01:02:29at gunpoint to hire women sometimes

01:02:31and the only way that women can be economically productive

01:02:35is with massive subsidies and laws that force people

01:02:38to hire them and also they have to not have children.

01:02:44Right, so in terms of like, we can aim for equality

01:02:47of outcome with regards to male and female employment

01:02:50but only at the cost of destroying our entire civilization

01:02:55through collapsing birth rates

01:02:57because if women say, I wanna have three kids, right?

01:03:01Say, I wanna have three kids.

01:03:02Okay, so when's the best time to have kids?

01:03:05Well, the best time to have kids is in your early 20s

01:03:08because you've got energy and strength and so on, right?

01:03:10I was talking to a friend of mine who was complaining,

01:03:12his wife was complaining about being tired

01:03:15raising their baby and she had a kid in her late 30s

01:03:18and it's like, well, of course you're gonna be tired.

01:03:19It's not your baby's fault but it's a whole lot easier

01:03:21to pull all-nighters in your early 20s than your late 30s.

01:03:26So if women are gonna have three children

01:03:30because you can't just have two

01:03:31because then you need 2.1.

01:03:34So let's just round up a little,

01:03:35obviously up more than a little

01:03:36because some people choose not to have kids.

01:03:38So let's say women wanna have three kids.

01:03:40You start having kids in your early 20s.

01:03:41Let's say the kids are two years apart or 18 months apart.

01:03:44Let's just say two years because the math is easier.

01:03:46So you have a kid at 22, 24, 26, right?

01:03:50You stay home for five years.

01:03:52That puts you in your early 30s, right?

01:03:57So how is it economically viable

01:04:06to have women in the workforce

01:04:08and have a replacement or mildly growing birth rate?

01:04:12It's not.

01:04:13And the only way you get women in the workplace

01:04:16is to destroy the birth rate.

01:04:19And so it's not civilizationally sustainable

01:04:24to subsidize women into, quote,

01:04:27equal economic outcomes to men

01:04:29because then the woman who has,

01:04:35she had a kid at 26.

01:04:37So the kid is five, she's 31,

01:04:39and she's probably going to need to be around those kids

01:04:45because in many places,

01:04:46it's not legal for your children to be home alone

01:04:49until they're at least 12, right?

01:04:51So she's got to go then to be available

01:04:54to the kids after school and so on

01:04:58from the age of her youngest kid is five when she's 31.

01:05:04So he's got to get to 12, which is seven years.

01:05:06So then she's 38.

01:05:09She's been an adult for 20 years.

01:05:11She's 38 when her youngest kid is 12

01:05:14and can spend time at home alone.

01:05:16Now, maybe then she can go and get a job.

01:05:18Maybe.

01:05:21The problem is though, when your kid is 12,

01:05:25your older kids are going through the teen storms, right?

01:05:29So they're having to navigate teenage structures,

01:05:32drugs, alcohol, sexuality, bad peers,

01:05:37bad parties, bad problems, peer pressure,

01:05:39all that kind of stuff.

01:05:40And if she just abandons all of them

01:05:42to go and work at some job, is it economically productive?

01:05:47So let's say that one of her kid goes off the rails

01:05:50just because she's not home,

01:05:51making sure she's vetting his social circle,

01:05:53making sure he's safe,

01:05:54making sure he's making good decisions,

01:05:56making sure he's exercising

01:05:58and making sure he's fulfilling his commitments

01:06:01and driving him to work if he's going to get a job

01:06:03or something like that.

01:06:04One of the kids goes off the rails

01:06:06and let's say going off the rails,

01:06:10I mean, that can easily cost a family $100,000

01:06:13if a kid goes off the rails,

01:06:16especially if he gets involved in something like drugs

01:06:19or even alcoholism.

01:06:21Maybe he's got a DUI, that's an easy 20, 30K.

01:06:24Maybe he gets a drug addict habit and steals

01:06:26and that's an easy 20, 30K.

01:06:28Maybe he's got to go rehab, that's another 20, 30K.

01:06:31All of these things.

01:06:32Is it economically viable for women

01:06:36to both have replacement birth rates

01:06:40and be in the workforce?

01:06:41And if you look around the world,

01:06:43the answer is pretty damn simple and it's no.

01:06:47It does not work.

01:06:49The only way that you can get women

01:06:51on even close to economic parity to men

01:06:54is for the government to hire them,

01:06:56for there to be laws that force employers to hire them

01:06:59and to give up your birth rate.

01:07:02So how is this even remotely sustainable?

01:07:06It's not.

01:07:07So when you say, well, maybe men should stay home

01:07:09and women should go to work.

01:07:10Well, first of all, who's going to breastfeed?

01:07:12Second of all, women have evolved

01:07:15for hundreds of thousands of years to deal with toddlers

01:07:21and men have not.

01:07:22And generally what happens is in most societies,

01:07:25around seven or eight sort of is when kids transition

01:07:29from moms to dads, in particular the boys, right?

01:07:33Because they can start to do some useful stuff

01:07:35with regards to hunting or farming

01:07:37or whatever it is, gathering and so on, right?

01:07:40So I'm open to the arguments

01:07:43and I love women and want women to be happy

01:07:46and I absolutely believe in perfect equality

01:07:48under the law for men and for women.

01:07:51But when you give women all the education

01:07:55in the known universe,

01:07:56they tend to go into economically unsustainable debt.

01:07:58You know, the student loan debt crisis

01:08:00is largely the women choosing unproductive degrees crisis.

01:08:05So how does it work to try and get women

01:08:10out into the workforce without any compulsion,

01:08:16without any violations of people's personal,

01:08:19private, property, legal and business rights?

01:08:23And again, I'm open to hearing the argument.

01:08:26I'm open to hearing the argument,

01:08:28but I can't see how it works.

01:08:30Let's also take welfare out of the equation

01:08:33because the welfare state

01:08:34is largely the single mother state.

01:08:35And, you know, again, I wanna reiterate,

01:08:38I have massive affection for women.

01:08:40I live with two wonderful females

01:08:42who are the absolute light and joy of my life.

01:08:45But if I look at this from a sort of cold, pragmatic,

01:08:47statistical, factual, across the world, across history,

01:08:52it doesn't work.

01:08:53Women can only be, quote,

01:08:56economically sustainable in the workplace

01:08:57with massive amounts of government intervention,

01:08:59control of the marketplace, subsidies, debt

01:09:02and a collapse in birth rate.

01:09:05So I don't,

01:09:09I did hear the chirp,

01:09:10I don't know if that's a smoke alarm, but anyway.

01:09:13So I'm sort of happy to hear the argument,

01:09:16but I can't see if I look all across the world,

01:09:18I look at places like Korea,

01:09:20I look at places even like Russia,

01:09:22I look at places like Japan,

01:09:24I look at the West as a whole,

01:09:27and it's like, well, we've worked really, really hard

01:09:29to try and close the gender pay gap.

01:09:33And the only way we can close the gender pay gap

01:09:36is to cease to exist as a civilization

01:09:38in any recognizable form.

01:09:40Call me crazy,

01:09:41that just seems like a rather high price to pay.

01:09:43What are your thoughts?

01:09:46Well, I get that.

01:09:48I agree with a lot of what you're saying.

01:09:51I guess my question is,

01:09:55if you have your followers that are watching your show

01:09:59and every once in a while,

01:10:01your daughter will come on the show

01:10:03and they will see the great relationship

01:10:05that you have with your daughter.

01:10:08And I'm gonna assume that you have this great relationship

01:10:13because you were able to work from home,

01:10:16just your circumstance.

01:10:22If men overall in general

01:10:27did not fit the prototypical role of protector and provider

01:10:32and were able to take their foot off the gas a little bit

01:10:35and be more present with their children,

01:10:38then now they can enjoy that fulfilling relationship

01:10:43with their children.

01:10:43So maybe when little Johnny falls and scrapes his knee,

01:10:47he runs to dad instead of mom

01:10:49because dad is a little bit more present.

01:10:52Okay, but sorry, who's providing for the family

01:10:55when the children are young, let's say?

01:10:58I mean, obviously you need women for breastfeeding, right?

01:11:00I mean, that's the healthiest thing.

01:11:02And it's at least, I think the World Health Organization

01:11:04back when it had some credibility

01:11:06was like 18 months for that.

01:11:09So who is providing for the family if the father is home?

01:11:14Well, it's sort of a hybrid situation.

01:11:16So you have breastfeeding, but women can pump.

01:11:19So-

01:11:20Yeah, but breastfeeding isn't just about

01:11:21getting the breast meat, oh, sorry, breast meat,

01:11:25like cannibalism.

01:11:26It's not about getting the breast milk

01:11:28down the gullet of the baby.

01:11:30It's eye to eye contact, it's skin contact,

01:11:33it's caressing, it's holding, right?

01:11:38So it's not just about, well,

01:11:39the breast milk has ended up in the baby's belly.

01:11:43It's a whole thing which has evolved.

01:11:45We were not evolved to pump and have bottles.

01:11:49And it's about the whole experience and connection

01:11:54and the scent of the mother and the feel of her skin

01:11:56and her sweat and her eye contact and the touch.

01:11:59I mean, it's a whole thing.

01:12:00It's not just about food.

01:12:02I mean, do you ever try,

01:12:04if you've got a new date with a girl,

01:12:05you ever try taking her to a hotdog stand, right, downtown?

01:12:12And she's like, well, hang on a second,

01:12:14why are you taking me to a hotdog stand?

01:12:16And he's like, and you're like,

01:12:17hey man, $3 street meat is the way to go.

01:12:21It fills you up just as much as a dinner

01:12:23at a nice restaurant.

01:12:24And she's like, yeah, but I want the ambience,

01:12:26I want the candlelight, I want the violins,

01:12:28I want the nice waiter, I want the tablecloth.

01:12:30And it's like, you understand, it's not just about the food,

01:12:33it's about the whole experience.

01:12:36Yeah, I get that, I get that.

01:12:38The milk change is based on the saliva of the baby.

01:12:40Sorry, I just wanted to mention that as well.

01:12:43So it is a symbiotic relationship.

01:12:46Sorry, go ahead.

01:12:48Okay, so, but you mentioned evolution,

01:12:54and you know-

01:12:55Is that your smoke detector, just out of curiosity?

01:12:57Yes, yeah, yeah, I got to change the battery,

01:12:59sorry about that.

01:13:00No problem.

01:13:01Yeah, so, okay, so we have evolution.

01:13:04And in the past, when you had saber-toothed tigers,

01:13:09or whatever the case may be,

01:13:10and men had to gather and hunt and coordinate

01:13:13that sort of thing and bring back calories

01:13:15for the old and the children and their wives,

01:13:18that sort of thing.

01:13:19But we don't deal with that anymore.

01:13:21And now women, over time, with technology,

01:13:25we haven't overcome everything,

01:13:27but women can go out there and work.

01:13:31Or they do work, I'm just-

01:13:32Okay, when do they work?

01:13:35When do they work?

01:13:35Let's assume that we want three kids, a family.

01:13:38When do they work?

01:13:39When do the children go to work?

01:13:40Sorry, when do the women go to work?

01:13:43Well, what I'm saying is-

01:13:46Come on, just tell me.

01:13:47At what age do women go to work?

01:13:50Well, unfortunately, you may have a circumstance

01:13:53where you might even have a newborn.

01:13:57I'm just making up a scenario, but-

01:13:58No, no, no, I'm not asking you to make up a scenario.

01:14:01I'm asking you to answer the question.

01:14:03You say women can go to work,

01:14:04and let's assume that we want a sustainable birth rate.

01:14:08Let's say three kids, a family,

01:14:09because, you know, more is better is more is better.

01:14:12That third kid wants to come along.

01:14:14So, at what age would you suggest women go to work?

01:14:23Well, my issue, it's, okay, you have a...

01:14:29They can go to work if you have a family situation,

01:14:34this particular family situation,

01:14:35three children, a husband, and a wife.

01:14:36No, no, I'm not looking for a particular family situation.

01:14:38I'm asking you, as a society, you've got,

01:14:41you want a birth rate of three kids, a family.

01:14:44When should women go to work?

01:14:51Ideally, okay, I keep saying ideally,

01:14:53when the children are a little older, so eight, nine, 10.

01:15:02Okay, so once the kids are how old?

01:15:08Let's just say eight years old.

01:15:10Eight years old, okay.

01:15:11So, at eight years of age,

01:15:15the children get on a school bus, they go to school,

01:15:17they come home from school to an empty house,

01:15:19is that right?

01:15:22No, they're not coming home to an empty house

01:15:24because dad is there, because...

01:15:27No, no, dad's working nine to five, right?

01:15:30So, they come home, and he's got to,

01:15:32often has to work a little late,

01:15:33or he's got a commute, or whatever.

01:15:35He probably doesn't get home till six or seven.

01:15:37So, an eight-year-old comes, hang on,

01:15:39an eight-year-old comes home to an empty house.

01:15:41Okay.

01:15:44Is that good?

01:15:45Well, of course not.

01:15:48Okay, so the answer can't be eight.

01:15:54So, what is the age that women go to work?

01:15:56It's certainly not in their early to mid-20s,

01:16:01because, again, I'm talking about a totally free society.

01:16:04You can hire and fire whoever you want.

01:16:06You actually have property rights in your business, right?

01:16:09So, if society is aiming for a

01:16:14birth rate of three per couple, right,

01:16:16then how many employers are going to hire and train women

01:16:21in their prime childbearing years,

01:16:23knowing that most people are gonna wanna,

01:16:25most of the women are gonna wanna get married and have kids?

01:16:27They're gonna say, no, no, no.

01:16:29If I hire a woman, she's gonna get married and have kids.

01:16:32If I hire a man, he's gonna have kids to provide for.

01:16:37So, who's gonna work harder and more consistently?

01:16:41The man is gonna work harder and more consistently.

01:16:44Okay, so, again, what age should women go to work?

01:16:49Can't be when their kids are eight,

01:16:50because their kids shouldn't be home alone

01:16:52at the age of eight.

01:16:53And we also have this freaky thing now

01:16:55where kids are getting access to horrendous stuff online

01:16:58at a very early age,

01:16:59so you're just gonna need to have someone home.

01:17:02Kids being home unsupervised is, in many ways,

01:17:04much worse now with the internet

01:17:06than it was even in the past.

01:17:07So, what age should the women go to work?

01:17:11Yeah, I get that.

01:17:12I mean, there's, you can't leave small children unattended,

01:17:17and you're not-

01:17:18Okay, so it's not eight.

01:17:20So, whatever.

01:17:21And you're not taking older children,

01:17:22because older children can get into all kinds of trouble

01:17:24with the internet, friends.

01:17:25Well, and I'm also not sure that it's entirely fair

01:17:28to say to older children, you have to be the parent now,

01:17:31because mommy wants to work.

01:17:34Because it's economically inefficient.

01:17:36I mean, you could say, well, she's gonna pay

01:17:39to have someone come and take care of her children.

01:17:42It's like, but that's not that much fun for the kids,

01:17:43because those people tend to come and go.

01:17:45They may not have the same values.

01:17:47In fact, they almost certainly won't.

01:17:48There's gonna be a lot of contradictions.

01:17:50There's gonna be a lot of problems.

01:17:51Those people can be untrustworthy.

01:17:53They're certainly not bonded with their children.

01:17:55They don't have the same loyalty

01:17:57towards your children, and so on, right?

01:18:00So, it doesn't end up being very economically efficient.

01:18:04So, at what age of the mother should she go to work?

01:18:13Now, again, if she doesn't want to become a mother,

01:18:14that's a whole different thing.

01:18:15But of course, I mean, in a free society,

01:18:17you can ask people that,

01:18:19because that would be a free speech issue.

01:18:21Now, you can't.

01:18:22But at what age should, again,

01:18:25assuming you want a replacement birth rate,

01:18:26at what age should the mothers go to work?

01:18:31Well, I mean, when you put it that way,

01:18:37the age of the mother,

01:18:38the mother would not be able to go to work

01:18:42until her children are pretty much grown.

01:18:48Okay, so let's say she's got her,

01:18:50she has her last kid at 26.

01:18:54So, he's 18 when she's 44, right?

01:19:00Right.

01:19:01Okay, now, remember,

01:19:04she is living in a society

01:19:08where women generally have kids in their early 20s, right?

01:19:14So, she's gonna go back to work

01:19:17when she is within a year or two or three

01:19:21of becoming a grandmother.

01:19:24Now, do you think that her time is better spent

01:19:28at work in her mid-40s,

01:19:31with no particular work skills,

01:19:34or is her time for society better spent

01:19:38transferring her parenting skills to her children

01:19:41and being a great grandmother

01:19:43and helping them with their babies?

01:19:46The latter.

01:19:47Okay, so again, I ask you,

01:19:49when does she go to work?

01:19:54I keep thinking my chair's squeaking.

01:19:56It's not, anyway, sorry, go on.

01:19:58Yeah, I understand everything that you're saying

01:20:01and the direction that you're leading.

01:20:05No, no, I'm not trying to lead in any direction.

01:20:06I'm genuinely, I ask this of friends and society as a whole,

01:20:11when should children, if we want a replacement birthrate,

01:20:14and we also want people raising their own children,

01:20:17because, right, I mean, there's not much point,

01:20:20and I go through all of this in my novel, The Present,

01:20:24which you should definitely check out

01:20:25at freedomain.com slash books.

01:20:27It's free, but it's not economically viable

01:20:31for women to go to work and then hand money

01:20:33to other women to raise their children.

01:20:35It's not economically viable,

01:20:37and it's not civilizationally viable

01:20:39because women are the transmitters of culture, right?

01:20:42So there's not much point.

01:20:43You don't have children to pass along your genes.

01:20:45You have children to pass along your values,

01:20:48and if you're paying other women to raise your children,

01:20:53then those children would have to be much,

01:20:55sorry, those women who raise your children

01:20:57would, by economic logic, have to be much less valuable

01:21:00and competent than you are,

01:21:01because otherwise, if, you know,

01:21:03you wouldn't have somebody who was a maid or a waitress

01:21:07paying a lawyer to raise her child

01:21:08because she couldn't afford it,

01:21:09so it has to be the other way around.

01:21:11So is there a logical time at which you say,

01:21:17oh, well, what about before they have kids?

01:21:19Okay, so let's say they can start working at 18,

01:21:21and then they go and get a job.

01:21:23Well, who's gonna hire them

01:21:24knowing that they want to have kids in their early 20s,

01:21:28and who's gonna hire and invest in them a lot?

01:21:29And also, shouldn't they be out there

01:21:31trying to find a great husband

01:21:33rather than typing into PowerPoint or Excel spreadsheets

01:21:37under fluorescent lights in an airless office?

01:21:39That doesn't seem to make much sense

01:21:40because then they won't get as quality a husband.

01:21:44So, I mean, I think we've sort of exhausted

01:21:46this line of reasoning,

01:21:47but there is no particularly decent answer

01:21:51as to when, if you want a replacement birthrate,

01:21:55when should women go to work?

01:22:00And there's no answer to it, that you can't answer it.

01:22:03So then my question is just for men and fathers,

01:22:08is there a path for men and fathers

01:22:13to be able to enjoy the love and connection

01:22:17and attachment with their children?

01:22:22Yes, absolutely.

01:22:23Sorry to interrupt.

01:22:24So the way for men to stop having to be distant

01:22:29from their family is to stop men

01:22:31from having to be forced fathers all the time.

01:22:36Because that's life at the moment,

01:22:39is that men are forced to be fathers.

01:22:44And what I mean by that is men are forced to provide

01:22:48for families that are not their own.

01:22:52Through the welfare state,

01:22:53through forced women's employment and so on,

01:22:55men are forced to provide for families

01:22:57that are not their own.

01:22:59So every working man is supporting, on average,

01:23:01another family or at least another child, right?

01:23:08So every man who's working is supporting

01:23:11at least one other child and quite often another family,

01:23:14depending on his tax bracket

01:23:15and his level of work and so on, right?

01:23:17So the fact that we have this bizarre,

01:23:19economically polygamous, fracked-up, harem-based society

01:23:24where a man, in order to have a family of his own,

01:23:27he has to work, and in order to have a family of his own,

01:23:30he's forced to provide for another family

01:23:33that he doesn't even know.

01:23:36And he provides for it directly through taxes,

01:23:38indirectly through inflation, money printing,

01:23:40debt, you name it.

01:23:42And also, he's forced to subsidize women

01:23:45to not have children.

01:23:48So he's forced to subsidize the women who have children

01:23:50through the welfare state,

01:23:51and he's forced to subsidize women to not have children

01:23:54through having to subsidize higher education

01:23:57and employment that is based upon government fiat

01:24:01and edict, government force.

01:24:04So I want fathers to be very much involved

01:24:09in their own families, but in order to do that,

01:24:11they stop having to be drow horses

01:24:13to other families from irresponsible women

01:24:16who have children outside of wedlock without a provider,

01:24:21or who want to LARP as girl bosses,

01:24:23but not subject themselves to the actual free market

01:24:26and voluntary choice.

01:24:27Oh, because women are all about free choice,

01:24:29my body, my choice.

01:24:30Well, what about the mind, body, and resources

01:24:32of all the men who are hooked up as drow horses to pull

01:24:36your vanity and often irresponsibility?

01:24:38For some women, not all women,

01:24:39of course, tons of responsible, wonderful women out there.

01:24:42So yes, I would absolutely love it

01:24:45if men got to spend more time with their family,

01:24:47but then they have to stop being forced

01:24:49to subsidize other people's families.

01:24:51Does that make sense?

01:24:53Okay, gotcha.

01:24:54Thank you.

01:24:55All right.

01:24:56I appreciate the conversation and great, great questions.

01:25:01Go change your battery, brother.

01:25:03Appreciate it.

01:25:04All right, thank you.

01:25:05Bye.

01:25:06All right.

01:25:07All right, we have another caller.

01:25:10Hello, freedomman.com slash donate

01:25:13to help out the show all donations get.

01:25:16A copy of my fantastic presentation

01:25:18on the French revolution,

01:25:18which will blow your mind and bring the modern world

01:25:21into glaring wild focus.

01:25:24Just before that, somebody says,

01:25:25I don't agree men are less capable

01:25:27of looking after toddlers.

01:25:28I think such evolutionary theories are vacuous.

01:25:30All right.

01:25:31So you're saying that men can breastfeed, right?

01:25:34Because that's into the toddler ville, right?

01:25:37And you're saying that women have not evolved

01:25:39to deal with toddlers,

01:25:40even though women spent almost all of their adult lives

01:25:42dealing with toddlers and children.

01:25:44There's just no evolutionary pressures whatsoever for that.

01:25:47Sorry, Lou, go ahead with your comment.

01:25:49What you got?

01:25:50Yeah, so I actually,

01:25:51I was trying to develop location independent income

01:25:56and I have a pretty good job.

01:25:59And I was interested to hear your thoughts

01:26:02on the viability of trying to get employed,

01:26:06finding an employer that would be willing

01:26:09to allow an employee to work either as a contractor

01:26:13or through hiring, sorry,

01:26:17to a staffing agency from other countries.

01:26:20Right.

01:26:21Well, how do you get an employer to pay you money?

01:26:27By providing more value than his next best option.

01:26:32Right.

01:26:32So you have to make a business case to an employer

01:26:35as to why that employer should hire you

01:26:39and the advantage of you being remote.

01:26:44So how do you do that?

01:26:48I guess the same, almost the same way

01:26:51I would ask for a raise before accepting a job.

01:26:55Well, but you're trying to get someone new to hire you.

01:26:57Is that right?

01:27:00Yeah, well, I was also thinking of doing it

01:27:03with my existing employer

01:27:05while he's trying to.

01:27:06Okay, got it.

01:27:07Now, so you have to figure out, this is sales 101.

01:27:12So I'm sorry if I sound obvious to those who know this,

01:27:15but so how do you sell something to someone?

01:27:17Well, you have to figure out what their objections are,

01:27:22assuming they have any desire for it at all

01:27:24and business people want to make more money

01:27:26and they don't want to spend money on offices

01:27:27and computers if they don't have to.

01:27:29So what are the biggest concerns

01:27:34that employers have about out-of-office workers?

01:27:41Slacking?

01:27:42Yeah, of course, right?

01:27:43I mean, there are people who walk around downtown

01:27:47at three o'clock in the afternoon

01:27:48and they ask everyone at a cafe where they work

01:27:51and then they just short that company.

01:27:54It's gonna be out of business, right?

01:27:56Or do badly.

01:27:57So how do you address your,

01:28:02I can only deal with new employers here, right?

01:28:04But let's say you're trying to build a stable

01:28:06or a group of people who are gonna pay you to work remotely,

01:28:09how do you overcome their fears or concerns

01:28:13that you're just gonna be slacking?

01:28:19I'm not sure, but I noticed that employers

01:28:21that are already offering remote-only work

01:28:27are not willing to allow one to work from out of country

01:28:32because it's not something their existing process supports.

01:28:37Okay, so you're saying that they have, say,

01:28:41some sort of payroll scheme or benefit scheme

01:28:43that is specific to a country

01:28:45and they don't want to pay somebody outside of the country?

01:28:50That's right.

01:28:51Okay, but that's easy.

01:28:54I mean, you know that there's international business

01:28:55all the time, right?

01:28:56I mean, business-to-business is significantly international

01:28:59and it has been since the 16th, 17th century.

01:29:02So then how do you deal with the fact

01:29:05that you don't hook into their existing payroll

01:29:07and benefit schemes if you're working outside country?

01:29:12Well, I can offer to work as a contractor,

01:29:14but if they see compliance risk with that,

01:29:17I can create my own entity

01:29:19and they can hire me through that,

01:29:22through a service agreement.

01:29:24And that way, my entity acts as a shield

01:29:27that absorbs all the compliance costs.

01:29:30Yeah.

01:29:31Okay, so you just have to make a business case for them.

01:29:38But yeah, I'm also thinking that this wouldn't work

01:29:41for positions where they can easily replace people.

01:29:44I think they would just hire someone else.

01:29:49I'm not sure what you mean.

01:29:52Can you give me, you don't have to tell me the exact job,

01:29:54but what sort of, do you mean like a call center

01:29:58or something?

01:29:59Call center's gonna get replaced by AI,

01:30:00but anyway, what do you mean?

01:30:01No, let's say a low-level position in any profession,

01:30:05like engineering, accounting, or software.

01:30:08Well, I don't know that those are low-level positions,

01:30:11but you have to be so productive that you're worthwhile.

01:30:18You know, it's like saying,

01:30:19well, how do I get my own private trailer on a movie set

01:30:23and my own private sous chef on a movie set?

01:30:26Well, don't be an extra, you have to be a star.

01:30:28So you have to relentlessly add to the value

01:30:31that you can provide to the point

01:30:32where people will bend over backwards to accommodate you

01:30:34because you're a 10X or a 20X kind of guy.

01:30:43Do you see what I mean?

01:30:45Yeah.

01:30:46The only thing that you can do in life

01:30:48is just completely aim to add value

01:30:53as much as humanly possible

01:30:54in just about every circumstance or situation.

01:31:00You know, I've been talking about this with my daughter

01:31:02since she was a little kid

01:31:03and she got her first job a month ago.

01:31:05She's already got a promotion.

01:31:11Did she have to ask for it?

01:31:13She just was relentlessly competent.

01:31:15No, she didn't ask for it.

01:31:17She goes the extra mile, she does the hard work,

01:31:20she always says yes, and she's very enthusiastic

01:31:23and she just gets a promotion.

01:31:31Okay.

01:31:32So you just have to keep adding value, right?

01:31:35Okay, so are you in the sort of engineering field

01:31:39or something like that?

01:31:40No, I'm in accounting.

01:31:41Accounting, okay.

01:31:43So if you're in the accounting field,

01:31:45maybe you learn about HR,

01:31:46maybe you learn about compliance,

01:31:48maybe you learn about the technical end

01:31:51of whatever business you're doing the accounting of,

01:31:53you need to cross-pollinate your skills, right?

01:31:56So one of the reasons that I made money

01:31:58in the business world is I did the programming,

01:32:01I was heavily involved in the marketing,

01:32:03I went along on all the sales calls

01:32:06because they desperately wanted me

01:32:07to come in on the sales calls

01:32:09and I learned about the business side.

01:32:12So that's a big gathering of skills, right?

01:32:17And so one of the reasons that I was successful

01:32:19in doing what I'm doing is because I know how to code,

01:32:22I know how to manage, I know how to do marketing,

01:32:24I know the business world and I have a reasonable degree

01:32:28of self-knowledge and causality within the human mind.

01:32:31So that's just a big, you know, big mess of skills.

01:32:34So you just keep widening your skill set

01:32:37rather than just deepening.

01:32:38The problem with deepening your skill set is,

01:32:41to me, it's like taking the wheels off your car.

01:32:44I mean, yes, you're gonna be there

01:32:47and you can't get anywhere else.

01:32:48So in terms of, how do you become more productive

01:32:54as an accountant?

01:32:55I always aim to do 10 times more

01:32:57than the guy in the next booth.

01:32:59I aim to have a show at least 10 times better

01:33:03than my nearest competitor.

01:33:05I mean, I'm not even gonna tell you

01:33:06whether I achieve that or not,

01:33:07that's really not up to me to judge, but that's my goal.

01:33:10So how can you be 10 times more productive

01:33:12to the point where, like, you just become this wood chipper,

01:33:16they can just throw anything,

01:33:17you just cruise through it, you do it,

01:33:19it's accurate, it's right, it's fantastic

01:33:22and all of that, right?

01:33:24So how do you become this sort of 10x or 20x kind of guy?

01:33:31As opposed to, well, I'll just try and do what I do,

01:33:34but a little faster and a little better,

01:33:35that's not gonna give you any kind of leverage.

01:33:37So the reason that movie stars have paid $10 million,

01:33:40$15 million and $20 million is because they open a movie.

01:33:45In other words, people will go and see a movie

01:33:48just because Robert Downey Jr. is in it.

01:33:51Like he's going back to the Marvel universe

01:33:53and they're paying him like $80 million

01:33:55or something like that.

01:33:56Why?

01:33:57Well, because people will go and see a movie

01:33:59just because Robert Downey Jr. is in it.

01:34:02And so they're not paying him $80 million.

01:34:07The moviegoers are paying the studio $160 million

01:34:12and they're just giving Robert Downey Jr. half of that

01:34:14or something like that, right?

01:34:15They're not paying him, they're making money from him

01:34:17because he's that charismatic, he's that beloved,

01:34:19he's got that much rizzle,

01:34:21whatever you wanna call it to the point

01:34:22and that much talent that he can open a movie.

01:34:25And also because he's Robert Downey Jr.,

01:34:28everybody in the media is thrilled

01:34:30to get an interview with him.

01:34:31Like I read an interview with Robert Downey Jr.

01:34:33in some men's magazine

01:34:35and they were thrilled to get the interview.

01:34:38There was a wine magazine on an airplane

01:34:42I read many, many years ago

01:34:43where a guy wanted to interview Tom Cruise.

01:34:47And I think he spent 18 months

01:34:50trying to get an interview with Tom Cruise

01:34:52and he finally got an interview with Tom Cruise

01:34:55because Tom Cruise doesn't give that many interviews

01:34:59and he's a real get.

01:35:00And so if you pay a movie star,

01:35:02they'll generate a lot of buzz about your movie,

01:35:06particularly if they change their weight,

01:35:07some sort of Christian Bale kind of thing, right?

01:35:12Yeah, develop some code

01:35:13that generates some repetitive task five times, easy.

01:35:16Yeah, can you learn how to program Excel?

01:35:18Can you learn how to deal with the back end

01:35:21of something that you can?

01:35:23So I mean, I don't wanna pump my own skills or whatever,

01:35:27but it's just the closest thing that I have to this.

01:35:29So a fellow, a very kind listener

01:35:35helped us automate the media posting

01:35:39and the uploading and publishing of videos.

01:35:42And I gave him some money for that

01:35:45and he was very kind and generous to do it

01:35:47and it's been an absolute lifesaver for me.

01:35:52So that is just, you just leave it

01:35:55and you come back and it's mostly done.

01:35:57I mean, it's a little bit of handholding,

01:35:58but for the most part, it's automated.

01:36:00So that you just, whatever you can do to automate,

01:36:03can, even assertiveness skills.

01:36:05So for instance, if you have an employer

01:36:08and you're an accountant and the employer

01:36:10is doing something that could be risky,

01:36:13could be dicey, could cause problems,

01:36:16are you confident to say, whoa, whoa, whoa,

01:36:19you need to stop this and we need to review this

01:36:21and I'm gonna, or maybe you do a presentation

01:36:23and say, here's the risks you're taking,

01:36:24here's the problems that I see.

01:36:26And that may be an assertiveness thing.

01:36:28So there could be softer skills that make you 10X.

01:36:31And then the guy's like, wow, you just pulled me back

01:36:33from walking into a highway in a foggy storm, right?

01:36:37So you could have just saved my bacon.

01:36:40So in my own situation, way back in the day,

01:36:44we had these databases and these front ends

01:36:47and all the customers wanted changes.

01:36:49They wanted to add fields, tables, forms, reports

01:36:51and so on, right?

01:36:52So I wrote a program that accepted, it was a spreadsheet

01:36:57and you could just say, here's what I wanna have changed

01:36:59and the customer could do it.

01:37:01I would spend an hour or two training them how to do it.

01:37:03They would do all of that.

01:37:04And then my program would open up that spreadsheet,

01:37:07make all of the changes automatically to all the tables,

01:37:10all the queries, all the forms, all the reports.

01:37:13It would create the dropdowns, it would create,

01:37:15every time you double clicked on a date field,

01:37:17you'd get a little calendar.

01:37:18Every time you double clicked on a number field,

01:37:19you'd get a little calculator.

01:37:21All the query forms where you could just pop up a form,

01:37:24type whatever you wanted,

01:37:25it would filter the underlying stuff.

01:37:26All the reports, everything would be altered automatically.

01:37:29Now that would take weeks and weeks of labor

01:37:32and it was all done in about an hour with a full report

01:37:36that the customer signed off on.

01:37:37And then there weren't any, oh, I didn't ask for that,

01:37:40I didn't ask for that, I wanted this to be different.

01:37:42People sometimes make decisions later or forget

01:37:44or try and weasel stuff in and it was a whole process.

01:37:46You'd send them this, you'd receive it,

01:37:49they'd sign off on it and those were the changes

01:37:51and they were documented, validated, automated, perfect.

01:37:55And this cut the time to produce a system

01:37:59in terms of these changes, it cut it by 90 to 95%.

01:38:03So what was that worth to our business?

01:38:05Well, it was worth a massive amount

01:38:07because you know in software,

01:38:08every time a human being has to touch something,

01:38:10it's like a massive sludgy break in the whole process, right?

01:38:15Is there negotiating power then from the expectation

01:38:18that you will continue to have those skills in the future

01:38:21and create more value in the future

01:38:23because they already have the automation

01:38:25since you've already created it?

01:38:28Well, not if you're keeping the automation.

01:38:31Oh, if they need you to maintain it.

01:38:32No, no, if I was a contractor saying,

01:38:36hey, I'll make these changes to your database,

01:38:38then I would automate those changes to the database.

01:38:42And if I didn't have the skills,

01:38:43I would just pay someone to do it

01:38:45and that way I could turn around and have this automated.

01:38:48In fact, I developed to the point

01:38:50where you could simply point a website at the database

01:38:53and it would dynamically generate

01:38:55all of the entry forms, the navigation forms,

01:38:58the report forms, the query forms,

01:39:00you could do data entry, you could do filters,

01:39:02the whole thing, it was just boom.

01:39:03I remember going to China

01:39:05and we had a translation of the system

01:39:07from English to Chinese.

01:39:09So I just changed all the labels instead of,

01:39:11because I had the whole,

01:39:13even the labels on the forms

01:39:14were documented in the database.

01:39:16So I just put another column in, I put the Mandarin in,

01:39:19I had them point at the,

01:39:20in fact, you could switch back and forth

01:39:21between Mandarin and English.

01:39:23It took about an hour to translate an entire database

01:39:27with hundreds of tables, thousands of queries

01:39:29and hundreds of forms and reports.

01:39:31It took about an hour and then that was permanent.

01:39:33You could switch back and forth between the two.

01:39:35How cool was that?

01:39:37It happened on the Windows version,

01:39:39it happened on the web version and it was all automated.

01:39:43So you hold onto those tools.

01:39:45You don't hand them over, right?

01:39:47You hold onto those tools.

01:39:50How can you hold onto them

01:39:51when they're the intellectual property of the company

01:39:53once you've created them?

01:39:55So the work product, right?

01:39:58If you use your own laptop

01:40:00to create an accounting package or an accounting solution,

01:40:04they don't take your laptop, they just take the solution.

01:40:06They don't take your capital equipment.

01:40:08They don't take your productivity, right?

01:40:11Yeah, okay, that makes sense.

01:40:13But do you give the, when you can make,

01:40:16when you can provide exceptional value as an employee,

01:40:19do you do it and then wait to see if value is reciprocated

01:40:23or do you try to negotiate ahead of?

01:40:25Oh no, you take, in my view,

01:40:28again, you can do it in a number of ways that you want,

01:40:31but a lot of people think

01:40:32that it's just about being productive,

01:40:34but it's as much about marketing

01:40:35as it is about anything else.

01:40:37There's no point in having a great product

01:40:38if people don't know about it, right?

01:40:40So one of the things that I've been doing

01:40:42with the private call-ins is I've been saying to people,

01:40:44can you tell me how valuable the call was to you

01:40:46and then I can use that to gain credibility.

01:40:48So with regards to people thinking

01:40:50that if you work remotely or in another country,

01:40:52you'll be lazy, well, what you need to do

01:40:54is do a couple of contracts,

01:40:56maybe even at cost or at a loss.

01:40:58And what you do is you get testimonials

01:41:01from the people you've worked with

01:41:02and you negotiate that ahead of time,

01:41:03say, look, I don't need a novel,

01:41:05I just need a certain amount of time.

01:41:09And you then get testimonials and say,

01:41:12the work was incredibly fast, incredibly efficient.

01:41:15And you say, I did this remotely,

01:41:16this is what people are saying.

01:41:17And that way you overcome this concern

01:41:20that you're gonna be a jiggler

01:41:21or somebody who just jiggles the mouse

01:41:23and pretends to be busy, if that makes sense.

01:41:25So you've got to get these testimonials.

01:41:28If you get these testimonials,

01:41:29then you overcome people's objections or fears or concerns

01:41:35that you're gonna be lazy, if that makes sense.

01:41:39Yeah, thank you, Stefan.

01:41:40You're very welcome

01:41:41and I wish you the very best in your career.

01:41:44Just keep relentlessly adding value

01:41:45and that's actually what makes it fun.

01:41:48The business world is fun because you get to say,

01:41:50how can I do this better?

01:41:51How can I do this faster?

01:41:52How can I do this in a more efficient manner?

01:41:54I mean, I used to have this almost complete obsession

01:41:58with making the scroll, like, you know, the status bar,

01:42:02that you don't see them as much quite anymore,

01:42:03but sometimes you do,

01:42:04like the bar of how fast a particular process is going.

01:42:08So the way that I wrote code

01:42:10was I would write it to get it right, but not efficient.

01:42:13Right, so to make sure I got the right numbers going in,

01:42:15the right numbers coming out,

01:42:16and that way I know what the input and output

01:42:18is supposed to be,

01:42:19and then I can make it efficient

01:42:21knowing that I have a baseline.

01:42:22And I always had the goal

01:42:25that I was going to make it at least 10 times faster,

01:42:29at least with server-side queries,

01:42:31or I would download stuff to local,

01:42:34they're called record sets,

01:42:35which is ways of working with data,

01:42:37and you can load record sets into RAM.

01:42:39Now, this was a little tricky

01:42:41because this is back when you only had a couple of megs

01:42:42of RAM, not gigs, but megs to deal with.

01:42:45So I would load record sets in,

01:42:46I would set pointers, I memory markers,

01:42:49I would index stuff,

01:42:50I would just, anything that I could do to make it faster.

01:42:53And it just was a complete obsession to me,

01:42:56just about, can I make it faster?

01:42:58There's a story about Steve Jobs, right,

01:43:03that when one of the first IMAX was being built,

01:43:06it took like, I don't know, three minutes to boot up.

01:43:09And he said, listen,

01:43:10if we can get this down to a minute and a half,

01:43:11he went through all the numbers,

01:43:12you'll be saving like 3,000 man years every day

01:43:15just by getting the speed of the boot up cut by half,

01:43:20right, or the speed accelerated by two.

01:43:23So I just have this particular obsession

01:43:27about trying to make things more efficient and faster.

01:43:32You know, I time myself.

01:43:34Honestly, I bring up, and do this,

01:43:36like I bring up, I got it right here,

01:43:38I bring up the clock on Windows or wherever,

01:43:40I bring up the clock,

01:43:41I still have the last one that I timed,

01:43:43and you go to stopwatch, and you reset, and you start.

01:43:47And I say, okay, I finished the show,

01:43:49how long is it gonna take me to process?

01:43:51Start!

01:43:51And I try to make it faster,

01:43:53and is there anything I can do to make it better,

01:43:55and a better flow, and so on, right?

01:43:57So just always be trying to increase and improve,

01:44:00that's fun, that's fun.

01:44:02You don't keep doing the same things over and over again,

01:44:04and if you can find a way to just make things improve

01:44:08in that way, you just get a reputation as a monster.

01:44:14And, you know, I mean, people like Steven Crowder,

01:44:16they have like 17 people working in the studio, right?

01:44:21And I have always been, at least in my studio,

01:44:25though I have obviously other help, but it's just me.

01:44:31All right, so let's see here.

01:44:32This conversation makes me concerned

01:44:34that I'm not being paid enough, right?

01:44:36There's not enough to be good,

01:44:37you also have to, people have to know that you're good.

01:44:42Steph, what are some tips to avoid going above and beyond

01:44:44and then receiving a $25 Pizza Hut gift card?

01:44:48Well, you have to get to better managers.

01:44:51You don't get to better managers

01:44:52until you're an exceptional employee.

01:44:55The best coaches teach the Olympic athletes, honestly.

01:45:00If you want good managers who recognize quality,

01:45:04you have to rise above the crappy managers.

01:45:08Like, why do so many young people

01:45:09have a bad view of capitalism?

01:45:10Because their managers suck.

01:45:12And why do their managers suck?

01:45:13Because high-quality managers

01:45:15aren't working with 19-year-olds.

01:45:17High-quality managers are working

01:45:18with top performers in their 40s.

01:45:22So, yes, of course.

01:45:27Of course your first managers suck.

01:45:31Because the good managers are...

01:45:33It's like saying,

01:45:34where are the really, really great directors?

01:45:37Well, they're making Hollywood movies

01:45:39for 100 million bucks a pop.

01:45:40They're not in some local podunk theater

01:45:43doing another version of Death of a Salesman with amateurs.

01:45:47And there's nothing wrong with any of that stuff,

01:45:48but so if you go above and beyond

01:45:52and you get a $25 Pizza Hut gift card, okay.

01:45:57Well, then you have to break above those managers.

01:46:00So you have to get promoted to the point

01:46:01where you get to the God-managers, the God-mentors,

01:46:05the people who can help you go from 10X to 100X.

01:46:09Those people.

01:46:10But those people's time is incredibly valuable

01:46:12and they don't waste it on people

01:46:14who don't have massive potential.

01:46:17Is it easy to know if you're with a good manager?

01:46:21Well, your numbers go up and you're incredibly thrilled

01:46:24to be there and you're very excited to get his feedback

01:46:27and you can't wait to put his suggestions into practice.

01:46:30Because you pay a great manager

01:46:32with productivity, enthusiasm, and appreciation.

01:46:35So when you're thrilled to listen

01:46:38and he just comes up with stuff that blows your mind

01:46:41and just is incredible with regards to his insights

01:46:45and it's just kind of magic, right?

01:46:48That's a great manager.

01:46:50And you just, if you've ever been around people

01:46:52who just have that level of enthusiasm

01:46:54that feels like you're getting irradiated,

01:46:57it feels like you're like that.

01:47:00Linda Hamilton character in Terminator 2

01:47:02and the chain link feng shui.

01:47:04You know, it's just like, wow, wow.

01:47:07Somebody says, I'm literally being called

01:47:09by different regional bank managers

01:47:10to assist in employee training

01:47:11and basically being told thanks.

01:47:13I'm the second lowest tier employee in the company.

01:47:15Yes.

01:47:16Do you know?

01:47:17I mean, and look, there's lots of barriers.

01:47:19There's lots of barriers

01:47:21to excellence in modern corporations, right?

01:47:24Because everything's gotta be equal

01:47:25and everything's gotta be even and so on.

01:47:27And I get all of that.

01:47:28But you should work for excellence no matter what.

01:47:32I mean, it's not like

01:47:34when I had a lot more people watching live streams,

01:47:36it wasn't like, well, I'm just gonna put more energy

01:47:38into those shows and none into these.

01:47:39Like you strive for excellence no matter what you do.

01:47:45I aim to strive for excellence

01:47:48no matter what it is that I'm doing.

01:47:50If I'm cooking an omelet,

01:47:51I want it to be the best omelet my family has ever tasted.

01:47:56Is it?

01:47:57Probably not.

01:47:58But that's what I'm aiming for.

01:47:59I want every live stream to be a great live stream.

01:48:03I want everything that I do

01:48:05to be as great as humanly possible

01:48:07and then to be even better next time.

01:48:10Because that's fun.

01:48:11Why would I wanna just do the same?

01:48:13I don't wake up every morning saying,

01:48:14damn, I'm still really good at walking.

01:48:17Right?

01:48:18Because you wanna go from walking to running

01:48:19to gymnastics to whatever, right?

01:48:21So just aim for excellence

01:48:25and the world is so hungry for competence

01:48:28that when you focus on being excellent

01:48:34and you let people know

01:48:36and you're very generous with your,

01:48:38because you're like, oh, I'm just gonna get

01:48:40a $25 gift card.

01:48:41It's like, but it's not about that.

01:48:45Because then what happens is you put out your effort,

01:48:47you get a $25 Pizza Hut gift card

01:48:49and you're like, oh man, this sucks.

01:48:51I'm never trying again.

01:48:52It's not worth it.

01:48:52And then you just sink back down again.

01:48:56You sink back down again.

01:48:58And you kind of, oh, I'm so cynical.

01:49:00No, you think you're gonna get bribed

01:49:04into having a commitment to excellence?

01:49:10You think if they gave you a hundred bucks

01:49:12or 500 bucks or a thousand or 10,000, no, no, no.

01:49:16You pursue excellence because it's good for your brain.

01:49:20It's exciting.

01:49:21It's an interesting challenge

01:49:23and it's good for the customer.

01:49:26And that's how you measure the quality

01:49:29of the work that you do.

01:49:32We're all alive because there were excellent hunters

01:49:34and excellent warriors and excellent nurses

01:49:37and excellent doctors and excellent mothers.

01:49:40We're all alive because of excellence

01:49:42and you pay it forward and you focus on quality

01:49:44and you focus on excellence

01:49:46and being the best at what you can do.

01:49:49Now, obviously I do some weights here and there,

01:49:51but I'm not some big weightlifting guy

01:49:53because that's just maintenance for me.

01:49:54I'm not aiming to be the excellent,

01:49:56perfect weight guy, right?

01:49:58That's not my thing because I'm there to pursue philosophy

01:50:02and working out and exercising gives me the energy

01:50:05and focus and physical health to be better at philosophy

01:50:08and do more philosophy.

01:50:10So, but the end goal has gotta be excellence.

01:50:13I mean, this is why I have like two microphones here

01:50:15because one is going into a Zoom recorder,

01:50:18the other one's going into the camera

01:50:20and I've got recording here so that I can,

01:50:22now I had to add that people are calling in

01:50:25so and I've gotta make sure that the quality

01:50:27and I think you'll recognize that the audio quality

01:50:29that I put out is excellent

01:50:30and the video quality is pretty good

01:50:33because I fussed around it like crazy.

01:50:34So just try to be excellent and good and focus on that.

01:50:38And it's like, yes, sometimes you'll get nothing from it.

01:50:41Sometimes.

01:50:43You know, I've complained about this before.

01:50:45It's just a fact of life.

01:50:47A lot of what I do just seems to spiral off into a void.

01:50:50You know, I put out these great novels

01:50:51and every now and then I'd be like on the,

01:50:53oh, a novel feedback and I'm like,

01:50:55oh, someone's got something to say.

01:50:56No, no, my mouse was just hovering

01:50:58over that particular channel.

01:50:59So blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, right?

01:51:01Now, I mean, I put out the peaceful parenting book

01:51:03and I get a couple of messages a week,

01:51:05but you know, relative to the amount of work

01:51:07and also the amount of effect that I know it's having,

01:51:09I just have to live on relatively little,

01:51:13if that makes sense.

01:51:14And that's, but that's,

01:51:15so that's my $25 gift card in a sense, right?

01:51:18But I'm still focused on

01:51:21being the best that I can possibly be

01:51:23because I'm aiming to be relevant in a thousand years.

01:51:27So aim for excellence.

01:51:29Oh, but I'm not getting the right feedback.

01:51:32It's like, but you're not in kindergarten.

01:51:33You don't need the teacher to be like,

01:51:35oh, good job, Johnny.

01:51:36That was excellent.

01:51:37Look at that lollipop man.

01:51:38It's almost looks like a real lollipop

01:51:40and a real man together.

01:51:41I want to eat the paper.

01:51:43I mean, that level of feedback has to come

01:51:45from your own commitment to excellence

01:51:46and your own conscience.

01:51:49Say, oh, well, but people aren't giving me

01:51:50the kind of positive feedback that I want.

01:51:52It's like, but you need to be committed to it

01:51:54for the thing itself.

01:51:55If you want to make a lot of money,

01:51:56if you want to be entrepreneurial,

01:51:57if you want to be recognized for value,

01:51:59you have to have a relentless commitment to value

01:52:02and not join into this low rent, trashy cynicism of,

01:52:05well, I worked very hard on this

01:52:08and I just got a $25 gift card.

01:52:11Okay.

01:52:13So aim to be better next time.

01:52:16And you will float up above the bad managers

01:52:19who only reward excellence with a $25 gift card.

01:52:22So one of the reasons why you get a $25 gift card

01:52:25is to see if you're actually committed to excellence

01:52:28or you just want a $50 gift card or a $100 gift card

01:52:31or a $500 gift card.

01:52:32Are you just in it for the money

01:52:34or are you in it for the thing itself?

01:52:36Because if you're just in it for the money,

01:52:38nobody's going to want to invest in improving your quality.

01:52:42Right?

01:52:43So does Brad Pitt need to do a movie to pay the bills?

01:52:47Like there's a funny thing

01:52:48where Tom Cruise was working

01:52:50with some Eastern European country

01:52:52and he needed something from them

01:52:54and he said, oh, you're doing this, that is like,

01:52:55yeah, it pays the rent, it pays the bills, right?

01:52:58Now that's funny

01:52:59because Tom Cruise is worth like $400 million, right?

01:53:03So by the way, for the future reference,

01:53:05$400 million is two Bitcoins in the future, right?

01:53:08So the idea that Tom Cruise is making movies

01:53:12to pay the bills is funny.

01:53:14So if Tom Cruise was in it for the money,

01:53:18he would have retired after Risky Business

01:53:21or whatever he could have lived on,

01:53:23whatever came, I don't know,

01:53:24whatever came after Risky Business,

01:53:27Legend or whatever it was, right?

01:53:29So if he was just in it for the money,

01:53:32he would have retired long ago.

01:53:34You know, raspy voice Clint Eastwood

01:53:36is making movies into his 70s.

01:53:40So he's not in it for the money,

01:53:42he's in it for the excellence.

01:53:44Now, the reason you get a $25 gift card

01:53:47is if you say, well, that's not enough recognition

01:53:52so I'm not gonna be committed to excellence,

01:53:55then what happens is

01:53:59people are like, oh, he only cares about the money

01:54:01so I'm not gonna invest in him

01:54:04because if he's committed to the excellence

01:54:06of the thing itself,

01:54:10then he's worth investing in

01:54:11because that's a self-sustainable commitment to excellence.

01:54:14So anyway, I hope that helps.

01:54:15Sorry, go ahead.

01:54:17Can she be both in it for the money and the excellence?

01:54:23Like, is there an inherent problem

01:54:25for being in it for the money to a degree?

01:54:30Listen, I have no issue with money,

01:54:32there's nothing wrong with getting paid well.

01:54:35The problem is, if you're paid well,

01:54:38does that diminish your commitment to excellence?

01:54:40Or if you're paid not as well as you want,

01:54:42does that diminish your commitment to excellence?

01:54:44Or does your commitment to excellence

01:54:46transcend immediate financial benefits?

01:54:50Right, I gave up over 80% of my income

01:54:52because of a commitment to excellence in philosophy.

01:54:57Now, that's my choice, maybe other people,

01:54:59I mean, obviously most people choose the money

01:55:00and I did not.

01:55:02I would consider it dishonorable to choose the money,

01:55:05but I chose a commitment to excellence over income

01:55:09and some not insignificant income, right?

01:55:13So that's my choice.

01:55:15I think that's what pays off for me.

01:55:17So I'm making the case for that, right?

01:55:19I gave up writing, I used to write two books a year for 10,

01:55:23so I gave up writing 20 books

01:55:24in order to pursue excellence as a father.

01:55:29I gave up illusions about my family

01:55:32in order to pursue excellence as a father.

01:55:35Now, am I getting paid for that?

01:55:36No, am I getting paid for my pursuit of excellence?

01:55:39I'm not.

01:55:42In fact, it's costing me.

01:55:46That's my particular commitment.

01:55:48That's because I want to be excellent at philosophy

01:55:52come what may.

01:55:53And so the $25 gift card,

01:55:57if you say, if you get cynical about that,

01:55:59then people say,

01:56:00well, he's mostly in it for the money and the recognition.

01:56:03No, no, you have a relentless commitment to excellence

01:56:05because that's a challenge, it's exciting,

01:56:08it's interesting, it's valuable.

01:56:11Now, if you say, well, my commitment to excellence

01:56:13depends upon how much other people recognize that value,

01:56:17then you're gonna fail.

01:56:20The commitment to excellence is not about

01:56:22whether everyone applauds you or curses you.

01:56:26It's about your commitment to excellence

01:56:28for excellence itself,

01:56:30because it's hard, because it's challenging,

01:56:32because it's exciting, because it's valuable,

01:56:34because it's interesting.

01:56:35It's more interesting than the average,

01:56:37the banal, the boring, the repetitive,

01:56:39that everyone else does it too.

01:56:44So, I mean, there's nothing wrong

01:56:45if you are doing fantastic work

01:56:49and people aren't recognizing it

01:56:51and they just won't recognize it,

01:56:52you can go elsewhere, you can get a better job,

01:56:54you can become a contractor,

01:56:58you can start your own business,

01:56:59I have no problem with that.

01:57:00If you wanna make more money, absolutely make more money,

01:57:02but excellence is not about the money.

01:57:05A commitment to excellence is not about the money.

01:57:09Just focus on being great because it's satisfying

01:57:13and it's enjoyable and it's fun

01:57:14and you will never ever doubt.

01:57:16If you commit to excellence,

01:57:17no matter what you're in, what field you're in,

01:57:19if you commit to excellence,

01:57:21you will never ever feel like you're not adding value

01:57:24or providing meaning in this world.

01:57:26That's a really, really great gift, so.

01:57:28All right, I got one more caller, so I appreciate that.

01:57:30Thank you so much and obviously,

01:57:31let me know how it goes if you can.

01:57:33Appreciate that.

01:57:34And we have another caller.

01:57:38We're gonna have to keep this relatively short.

01:57:40It's been a long show, but I am absolutely with you.

01:57:46Oh, look at that, it does look good.

01:57:48Yeah, go ahead, man, what's up?

01:57:50How are you?

01:57:52I haven't seen you in a while, my friend.

01:57:54Still the same, still baldish.

01:57:57I just do want to preamble.

01:58:00I like your CIA anonymous whistleblower lighting

01:58:02that's going on back there, that's nice.

01:58:04Anyway, go ahead.

01:58:06It's just the sun coming through,

01:58:08although anonymity is what it is.

01:58:11I do regret what YouTube did to you.

01:58:13I know that you created a really big kind of,

01:58:18well, you said, you know, if you are a surf working a field,

01:58:23you don't necessarily work the field,

01:58:24but you have produced the crop.

01:58:26And if the Lord comes around and says suddenly,

01:58:29you know what, I'm just gonna take all this back from you.

01:58:32He's not just taking a plot of land.

01:58:39Yeah, it looks like the Lord has also taken his bandwidth.

01:58:45Are you with me?

01:58:46He's come, he's gone, hello.

01:58:50That's cool, I didn't know it did video.

01:58:52I guess we have found out that it does in fact do video.

01:58:56Although it both does and does not,

01:58:57it's Schrodinger's video.

01:59:00Now people, come on, man, I'm working like a surf here.

01:59:04Come on, a little tip here and there

01:59:06would not be the end of the world, would it?

01:59:08I'm looking at you, rumble people.

01:59:11A lot of people there and no tips.

01:59:15So if I'm providing value to you and I know that I am,

01:59:19return value for value, that's called excellence

01:59:23in being a listener too, being a participant.

01:59:26The Lord giveth, the Lord taketh awayth.

01:59:28I don't think that's quite how it works.

01:59:29All right, well, I guess we'll hopefully

01:59:32hear from him next time.

01:59:33And it's very cool, of course, that it does video.

01:59:37I did not know, we'll go full Kevin Samuels.

01:59:41As my boss says, somebody says you aim for perfect

01:59:43and sometimes you settle for good

01:59:44and good is not dropping a tree on somebody's house.

01:59:47Did you see my tip, Steph?

01:59:50Let me see, did I see your tip?

01:59:57Last one I got was 20 minutes ago.

02:00:00So if that was it, then I have seen it,

02:00:03but I don't think that the usernames match.

02:00:06I just wanted to mention that.

02:00:08Somebody says, unfortunately,

02:00:09I don't expect to get moved up in the company

02:00:11any time soon, 10 plus years.

02:00:12I'm actively looking for better employment

02:00:14slash entrepreneurship at this point.

02:00:15Should I confront my employer or make a quiet exit?

02:00:18Rhetorical question, sorry for my venting,

02:00:20just feeling stuck at the moment.

02:00:22So if you're unhappy, are you honest?

02:00:28If you're unhappy at your company,

02:00:31are you honest about that?

02:00:33If you're unhappy at your company,

02:00:35are you honest about that?

02:00:38Or are you lying by omission?

02:00:43Now, you don't have to go to your boss

02:00:45every time you are discontented about anything,

02:00:48but I generally did not like it

02:00:50if employees just ghosted and vanished.

02:00:52I always liked the opportunity to give a counteroffer

02:00:56because I would like to have the choice to keep employees.

02:00:58Now, if somebody leaves and I want them to go,

02:01:00that's a different matter,

02:01:01but in general, I preferred it when people,

02:01:03especially if you have a 10-year relationship, right?

02:01:06Like if your girlfriend's unhappy,

02:01:07wouldn't you want her to tell you that she's unhappy

02:01:10rather than just break up with you

02:01:11without giving you the chance of response?

02:01:14So with your boss, you can say,

02:01:17I'm not feeling particularly happy or motivated,

02:01:19and here's why.

02:01:21I mean, I've mentioned this story before,

02:01:22so I'll just touch on it briefly here,

02:01:24but when I was a manager, I managed about 35 people,

02:01:27and the head of the programming department came to me

02:01:31and said, we feel that we're underpaid.

02:01:34This is a company that, not the one that I co-founded,

02:01:36but one I was hired into,

02:01:37and he said, we feel underpaid,

02:01:40and long story short,

02:01:42I did the whole commission to salary review

02:01:45and looked at the averages and interviewed people

02:01:47and did my research,

02:01:48and then I went to the board,

02:01:50and I got about close to a million dollars

02:01:53worth of raises a year.

02:01:54This is why it's always funny to be,

02:01:56help the poor, help the poor.

02:01:58It's like, hey, I got people a million dollar raises,

02:02:00and that's gonna follow them

02:02:01for the rest of their career, right?

02:02:04So I'm very, very happy that those people came to me

02:02:08and said, we're not happy,

02:02:10because my friend is making 30% more than I am.

02:02:15I was very gratified and relieved,

02:02:18because what I did was I went to the board,

02:02:20and I said, okay, here's the whole presentation.

02:02:23Here's the salary averages.

02:02:25You know, here's what we're paying them,

02:02:27and here's the cost of how to replace it.

02:02:28We had two million lines of code.

02:02:30It's gonna take six to eight months

02:02:31for somebody to become competent

02:02:32and working with that code

02:02:34and all that kind of stuff, right?

02:02:35So I was very happy that they came to me

02:02:39and said that they wanted more,

02:02:40and I was very happy.

02:02:41I spent a month or two working to get them more pay,

02:02:44because they deserved it,

02:02:46and they worked hard,

02:02:46and they did a good job,

02:02:48and it was not the easiest field sometimes to work in.

02:02:53I'm pretty quiet.

02:02:54That may be the primary issue.

02:02:56Yeah, well, that's a family thing, right?

02:02:58That's a family thing.

02:03:03People aren't there as adults in your adulthood.

02:03:06People aren't there

02:03:09to

02:03:15meet your needs.

02:03:16They're not there to figure out what you need.

02:03:18They're not there to puzzle out your goals.

02:03:20They're not there to facilitate your career

02:03:22or anything like that.

02:03:26Oh, yeah, don't worry about trying to connect again,

02:03:28because I've been going for over two hours,

02:03:30so I think I'll stop in just a sec,

02:03:32but you can call on Sunday,

02:03:35but I appreciate that.

02:03:36The call then was great.

02:03:39So,

02:03:44all right, tips to identify bad managers.

02:03:46If you go ahead and above and beyond

02:03:48and get a $25 gift card,

02:03:49time to change managers.

02:03:51Wow, Joe, you are really, really working hard

02:03:53and not listening to a freaking word I'm saying.

02:03:57You're not listening hard.

02:03:58You're hard work not listening to a word I'm saying.

02:04:02How do you change managers?

02:04:04You continue to commit to excellence

02:04:10to the point where you end up with a great manager

02:04:13who would never dream of giving you a $25 gift card.

02:04:16You continue to work up and up and up

02:04:18until you get to the great manager level.

02:04:21Somebody says, I quiet, exited, and started my own business

02:04:24and brought some of the clients with me.

02:04:26Never sent a letter or message to the boss,

02:04:27just up and left and went well for me.

02:04:29Boss was absolute whippet shit.

02:04:32I don't particularly approve of,

02:04:35not that that particularly matters,

02:04:36I'm just telling you,

02:04:37I don't particularly approve of stealing clients,

02:04:41because it was your boss who

02:04:45paid all of the marketing and sales costs

02:04:48and employees and everything else.

02:04:50And employee training costs in order to get those clients.

02:04:53And if you take clients,

02:04:54and in a lot of places that'll get you sued, right?

02:04:56It's called poaching, right?

02:04:58And so if you just go start some other shop

02:05:02and then the clients follow you of their own volition,

02:05:05that's one thing.

02:05:06But if you say, hey, you should come with me

02:05:07and I'm gonna do this and I'm gonna do that,

02:05:10I think that's not ideal

02:05:12because you are taking the investment

02:05:14that somebody else has into those clients

02:05:16and then making it your own.

02:05:18And I'm not a huge fan of that.

02:05:20I mean, I remember I had an employee who left

02:05:24and then just kept coming back to poach my employees

02:05:28or try to poach my employees.

02:05:30And I'm like, I've done all of the work

02:05:31to hire and train them

02:05:32and I would appreciate it if you didn't do that.

02:05:34I mean, it's not some massive morals violation

02:05:37or anything like that,

02:05:38but it's not a particularly honorable way,

02:05:40in my view, to do business.

02:05:42But again, I mean, I don't know the details and so on.

02:05:46But if your boss has cultivated the clients

02:05:48and then you take them with you,

02:05:51that's a little bit of a shortcut, to put it mildly.

02:05:54And then you end up with these clients

02:05:55without developing the marketing

02:05:57to replace them when they go awry.

02:05:58So it doesn't tend to work out that well

02:05:59in the long run anyway,

02:06:00because you're subsidizing your business

02:06:02by having somebody else pay to get the clients.

02:06:05So then you just kind of get that as a value

02:06:07without having to set up your own way to get new clients.

02:06:10All right, well, thanks everyone.

02:06:12Got some great call-in shows coming out

02:06:15over the next little while.

02:06:16I have been working quite hard.

02:06:18I did a brother-sister call-in show today

02:06:19that was really fiery,

02:06:21and I hope that you will check those out.

02:06:23Of course, appreciate if you're listening to this later,

02:06:26freedomain.com slash donate,

02:06:27if you could make up for a rather

02:06:28tragically low donation evening,

02:06:31I would certainly help,

02:06:32because the motivation is quite important for me.

02:06:36So if you could, I would really, really appreciate that.

02:06:39And have yourselves an absolutely wonderful,

02:06:41wonderful evening.

02:06:42We will talk Sunday.

02:06:43And lots of love from up here.

02:06:46I'll talk to you soon.

02:06:47Bye.

02:06:48Bye.

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