1 00:00:09,093 --> 00:00:11,973 Speaker 1: You're listening to a podcast from news Talks It be 2 00:00:12,373 --> 00:00:16,133 Speaker 1: follow this and our wide range of podcasts now on iHeartRadio. 3 00:00:16,693 --> 00:00:19,733 Speaker 1: It's time from all the Attitude, all the opinion, all 4 00:00:19,773 --> 00:00:24,293 Speaker 1: the information, all the debates of the sis, Now the 5 00:00:24,453 --> 00:00:27,493 Speaker 1: Layton Smith podcast powered by news Talks It. 6 00:00:27,613 --> 00:00:30,773 Speaker 2: Be Welcome to Podcasts two hundred and ninety seven for 7 00:00:31,053 --> 00:00:34,973 Speaker 2: August thirteen, twenty twenty five. The Treason of the Experts 8 00:00:35,013 --> 00:00:39,813 Speaker 2: by Thomas Harrington underscores the need to apply intellectual discernment 9 00:00:40,413 --> 00:00:43,773 Speaker 2: on all pressing questions. In a case by case manner, 10 00:00:44,133 --> 00:00:48,453 Speaker 2: Tom suggests that having more educational credentials is no guarantee 11 00:00:48,493 --> 00:00:53,213 Speaker 2: against the danger of believing in stories that seriously distort 12 00:00:53,253 --> 00:00:57,573 Speaker 2: our understanding of imperial facts. Now I've just listened to 13 00:00:57,933 --> 00:01:02,173 Speaker 2: a few outtakes of this interview, and I've forgotten how 14 00:01:02,253 --> 00:01:07,453 Speaker 2: good Tom is. Is. Capacity to expose wrongthink and inspire 15 00:01:07,573 --> 00:01:12,453 Speaker 2: and develop how we think is well amazing. So if 16 00:01:12,453 --> 00:01:15,373 Speaker 2: you haven't heard this interview before, you'll get plenty out 17 00:01:15,373 --> 00:01:18,733 Speaker 2: of it. And may I say yet again, if you 18 00:01:18,893 --> 00:01:21,933 Speaker 2: have heard it, you'll get plenty more out of it 19 00:01:22,053 --> 00:01:34,253 Speaker 2: the next time you listen. Enjoy Buccolan is a natural 20 00:01:34,453 --> 00:01:38,413 Speaker 2: oral vaccine in a tablet form called bacterial nicate. It'll 21 00:01:38,453 --> 00:01:42,013 Speaker 2: boost your natural protection against bacterial infections in your chest 22 00:01:42,093 --> 00:01:45,333 Speaker 2: and throat. A three day course of seven Bucklan tablets 23 00:01:45,333 --> 00:01:47,533 Speaker 2: will help your body build up to three months of 24 00:01:47,653 --> 00:01:52,453 Speaker 2: immunity against bugs which cause bacterial cold symptoms. So who 25 00:01:52,453 --> 00:01:55,293 Speaker 2: can take buccolan well, the whole family From two years 26 00:01:55,293 --> 00:01:58,493 Speaker 2: of age and upwards. 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Only available from your pharmacist. 36 00:02:29,813 --> 00:02:33,093 Speaker 2: Always read the label and users directed and see your 37 00:02:33,173 --> 00:02:49,093 Speaker 2: doctor if systems persist. Farmer Broker, aucklumb Layton Smith, Thomas Harrington, 38 00:02:49,293 --> 00:02:53,333 Speaker 2: Senior Brownstone Scholar and twenty twenty three Brownstone Fellow is 39 00:02:53,373 --> 00:02:58,333 Speaker 2: Professor Emeritus of Hispanic Studies at Trinity College at Hartford, Connecticut, 40 00:02:58,773 --> 00:03:02,533 Speaker 2: where he taught for twenty four years. His research is 41 00:03:02,613 --> 00:03:08,213 Speaker 2: on Iberian movements of national identity and contemporary Catalan culture. 42 00:03:09,053 --> 00:03:11,093 Speaker 2: It is. It's a great pleasure to have you on. 43 00:03:11,133 --> 00:03:14,973 Speaker 2: We got an extremely good reaction Tom to your appearance 44 00:03:15,453 --> 00:03:19,013 Speaker 2: in that last one, which was probably far too long ago. 45 00:03:19,613 --> 00:03:22,893 Speaker 3: How are you, Yeah, I'm great. I'm delighted to be 46 00:03:22,933 --> 00:03:23,413 Speaker 3: here with you. 47 00:03:23,573 --> 00:03:24,213 Speaker 2: Yeah, me too. 48 00:03:24,293 --> 00:03:25,413 Speaker 3: Really nice. 49 00:03:25,653 --> 00:03:31,333 Speaker 2: Now, the Brownstone Institute and Jeffrey Tucker, who I had 50 00:03:31,373 --> 00:03:36,013 Speaker 2: been speaking with before any any intimation of the Brownstone 51 00:03:36,053 --> 00:03:39,893 Speaker 2: Institute emerging, you had and you're part of it. You 52 00:03:39,973 --> 00:03:45,693 Speaker 2: had your third conference a few weeks ago entitled Rebuild Freedom. 53 00:03:45,733 --> 00:03:48,853 Speaker 2: It was held in Dallas, and I really wanted to 54 00:03:48,893 --> 00:03:51,493 Speaker 2: go and couldn't. But why don't you give us a 55 00:03:51,533 --> 00:03:54,453 Speaker 2: bit of a take on what it produced, how beneficial 56 00:03:54,453 --> 00:03:56,173 Speaker 2: it was, and how good it was, and what did 57 00:03:56,173 --> 00:03:58,573 Speaker 2: I miss well? 58 00:03:58,613 --> 00:04:00,933 Speaker 4: I think one of the nice things about having gotten 59 00:04:00,933 --> 00:04:04,973 Speaker 4: involved with Brownstone is that you are part of a 60 00:04:05,053 --> 00:04:07,853 Speaker 4: movement where, for the most part, people are coming from 61 00:04:07,933 --> 00:04:12,773 Speaker 4: very different places and very different ideological positions. Despite what 62 00:04:12,853 --> 00:04:16,573 Speaker 4: our mainstream media would tell you is the case, and 63 00:04:17,133 --> 00:04:21,373 Speaker 4: we have joined together because we all believe in some 64 00:04:21,453 --> 00:04:24,853 Speaker 4: of these ideas about human freedom and dignity, and I 65 00:04:24,893 --> 00:04:28,773 Speaker 4: think the first time we came together there was a 66 00:04:28,773 --> 00:04:32,613 Speaker 4: giddiness to it. We couldn't believe we were together. Last year, 67 00:04:32,693 --> 00:04:38,053 Speaker 4: we were still giddy this year. I think in conscious 68 00:04:38,133 --> 00:04:39,933 Speaker 4: we have a consciousness of the fact that this is 69 00:04:39,973 --> 00:04:43,453 Speaker 4: going to be a long fight, and so there was 70 00:04:43,493 --> 00:04:45,653 Speaker 4: a worry, at least on my part, that the magic 71 00:04:45,693 --> 00:04:48,533 Speaker 4: would be gone and that the idea that we weren't 72 00:04:48,533 --> 00:04:52,413 Speaker 4: going to turn this around in a day might discourage people. 73 00:04:52,893 --> 00:04:55,813 Speaker 4: But on the contrary, I think the gathering show that 74 00:04:55,853 --> 00:04:59,773 Speaker 4: there are a bunch of people still flame inflamed by 75 00:04:59,973 --> 00:05:03,813 Speaker 4: what has been done done to them, and that they 76 00:05:03,933 --> 00:05:07,613 Speaker 4: are very much getting ready for the long fight and 77 00:05:07,653 --> 00:05:11,853 Speaker 4: are beginning to bigger and more expansive questions about our culture, 78 00:05:12,613 --> 00:05:15,173 Speaker 4: which are some of the things that I try to 79 00:05:15,173 --> 00:05:18,133 Speaker 4: bring to the movement, as I'm not a physician or 80 00:05:18,173 --> 00:05:20,693 Speaker 4: a policy person, but trying to look at some of 81 00:05:20,693 --> 00:05:24,493 Speaker 4: the big cultural problems that made this possible and some 82 00:05:24,573 --> 00:05:27,813 Speaker 4: of the cultural building we need to do to perhaps 83 00:05:28,453 --> 00:05:31,973 Speaker 4: spur renewal of some of those essential values you spoke 84 00:05:32,053 --> 00:05:34,773 Speaker 4: about in your introduction when you looked at the when 85 00:05:34,813 --> 00:05:38,133 Speaker 4: you were reading the cover from my book. 86 00:05:38,213 --> 00:05:41,213 Speaker 2: Yeah, well, I haven't finished with the introduction yet because 87 00:05:41,293 --> 00:05:43,853 Speaker 2: I'm going to quite a little paragraph written by Jeffrey 88 00:05:43,853 --> 00:05:48,893 Speaker 2: Tucker as the forward to the book. He says, being 89 00:05:48,933 --> 00:05:52,093 Speaker 2: on the editorial board of the Brownstone Institute's Operations, I 90 00:05:52,133 --> 00:05:55,533 Speaker 2: can report my excitements when an essay by Tom arrives 91 00:05:55,533 --> 00:05:58,133 Speaker 2: in my inbox, I know for certain that I will 92 00:05:58,173 --> 00:06:00,933 Speaker 2: learn something new, be encouraged to turn the prism in 93 00:06:01,013 --> 00:06:04,213 Speaker 2: a different direction at observe events and trends from a 94 00:06:04,213 --> 00:06:07,733 Speaker 2: new perspective, and feel infused by the power of his 95 00:06:07,853 --> 00:06:13,653 Speaker 2: mind erudition that emanates from his spectacular writing talent. In 96 00:06:13,693 --> 00:06:16,493 Speaker 2: so many ways, each essay is a gift. A full 97 00:06:16,533 --> 00:06:19,333 Speaker 2: book of them is a windfall, and just when we 98 00:06:19,573 --> 00:06:23,053 Speaker 2: need to understand what has happened to us and where 99 00:06:23,093 --> 00:06:25,773 Speaker 2: to go from here. Now that was that was some 100 00:06:25,853 --> 00:06:28,013 Speaker 2: commentary from him, because I don't think he's I don't 101 00:06:28,013 --> 00:06:32,213 Speaker 2: think he gives away platitudes like that unless they're unless 102 00:06:32,213 --> 00:06:35,933 Speaker 2: they're certainly warranted. But the conference itself, it would have 103 00:06:35,973 --> 00:06:39,693 Speaker 2: been extremely well run and there were so many people 104 00:06:39,733 --> 00:06:42,613 Speaker 2: there who I who I either knew of or who 105 00:06:42,733 --> 00:06:46,613 Speaker 2: I have had on this podcast, as as some we 106 00:06:46,733 --> 00:06:50,573 Speaker 2: have spoken in the past, and and I wanted to 107 00:06:50,573 --> 00:06:52,893 Speaker 2: to get together with. Mostly the only one that the 108 00:06:52,933 --> 00:06:56,453 Speaker 2: only one that I have met and we had dinner 109 00:06:56,533 --> 00:07:02,133 Speaker 2: about or two months ago, was Ramesh the kur And 110 00:07:02,133 --> 00:07:05,773 Speaker 2: and Ramesh I think is brilliant. I agree he was 111 00:07:05,813 --> 00:07:10,333 Speaker 2: the featured speaker, and I'm interested from you to find 112 00:07:10,333 --> 00:07:15,573 Speaker 2: out how I've read the speech, but I haven't heard it. 113 00:07:16,093 --> 00:07:17,053 Speaker 2: How was he received? 114 00:07:17,773 --> 00:07:21,013 Speaker 4: He was received very very well. And Ramish is a 115 00:07:21,013 --> 00:07:23,493 Speaker 4: figure I can't claim to know him well. We said 116 00:07:23,533 --> 00:07:27,973 Speaker 4: hello to each other at the conference. He's to me 117 00:07:28,013 --> 00:07:30,373 Speaker 4: a very interesting fellow because he's been at the very 118 00:07:30,413 --> 00:07:34,853 Speaker 4: inner workings of all of at the very highest levels 119 00:07:34,893 --> 00:07:39,493 Speaker 4: of policy and health policy. And I'm very admiring of 120 00:07:39,573 --> 00:07:43,333 Speaker 4: him to have the wherewithal to take two steps back, 121 00:07:43,373 --> 00:07:46,733 Speaker 4: three steps back, and four steps back and question what 122 00:07:46,893 --> 00:07:49,413 Speaker 4: is going on? And I think that gets to one 123 00:07:49,413 --> 00:07:52,413 Speaker 4: of the big problems we've had throughout this that people 124 00:07:52,453 --> 00:07:57,013 Speaker 4: become so enamored of their positions in life and their 125 00:07:57,053 --> 00:08:02,573 Speaker 4: alleged expertise, they become locked into ideological positions that don't 126 00:08:02,573 --> 00:08:06,133 Speaker 4: allow them to look freshly at new problems and new realities. 127 00:08:06,773 --> 00:08:09,453 Speaker 4: And I think, what's so wonderful Ramus, and he's been 128 00:08:09,493 --> 00:08:12,653 Speaker 4: great from the beginning when I think I started reading him, 129 00:08:13,053 --> 00:08:16,293 Speaker 4: probably in the fall of twenty twenty, is that he's 130 00:08:16,293 --> 00:08:18,613 Speaker 4: been able to do that pivot and he's been able 131 00:08:18,653 --> 00:08:22,453 Speaker 4: to bring all of his vast experience along with him 132 00:08:23,013 --> 00:08:26,973 Speaker 4: into our camp. And I think it was that weightiness 133 00:08:27,013 --> 00:08:31,093 Speaker 4: that people understood as they were listening to him. 134 00:08:31,213 --> 00:08:36,133 Speaker 2: Yes, his occasional position as Assistant Secretary General of the 135 00:08:36,213 --> 00:08:42,053 Speaker 2: United Nations one is one that adds weight. Well, it 136 00:08:42,093 --> 00:08:46,853 Speaker 2: adds weight because basically has rejected pretty much everything as 137 00:08:46,853 --> 00:08:48,653 Speaker 2: far as as far as I can tell, as far 138 00:08:48,693 --> 00:08:53,253 Speaker 2: as the uns concern, He's on a constant front foot 139 00:08:53,253 --> 00:08:57,133 Speaker 2: in attacking it wherever is appropriate, and there's plenty of opportunity. 140 00:08:58,013 --> 00:08:59,693 Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, that's something. 141 00:09:00,133 --> 00:09:01,973 Speaker 4: And this gets to one of the I think underlying 142 00:09:02,013 --> 00:09:05,453 Speaker 4: themes that I discussed in my book is, to what extent, 143 00:09:05,973 --> 00:09:10,053 Speaker 4: living in a consumer culture where success is the ultimate 144 00:09:10,133 --> 00:09:14,733 Speaker 4: gold in life rather than perhaps other transcendent ones, how 145 00:09:14,773 --> 00:09:16,813 Speaker 4: hard it is for people who have been brought up 146 00:09:16,813 --> 00:09:20,693 Speaker 4: on the model of success again to use the term 147 00:09:20,733 --> 00:09:24,093 Speaker 4: pivot away from all of the things that granted them 148 00:09:24,093 --> 00:09:28,973 Speaker 4: their accolades and perhaps their money. And I think that's 149 00:09:28,973 --> 00:09:30,333 Speaker 4: one of the biggest things we're going to have to 150 00:09:30,773 --> 00:09:34,213 Speaker 4: deal with. What can we do, how can we begin 151 00:09:34,293 --> 00:09:37,693 Speaker 4: to generate a new appreciation for things that are bigger 152 00:09:38,413 --> 00:09:43,213 Speaker 4: than perhaps material and career success. And that's something he did. 153 00:09:43,493 --> 00:09:47,053 Speaker 4: Another person who is there is an Australian David Bell. 154 00:09:47,213 --> 00:09:51,493 Speaker 4: I don't know if you've spoken to him, Yes, And 155 00:09:51,733 --> 00:09:56,253 Speaker 4: I consider David another extraordinary human being who's been at 156 00:09:56,333 --> 00:09:59,933 Speaker 4: the very center of things and again has in a 157 00:09:59,973 --> 00:10:01,173 Speaker 4: certain sense walked away. 158 00:10:01,373 --> 00:10:05,333 Speaker 3: Is by understanding and is absolutely. 159 00:10:06,213 --> 00:10:10,333 Speaker 4: Integral in the way he approaches from a values point 160 00:10:10,333 --> 00:10:14,533 Speaker 4: of view, and he makes a huge contribution to the 161 00:10:14,573 --> 00:10:15,773 Speaker 4: Brownstone movement. 162 00:10:15,813 --> 00:10:18,293 Speaker 2: I think I particularly like the fact that he that 163 00:10:18,413 --> 00:10:21,173 Speaker 2: he moved to I think it was Washington State, wasn't it. 164 00:10:22,013 --> 00:10:23,853 Speaker 3: He moved from Washington State to Texas? 165 00:10:23,933 --> 00:10:26,173 Speaker 2: Yeah, But he moved to wash into Washington State when 166 00:10:26,213 --> 00:10:32,013 Speaker 2: he gave up his position in Geneva, was it Yeah? 167 00:10:32,053 --> 00:10:34,653 Speaker 2: And then packed his bags and took the family down 168 00:10:34,693 --> 00:10:38,933 Speaker 2: to Texas because well, he realized where he was up 169 00:10:39,013 --> 00:10:43,093 Speaker 2: north was no place to bring up kids. Yep, so 170 00:10:43,373 --> 00:10:50,453 Speaker 2: he also has marched to his own tune after succeeding. 171 00:10:50,653 --> 00:10:55,453 Speaker 2: But just on that note of success, to me, the 172 00:10:55,453 --> 00:10:59,133 Speaker 2: greatest thing, the most important thing of all, is freedom, 173 00:11:00,333 --> 00:11:03,213 Speaker 2: however you want to construct it. We talk about free speech, 174 00:11:03,253 --> 00:11:06,493 Speaker 2: et cetera a great deal, but freedom overall is the 175 00:11:06,493 --> 00:11:09,453 Speaker 2: most important thing. Freedom to say what you want, freedom 176 00:11:09,493 --> 00:11:11,653 Speaker 2: to move where you want, go where you want, pretty much. 177 00:11:12,253 --> 00:11:16,533 Speaker 2: And the challenges are rising at a rapid rate of 178 00:11:16,613 --> 00:11:20,373 Speaker 2: knuts from what I see to put chains on that. 179 00:11:21,093 --> 00:11:25,133 Speaker 4: Yeah, And this is to me perhaps the most frightening 180 00:11:25,973 --> 00:11:29,453 Speaker 4: thing of what we've been through is that what to 181 00:11:29,493 --> 00:11:32,533 Speaker 4: you and me is self evident that freedom is the 182 00:11:32,533 --> 00:11:36,093 Speaker 4: most important thing, that without it we lose our sense 183 00:11:36,133 --> 00:11:39,733 Speaker 4: of dignity and we become playthings in the hands of others. 184 00:11:40,373 --> 00:11:44,333 Speaker 4: Seems to not always resonate resonate with a lot of people, 185 00:11:45,013 --> 00:11:49,133 Speaker 4: and that it seems to be trumped by, as absurd 186 00:11:49,133 --> 00:11:53,413 Speaker 4: as it may sound, convenience, that living a convenient life, 187 00:11:53,533 --> 00:11:59,373 Speaker 4: living a resistance free life is really more important than 188 00:11:59,493 --> 00:12:04,693 Speaker 4: living a free life and accepting the contingencies that go 189 00:12:04,733 --> 00:12:08,573 Speaker 4: along with being free. And I am especially troubled by 190 00:12:08,613 --> 00:12:12,453 Speaker 4: what appears to be a generational divide on this. I 191 00:12:12,533 --> 00:12:14,973 Speaker 4: was not long ago in Europe and I was on 192 00:12:15,013 --> 00:12:17,653 Speaker 4: a bus and there were some American young people behind 193 00:12:17,693 --> 00:12:21,213 Speaker 4: me in their mid twenties, and they were getting to 194 00:12:21,253 --> 00:12:24,253 Speaker 4: know each other, and I couldn't help but not eavesdrop 195 00:12:24,333 --> 00:12:26,693 Speaker 4: on them because their voices were coming over the seat 196 00:12:26,733 --> 00:12:29,453 Speaker 4: to me, and they were getting to know each other. 197 00:12:29,573 --> 00:12:31,373 Speaker 4: But they were getting to know each other on the 198 00:12:31,413 --> 00:12:37,333 Speaker 4: basis of their shared weaknesses. I suffer from this, I 199 00:12:37,453 --> 00:12:43,333 Speaker 4: suffer from that. I suffer I also have obsessive compulsive disorder. 200 00:12:43,893 --> 00:12:46,853 Speaker 4: And on and on it went for twenty minutes, which 201 00:12:46,893 --> 00:12:51,653 Speaker 4: isn't to denigrate real problems that people have, but I 202 00:12:51,733 --> 00:12:55,653 Speaker 4: was struck by how their weaknesses had become a sort 203 00:12:55,653 --> 00:12:57,253 Speaker 4: of currency between them. 204 00:12:58,053 --> 00:13:00,013 Speaker 3: That when we go into. 205 00:13:00,253 --> 00:13:02,693 Speaker 4: A relationship and we meet someone, we're not putting our 206 00:13:02,733 --> 00:13:06,613 Speaker 4: best foot forward, We're not putting our heroic self forward. 207 00:13:07,213 --> 00:13:09,933 Speaker 3: We're putting our weeks self forward. And that led me 208 00:13:09,973 --> 00:13:10,253 Speaker 3: to a. 209 00:13:10,173 --> 00:13:13,373 Speaker 4: Whole bunch of reflections about what it is in our 210 00:13:13,373 --> 00:13:17,573 Speaker 4: culture that might be impelling people to see weakness as 211 00:13:17,613 --> 00:13:22,693 Speaker 4: a greater currency than self reliance or strength. We're all flawed, 212 00:13:22,733 --> 00:13:25,853 Speaker 4: and we're all weak in our ways, but nonetheless we 213 00:13:25,973 --> 00:13:27,733 Speaker 4: have to put on a good face and move on 214 00:13:27,853 --> 00:13:32,013 Speaker 4: sometimes and frankly be courageous even though we're not sure 215 00:13:32,093 --> 00:13:35,373 Speaker 4: sometimes that we can be. And yet here was the 216 00:13:35,413 --> 00:13:37,693 Speaker 4: polar opposite. And it's something I saw in the last 217 00:13:37,773 --> 00:13:40,653 Speaker 4: years of my teaching career that this idea that I 218 00:13:40,693 --> 00:13:46,293 Speaker 4: am a mass of pathologies and that as such need 219 00:13:46,373 --> 00:13:50,373 Speaker 4: to be treated with a certain condescension and or belief 220 00:13:50,413 --> 00:13:53,533 Speaker 4: in my own fragility, and that it would seem would 221 00:13:53,613 --> 00:13:58,573 Speaker 4: lead directly to the acceptance of tutelage from very big 222 00:13:58,653 --> 00:14:01,213 Speaker 4: powers from on high. And so I see it as 223 00:14:01,213 --> 00:14:05,773 Speaker 4: a very dangerous dynamic and one that begs a lot 224 00:14:05,773 --> 00:14:08,613 Speaker 4: of questions about what the social teachings were and have 225 00:14:08,733 --> 00:14:14,493 Speaker 4: been an are that have made young people portray themselves 226 00:14:14,973 --> 00:14:17,453 Speaker 4: in this way and play into a game of weakness. 227 00:14:17,893 --> 00:14:19,053 Speaker 3: I don't know if that makes sense to. 228 00:14:19,093 --> 00:14:22,973 Speaker 2: You, but it certainly makes sense. And I just want 229 00:14:23,013 --> 00:14:27,533 Speaker 2: to insert something here that occurred to me and I 230 00:14:27,573 --> 00:14:29,773 Speaker 2: didn't include it, and then we'll pick it up again 231 00:14:29,813 --> 00:14:32,133 Speaker 2: from where you were. Sure, well, it was just the 232 00:14:32,213 --> 00:14:35,213 Speaker 2: success that one for freedom. This is something I've tried 233 00:14:35,213 --> 00:14:39,213 Speaker 2: to teach my kids. For freedom, you actually need or 234 00:14:39,253 --> 00:14:43,013 Speaker 2: it certainly helps a great deal if you have financial independence, 235 00:14:44,293 --> 00:14:48,173 Speaker 2: and gaining that financial independence can appear to be agreed 236 00:14:48,853 --> 00:14:53,213 Speaker 2: a selfishness or however any individual wants to interpret it 237 00:14:53,413 --> 00:14:56,413 Speaker 2: because of how they see it. But to me, it's 238 00:14:56,493 --> 00:15:00,013 Speaker 2: a way of establishing yourself with the ability to be 239 00:15:00,173 --> 00:15:05,213 Speaker 2: yourself and not be under threat of all the threats 240 00:15:05,213 --> 00:15:07,933 Speaker 2: that we face these days, that are imposed upon you 241 00:15:07,973 --> 00:15:09,293 Speaker 2: by other people. 242 00:15:10,813 --> 00:15:12,853 Speaker 4: I would agree with that, but I would just add 243 00:15:12,893 --> 00:15:15,773 Speaker 4: one caveat to it, and it would be this. I 244 00:15:15,773 --> 00:15:19,533 Speaker 4: have watched people who set out to do that as 245 00:15:19,613 --> 00:15:22,653 Speaker 4: their life goal, and who in the process of doing it, 246 00:15:22,693 --> 00:15:27,893 Speaker 4: have become co opted by the game itself such that 247 00:15:28,973 --> 00:15:31,733 Speaker 4: they get to a point of material success where they 248 00:15:31,773 --> 00:15:35,453 Speaker 4: probably could opt out or walk away, and yet the 249 00:15:35,493 --> 00:15:38,573 Speaker 4: game itself begins to exert a certain addiction on them 250 00:15:39,373 --> 00:15:42,453 Speaker 4: and begins to take over the freedom that they were 251 00:15:42,493 --> 00:15:46,253 Speaker 4: playing the game to earn. And you have a version 252 00:15:46,293 --> 00:15:49,653 Speaker 4: of it in academics, I mean academics. You spend these 253 00:15:49,733 --> 00:15:51,733 Speaker 4: years trying to get your tenure so that you can 254 00:15:51,773 --> 00:15:55,933 Speaker 4: be free. But in the process people make so many compromises, 255 00:15:56,213 --> 00:16:00,773 Speaker 4: oftentimes with the establishment, in order to get that tenure 256 00:16:00,773 --> 00:16:04,013 Speaker 4: that they learn that they forget how to exercise the 257 00:16:04,053 --> 00:16:07,733 Speaker 4: freedoms when in your late thirties or your early forties 258 00:16:07,773 --> 00:16:12,333 Speaker 4: you get that that wonderful tenure. So it's I would 259 00:16:12,373 --> 00:16:15,133 Speaker 4: just add that complexity to to what you just said. 260 00:16:14,933 --> 00:16:18,413 Speaker 2: And I accepted. So the where were we Where were 261 00:16:18,333 --> 00:16:18,933 Speaker 2: we going to pay? 262 00:16:18,933 --> 00:16:19,373 Speaker 3: I don't know. 263 00:16:20,213 --> 00:16:24,813 Speaker 4: Oh with with weakness as as a as a as 264 00:16:24,853 --> 00:16:26,293 Speaker 4: a performative value. 265 00:16:26,453 --> 00:16:27,373 Speaker 3: Let's put it that way. 266 00:16:27,533 --> 00:16:31,813 Speaker 4: If any more on that, yeah, it bigs again. I 267 00:16:32,133 --> 00:16:34,973 Speaker 4: have more questions and answers, but it begs questions about 268 00:16:36,253 --> 00:16:39,333 Speaker 4: how child riving has been done in what I guess 269 00:16:39,413 --> 00:16:44,973 Speaker 4: is my generation, and why those simple things that are 270 00:16:45,013 --> 00:16:49,533 Speaker 4: both mythological and necessary like put on your brave face 271 00:16:49,973 --> 00:16:54,373 Speaker 4: and stick to it have given way to g I'm weak. 272 00:16:55,693 --> 00:16:59,493 Speaker 4: I need someone's help, and I will accept it, even 273 00:16:59,573 --> 00:17:03,333 Speaker 4: though it involves giving away my freedom. 274 00:17:04,173 --> 00:17:06,413 Speaker 3: Uh and and and and. 275 00:17:05,933 --> 00:17:08,333 Speaker 4: That to me is where we should be really worried 276 00:17:09,053 --> 00:17:12,253 Speaker 4: that students are now saying they're not for free speech. 277 00:17:12,693 --> 00:17:16,173 Speaker 4: In fact, they believe they should be protected from free 278 00:17:16,173 --> 00:17:20,093 Speaker 4: speech from ideas that disturb them. I mean, what kind 279 00:17:20,133 --> 00:17:22,773 Speaker 4: of world is that? When the old sticks and stones 280 00:17:22,893 --> 00:17:27,213 Speaker 4: will break my bones becomes but names can never hurt me, 281 00:17:27,253 --> 00:17:30,093 Speaker 4: become names will always hurt me, and please owe great 282 00:17:30,173 --> 00:17:34,813 Speaker 4: power save me from them. It seems to be a 283 00:17:34,813 --> 00:17:36,653 Speaker 4: bit of a world upside down from the one I 284 00:17:36,693 --> 00:17:37,053 Speaker 4: grew up. 285 00:17:37,493 --> 00:17:40,973 Speaker 2: Yes, so the question then, is, having painted the picture 286 00:17:41,053 --> 00:17:43,053 Speaker 2: that you have in the last five or ten minutes, 287 00:17:43,773 --> 00:17:47,133 Speaker 2: how do we make a break from it? 288 00:17:47,213 --> 00:17:50,333 Speaker 3: To me, one of the things that makes. 289 00:17:51,373 --> 00:17:56,933 Speaker 4: These attitudes, these what I consider unfortunate attitudes, possible, is 290 00:17:57,533 --> 00:18:02,013 Speaker 4: a certain degree of emotional and physical alienation. Another of 291 00:18:02,013 --> 00:18:04,413 Speaker 4: my favorite essays in the book as the one that 292 00:18:05,093 --> 00:18:09,773 Speaker 4: speaks to the lack of physicality in the in the 293 00:18:10,893 --> 00:18:14,933 Speaker 4: middle and upper middle classes, that we are become people 294 00:18:14,933 --> 00:18:18,053 Speaker 4: that live inside our brains and not with our bodies 295 00:18:19,613 --> 00:18:22,373 Speaker 4: by and I'm not just talking about physical work, which 296 00:18:22,413 --> 00:18:24,773 Speaker 4: of course is important and used to be part of 297 00:18:25,253 --> 00:18:29,373 Speaker 4: one's general upbringing to do physical work, but I'm also 298 00:18:29,413 --> 00:18:33,573 Speaker 4: talking about physical engagement with the senses, with other people, 299 00:18:33,773 --> 00:18:40,093 Speaker 4: eye to eye, across tables, in physical presence, with their bodies, 300 00:18:41,093 --> 00:18:44,533 Speaker 4: where we are engaging the full amount of our observational 301 00:18:44,613 --> 00:18:48,133 Speaker 4: qualities to become to become social beings, and to become 302 00:18:48,173 --> 00:18:53,813 Speaker 4: well socialized social beings. I think the intervention of technologies 303 00:18:54,733 --> 00:18:59,053 Speaker 4: has begun to ameliorate that training that used to be 304 00:18:59,213 --> 00:19:02,053 Speaker 4: just what you did as a young person. You sat 305 00:19:02,173 --> 00:19:05,453 Speaker 4: and watched older people. You watched how they interacted at 306 00:19:05,453 --> 00:19:08,973 Speaker 4: a table. You began to look at their ticks, and 307 00:19:09,053 --> 00:19:11,773 Speaker 4: you begin to look at the way they expressed themselves. 308 00:19:11,813 --> 00:19:12,933 Speaker 3: You looked at the way. 309 00:19:12,733 --> 00:19:16,653 Speaker 4: They when they told stories, are told FIBs, how you 310 00:19:16,693 --> 00:19:20,373 Speaker 4: could pick up on it in their physical being. I 311 00:19:20,413 --> 00:19:22,493 Speaker 4: think a lot of that, and this, I think even 312 00:19:22,533 --> 00:19:25,653 Speaker 4: pre dates technology has begun to slip away because of 313 00:19:25,693 --> 00:19:28,933 Speaker 4: the way we live. We don't sit around tables, We 314 00:19:29,013 --> 00:19:31,213 Speaker 4: don't have the what someone said to me the other 315 00:19:31,333 --> 00:19:34,173 Speaker 4: day the third place, which was the bar where you 316 00:19:34,333 --> 00:19:37,853 Speaker 4: go and you have a beer and you joke around 317 00:19:38,013 --> 00:19:44,453 Speaker 4: and you engage in formalized aggressiveness, in the case of men, 318 00:19:45,573 --> 00:19:50,213 Speaker 4: oftentimes with each other, verbal aggressiveness that is playful. And 319 00:19:50,293 --> 00:19:53,173 Speaker 4: if you don't know how verbal aggressiveness of the playful 320 00:19:53,213 --> 00:19:56,173 Speaker 4: sort exists, especially among men, then you're going to have 321 00:19:56,333 --> 00:20:01,933 Speaker 4: very little ability when you run into it, to understand 322 00:20:01,973 --> 00:20:05,133 Speaker 4: what it's about and that it's essentially benign in many cases, 323 00:20:05,613 --> 00:20:08,333 Speaker 4: and it is not this thing that's going to kill you, 324 00:20:08,853 --> 00:20:11,093 Speaker 4: and that you need to be protected from. But if 325 00:20:11,093 --> 00:20:14,493 Speaker 4: you don't have that training and that socialization, you're not 326 00:20:14,533 --> 00:20:15,133 Speaker 4: going to know that. 327 00:20:15,613 --> 00:20:18,093 Speaker 2: How I've noticed it is when you talk about that 328 00:20:18,133 --> 00:20:25,013 Speaker 2: playful discussion or commentary verbiage, is that somebody that keeps 329 00:20:25,053 --> 00:20:29,653 Speaker 2: telling me that my sense of humor isn't isn't cutting through. 330 00:20:29,693 --> 00:20:33,533 Speaker 2: They don't get it well. And the sense of humor 331 00:20:33,533 --> 00:20:35,333 Speaker 2: I've got is one I've had for a long time, 332 00:20:35,493 --> 00:20:38,893 Speaker 2: and I remember, just to give you a quick idea, 333 00:20:39,093 --> 00:20:41,853 Speaker 2: I remember the days when I first moved to New 334 00:20:41,933 --> 00:20:44,773 Speaker 2: Zealand and it was a different country then to what 335 00:20:44,813 --> 00:20:49,493 Speaker 2: it is now, and the humor that I had, that 336 00:20:49,573 --> 00:20:55,413 Speaker 2: we had developed, you just couldn't utilize it because nobody 337 00:20:55,413 --> 00:20:57,293 Speaker 2: got it. And so I used to I used to 338 00:20:57,293 --> 00:20:59,773 Speaker 2: fly back to Sydney four times a year just to 339 00:20:59,773 --> 00:21:02,893 Speaker 2: get a break and enjoy my old sense of humor again. 340 00:21:03,213 --> 00:21:05,973 Speaker 4: Yeah, I think there's a couple of course. Humor is 341 00:21:06,133 --> 00:21:10,813 Speaker 4: in many ways culturally culturally learned. I come from an 342 00:21:10,853 --> 00:21:16,693 Speaker 4: Irish subculture which tends to be verbally profuse and has 343 00:21:17,013 --> 00:21:21,453 Speaker 4: an undercurrent of aggressiveness to it that perhaps other subcultures 344 00:21:21,493 --> 00:21:24,053 Speaker 4: don't have. But I think in a bigger sense, the 345 00:21:24,133 --> 00:21:28,813 Speaker 4: problem of humor. Humor is in the final analysis, based 346 00:21:28,853 --> 00:21:32,093 Speaker 4: on irony, and irony, of course, is based on the 347 00:21:32,093 --> 00:21:34,733 Speaker 4: idea that a single set of words can have multiple 348 00:21:34,853 --> 00:21:39,413 Speaker 4: layers of meaning. Visual imagery, which is the dominant way 349 00:21:39,453 --> 00:21:43,093 Speaker 4: that or dominant way that most young people are getting 350 00:21:43,093 --> 00:21:48,213 Speaker 4: their information today, is very different from reading. Reading, if 351 00:21:48,253 --> 00:21:52,173 Speaker 4: you do it assiduously, teaches you necessarily that you have 352 00:21:52,213 --> 00:21:55,493 Speaker 4: to be thinking about several levels of meaning of a 353 00:21:54,813 --> 00:21:58,813 Speaker 4: given word, in terms of its intonation, in terms of 354 00:21:58,853 --> 00:22:01,573 Speaker 4: its context, and in terms of all those things. So 355 00:22:01,653 --> 00:22:05,093 Speaker 4: to be a reader makes you be multi vail, a 356 00:22:05,093 --> 00:22:10,173 Speaker 4: person who can understand multi valent understandings of words and 357 00:22:10,693 --> 00:22:14,093 Speaker 4: of statements, which of course makes you able to understand irony, 358 00:22:14,133 --> 00:22:18,173 Speaker 4: which in turn makes you able to understand humor. But 359 00:22:18,453 --> 00:22:21,813 Speaker 4: if you don't understand the language is multi valent by definition, 360 00:22:22,293 --> 00:22:26,733 Speaker 4: you're going to seize upon a literal utterance, an utterance 361 00:22:26,773 --> 00:22:29,173 Speaker 4: as a literal statement, and you're not going to get 362 00:22:29,213 --> 00:22:29,653 Speaker 4: the humor. 363 00:22:30,573 --> 00:22:34,613 Speaker 2: Indeed, so it's probably time we turned our attention back 364 00:22:34,653 --> 00:22:39,813 Speaker 2: to the book and the Treason of the Experts. Where 365 00:22:39,813 --> 00:22:41,573 Speaker 2: did you come up with the title? How did you 366 00:22:41,613 --> 00:22:42,493 Speaker 2: come up with the title? 367 00:22:43,613 --> 00:22:48,773 Speaker 4: The title is for some scholars of French literature out there. 368 00:22:49,253 --> 00:22:51,813 Speaker 4: It's from nineteen twenty. I got the idea from a 369 00:22:51,893 --> 00:22:55,613 Speaker 4: nineteen twenty seven book by Julien Benda, who was a 370 00:22:55,653 --> 00:22:59,933 Speaker 4: French Jewish intellectual who in twenty seven wrote a book 371 00:22:59,973 --> 00:23:03,133 Speaker 4: called The Treason of the Clerques or the Clerics. It 372 00:23:03,373 --> 00:23:06,253 Speaker 4: has a double meaning there it goes again, which can 373 00:23:06,293 --> 00:23:08,853 Speaker 4: be translated into English as reason. 374 00:23:08,653 --> 00:23:11,053 Speaker 3: Of the clerks or as the clerics. 375 00:23:11,933 --> 00:23:15,453 Speaker 4: So, in other words, he was stating or advancing the 376 00:23:15,573 --> 00:23:20,093 Speaker 4: argument that in the modern era the intellectual had supplanted 377 00:23:20,733 --> 00:23:25,693 Speaker 4: the cleric or the priest as the moral leader of 378 00:23:25,733 --> 00:23:30,933 Speaker 4: our society, and that as the people who had supplanted 379 00:23:31,613 --> 00:23:37,453 Speaker 4: the clericy as the leaders of morality and envision, they 380 00:23:37,493 --> 00:23:43,293 Speaker 4: had a responsibility to act in a very distance and 381 00:23:43,493 --> 00:23:47,173 Speaker 4: nuanced way, and as in a way that is least 382 00:23:47,693 --> 00:23:53,373 Speaker 4: contaminated by the jingoism of patriotism. So his book was 383 00:23:53,413 --> 00:23:57,053 Speaker 4: an attack on both the French and German intellectual classes 384 00:23:57,893 --> 00:24:01,933 Speaker 4: for the ease with which they were subsumed by the 385 00:24:02,053 --> 00:24:07,693 Speaker 4: jingoism that made possible the horrendous slaughter of World War One. 386 00:24:08,373 --> 00:24:11,413 Speaker 4: And he was saying that an intellectual worth his or 387 00:24:11,413 --> 00:24:15,573 Speaker 4: her weight is one who can distance himself from political 388 00:24:15,653 --> 00:24:18,173 Speaker 4: encroachments and say this is the truth as I see it. 389 00:24:18,653 --> 00:24:21,133 Speaker 4: And then if they're not doing that, they're engaging in 390 00:24:21,173 --> 00:24:26,333 Speaker 4: an active treason against the society because they're betraying the 391 00:24:26,453 --> 00:24:29,053 Speaker 4: role they have in the culture. 392 00:24:30,293 --> 00:24:32,373 Speaker 2: I want to pick out a couple of chapters at least, 393 00:24:33,653 --> 00:24:38,493 Speaker 2: and have you addressed them, And this is the final 394 00:24:39,093 --> 00:24:42,973 Speaker 2: sentence of the first one. If we really are interested 395 00:24:43,013 --> 00:24:48,493 Speaker 2: in democracy, we cannot passivelyceede to the ethos of technocratic management. 396 00:24:48,893 --> 00:24:52,973 Speaker 2: That are lazy and cowardly politicians and their media servants 397 00:24:53,453 --> 00:24:57,293 Speaker 2: are now relentlessly foisting upon us. Keeping in mind this 398 00:24:57,493 --> 00:25:01,293 Speaker 2: was April of twenty twenty, the earlier days of the 399 00:25:01,333 --> 00:25:06,533 Speaker 2: pandemic of COVID. Would you adjust your approach to that now? 400 00:25:07,493 --> 00:25:08,173 Speaker 3: No? 401 00:25:09,093 --> 00:25:12,813 Speaker 2: Okay, well that's I think that's the right answer. So 402 00:25:13,653 --> 00:25:16,373 Speaker 2: just walk us through that chapter. They're all short. It's 403 00:25:16,373 --> 00:25:19,813 Speaker 2: not a chapter. It's a called technocratic and authoritarianism. 404 00:25:20,333 --> 00:25:24,493 Speaker 4: Technocracy is, believe it or not, a term I came 405 00:25:24,573 --> 00:25:29,853 Speaker 4: in contact with through my study of contemporary Spain, and 406 00:25:30,013 --> 00:25:34,013 Speaker 4: Spain had a very interesting nineteenth and twentieth century, which 407 00:25:34,013 --> 00:25:36,173 Speaker 4: were the areas I spent a lot of time on 408 00:25:37,693 --> 00:25:40,533 Speaker 4: and what happened in Spain was that they were a 409 00:25:40,573 --> 00:25:44,173 Speaker 4: failing empire that had lagged behind the rest of Europe 410 00:25:44,173 --> 00:25:48,133 Speaker 4: in terms of the adoption of democratic forums, and that 411 00:25:48,213 --> 00:25:50,533 Speaker 4: in the early part of the twentieth century sought to 412 00:25:50,693 --> 00:25:55,133 Speaker 4: install democratic forms like those that inhered in France and 413 00:25:55,573 --> 00:25:58,613 Speaker 4: in Great Britain, but they had no democratic culture to 414 00:25:58,653 --> 00:26:03,573 Speaker 4: go with it, and so what happened is that democracy, 415 00:26:03,333 --> 00:26:07,853 Speaker 4: in the attempts to establish a semblance of it often 416 00:26:07,893 --> 00:26:11,893 Speaker 4: failed and brought on confusion. And the solution that was 417 00:26:11,933 --> 00:26:14,213 Speaker 4: begun to be advanced at the end of the nineteen 418 00:26:14,253 --> 00:26:18,013 Speaker 4: twenties was that we had to appoint a group of 419 00:26:18,053 --> 00:26:23,253 Speaker 4: people who were more clairvoyant and more far seeking than 420 00:26:23,293 --> 00:26:27,733 Speaker 4: the average person, who were technically intelligent that would solve 421 00:26:27,973 --> 00:26:33,293 Speaker 4: complex problems for us and save us and the common 422 00:26:33,333 --> 00:26:37,813 Speaker 4: people from the need to use their obviously impaired minds 423 00:26:38,693 --> 00:26:42,093 Speaker 4: in a democratic process. And that gave way in a 424 00:26:42,173 --> 00:26:48,253 Speaker 4: very real way to Franco's dictatorship. There was that impulse 425 00:26:48,253 --> 00:26:50,813 Speaker 4: of the twenties came to fruition really in the thirties, 426 00:26:51,373 --> 00:26:55,213 Speaker 4: when the Spanish Republic was established, and as you might think, 427 00:26:55,253 --> 00:27:01,133 Speaker 4: with a fledgling and separated society, it became conflictive. The answer, 428 00:27:01,173 --> 00:27:05,053 Speaker 4: of course, was to find people from on high who, 429 00:27:05,093 --> 00:27:08,893 Speaker 4: with force on one hand and supposed clairvoyance on the other, 430 00:27:09,573 --> 00:27:12,093 Speaker 4: would be there to direct the society and tell them 431 00:27:12,093 --> 00:27:13,053 Speaker 4: how they had to act. 432 00:27:15,213 --> 00:27:16,293 Speaker 3: And that's technocracy. 433 00:27:16,293 --> 00:27:19,213 Speaker 4: And then it came to a real four in nineteen 434 00:27:19,253 --> 00:27:24,173 Speaker 4: fifty nine in Spain when the Spanish economy under Franco 435 00:27:24,333 --> 00:27:27,573 Speaker 4: was not prospering, and he brought in a group of economists, 436 00:27:27,613 --> 00:27:31,493 Speaker 4: so they called technocrats. And what the idea they had 437 00:27:31,653 --> 00:27:34,773 Speaker 4: was that we would open up the Spanish market, but 438 00:27:34,893 --> 00:27:38,733 Speaker 4: we would keep closed the Spanish Spanish social life. And 439 00:27:38,813 --> 00:27:44,053 Speaker 4: so these people would be non ideological, or allegedly non ideological, 440 00:27:44,733 --> 00:27:47,093 Speaker 4: and because they were above the fray, we could trust 441 00:27:47,133 --> 00:27:49,773 Speaker 4: them and they would be the ones to lead us 442 00:27:49,773 --> 00:27:52,853 Speaker 4: to a better place. But of course, no expert is 443 00:27:52,933 --> 00:27:56,693 Speaker 4: ever apolitical, and that's one of the great dishonest conceits 444 00:27:56,773 --> 00:28:01,293 Speaker 4: of all of this. All people are political, whether they 445 00:28:01,293 --> 00:28:03,973 Speaker 4: want to admit it or not, and they have certain 446 00:28:04,093 --> 00:28:08,693 Speaker 4: inbuilt biases and tendencies. So to portray yourself as being 447 00:28:08,773 --> 00:28:14,493 Speaker 4: above the political fray, as our experts in Corona Corona 448 00:28:14,573 --> 00:28:17,853 Speaker 4: Land did, is an impossibility and we should be very, 449 00:28:17,973 --> 00:28:22,573 Speaker 4: very suspicious of anyone who proclaims themselves to be above debate. 450 00:28:23,013 --> 00:28:26,853 Speaker 2: There's only one criticism I have of the book. Sure, 451 00:28:27,013 --> 00:28:29,973 Speaker 2: if you don't mind, there is no mention of New 452 00:28:30,053 --> 00:28:33,493 Speaker 2: Zealand or Australia, or Australia for that matter. But I 453 00:28:33,653 --> 00:28:37,173 Speaker 2: mentioned New Zealand specifically because this is where the bulk 454 00:28:37,213 --> 00:28:42,373 Speaker 2: of our audience is. But we had a prime minister 455 00:28:42,693 --> 00:28:45,813 Speaker 2: for most of the COVID era. We had a prime 456 00:28:45,853 --> 00:28:49,373 Speaker 2: minister who was faithed by the rest of the world, 457 00:28:51,173 --> 00:28:56,853 Speaker 2: but was very destructive of the weld the goings on 458 00:28:57,013 --> 00:29:02,133 Speaker 2: in this country and the recent election of course has 459 00:29:02,173 --> 00:29:05,493 Speaker 2: given way to that. But I would have thought that 460 00:29:05,573 --> 00:29:07,093 Speaker 2: she deserved your attention. 461 00:29:07,893 --> 00:29:10,733 Speaker 4: She did get a lot of my attention, although I 462 00:29:10,733 --> 00:29:13,413 Speaker 4: didn't write about her, And the reason I didn't write 463 00:29:13,093 --> 00:29:16,293 Speaker 4: I try to write on things that I feel. You know, 464 00:29:16,373 --> 00:29:20,653 Speaker 4: I have a inadequate control of in terms of my background, 465 00:29:21,253 --> 00:29:25,373 Speaker 4: and I'm very comfortable in European and American politics. I 466 00:29:25,453 --> 00:29:28,373 Speaker 4: have spent little or no I've spent no time in 467 00:29:28,373 --> 00:29:32,133 Speaker 4: Australia or New Zealand. Although I followed it closely. I 468 00:29:32,173 --> 00:29:37,893 Speaker 4: followed that horrendous moralizing woman very closely, and in fact 469 00:29:37,973 --> 00:29:42,493 Speaker 4: I remember her saying you'll only get good information from us, 470 00:29:42,613 --> 00:29:48,533 Speaker 4: or something like that if you don't yeah, yeah, and 471 00:29:49,333 --> 00:29:52,413 Speaker 4: if and that's it. Anywhere else you ought to be 472 00:29:52,493 --> 00:29:52,973 Speaker 4: wary of. 473 00:29:53,533 --> 00:29:55,173 Speaker 2: It was even worth a don't believe. 474 00:29:55,973 --> 00:30:00,173 Speaker 4: I don't believe. And I was horrified at that. And 475 00:30:00,213 --> 00:30:05,253 Speaker 4: one of the things that that incident with Ardurn and 476 00:30:06,133 --> 00:30:09,613 Speaker 4: several others, with Dan what's his named over in Australia, 477 00:30:09,693 --> 00:30:14,093 Speaker 4: Dan Andrews. I mean, I followed them closely, but I 478 00:30:14,133 --> 00:30:16,573 Speaker 4: think in a broader sense they coincide with a lot 479 00:30:16,613 --> 00:30:20,413 Speaker 4: of what we saw here and in Europe, and I 480 00:30:20,453 --> 00:30:24,053 Speaker 4: think it has a lot to do with the infantilization 481 00:30:25,493 --> 00:30:28,453 Speaker 4: of the populace, and that there has been a long 482 00:30:28,573 --> 00:30:33,093 Speaker 4: term effort, through our media and through the great global. 483 00:30:32,733 --> 00:30:35,213 Speaker 3: Powers to infantilize us. 484 00:30:35,333 --> 00:30:38,853 Speaker 4: I mean, when she said that, I couldn't believe that 485 00:30:38,973 --> 00:30:44,973 Speaker 4: eggs weren't thrown at her, that laughter didn't break out everywhere, 486 00:30:46,613 --> 00:30:49,293 Speaker 4: and so on and so forth, and yet she said 487 00:30:49,333 --> 00:30:52,853 Speaker 4: it with earnestness. It was taken with earnestness by a 488 00:30:53,533 --> 00:30:57,093 Speaker 4: by a soporific press, and on it went, and it 489 00:30:57,133 --> 00:31:00,573 Speaker 4: was only a few of us nuts in the in 490 00:31:00,653 --> 00:31:05,053 Speaker 4: the medical freedom movement, who saw it for the incredible 491 00:31:05,773 --> 00:31:10,333 Speaker 4: infantilization of the populace that it's vote for. And that's 492 00:31:10,533 --> 00:31:14,013 Speaker 4: that's a very vexcing question. Have we become infantilized? I 493 00:31:14,013 --> 00:31:18,293 Speaker 4: think I later have written an article called infantilized or Us? 494 00:31:18,973 --> 00:31:22,813 Speaker 4: And I really think we've got to ask questions about 495 00:31:23,133 --> 00:31:29,133 Speaker 4: infantilization and how we have come to accept clowns like 496 00:31:29,653 --> 00:31:34,493 Speaker 4: that woman who's an obvious corporate shill who was installed there, 497 00:31:35,093 --> 00:31:37,253 Speaker 4: and why we don't just laugh at them? 498 00:31:37,493 --> 00:31:40,853 Speaker 2: The only response I can give is that it was 499 00:31:40,973 --> 00:31:46,493 Speaker 2: so painted as horrific that nobody had the wherewithal little 500 00:31:46,533 --> 00:31:49,213 Speaker 2: and the courage. I shouldn't say nobody, because there were 501 00:31:49,213 --> 00:31:52,613 Speaker 2: people right from the beginning, but and they grew. But 502 00:31:52,653 --> 00:31:56,893 Speaker 2: the majority of people were so concerned about frightened about 503 00:31:57,053 --> 00:32:00,413 Speaker 2: what was going to happen or likely to happen, that 504 00:32:01,053 --> 00:32:02,933 Speaker 2: they had no choice or they felt they had no 505 00:32:03,053 --> 00:32:04,453 Speaker 2: choice but to submit. 506 00:32:05,333 --> 00:32:09,293 Speaker 3: Yeah, wow, wow, Where is skepticism? 507 00:32:09,333 --> 00:32:14,293 Speaker 2: Where is? I can answer that question for you, okay, 508 00:32:14,413 --> 00:32:18,133 Speaker 2: because skepticism has been a word that has written the 509 00:32:18,173 --> 00:32:23,413 Speaker 2: climate change global warming train for a long time. From 510 00:32:23,453 --> 00:32:27,933 Speaker 2: some sources, the bulk of people again, because it's an 511 00:32:27,933 --> 00:32:30,893 Speaker 2: area that, going right back to the beginning, it's an 512 00:32:30,933 --> 00:32:34,893 Speaker 2: area that most people don't know anything about. And what 513 00:32:35,013 --> 00:32:40,453 Speaker 2: went on was that skepticism was essentially outlawed, and many 514 00:32:40,453 --> 00:32:45,613 Speaker 2: people lost their jobs, many people suffered from in various ways, 515 00:32:46,133 --> 00:32:48,133 Speaker 2: and skepticism got itself a bad name. 516 00:32:49,293 --> 00:32:52,133 Speaker 4: Yeah, I'll give you a concrete example of that, and 517 00:32:52,173 --> 00:32:54,733 Speaker 4: the one that I pushed back. Some of the articles 518 00:32:55,453 --> 00:32:58,973 Speaker 4: in the book or the chapters were written originally in Catalan. 519 00:33:00,093 --> 00:33:02,933 Speaker 4: At the time. I had a column there's much of 520 00:33:02,933 --> 00:33:06,013 Speaker 4: the pandemic. I had a column in a Catalan newspaper 521 00:33:06,773 --> 00:33:09,573 Speaker 4: and I used to write a monthly call there, and 522 00:33:09,653 --> 00:33:15,093 Speaker 4: in one of them I said that any well educated person, 523 00:33:15,533 --> 00:33:17,653 Speaker 4: especially one who is engaged in a great deal of 524 00:33:17,653 --> 00:33:21,733 Speaker 4: research in their lives, can and should read medical literature 525 00:33:22,693 --> 00:33:25,733 Speaker 4: and come to their own conclusions. And I was careful 526 00:33:25,173 --> 00:33:29,293 Speaker 4: to bracket that by saying, obviously, my ability to read 527 00:33:29,333 --> 00:33:32,693 Speaker 4: it on the granular level would be less than that 528 00:33:32,813 --> 00:33:36,213 Speaker 4: of a trained physician or scientist, but that even as 529 00:33:36,213 --> 00:33:41,693 Speaker 4: a humanist, I can make sense in broad break broad 530 00:33:41,813 --> 00:33:46,333 Speaker 4: terms of the medical literature and come, after reading a 531 00:33:46,453 --> 00:33:50,253 Speaker 4: number of things on a given subject to some tentative 532 00:33:51,093 --> 00:33:56,213 Speaker 4: conclusions about what they point to. I was roundly criticized 533 00:33:56,293 --> 00:33:58,373 Speaker 4: by the readers as. 534 00:33:58,173 --> 00:34:01,413 Speaker 3: If to say, who are you. You're not a scientist. 535 00:34:02,173 --> 00:34:05,333 Speaker 4: And there we get to this idea that there are 536 00:34:05,493 --> 00:34:09,933 Speaker 4: and I think a subproduct of the un fortunate overspecialization 537 00:34:10,013 --> 00:34:12,253 Speaker 4: of the university, this idea that. 538 00:34:12,173 --> 00:34:16,613 Speaker 3: One must stay in his lane. If not, he's a faker. 539 00:34:16,973 --> 00:34:20,773 Speaker 4: And if he's a faker, you can dismiss him because 540 00:34:20,933 --> 00:34:24,413 Speaker 4: the real questions come from the people within the field. 541 00:34:24,613 --> 00:34:29,533 Speaker 4: When in fact, if we know Thomas Kun's outlook on 542 00:34:29,613 --> 00:34:34,213 Speaker 4: the advancement of scientific knowledge, he says precisely the opposite. 543 00:34:34,413 --> 00:34:37,333 Speaker 4: It's the people who are the outliers, who are not 544 00:34:37,453 --> 00:34:40,893 Speaker 4: subsumed by the logic of the field, who are the 545 00:34:40,933 --> 00:34:44,413 Speaker 4: most necessary for advancing us to the next stage of knowledge. 546 00:34:44,613 --> 00:34:47,493 Speaker 4: So you need outsiders. But what we were told again 547 00:34:47,533 --> 00:34:51,493 Speaker 4: and again during the so called pandemic was that this 548 00:34:51,653 --> 00:34:56,413 Speaker 4: was protrietary information. There was a priesthood there who understood it. 549 00:34:57,013 --> 00:35:00,853 Speaker 4: You had no business thinking for yourself, and don't even try, 550 00:35:00,933 --> 00:35:03,453 Speaker 4: and if you do, you should be ready to be 551 00:35:03,573 --> 00:35:06,293 Speaker 4: mocked as an interloper and a fool. 552 00:35:08,413 --> 00:35:10,933 Speaker 3: And people got that message. 553 00:35:11,413 --> 00:35:18,493 Speaker 2: Most people are terrified of being mocked, especially publicly. But 554 00:35:18,613 --> 00:35:22,613 Speaker 2: I think that I think that skepticism may be making 555 00:35:22,613 --> 00:35:27,053 Speaker 2: a return, because there are numerous fronts in which the 556 00:35:27,173 --> 00:35:33,653 Speaker 2: skeptics have shown themselves to be on track absolutely now 557 00:35:34,453 --> 00:35:35,693 Speaker 2: of the chapters. 558 00:35:36,133 --> 00:35:39,413 Speaker 4: Sorry, go just one more note on that, just to 559 00:35:39,453 --> 00:35:43,853 Speaker 4: extend the metaphor of tunes thinking about the advancement of 560 00:35:43,893 --> 00:35:47,413 Speaker 4: scientific knowledge. One other thing that animates me is the 561 00:35:47,493 --> 00:35:50,013 Speaker 4: idea that we might in fact be at the end 562 00:35:50,093 --> 00:35:54,453 Speaker 4: of a historical epoch, and or, at least in the 563 00:35:54,573 --> 00:35:56,133 Speaker 4: sense of the United States, we're at the end of 564 00:35:56,173 --> 00:36:00,813 Speaker 4: an epic in which the US Empire and its assumptions. 565 00:36:01,733 --> 00:36:04,093 Speaker 3: Fit and are fit to lead the world. 566 00:36:04,973 --> 00:36:08,333 Speaker 4: And I think what happens at the end of a moment, 567 00:36:08,453 --> 00:36:11,933 Speaker 4: of a historical moment, a broad historical moment, is that 568 00:36:12,413 --> 00:36:17,413 Speaker 4: the people who can't adjust to the changing circumstances outside 569 00:36:18,053 --> 00:36:20,653 Speaker 4: that they can no longer control, double and triple down 570 00:36:21,133 --> 00:36:24,453 Speaker 4: on the articles of faith that have gotten them to 571 00:36:24,533 --> 00:36:28,013 Speaker 4: the to the dance. And I think that historical element 572 00:36:28,093 --> 00:36:29,733 Speaker 4: may have something to do with that. I think there 573 00:36:29,733 --> 00:36:32,653 Speaker 4: are a lot of people that know intuitively that the 574 00:36:32,693 --> 00:36:36,133 Speaker 4: paradigms we've lived by no longer work they don't know 575 00:36:36,173 --> 00:36:38,813 Speaker 4: what the new ones will be, and in their fright 576 00:36:38,853 --> 00:36:41,453 Speaker 4: they double and triple down and say you must believe this, 577 00:36:41,853 --> 00:36:43,453 Speaker 4: and if you don't, you're harming me. 578 00:36:44,253 --> 00:36:45,773 Speaker 3: But that's just a sidebar, I guess. 579 00:36:46,973 --> 00:36:50,173 Speaker 2: There is a book probably some years ago called Why 580 00:36:50,333 --> 00:36:55,853 Speaker 2: the West Rules for Now, And only yesterday I saw 581 00:36:55,853 --> 00:36:59,893 Speaker 2: a headline that I don't have I don't have with me, 582 00:37:00,373 --> 00:37:04,533 Speaker 2: but it was it was basically a no attachment to 583 00:37:04,573 --> 00:37:07,733 Speaker 2: the book, but basically a confirmation that we're in. We're 584 00:37:07,733 --> 00:37:10,733 Speaker 2: in right in the zone now for exactly that, or 585 00:37:11,053 --> 00:37:14,253 Speaker 2: the wist to lose its leadership. 586 00:37:14,573 --> 00:37:18,933 Speaker 4: Yeah, the idea first came to me, interestingly enough, about 587 00:37:18,933 --> 00:37:22,053 Speaker 4: twenty years ago. I was doing some work in Uruguay. 588 00:37:23,013 --> 00:37:25,973 Speaker 4: And when you're in Uruguay or in Argentina or in Chile, 589 00:37:27,173 --> 00:37:31,213 Speaker 4: the world of the United States is far away. It's 590 00:37:31,253 --> 00:37:33,333 Speaker 4: really interesting, and all the things that we think the 591 00:37:33,373 --> 00:37:36,933 Speaker 4: whole world is thinking about in the Euro American space 592 00:37:37,253 --> 00:37:39,613 Speaker 4: are not so important. And a good friend of mine, 593 00:37:39,613 --> 00:37:41,853 Speaker 4: a very bright ice, is Tom We're at the end 594 00:37:41,853 --> 00:37:44,653 Speaker 4: of an epic. I know we're at the end of 595 00:37:44,693 --> 00:37:47,453 Speaker 4: an epic. And it was the first time that I 596 00:37:47,453 --> 00:37:50,893 Speaker 4: had ever been forced to look at my own country 597 00:37:51,093 --> 00:37:53,653 Speaker 4: in terms of its possible death as number one in 598 00:37:53,693 --> 00:37:57,253 Speaker 4: the world. And as I began to get over some 599 00:37:57,333 --> 00:38:00,573 Speaker 4: of my prejudices about the need for us to be 600 00:38:00,733 --> 00:38:04,333 Speaker 4: number one and entertain the idea, I began to agree 601 00:38:04,373 --> 00:38:08,293 Speaker 4: with the thesis of my friend and have begun to 602 00:38:08,413 --> 00:38:11,213 Speaker 4: explore it. But in my experience as both a teacher 603 00:38:11,253 --> 00:38:14,373 Speaker 4: and a friend of others and in conversation, I have 604 00:38:14,533 --> 00:38:18,653 Speaker 4: given versions of that idea to other people, and it 605 00:38:18,773 --> 00:38:23,373 Speaker 4: induces fright in them. Rather than saying, gee, that may 606 00:38:23,413 --> 00:38:27,013 Speaker 4: be true, and how can we adjust, the reaction is, oh, 607 00:38:27,053 --> 00:38:30,653 Speaker 4: come on, We've always been number one. And I think 608 00:38:30,693 --> 00:38:33,293 Speaker 4: you can see this in our elite class and especially 609 00:38:33,373 --> 00:38:36,173 Speaker 4: in our diplomatic core in the United States. 610 00:38:37,053 --> 00:38:41,493 Speaker 3: We no longer do diplomacy. We will issue orders. We 611 00:38:41,613 --> 00:38:42,773 Speaker 3: go around the world. 612 00:38:42,573 --> 00:38:45,813 Speaker 4: Issuing orders and saying do this or else. And if 613 00:38:45,813 --> 00:38:47,693 Speaker 4: you think about it from the point of view of 614 00:38:49,173 --> 00:38:54,213 Speaker 4: a mature and resilient society, that's something you don't do. 615 00:38:54,613 --> 00:38:58,933 Speaker 4: That's a panic move when you have to convert diplomacy 616 00:38:59,093 --> 00:39:00,893 Speaker 4: into a series of dictates. 617 00:39:01,733 --> 00:39:04,133 Speaker 3: And I think it's a good sign that the idea 618 00:39:04,133 --> 00:39:08,053 Speaker 3: that we may be at the end of something has 619 00:39:08,053 --> 00:39:10,373 Speaker 3: some all its watch. 620 00:39:10,173 --> 00:39:14,813 Speaker 2: This space the chapter or the article Bill Gates and 621 00:39:14,853 --> 00:39:19,213 Speaker 2: the frame game. A few weeks back, and this was 622 00:39:20,133 --> 00:39:23,213 Speaker 2: this was June of last year. A few weeks back 623 00:39:23,253 --> 00:39:25,573 Speaker 2: in the World Economic Forum meeting in Davos, Bill Gates 624 00:39:25,573 --> 00:39:28,053 Speaker 2: said some surprising things in the course of a fifty 625 00:39:28,093 --> 00:39:33,293 Speaker 2: six minute panel discussion. The vaccine pusher extraordinary admitted that 626 00:39:33,453 --> 00:39:36,013 Speaker 2: the and you even put in brackets starting at the 627 00:39:36,053 --> 00:39:40,053 Speaker 2: eighteen twenty two mark, that the COVID vaccines do not 628 00:39:40,293 --> 00:39:44,453 Speaker 2: block infection, and that the duration of whatever protection they 629 00:39:44,573 --> 00:39:50,813 Speaker 2: bring to the table is extremely short. People seem to 630 00:39:50,813 --> 00:39:53,933 Speaker 2: to well, if not worshiped Bill Gates, then they get 631 00:39:54,013 --> 00:39:57,933 Speaker 2: very some of them get very close. What words of 632 00:39:58,253 --> 00:39:59,293 Speaker 2: advice would you give? 633 00:39:59,893 --> 00:40:05,493 Speaker 4: That intervention by Bill Gates at that forum, which went 634 00:40:05,733 --> 00:40:10,253 Speaker 4: almost completely uncommented on in the mainstream media, is one 635 00:40:10,253 --> 00:40:12,813 Speaker 4: of the most extraordinary things I think I had ever seen. 636 00:40:13,493 --> 00:40:15,413 Speaker 4: Here was the man who had told us we all 637 00:40:15,493 --> 00:40:19,573 Speaker 4: need to get this thing in order to save someone else, 638 00:40:20,373 --> 00:40:22,453 Speaker 4: and that it was our moral duty to do. 639 00:40:22,493 --> 00:40:25,133 Speaker 3: So, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. Here he was 640 00:40:25,173 --> 00:40:26,773 Speaker 3: basically admitting. 641 00:40:27,893 --> 00:40:31,493 Speaker 4: That it was an absolute failure and it didn't get reported. 642 00:40:31,813 --> 00:40:34,653 Speaker 4: And then I began to analyze his intervention even more, 643 00:40:35,173 --> 00:40:37,733 Speaker 4: and I realized there was the second part, which you 644 00:40:37,773 --> 00:40:40,373 Speaker 4: have there in front of you, in which he says, 645 00:40:41,373 --> 00:40:47,093 Speaker 4: though though they saved millions of lives, you know they 646 00:40:47,093 --> 00:40:49,453 Speaker 4: didn't do this, which was the reason we told you 647 00:40:49,493 --> 00:40:51,933 Speaker 4: to get them. But they did save millions of lives, 648 00:40:51,933 --> 00:40:54,813 Speaker 4: which itself has been completely unproven and by the way, 649 00:40:54,893 --> 00:40:56,853 Speaker 4: looks completely specious as a claim. 650 00:40:57,773 --> 00:40:59,693 Speaker 3: So what was Bill Gates doing. 651 00:40:59,733 --> 00:41:03,413 Speaker 4: He was engaging in the old thing that the intelligence 652 00:41:03,493 --> 00:41:05,853 Speaker 4: services often called the limited hangout. 653 00:41:06,733 --> 00:41:11,413 Speaker 3: He was trying to free throw overboard that which was. 654 00:41:11,373 --> 00:41:14,893 Speaker 4: Troublesome to him from a rhetorical point of view and 655 00:41:14,973 --> 00:41:19,853 Speaker 4: save the overall frame of goodness about the vaccine, And 656 00:41:19,973 --> 00:41:22,813 Speaker 4: to my amazement, he got away with it. And so 657 00:41:22,933 --> 00:41:25,813 Speaker 4: after that we saw the press never talk more about 658 00:41:25,813 --> 00:41:31,653 Speaker 4: the problem of infection or transmission and started with a 659 00:41:31,693 --> 00:41:33,093 Speaker 4: new meme about how many. 660 00:41:32,893 --> 00:41:33,693 Speaker 3: Lives it had saved. 661 00:41:33,853 --> 00:41:36,533 Speaker 4: In other words, the vaccine wasn't a total loss, even 662 00:41:36,533 --> 00:41:39,813 Speaker 4: though it was a total loss on in the very 663 00:41:39,813 --> 00:41:42,453 Speaker 4: parameters that you had set out for it to succeed upon. 664 00:41:43,493 --> 00:41:45,053 Speaker 3: And in that way, he was. 665 00:41:45,013 --> 00:41:48,973 Speaker 4: Trying to keep the rhetoric of success alive. And it 666 00:41:49,013 --> 00:41:51,013 Speaker 4: appears he did so, because there are still plenty of 667 00:41:51,053 --> 00:41:56,093 Speaker 4: people who look at the failure, ignore that it happened, 668 00:41:56,813 --> 00:41:59,373 Speaker 4: forget all that was said about the moral need to 669 00:41:59,413 --> 00:42:03,173 Speaker 4: protect others because of transmission and infection. And and I'll say, 670 00:42:03,173 --> 00:42:05,853 Speaker 4: they were a wonderful success and a wonderful thing, and 671 00:42:05,893 --> 00:42:08,973 Speaker 4: we have to have more of them in the next pandemic, 672 00:42:08,973 --> 00:42:10,893 Speaker 4: which of course is bound to come along. 673 00:42:11,613 --> 00:42:16,653 Speaker 3: Well. Extraordinary lieing of a very sophisticated. 674 00:42:15,853 --> 00:42:22,973 Speaker 2: Sort skepticism is required. Yeah, I'll say, I do want 675 00:42:23,013 --> 00:42:25,013 Speaker 2: to I want to go back a bit in the 676 00:42:25,053 --> 00:42:30,613 Speaker 2: book the Hitting what Everybody Knows Knows in quests, because 677 00:42:31,053 --> 00:42:35,093 Speaker 2: I thought that you hit on something extremely important. So, 678 00:42:35,373 --> 00:42:38,733 Speaker 2: just briefly, what was the purpose of that article? 679 00:42:39,213 --> 00:42:43,613 Speaker 4: That article was took place in the late spring of 680 00:42:43,613 --> 00:42:46,613 Speaker 4: twenty twenty. I wrote that it was a time in 681 00:42:46,693 --> 00:42:51,053 Speaker 4: which the university in which the university I was teaching at, 682 00:42:51,333 --> 00:42:54,293 Speaker 4: was debating what would be done in the following academic year, 683 00:42:55,413 --> 00:42:58,493 Speaker 4: A time in which you had a group of well 684 00:42:58,533 --> 00:43:03,933 Speaker 4: paid and tenured, often mostly tenured, professors wondering whether it 685 00:43:04,053 --> 00:43:07,173 Speaker 4: was safe for them to have in person classes the 686 00:43:07,213 --> 00:43:10,773 Speaker 4: next year, or whether they would have to continue to 687 00:43:10,853 --> 00:43:14,133 Speaker 4: teach by zoom, as they had done through the latter 688 00:43:14,173 --> 00:43:18,013 Speaker 4: part of twenty twenty, something I was doing at the time. 689 00:43:18,933 --> 00:43:21,053 Speaker 4: On the other hand, I was working with my wife, 690 00:43:21,093 --> 00:43:26,333 Speaker 4: who's a handywoman of deluxe and likes to work on houses. 691 00:43:26,333 --> 00:43:29,093 Speaker 4: And she has a bit of a rehab business that 692 00:43:29,173 --> 00:43:31,653 Speaker 4: she does on a house that she has near a 693 00:43:31,733 --> 00:43:34,733 Speaker 4: lake in a rural area of the state I live in, 694 00:43:35,693 --> 00:43:38,093 Speaker 4: and so I sometimes help her as her gopher as 695 00:43:38,133 --> 00:43:42,373 Speaker 4: she's doing her renovations, And of course in the course 696 00:43:42,413 --> 00:43:44,893 Speaker 4: of that I talk with people of a class in 697 00:43:44,933 --> 00:43:47,533 Speaker 4: the rural areas of the state of Connecticut that I'm 698 00:43:47,573 --> 00:43:52,453 Speaker 4: generally not in contact with, carpenter's tradesmen of all sorts, 699 00:43:52,493 --> 00:43:55,533 Speaker 4: people who work at lumber yards, and the life. And 700 00:43:55,573 --> 00:44:00,213 Speaker 4: what was remarkable as my colleagues quaked in fear about 701 00:44:00,213 --> 00:44:04,693 Speaker 4: the possibility of being in classrooms six months away with 702 00:44:04,813 --> 00:44:07,933 Speaker 4: young people who are known not to be important vectors 703 00:44:08,133 --> 00:44:11,253 Speaker 4: of disease for a disease that we knew by then 704 00:44:12,093 --> 00:44:17,453 Speaker 4: really only killed zero point twenty percent of one percent 705 00:44:17,533 --> 00:44:19,333 Speaker 4: of the people who got it, and most of them 706 00:44:19,373 --> 00:44:22,573 Speaker 4: over the age of seventy five. While they were quaking 707 00:44:22,653 --> 00:44:25,853 Speaker 4: and saying, under no circumstances. When I get into the classroom, 708 00:44:26,693 --> 00:44:31,373 Speaker 4: here were people in the trades working daily, unmasked with 709 00:44:31,493 --> 00:44:34,813 Speaker 4: each other, and when I talked to them, they knew 710 00:44:35,213 --> 00:44:40,533 Speaker 4: much better than my PhD colleagues the actual statistics and 711 00:44:40,653 --> 00:44:44,093 Speaker 4: risk calculations having to do. 712 00:44:46,253 --> 00:44:48,213 Speaker 3: With the COVID virus. 713 00:44:49,013 --> 00:44:52,173 Speaker 4: And they could quote me chapter and verse and were 714 00:44:52,173 --> 00:44:58,213 Speaker 4: completely skeptical about the dominant discourse. I couldn't believe it, 715 00:44:59,013 --> 00:45:01,333 Speaker 4: and it was the world on its head. The people 716 00:45:01,333 --> 00:45:04,853 Speaker 4: who think that because they're information managers they have an 717 00:45:04,853 --> 00:45:09,053 Speaker 4: ability to tell people how to think, had completely missed 718 00:45:09,053 --> 00:45:13,053 Speaker 4: the boat, both in terms of fear but also in 719 00:45:13,133 --> 00:45:17,213 Speaker 4: terms of actual risk risk calculation. Well, the people who 720 00:45:17,213 --> 00:45:20,733 Speaker 4: generally were not college education but were outside working and 721 00:45:20,773 --> 00:45:25,013 Speaker 4: in touch with empirical reality knew an awful lot more 722 00:45:25,053 --> 00:45:26,493 Speaker 4: than they did about the issue. 723 00:45:26,773 --> 00:45:29,733 Speaker 2: And it's amazing how when you approach it in the 724 00:45:29,813 --> 00:45:34,333 Speaker 2: right manner, how many people who are not educated in 725 00:45:34,373 --> 00:45:39,293 Speaker 2: the fields that or even not well educated in the 726 00:45:39,293 --> 00:45:44,213 Speaker 2: fields that might be under investigation discussion, can put two 727 00:45:44,253 --> 00:45:46,533 Speaker 2: and two together better than the experts. 728 00:45:46,973 --> 00:45:48,773 Speaker 3: Yeah, it has a lot to do. 729 00:45:48,853 --> 00:45:51,653 Speaker 4: I think I think we forget those of us who 730 00:45:51,653 --> 00:45:55,173 Speaker 4: have been lucky enough to achieve a certain middle class life. 731 00:45:56,333 --> 00:45:59,773 Speaker 4: How keenly you have to be observing when your life 732 00:45:59,813 --> 00:46:05,853 Speaker 4: is more difficult. People who are less insulated from life's difficulty, 733 00:46:06,533 --> 00:46:09,973 Speaker 4: almost by definition, have to be come better calculators of 734 00:46:10,093 --> 00:46:12,973 Speaker 4: risk than we do. We have we I say, we 735 00:46:14,093 --> 00:46:16,093 Speaker 4: you know a person like me, a college professor, we 736 00:46:16,213 --> 00:46:19,213 Speaker 4: have certain cushioning at a certain stage in our life 737 00:46:19,613 --> 00:46:22,733 Speaker 4: that relieves us from moment to moment, day to day 738 00:46:22,813 --> 00:46:26,653 Speaker 4: risk calculation. It removes us from the need to size 739 00:46:26,733 --> 00:46:31,853 Speaker 4: up people and their honesty constantly, as say a tradesman 740 00:46:31,893 --> 00:46:32,613 Speaker 4: would have to do. 741 00:46:33,093 --> 00:46:34,133 Speaker 3: And yet, and. 742 00:46:34,093 --> 00:46:37,453 Speaker 4: So we have certain qualities that have atrophied in us 743 00:46:37,893 --> 00:46:39,733 Speaker 4: that go back to what I was talking about earlier 744 00:46:39,773 --> 00:46:44,293 Speaker 4: about socialization. We either never got or we have let 745 00:46:44,373 --> 00:46:47,693 Speaker 4: atrophy many important social skills that have to do with 746 00:46:48,293 --> 00:46:49,893 Speaker 4: sizing reality up. 747 00:46:50,333 --> 00:46:55,333 Speaker 2: Indeed, so my favorite chapter, for personal reasons and in 748 00:46:55,373 --> 00:46:57,253 Speaker 2: relation to things that are happening in this country at 749 00:46:57,293 --> 00:47:03,533 Speaker 2: the moment, speed bumps is I think a very interesting 750 00:47:03,613 --> 00:47:06,813 Speaker 2: one from a variety of reasons. Not least of all 751 00:47:06,853 --> 00:47:11,413 Speaker 2: of course, is because speed bumps and traffic traffic control 752 00:47:12,773 --> 00:47:16,733 Speaker 2: is under full assault in this country. Let me give 753 00:47:16,733 --> 00:47:19,213 Speaker 2: you an example. Not far from where I am, there 754 00:47:19,333 --> 00:47:24,133 Speaker 2: is a nine hundred meter section of road which had 755 00:47:24,333 --> 00:47:28,773 Speaker 2: no traffic lights and no speed bumps. Now there is 756 00:47:28,853 --> 00:47:31,333 Speaker 2: going to be and they've they've put most of them 757 00:47:31,413 --> 00:47:37,013 Speaker 2: in five pedestrian crossings, and nobody can work out why, 758 00:47:37,453 --> 00:47:40,493 Speaker 2: because a golf course on one side and and you know, 759 00:47:40,653 --> 00:47:43,933 Speaker 2: housing on the other and no shops in this area. 760 00:47:45,373 --> 00:47:52,453 Speaker 2: So five traffic light controlled crossings. And then you get 761 00:47:52,453 --> 00:47:55,973 Speaker 2: to the roundabout that at the end of this stretch 762 00:47:56,013 --> 00:48:00,013 Speaker 2: of road where it goes off inwards. Four different inputs 763 00:48:00,053 --> 00:48:03,813 Speaker 2: into it, and each one of those inputs has a 764 00:48:03,853 --> 00:48:06,493 Speaker 2: speed bump, and they were actually the first things to 765 00:48:06,533 --> 00:48:09,853 Speaker 2: go in. And then these traffic lights started appearing, and 766 00:48:10,333 --> 00:48:13,093 Speaker 2: all of a sudden people are waking up to and 767 00:48:13,093 --> 00:48:15,853 Speaker 2: it's doing all the social media rounds and people are 768 00:48:15,893 --> 00:48:21,293 Speaker 2: getting really agitated. But for a cost of each traffic 769 00:48:21,373 --> 00:48:26,093 Speaker 2: light that's going in, there is a four bedroom home 770 00:48:26,133 --> 00:48:29,413 Speaker 2: that could have been built with less money. And we 771 00:48:29,453 --> 00:48:31,933 Speaker 2: have shortage of housing at the moment and the no 772 00:48:32,053 --> 00:48:37,293 Speaker 2: shortage tall of bureaucrats. So not only that, tom they're 773 00:48:37,293 --> 00:48:40,573 Speaker 2: reducing speeds in the city to thirty k's an hour. 774 00:48:40,653 --> 00:48:42,893 Speaker 2: There's even a few ten k's an hour, et cetera. 775 00:48:43,733 --> 00:48:47,173 Speaker 2: And the reason is, and I've always known this, is 776 00:48:47,413 --> 00:48:50,133 Speaker 2: because they hate cars. And it's a matter of whether 777 00:48:50,173 --> 00:48:52,453 Speaker 2: they hate the driver or the car the most, and 778 00:48:52,533 --> 00:48:55,653 Speaker 2: they are simply trying to drive cars off the road. Now, 779 00:48:56,373 --> 00:49:02,413 Speaker 2: in your speed Bumps, you refer to Wahaka in Mexico 780 00:49:02,773 --> 00:49:05,653 Speaker 2: where you first came into contact with speed bumps. Pick 781 00:49:05,653 --> 00:49:07,813 Speaker 2: it up from there and tell me what the story 782 00:49:07,893 --> 00:49:08,893 Speaker 2: is from your perspective. 783 00:49:09,453 --> 00:49:11,453 Speaker 4: Yeah, it wouldn't be the first time, but it was 784 00:49:11,493 --> 00:49:13,773 Speaker 4: the place where I ran into speed bumps of such 785 00:49:13,813 --> 00:49:18,333 Speaker 4: an enormous size and interruptive capability that I just couldn't 786 00:49:18,373 --> 00:49:19,573 Speaker 4: ignore them any longer. 787 00:49:20,293 --> 00:49:21,253 Speaker 3: And it got me thinking. 788 00:49:21,293 --> 00:49:23,653 Speaker 4: You know, my job as a cultural historian, and one 789 00:49:23,653 --> 00:49:26,293 Speaker 4: of the things is to look at manifestations of culture, 790 00:49:27,133 --> 00:49:30,773 Speaker 4: which generally speaking, speak for values, and ask what are 791 00:49:30,773 --> 00:49:35,533 Speaker 4: the values underlying the sudden proliferation of speed bumps in 792 00:49:35,613 --> 00:49:40,093 Speaker 4: my own city of Hartford, Connecticut. After I began thinking 793 00:49:40,093 --> 00:49:42,213 Speaker 4: about speed bumps in Wahaka, I said, well, damn it, 794 00:49:42,573 --> 00:49:45,973 Speaker 4: there's going in everywhere here in the city of Hartford. 795 00:49:46,533 --> 00:49:48,573 Speaker 3: What does this tell us about. 796 00:49:48,373 --> 00:49:51,413 Speaker 4: The evolution of the culture we live in and what 797 00:49:51,493 --> 00:49:53,733 Speaker 4: I conclude in the article is that it tells us 798 00:49:53,773 --> 00:49:58,533 Speaker 4: that we are living in a time where there are 799 00:49:58,533 --> 00:50:01,093 Speaker 4: people who have come to see themselves not as our 800 00:50:01,093 --> 00:50:05,253 Speaker 4: electric representatives who are there to do our bidding, but 801 00:50:05,373 --> 00:50:09,493 Speaker 4: as people who see it as their role to nudge 802 00:50:09,573 --> 00:50:14,773 Speaker 4: us and cajole us, and if not force us into 803 00:50:14,813 --> 00:50:18,613 Speaker 4: behaviors that they have decided all on their own, are 804 00:50:18,693 --> 00:50:22,093 Speaker 4: what we need to be doing. And that in that 805 00:50:22,133 --> 00:50:27,213 Speaker 4: way they were expressing a general disdain for not only us, 806 00:50:27,693 --> 00:50:32,213 Speaker 4: but for the democratic processes on which the culture is 807 00:50:32,253 --> 00:50:38,893 Speaker 4: allegedly based. So they're saying, I don't trust you. 808 00:50:37,333 --> 00:50:38,933 Speaker 3: You're not again. 809 00:50:38,973 --> 00:50:42,253 Speaker 4: It goes along with the idea of infantilization. If left 810 00:50:42,293 --> 00:50:45,813 Speaker 4: to your own devices, you would just go ninety miles 811 00:50:45,853 --> 00:50:49,733 Speaker 4: per hour and you would steamroll people because you're a 812 00:50:49,853 --> 00:50:53,333 Speaker 4: dumb peasant that wouldn't know any better. And of course, 813 00:50:53,373 --> 00:50:56,253 Speaker 4: when you treat people with contempt, and you see this 814 00:50:56,333 --> 00:50:59,453 Speaker 4: as you're a parent raising children, If you treat your 815 00:50:59,533 --> 00:51:02,133 Speaker 4: children as if they're going to make mistakes all the 816 00:51:02,213 --> 00:51:05,973 Speaker 4: time and they don't have the ability to be sentient beings, 817 00:51:06,573 --> 00:51:10,613 Speaker 4: they will oftentimes jumped themselves down to the expectations that 818 00:51:10,733 --> 00:51:13,493 Speaker 4: go along with it. And in that sense, I see 819 00:51:13,493 --> 00:51:16,853 Speaker 4: speed bumps as an attempt to remind us that if 820 00:51:16,933 --> 00:51:22,053 Speaker 4: left to our own devices, we are fundamentally destructive and irresponsible, 821 00:51:22,533 --> 00:51:24,813 Speaker 4: and that if left to our own devices without the 822 00:51:24,973 --> 00:51:29,893 Speaker 4: loving tutelage of the better people, we would just be 823 00:51:30,253 --> 00:51:36,213 Speaker 4: abusive and kill people. And that's a very hefty indictment. 824 00:51:36,293 --> 00:51:40,813 Speaker 4: Although it's relayed to us through the symbolic means of 825 00:51:40,813 --> 00:51:43,613 Speaker 4: the speed bump, I think the message is absolutely clear. 826 00:51:44,453 --> 00:51:46,773 Speaker 3: And it was interesting. I got a letter on. 827 00:51:46,733 --> 00:51:48,933 Speaker 4: That from a young woman who's a graduate student at 828 00:51:48,933 --> 00:51:52,893 Speaker 4: Harvard afterwards, and she said, well, I take issue with 829 00:51:52,973 --> 00:51:59,173 Speaker 4: your article because I lived in Africa and people went 830 00:51:59,333 --> 00:52:01,653 Speaker 4: very fast on this road and they put speed bumps 831 00:52:01,653 --> 00:52:05,733 Speaker 4: in and it got better. And I said, well, there 832 00:52:05,733 --> 00:52:09,733 Speaker 4: may be a difference of generation here, because when I 833 00:52:09,973 --> 00:52:14,293 Speaker 4: was your age, the government basically trusted us to do 834 00:52:14,373 --> 00:52:17,293 Speaker 4: the right thing and knew that the idea of forcing 835 00:52:17,333 --> 00:52:20,173 Speaker 4: people to do things could never be a substitute for 836 00:52:20,213 --> 00:52:23,533 Speaker 4: the voluntary compliance of people who believe that they're part 837 00:52:23,573 --> 00:52:26,813 Speaker 4: of a social project. And I said, maybe the fact 838 00:52:26,813 --> 00:52:29,693 Speaker 4: that you've been brought up mostly in the post September 839 00:52:29,733 --> 00:52:33,053 Speaker 4: eleventh era were a lot of these measures that basically 840 00:52:33,093 --> 00:52:37,013 Speaker 4: say you are guilty until proven innocent, turning our whole 841 00:52:37,093 --> 00:52:40,733 Speaker 4: constitutional system on its head, were put into place, And 842 00:52:40,773 --> 00:52:44,253 Speaker 4: so I honestly think she had no means of contrastive 843 00:52:44,253 --> 00:52:48,613 Speaker 4: analysis because her whole life has been spent under this 844 00:52:48,693 --> 00:52:51,773 Speaker 4: sort of tutelage from the state, which seems to be 845 00:52:51,813 --> 00:52:53,493 Speaker 4: getting only worse all the time. 846 00:52:53,933 --> 00:52:56,773 Speaker 2: I love the way that you put this in one 847 00:52:56,813 --> 00:52:59,373 Speaker 2: part of that chapter. It is rather part of a 848 00:52:59,413 --> 00:53:03,013 Speaker 2: clear campaign to render us all impervious to the natural 849 00:53:03,053 --> 00:53:06,733 Speaker 2: development and deployment of our own social instincts. In other words, 850 00:53:06,773 --> 00:53:09,293 Speaker 2: they're controlling the dives element of society. 851 00:53:10,173 --> 00:53:14,453 Speaker 4: Yeah, and it carries on with the idea that I 852 00:53:14,493 --> 00:53:17,093 Speaker 4: spoke a little bit more in the realm of socialization 853 00:53:17,893 --> 00:53:21,333 Speaker 4: that people need to be left on their own as 854 00:53:21,373 --> 00:53:26,093 Speaker 4: young people and throughout life to give them sell space, 855 00:53:26,253 --> 00:53:29,773 Speaker 4: or to be given space to develop their own interpretive 856 00:53:29,773 --> 00:53:34,173 Speaker 4: capabilities about how the world works. And what our elite 857 00:53:34,213 --> 00:53:36,493 Speaker 4: classes seem to be telling us again and again and 858 00:53:36,533 --> 00:53:40,853 Speaker 4: again is no if left to your own devices, you 859 00:53:41,173 --> 00:53:45,653 Speaker 4: lack interpretive capabilities, and you will never figure things. 860 00:53:45,453 --> 00:53:47,853 Speaker 3: Out in a way that helps us all. 861 00:53:48,613 --> 00:53:50,613 Speaker 4: Or either that or you will find a way to 862 00:53:50,853 --> 00:53:54,653 Speaker 4: come to the wrong conclusion, and therefore you need to 863 00:53:54,693 --> 00:53:59,293 Speaker 4: be corrected or nudged into the right conclusion, because again, 864 00:53:59,413 --> 00:54:03,053 Speaker 4: left to your own devices, you will do something stupid 865 00:54:03,533 --> 00:54:07,213 Speaker 4: or you simply will not develop those skills necessary. That 866 00:54:07,253 --> 00:54:10,413 Speaker 4: flies in the face of everything that the American experiment 867 00:54:10,533 --> 00:54:14,933 Speaker 4: is about, which says that if you give people a 868 00:54:15,053 --> 00:54:18,053 Speaker 4: heavy degree of freedom and give them the ability to 869 00:54:18,213 --> 00:54:23,173 Speaker 4: organize themselves in community with others, more often than not 870 00:54:23,853 --> 00:54:25,653 Speaker 4: they will find an effective way. 871 00:54:25,453 --> 00:54:25,893 Speaker 3: To do so. 872 00:54:26,773 --> 00:54:29,053 Speaker 4: Which doesn't mean there won't be mistakes and there won't 873 00:54:29,053 --> 00:54:31,973 Speaker 4: be horrible things that they do do in organize themselves 874 00:54:32,053 --> 00:54:35,253 Speaker 4: to do, but that it was worth the risk to 875 00:54:35,373 --> 00:54:38,933 Speaker 4: give people that freedom in the trust you had, in 876 00:54:38,973 --> 00:54:43,053 Speaker 4: the trust that they would work things out on their own. 877 00:54:43,453 --> 00:54:47,453 Speaker 4: And again, I have to think that child rearing practices 878 00:54:48,133 --> 00:54:50,573 Speaker 4: of these later years have something to do with it. 879 00:54:51,493 --> 00:54:54,733 Speaker 4: I'm one of five children, and one of the things 880 00:54:54,773 --> 00:54:58,413 Speaker 4: in a family like that is you were left to 881 00:54:58,453 --> 00:55:01,533 Speaker 4: work things out. Sometimes there was a lot of mayhem 882 00:55:01,613 --> 00:55:06,493 Speaker 4: going on, and you learn skills by negotiating through them. 883 00:55:07,133 --> 00:55:10,413 Speaker 4: And my mother and father could possibly intervened all the time, 884 00:55:10,533 --> 00:55:13,293 Speaker 4: nor did they want to. They believed that it was 885 00:55:13,853 --> 00:55:18,133 Speaker 4: incumbent upon them to leave us space to learn. 886 00:55:17,973 --> 00:55:20,213 Speaker 3: Things on our own and how to work things out. 887 00:55:21,013 --> 00:55:23,333 Speaker 3: I don't think that go ahead. 888 00:55:23,093 --> 00:55:26,693 Speaker 2: Would it be unfair to say that when you were 889 00:55:26,693 --> 00:55:29,613 Speaker 2: growing up, when I was growing up, there were far 890 00:55:29,693 --> 00:55:38,693 Speaker 2: less damaging issues that we could involve ourselves in than today. Therefore, more, 891 00:55:38,973 --> 00:55:44,213 Speaker 2: more interference, more control might be required. Well, guidance that 892 00:55:44,333 --> 00:55:44,613 Speaker 2: you want. 893 00:55:45,693 --> 00:55:50,093 Speaker 4: I'm not so sure of that thesis, because my teenage 894 00:55:50,133 --> 00:55:55,133 Speaker 4: years were spent mostly in the seventies late seventies, which, 895 00:55:55,173 --> 00:55:59,213 Speaker 4: if you look back, was a real sweet spot in 896 00:55:59,333 --> 00:56:03,573 Speaker 4: terms of human freedom, almost to an abusive extent in 897 00:56:03,613 --> 00:56:07,573 Speaker 4: the United States. As I look back on it, because 898 00:56:07,613 --> 00:56:11,493 Speaker 4: my parents have a World War two generation often didn't 899 00:56:11,533 --> 00:56:15,013 Speaker 4: know what was going on, and they just expressed trust 900 00:56:15,053 --> 00:56:18,333 Speaker 4: and our ability to ga navigate through it. And did 901 00:56:18,373 --> 00:56:22,013 Speaker 4: some people get lost in drug addiction and things like that, 902 00:56:22,053 --> 00:56:25,693 Speaker 4: They absolutely did as a result of that great freedom. 903 00:56:26,373 --> 00:56:29,693 Speaker 4: But a lot of people figured it out and moved on. 904 00:56:31,453 --> 00:56:34,013 Speaker 4: So there was an awful lot of freedom. I mean, 905 00:56:34,053 --> 00:56:37,173 Speaker 4: from the time I was fourteen or fifteen, I was 906 00:56:37,213 --> 00:56:40,853 Speaker 4: going places, going fireplaces on my bike. My parents didn't 907 00:56:40,853 --> 00:56:43,853 Speaker 4: know where I was, and they were good parents, but 908 00:56:43,973 --> 00:56:46,133 Speaker 4: they just didn't see it as their purview to be 909 00:56:47,013 --> 00:56:51,733 Speaker 4: knowing everything about me every moment I was doing something. 910 00:56:52,093 --> 00:56:56,773 Speaker 2: Well, it seems to turned out a right. So The 911 00:56:56,813 --> 00:57:00,733 Speaker 2: Treason of the Experts, COVID and the Credentialed Class. It's 912 00:57:00,773 --> 00:57:05,893 Speaker 2: available via Amazon Australia. It's actually printed. My version is 913 00:57:05,893 --> 00:57:11,413 Speaker 2: printed in Australian by Amazon. And there you've just had 914 00:57:11,413 --> 00:57:13,973 Speaker 2: a taste of it. Because there are I've forgotten how 915 00:57:14,013 --> 00:57:17,573 Speaker 2: many well, the chapters aren't numbered, all the columns aren't numbered, 916 00:57:17,573 --> 00:57:20,093 Speaker 2: but there's a hell of a lot of them, and 917 00:57:20,133 --> 00:57:21,733 Speaker 2: there's a lot of wisdom in there and a lot 918 00:57:21,733 --> 00:57:26,013 Speaker 2: of experience as well. And it's a book I certainly recommend, 919 00:57:26,533 --> 00:57:28,933 Speaker 2: and I'm very pleased that we got the chance to 920 00:57:28,973 --> 00:57:31,573 Speaker 2: talk about it. It took six months basically for us 921 00:57:31,613 --> 00:57:35,013 Speaker 2: to get together after we first made contact on it, 922 00:57:35,253 --> 00:57:37,173 Speaker 2: because you were going away and I was going away, 923 00:57:37,173 --> 00:57:40,693 Speaker 2: and then all sorts of other things intervened. One last 924 00:57:40,773 --> 00:57:47,133 Speaker 2: quick question, now that COVID is over, and I suppose 925 00:57:47,133 --> 00:57:52,653 Speaker 2: you partly addressed this over the over the Institute Brownstone 926 00:57:52,933 --> 00:57:56,453 Speaker 2: at the very beginning, but where does this leave Tom 927 00:57:56,533 --> 00:58:02,653 Speaker 2: Harrington with his writing? Because you've got a boost from 928 00:58:02,813 --> 00:58:13,413 Speaker 2: this particular era. You have probably exhausted this particular subject 929 00:58:13,853 --> 00:58:18,133 Speaker 2: and associated subjects. So what are we going to mind? 930 00:58:19,333 --> 00:58:21,613 Speaker 4: It's a great question and one that I think I'm 931 00:58:21,613 --> 00:58:25,173 Speaker 4: not alone in facing. In some ways, I suspect I 932 00:58:25,253 --> 00:58:28,493 Speaker 4: have it a little easier than some in that my 933 00:58:28,693 --> 00:58:34,253 Speaker 4: game has always been looking and trying to explain how 934 00:58:34,333 --> 00:58:40,573 Speaker 4: cultural systems work and trying to decipher for other people 935 00:58:40,613 --> 00:58:43,173 Speaker 4: that may have not spent as much time looking at 936 00:58:43,213 --> 00:58:48,933 Speaker 4: the dynamics of culture, how culture creation works, how what 937 00:58:49,013 --> 00:58:53,373 Speaker 4: my mentor Adamar Evan Zohar calls culture planning works, and 938 00:58:53,613 --> 00:58:59,013 Speaker 4: how the institutions that we live under are built, and 939 00:58:59,493 --> 00:59:03,973 Speaker 4: how and why they come to use the culture planning 940 00:59:04,493 --> 00:59:09,813 Speaker 4: tools and emphasies they do. And that's an inexhaustible subject 941 00:59:12,333 --> 00:59:14,333 Speaker 4: because if you look around your world, just as I 942 00:59:14,373 --> 00:59:16,613 Speaker 4: did with the speed bumps, you say, well, why are 943 00:59:16,613 --> 00:59:20,173 Speaker 4: those speed boats there? And then, as a cultural theorist, 944 00:59:20,533 --> 00:59:23,653 Speaker 4: if you will, you extrapolate the meaning of that particular 945 00:59:23,773 --> 00:59:28,373 Speaker 4: cultural artifact in the larger cultural field and say, who 946 00:59:28,733 --> 00:59:32,733 Speaker 4: is making who is imbuing that cultural object with its meaning? 947 00:59:33,333 --> 00:59:35,253 Speaker 4: And what does it mean that they're imbuing it with 948 00:59:35,373 --> 00:59:38,333 Speaker 4: certain meanings? And if you keep your eyes open. You 949 00:59:38,373 --> 00:59:39,373 Speaker 4: can do that endlessly. 950 00:59:40,253 --> 00:59:43,773 Speaker 3: So in some ways I plan. 951 00:59:43,733 --> 00:59:48,653 Speaker 4: To continue doing that. If you've also seen my website, 952 00:59:48,693 --> 00:59:52,853 Speaker 4: I have played around with photography a good deal and 953 00:59:53,813 --> 00:59:57,613 Speaker 4: I have a keen love of photography as an amateur, 954 00:59:57,933 --> 00:59:59,853 Speaker 4: and I'm trying to work a little bit more with that. 955 01:00:00,613 --> 01:00:05,533 Speaker 4: But I suspect the urge to explain and decipher the 956 01:00:05,693 --> 01:00:07,813 Speaker 4: dynamics of culture is going to continue to be what 957 01:00:07,933 --> 01:00:12,573 Speaker 4: I do, be it strictly on COVID or in derivative ways. 958 01:00:13,693 --> 01:00:16,013 Speaker 2: Well, I congratulate you on what you've done, and I 959 01:00:16,693 --> 01:00:20,413 Speaker 2: look forward with anticipation to what comes next. It's been 960 01:00:20,453 --> 01:00:22,453 Speaker 2: great talking with you. Thank you so much for your time. 961 01:00:22,493 --> 01:00:23,173 Speaker 2: You've been generous. 962 01:00:23,973 --> 01:00:25,613 Speaker 3: Thank you laden do the same thing. 963 01:00:41,573 --> 01:00:45,413 Speaker 2: Now, was I right? Let me know Latent at newstalks 964 01:00:45,453 --> 01:00:48,253 Speaker 2: ab dot co dot nz or Carolyn at newstalks ab 965 01:00:48,373 --> 01:00:51,973 Speaker 2: dot co dot NZID. The mail keeps coming in and 966 01:00:52,053 --> 01:00:55,573 Speaker 2: we'll catch up with it when we return. And that is, 967 01:00:55,653 --> 01:01:01,093 Speaker 2: by the way, for episode three hundred, which is very 968 01:01:01,253 --> 01:01:04,813 Speaker 2: rapidly approaching. Next week. It's very likely that we'll be 969 01:01:04,933 --> 01:01:08,853 Speaker 2: joined by Christian Smith in London. In the mean time. 970 01:01:09,933 --> 01:01:12,413 Speaker 2: Thank you for listening and we'll talk. 971 01:01:12,493 --> 01:01:20,773 Speaker 3: So thank you. 972 01:01:26,853 --> 01:01:29,413 Speaker 1: For more from News Talks at b Listen live on 973 01:01:29,573 --> 01:01:32,493 Speaker 1: air or online, and keep our shows with you wherever 974 01:01:32,573 --> 01:01:35,133 Speaker 1: you go with our podcasts on iHeartRadio