WEBVTT - Part One: The Con Artist Who Invented A Country 0:00:00.040 --> 0:00:07.800 M did theoria that's a disease, and I'm Robert Evans, 0:00:07.840 --> 0:00:10.080 and this is Behind the Bastards, a podcast that's not 0:00:10.119 --> 0:00:12.400 about diseases. It's about the worst people in all the 0:00:12.480 --> 0:00:15.400 history who are kind of a disease on the human condition. 0:00:15.720 --> 0:00:17.599 I couldn't think of anything else to shout at the 0:00:17.600 --> 0:00:20.800 start of the episode, so I went with diphtheria. Anyway, 0:00:20.920 --> 0:00:24.200 the show has begun. My guests today are one of 0:00:24.200 --> 0:00:30.240 our very best guests, the wonderful, the incomparable Lazy Mobery. 0:00:30.640 --> 0:00:32.159 I'm so happy to be here. I haven't seen you 0:00:32.159 --> 0:00:34.880 in so long, Robert, yet it has been a minute. 0:00:34.960 --> 0:00:37.000 It has been a minute. How have How are you 0:00:37.040 --> 0:00:40.960 doing in in this year of plague and also general 0:00:41.080 --> 0:00:45.680 uprisings and also a political election and also an economic collapse. 0:00:46.520 --> 0:00:49.920 Um I was in the beginning, in the beginning of this, 0:00:50.000 --> 0:00:52.360 I know when you say it all together, when you 0:00:52.400 --> 0:00:55.360 talk about what's been happening, it sounds very bad because 0:00:55.400 --> 0:00:57.720 the new cycle is so crazy. Like that the one 0:00:57.760 --> 0:01:00.960 week where Malaia was like, Chris, I can't do her voice, 0:01:01.000 --> 0:01:05.840 but she's like and then taxes came out the same week. 0:01:06.040 --> 0:01:09.200 Also he got COVID. It was like so many things happened, 0:01:09.200 --> 0:01:12.080 and we were like, oh, this is just Tuesday. Okay, 0:01:12.840 --> 0:01:15.800 I'm doing a lot better. In the beginning. I'm a 0:01:16.160 --> 0:01:19.199 like an introvert. People don't know that about me because 0:01:19.200 --> 0:01:20.920 I do a lot of this ship, but like, I 0:01:20.920 --> 0:01:22.800 am alone a lot and I like it. So I 0:01:22.880 --> 0:01:25.880 was like, oh, putting up on TV's Netflix movies, honey. 0:01:26.240 --> 0:01:28.399 And then when we got into June, it was like, okay, 0:01:28.440 --> 0:01:30.880 Black Liberation and that kind of kept me busy. And 0:01:30.880 --> 0:01:33.600 then I took a real dump like after that of 0:01:33.760 --> 0:01:36.480 like closing my blackout curtains. Like I was like a shutting, 0:01:37.240 --> 0:01:40.840 bedridden pregnant woman in the eighteen hundreds and just like 0:01:41.000 --> 0:01:43.920 laying in the dark for a few days. But now 0:01:43.920 --> 0:01:47.160 I'm back, I'm going working out every day and you know, 0:01:47.200 --> 0:01:53.000 I just trying to keep myself safe. You know how 0:01:53.000 --> 0:01:54.560 they used to be like Google, gott I had a 0:01:54.680 --> 0:01:57.160 king's baby, so get your aunts in bed and closed 0:01:57.160 --> 0:02:02.880 these curtains. Yes, So that was me except for no baby, 0:02:03.200 --> 0:02:07.000 no quarantine baby. Thank god, I have not had a 0:02:07.040 --> 0:02:10.720 quarantine baby either. Um. I did adopt a riot son, 0:02:10.840 --> 0:02:15.360 but but but no quarantine baby. Um lazy, How do 0:02:15.400 --> 0:02:20.560 you feel about but I do. I really love them. 0:02:20.639 --> 0:02:24.079 It's a complicated relationship though, because I don't love when 0:02:24.080 --> 0:02:26.480 people are victimized. I hate to see it happened. Actually 0:02:26.520 --> 0:02:30.000 this morning, my little sister got scammed. Oh no, what 0:02:30.120 --> 0:02:32.600 kind of scam I was doing with the family crisis 0:02:32.600 --> 0:02:35.240 before nine am? Chair because they two hours ahead of me. 0:02:35.760 --> 0:02:39.600 And so basically, my sister met this girl and they've 0:02:39.639 --> 0:02:42.000 been hanging out through a mutual friend for three months. 0:02:42.280 --> 0:02:44.560 And the girl was like talking about how she needed 0:02:44.600 --> 0:02:46.880 to move out from her parents house and how during 0:02:46.960 --> 0:02:49.560 quarantine things have just got so bad, you know, side story, 0:02:49.560 --> 0:02:52.480 side story, honey. So she's like, I'm selling my art 0:02:52.919 --> 0:02:55.560 online and I don't want to put the money in 0:02:55.600 --> 0:02:57.200 my bank account because I don't want my parents to 0:02:57.200 --> 0:02:59.520 know that I'm saving up to leave. So she asked 0:02:59.520 --> 0:03:01.440 my little sister, is she could put the money in 0:03:01.560 --> 0:03:05.360 her bank account cut to some man named Clad or 0:03:05.360 --> 0:03:09.920 some ship emailing my sister four checks for eight hundred dollars. 0:03:09.960 --> 0:03:12.120 Why my sister didn't think? I was like you, I 0:03:12.280 --> 0:03:13.919 literally the first thing I text, because she was like, 0:03:13.960 --> 0:03:16.200 don't tell my mom dad. I was like, first of all, 0:03:16.200 --> 0:03:22.480 I have to Second of all, I know this is petty, 0:03:22.520 --> 0:03:25.359 but I was like, I run a show called scam Guys. 0:03:25.440 --> 0:03:26.880 I was like, y'all support your sister and listen to 0:03:26.919 --> 0:03:29.000 her show, because girl, i'n't talked about this scam like 0:03:29.480 --> 0:03:35.520 eleven times. I'm trying to help you seventeen so all 0:03:35.680 --> 0:03:38.480 enough to know about her. It's like it's like if 0:03:38.520 --> 0:03:41.360 your job was to give out flu vaccines and then like, 0:03:41.600 --> 0:03:44.000 your sister gets the flu and she's like, well I 0:03:44.000 --> 0:03:45.880 didn't know there was a vaccine, Like what the funk 0:03:45.920 --> 0:03:48.440 are you? Like? Right, I'm like, I spent a whole 0:03:48.480 --> 0:03:50.839 section of my life just talking about scams. You ain't 0:03:50.920 --> 0:03:53.560 think nothing, thought like let me text my older sister 0:03:53.640 --> 0:03:56.800 before I make a devilas and nothing. So she said, 0:03:56.920 --> 0:04:01.640 up the hundred dollars because they cleared it automatically, which 0:04:01.640 --> 0:04:03.680 is there, so we're dealing with them. But it was 0:04:04.840 --> 0:04:06.840 total and so the bank of course did a charge 0:04:06.880 --> 0:04:08.840 back and then that coin flew right out of her 0:04:08.840 --> 0:04:11.320 account and she was like, well, my friend didn't know. 0:04:11.360 --> 0:04:13.520 I was like, your friend did no, Okay, she scammed 0:04:13.520 --> 0:04:16.640 and she got your friend and don't talk to her again. 0:04:16.680 --> 0:04:19.200 And also I will pull up to whatever slide whatever 0:04:19.200 --> 0:04:22.080 swing set. I need to to be her ass uh. 0:04:23.400 --> 0:04:26.880 I will fight children. Um yeah, if you're five one, 0:04:26.920 --> 0:04:33.120 you can fight kids. Mostly I will fight children. Have one. 0:04:33.240 --> 0:04:37.599 It's a fair fight. Okay? He is her friends seventeen two? Yeah, 0:04:37.640 --> 0:04:41.039 I think they're around the same A. Yeah, but a 0:04:41.080 --> 0:04:45.880 surprise bastard. Yeah, surprise. I didn't expect to talk about 0:04:45.920 --> 0:04:49.640 this one. Sorry, it was on my heart. You know 0:04:49.680 --> 0:04:55.800 who else would fight children? Probably probably the subject of 0:04:55.839 --> 0:05:00.479 today's podcast, I assume based on everything else he did so, Lacy, 0:05:01.160 --> 0:05:03.720 you and I are both are both connoisseurs of con men. 0:05:03.839 --> 0:05:05.880 You know, we love we love us some connors right, 0:05:05.960 --> 0:05:08.360 like it's it's there's something just you gotta you love 0:05:08.400 --> 0:05:12.240 a grifter like they're they're monsters, but they're fascinating. And 0:05:12.560 --> 0:05:14.679 most of the grifters, at least that I talk about, 0:05:14.720 --> 0:05:16.520 I know, you cover kind of a different branch of them. 0:05:16.520 --> 0:05:18.520 Most of the ones I talk about are either like 0:05:18.680 --> 0:05:21.760 hawking some sort of miracle medical treatment, or like a 0:05:21.800 --> 0:05:24.640 path to easy riches. I guess that that's basically all 0:05:24.680 --> 0:05:28.280 of them, right. Um. There are like, you know, a 0:05:28.279 --> 0:05:31.240 couple though, who rise above the rest. There's people like 0:05:31.240 --> 0:05:33.719 oh Ron Hubbard, right, who like drifted a whole religion 0:05:33.800 --> 0:05:37.599 and it's like, you know, and today's grifter is that 0:05:37.720 --> 0:05:41.120 level of grifter. Um, he didn't make a religion. But 0:05:41.160 --> 0:05:44.239 the guy we're talking about today, Sir Gregor McGregor, count 0:05:44.320 --> 0:05:47.520 people into believing he had a whole country. And that's 0:05:48.240 --> 0:05:54.080 pretty ambitious. It is good, you know travel. He's like, no, 0:05:54.200 --> 0:05:56.719 you don't have to come, just no, oh no, he 0:05:56.720 --> 0:05:59.000 he convinced them to come. Now, this was a different 0:05:59.040 --> 0:06:02.440 era we're talking about. Out the eighteen hundreds, um, and spoiler, 0:06:02.560 --> 0:06:06.520 a lot of them died. Um. This is a high 0:06:06.600 --> 0:06:10.560 body count scammer. Um. But our first episode is going 0:06:10.600 --> 0:06:12.400 to be about the rest of his back because like 0:06:12.400 --> 0:06:14.680 every grifter, he had to like build up, you know, 0:06:14.800 --> 0:06:18.200 just start by faking a country, right, Like you gotta 0:06:18.440 --> 0:06:21.279 that's like, that's like the marathon of grift ing and 0:06:21.360 --> 0:06:23.840 like you gotta do some tin ks, some twenty k's 0:06:23.920 --> 0:06:26.120 like before you can you know, before you can get 0:06:26.120 --> 0:06:31.240 that ship. So. Gregor McGregor was born in Sterlingshire, Scotland, 0:06:31.279 --> 0:06:35.160 on Christmas Eve, seventeen eight six. His family were somewhat 0:06:35.200 --> 0:06:38.400 famous among the contentious peoples of Scotland. One of his 0:06:38.480 --> 0:06:41.640 ancestors was a guy named rob Roy McGregor, a cattle 0:06:41.640 --> 0:06:45.159 wrestler and a bandit who basically charged people not to 0:06:45.240 --> 0:06:47.880 steal their ship. He was a gangster Um. He controlled 0:06:47.920 --> 0:06:50.160 a large group of raiders who would like steal cows 0:06:50.200 --> 0:06:52.760 and then ransom them back to their customers or just 0:06:52.839 --> 0:06:55.039 like get money from them not to steal their cows 0:06:55.080 --> 0:06:58.560 in the first place. The origin, yeah, yeah, he was. 0:06:58.600 --> 0:07:00.240 He was kind of like a towing company, but an 0:07:00.279 --> 0:07:03.440 a legal towing company. Um, we're like some guy with 0:07:03.440 --> 0:07:04.840 a gun comes out and said, oh, you want your 0:07:04.880 --> 0:07:10.640 fucking car back, Like, yeah, I have definitely had my 0:07:10.720 --> 0:07:13.960 car toad, but it was unfortunately legal, although I felt 0:07:14.040 --> 0:07:15.680 as if it was not, and if it were a 0:07:15.680 --> 0:07:19.240 bandit perhaps that would have been nicer. Um because there 0:07:19.240 --> 0:07:21.880 were cops involved anyway, So he piste off a local 0:07:21.960 --> 0:07:25.040 noble by stealing stealing his cows eventually, and that got 0:07:25.120 --> 0:07:27.840 the McGregor clan kicked off. There's like a roster of 0:07:27.840 --> 0:07:30.880 official Scottish clans. It's like a it's like a whole deal. 0:07:31.160 --> 0:07:33.440 And so the McGregor family got kicked off for like 0:07:33.560 --> 0:07:37.480 decades um and rob Roy's family got like tossed out 0:07:37.480 --> 0:07:39.680 of their home in the dead of winter. Um, and 0:07:39.720 --> 0:07:42.080 he was he was really it seems like just a criminal, 0:07:42.200 --> 0:07:44.840 like just like not a good criminal either, Like you know, 0:07:44.880 --> 0:07:47.040 I'm not judgmental of criminals, but he's just like stealing 0:07:47.040 --> 0:07:51.000 people's ship. But because of like for whatever reason, it's complicated. 0:07:51.200 --> 0:07:53.680 He's still he turned into a folk hero in Scotland 0:07:53.720 --> 0:07:56.120 and he's kind of you now is the Scottish Robin Hood. 0:07:56.360 --> 0:07:59.720 So this is Gregor McGregor's like famous ancestor, and he's 0:07:59.800 --> 0:08:02.480 he's only born like sixty years before Gregor's birth, but 0:08:02.520 --> 0:08:04.640 like you know, back in the seventeen hundreds, that's like 0:08:04.680 --> 0:08:08.560 a billion years, you know. Yeah. So by the time 0:08:08.600 --> 0:08:11.600 Gregor McGregor comes into the world, his family, his clan 0:08:11.680 --> 0:08:14.280 had been re estate and stated to the roles, and 0:08:14.320 --> 0:08:17.440 he's got like this famous tradition of like we're we're 0:08:17.160 --> 0:08:20.920 we're we're both warriors and and freedom fighters, YadA, YadA, YadA. 0:08:21.320 --> 0:08:24.240 His family weren't rich, but they were really very comfortable 0:08:24.280 --> 0:08:29.200 local aristocrats, like upper middle class. They were eating every day, 0:08:29.280 --> 0:08:31.480 yeah yeah, yeah, and they were eating well. Um, he 0:08:31.480 --> 0:08:34.120 would have grown up hearing tales of like his ancestors glory, 0:08:34.200 --> 0:08:37.360 YadA YadA. Uh. We don't know any details about Gregor's 0:08:37.480 --> 0:08:40.320 education or his early life because people didn't keep great 0:08:40.320 --> 0:08:42.600 notes in the seventeen hundreds about folks who weren't like 0:08:42.640 --> 0:08:45.080 super rich. But we know that his father worked for 0:08:45.080 --> 0:08:47.480 the British East India Company and would have been absent 0:08:47.559 --> 0:08:50.839 all the time doing you know, genocides and stuff. Uh. 0:08:50.880 --> 0:08:53.440 It's likely that Gregor was raised by his mom and 0:08:53.480 --> 0:08:55.720 his aunts and showered with attention because he was the 0:08:55.720 --> 0:08:58.319 only boy in the family and I think most people 0:08:58.360 --> 0:09:01.880 know what that kind of does to you. He was 0:09:01.920 --> 0:09:04.880 like the original influencer of the seventeen hundred. It sounds 0:09:04.880 --> 0:09:06.520 like he would have had like, maybe like eighty four 0:09:06.559 --> 0:09:13.400 Instagram followers. Yeah, it's weird how quickly you've picked up 0:09:13.440 --> 0:09:18.360 on where this story is going lazy. Um so. Yeah. 0:09:18.440 --> 0:09:21.480 His His modern biographer, a guy named David Sinclair, posits, 0:09:21.480 --> 0:09:23.599 based on his later life he was probably showered with 0:09:23.640 --> 0:09:25.760 attention and grew used to getting whatever he wanted, like 0:09:25.840 --> 0:09:28.040 he was he was the special boy of the family, right. 0:09:28.600 --> 0:09:32.120 Um So, he probably left school at about age fifteen 0:09:32.200 --> 0:09:34.920 because that's when Scottish boys became adults, which is interesting 0:09:34.920 --> 0:09:37.240 to me because like pretty much everywhere else in Urope, 0:09:37.240 --> 0:09:39.280 it was like age fourteen. So I guess the Scots 0:09:39.840 --> 0:09:42.400 you get an extra year of being a kid. That's nice. Yeah, 0:09:42.400 --> 0:09:45.599 they're progressive. Uh. The next year, at age sixteen, he 0:09:45.720 --> 0:09:48.600 enlisted in the British Army. Uh. Sixteen was the earliest 0:09:48.679 --> 0:09:50.559 age at which this was allowed. And before you get 0:09:50.559 --> 0:09:53.040 all judge, you should know that seventeen year olds joined 0:09:53.040 --> 0:09:54.920 the U s Army all the time, so things aren't 0:09:55.000 --> 0:09:59.000 changed all that much. Like we added a year. We're 0:09:59.000 --> 0:10:03.280 the Scotsman of the modern era. So um, yeah, Gregor 0:10:03.360 --> 0:10:06.319 joins the army and uh. He would claim later that 0:10:06.360 --> 0:10:09.079 he spent the year between graduation and joining the university 0:10:09.400 --> 0:10:12.000 and joining the army at the University of Edinburgh, But 0:10:12.080 --> 0:10:14.240 everything he ever said was a lie, so don't put 0:10:14.240 --> 0:10:16.040 too much stock in that. There's no evidence that he 0:10:16.080 --> 0:10:19.079 ever attended college. Now. Back in those days, as a 0:10:19.120 --> 0:10:21.840 result of changes made by King Charles the Second, young 0:10:21.840 --> 0:10:24.480 men with money could buy their way into the British Army, 0:10:24.679 --> 0:10:27.000 and it's almost certain that Gregor's father paid for him 0:10:27.040 --> 0:10:29.200 to be commissioned as an incident, which was like the 0:10:29.280 --> 0:10:32.000 lowest officer rank at the period and cost about four 0:10:32.040 --> 0:10:34.839 hundred and fifty pounds, which was equivalent to around twenty 0:10:34.880 --> 0:10:38.800 five dollars in modern money. So like this was expensive, 0:10:38.880 --> 0:10:41.719 it was also the normal way that officers got promoted, right, 0:10:41.880 --> 0:10:44.400 you could either wait years to earn a promotion or 0:10:44.440 --> 0:10:47.160 you could pay for it. Um. Poorman had to settle 0:10:47.200 --> 0:10:49.280 for being promoted the old fashioned way through like hard 0:10:49.280 --> 0:10:51.560 work and courage, and so the you know that took 0:10:51.559 --> 0:10:54.840 a long time. Um. Until fairly late in the eighteen hundreds, 0:10:54.880 --> 0:10:57.199 every officer rank in the British Army worked this way 0:10:57.280 --> 0:11:00.360 up to the rank of lieutenant colonel. UM. So the 0:11:00.400 --> 0:11:06.079 people who are at least qualified. It's interesting because it 0:11:06.120 --> 0:11:08.200 did work very badly a lot of the time, and 0:11:08.240 --> 0:11:11.440 that's why it was eventually stopped. UM. And obviously, like 0:11:11.440 --> 0:11:13.200 the thing that you'd imagine did happen, a bunch of 0:11:13.240 --> 0:11:15.800 idiots got to command the lives of thousands thanks to 0:11:15.840 --> 0:11:18.319 their rich dad's UM. And you can look at ship 0:11:18.400 --> 0:11:20.720 like the famous charge of the Light Brigade during the 0:11:20.760 --> 0:11:24.240 Crimean War, and even the I mean they'd stopped that process, 0:11:24.280 --> 0:11:26.760 but still a lot of the officers in charge during 0:11:26.800 --> 0:11:30.040 that war had paid to become officers Um, and even 0:11:30.080 --> 0:11:32.400 the British loss of North America is like maybe partial 0:11:32.440 --> 0:11:36.160 consequences of the fact that the system work this way. Um, 0:11:36.200 --> 0:11:40.600 but it wasn't like it wasn't all bad actually, And 0:11:40.600 --> 0:11:43.120 this is the I found like a really interesting letter 0:11:43.160 --> 0:11:45.600 to the editor in an eighteen sixty issue of The 0:11:45.600 --> 0:11:48.920 New York Times, Um, We're like a British military veteran 0:11:48.960 --> 0:11:52.880 explained why the system wasn't quite as as simple as 0:11:52.920 --> 0:11:54.360 people thought it was. And one of the points he 0:11:54.440 --> 0:11:56.760 made is that it allowed people who were good leaders 0:11:57.080 --> 0:11:59.440 to speed up their rise to through the ranks and 0:11:59.480 --> 0:12:02.120 then thus spend more time commanding armies in the prime 0:12:02.160 --> 0:12:04.959 of their lives. And there's actually at least one really 0:12:05.000 --> 0:12:07.920 good example of this. The Duke of Wellington paid for 0:12:07.960 --> 0:12:11.000 all of the seven biable promotions he could possibly have paid. 0:12:11.320 --> 0:12:13.040 And like, by the time he was a lieutenant colonel, 0:12:13.080 --> 0:12:16.160 he'd never seen combat, had no functional experience, and he 0:12:16.200 --> 0:12:19.040 went on to beat Napoleon at Waterloo. So like, sometimes 0:12:19.080 --> 0:12:25.400 it worked sometimes, Yeah, he was a strategist, he was Yeah, 0:12:25.480 --> 0:12:28.840 he was good at what he like. Sometimes this worked out, um, 0:12:28.880 --> 0:12:30.760 And like one of the one of the famous defenses 0:12:30.760 --> 0:12:33.040 when people would talk about canceling this system in the 0:12:33.120 --> 0:12:35.160 late eighteen hundreds, was that, like, well then we'd have 0:12:35.200 --> 0:12:37.240 to pay all these officers back for the money they 0:12:37.240 --> 0:12:39.760 paid to like get their promotions, and that would cost 0:12:39.760 --> 0:12:42.080 way too much money. Um, so let's just let's just 0:12:42.280 --> 0:12:46.240 keep having idiots and charity. It was a very silly 0:12:46.280 --> 0:12:49.400 thing for the most part. Now. The unit Gregor's dad 0:12:49.440 --> 0:12:53.080 bought his son into was the fifty seventh Foot, a 0:12:53.080 --> 0:12:55.800 Scottish regiment famous for the fact that almost everyone in 0:12:55.840 --> 0:12:58.480 it was a criminal. Their name their nickname was the 0:12:58.520 --> 0:13:02.120 Steelbacks because were flogged with whips so many times for 0:13:02.120 --> 0:13:04.440 their disobedience. So it said that like you had to 0:13:04.480 --> 0:13:07.040 have a strong back to survive because they'd regularly get 0:13:07.080 --> 0:13:10.080 like nine lashes and ship for like all of the 0:13:10.120 --> 0:13:14.240 crimes they committed. Now, is that pre army or during 0:13:14.360 --> 0:13:17.400 the army? That's during the army. I feel like they 0:13:17.400 --> 0:13:20.240 shouldn't beating all people that you need to fight. The 0:13:20.280 --> 0:13:22.960 British Army did that all the time. There was in fact, 0:13:23.040 --> 0:13:25.319 there was like a saying that like the British Navy 0:13:25.480 --> 0:13:30.400 was kept in order by rum, sodomy and the lash. Yeah, 0:13:30.640 --> 0:13:32.800 so like they're drunk, they get to funk each other 0:13:32.880 --> 0:13:34.720 and we beat them when they step out of line. 0:13:34.720 --> 0:13:37.360 And that's why there's the there's also a great Pogues 0:13:37.400 --> 0:13:40.520 album called Rum Sodomy and the Lash wonderful. That's a 0:13:40.520 --> 0:13:46.559 good time. Some people would like it, like there are 0:13:46.640 --> 0:13:49.640 some stores I've been to in San Francisco that specifically 0:13:49.720 --> 0:13:56.360 catered to that set of things. But these were not 0:13:56.520 --> 0:13:59.400 fun lashes, you know, like these would do real damage 0:13:59.440 --> 0:14:02.560 to you. Um. The commander of the fifty seven foot 0:14:02.600 --> 0:14:05.880 once nicknamed them the fighting Villains, um, because again, they're 0:14:05.880 --> 0:14:09.440 all criminals. So McGregor did well there at first. He 0:14:09.480 --> 0:14:12.160 actually earned a promotion from instant to lieutenant without having 0:14:12.160 --> 0:14:15.200 to pay for it. Um. So he had like promise 0:14:15.880 --> 0:14:17.360 he there was a chance he could have lived a 0:14:17.400 --> 0:14:19.400 legitimate life at one point. Is what I want you 0:14:19.440 --> 0:14:24.200 to keep. They're always there. Yeah. Yeah. There was that 0:14:24.240 --> 0:14:27.600 moment where John McAfee had to choose to murder a 0:14:27.640 --> 0:14:30.760 bunch of people in the jungle, and when he chose Crack, 0:14:30.880 --> 0:14:36.600 his choice was paid for him to do. The Crack 0:14:36.680 --> 0:14:41.960 stepped into the Crack entered the chat and it's like 0:14:42.000 --> 0:14:44.720 one of those Jesus take the wheel posters, but Crack 0:14:46.040 --> 0:14:50.160 John McAfee closed his eyes and let crack take the wheel. 0:14:50.240 --> 0:14:55.800 Do take the wheel, y'all. Ever, so at this point 0:14:55.800 --> 0:14:58.880 in history, the British were real scared about Napoleon because 0:14:58.960 --> 0:15:02.440 Napoleon was, you know, be pretty good at war. Uh 0:15:02.440 --> 0:15:05.000 And yeah, Gregor spent the bulk of his military career 0:15:05.040 --> 0:15:07.440 being sent around a different islands as forts and forts 0:15:07.520 --> 0:15:09.200 is part of like a big chess game between the 0:15:09.200 --> 0:15:11.920 Empire and Napoleon. The British were terrified the French were 0:15:11.920 --> 0:15:14.760 going to invade you know, England, so like they were 0:15:14.760 --> 0:15:17.800 just always moving soldiers and fleets around. It was so 0:15:18.040 --> 0:15:20.480 he spends he doesn't actually fight, He spends all of 0:15:20.480 --> 0:15:22.520 his time like moving from post to post. And his 0:15:22.600 --> 0:15:25.360 favorite part of life in the military was all the 0:15:25.400 --> 0:15:28.000 fancy parties because all of these fortresses and posts are 0:15:28.000 --> 0:15:30.240 near like towns and cities, and they all of these 0:15:30.280 --> 0:15:33.080 big social lives, and of course the visiting young officers 0:15:33.080 --> 0:15:36.560 are the you know, the biggest thing in town whenever 0:15:36.560 --> 0:15:39.120 they come in. And he was a very handsome guy. 0:15:39.160 --> 0:15:42.200 He was meticulous about his uniform. He wore every decoration 0:15:42.280 --> 0:15:45.480 he possibly good on it um and he he you know, 0:15:45.520 --> 0:15:48.320 he stood out at these parties, and as a result 0:15:48.360 --> 0:15:50.480 of standing out when he was still like a teenager, 0:15:50.760 --> 0:15:54.200 he met a lady. Her name was Maria bowater Um 0:15:54.280 --> 0:15:56.560 and her father had been an admiral, and so their 0:15:56.600 --> 0:15:59.880 family had fuck you money. They get married and yeah, 0:16:00.200 --> 0:16:02.040 you know, and in those days, you get married to 0:16:02.080 --> 0:16:04.680 a girl and she comes with money, right, yeah, yeah, 0:16:04.840 --> 0:16:09.360 you get like yeah, said handsome question mark. I just 0:16:09.400 --> 0:16:15.040 google searched. The standards were lower in those days. Everybody. 0:16:15.160 --> 0:16:18.680 Everybody's got the typhoid he has, he has, I just 0:16:18.800 --> 0:16:22.400 farted face. Yeah, but he didn't. He's not actively shifting 0:16:22.480 --> 0:16:25.920 himself to death. So like that's that's kind of the 0:16:25.960 --> 0:16:29.800 standard is like, oh, you're not You're not having fatal diarrhea. 0:16:30.160 --> 0:16:38.080 What a handsome man. You don't have both ears. It 0:16:38.200 --> 0:16:43.480 was a rough time, so uh yeah. They get married 0:16:43.480 --> 0:16:46.400 and her dowry is like huge. So Gregor has fuck 0:16:46.480 --> 0:16:48.960 you money too, at least for a while. Um. And 0:16:49.080 --> 0:16:52.760 unfortunately this has a bad effect on him. Number one, 0:16:52.840 --> 0:16:55.160 it swells his head because immediately he's like, oh, now 0:16:55.160 --> 0:16:59.120 I'm like a fucking rich officer guy. But also like 0:16:59.200 --> 0:17:01.640 he marries into this family that has this tradition of 0:17:01.680 --> 0:17:05.040 like being very powerful people and he's just a lieutenant 0:17:05.160 --> 0:17:07.359 and they don't. That does not impress them. So to 0:17:07.359 --> 0:17:09.520 earn their respect, he uses some of the money that 0:17:09.600 --> 0:17:12.040 he their money that he got to buy himself a 0:17:12.080 --> 0:17:14.879 promotion to captain. He's got douche face. I'm looking at 0:17:14.880 --> 0:17:18.080 his face, but he's it was good looking for the day. No, 0:17:18.280 --> 0:17:19.960 it's not. You know, I could see him being a 0:17:20.000 --> 0:17:22.440 baddie back in the day. I'm just saying he's got 0:17:22.440 --> 0:17:25.600 that douchey face of like everything I want. Like, it's 0:17:25.640 --> 0:17:29.399 just he's no, No, he would have. He would have 0:17:29.400 --> 0:17:31.040 been in a fraternity and he would have been one 0:17:31.080 --> 0:17:37.000 of those guys that there were unfortunate stories about because yeah, yeah, yeah, 0:17:37.040 --> 0:17:40.080 that's this guy. Um, not that he actually does anything 0:17:40.119 --> 0:17:42.680 like that, I'm just assuming because of other things he does. 0:17:42.720 --> 0:17:45.480 So I'm gonna quote next from David Sinclair's The Land 0:17:45.480 --> 0:17:49.080 That Never Was, which is a biography of Gregor McGregor. Quote, 0:17:49.680 --> 0:17:52.240 the young captain's progress should have been assured. Using his 0:17:52.240 --> 0:17:54.600 newfound wealth, McGregor could have bought himself the rank of 0:17:54.640 --> 0:17:58.080 regimental major, which could take anything between six and seventeen years, 0:17:58.080 --> 0:18:00.760 on the basis of promotion, and then with war with certainty, 0:18:00.760 --> 0:18:03.600 could have either counted on distinguishing himself sufficiently to move 0:18:03.640 --> 0:18:05.879 up to lieutenant colonel, or else paid again for the 0:18:05.920 --> 0:18:08.560 highest purchasable rank in the army. There appeared to be 0:18:08.600 --> 0:18:10.840 no reason why, in due course he should not become 0:18:10.840 --> 0:18:12.960 a general, as his wife's uncle had and as her 0:18:12.960 --> 0:18:16.119 brother subsequently would. By this time, however, certain traits in 0:18:16.160 --> 0:18:18.160 the young man's character were beginning to turn him into 0:18:18.200 --> 0:18:21.200 his own worst enemy. One of his later military comrades, 0:18:21.240 --> 0:18:22.719 if that is the right term for a man who 0:18:22.800 --> 0:18:27.000 disliked him intensely, observed McGregor was spoiled by prosperity, and 0:18:27.000 --> 0:18:31.320 his versatility and haughtiness of disposition soon overturned his flattering prospects. 0:18:31.520 --> 0:18:33.040 So he gets a big ass head. That's a fancy 0:18:33.080 --> 0:18:35.639 way of saying he gets a big head. Yeah, and 0:18:35.640 --> 0:18:38.320 this guy's a hater. Whoever this comrade is is definitely 0:18:38.320 --> 0:18:40.520 a hater. He's probably like had to work his way up. 0:18:41.000 --> 0:18:47.920 Yeah exactly. Yeah, he's like he's he's actually gotta do ship. 0:18:48.240 --> 0:18:51.119 Um so. One of his other comrades later noted that 0:18:51.160 --> 0:18:54.960 he began to show a growing fascination with extreme affectation 0:18:55.040 --> 0:18:57.960 of dress and fashion and an overpowering fondness for the 0:18:58.040 --> 0:19:00.560 nicest distinctions of rank and the over or in the 0:19:00.600 --> 0:19:04.480 imposing spectacle of honorary badges and tangible tokens of merit. 0:19:04.920 --> 0:19:06.639 And this means like he would. You know, there's all 0:19:06.640 --> 0:19:09.040 sorts of bullshit awards you get in the military for 0:19:09.080 --> 0:19:12.000 like showing up and not doing anything, and most like 0:19:12.600 --> 0:19:14.680 most like grunts, the people who actually fight, like don't 0:19:14.720 --> 0:19:16.879 don't wear that ship. And he like he would, he 0:19:16.880 --> 0:19:19.359 would wear that ship because, like he always he wanted 0:19:19.400 --> 0:19:21.440 to have everything he possibly could on him. It was 0:19:21.480 --> 0:19:24.800 about like looking good. Right, he's like a rapper. He's 0:19:24.800 --> 0:19:27.600 showing up to these cities like he's Travis Scott and 0:19:27.680 --> 0:19:29.600 you know, showing off for the bitches. He said, there's 0:19:29.640 --> 0:19:31.159 a party in every town, and I gotta have my 0:19:31.240 --> 0:19:34.000 gold chains. And his health chains were purple hearts and 0:19:34.359 --> 0:19:39.639 medals of freedom. Yeah exactly. Yeah, that's why the like, 0:19:39.720 --> 0:19:42.520 that's the fucking you know. I grew up like really conservative. 0:19:42.520 --> 0:19:44.920 I talked about this a lot, and like the discourse 0:19:44.960 --> 0:19:47.560 around rappers when I was a kid was like, oh, 0:19:47.600 --> 0:19:50.200 look at how like look at how look at how 0:19:50.280 --> 0:19:53.320 like shameful This culture is because of like these men 0:19:53.400 --> 0:19:55.879 with their like big golden chains bragging about like you 0:19:55.920 --> 0:19:58.760 know what, like the stuff that rappers brag about, and 0:19:58.760 --> 0:20:01.159 it's like money, car, fucking Yeah, it's the same thing 0:20:01.240 --> 0:20:04.040 rich white people brag about. It's just different money, different cars, 0:20:04.080 --> 0:20:06.919 different women. Like there's nothing different about it. It's just 0:20:06.960 --> 0:20:10.360 what men do, like grossmen do at least, like it's 0:20:10.400 --> 0:20:14.080 just a thing. Yeah, So I don't see, but I 0:20:14.119 --> 0:20:16.399 get it that it's like if you're really doing work 0:20:16.480 --> 0:20:18.439 and you're in the military and you're looking at this 0:20:18.480 --> 0:20:20.800 guy and people are dying all around you, and you're 0:20:20.800 --> 0:20:23.000 on the battlefield and you have phone boy who doesn't 0:20:23.040 --> 0:20:25.639 even have to touch the soil, and he's like dripped 0:20:25.640 --> 0:20:29.160 down with every medal and accomplishment, and I were talking 0:20:29.240 --> 0:20:33.320 cash it at all these functions and being a douche Yeah, 0:20:33.359 --> 0:20:36.320 because at least, like you know, it's like like if 0:20:36.320 --> 0:20:38.720 you've got a fucking gold chain or whatever, you probably 0:20:38.760 --> 0:20:40.760 had to earn that gold chain. You had to fucking hustle, 0:20:41.080 --> 0:20:44.280