WEBVTT - Lord Miles Routledge: The Stirring Journey of an Asshole 0:00:05.080 --> 0:00:10.000 Ah boy, welcome to it could happen here a podcast 0:00:10.200 --> 0:00:14.440 about things falling apart and sometimes stuff that's less depressing 0:00:14.480 --> 0:00:16.880 than that. This is gonna be a mix of both 0:00:16.880 --> 0:00:20.880 of those things. I'm Robert Evans. My co hosts for 0:00:21.200 --> 0:00:26.400 today are James Stout and Mia Wong. How are we both? 0:00:26.480 --> 0:00:28.800 How are we all? How's everybody? How's everybody feeling? 0:00:30.040 --> 0:00:35.360 I'm anticipating eagerly the topic of today's episode, So I'm 0:00:35.400 --> 0:00:37.240 excited like a kid Christmas. 0:00:37.800 --> 0:00:38.279 Yeah. 0:00:38.320 --> 0:00:41.400 So, James, that answers my question for you. But Mia, 0:00:41.440 --> 0:00:43.600 have you ever heard of Lord Miles Rutledge. 0:00:44.120 --> 0:00:48.559 I have seen him on Twitter and I cannot express 0:00:48.600 --> 0:00:49.479 how excited I. 0:00:49.440 --> 0:00:50.080 Am for this. 0:00:50.560 --> 0:00:54.440 So we are talking about a real piece of shit today. 0:00:54.600 --> 0:00:57.560 This is kind of relevant to our I try to 0:00:57.560 --> 0:01:01.760 always justify, you know, our purview is broadly speaking, collapse, 0:01:02.000 --> 0:01:04.920 you know what we call the crumbles, and Miles Rutledge 0:01:05.120 --> 0:01:08.479 is a perfect example of the kind of grifters and 0:01:08.560 --> 0:01:12.440 conmen who sort of sort of seep in at the 0:01:12.600 --> 0:01:16.040 edges of war and disaster and calamity and have for forever. 0:01:16.160 --> 0:01:20.080 You know, they're in behind the bastards. We've done a 0:01:20.160 --> 0:01:24.160 couple episodes on, like different white people who tried at 0:01:24.240 --> 0:01:27.120 various points to like conquer Latin American nations, and like 0:01:27.200 --> 0:01:30.760 the seventeen and eighteen hundreds, just kind of during these 0:01:30.800 --> 0:01:33.240 periods of there would be a bunch of rebellions going on, 0:01:33.319 --> 0:01:35.440 and so like some group of mercenaries would be like, 0:01:35.760 --> 0:01:39.520 I bet we can like steal Nicaragua, right, let's Goways 0:01:39.520 --> 0:01:42.920 wear the shot. You know, you get these kind of 0:01:43.000 --> 0:01:46.160 like these kind of people, and Lord Myles Rutledge is 0:01:46.200 --> 0:01:50.040 sort of the lower body count end of that, but 0:01:50.080 --> 0:01:53.000 in some ways a lot more frustrating because at least, look, 0:01:53.320 --> 0:01:58.400 there's there's something respectable about trying to violently conquer another 0:01:58.480 --> 0:02:01.840 country and then getting yourself. There's at least like a 0:02:02.280 --> 0:02:05.680 degree of honesty there. This guy, Miles Rutledge is like 0:02:06.280 --> 0:02:10.720 purely but like doing war tourism in order to like 0:02:10.840 --> 0:02:13.840 pump his his TikTok and his Instagram and his YouTube. 0:02:14.840 --> 0:02:16.760 And I find that worse than like, I don't know, 0:02:16.800 --> 0:02:19.919 those guys who tried to overthrow Venezuela and got captured 0:02:19.919 --> 0:02:25.119 by fishermen, so they were great, yeah, and then laid 0:02:25.160 --> 0:02:28.279 in their own piss on camera. Beautiful story, perfect. 0:02:28.080 --> 0:02:29.679 Story, took a be begun with them. 0:02:33.840 --> 0:02:37.320 Such a good story, and this one has a similar 0:02:37.360 --> 0:02:39.959 this story, thankfully, Miles the story has has a is 0:02:40.000 --> 0:02:44.400 an ending almost that satisfying. So Miles Rutledge was born 0:02:44.560 --> 0:02:46.520 on James. Actually, I'm gonna I'm gonna bring you in 0:02:46.560 --> 0:02:48.440 for a second. How do I spell this last name 0:02:48.600 --> 0:02:50.600 r O U T l E d g E. 0:02:50.639 --> 0:02:56.200 He's British age Routledge on believe if it's the same 0:02:56.240 --> 0:02:59.360 as the academic publisher which which is spelled the same, 0:02:59.400 --> 0:03:01.760 and then it's Routledge. And look, I don't give a 0:03:01.760 --> 0:03:03.560 fuck about I Skyfields, so let's just say, how have 0:03:03.600 --> 0:03:03.959 we won? 0:03:04.520 --> 0:03:09.880 Yeah? Okay, So Miles Routledge was born on September fourteenth, 0:03:10.080 --> 0:03:14.160 nineteen ninety nine, probably somewhere near Birmingham. Uh, I don't 0:03:14.160 --> 0:03:16.880 think we have like like it's just kind of based 0:03:16.919 --> 0:03:19.200 on shit, he said. But yeah, I don't see why 0:03:19.240 --> 0:03:21.880 he'd probably he'd lie about that. I don't think people 0:03:21.919 --> 0:03:23.600 brag about coming from Birmingham. 0:03:23.919 --> 0:03:30.680 Yeah. Wow, it's wonder like. Yeah. Yeah. 0:03:30.800 --> 0:03:35.040 So unfortunately, thanks to generations of medical advancements, he survived 0:03:35.120 --> 0:03:37.280 to adulthood. Because he does strike me as the kind 0:03:37.280 --> 0:03:39.240 of person who wouldn't have done that in like the 0:03:39.280 --> 0:03:42.600 eighteen hundreds. He got into the University of I'm gonna 0:03:42.600 --> 0:03:48.040 need your help here again, James Lowborough, Luffborough, Luffbrough. Unbelievable. 0:03:50.800 --> 0:03:54.120 That sounds like an incredibly obscure World War two German 0:03:54.160 --> 0:03:55.440 aerial division or something. 0:03:55.800 --> 0:04:00.880 Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, that's like the every bro each 0:04:01.200 --> 0:04:06.480 section of the LUFTWAFFA. So he gets into the University 0:04:06.520 --> 0:04:11.400 of luft Bro as a fucking physics student, or so 0:04:11.520 --> 0:04:14.320 he says, And sometime within the last two years he 0:04:14.400 --> 0:04:17.159 got an internship at an investment banking firm. 0:04:18.040 --> 0:04:21.000 So a kind of guy. 0:04:21.640 --> 0:04:24.720 He's laser targeted on a career as a giant piece 0:04:24.760 --> 0:04:29.520 of shit. But I haven't found much in my casual 0:04:29.560 --> 0:04:32.320 research about his financial situation or how much money he 0:04:32.360 --> 0:04:34.840 was born into. But I think he was, like I'm 0:04:34.839 --> 0:04:37.160 gonna guess his parents were at least comfortable, because as 0:04:37.200 --> 0:04:39.720 a young man still in college, he had the funds 0:04:39.720 --> 0:04:43.719 to travel pretty extensively, starting in twenty nineteen when he 0:04:43.800 --> 0:04:47.320 visited the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone. Now, this is one of 0:04:47.320 --> 0:04:49.719 the most popular destinations in the world for what is 0:04:49.800 --> 0:04:53.520 called dark tourism, and this is largely this is people 0:04:53.560 --> 0:04:57.239 who live kind of boring lives otherwise traveling to places 0:04:57.240 --> 0:04:59.719 that sound scary in order to impress people on like 0:05:00.120 --> 0:05:02.520 TikTok or whatever. Now I just said that, but like, 0:05:02.640 --> 0:05:05.440 I don't think there's anything wrong. Now there's like a 0:05:05.760 --> 0:05:08.680 lot of problems with getting to Chernobyle because of the war, 0:05:08.720 --> 0:05:11.600 but like prior to the expand innovation, I don't think 0:05:11.600 --> 0:05:14.760 there's anything wrong with wanting to like see Chernobyle. Mike 0:05:14.880 --> 0:05:18.520 thinking on like the ethics of going somewhere dangerous or 0:05:18.560 --> 0:05:22.280 whatever is like, are you increasing the odds of like 0:05:22.760 --> 0:05:26.760 causing a problem that diverts medical resources or other resources 0:05:26.800 --> 0:05:30.320 in a way that like harms people who have no 0:05:30.440 --> 0:05:33.080 choice in being there? Right, and visiting Chernobyl whatever, You're 0:05:33.080 --> 0:05:37.279 not really putting anyone at risk, So that's fine. But 0:05:37.480 --> 0:05:40.760 in May of twenty twenty one, though, Miles Rutledge made 0:05:40.760 --> 0:05:42.880 the decision to plan a trip to somewhere that was 0:05:42.880 --> 0:05:47.719 distinctly not fine to visit as a tourist, Afghanistan. Now 0:05:48.040 --> 0:05:50.080 he decided to head over there during kind of the 0:05:50.200 --> 0:05:52.720 end stages of the war. Although if you guys can 0:05:52.760 --> 0:05:58.279 remember back that far, the collapse of the Afghan government 0:05:58.360 --> 0:06:01.560 that the United States had backed happened more rapidly than 0:06:01.640 --> 0:06:04.479 most people had predicted, so it was kind of like 0:06:05.040 --> 0:06:07.240 less clear. I think when he booked his trip that 0:06:07.279 --> 0:06:09.400 thinks we're going to fall apart quite that quickly. 0:06:10.040 --> 0:06:13.320 Yeah, humor to feel the same way about that. 0:06:13.560 --> 0:06:17.440 Yeah, yeah, yeah, So yeah, it's one of those things where, 0:06:17.440 --> 0:06:22.039 like Miles, you know, his plan to go there was 0:06:22.279 --> 0:06:24.479 again not as like he's not heading there as a journalist. 0:06:24.560 --> 0:06:26.760 There's not like a story he wants to tell. He's 0:06:26.760 --> 0:06:30.200 not traveling there for kind of a practical purpose, Like 0:06:30.240 --> 0:06:32.640 he really does frame this as just he wanted to 0:06:32.640 --> 0:06:35.400 go on vacation, and he wanted to go on vacation 0:06:35.600 --> 0:06:38.839 specifically for what I think is probably like the dumbest 0:06:38.920 --> 0:06:43.440 reason I've ever heard of anyone choosing of a vacation location, 0:06:43.600 --> 0:06:47.440 especially choosing fucking Afghanistan as a vacation location. I'm going 0:06:47.520 --> 0:06:50.719 to play a clip from one of his YouTube videos. 0:06:50.760 --> 0:06:53.640 Now, why am I in Afghanistan? Well, that's a really 0:06:53.640 --> 0:06:54.159 good question. 0:06:54.279 --> 0:06:57.440 During COVID lockdowns, Afghanistan was the only country open round 0:06:57.440 --> 0:06:58.080 of vaccine mandate. 0:06:58.160 --> 0:07:01.400 So I just think I've never heard his voice before. 0:07:02.720 --> 0:07:03.480 I'm more angry. 0:07:03.520 --> 0:07:09.279 Now he gives to Afghanistan because they don't have a 0:07:09.320 --> 0:07:11.000 fucking vaccine mandate. 0:07:11.840 --> 0:07:16.840 Oh my fucking god, real warrior for freedom. 0:07:17.520 --> 0:07:25.000 Yeah, just the just the dumbest idiot. I hate him 0:07:25.320 --> 0:07:28.640 so anyway, as a result of wanting to avoid the 0:07:28.760 --> 0:07:32.200 vaccine mandate, Miles joined the long and historic line of 0:07:32.280 --> 0:07:34.800 young British men who have gone out to Afghanistan on 0:07:34.840 --> 0:07:38.520 a lark. Unfortunately, unlike many of them, Miles would survive 0:07:38.600 --> 0:07:41.920 his adventure. He does not seem to have a regular 0:07:41.960 --> 0:07:45.280 Wikipedia yet, but he does have an entry on something 0:07:45.320 --> 0:07:50.320 called everybody Wiki, which yeah, yeah, which I hadn't heard 0:07:50.360 --> 0:07:54.760 it that one before, but it's it very hilariously lists 0:07:54.760 --> 0:07:58.560 his occupation as quote, posting online during the twenty twenty 0:07:58.560 --> 0:07:59.640 one seeche of Kabul. 0:08:03.920 --> 0:08:04.400 That's great. 0:08:04.840 --> 0:08:07.360 That's that's actually Tim Kennedy. That's great. 0:08:09.840 --> 0:08:12.960 So for obvious reasons, he encountered difficulties. 0:08:13.200 --> 0:08:13.280 Uh. 0:08:13.440 --> 0:08:15.160 He wind wound up sleeping by the side of the 0:08:15.240 --> 0:08:19.280 road one night he was taken into Taliban custody. While 0:08:19.320 --> 0:08:21.840 he makes a big deal out of this, I actually 0:08:21.840 --> 0:08:24.360 don't think he was ever in serious danger, particularly not 0:08:24.400 --> 0:08:26.720 compared to, for example, the people fighting and dying or 0:08:26.720 --> 0:08:29.200 the civilians and said he's taken by the Taliban, who 0:08:29.280 --> 0:08:32.040 had to endure an often violent change of regime when 0:08:32.040 --> 0:08:34.920 the Taliban was taking over here. And lets you know, 0:08:34.960 --> 0:08:37.840 obviously there's the danger of like accidents on the road, 0:08:37.880 --> 0:08:40.000 which is always a significant danger in a place called 0:08:40.000 --> 0:08:43.320 like Afghanistan. There's the danger of you know, being caught 0:08:43.440 --> 0:08:47.160 up in a fight or something potentially, But the Taliban 0:08:47.760 --> 0:08:49.640 in this kind of late stage of their takeover, had 0:08:49.720 --> 0:08:52.400 no desire to harm a British citizen like Miles, or 0:08:52.440 --> 0:08:55.240 to harm like, you know, Americans who were in the country. 0:08:55.800 --> 0:08:57.680 And in fact, we're working kind of in the later 0:08:57.720 --> 0:08:59.640 stages of the US evacuation to try to make sure 0:08:59.640 --> 0:09:02.120 it happened and peacefully. Not because the Taliban are such 0:09:02.120 --> 0:09:05.720 good guys, but because like there's no geopolitical benefit to 0:09:05.760 --> 0:09:08.600 them from like a random British traveler dying. It's just 0:09:08.640 --> 0:09:09.959 gonna cause problems for them. 0:09:10.640 --> 0:09:12.840 Yeah, it's just stress and the. 0:09:13.320 --> 0:09:15.960 Yeah, like they didn't have like I don't believe they 0:09:15.960 --> 0:09:19.680 were the Taliban was ever like threatened his life in 0:09:19.720 --> 0:09:23.800 any way. Miles, though, posted through it, reporting that he 0:09:23.960 --> 0:09:26.720 was stuck in a pickle and giving details of his 0:09:26.800 --> 0:09:30.120 experience to fans on four Chan and Twitch, he started 0:09:30.200 --> 0:09:32.240 using the name James. You had asked about this, he 0:09:32.280 --> 0:09:35.040 started using the name Lord Miles due to the fact 0:09:35.080 --> 0:09:38.640 that he had purchased a fifteen pound lordship certificate as a. 0:09:38.600 --> 0:09:41.079 Bit I knew it. 0:09:41.200 --> 0:09:43.360 Yeah, yeah, yeah, not that surprising. Huh. 0:09:43.760 --> 0:09:45.560 What can't say that? 0:09:46.520 --> 0:09:51.360 Sorry, no, you can You're you're You're British. It's fine, okay, Daniel, Yeah, 0:09:51.360 --> 0:09:55.480 I leave that one in. That is my conviction. I 0:09:55.600 --> 0:09:59.120 what a twat, Sorry, what an absolute prick because he's 0:09:59.280 --> 0:10:01.920 what's really fun frustra with everything about his existence is 0:10:01.920 --> 0:10:02.880 frustrating right now. 0:10:03.160 --> 0:10:06.560 So it's what's so annoying is he's playing this fucking 0:10:06.800 --> 0:10:11.760 twee parochial version of Britishness for an exclusively in American audience. Right, 0:10:11.800 --> 0:10:15.640 if you're born near fucking Birmingham, we're not all we 0:10:15.679 --> 0:10:17.600 are not all pride and prejudice people. 0:10:17.880 --> 0:10:20.240 And if you've moved to another country, you will constantly 0:10:20.280 --> 0:10:22.920 encounter people thinking you grew up in Harry Potterland. But like, 0:10:23.760 --> 0:10:27.840 we're not all turfs either, But like he's fucking doing 0:10:27.880 --> 0:10:30.320 it like and he's doing it like a naive America 0:10:30.480 --> 0:10:34.280 like there are like the Scottish Parliament has made statements 0:10:34.280 --> 0:10:37.079 about not buying these stupid Scottish titles. 0:10:38.360 --> 0:10:39.480 Yeah, here's a prayer. 0:10:40.160 --> 0:10:43.800 Yeah, it's it's very silly. He justified this by saying, 0:10:43.800 --> 0:10:46.120 because I think he buys it while he's in Afghanistan, 0:10:46.320 --> 0:10:49.240 he explained to his followers, the Taliban may see that 0:10:49.280 --> 0:10:53.880 as a reason to keep me alive some negotiating powder power, 0:10:53.880 --> 0:10:56.840 as they'll think I'm important. They don't care. They don't 0:10:56.880 --> 0:11:00.120 want any fucking Westerners dying in the country because that 0:11:00.160 --> 0:11:02.679 will fuck up their chances of, like you know, they 0:11:02.720 --> 0:11:06.520 want to get integrated to the like fucking global economy. 0:11:06.520 --> 0:11:08.800 They want to qualify for like loans and ship like 0:11:09.120 --> 0:11:11.320 they don't want to. They don't want the problems that 0:11:11.360 --> 0:11:13.800 you dying bring, like you being a lord has not 0:11:13.840 --> 0:11:15.400 going to impact this in anyway. 0:11:15.600 --> 0:11:17.680 Yeah, and they don't. I don't want like the British 0:11:17.720 --> 0:11:21.000 government deciding like, oh, ship, they killed someone, now we 0:11:21.080 --> 0:11:24.079 need to just bomb like cobble for eight months or whatever. 0:11:24.880 --> 0:11:25.120 Now. 0:11:26.000 --> 0:11:27.400 I don't want to say in his defense because I 0:11:27.400 --> 0:11:28.760 would not like to speak in his defense, but I 0:11:28.800 --> 0:11:31.040 will say that the one person who might be conned 0:11:31.040 --> 0:11:33.720 by a lordship you bought online is Boris Johnson? 0:11:34.120 --> 0:11:41.720 Yeah, have an impact on Bojo, yah, but it is 0:11:41.920 --> 0:11:42.840 It is not defense. 0:11:42.880 --> 0:11:45.280 It's not like Bojo's gonna be sticking around for very long. 0:11:45.360 --> 0:11:45.520 Right. 0:11:45.720 --> 0:11:48.840 You have to like you every every every like seven weeks, 0:11:48.880 --> 0:11:51.400 you are rolling a dice as to whether the Conservative 0:11:51.440 --> 0:11:53.680 PM is someone you can con with the lordship title. 0:11:53.880 --> 0:11:54.720 Yeah. 0:11:54.720 --> 0:11:57.160 Well, none of them in the last few years have 0:11:57.240 --> 0:11:59.439 been what I would call intellectual titans. 0:12:00.800 --> 0:12:01.360 That's true. 0:12:01.360 --> 0:12:04.880 But but but Hope springs a turtle, Rishi sud acts 0:12:04.920 --> 0:12:09.880 in trouble too, so they might I don't know, a 0:12:10.000 --> 0:12:11.160 brave shot. 0:12:11.720 --> 0:12:14.559 You just really go down the fast road. 0:12:14.960 --> 0:12:17.840 I really I feel sorry for you all across the pond. 0:12:17.960 --> 0:12:19.880 I can't imagine what it would be like to have 0:12:20.400 --> 0:12:23.400 your politicians be national laughing stocks. I mean, that's just 0:12:23.480 --> 0:12:25.920 gotta be that's just got to be hard. No American, 0:12:26.400 --> 0:12:28.240 we know, we'll ever know what that's like. 0:12:28.720 --> 0:12:30.640 We are ruled by the hero of Ireland. 0:12:32.640 --> 0:12:35.040 Oh I I was gonna talk about you know, my hero, 0:12:35.280 --> 0:12:37.880 the governor of Florida and his best friend, the pedophile 0:12:37.920 --> 0:12:43.199 who just committed suicide. This a different pedophile, No, this 0:12:43.320 --> 0:12:46.720 is the pedophile who like backed Santus's like early political 0:12:46.880 --> 0:12:49.319 rise and now just killed himself after he got exposed. 0:12:49.800 --> 0:12:51.720 Oh so it's Alexander. 0:12:51.760 --> 0:12:58.280 Okay, never mind, this is a different pedophile. I'm every 0:12:58.360 --> 0:13:01.679 day there's a new one. I can't it's not Mike Gates. 0:13:01.679 --> 0:13:03.360 Who's other friend who's also a pedophile. 0:13:15.920 --> 0:13:18.600 Now you know who I cannot prove at this point 0:13:18.720 --> 0:13:20.840 is a pedophile, Miles Rutledge. 0:13:20.880 --> 0:13:23.200 So let's get back to his story, please. 0:13:24.360 --> 0:13:27.800 So he also claimed during this period where he's kind 0:13:27.840 --> 0:13:31.960 of like quote unquote on the run, that the four 0:13:32.040 --> 0:13:34.680 Chan users he was posting with kept him alive by 0:13:34.720 --> 0:13:38.520 giving him updates on Taliban progress through Osent as they 0:13:38.559 --> 0:13:43.679 advanced through Kabul. That's broadly speaking not impossible. So the 0:13:43.800 --> 0:13:46.600 idea that Miles again, I don't believe he was ever 0:13:46.679 --> 0:13:49.520 threatened by the Taliban. They're again not nice people, but 0:13:49.559 --> 0:13:52.160 they're not like unhinted, they're not isis you know, they 0:13:52.360 --> 0:13:55.040 they are a government. They don't have a benefit in 0:13:55.160 --> 0:14:00.199 something bad happening to someone like him. So Miles, though, 0:14:00.240 --> 0:14:02.760 played up the idea that he was something between a tourist, 0:14:02.880 --> 0:14:06.559 a journalist, and a philanthropist. Building his trip to Afghanistan 0:14:06.720 --> 0:14:09.480 is a quote little charity thing. At the same time, 0:14:09.559 --> 0:14:11.920 as he said that he was prepared for death when 0:14:11.960 --> 0:14:14.320 he couldn't immediately secure a way out of the country. 0:14:14.840 --> 0:14:17.880 Eventually a United Nations safe house took him in and 0:14:17.960 --> 0:14:19.640 he was given a seat on one of the last 0:14:19.760 --> 0:14:24.480 planes out of the country. Now this is an actual actor. Yeah, 0:14:25.760 --> 0:14:29.640 that's frustrating because like there are people in danger from 0:14:29.680 --> 0:14:33.640 the Taliban who had couldn't leave, right, Like he took 0:14:33.720 --> 0:14:36.600 one of their spaces. Somebody didn't get out who is 0:14:36.680 --> 0:14:37.880 in danger because of him. 0:14:38.760 --> 0:14:41.600 Yeah, like very good friends of mine, like I spent 0:14:41.760 --> 0:14:44.080 much of that time, like I've written about Afghanistan, I've 0:14:44.080 --> 0:14:48.280 worked with translators and like good friends of mine sometimes 0:14:48.360 --> 0:14:51.400 and left Afghanistan, but many of them still have their 0:14:51.440 --> 0:14:54.440 families there, right, and every single day they have anxiety 0:14:54.480 --> 0:14:56.880 about whether their faunilies are okay, if something terrible has 0:14:56.920 --> 0:14:59.280 happened to them. Yeah, and this twat is just like 0:14:59.440 --> 0:15:02.040 sitting on a plane posting on four chaney Like that 0:15:02.160 --> 0:15:03.200 makes me properly angry. 0:15:03.480 --> 0:15:06.160 Yeah, it's it's and that's again what I was talking about, Like, 0:15:06.320 --> 0:15:09.360 if you're going to if you're gonna go to a 0:15:09.480 --> 0:15:12.400 place that is that is beset by conflict, you know, 0:15:12.520 --> 0:15:16.160 by civil war, by violence or anything like that. Number One, 0:15:16.200 --> 0:15:18.680 you have responsibility to like have a reason to go beyond. 0:15:18.800 --> 0:15:22.720 I wonder what it's like. And you have a responsibility 0:15:22.960 --> 0:15:26.360 to not make things worse for people who don't have 0:15:26.480 --> 0:15:27.800 a choice about being there. 0:15:28.120 --> 0:15:28.640 And he did. 0:15:28.800 --> 0:15:31.560 You know, that's like fundamentally why I hate this guy 0:15:31.760 --> 0:15:35.520 is he absolutely took an opportunity to escape from I 0:15:35.520 --> 0:15:37.840 don't know, some woman's rights activist or something, you know, 0:15:38.000 --> 0:15:40.720 some somebody who was some turp or something, somebody who 0:15:40.800 --> 0:15:44.120 didn't have a choice about fucking being stuck in Afghanistan. 0:15:44.280 --> 0:15:46.760 Yeah, just some fuck you wanted a fair cracket life. 0:15:46.920 --> 0:15:50.800 And and yeah there's a prick. Yeah yeah, I mean 0:15:50.880 --> 0:15:53.760 it's yeah. And he could have stayed. I have friends 0:15:53.800 --> 0:15:57.680 who stayed through that time and covered it, like your 0:15:57.720 --> 0:15:59.560 concern is for your sources, not yourself. 0:16:00.240 --> 0:16:00.760 Yeah yeah. 0:16:01.000 --> 0:16:03.280 Or he could have done the thing that his ancestors didn't, 0:16:03.360 --> 0:16:05.880 just walk across the border Pakistan like. 0:16:06.760 --> 0:16:07.920 Your ancestors did this. 0:16:08.120 --> 0:16:11.160 This is the one thing like hell. 0:16:12.880 --> 0:16:15.880 Through the Kyber Pass and then becomes Sherlock Holmes his 0:16:15.960 --> 0:16:21.120 best friend. You know, that's a proud tradition, which. 0:16:21.040 --> 0:16:22.680 I thought you were gonna go with dying man, which 0:16:22.720 --> 0:16:25.520 would have also been a very well. 0:16:24.760 --> 0:16:26.040 That's another proud tradition. 0:16:26.160 --> 0:16:30.120 Getting sniped by a jizil in the fucking uh Kaiber Pass. 0:16:30.200 --> 0:16:35.520 Absolutely so. He had a marvelous time in Afghanistan and 0:16:35.600 --> 0:16:38.600 immediately pivoted because he built up a big social media 0:16:38.680 --> 0:16:41.440 following around his posts there, pivoted to a career as 0:16:41.480 --> 0:16:45.560 a dark tourist influencer. He traveled next to an ireland, 0:16:46.320 --> 0:16:49.160 not an Ireland. He traveled next to an island in Brazil. 0:16:49.240 --> 0:16:51.400 There's this island off the coast of Brazil that like, 0:16:51.600 --> 0:16:53.400 like you're not allowed to go to because there's so 0:16:53.520 --> 0:16:56.920 many fucking snakes. Like it's just it's extremely dangerous to 0:16:56.960 --> 0:16:59.160 go there because it's covered in fucking snakes. And he 0:16:59.280 --> 0:17:01.840 like went there where armor, but he didn't actually run 0:17:01.920 --> 0:17:05.680 into any snakes because snakes don't, like you know, they're 0:17:05.720 --> 0:17:09.680 not generally aggressive, most of them. He got arrested in 0:17:09.800 --> 0:17:12.480 Kenya for as best as I can tell, being a 0:17:12.600 --> 0:17:17.680 prick nearer refugee camp, and then he traveled to Ukraine 0:17:18.040 --> 0:17:21.040 right after the expanded invasion to Ukraine to try to 0:17:21.119 --> 0:17:23.000 make the suffering of hundreds of thousands of. 0:17:23.000 --> 0:17:23.800 People about him. 0:17:25.000 --> 0:17:27.480 The highlight of that trip was he claims that he 0:17:27.600 --> 0:17:29.679 drove a woman and her kid out of the country 0:17:29.760 --> 0:17:36.560 and rescued them and also brought people snacks whatever. Miles 0:17:36.600 --> 0:17:39.199 has always been two things. He's deeply enmeshed in right 0:17:39.240 --> 0:17:42.520 wing meme culture, and he is at least superficially committed 0:17:42.560 --> 0:17:46.160 to Christian extremism. He is like kind of at least 0:17:46.560 --> 0:17:50.120 it like signals as a fundamentalist Christian. He's like, he's 0:17:50.119 --> 0:17:53.399 super fashy right, but this is not like a hidden 0:17:53.480 --> 0:17:56.800 thing within his videos and stuff. I found one write 0:17:56.840 --> 0:17:59.920 up of him on a right wing religious news website 0:18:00.040 --> 0:18:01.920 that gives you an idea of how he builds himself 0:18:01.960 --> 0:18:06.080 to his ideal audience. Miles Routledge is a self described Catholic, 0:18:06.200 --> 0:18:09.520 independent war journalist and charity on the ground. At just 0:18:09.600 --> 0:18:11.840 twenty one, he had to do Afghanistan when the Taliban 0:18:11.960 --> 0:18:15.159 seized control, and now he's in Ukraine giving refreshing updates 0:18:15.160 --> 0:18:17.760 that are peppered with humor, reality, and a little naivete. 0:18:18.280 --> 0:18:20.520 In the past, Routledge went to war torn countries and 0:18:20.600 --> 0:18:24.040 into areas no NGO or charity dared to go according 0:18:24.080 --> 0:18:26.840 to his GoFundMe Paige, so he can hand out bibles, food, 0:18:26.960 --> 0:18:27.840 medicine and money. 0:18:28.920 --> 0:18:31.000 Well, there's a special place in hell for some time 0:18:31.119 --> 0:18:32.639 giving a stopping person a bible. 0:18:33.000 --> 0:18:35.640 Yeah, And also like he never went to places other 0:18:35.720 --> 0:18:38.440 people wouldn't dare to go. I will guarantee you everywhere 0:18:38.520 --> 0:18:41.680 he went, there were already like people like the Freeburmer 0:18:41.760 --> 0:18:46.040 rangers or even medicine sands, frontiers or journalists without borders, 0:18:46.119 --> 0:18:49.440 like there were there were people there. Because he's not 0:18:49.720 --> 0:18:51.800 He's not like I've seen his videos, He's not going 0:18:51.880 --> 0:18:52.679 anywhere special. 0:18:53.440 --> 0:18:56.520 Yea, there how many people are recallable, like ten million people? 0:18:57.080 --> 0:19:00.359 Yes, these are big cities. He's before million people. 0:19:00.440 --> 0:19:03.840 Sure, playing off of kind of the provincialism of his 0:19:04.000 --> 0:19:06.119 audience and the fact that most people in the West 0:19:06.160 --> 0:19:09.399 when they hear Afghanistan or now Ukraine when they hear it, 0:19:09.560 --> 0:19:11.440 or like even like a place like Kenya which is 0:19:11.480 --> 0:19:14.359 like a massive country with major cities and all sorts 0:19:14.359 --> 0:19:17.280 of stuff like that, like oh, these places are just 0:19:17.520 --> 0:19:19.399 death traps and you don't go there, and like no 0:19:19.520 --> 0:19:21.480 man even like I would get this when I'd go 0:19:21.520 --> 0:19:24.359 to I've spent a lot, visited Arax seven or eight times, 0:19:24.400 --> 0:19:26.600 and it's like, no, man, it's like most of it's 0:19:26.680 --> 0:19:29.040 just a country. Like, yeah, there's specific things you have 0:19:29.119 --> 0:19:31.400 to keep in mind that are dangerous, but like it's 0:19:31.480 --> 0:19:33.800 just a place, like millions of people live there and 0:19:33.920 --> 0:19:34.920 don't die every day. 0:19:36.400 --> 0:19:39.040 Yeah, this is ludicrous to suggest that he was in 0:19:39.119 --> 0:19:41.359 any Yeah, like you could go to all these places 0:19:41.400 --> 0:19:43.680 and stay in a five star hotel and yeah, like 0:19:44.880 --> 0:19:46.919 you're not in any danger, especially as a. 0:19:47.000 --> 0:19:48.840 Rich white British guy parading ground by. 0:19:48.960 --> 0:19:52.200 Yeah, to the extent that he's like in Ukraine and 0:19:52.359 --> 0:19:56.240 traveling near the front where there's like random missiles and shelling, 0:19:56.320 --> 0:19:59.040 Yeah there's some danger, but again it's danger that he 0:19:59.240 --> 0:20:03.720 is exposed, using himself to unnecessarily and then creating a 0:20:03.800 --> 0:20:07.800 situation whereby if he is injured, that's a bunch of 0:20:07.920 --> 0:20:11.440 morphine and antibiotics that can't go to a fucking civilian 0:20:11.720 --> 0:20:14.720 who had no choice because they were raised in Constantinifa 0:20:14.840 --> 0:20:19.240 or whatever, you know, Like, yeah, fucking yeah, he's a 0:20:19.280 --> 0:20:25.080 praise Yeah, yeah, so I mentioned a little earlier, he's 0:20:25.160 --> 0:20:28.440 definitely a fascist. And you know when I say that, 0:20:28.560 --> 0:20:31.240 sometimes people do the whole ou lefties will call anything 0:20:31.320 --> 0:20:34.600 a fascist. Don't worry, I have some receipts on this one. 0:20:35.119 --> 0:20:39.160 So shortly after his famous trip to Afghanistan, he published 0:20:39.200 --> 0:20:41.760 a book about his very brief time in the country. 0:20:42.200 --> 0:20:45.080 This book included some interesting claims, like that he was 0:20:45.160 --> 0:20:47.159 the last person to enter the country on a tourist 0:20:47.240 --> 0:20:49.879 visa before the fall of Kabul, and that his visa 0:20:49.960 --> 0:20:53.200 had required a personal statement explaining his reasons for visiting. 0:20:53.520 --> 0:20:56.320 He wrote, quote, my response was simply an a four 0:20:56.359 --> 0:20:58.680 sheet of paper with only the word fun written on it. 0:20:58.840 --> 0:21:01.359 It was accepted without quest. I was ready for my 0:21:01.560 --> 0:21:04.920 very own white boy summer. He also notes that the 0:21:05.080 --> 0:21:10.040 last right, which was at the time kind of like 0:21:10.160 --> 0:21:14.080 a meme and you know, fashy online Nazi circles, It 0:21:14.160 --> 0:21:15.200 was all over telegram. 0:21:15.800 --> 0:21:16.480 He also. 0:21:19.160 --> 0:21:20.240 Very problematic child. 0:21:21.080 --> 0:21:23.800 Yeah, although not problematic in this sense. Chet did not, 0:21:24.280 --> 0:21:28.040