0:03 - Questions from various places around the net.
1:10 - Risk Tolerance and Personal Autonomy
4:39 - The Case Against Coercive Systems
7:33 - The Value of Risk Diversity
9:09 - Risks of Political Power
11:33 - Managing Mental Health and Society
14:05 - Justifying Peace in a Voluntary Society
19:18 - The Role of Anger and Honesty
21:50 - Emotional Reactions and Rational Thought
23:34 - The Complexity of Parenting
27:42 - Interventions in Parenting
29:39 - The Nature of Discipline
31:38 - Free Market vs. Government Intervention
39:17 - Contracts and Free Speech Platforms
42:24 - Conclusion and Farewell
In this lecture, Stefan Molyneux addresses questions surrounding anarcho-capitalism, particularly focusing on how this ideology interacts with the concept of risk and the varying levels of risk tolerance in society. He begins by exploring the implications of allowing individuals with differing risk tolerances to coexist within a community. The discussion reflects upon the moral dilemma of balancing personal autonomy against the potential recklessness of those with low risk tolerance, likening such individuals to "helicopter neurotic moms" who seek to impose their anxieties on others through coercive political means.
Molyneux emphasizes the importance of contextualizing the arguments regarding anarcho-capitalism. He challenges the notion that there exists an ideal system against which anarcho-capitalism must justify itself. Rather than presenting an alternative that benefits everyone equally, he critiques the coercive nature of traditional political systems that consolidate power among a select few, resulting in systemic issues such as propaganda, coercion, and exploitation. His argument asserts that forcing compliance based on varying risk tolerances does not resolve societal dysfunction; instead, it perpetuates cycles of violence and subjugation.
Continuing with the theme of risk, Molyneux articulates the necessity of varied risk tolerance levels to the survival and advancement of humanity. He explains how individuals with higher risk tolerance play essential roles as innovators and protectors, while those who are more risk-averse contribute in different but equally vital ways. This diversity, he argues, is crucial to a balanced society and illustrates the evolutionary benefits of having a spectrum of risk attitudes. The dynamic nature of risk calculation, influenced by changing information and experiences, underscores the complexity of human interactions within social systems.
Molyneux also tackles the potential dangers of empowering individuals with extreme risk sensitivities to enforce their will on the broader community. He highlights the peril of creating political powers that may cater to those with neurotic fears, leading to overregulation and ultimately harming the general populace more than the initial risks could. He draws parallels between personal autonomy and the moral implications of initiating violence or coercion, particularly in matters concerning personal relationships and property rights.
A significant portion of the lecture dissects the flawed premises surrounding government interventions in public safety and health. Molyneux references public health crises, such as the opioid epidemic, as outcomes of misguided regulation driven by fear rather than sound science. He argues that the complexities of risk management should be addressed through voluntary interactions and market solutions instead of political mandates that often ignore individual rights and freedoms.
As the lecture progresses, Molyneux delves into more personal topics regarding relationships and emotions. He discusses the notion of anger as a catalyst for establishing healthy boundaries, particularly in abusive family dynamics. He posits that while anger should not be suppressed, it should also not be weaponized against others. This nuanced approach to emotional health aligns with his overarching advocacy for voluntary interactions based on mutual respect.
Towards the end, Molyneux shifts focus to the topic of censorship and free speech within digital platforms. He critiques the inconsistency of platforms that claim to support free speech but later impose arbitrary restrictions on content. He argues that just as we expect contract stipulations to be honored in real estate, the same principle should apply to virtual spaces where users build their presence.
Overall, Molyneux's lecture presents a comprehensive examination of individual risk tolerances within an anarcho-capitalist framework, interspersed with discussions on emotional health, family dynamics, and the implications of digital censorship. By advocating for a society rooted in voluntary interactions, he challenges listeners to reconsider the moral implications of coercion versus cooperation in various aspects of life.
[0:00] All righty, righty. Good morning, everybody. Stefan Molyneux from Freedomain.
[0:03] Questions from various places around the net. Number one, how does anarcho-capitalism reasoning deal with risk? Different people have different levels of tolerance. Some are so reckless that they are a serious danger to the community. Then you have the people who are still wearing COVID masks. It's a value judgment with moral implications. How do we keep stupid people from endangering others without violating personal autonomy? Well, I mean, literally not your fault because you've not maybe heard this before, but literally for the millionth time, the question is always compared to what, right? So let's say that there are people who have very low risk tolerance. They don't like frying bacon in the nude, right? They have very low risk tolerance and they're really anxious and upset, you know, like you say sort of helicopter neurotic moms, right? Don't climb on that. Don't go up there. Wear a helmet when you're on a slide. You know, that kind of stuff, right? So, let's say that we have people like that. Should we give them coercive political power to enforce their neuroticism on others?
[1:10] Right? It's always compared to what?
[1:13] If you say that society is destabilized by people having, different levels of risk tolerance, then how does giving people coercive universal power to initiate the use of force solve that problem, right? It doesn't. So, it's always compared to what? There's not a perfect system that anarcho-capitalism needs to justify itself relative to. There's not, well, this is ideal, but how does your system handle it? It's like, well, the status system is to give a small group of people near universal power of propaganda and coercion. How's that? Is that a solution, right? I mean, it's sort of like saying, well, you know, in a free market of dating, some people are going to end up unmarried and unhappy.
[2:02] Okay, but where is the solution? Like, there's no platonic solution that ANCAP, is comparing itself to in any rational universe, right? So, let's say you have a system where the government assigns a husband and a wife to everyone and forces them to stay married, right? The husband assigns a husband and a wife to everyone in society and forces them to stay married. Well, that would just be institutionalized financial exploitation at rape, right? Forcing someone to be married, forcing someone to have sex, forcing someone to provide for others. That would be institutionalized financial theft exploitation and rape. So I don't see, fundamentally, why a system of voluntary interactions and peaceful transactions has to justify itself relative to a system of institutionalized theft, financial exploitation, and rape? Are you asking an advocate for freedom to justify a system relative to near universal propaganda, lies, coercion, exploitation, the indebtedness of the next generation, the capacity to start wars, and initiate the use of force? So this is a sort of fundamental mind shift.
[3:19] So your belief implicit in the conversation and this is i'll get to the actual answer to this but this is just a mindset that will have you stop trying to keep asking these honestly i mean no no disrespect to you whatsoever i mean i get that you're struggling to to understand this mindset and i sympathize with that but once you get this you'll realize that these questions are ridiculous not that you're ridiculous and i understand why you're asking them but these questions are, well, there's a system, Steph, where different risk levels are handled perfectly. How does your system handle it? Right? How does your system handle it? But there is no system wherein different risk levels are handled, quote, perfectly to the satisfaction of everyone. There's always going to be conflict. There's always going to be disagreements.
[4:13] There's always going to be people who think my way is the right way and your way is the wrong way and the terrible way. All of this stuff is going to happen. And the question is, do we resolve these differences with peace and negotiation and compromise or with violence, subjugation and theft? Right. So it's it's peace or war. It's violence or negotiation. That's it.
[4:40] Now, violence is the initiation of the use of forces immoral, and you can check out my book, Universally Preferable Behavior, a Rational Proof of Secular Ethics for all of that. But let's say that you have a system where, in a centralized, either theological or secular government, forces men and women to get married, forces them into sexual activity for the sake of reproduction, forces the man to provide for the woman even if he loathes her, forces the woman going to have sex with the man, even if he loathes her. And I'm saying we should not use force in the realm of sexual activity, because that makes it rape and sexual assault. And we should not use force in the realm of property, because that makes it theft and exploitation, right? So you have a system of universal rape and theft, because you're forcing men and women to get married and have sexual activity with each other. And then you say to me, well, Steph, how does your voluntary system handle the fact that some people might get lonely.
[5:40] Come on. Do you understand what I'm saying here? Are there different levels of risk tolerance in society? Absolutely. And there should be. And there should be because the calculations of risk are constantly changing. So there should be different levels of risk tolerance in society. You need people who are more risk averse and you need people who are more risk-tolerant.
[6:04] So people who are more risk tolerant are going to be your scouts, they're going to be your entrepreneurs, they're going to be maybe soldiers, they're going to be policemen, policewomen. So you need people who are more risk tolerant, even risk friendly. And then you need people who are more risk averse in society, because you can't just have all bosses, you can't have all chiefs and no Indians, as the old saying goes. You actually have to have people who work, people who applaud along, people who are too nervous to do X, Y, and Z. You need people who are more risk-averse to design bike helmets and construction safety helmets. You need people who are more risk-averse to monitor babies and toddlers and be alert and aware of the dangers that they may experience, which can easily be fatal, like one toddler tumbles down the stairs, and you could end up with a dead toddler or a toddler in a wheelchair for life. So yeah, there's a wide variety of risk tolerance in society. And that's good. That's not by accident, right? I mean, we've become the most successful species in the known universe, like by far not even a close second, right? Now, because we can do things that no other creature can do, such as have these kinds of conversations. That's great. It's good. That's a plus.
[7:20] So when you look at the fact that we have evolved to be the most successful, organisms in the known universe, and you say, well, gee, people have a wide variety of risk tolerances, well, that's because it serves our evolution.
[7:33] It serves our advancement. And there should be strenuous negotiations and conflicts, as there are in families between husbands and wives, between fathers and mothers, where the fathers are saying, let the kids take some risks, and the mothers are saying, it's too awful, I can't watch. And both these things are helpful. Both these things are helpful. There are times, I mean, just think of an animal, right? So if an animal is being hunted by a predator let's say it's a rabbit being hunted by a fox right so the rabbit will freeze and hide because it's safer to freeze and hide than to run.
[8:14] Unless the fox sniffs out the rabbit and gets too close then the rabbit has to run because now before it was safer to freeze than to run, but if the fox gets too close and clearly has picked up ascent, then it is then more risky to stay in place than it is to flee. So risk calculations are constantly changing, both for individuals and in society as a whole. It was very risky to fly on airplanes when they were first developed. It is now pretty much the safest thing to fly on an airplane. So, we understand how all of this stuff changes. So, how do we keep stupid people from endangering others without violating personal autonomy? How do we keep? What do you mean? Who is going to have that power? Who is going to have that power?
[9:10] Power attracts extreme personalities as a whole. Power attracts extreme personalities with neurotic agendas. Political power is the way that mental illness is inflicted upon the general population, slowly turning everyone mad. So people who are neurotically attached to animals, usually in substitute of human children, people who are neurotically attached to animals are the kind of people who make Elon Musk kidnap seals to see if loud noises stress them out too much. People who are neurotically attached to particular risks will then inflict the mitigation of those risks on society as a whole, thus creating other risks. So people who are worried about industrial accidents will create endless requirements for occupational health and safety standards to the point where businesses go overseas, men and women can't get jobs, get addicted to drugs out of despair, and die at far higher rates than industrial accidents could ever, ever have occurred or achieved.
[10:22] Do you follow? Well, you know, I saw this video of a guy, he was wearing a helmet, he got hit on the head by something, so now we need all of these regulations to make sure that never happens again. And you keep piling those neurotic fears on, neurotic fears, and then eventually you can't do business. It's impossible to start a business, particularly a manufacturing business. And so then there's no jobs for the average person, so they turn to crimes and suicides and self-medication of despair, and you end up with a far higher death count. I mean, the fentanyl crisis is directly related to the de-industrialization crisis that comes about because of neurotic concerns about safety and environmentalism and so on. In other words, in order to avoid extra particulates in the air that could conceivably have some negative effect on health in 60 years, we, instead of having those particulates in the air, we have fentanyl in the veins, which is dropping more than a Vietnam's worth of Americans every single year.
[11:31] Because it's about anxiety management, it's not about health. Dr.
[11:34] Mary Ruart, I couldn't remember her name the other day, I did an interview with her like 15 years ago, where she was talking about how out of concerns for thalidomide, the FDA was established and requires, you know, incredibly strict safety standards to the point where, back in the day, the estimate was 5 million, like, extra Americans had died as a result of substances being banned in America that were perfectly legal elsewhere. And so, because there were 800 babies who were hit with, I mean, obviously terrible, severe, horrible birth defects, and died and so on. So, you trade in those, you get 5 million deaths, right? Because it's all about managing anxiety rather than making intelligent and rational decisions.
[12:16] So, if you create political power, the most anxious will be in charge of it. You are creating political power which weaponizes severe mental illness and dysfunction and inflicts that neurosis on the rest of the population, and it is a vector through which disordered, chaotic, neurotic thinking is inflicted on the general population. And the only way that we can deal with different levels of risk tolerance is to have a continually shifting calculation of its costs and benefits, which is only possible in the free market. The free market responds in a dynamic fashion to what is optimum based upon free choices and money payments. The free market dynamically shifts to that which is optimum.
[13:07] Society, the political power does not. Political power freezes things in time. I mean, we know this from the obvious example of government schools. Government schools, back in the day, you had to have a couple of months off in the summer for farm work, and that still remains the same because it just gets frozen in time, right? Think of all of the technological changes that have occurred over the last 150 years, and yet you still have, for the most part, kids in rows and a teacher with the blackboard, although I think it's changed to a whiteboard as a whole. So, if the alternative is violence, I don't need to justify shit to anyone, as far as the system goes. If the alternative, and the alternative to a voluntary society, is a politically coercive society, so if you're saying, how do you justify peace and reason relative to violence and exploitation, I don't have to justify shit.
[14:05] Because you are implicitly saying, well, the option of massive amounts of violence is always on the table and is superior. You need to justify property rights relative to theft. I don't, actually. Theft is immoral. The initiation of the use of force is immoral. So I don't have to justify squat. You just have to recognize that the alternative to peace is violence, and that's what you're finding seductive. All right, let's see here.
[14:37] Oh yes, the comment, I think this was referring to me. He is an atheist who loves Christians, but tells callers to get angry to their parents. He whines, why you not get angry at your parents? Then he bows down to Christians because he wants to be, remember, as a moral philosopher. Now, it's easy to make fun of somebody's grammar, but...
[14:57] Guess it's less easy now because you can always run it through AI to get the grammar corrected but I try not to nitpick at people's grammar because it could not be their first language and because I'm I suck at I know 17 different computer languages but only 1.2 human languages a little bit of French even less of German anyway but so I'm not gonna mind all of that tells people to get angry to their parents. That is, as somebody who's not listened to what I said, but have listened to other people's interpretation of what I've said.
[15:35] So, I don't tell people to get angry at their parents. Now, if people call me, I mean, you know this, right? But if people call me and they say that they were abused and neglected, which is, I mean, neglect is one of the worst forms of abuse. If they were abused and neglected by their parents, well, it's hard to be secure if evil doers walk all over you, trample your honesty, trample your integrity, trample your directness. So if you are being exploited and abused, anger can be a healthy emotion to establish boundaries, right? I mean, I view the suppression of anger, which is a necessary survival tactic when you're a child, if you have abusive parents, But I view, as an analogy, I view the suppression of anger as the suppression of the immune system that protects you from foreign dangers, viruses, bacteria, that kind of stuff. So if you have an autoimmune disorder, in other words, if your immune system is attacking healthy cells, that's very bad. right? If you have some sort of disorder where your immune system is disabled, right, as the sort of AIDS used to think used to happen way back in the day, then you also are in significant danger because you don't have protection.
[16:57] So if you want to tell the truth to people in your life about, you know, maybe your parents, if they harmed you, how they harmed you, if you want to tell the truth to people in your life but you you you get anxious sweaty palmed horrified nervous and and you want to faint well then you have these moral equivalent of an autoimmune disorder obviously i'm not talking about anything medical i'm not a doctor i'm just using it as an analogy so anger is healthy and if, just anger is healthy, right? Not manipulative bullying anger, which is just a form of rage for the purpose of forcing others to do what you want. And it's dishonest because you're not talking about your motives. You're only pretending to be angry in order to control others. So if you are terrified to tell the truth, say to your parents.
[17:50] Then you are your mindset, which again, I completely sympathize with and was almost certainly perfectly sensible and healthy when you were a kid. So if you are fearful of telling the truth, then you have the moral equivalent of an autoimmune disorder, wherein you are attacking honesty, which you should be promoting, right? It's healthy to be honest. Can't have a real relationship if you're dishonest. It's healthy to be honest. And if you are attacking yourself for wanting to be honest, like you think of just opening your mouth and telling the truth to your parents, and you are, you know, shocked, appalled, and horrified, and would, you know, feel like you're going to faint if you do it, have to force yourself to do it, the heart pounding. So, you have a moral challenge in that you are attacking your virtues and find relief in vices, right? So you are attacking yourself for wanting to tell the truth, and you then will reward yourself with sweet relief if you lie. Well, that's the opposite, and that's not healthy, right? And if you attack your virtues and reward your vices, that's like an autoimmune disorder where your immune system feeds unhealthy cells and attacks healthy cells. That's not good. That's not good. And then you don't have any protection against further exploitation. All right.
[19:18] I love Stefan's perspective on many topics. He does have a huge blind spot, though, with regards to human nature that he needs to update if he's going to be the kind of thinker he thinks he is. See here. So just just so you know, like from from my perspective, because it's important to know how people land for others. So I love Stefan's perspective on many topics. I mean, that's nice, and I appreciate that, but that's emotional, right? You're saying that you're being driven by and run by emotions. Well, I love this take, but this take really bothers me. It's like, but...
[19:51] Emotions are not tools of cognition, right? To use an old objectivist phrase or argument. Emotions are not tools of cognition. The fact that you love my perspective, and of course, perspective, that's also an emotional thing, right? We wouldn't say that two and two make four is a perspective, right? We wouldn't say that an argument that is proved through Socratic reasoning is just a perspective, right? All men are mortal. Socrates is a man, therefore Socrates is mortal. Oh I love that perspective it's like no that that's that's not a perspective that is that is something that is that is that is actually true so I love Stefan's perspective on many topics, he does have a huge blind spot though that he needs to update if he's going to be the kind of thinker her thinks he is my he thinks he is yeah so these are all just emotional stuff and if you're going to say I have a huge blind spot, then you're saying I don't apply a consistent methodology. I mean, I'm always trying to do that empiricism, reason, and evidence thing. So if I have a huge blind spot, you're saying that I have a massive psychological problem in that I have a consistent methodology for approaching truth, facts, reason, and evidence in the universe, except for a huge blind spot, which means I'm doing the exact opposite of my general methodology, and nobody's really pointed that out.
[21:14] Been a public intellectual for almost 20 years, and you're saying that I have a huge blind spot wherein I reverse all of the principles I have dedicated myself to for low these 43 years of being a philosopher or being interested in philosophy. I have a huge blind spot that I completely reverse my principles in, and nobody's really noticed it except you. So that, I mean, that's a bold claim, because it would mean that everybody shares my blind spot. Like we all completely reverse our principles in our conversations about what is true and what is good, right? Facts and empiricism, accuracy and virtue.
[21:51] We all share this massive blind spot, and you're the only person who doesn't, right? I mean, of the, like, so this is regarding spanking, right? So I apparently have a massive blind spot with regards to spanking, although spanking is a violation of the non-aggression principle because it's violence not used in immediate self-defense.
[22:10] So, I have missed it. All of the experts I've talked to about spanking have missed it. Everybody I've had conversations with about spanking has missed it. So, what it is, is the belief that you're smart because you can invent blind spots in other people rather than reconcile arguments that go against what you prefer emotionally, right? So, I love Stefan's perspective. I don't love him on this topic, but it's just feelings, right? And feelings are important, but they're not tools of cognition. So, what are the odds that I and my audience and all the experts I've talked to and the reasoning that I've gone through and the data that I've cited about spanking, what are the odds that everyone has a blank, has a blind spot and you're the only one who doesn't? Well, that's the idea that you can imagine that you're smart by pretending that everyone else is dumb. All right. So, smacking, he says smacking, the word invokes a huge reaction from him and is pivotal to the core of his beliefs.
[23:11] So this is also, this is just, you know, self-knowledge 101, right? That this is called projection, right? So I love Stefan's perspective on so many topics, but I'm really, you know, he's got a huge blind spot. And then you claim that I'm triggered. Well, first of all, triggered is not an argument. And what's wrong with being triggered? What's wrong with being, what's wrong with having a strong emotional reaction to something that is immoral.
[23:34] I mean, if you see, is it triggered if you're, you know, on a bus and you see a guy punching his daughter? Oh, he just got triggered. It's like, well, no, it's a vile action. It's a vile, evil action. So, he says, the flaw, as I see it, is captured in this question. Are you a good parent if you don't smack a child's hand away from an instant threat like a child reaching for a poisonous spider, a naked flame, or an electrical circuit? So.
[24:01] This is not what spanking is, right? So spanking, almost all we're spanking is because the parent gets angry because the child is disagreeing or defying, or is not following rules that the child doesn't understand or agree with. So, of course, you're going to grab a child's hand away. Let's say the child is reaching for a poisonous spider. Well, first of all, don't have a child in an environment with a poisonous spider, so they can reach for it, instruct the child, and so on. Don't have a child. Okay, maybe you're in Australia, right? So a child is reaching for a poisonous a spider, of course you're going to grab the child and move the child away. And you might have to do that quite aggressively. Yeah, if the child is reaching for a naked flame or don't have naked flames, don't have electrical circuits around where children can reach for. But of course, that's not a violation of the non-aggression principle to protect the child. I can't grab and manhandle adults, but let's say that there's some dog, maybe it's a small yappy dog. And oh, no, then remember this happened in Brazil. A dog jumped at my daughter, sort of came out an alley in Sao Paulo, and jumped at my daughter, and I lifted my daughter out of harm's way. I grabbed her, and I lifted her up. Yeah, I was moving her out of harm's way. I don't understand, you know, if your child is going to run into traffic, then you grab the child and hold the child back. That's not smacking, right? They say smack a child's hand away. Well, smacking a child's hand away isn't solving the problem. You have to remove the child from the situation.
[25:24] So this is called third-party self-defense, right? The child cannot defend itself. The child lacks understanding, so you act to protect the child, right?
[25:34] So that is not what spanking is. So 70 to 80 plus percent of parents hit their children, and there was a study that if my memory served me right, it was something like 18 times a week. I mean, this was just one audio study. It's not decisive or definitive, but a significant proportion of children are still being hit even into junior high, right?
[26:03] Of course, the people that I've talked to, we do the math sometimes, they've been hit hundreds and hundreds or even a thousand plus or more times. So, it's the theory that the children are just on this conveyor belt of Indiana Jones-style infinite dangers, so that the parents need to just, there's just like, this poisonous spider is just coming out the walls and you just have to, you know, a dozen or two dozen times a week smack the child because the child is just continually reaching for open flames and poisonous spiders. I mean, I don't mean to laugh, but electrical, open electrical circuits, they're sticking forks and plugs, they're, you know, this continually in this cavalcade of tumbling doom and danger. And I mean, come on, man, this is not, it's not Mario, bro. It's not like, it's not like Donkey Kong. So that is not, that is not the case, right?
[26:55] That is not the case. I mean, when you, you can't just go and tackle someone off a bike, right? But if your child is about to fall off the bike, you can pull them off the bike, right? Anybody who's taught a child to ride has probably gone through this situation, right? So the idea that in an extremity where there's a poisonous spider and the child's reaching for it and you grab their hand and pull it away and, right, that that's somehow why parents hit their children hundreds of times over this course of continual danger and doom and come on that's just not it's not a reasonable thing so you take a case of genuine defense of the child's interests right and of course it's you know it is would you do this to yourself right i mean do you smack yourself for disagreeing with yourself well of course not.
[27:43] But would you let's say that you're i mean take a silly example right your your arm fell asleep you lay on it your arm fell asleep and there was a spider and, towards your arm, would you use your other arm to grab your arm and move it out the way? Sure. Sure, you do that yourself, right? So, all right. So he says, obviously, if you take any time to think about it, you may find ways to avoid it. And if it's true that there's trauma attached to any control you have over others, sorry, if, and it's true that there's trauma attached to any control you have over others, but our environment and social fabric is not as pristine as an ideological possessed person would have it. Okay. It's just a bunch of noise. Philosophy is useless when it only partially represent the environment. He is blessed with a fortunate daughter that reinforces his beliefs, but as a father of four and one who is also fortunate to have a daughter very much like his, he would be completely rocked if he had a son like one of mine. I won't go further into that, but people are innately more diverse straight out of the box than his experience is telling him. The question then becomes, when is it appropriate to stop intervening as a parent?
[28:44] So he's saying, he's using the word smacking instead of hitting, and now it's intervening, right? Of course you intervene as a parent. this problem extrapolates out to poorly parented individuals when their actions are at a detriment to themselves or others not just for them though because the question who decides becomes even more important okay so steph is replying reductions and ideological solutions to something that is more complex so no you see the thing is if i say don't steal say well that's just reductionist and ideological some it's really complex it's like no don't steal now if you say don't steal then how you get property, how you trade, how you acquire property, how you create property, that's complex. So when I say don't do X, right? If I say don't go to this waterfall 50 kilometers north of a town in Thailand, right? Just don't go there.
[29:40] Well, then you can go anywhere else. So when I'm saying don't hit your kids.
[29:46] The solutions become quite complex. See, if you have a very, let's say you have a very aggressive child. Well, if you've been hitting a child, maybe that's one of the reasons why. You say, oh, well, I'm hitting my child because he's aggressive. It's like, well, no, maybe he's aggressive because you've hit him. I mean, boys, and I talked about this way back in the day, but boys have, some boys have genetics that if they're physically abused, they will almost certainly become criminals. And you don't know, of course, if your boy has those genetics or not. So, if your child is, let's say your child is very aggressive, okay, then you need to teach that child to manage his own aggression with tools that will last him a lifetime, right? You need to teach your child to manage that aggression with tools that are going to last him a lifetime, and given that he's not going to spank himself when he's 40 and feeling aggressive in a business meeting, you need to teach him self-knowledge and mental solutions to his aggression so that it can be focused and shaped into something productive and positive, and that's not just by hitting him, right? Hitting him does not give him the tools to manage his own aggression. It just teaches him that aggression is managed with violence. Well, how's that going to, right? How's that going to work for him in the long run? In this manner, he's as useful as feminist ideologue with regards to his overall philosophy. Yeah, I mean, there's no actual argument here, right? Just, it's a bunch of noise to cover up a bad conscience. All right.
[31:07] Steph set a chain of logic into action in my life that cleared away thickets of awful people. I live in a paradise now with only the best of friends and family. Oh, amen, brother. I'm just completely thrilled to hear that. And congratulations. It's a tough thing. But, you know, I've sort of often thought that if there was a documentary that followed me around for a day or a week, people wouldn't believe it. Like, they wouldn't believe it. How much fun we have as a family, how much I enjoy the company of friends and all of that, and how much laughter there is, and how little dysfunction and all of that. People wouldn't, right?
[31:38] What does Molyneux think about RFK Jr. wanting to ban certain ingredients to make the population in the USA, quote, healthy again? A government getting in the way of private companies adding harmful ingredients is against free market principles, according to most libertarians and narco-capitalists. Well, let's say that there are ingredients that are put into food that is marketed as healthy and safe for human consumption that is not healthy and safe for human consumption. Well, in a voluntary society, the executives who made those decisions would lose everything and probably including their right to economically participate in society. Right, so if there's an executive who says, let's put ingredient XYZ into these cookies, and it turns out it keeps them fresher for a little bit longer, and then it turns out to cause cancer, then all the people who can trace that causality.
[32:30] Will sue him and there'll be no corporate shields in a free society because I want to do business with people who are going to be personally liable for bad things, not be able to pull all the profits out of a corporation and use it as a human shield. Inhuman shield to avoid personal liability. I want people who poison others, particularly children, of course, I want them to lose their house and be taken out of economic participation in society. So, in a free society, you're personally liable for bad decisions. So, they won't make those bad decisions, right? Then he says, this cat is pure chatterbox and pretty much nothing more, a shitstorm of mixed metaphor and hyperbole. Practical act upon consciousness is something like brown crackle noise, or maybe the continual sound of shattering glass. Which is, that again, pure projection, right? So that is a shitstorm of mixed metaphor and hyperbole. This cat is pure chatterbox and pretty much nothing more. Practical act upon consciousness is something like brown crackle noise, so he's basically somebody's writing a word salad saying that I'm just a word salad. And that's kind of funny, right? Tragic, but funny. I've never seen a bigger coward than Molyneux.
[33:36] Yeah, I guess you need to get out more. Molyneux is crazy. I liked him because of the Rothbard economics, anarchy, etc., etc., except he lost me when he said I had to cut off my family if they disagreed with anarchist stuff. No, no, that's not it. That's not it. That's not it. And it's funny because the vast majority of society said that you should cut off family members if they don't take an experimental vaccine. I mean, that was a very common belief, and there's endless tales. I don't know exactly what percentage of people agreed with it, but they certainly seem pretty much down with having people lose rights because they didn't want to participate in COVID-era mRNA stuff. So yeah, I don't, I mean, it's not because you don't, you don't, you don't cut, you don't cut family members off because they disagree with you because disagreement is a fertile ground for progress. Disagreement is great. But let me ask you this.
[34:31] If you had a third cousin who said he had the right to beat up women and beat up women in your family, including your wife, mother, aunt, and daughter. You had a third cousin who believed that he had the right to beat up women and beat up women. Would you ostracize him because you just had a disagreement on whether you, well, you know, he thinks that you should and can beat up women. I think that you shouldn't and can't, and we, you know, we have a disagreement. I mean, I wouldn't want to ostracize the guy and not have him around my wife, aunt, mother, and daughter. I don't want to ostracize the guy because, I mean, it's really weird and mean to just ostracize someone because of a simple, silly disagreement. It's like, well, no, it's not a simple, silly disagreement. He's justifying the use of violence that is enacted against the women in your life, right?
[35:30] It's not a disagreement that causes or could cause something like not having someone in your life. It's when they advocate and cheer on the use of violence against you. In other words, they're not allowing you to disagree. They're threatening you with violence for disagreeing with them. In other words, if you think that the welfare state is immoral and corrupt and damaging and he votes for the welfare state, then he's voting to have you thrown in prison if you don't fund the welfare state. So he's not allowing you to have a choice and he's cheering on the use of violence against you.
[35:59] So if being allowed to disagree is fine which is fine you should be allowed to disagree, but if someone says you're not allowed to disagree with me about how the poor should be helped you're going to be you should be thrown in jail if you do disagree with me about how the poor should be helped it's a different fucking matter entirely jesus people grow a spine all right he says deplatforming is house rules it's legit if people are too lazy to switch to a better platform that doesn't censor, then maybe that means humanity is exactly where it serves to be. Deplatforming is house rules. Well, here's the thing, though. I mean, deplatforming, right? So let's say there's company ABC, right? So company ABC lures people onto its platform by saying, we're a free speech platform, right? We're a free speech platform, right? If your speech is not illegal, then you're allowed to say what you want, right? So then people invest tens of thousands of hours building material providing videos or audio or text or whatever on abc platform and then they say well you know if we have a problem with you, with something that you say you know we'll give you uh you know one two three warnings we'll give the opportunity we'll we'll publish clear guidelines so that you know whether you're.
[37:17] Or incompliance or not, and you'll know for sure, you'll have certainty, right? So if people build a platform, and there's a certain, there's got to be a certain sunset clause. Like if you, if you have, let's say, a video on ABC platform, you have a video on there, and it's been up for five years, right? Then you're assuming it's okay. Because you can't, you can't if the video is okay when it's uploaded but then five years later it's considered not okay well that's a problem because that means the rules have changed and they've changed retroactively, so if you've had content up there for a long time and it's been okay then there has to be an assumption that it's okay right so if a company offers people a free speech platform and they're on there for many years and their videos are okay, and then suddenly everything gets erased with no warning and no explanation, well, isn't that sort of an explicit or implicit violation of the contract?
[38:24] That's a complex question right that's a complex question there are assumptions that you make right that are essential to a functional a functional economy right so if for instance you buy property right you buy an acre somewhere and then you build your house on that acre, and then the company that sold you the acre of land after you've built the house, the company says that they don't want to sell you that land anymore and then they come and knock down your house and then it turns out it's because they want to build something there. Well, that would be pretty bad, right? I mean, you have a contract that you own the land and that contract can't just be repudiated at a later date.
[39:17] And when you have a let's say a media sharing platform again ABC company you have a media then what you're doing is you are homesteading servers right you are homesteading portions of their servers now of course it's their servers I understand that for sure that makes sense right it's their servers but they are giving you the right to homestead their servers to put your property on their servers in return for advertising and clicks and views and the other sort of profit sharing stuff, right? So maybe we can revisit the house building thing with a slightly better example. So let's say that you have a perpetual lease, right? You lease land and they say, well, this land is yours in perpetuity as long as you don't do illegal things on the property, right?
[40:06] It's like a lease in an apartment, right? Now, if you build a house on land, because the lease says that the land is effectively yours, just don't do illegal things, right? Okay. So then you build the house. And if you haven't done anything illegal, and then they take back the ownership of that lease and destroy your house, maybe for political reasons, well, is that a problem, right? In other words, if you had known ahead of time, right, this is one of the foundational aspect of contracts, right, if you'd known ahead of time that your house was going to be knocked down for arbitrary reasons with no warning, even though it specifically says you'll get warnings if you do anything that's illegal, you've never been charged, you've never been prosecuted, you've never been found guilty of anything, and so on, and then they just, you wake up, you come back from your day at work and half your house is knocked down, well, you wouldn't have built the house on that land if you had known that would be the outcome. Now, if they change the rules, that's fine. Then they can change the rules going forward, but you have to be grandfathered in, right? So if you don't get any strikes or problems or issues or whatever.
[41:23] Ever and ever, amen, then everything that you did before has to be covered by whatever the prior standard was, right? I mean, it's like you can't raise taxes legally or morally retroactively, right? So you can't say, well, I'm going to put a tax on house purchases and now it's going to go back 20 years, right? So now you owe, everybody owes the government a million dollars because of the additional taxes on stuff they bought and sold 10 or 20 years ago, like that would not be rational, right? So that's the challenge, right? That's the challenge. Would you build a house if you knew ahead of time that the land could simply be taken away and your house would be destroyed with no say, no warnings, no recompense? Would you build a house there? And of course you wouldn't, right? So you build the house on the land based upon the contract when you start building your house. And now if they want to change that contract, they can do that for new purchase this because people can then make that decision, but they can't do that for stuff that was 20 years ago. So, I mean, that's one of the challenges of this kind of stuff.
[42:25] All right, well, thanks everyone so much. Have yourself a wonderful, glorious, perfect, beautiful, wonderful day. Freedomain.com to help out the show. I really would appreciate your support, and I will talk to you tomorrow. Bye.
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