Michael Malice: Christmas Special | Lex Fridman Podcast #347

- The following is a conversation with Michael Malice. This is a special holiday episode. and it is made extra special. because it's announcing the release of Michael's new book. called "The White Pill, A Tale of Good and Evil". Michael and I disagree on a lot of ideas. and politics and philosophy, and we have a lot of fun disagreeing, but there's no question. that he has a deep love for humanity. and puts his heart and soul into his work, especially into this heart-wrenching, deeply personal book.

So I ask that you support him by buying it at. whitepillbook.com. that should hopefully forward to the Amazon page. As always, we each dressed up. in a ridiculous outfit without coordinating. for the chaos that makes life so damn interesting. This episode is full of humor, darkness, and love, which is the best way to celebrate the holidays. This is the Lex Fridman Podcast. To support it, please check out our sponsors in the description.

And now dear friends, here's Michael Malice. We probably should have. coordinated this better, shouldn't we? - Yeah. - I think so. Have you, since this is a Christmas special, a holiday special, have you been a good or a bad boy, Michael, this year? - Well, that's interesting. One of the people in the book, Grandville Hicks, his autobiography starts with, I was a good boy and he wasn't a very good boy.

- On a scale of one to 10. - I'm trying to think of what bad things I've done. Oh, okay, there's that. Okay, wait, that's not, that was. - No, that's, that's all right. - I would say nine. - A nine? - Yeah. I try to do the right thing. - Okay. - What about you? You're either it's, is it gonna be a one or zero? - Yeah, no, I'm extremely self-critical. I pushed the zero. - Okay. - I reached for the Zero. - Well, mission accomplished. - So this, this episode. is announcing the release of "The White Pill",

a book you wrote. - Yeah. - Which is, I've gotten the honor, the privilege, the pleasure of being one of the first people to read it. - You're the first. So I'm really, I dunno if nervous is the word, but you are the first person who has read it. that I am speaking to about it. - My first, my last, my everything. - [Michael] Yes. - You say that to all the girls, but. - All the fembots. - All the fembots. But yeah, it was a truly incredible book. It's basically a story of evil in the 20th century, and throughout it,

you reveal a thread that gives us hope. And that's the idea of "The White Pill". So there's the, the blue pill and the red pill. There's the black pill, which is a kind of deeply cynical, maybe empathetic, just giving up on the world, given that you see behind the curtain and you, given that you don't like what you see, given that there's so much suffering in the world, you give up, that's the black pill. And "The White Pill", I suppose, is, even though you acknowledge that there's evil in the world, you don't give up.

- Yes. - So if you're listening to this. and you're a fan of this podcast. - [Michael] You go to whitepillbook.com, it'll go to it. - Whitepillbook.com, and if you don't know how to spell, we'll probably have a link that you can click on. So for people who also don't know, Michael Malice is not just a troll, not just the hilarious comedic genius. who hosts his own podcast, but he's an incredible, brilliant author, "Dear Reader, the Unauthorized Autobiography, Kim Jong Ill.". So that's a story of North Korea.

"The New Right: A Journey to the Fringe of American Politics". That's the story of the extremes. of the United States political movements, and then "The Anarchist Handbook". that's talking about the ideologies, the different flavors of ideologies of anarchism. But on top of that, you're now going in, going into the darkest aspects of the 20th century. with the Soviet Union and the communism. with "The White Pill". So let me ask you,

let's start at at the beginning, at the end of the 19th century, as you write, "the term, socialist, communist and anarchist. were used somewhat loosely and interchangeably. because the prophecy Marxist society was one. in which the state had famously weathered away. There was a great disagreement. about what a socialist system would look like in practice, but two things were clear. First that socialism was both inevitable and scientific, the way of the future. And second, that the capitalist ruling class.

were not going down without a fight.". So what are the key points of disagreement. between the socialists, the anarchists, the communists, along that, at that time, at the begin, at the end of the 19th century, at the beginning of the 20th century, the possibility of the century laid before us. That eventually led to the first and the second World War. - The idea when the Industrial Revolution came, and Marx was very much a product. of Industrial Revolution era thinking. was, okay, now that we have technology, now that we have science, we can scientifically managed society.

We saw this very much with Woodrow Wilson. and this kind of idea of progressivism that, you know, we could use technology and kind of not capitalism. in their view, unfettered capitalism was wasteful. You're making too much stuff. You have surpluses, you have shortages. If we produce just exactly what we need. and you have these people, engineers, their engineering society, then you know everyone will be happy. and you won't have to have any suffering or waste. So socialism at that time was used as a broad umbrella.

It's not used in the term that it means today. of necessarily state socialism. It just meant the idea. of a having society scientifically run. So you had a huge argument. There are different wings. You even had it from the beginning with Marx versus Bakunin, 'cause Marx was for obviously state socialism, the absolute state running everything. Although even with Marx and Engles, it was a means to an end after man is remade. in his very nature, then the state withers away,

and everyone's equal and, and you have this kind of heaven on earth situation. Bakunin you know, was the opposite. He regarded the state as inherently immoral. and wanted to have kind of like workers collectives. and things like that, and ultra localized control. - So the end was always stateless. It's just that some people viewed this state as a, a convenient, effective, intermediate state. - Well, I think at least Marx and Bakunin, there were plenty of others who just regarded it, you know, have the work, have state owner, have the workers, you know, control. the production via the state. - By the way, how does my hat look?

- [Michael] It looks great. Festive. - Good? It's good? - Yeah, yeah. - Is this is this side better than the other side? - [Michael] I think you want it on this side. so people can see you. - Oh, no, no, no. I want it to, you know, like when you have like hair. - [Michael] Peek-a-boo hair, it's called. Veronica Lake, I think was her name. - And then I just glance. flirtatiously toward the camera sometimes. I gotta stay, don't go anywhere. - [Michael] Sure. - [Lex] I gotta put on gloves. - Oh. (Michael chuckling). No glove, no love.

- The bad, the bad aspect of white gloves is. the blood stains them. So you have to get new ones every time. And now I glance flirtatiously after that. I'm sorry. Okay, Bakunin and Marx, go ahead. - So there were, there were, there were other socialists who did not regard. this kind of end times where the state. would do their way at all. And there were, you know, various strains in between where, you know, you'd have some capitalism and some socialism.

You know, the concept of a safety net. came out of socialist thinking. The Labor Party came outta the Fabian Socialist. in Great Britain. Their, their logo was a wolf in sheep's clothing. And then when that was too on the nose, they changed it to a tortoise, meaning we're gonna get to socialism slowly. in the sense of either gradualism or boiling a frog. And also the big part of this thinking at the time, this is again, the late 19th century, is the idea that there's gonna be. a worldwide workers' revolution.

It wasn't going to be that, you know, in one country, you know, it was gonna happen. And then all the other countries be capitalists. The idea was, all right, like the workers in Germany. have more in common with the workers in America. than the workers in Germany have. with the capitalists in Germany. So the idea is, all right, like the, the working class all over the world, at one point they're gonna be like, we're being exploited. It's getting worse and worse for us. We can't feed our families, we're getting injured and so on and so forth, and there's no compensation for this. We're just gonna overthrow our chains.

and we're gonna run everything ourselves. We're the ones running it already anyway. And you know, the, this was a--. - [Lex] Doing all the work. - And we're doing all the work. So why we, why shouldn't we be getting all the benefit? - What's the role of violence in all of this? - So this was a big source of contention. So the Fabians, for example, in Britain. who were all socialists, they were very heavily. of the idea that we can can do this through the ballot box. We can advocate and agitate and get the people to be voting.

for their own self-interest and furthering the state. at the expense of the capitalist class. Then there were the people who were the hardcore anarchists. who were like, if voting changed anything, they wouldn't let us do it. And the only way to have a revolution. is to have a revolution, to kill, to overthrow, to seize these factories. And this was a big argument. And it also fed into the idea of where does free speech end?

Is it legal to be giving speeches, advocating for violence and revolution? Is it legal? Johann Most, you know, who I discussed in the book. and in "The Anarchist handbook,". he published a book in the 1800s. about how to build dynamite and how to build bombs. And this is a big free speech concern at the time, because now anyone in their own house. can make a bomb and kill lots of people. And this is something that was happening. with enormous frequency at the time.

And people tend to think, you know, 'cause we have these kind of prejudices, or we only remember what's happening now. But this was a, I mean, World War II, oh, excuse me, World War I got started with the assassination. of Archduke Franz Ferdinand. There were lots of peop, McKinley is another one who I discussed in the book, his assassination, there was lots of violence happening very regularly. And with the creation of dynamite, it kind of exponentially. became more dangerous and threatening. Even now on Wall Street, there was a bomb that went off, I think in the 1920s.

And the shards of shrapnel. are still in the JP Morgan building, I believe. - Do you ever think if you were alive during that time, what you would be doing? You think of yourself as an anarchist. - Right. - Would you be, where would you be? Would you be a socialist, a communist? Which parties would you attend? Figuratively and literally. - Well, the thing that was so interesting back then. is there was a woman named Mabel Dodge Luhan, and she ended her days into Taos, New Mexico. She found an artist colony, and she had an apartment on 9th Ave,

9th Street and 5th Avenue in Manhattan. She had a little salon. And everyone got together and talked, and you'd have Emma Goldman, who's an anarchist, Margaret Sanger, who invented Planned Parenthood. and advocated for birth control. And you'd have the people from the wobblies, the, the hardcore labor unions, and everyone kind of, and Adshel Menkin didn't attend, but he was friends with them at all. So there was this very weird, with the birth of modernism in art and, and in kind of modernist thinking, there was this idea of like, all right, like this was the first time where you could be intellectual.

as a class where there really was this space. for people who were thinkers. And they just sat around being like, all right, like, what are we gonna do with ourselves? You know, it, and you had it in modern art, you had it in literature, you had it in politics. So it was a very exciting time. where people were like, all right, like everything is now on the table. What are we gonna do with this? And they very much were aware that this was a break with, you know, the pre-Industrial Revolution. kind of farmer labor era.

- Do you see, do you think for you, violence would be compelling? - No. First of all, I'm just too small. But second, I just--. - Dynamite doesn't care about your size. - Yeah, but I mean, retribution does, and I think, I don't know, but to me, violence is the kind of thing where. you think you're running it, but it's running you. Once you, you know, cross that line, you know, violence sings its own song. So whenever I hear even contemporary times.

where people are advocating for, you know, violent actions, it's like when you start a fire, you're not like, I'm just gonna burn down this house, you know. It, and there's many cases over and over. of people who are building bombs. or trying to assassinate someone or, or things like that. and it ended up literally, literally, literally blowing up in their own face. So, and violence doesn't really work necessarily because, you know, if you have an assassination, you're not assassinating the presidency.

You know, if you take out, you know, a president, there's another president instantly there. So what have you accomplished? Someone's husband, dad is gone. You replaced him with someone who now is in a position. to crack down and retaliate with even more violence. So it, it's, the the calculus for me isn't there. Would I be advocating for it then? Who knows. But I mean, I don't know if I'd be above the space to be. the, I certainly wouldn't have the space. to be a podcaster or like a media personality.

That wasn't really a thing. It to some extent, it was in the 1920s. with the Algonquin Roundtable. and all the people from the New Yorker magazine, but they were all drunks, you know, it was very much. a weird kind of situation to be a thinker. - What would you think you would do? Work at a carnival? You look good in lipsticks, so. - Well, thank you. I look good in anything. What would I, I don't know. I mean, you're not building robots. I mean, you could have been a Tesla, right? - Okay. - [Michael] I didn't mean a car, I meant the person.

- I understand. Oh, thank you for explaining the witty comments to me. I didn't-- - It wasn't witty at all. Because you wouldn't be Einstein, 'cause you're, he was an immigrant. - So I wouldn't work with an immigrant. What does that even mean? - No, you would've been a Tesla like figure. There's already a Tesla, so you wouldn't literally be Tesla. That's why I said a Tesla. - Oh, a Tesla, okay. So, right. Thank you for the explanation. See Michael doesn't only make funny things, he also explains them for you. - It wasn't funny-- - Mansplains them. - It wasn't funny at all. - That I agree with. Okay, so yes, when you achieve.

- [Michael] See this is why Kanye didn't like you. It's this. - All right. I'm, I'm downgrading you from a nine down to an eight. And if you keep talking like this, a five is a real possibility. All right, so vacuum is, the kind of vacuum that's graded with violence is, is usually filled with like a, with a harsh, with a harsher figure. So you don't think violent revolution. ultimately leads to a positive pro,

to positive progress in the short term? - Well, sometimes it does. The American Revolution, I think was a positive example. And overthrowing the czar, which was done peacefully, was a positive example. But again, when violence happens, people get scared. and they want the violence stopped immediately. And that's a call for authoritarianism. and you see it time and time again. And, and they also want retribution. They were like, bring this back to normal. And they don't really worry about things. like civil liberties or things like that. It, it's, it's a very,

and then it also creates this space. for invasion from foreign sources or demagogues, you know, like, oh look, they're killing us in the streets. now you gotta support me. It's a, a very deadly game, obviously. - I remember somebody told me. that, I forget where it was, but they, they told me that from the very beginning. was obvious that communism is an evil system that would, or a system that leads to evil. And to me at least, that's not, if I had to put, put myself in the beginning of the 20th century.

or at the end of the 19th century, that's totally not obvious. They are trying to elevate humanity, the basic worth of a human being, of a hardworking human being, of the working class, of the people that are doing the work. and are striving and just really trying to. build up society with their own hands. It just seems like a beautiful ideal. So I guess the question is, can you see yourself believing in that, in the ideas of socialism and communism? Yeah, let's say if you were living in Russia.

- Oh, yeah, easily. So first of all, I don't think anything is obvious in politics. It's not obvious that, you know, humans have rights. It's not obvious that liberty is better. or the markets, either, either, whether you're for, you know, welfare state. or you're for more free markets, neither of those is obvious. Both of them involve enormous amount of thought. and background information. So when someone says something is obvious in politics, they really mean something is apparent. Well, it's not apparent on its face. that if we all get together.

and promote a society based on equality, and we all chip in. that it's gonna really be good for everyone. I mean, that to me is the promise of communism. And it was also very appealing. to many people because it was new. So the idea was, all right, we've tried it these other ways. There's all these negative consequences. You have all these slums, you have people getting, you know, fired and then they have no recourse.

You have women with 10 kids. and they can't feed their kids, infant mortality, you don't have sanitation, you don't have food. You know, everyone's illiterate and uneducated. And then here's saying, look, if we all chip in together, everyone will have clothes. Everyone will have food, everyone will be educated, everyone will do their part. It's gonna be rough in the short period. That's a very compelling case to be made for communism. It's really easy in many ways. when something hasn't been tried. to make it sound compelling.

because you just talk about how great it's gonna be. And then no one, no one, you know, people are always arguing about how like Venezuela. and Sweden like, oh, we, you know, you want democratic socialism to be like Sweden. You don't want to be like Venezuela. The Venezuelans didn't vote for Venezuela, they voted for Sweden, they ended up with Venezuela. So it's, I think, and the thing with the communism, especially at that era, it was very much a correlated. with people who are too smart for their own good.

Because they had the idea that if we are just put in charge. instead of these like business people. or these heirs to great estates, if the people who are smart and get it like us, I don't mean you and me like the people at the time. who were advocating for it, once we are in charge, since we are good people. and we want what's best for everyone, we are gonna make sure everyone's taken care of. And you know, they always talked about. how much they cared about the little guy. And so I'm sure some of them meant it a lot. And they're like, look, if the guy in charge.

is very much concerned with the little guy, he's not gonna slip between the cracks. and it's just gonna be absolutely great. And we don't have to worry about, you know, you know, the capitalist class. just basically exploiting people. and having these huge estates. while these people can't even feed their own families. - Since we have a little bit of momentum. Can you steel man the case for socialism, at that time and even today? I don't know if it's, I don't know if there's a rhyme and similarity to those,

to socialism as implemented at that time. and what could possibly be implemented today, but maybe you can dance between the two. - The steel man argument for socialism is. if you have everything up to private industry, you do not have a guarantee. that someone won't fall between the cracks. And the other concern is, in any other context, if someone is, let's suppose mentally ill, right through no fault of their own, and they, or someone's handicapped, you know,

they can't feed themselves. or mentally disabled or something like that, if you have everything up to charity, some if this, you see this with like endangered species, right. The species that are cute, it's easy to raise money for them to protect them. Some weird kind of frog somewhere. that no one cares about, you can't raise money for it. There's, people's interests. are to what they find interesting. So if someone is someone who's like, not socially appealing in some way, whatever capacity, they're gonna fall between the cracks.

and they're screwed. Under socialism, if you have a government taking care of everything, no one is left behind. You are guaranteed that the lowest of the low. and the worst of the worst. are still going to make sure. that they're not starving the street or just left behind. So that is a big moral case. to be made for having the state running everything. In terms of economics, it's a lot harder. But the argument there would be,

it's why it's, it's not fair, a term which in my view. does not actually have a good meaning. But it's not fair that because you were born a Rockefeller. and I was born in Poland, that you never have to worry about food. for the rest of your life. Whereas I have to worry about, you know, paying for a doctor for my kid. Like, you just, you won this lottery when you're born. and now I have to be screwed. and I have to respect all your property. Why? So that is another strong argument to be made for socialism.

And the other argument is, if you have a media apparatus. that is operated under profit-seeking principles, it is going to feed into people's worst qualities, most basic animal-like qualities. and sensationalist qualities, and will be used as a mechanism for capitalist control. Whereas if the government, which represents all of us, all of us is running things, then everyone will have a right. to have their voice heard and won't be manipulated.

That's the argument. - What about the reaching towards the stateless version? Sort of, because you espouse the ideas of anarchism, it kind of has the same conclusion, which is reaching towards the removal of the state. to where we, I guess have. some distributed reallocation of resources. that are quote unquote fair. - But the thing is, the, the Marxist vision of the state withering away. and becoming anarchism,

it's really kind of like the underpants gnomes, because it's like step--. - Tell me more. - I will. Step one. - Hmm. - You have Marx. - Tell me slowly. I'm sorry. - You have full communism. The state's running everything, including education. Step two, question mark. Step three, anarchism. So their idea was that after enough time, the nature of man himself. was going to change, and then the government would be superfluous. because we would all be.

equal and we would all naturally or socially, whatever term they would use, want to act the part that we would need to do. And in fact, Reagan had a great joke about this, where there were two, where there were two commissars, I think in Moscow. And one of 'em, they're walking around, they're going, is this it, is this full? Have we done it? Have we reached full communism? The other goes, oh no, it's gonna get a hell of a lot worse. So, you know, that's kind of the, the counterargument to that. - Do you think culture society can change the nature of man?

- [Michael] No. - So no matter, you don't think this idea that, for example, America has been founded on that all men are created equal, that that idea can't permeate the culture. and in thereby change how we see each other, how we think of the basic worth of a human being. and thereby change our nature. - Doesn't change our, that's epigenetic. I don't, I don't think that that changes the nature of man. I think, for example,

if I say someone, at which I agree with that, if someone is innocent to have proven guilty, they're not literally innocent. They're regarded in a legal context as innocent, but that person is or is not a murderer. or thief or so on and so forth. So we can legally and ethically regard everyone as equal. But as Thomas Sowell pointed out, a human being isn't even equal to himself. over the course of a day. Twins who are genetic clones are not equal to one another. So it is a important thing legally,

and it's a good yardstick, but it's not literally true. - But don't you think that law becomes ethics? So we, that like idea of justice starts to like, we start to internalize it, that we just, the way we behave, the way we think about the world, the way--. - No, I, I think it's a complete red herring. because no one is. - [Lex] No, you're a red herring. - Okay. - [Lex] See what I did there? (Michael speaking in foreign language). - Because someone is,

people are still going to always prefer. their family to strangers or they're in group to out group. So in terms of you're gonna have equality, that means it's gonna not matter to you. whether someone is your mom or someone is, you know, someone down the street. And I don't see how that will ever become the case. - Do you think it would, it would be possible. if you were an intellectual. like you are at the beginning of the 20th century, would you be able to predict. the rest of the 20th century? - No, I don't think at all.

I think there was so many. out of nowhere turns. that no one would've seen their, them coming. And as an example, Lenin seizing power. and making the Bolshevik revolution a reality. was regarded as utopian and insane. The fact that he pulled it off is close to miraculous, and it was quite literally unprecedented. The fact that, so that's a very big one. - Which aspect of it, sorry to interrupt.

Which aspect was hard to predict? That a singular figure, which is some ideas, would be able to take so much power? - And maintain that power and remake that society. so drastically, so quickly despite such opposition. - Also not just a set of temporary protests. by hooligans that lead to. turmoil in the short term, but then stabilizes, but literally changes the entirety of the society. - Yeah. Lutgendorf, who is the German general, he's like, all right, we gotta get this, the Russians out of World War I. He's the one who's like, all right,

let's get this lunatic Lenin who already tried, tried and failed to have a revolution in Russia. Let's send him back there. and he's just gonna cause problems to everybody. and it's gonna be great 'cause it's gonna weaken Russia. and then our Eastern front. isn't gonna have to be a problem. And then to his surprise, and everyone elses including, you know, anarchists and communist worldwide, they pulled off this, you know, October Revolution. and then for a while it's like, all right, I mean, I mean, I think my understanding is even people at the time. in St. Petersburg and in Moscow were like, what,

what does this even mean, right? Like, no one took it seriously. And then very quickly you had the Cheka and, and the secret police. and all these other kind of implementations. of the, you know, the communist state. And people are like, oh, they're not messing around. But they're like, all right, this is, this is not gonna last for, for long. And, you know, the USA, the US and A, we didn't even recognize the Soviet Union's legitimacy. for a very long time. There were no diplomatic relations. And after a certain point, it's like, who's the, if you don't recognize Lenin and Stalin's government,

who's the government of this, of Russia or the Soviet Union? Is it the Czar? Like you have to recognize it. It's just, it's, they're not going anywhere. So that was something that was not, I think, very predictable. The Great Depression in retrospect, there were certain things that were predictable, but it was not at all the case that it needed to last. as long as it did in the states as FDR made it do. So there's all sorts of things. I mean, if they. fought Germany's remilitarization,

you know, World War, World War II could have been prevented. if you didn't have the Treaty of Versailles, would you have the hyperinflation? Would you have Hitler? These are all, I think, choose your own adventure moments. where things could have gone in other directions. I don't, I don't, I don't believe this kind of idea. This, this is a very Marxist idea that like, history is inevitable. and once you start with certain premises, the contradictions kind of unfold. I think that's ridiculous. - I feel that there's power in the Santa Claus outfit. - [Michael] Yeah? - I mean, it's a fundamentally communist idea, right?

- How? - Santa Claus, arbitrary redistribution of wealth. - It's not redistribution. - Well, at least I decide who's good and bad. - Yeah. - Only I, only I know this. And I mean I am somehow getting funding from someone, right? - No. - Okay, listen, there's a, I have so much to teach you. - You have a workshop. - Little Michael. Workshop, yeah. And how many people do you think are employed. in this workshop? - [Michael] They're slaves. - Yes. - [Michael] I don't know how many elves are in the workshop?

- I think the rest of you. are gonna have to look into it. No anyway, and the red colors and everything, is that the biggest holiday of all time, Christmas? Like, just in terms of. the intensity of the festivities? - No, I think Christmas is a very recent phenomenon. I think historically it was not a big deal. - No, I know historically it has not been. But in terms of how much it captivates, how intense it is, I guess from a capitalist perspective, like how much is going on, how visual it is, how intense it is. - I think-- - How it grabs. a whole population.

- I think it's because the idea of Christmas. is probably the, one of the most powerful holiday ideas. Easter's probably up there. Easter's obviously up there. 'cause you have Christ resurrect, Christ dying, his resurrection. So that's kind of a big one. But Christmas is this symbol of. brotherhood and kindness and magnanimity. You know, one of the things I despise about our culture. is this glor, and something I'm fighting very heavily with this book, or at least attempting to, is this glorification of cynicism. This kind of like, oh, you like this song?

That's cute. It's stupid. Whereas Christmas is the one time of year. where you could be happy and joyous and kind, and people don't get to roll their eyes at you. They get to stop being too cool for school. and they get to be like, you know, I'm, I enjoy your friendship. Your, your my sister, my brother, my dad, my mom, whatever. And it's the, you know, it was Ayn Rand's favorite holiday, I adore it. And especially Christmas in New York.

And it's just this idea of like, even though we're cold and it's dark outside, you know, it's still this kind of like, it's still cozy and you, and the next let's hope the next year is 'cause with, with with Russians, Ded Moroz, Santa comes on New Year's. So it's kind of like, let's make this next year an even better one. So it's very much the holiday of hope and joy. - Yeah. And like love for family, for friendship. - [Michael] And kindness and benevolence, yeah. - And like almost the whole, that whole rat race of chasing material possessions.

and all that gets put on hold for a brief moment. It just all goes quiet. - But it's also about giving people material possessions. Like here, like I value you. This is something that brings you joy, yeah. - Yeah, you write in the book, which by the way, people should go get, buy it right now. if you support this podcast. or if you support. the ridiculous outfits that Michael's wear, wears. The more books you buy, the more outfits he is gonna wear. - I've got two, my next two appearances on the show, assuming I don't burn this bridge,

I've got some good ones. - This bridge. has been burning for a long time. We've been, we've been going across the road by canoe at this point. Next time we're gonna be swimming. - How the hell are you gonna swim? You're made outta lead. - It is true. Sink to the bottom. Get dragged across by rope. Okay, you write in the book, "cynics like to lie and call themselves realists, hoping for positive outcomes. Can this be dismissed as being naive or utopian?".

Can you elaborate on this point? Just like you said right now, I mean, it seems like a, I don't know if it's a fundamental characteristic. of our society today or just societies throughout history, but there is a cynicism. You write in the Soviet Union, it was a really, there's a deep cynicism. - [Michael] That was good at the end, yeah. - And, but there is a cynicism today as well, at least in like public discourse. - [Michael] Yes. - [Lex] Why does it happen and how can we fight it?

- I think it is easy. to be like, eh, everything sucks. You know, I had a, my friend Luxe, she was a blogger, she was an author. She had this great line 'cause you know, we worked in media. and she's like, if you're ever at a party. and someone starts talking about a new app or website. and you don't know anything about it, just say, oh, I was on that for a while, it sucked. And and that's all you need to say. I'm like, Luxe, that's a great line. But I, I think it is,

and especially I'm sure you had to, you experienced this as well with your family. I certainly did with mine. There's this idea, especially in Russian culture, but in American culture to some extent as well, where if you have aspirations, I remember there was this show called "Russian Dolls". It was, oh, I just got it, like the (speaking in foreign language). Okay, I just got it. That's the name, okay. The show was called "Russian Dolls". It was about Brighton Beach, which is the Russian Jewish neighborhood in Brooklyn. It was supposed to be their version of Jersey Shore,

it was on Lifetime and it had no ratings. And I remember the last four episodes they had to burn them. So they just ran it through. like 8:00 AM to 10:00 AM one day. And there was this one scene where the, one of the girls, I forget her name, probably Natalia. And she'd been in college. and she had been wondering. what she wanted to major in, right? And I, this story was so perfect, I'm sure I've told it before. And she took an aptitude test. and she went with her mom. to get like mani pedis or something. and she goes, mom, you know, I've had like 80 majors. I didn't know what I wanted to do.

And she goes, I took this aptitude test, it really made sense to me. I am gonna go to law school, I want to be a lawyer. That's something I enjoy. And the first thing outta her mom's mouth is, how are you gonna pay for it? And the girl, and I really related. 'cause if you didn't have this Russian upbringing, you watched it, you would think her reaction was completely insane. She just lost it, just screaming. She's like, people pay for law school all the time. I'll figure out a way. Why is your first reaction to look for a problem? Why is your first response to be like, oh, what are you sure you've thought this through?

I have been struggling with one problem for years, what I wanted to do for a living. - Yeah. - And now like, as soon as I solve this one big problem of identity, your first reaction is like, let's find a new problem. Why is that your? Instead of let's figure out how we're gonna pay for it. And that kind of approach is so. deadly and it, it gnaws at you. And I always, I don't like giving people advice because I, who the hell am I? And also, if I don't know the context of the problem, I'm not informed enough to give advice.

But this is piece of advice. that I do feel comfortable giving. If you are someone who has around you, people who, as soon as you have any accomplishment. or any hope that their first reaction. is to be like, well what about this, you have to get rid of them or sit them down, maybe give 'em a chance. Because that is something that is such, so demoralizing and it drains you. And it's like, you know the example I've used all the time, all the time, all the time. I say, if you wanna be an author, right,

you can go to any bookstore. and look at all the shitty shitty books, like "The White Pill". and you could say to yourself, I could be this shitty author. You don't have to be Hemingway. - So people should buy your book just to know. it doesn't take much. It really does not take much. - What shitty writing is all about. And boring. - Yeah. You could just pick a random, random period in history. and just write a bunch of crap about it. - [Michael] Yes. - And and put a pretty stamp on the cover and just go. - [Michael] It was pretty, yeah.

- Yeah. - But I mean like, like for you, right? - Yeah. - Like not, you don't, I don't mean you Lex--. - I was raised by the wolves. - The, the wolf bots. There's lots of standup comedians who aren't Jerry Seinfeld. - Yeah. - Right. If you wanna be a podcaster, you don't have to be Joe Rogan. You could be someone who's got a medium audience. and are enjoying it. So like the idea that like something has to be, you have to be a massive superstar or you're a failure. is also ridiculous. But that's cynicism. - I mean you can even be a failed comedian like Dave Smith.

- Who? - Yeah I don't, there's a generic name I came up with as an example. I think he has like a podcast of some kind he said. - Sounds like it. - Yeah. Not very funny. I don't know why he would call himself a comedian. But you-- - Maybe he's being ironic. (chuckling). - Don't you think? Yeah, so even, even then you could do something special. - [Michael] I remember what you did with me. in the movie theater. - What's that? I don't is, oh, you continue. Can you explain the jokes? Because I can't. - No. I'm not explaining jokes. I'm wearing lipstick.

Isn't that enough? - Now I remember what you did to me in a movie theater. and you wore lipstick that night too. - [Michael] Not when I was done. - People for sure will think this, this feels like a gay porn, like, like a very long intro. - [Michael] Because we're not wearing pants? - Yes. There's many reasons why this feels like this. and the outfits and just everything about this. - [Michael] How would you know? - I, my friend, I have stories. - [Michael] I thought you don't, I thought I don't have friends.

- They're, they're all suspiciously named either Lex or Lux. or some variation. Like you lack complete creativity. just like in the writing of your book. - [Michael] Or Lux, yeah. - It's, it's like you, you didn't even use like a thesaurus for your book. The same words over and over and over. - That's so bad. - The sad thing about the cynicism is like, I don't think it's just the Russian thing. I think the, the people--. - No, the, let me interrupt you. 'cause I didn't finish what you were saying earlier. In America, it's not just a Russian thing.

- Yeah. - In American culture, if you have like a sitcom or a musical, it's regarded as less legitimate than a drama, right? Like if something's gotta be about someone's struggling. or someone's suffering, whereas this is like a joyous happy story. Like maybe something like Pixar, right? Like sure they have conflict. and they're going for something, but it's overall the background the universe is taking in. is very joyous and happy. That is regarded artistically. as less legitimate than something which is dark.

and the background is despair. And that very subtly sends a very, to me pernicious message that the, you know, that what's real is despair. and happiness is the aberration. And I think if you have that as your mindset, you're setting yourself up for maybe not failure, but certainly not happiness. - Yeah. But that's in the, the figures, the ideas that the culture elevates. But at the local personal life of parents and teachers,

that still happens a lot. In Russia and here, just my whole life, especially cause I'm a weirdo, I've been kind of told to. basically be less weird. Be, there's a kind of. sense in where there's a certain path. you're supposed to take in life. and every time you have a little bit of success. on those very specifically defined paths, you're pushed to do more and more and more on those paths.

as opposed to celebrating the full complexity of the weirdo. that each one of us is, and I certainly am. And I just, teachers even friends. and certainly family have constantly been. very cynical about my aspirations, my dreams and so on. I think that actually created. a deeply self-critical engine in my brain. that I think it ultimately was productive.

because it was also. balanced by just an internal, maybe through genetics thing I have of optimism. about the world of just seeing the beauty in the world. But it is weird looking back how much the, how much people that love me were trying to bring me down. - Yeah. - It's so strange. - It, it's also very hurtful for me. because when I graduated college, it was important for me. to be self-made and not take money from my family. And I remember my grandma, this was a huge argument, an ongoing argument.

And one time she, you know, as we were leaving, as she was leaving my house, she slipped money in under the door. and I threw it out and it, it made me so angry. Or like one year for my birthday. she gave me I think like $500, which was a lot of money, you know, when you're like 22 or 23. And I was so pissed. because that told me. that they didn't believe. that I'd be able to feed myself or make it on my own. And I understand their mindset, but it's like I'm not, I wasn't, you know,

I never was never hungry. Like maybe I couldn't, I remember I'd have to wait on the subway. 'cause I couldn't afford a cab. So, but that was a sacrifice I had to make, you know, I had to wait that half hour. So it was a huge source. and remains a source of enormous tension and contention. And I think also, I'm sure speaking to your upbringing, in their minds, unless you're going into an office, you can't pay the rent. It doesn't make sense. So, and--. - But there's just, like you said, forget the office,

forget all that. No matter what, there's always, whatever you accomplish in life, you always do, you're always negative about your current position. You always come up with another problem, just like you said. - I-- - There's always, it is like a self-generating problem box. - Yeah, I remember I didn't speak to my dad for a few years, then I'm like, let me give this guy another chance. And in that time period, Harvey Pekar the author of subject of "American Splendor".

the movie and author of the series of comic books, he and I became friends. and he was writing a graphic novel about me. And when I met with my dad, I'm like, oh, someone's writing a book about me. And he goes, I know, so. And it was one of those moments where I'm like, wow, you're an asshole. and not the kind of asshole I am. You're just like not a good person. And I don't know, or really at this point care, what the motivation or if there was no motivation, what the visceral emotional reasoning for that.

But that kind of thing is something I, you know, much later now in life, have absolutely no tolerance for. - Well in my, in my own private life, I try to forgive and love those people. But it is, there've been a few in my life like this. And I think they are, they are incredible people if you allow yourself to see it. But they're flawed, and so I try to forgive them. That said, it is true. that the people that are close to you, especially family,

have a disproportionate psychological effect on you. - Yes. - So you have to be. very careful having them in your life too much. Like one thing is to love them. and the other is to actually, you know, allow yourself to flourish. Surround yourself with people that help you flourish. And like you said, the advice there is is really powerful, especially early on to have people that believe in you. in whatever crazy big dreams you have, that pat you on the back and say you got this kid. - And-- - So valuable.

- Here's the other thing, if you try. and you don't make it to that Rogan level, it's okay. Like, I have several books that I've written. that are on my hard drive. that have not been published. and they were a lot of work. and it was really disappointing when they were went out. and no publishers were interested in them. And maybe I'll publish 'em one day, maybe I won't. Point being, it's fine. I tried. - [Lex] Is it a romance novel? - One is, one is a--. - A gay romance novel? Does it have a Santa, guy in a Santa outfit?

- Can you please stop asking me to send you gay pornography? He's calling me up all hours of the night. I need more gay porn. I need some ones. I only have zeroes. - Yeah. Never enough, never enough. - No, I, this one almost got a book deal. This was, would've been, it was 16 years ago. It was a, it was a, a lad lit novel. - [Lex] What kind of novel? - Lad lit. It's like Nick Hornby. - What? - Nick Hornby, "About a boy". So there was a little mini genre.

of these books about young men. trying to struggle their way through is a whole little, there's there's a whole little series of them. "Fight Club" is adjacent to that. It's not literally lad lit. - I feel like you would write. a great "Fight Club" type novel, you know? - You know, "Fight Club's" much, and Chuck Palahniuk is my understanding admitted this, "Fight Club" is one the few things where the movie. is better than the book. - Oh, that's interesting. But the movie's so iconic. Yeah, for sure. But still isn't there a deeply like philosophical,

it's kinda like David Foster Wallace novels. isn't, doesn't it, it doesn't "Fight Club" capture some moment in time. that's very kind of--. - Well I was hanging with Kurt Metzger a couple weeks ago, comedian very, failed--. - Name drop. - Yeah. Hey Kurt. - [Lex] Watch out. - And he was, he had this great story. He was hanging out with Patrice O'Neil, the late comedian. - [Lex] Name drop. - One of the great comics of all time. And Patrice goes, Kurt was talking about how much he liked the book. or the movie "Fight Club". and Patrice like that is the whitest book on earth.

He goes, your problem in life. is you don't have enough violence. Your problem in life, you need someone to beat you up. That's not a problem for me. - Yeah, well the, I mean, but still it's, it is, it is a very white book, but it, it's still captures a kind of anger and an angst. and a certain subculture and society. - Yes, yes. - That's really powerful. That probably led to in some part of the thing. you wrote about in "The New Right". - [Michael] Oh, for sure. - Came about. - I mean it was. this kind of like,

there's that line in the movie where. Edward Norton says, I'm a 30 year old boy. This kind of question of what is it, sorry to be Matt Walsh, but what does it mean to be a man, right? What is masculinity mean? What are, why are so many men. so at such a young age, feeling so lost? This idea that like if I fill my house with nice furniture, that's still not gonna be fulfilling to anyone. - Matt Wa, who's, Matt Walsh is? - [Michael] He's from the Daily Wire. He just documentary called "What is a Woman?". - [Lex] Can you explain? . I don't know who he is. - So Matt Walsh. is someone who works for a Daily Wire.

- Yes. - And he just recently. did a documentary called "What is a Woman", I think it was called. And he went out to lots of people working in gender theory. and all that thing. And he asked them to defi, and he went to the Messai in Africa, the tribe, and to talk to people about transgenderism, non-binary, which is a word I know you hate. And the documentary was surprisingly well done. - Is that like a passive aggressive compliment? Surprisingly well done. - Well because Matt is very.

aggressive on Twitter. - Sure. - We follow each other. and there was a lot of opportunities in this film. for him to really be like blah, blah, blah. And instead to his credit, he let the people speak and it, it's possible it was edited a certain way, of course. It was obviously edited. But when he's just asked them, can you just define woman for me? And playing dumb or not playing dumb, just saying, what's your opinion? A lot of the people he was speaking to. were getting extremely agitated. So it worked in that kind of context as well.

It was not his usual style. - Speaking of which, do you ever regret your behavior on Twitter? - There were a couple of times, but very rarely. - Can you describe the big strategy. before we dive back into the October Revolution? - [Michael] My strategy--. - Do you have a strategy or is it, does it come from the heart. or does it come from the brain? - It comes from, I want to have fun.

So that's literally what it comes down to. It's like, this is--. - Girls just want to have fun. - Are you drunk? What is, what are you, what is in there? - I'm very cheeky. I have the holiday spirit, even though it's not the holidays. - Oh, that's eggnog in there. - I'm delirious. I did not sleep much last night. I've been, which is I think. the second time we talked or the third time. The second time, I stayed up almost all night. - Oh, I know. I keep track of when you come and go. - Yeah. - So my door camera points at your garage, so I know when you're leaving or coming home.

- My camera points at your bedroom from the inside--. - So you can stare directly--. - [Lex] I shouldn't told you that, no. - Let me ask you this. 'cause there's something's been bothering me. - [Lex] Yes. - There was a chair that you threw out. - [Lex] Yep. - And I. - Broken. - And I was looking at my camera and I'm like, let me see when he threw this out. And then one time you went to the garbage. and you adjusted it to make it. stick out of the garbage even more. What were you doing there? - What was I, oh, to, to make sure that people know there's a chair in there. - Is that really what you, what?

- Well, like the garbage person, so they know it's a chair, so they don't get like, I always think I don't want them. to get like hurt or whatever. - Oh, okay. - Like they open the thing, it's like chair. - Oh, got it. - I don't know. I don't know what I was thinking. - [Michael] Okay. It was really odd. - I didn't know how to get rid of a chair. It was broken. - Yeah, yeah. - It was like cracked and I didn't, it was, it was a problem. - So Twitter for me, I, my point is to have fun, it's also fun to kind of smack down people. who I regard as bad actors. and also kind of to promote news that I find interesting. that maybe isn't as prominently part of the culture.

as it might otherwise be. - Do you think sometimes you draw. too broadly the category of people that are bad actors. and then some thereby. sort of adding to the, the mockery and the cynicism in the world? - I don't think mockery and cynicism are at all synonymous. I think cynicism means everyone sucks. I don't think everyone sucks. I think it is undeniable that a lot of people suck. - What if I told you most people don't suck? Could you, could you,

could you steel man the case that most people don't suck? - Sure. I can do it in a cynical way, honestly. A quasi cynical way. - Yeah. - But I think most people are neither here nor there. Most people just kind of go with the flow. They're amiable. Human beings are social creatures. They wanna get along. They don't want to cause problems. They don't have the capacity to be the target of a problem. So most people, I mean, if people, if most people sucked, then going anywhere would be a excruciating ordeal, right.

Like literally any, like the airport's annoying, but if most people sucked, it would really be annoying, you know, go in the supermarket, be really annoying. So I don't think most people suck, but I do think that in public discourse, there are lots of people. who are dishonest about their agenda. For example, if I'm, you know, I could be a someone who has promoting a certain ideology, but I'm in the payroll of a candidate or you know, my thing tank needs this to happen or I'm,

I'm being paid for someone, something like that. So that sort of thing I think happens all the time. There's the line I have in the book, Upton Sinclair, I forgot how he exact, he worded it exactly. But it's very hard to convince someone of something. if his payroll depends on him. not being convinced of it, right. So I think things like that are, the thing I'm really excited about. with what Elon's doing with Twitter and I, I'm just ecstatic about this, is to have the context now. So you'll have a politician making a claim. and they're gonna word it in certain ways. Like my favorite example is when people are like,

if you look at the years 2002 to 2020, terrorism in America, it's like, did anything happen in 2001? Is there a reason you're just coincidentally. started in 2002? Like things like that. So when people are manipulating things. to force an outcome that they want. and to promote an idea that they want disingenuously. to have that underneath that in Twitter now. where the audience provides context, I think is something extremely useful. And it's a great way to nip propaganda in the bud.

and propaganda pervades. the entire political spectrum, of course. - And the interesting thing about Twitter. is also the discussion about free speech and so on. I think it's interesting to discuss free speech. and the freedom of the press. from the context of the Soviet Union. - [Michael] Sure. - Let's return to the October Revolution. - Yeah. - And Lenin. What was the October Revolution? What, who was Lenin? What are some interesting aspects of this, this human being and also this moment in history.

that stand out to you that are important to understand? - I think the. interesting thing about Lenin. is he was a zealot. and he was a visionary. and he really kind of meant it. And I'm skipping ahead a little bit, but Lenin also was someone who was strategic. So at a certain point when they were trying to advance. communism throughout the Soviet Union. and the costs were outweighing the benefits, he did a strategic retreat,

he did the new economic policy. You had a rise of kind of these. small capitalists coming back. You could hire people again. And for the hardcore people in the Soviet Union, hardcore communist, this was a huge betrayal. It's a step back. He didn't do it because he was. some kind of crypto capitalist. He did it because he's like, all right, we know where we gotta get to, but we have to go at a certain pace. and we have to adjust as we go along. So to have someone who is that much of an ideologue. and that much of a visionary, but still to have any element of pragmatism to him is,

I think a very rare combination. - And that pragmatism, do you think that's ultimately where things go wrong? Sort of. that's where you sacrifice the ideas. - Pragmatism is, in this case was good. because by taking a step back, you know, he kind of gave himself some breathing room. to allow the revolution to continue to win the Civil War. There was a big moment where Germany, it, this, it's just, there's lots of like little funny anecdotes that I learned.

while researching this book. So, you know, they were Germany and Russia, they were negotiating stale, a ceasefire. 'cause they wanted, Germany wanted Russia outta the war. And basically Germany was like, all right, you, we will let you leave, but you have to sign this treaty. And basically hand over all this land. that we're currently occupying. It was just parts of Ukraine, parts of Poland. And Lenin tells Trotsky to stall. He's just run the clock. Because he was of the belief. that now that they've taken power in Russia,

you're gonna have a worldwide workers revolution. So he's like, just, just stall them. And he stalled, he stalled. At a certain point, Germany's like, all right, you're signing this tomorrow, or we're invading. And Trotsky basically said, yeah, so we're leaving the war, but we're not signing anything. And the Germans are like, what? And he's like, yeah, well that's what we're doing, so hey. And basically it eventually he had to sign the treaty. and cede huge parts of land and a lot of money. And this was a very precarious moment for him.

to maintain control of Russia. And people were telling him like, you've lost huge amounts of territory. You know, you, you've blown it. You should be in jail. And he's like, watch your mouth, because if you look forward the future, it'll be clear which one of us. is more likely to be the one ending up in jail. And he was absolutely right. - This was Troskey or Lenin saying? - This is Lenin saying this to Carl Raddick. - Ah. So who are these figures here? Who's Troskey? Who's Lenin? Who's Stalin? What are some interesting aspects of all of this?

What are sort of just to linger on it, the personalities, the ideas that were important? - Well, Trotsky came late to Bolshevism. He was really the brains in many ways. of the October Revolution. He was an amazing strategist. He never forgot that he was in amazing strategist, had a very high opinion of himself. - And by the way, the October Revolution, 1917, that's like a key moment. Of course, the Russian Revolution lasted a long time. But this was a key moment of what the,

the face shift towards success of the Bolsheviks. - Well, that was the moment that was like, all right, we are the government now. - Yeah. - And now we have to make, it's a, you know, like Thomas Jefferson said, I think it was Thomas Jefferson, or no, it's Ben Franklin a republic. If you can keep it, it's like, all right, we've made our own kind of government, if we can keep it. 'cause that was the big question. You had international blockade, you had the white armies, the czars forces who want to restore czarism, or at least the, the parliament from right before Lenin took over.

So this was a big kinda no one's was, you know, in some ways it was like the 2016 election. It's like, all right, we voted in Trump. Whoa, what's this gonna look like? Like no one, no one had any idea. of what a Trump presidency was gonna look like. All we knew was this guy's on Twitter running his mouth. He's insulting people. And he, he's had all these views some are over here, some are over there. - And the funny thing is, the Russians hacked both elections. (chuckling). - That's true. See, that's true. It was Putin and the Gremlin. So Trotsky was, you know, Lenin's right hand man.

And he was, you know, enormous. And to this day, he remains this kind of figure. who is supposedly a less authoritarian, anti Stalinist version of communism that people can endorse. And Stalin of course was Lenin's successor. At first there was a triumvirate running Russia. as Lenin was recuperating from strokes. Then very quickly, not very quickly, but gradually,

and then suddenly Stalin became an absolute dictator. And he had a series of, of purges and so and so forth, which solidified his control over the country. - And of course for Stalin, Trotsky later, but throughout, as you write, seemed to almost take on a supernatural character. where in everything that went wrong, and the USSR was due not just to his views, but to his direct orders from abroad. And of course, George Orwell brilliantly,

and probably my favorite book of his, which is "Animal Farm" and also "1984". portrayed Trotsky ask, as Snowball in "Animal Farm". and Emmanuel Goldstein in "1984". as this embodiment of this evil. that will always have to be fighting. And you need that in order to hold, hold onto power. You always have to have that enemy. - Right, so that, I mean, that's something I talk about in, in "The White Pill" as well.

When things start going wrong, they always have to have scapegoats, right. And there's this Russian anecdote, you know, what the Russians like to do is, you can't say things out loud, but if you make jokes, you can say unspeakable truths. And there's this one anecdote where. there's a Russian leader and things are going bad. And he looks in his drawer. and there were two letters from his predecessor. And he opens the first letter in a panic, and the letter says, you know, for advice. And the letter says, blame everything on me. So he goes out there and he is like, oh, my predecessor sucked. He was terrible, blah, blah, it's his fault.

And everyone's like, okay. And then there's a calamity again. And he's like, oh crap. So he goes back at his desk and he reads a second one, and it says, sit down and write two letters. So the, when things start going wrong, as they constantly did throughout the history. of the Soviet Union or any, you know, totalitarian and authoritarian country, it's someone has to be the blame. Since we know that our ideology is true. and scientifically true, if it's not working in reality, given the perfection of the ideology, someone must be intentionally.

undermining it and causing the disconnect. between thought and reality. And in the Soviet Union, there were think it was the Kulaks at one point, then it was the wreckers, the doctors, it was just different. The cap, there was always someone to, and Trotsky was called a fascist. and was accused of plotting with Hitler. and all this other stuff. - And you also write, the problem with communism. is that eventually you run out of possible scape boat. - [Michael] Scape boats. - Scape boats.

You run outta boats. - You do run outta boats. - Who's gonna carry them? Eventually you run outta possible scapegoats. It's, it's, it's my second language, this English thing. I'm a failed podcaster. I'm a failure. Eventually you run out a possible scapegoats for failure, at which point acknowledging. or even noticing that something was wrong itself. becomes a form of treason. - Yeah. So I saw that in North Korea, right?

Wherever you went in North Korea, something was wrong. So if you have four buttons for the elevator, one would be mismatched. Every wall had a crack, every floor had a stain. The bathroom would be rusted through. when you wanted to flush the urinal. But if you are someone who points this out, you're a troublemaker. and you're, oh, you're, oh, you're saying something's wrong. You're criticizing the operation. You're, first of all, you're, you're threatening the person who's in charge. 'cause now they're incompetent. and now that's a big red flag for them. But second, if you're just going around saying,

this is wrong, this is wrong, this is wrong, even if it's objectively true, you are troublemaker and you're counter revolutionary. So at a certain point, everyone just has to put on blinders. and pretend that everything is fine. At one example I used in the book, an extreme example was there was a photography professor. and he pointed out to his class. and he was an older man that before the revolution, the quality of photographic paper was better. And he was, I think, executed for this heresy. So yeah, you have to pretend there was, I just, I'm reading a book right now. about the Chinese cultural revolution.

and there was an academic, I forget his name, Hu Shi, I think, and he points out that in these countries, not only do you not have freedom of speech, you don't have freedom of silence. You can't just sit there quietly. You have to say how great things are. and how much you're enjoying. and how wonderful they are instead of just keeping quiet. 'Cause if you keep quiet, that's suspicious. - [Lex] Yeah, those. - They're always singing those songs. about how happy they are and how great everything is. And if everyone else is singing,

who are you to sing, not sing? - Yeah, those pictures, especially when, you know, when it's Stalin giving speeches and everyone is applauding. any dictator, and you do, you don't want to be the, the first person that stops applauding. - Stalin had to have a button, is my understanding at a certain point. to tell people to stop applauding. 'cause they're, like you said, if you're the first one to stop clapping, people are gonna notice. and why'd you stop clapping? You don't like Stalin? - [Lex] But just imagine being one of those people clapping. - But that's the thing, they,

they always had a sword over their head and they had, but they all had a lot of blood on their hands too. It's a very, very precarious life. - But there's also, I mean, "1984" does a good job of this. What is that, like two minutes of hate. or something like this? - Yes. - You like lose yourself in the, in the hysteria of it, in the hyster. So there's some level of which at first it's, you're sacrificing your basic individualistic. ability to think,

but then you get lost in this kinda. wave of emotion and you give into it, you allow yourself, it's like a mix of fear and then anger, and then you direct that anger towards. like Snowball or Trotsky or whoever the, and like I don't what is that? - You're also losing yourself in the crowd. - [Lex] Yeah. You're losing-- - Because you're like, it's not just I'm angry, everyone I know, we're all angry together. So you really are becoming a part of something. bigger than yourself. And having this kind of communal, very primal emotional experience. It's like the opposite of Christmas, right?

Christmas we're all together, everyone's sharing their joy, everyone's sharing their love. This is the opposite, literally the opposite. Like everyone's together sharing. their hate and anger and rage, but you're all kind of having a mind meld. - But I wonder what it's like. to be an independent thinker in those, in those moments. Like allow yourself to think. - Well, we know. 'cause there were a lot of them. and they were all punished enormously. - [Lex] So they can be noticed. You can notice them. - Oh yeah, you even noticed it. in America's a free country,

but when, when people start asking too many questions, it's like, where, where are you going with this? You know, like if, if you're in an office, even in a, in a corporate setting, you're a troublemaker. You're just, you know, you're making problems for everyone. Why can't you be normal? Why can't you be just like everybody else? So people do not like having to be made to think. And they certainly despise. having to be made to justify themselves. because that's a threat to their status and to their power. And this applies in totalitarianism. or applies to, you know, Dunder Mifflin.

- I still can't believe you're wearing lipstick. - I'm not. - Goes to show you can pull lipstick on a pig. - It's like a Snowball. I think you've just been on a bender, that's what I think. - It's been rough. It's been rough, it's been rough. I feel kind of,

I feel like I can be myself in this outfit. Like I honestly feel like. I could just go around in this outfit. and just be weird. 'cause everyone will accept you. if you're wearing a Santa outfit. Like you can say anything in a Santa outfit, right? - Have you seen "Bad Santa", you're favorite comedy? - Yeah, exactly. - You can't say anything. Like "fuck stick". - How did Stalin come to power? If we return back to. those early days post October Revolution.

with Lenin and Trotsky and Stalin, how did he come to power? - So what Stalin did very cleverly, Stalin was, you know, he worked the system. He was, you know, but he was very much in the background. And what he did better than Trotsky. is he was much more a politician. He was a glad hander. He made friends within the party. He made people feel respected and appreciated. and Lenin trusted him. When after Lenin's stroke, Stalin was basically the one who was keeping track of him.

Lenin asked Stalin at one point for to kill him. because after the strokes he was incapacitated. Stalin talked him out of it. But at the same time, Lenin was like, if I need someone killed, like this is who I need to talk to. You know, Stalin, if you look at photos of him, when he was young, he was a stud, he was a gangster, he was a bank robber and. you know, he basically worked the system. and you had the Trotskyites on one hand. who were much more to the left. Stalin's big, I would guess I would call it a heresy,

was he put forth the idea of socialism in one country, whereas like, we're just gonna make it work here. in what became the Soviet Union. The Trotsky idea, and this is really kind of the Marxist idea, is that the workers' revolution has to be worldwide. This is just a worldwide kind of new era of humanity. where Stalin's like, no, no, we're just gonna make it he here and then later. behind what became the Iron Curtain. But this was, sure this was an ideological division. between the two. But what happens in totalitarian countries, what happens in any kind of like, you know,

when you have intermingling of like religion and government, things that are like ideological, ideological disputes like the Arian heresy, the Arian heresy in Christianity. is that Christ the subordinate to God the Father, right? Whereas the contemporary Orthodox version, it's three gods, one God and three person, excuse me. So they're all co-equal aspects of God in heaven. But that was an excuse to be like, you guys are evil, you're on the side of the devil, we're gonna kill you. So these little disputes about ideas. are often a convenient cover.

for people to have a power struggle. in the guise of being like, it's not that I'm about wanting to be more powerful, I'm just on the side of the truth and you're speaking lies. And that's dangerous to the revolution or to the true faith. So he squeezed, but the thing is, Troskey had the seeds of his own defeat. Because per Trotsky, the party is always right. You cannot be right against the party, right? So if you have this kind of party structure. and the party is saying you are wrong, as an individual, you are wrong.

'Cause the collective is what makes decisions, the collective, the workers are who have the knowledge and, and the information. And it is important for you to kind of subordinate. your selfishness, your individualism to this greater good. So he kind of set himself up in many ways. - Is it clear to you why Trotsky lost that power struggle? So you, you just explained that he set himself up, but you can see how different ideologies can be used to,

to achieve different ends. Is there another alternative possible trajectory. where Troskey could have been the, the head of the Soviet Union? - It would be very hard because he was Jewish. So when they were seizing power, Trotsky explicitly said, I can't be in charge, I'm Jewish. So the Soviet Union remained extremely anti-Semitic. One the reason so many Jews became communists. in the Soviet Union because the promise was. once the communists took over, we're not gonna have pogroms anymore.

Pogroms was, you have these Jewish ghettos. and under the permission or encouragement of the czar, just gangs of people go through. killing, raping, robbing, stealing, rioting for days. and just, it was a complete massacre. and the ideas like under communism. everyone's gonna be equal. We're not gonna have this anymore. They still had it, but to a lesser extent. But since Trotsky was Jewish, his real name is Lev Bronstein, you can't you, it was almost impossible. to have a scenario where he was going to be in charge.

And Stalin fed into that to some extent. Also this kind of idea of Jewish internationalism, it's like, okay, he doesn't really have loyalty to Russia. And many of the people who were Jewish, who were high up in Stalin's. government administration, they very much had to prove their loyalty. to communism as opposed to Judaism. - Throughout the 20th century, what was the relationship between communism. and Jews in the Soviet Union? What in terms of anti-Semitism,

the ups and downs of anti-Semitism? It seems like it lessened, it was lesser and greater. in different parts of the 20th century. - Well it, it's the kind of thing where. if something was bad, it's, there's this Russian rhyme, like, (speaking in foreign language). Like if there's, if there's no water in the sink, who drank at all, the Jews. So if something goes wrong, there's,

there's just a convenient historical scapegoat. It's the Jew's fault. So this is something. that's towards the end of his life, very much. And this was after World War II, Stalin was getting ready. for another kind of series of pogroms there. All these Jews were getting kicked out of their jobs. Jewish doctors were getting sent to the far east. instead of being in cities. The newspapers started talking about cosmopolitan, rootless cosmopolitans, which was a term the Nazis also used. to kind of regard Jews as others or as aliens.

And this was going to be, and and they were very clever about it. In Pravda, they would, and I talk about this in "The White Pill". In Pravda, there were articles and letters to the editor, they were like, you know, things are getting so anti-Semitic, we really should round up all the Jews. and send them elsewhere for their own safety. So they were kind of setting the, the ground rules or the, or the basis to have this sort of pogrom come back. But spoiler alert, Stalin dies and immediately.

all of this gets reversed. And the new administration. rehabilitates the doctors who are accused. of trying to hurt him and, and all this other sort of thing. - What is it about the scapegoats in society? Are we always going to be looking for scapegoats? What do you learn from human nature. that this seems to keep happening? - I think there's a book called "The Nurture Assumption", and I discussed this in "The New Right", and what the author learned.

is that humans define themselves by opposition. So if you have a group of people and it's kids and adults, the kids will see themselves as kids. 'cause we're as opposed to adults. If the adults leave, the kids see themselves as boys and girls, because I'm not a girl, I'm a boy, I'm not a boy, I'm a, I'm a girl. So they divide. So this idea, which is very lefty idea, that human beings naturally all get along is not accurate. And the best example of this is, look after 9/11, look where there's a war.

Nothing unites a population, it's not like when times are thriving. that everyone's all working together. When things are bad and there's an enemy, you know, it's the Japanese at Pearl Harbor, it's Al Qaeda, that's when everyone really comes together. 'Cause now we have someone to be against. So there will always be. someone has to be the out group. and we have to be the in group, as opposed to them. - But there's a viciousness to the actions you take to the,

towards the out group that, that varies throughout history. - Yes. - Some, like the degree of viciousness can cross the line. towards like atrocities towards genocide. - [Michael] Right. - And that's the question of in. why does this sometimes do that? Why does it sometimes cross into genocide? I understand it's a useful thing to have the other. to blame in this world, especially when times are rough. But why does that sometimes. lead to sort of action that says, I'm going to murder,

I'm going to torture the other? - Well I think the question really is. why sometimes it doesn't. - Right. - And one of the things I learned. when I was doing "The New Right". is a lot of the Nazis, Using that term loosely speaking, neo-Nazis, they make the point. They're like, oh, when the Holocaust happened, it really wasn't that big of a deal. And that only became a big deal and the decades later, and this just shows the power of Jewish influence. And I'm like, this to me is a great thing. It's a great thing that we sat down. pretty recently, historically.

and we're like, wait a minute guys, when we have a war or we have conquest, you don't have to just start killing everyone. Like this is something that's bad and wrong. And, and certainly in the last 60 years, 70 years, this is something that people have come to take for granted. But that wasn't the case before. It would always be, or not always, but often, if you conquer, you just go wild. and just start slaughtering masses of people. It's, who's the guy from Harvard and he?

- Steven Pinker. - Steven Pinker, I'm sorry I forgot his name. So he just talks about like, you know, we know this is one of the reasons also why. there was so much skepticism when the Holocaust started. because this was regarded as something that was barbaric. This is from the middle ages, from the biblical times. We don't do this anymore, we're civilized now. So genocide is historically the norm. I think it's also harder to pull it off emotionally. when you have the visuals.

and when you have the audio. and when you have the voices. of the people being slaughtered. We don't know, you know, if this was 2000 years ago and, and people, you know, in the Bible they go kill this group, go kill that group. We don't have their names, we don't have their visuals, we don't have anything. But when you see someone being like, you know, the, there's a book about I think the Rwandan genocide. and the title is, "We Regret to Inform You That Tomorrow We Will Be Executed. with All of Our Families Like a Telegram.". And like when you get a telegram like this,

it's very different than reading some history book about, you know, the Assyrians killed the Phoenicians. It's like, I dunno who this is, I don't know who that is, right? So I think this is something that has changed very recently. There was this kind of interesting moment. just that speaks to the way technology. has liberated people from violence. Kristallnacht, which was a moment in the lead up. to the Holocaust where basically, you know, with Hitler's blessing, you had a nationwide burning of Jewish businesses,

synagogues burnt down. And Kaiser Wilhelm, you know, the Kaiser, he said for the first time my life, I'm embarrassed to be a German. But that was a moment where worldwide, even plenty of people who did not think. very highly of Jewish people were like, this is a rap. This is a complete nightmare. But 200 years ago, a hundred years ago, maybe not literally at Kristallnacht, but there's an out group and we hate them. and we're gonna kill 'em and it's fine. - And you think it's even more difficult now.

with the internet? - Yes. - To do that kind of thing? - Yeah, I'm not, now more difficult, doesn't mean it doesn't happen or it can't happen. I'm not saying that at all. But I'm saying the, we know a lot about what's going on in North Korea, you know, probably the most secretive country on earth. There's a lot of atrocities in Eritrea, which is kind of known. So I think it also, it's also like, if you think about it, if you're, how many years ago, 300 years ago, you only know the people in your village. and they're all probably gonna look like you, so on and so forth.

Whereas now if I'm on social media. and there's someone from any country. and maybe their picture looks a little different. and they use the same anime picture as somebody else, but they're putting forth their ideas, you do see the humanity in them and you do see a sense of, of familiarity and a familial bond with them. And when you hear about these things, you know, when I, again, like I did when I did "Dear Reader", no one, I was on Al Qaeda and I was on Ox Jones, no one pushed back about like, oh, the North Koreans. They were all like, this is horrible.

If I had a magic wand, I'd give them food. I wouldn't have them live in fear. And, and this is something that I don't think was the case. a couple of hundred years ago. - As I said, I'd love to get your thoughts. about what's going on in, in Iran, the protests. It seems like the, the regime there is able to crack down with violence. - My thoughts about Iran, lemme just, there's something else about Iran. which I think is interesting, this whole idea of careful what you wish for, because people have this I, and something I kind of, one of the reasons I have "The White Pill".

is Americans really are very naive. about the nature of evil, right? They really think that a dictator has a weird mustache. and he's banging the table and he's, you know, like a crazy person. And it's often not the case. But they also think if something is bad, therefore the alternative is gonna be better. So you had the Shah of Iran. and he was kind of authoritarian and no, he's not a good guy. So in 1979 there were a lot of people like,

this guy's a horrible, he's oppressing the Iranian people, let's get him the F out of there. He's so bad that whatever comes after it. has to be an improvement. And it's like, no, that's, if you think, I mean this drives me crazy. when conservatives are like, you know, Joe Biden's the worst president we've ever had. Like this is destroying America. I'm like, you have no idea how bad things can get. The fact that you are in a position to complain. means we got a ways to go.

- Yeah, every time. you say that Donald Trump or Joe Biden. is the worst president ever, that that warms my heart. Because the, you'll, because you're allowed to say that. - [Michael] Yes, yeah. - It's like, I just let it, it's like music. because you're, you're allowed to be pretty. In response to a president's tweet, you could write that. - [Michael] Yeah, yeah. - And it still lives there and it's, and nobody arrests you. - [Michael] Yeah. - Which is a rare thing in human history.

- [Michael] Yes. - And still rare thing in the world. I mean, what, it does seem that Iran, the current regime is able to crack down. on communication channels. It's still, it's surprising to me. how much power our government can have. Like they could use violence to control the population. - [Michael] Right. - And nobody's gonna do anything about it. - Well, I-- - The rest of the world. just watches. - But here's the thing, right.

Because if the rest of the world starts doing too much, then they have a justification to crack down even more. This regime, this protest are illegitimate. These are, this happened constantly in the Soviet Union, these are foreign provocateurs. - [Lex] Yeah. - This is in, you know, meddling in our country. Curfew, lockdown, ID, you know, mandatory searches. Everyone's a spy. So that narrative is a very convenient one. for people who are authoritarian. I know a lot of people who are Persian, as I'm sure you do as well.

Very hardworking, very bright, great people. And you know, all you could do is hope. for a peaceful liberalization of I, but here's the, people don't realize how liberal. Iran used to be. Andy Warhol, Andy Warhol used to be friends with the Shah. And if you read his, his diaries, he talks about how he knew things weren't going well. for the Shah, 'cause they had less caviar than table. But like, this is, he was really kind of, there's, there's I think a poor understanding in America,

and I'm not sure why, of what these liberal Muslim countries are like. I gave a talk in Bodrum in Turkey, which is like a resort town in Turkey. And I had thought previous to that, or I had suspected, if push comes to shove. and they have to choose people in Turkey. between the west and like Al Qaeda, not Al Qaeda, but like, you know, hardcore Islam, they're gonna choose hardcore Islam. You go there and you're like, oh, this is like Los Angeles.

Like, these people are so liberal, so, and they're the first to be killed. They're the first targets. So that, people like that in Iran are who my thoughts are. And with the, I gotta tell you like nothing makes me more of a feminist. than seeing the women in countries like this. fight for the right to education, the right to dress as they please. Maybe we don't need them driving, but you know, that's okay. - There he is. with that characteristic brilliant humor.

that you're so loved for. and should probably be, be banned for on Twitter. I'll, I'm doing my best. Every time you tweet, I just report, report, report. Please stop this man. - You, you don't have a, like a script to just? - Exactly. Well actually, funny enough I do, but I don't, I don't abuse my power. I wear the ring like Frodo and I respect the power. - But you look like Gollum.

- That's not what your mom said last night. - She said, you're hung like Gollum. (chuckling). - I'm not going down that road with you. I'm not holding hands. One, another time. I learned my, fool me once. Okay. My close childhood friend is from Iran. - [Michael] Oh wow, okay. - And I talk to him a lot. I wanted to go to Iran.

- But it's so far away. - I can see it from my house, my friend. I would love to take that trip even now. It's, just culturally, so all the different little pockets of local cultures. that make up Iran, I just heard so many amazing things. - Yeah, my friend Paul went there. He had an amazing time. He just absolutely loved it. He thought the people were awesome. It was so interesting. Very developed, just like Tehran is, I mean this is the history and Tehran is insane. - Yeah, I would, I would, I would, I would really love to,

to visit. Nah, we were turned back. I don't know how we ended up in Iran, but let us, let us stroll back to, to Stalin taking power. What role did the suppression of speech, the censorship, the suppression of the, the freedom of the press have in Stalin taking hold, taking power? In Lenin, in Trotsky, in Stalin having power? - Well, the, it was a very useful mechanism.

to direct public opinion. and inform public perspectives and everything. So first of all, there was a lot of news about how great things were. You have a bumper crop here, you know, grain's never been better. You have, there's this great, there's another anecdote where President Kalinin. is talking about how on Karl Marx Street in Kharkiv, there's all sorts of new skyscrapers being built. and it's just absolutely amazing. And some of the audience gets up and goes, comrade,

I work on Karl Marx Street. I walk there every day, there's none of these skyscrapers. He goes, see that's your problem. You're trusting your eyes. instead of what's reading something and learning. what's in the papers. So there was this kind of disconnect between, you know, I forget you probably know the joke, like (speaking in foreign language). like Pravda means truth, but there's no truth to be had. It's like kind of the Russian line. The point is it very much, and the other thing this is, you know, my mom wasn't particularly politically motivated,

but she talked about how. you didn't have to be smart to realize how dishonest it was. Because one day. someone is the great hero of the Soviet people, and the next week. he's been a traitor and a class enemy and the worst. And then sometimes they reverted and it's like, okay, like they couldn't even keep their their story straight. And in fact, at a certain point when they, you know, Gorbachev liberalized, they had to cancel tests. because the history books.

had to be rewritten so quickly. So and the thing that also with these newspapers. is there was a lot of, it was very monotonous. because, you know, you had the same message over and over the, a lot of these papers were about. kind of speaking to the lowest common denominator. Stalin's great, everything's great, overseas bad. So it, it very much was about not informing but creating. a certain perspective in the public at large.

And also it, you, you were educated as a citizen. on what you're supposed to think and say. So you have, since a lot of this was this kind of private truths, public lies situation. So you could read the paper and at your, at your factory, you could be like, oh my god, this this guy Carl Roddick great. He's like, oh my god. Yeah, he's amazing. You knew what to talk about. and you knew how to look at it as well. And then when you get home, you could just kind of be more honest with family. - But the question is,

to which degree does this propaganda. and this ideology infiltrate your actual thinking? You give examples of this like scientists. in infiltrated science. - Oh yeah. So basically, you know, Lysenko is the textbook example. Lysenko was in biology. So because Marxism is materialist, they didn't like the idea that genes pass on, you know, from one generation to the next. So Lysenkoism was kind of was a rejection. of Mendel and, and that kind of genetics.

And if you reject genes, you're really going in a bad direction in terms of biology. The Soviet union's biological, biological program became an international laughing stock. At one point, Lysenko claimed he crossed a tomato. and a potato. You had things where they said they had nuclear, which is wait, we have fission, but they said they invented fusion, or hard or heavy water or hard whatever it was. Point being in cultures like this, your way to achieve status.

wasn't necessarily about your accomplishments, but about your loyalty to orthodoxy. So if you were saying things that got to a result. that was congruent with the broader ideology as a whole, that was much better as a means of furthering yourself. in the arts or in the sciences, in the sciences. than if you had something that was innovative. Because if you're innovative, it's like, well how do I fit this in with the broader ruling ideology? The problem with totalitarianism,

one of the many problems is everything, literally everything has to be perceived. through the lens of ideology. So, and that is, you know, there were scientists who were arrested. or at least fired. because of their theories about sunspot developments. 'Cause it was regardless un-Marxist, there was just, there was a, there was an epidemic and all these horses got sick. and because the vaccine didn't work on the horses, the bacteriologists were arrested.

'cause they regard as wreckers. It's like we gave you a job, you didn't do it, you're undermining the socialist state. So it's kind of a backward series of incentives. and it's designed to maintain at all costs, the ruling, ideological super structure. - But you draw a small distinction between the ideology. and the ideological superstructure and the propaganda. Aren't those kind of intermixed together? - Well, the ideological is like in the sciences. and what's true in genetics or what's true in astronomy, that doesn't really percolate out to the masses, right? So the, the, the provda is not,

is maybe covering this scientist is great, or these discoveries are great, but it's not necessarily the same as day-to-day. or glorifying political leaders. - But Pravda is a manifestation of the idea. that truth can be conjured up. - Yes. - It can be constructed and it can be altered quickly. And then I just, I wonder sort of "1984" caricatures. that I wonder to what degree. it really could control the way you think. that, like how many people it affected.

- I couldn't give you an example, a very easy one. So, and again, with, with regarding North Korea. Kim, the great leader Kim Il-sung, who was the founder of North Korea, had a tumor on the back of his neck. and it was too close to either the skull, the spinal column. So they couldn't operate on it. And throughout his life it got bigger and bigger. And I got mixed messages in my research. about whether North Koreans knew about it. because they always photographed him from this angle. And I met a refugee.

and I asked her, I'm like, did you know that he had this tumor? She goes, yeah, yeah, when people played him in the movies, they would, you know, use make up there. And she goes, it was an old war injury. And I go, why would a war injury get bigger. throughout your life? And she just stood there and she was like, holy. But she never questioned it, but it was the kind of thing. where they put the idea in her head. And since there's no reason to question it, she just kind of went with it her entire life. until I talked to her. Audrey, her name. Hi Audrey. - Hi Audrey.

I wonder what percent of the population is like that. - Here's the thing, if there's a cost to me questioning. Lysenko as a great scientist and there's no benefit, why wouldn't I just go. with what's going to keep me and my family safe? - But I also mean just the psychological, there might be a very local psychological cost, so not a cost you're going to jail, but a cost like. you're gonna kind of ruin the conversation. by bringing it up. Kind of like. - Yeah.

- I don't, I'm I'm just trying to. - It's like Debbie Downer, right? Wa wa. - Yeah. - Yeah. But there's also the, the whole metaphor of like, there's two fish in the river. One says, oh man, the water's really great today. And the other one goes, what's water? Like a friend of mine, Adriana, her mom came to the west. and they went to supermarket. and the mom just in front of all the Fanta, so just crying. And she's like, what's going on? She goes, they told us we had more food than you. And when something is you can, it's, you can under think this story. Ugh, this guy's an enemy of the people.

And he was the hero. He just offended someone. This is bullshit. It's almost impossible psychologically. to think I'm living in the Truman Show. and that everything in the media. is not just wrong, but a carefully constructed narrative and a lie. Like what, they're never gonna tell the truth. And how you, you know, like what? Like you, and even if that, even if you do understand that, how would you even read between the lines. to deduce what the truth is? - Yeah, it's a must have been a strange experience.

There's stories of soldiers, the Red Army soldiers throughout World War II. as they go to different countries, even Romania, but in Europe to just to, to understand that people live much better. than they did, than the soldiers did back in the Soviet Union. - And, and that's why a lot of times when they went back, Stalin had them killed. because they saw too much or sent to the camps. - So just to linger on this idea of free speech, so there's constant.

discussion about free speech and this modern debate. about social media and all that kind of stuff. What, what's your take on it? Grounding it not in some kind of shallow discussion. of free speech we have today, but more in the context of. Pravda and the suppression of speech in Stalinist Russia. - I hate the term free speech. because it's used in many different contexts. Some I agree with entirely, some I disagree with at all.

I don't think everyone has something to say. or something to add to the conversation. And you know, I have my locos community and it used to be, I think the, the boilerplate language is, you know, come support free speech and free discourse. And I change that because I, I don't like that term. because people will tell you with, with some reason that, oh, if you block me on Twitter, you're voiding my free speech. It's like, okay. So I don't, I don't like that term as a whole,

but one of the points of "The White Pill". and something I see enormous parallels with today, if you have one news outlet. or three news outlets with identical ideology, you are not going to be able to get to any kind of truth. or any kind of useful information. It's all gonna be pre-filtered for you. It's like a baby bird. and you're eating the mother bird's vomit, right? But if you have, what we have increasingly now with technology,

if you have a world where everyone has a camera. on their phone, if you have a world where anyone. can put their ideas out there, maybe they're banned from certain outlets, but they're not literally vanished. like they were in the USSR, that is very healthy. That is something I'm enormously supportive of. because back in the day, if you only had the TV crews with cameras, you can only see what they're capturing. and they could edit it. Whereas now we saw this recently during COVID, right?

You had these reporters with masks on and they're talking, but the cameraman wasn't wearing a mask. So you'd have the people on the street being like, look, this, they don't believe it, you know? Or as soon as they, they would start filming, the guy took the mask off and they'd film them, they'd go, you are lying. You don't believe this, you're putting this on for some purpose. Whether you're leaving the efficacy of mask or not, that person clearly does not, is only putting on for show. So that's, or crimes. It's people, you know, are anti-police.

They, they say, okay, the cop said this. Did he draw the gun on this guy necessarily? So on and so forth. It is so much better. when everyone has access. to as much of the information as possible. and can make that informed decision themselves. Now there certainly is space. for informed people to be like, no, no, no, no, this isn't what it looks like. If you look here, if you look there, it's cropped here, so on and so forth. But that's still much more useful. than just having that 20 second clip.

that someone has decided to edit for you. - So like truth has a way of, because it's, everything is so interconnected, truth, no matter what has a way of finding. its way to the populace. - And also there's an, there's a big asymmetry in terms of trust. So if I tell you 100 truths and one lie, that lie is equal, I'm screwed. 'cause once you catch me in a, like a, you don't have to kill someone every day. to be a murderer, right? You only have to do it once. So if you catch me in a brazen lie,

you're gonna look at everything I say after that. with an enormous grain of salt. So that is another big asymmetry in favor of truth. If someone trusts you, you have to be honest all the time. and you're gonna make mistakes. You can own those mistakes, be like, hey, this is why I made the mistake. This is why I said such and such. - Okay, but the flip side of that, which has been disheartening to me, is that people on the conspiracy side, conspiracy theory side of things, I've noticed how easy it is to just call something a lie.

- [Michael] Yes. - And then that becomes viral. For some reason, there's a desire for people, yeah, for anyone who points out. that the emperor's not wearing a clothes, even when the emperor is fully clothed. So I don't know what that is, but that really seems to mess with this truth mechanism. So when, when it becomes viral to call people a liar, whether they're a liar or not, it's like, I'm feel, you feel like an unstable ground. because it, to me, that idea of revealing a lie that somebody told.

is a really powerful mechanism to keep people honest. But when you're like misusing it, crying wolf too much, it seems, it seems to break the system. Makes me nervous because there's also like. - But just it's, if someone is a liar, that doesn't mean literally everything they say is a lie. - No, but what is a lie and what isn't? I just noticed that there's money to be made. in calling out something as a lie. It's just the conspiracy theories, straight up.

The first thing, some traumatic event happened, give an explanation that's not the mainstream explanation. No matter what, whether it's true or lie, there's a lot of virality and money to be made in that. And that makes me nervous. because it doesn't matter if it's true or not. It becomes, anti-establishment ideas are viral whether they're true, whether they're true or not. - Sure, but I think establishment ideas are powerful, whether they're true or not. - Sure. - So I think--. - On the whole, I think you're right.

I mean on the whole, it's good to test the power centers, but it just makes me. nervous in our attention economy. that the sexy thing seems to be. the anti-establishment message. And then it feels like that becomes a drug where you, everything, anything the establishment says, anything institution say, anything the mainstream says must be wrong. because it comes from the mainstream. - I have that line that you, you're supposed to take one red pill, not the whole bottle.

- Yeah. - I am certainly one of those people. who is of the idea that they are dishonest far more, more open, but they're honest. That said, there are people who are of the belief, to use an extreme example, that Trump is still the shadow president. and you know, there's gonna be these Q-anon mass arrests. I thought this was something. that like the Daily Beast made up to make fun of MAGA. But I was just on the phone with my buddy last night. and he was like, no, no, if you go to Troth Central,

they're like all over there and if you disagree with them, they call you controlled opposition. or a grifter or so on and so forth. - [Lex] Is it on 4Chan or where. - Troth Central, Trump's social media outlet. - Oh, truth, no truth social. - Yeah, but he, he forgot the name of it himself. So he's like-- - Oh, I see the jokes. You gotta explain the jokes. You gotta explain the jokes. You do like, like the, the way Twitter puts that context, you gotta, you gotta do the joke. and then pause and like turn to the camera and explain. - And have a laugh track. Yeah, so people know where the jokes are.

That's, that's how, that's real humor. - Yeah. So we, and then we just clap. - And everyone, and then everybody clapped. I think for the last two years, especially vis-a-vis COVID, the overwhelming message was. the experts know what they're talking about. And if you are questioning this, you're a, a vax denier. and you basically should be read out of polite society. And one obvious counter example to this. was social distancing. If social distancing was efficacious, why were there no attempts ever.

to bring it back, right, when you had different waves. and if it wasn't efficacious, why was it so insistent that we do it all, do it at the very beginning. In fact, in many places you'll still see the signs. on the floor where it's six feet apart. So there's an incongruity there. And I think it, we are forgetting as a people, the intensity with, and understandably to some extent, if you have this worldwide deadly plague, like, like it's gonna be go where the leakiest hole is. So you really gotta kind of get everyone on board.

But to the, the vehemence with which we're told, we know what we're doing, this is the way to solve it. If you don't do it, you are causing mass death. That I think fed in very heavily. to people's enormous sense of skepticism. toward establishment sources. - Speaking of the plague, you opened the book with the--. - [Michael] Oh, yeah, that quote from Camus. - It's a strong, strong quote. - Camus brings me to tears. And it's funny 'cause I reread "The Myth of Sisyphus", which I had been recommending to people. I'm like, this book is not good, but he's got his ethos is my favorite.

of all the philosophers. - It sounds like "The Myth of Sisyphus" was a myth. - He says-- - Laugh track, cue. - "All I maintain is that on this earth. there are plagues and there are victims. And it's up to us so far as possible. not to join forces with the plagues.". And why I have that as the introductory quote to the book. is I think morality and ethics. are very, very complicated subjects.

There's lots of gray areas. where you don't know which way to choose, but at a base level, he has another quote that's ascribed to him, he never actually said, but something about, you know, is the duty of thinking people. not to be in the side of the executioners. If you are go, we should do whatever we can. not to have blood on our hands, not to be murderers, not to want death. And that in and of itself. is a big pill for a lot of people to swallow. We're all brought up taught that war is a last resort.

And yet when it comes to international affairs, it's always often a first priority. And people are championing at the bit. to start going in and killing people. And what war means isn't good guy soldiers. versus bad guy soldiers. It, my concern is always with the civilians, with the kids who become orphans, with the wives who become widows and, and things like that. And then communities, which are, you know, ruined forever. So I love that quote of his.

I think he's, I mean the, the book started, it was going to be a recontextualization of Camus' thought. I was gonna rip off my old buddy Ryan Holiday, what he did with the stoics and do about Camus. And then when I started rereading Camus, I'm like, oh, there's, I've read more into him than is really there. And then it went to a whole other direction. - So you wanted to do almost. like an existentialist manifesto. So like-- - Camus. - Must imagine Sisyphus happy?

- Well more like Camus for today and, and what his philosophy can teach us. like Ryan did with his many books about the stoics, yeah. And it was gonna be called "The Point of Tears". - [Lex] "Live to the Point of Tears?". - Yes, but the title was gonna be "The Point of Tears". - No, I know, but that, from that line. That's a good line, right? - He has so many good lines. - Yeah. - Maybe it's not about how--. - Pretty shitty in bed though, right? - Well, no, he was a big, he was a big Lothario. He was probably-- (Lex mutters). - He, he got around.

What? - At what percent of the audience of humans on earth. do you think know the word Lothario? - [Michael] What, what percent of them. have a computer, look it up? - [Lex] Lothario. - It's not some weird term. - Lothario. - L-O-T-H-A-R-I-O. Lothario. - Lothario, a man who behaves selfishly and irresponsibly. in his sexual relationships with women. They're seduced by handsome, in quotes, "They're seduced by handsome Lothario. who gains control of their financial affairs.". - Oh, I didn't, I didn't think, I always thought of as more as just a someone. who's like a stud.

- A like a player, but no. - Yeah, player, yeah. - There's a malevolent. - Oh, I didn't realize that. Okay, well then he's. - Selfishly. - Okay, that's not him. - Irresponsibly, and a man too, although Ayn Rand would be proud, selfishly. - Well, no. - [Lex] There's nothing wrong with selfish. - She wouldn't like that kind of selfishness. That's (mumbles). - A man who behaved selfishly and irresponsibly. in his sexual relationships with women. Huh? Yeah, okay. So he was, he was just a player. - Not a maybe, maybe a stud.

I don't think he was promiscuous particularly. - Nietzsche didn't get, he got, he didn't, never got laid, right? - He syphilis. He died of syphilis. - Oh, like the pro, was from prostitute. - Was it, okay? Possibly yeah. - No, I don't, you're asking me like, I knew the guy I, I heard it's from. He never had a deep, loving, fulfilling relationship. He had a very skewed understanding. and the way he wrote about women. Although somebody wrote to me and said, that's a mischaracterization, that he was actually very respectful of women. - Yeah, but he had that line, "If you're going before women bring a whip",

wasn't that him or was that (mumbles)? - If I were to quote you from your Twitter? - [Michael] Yeah. - I think I could make a very convincing argument. that you're sexist, racist, and probably a Nazi. - Well, I do own like some of Hitler's stuff. - [Lex] Exactly. - I got the-- - I rest my case. - I feel like I'm a Nuremberg, I'm gonna be hung by his own tie. (laughs). This isn't a tie, it's a noose. - You should have thought about that.

when you were saying all those things. Okay. What do you think of the leak of the Twitter files? - I. was. so. happy that Elon gave the information. to Matt Taibbi and Barry Weiss, who are both by any metric, lefties, who are both professional journalists of long standing. with great resumes. and overnight now they're,

they're doing PR for the worlds, which all the, whatever the party line was. The fact that you had all these corporate journalists. now having to play catch up. and not having control of the microphone, to me, was just absolutely amazing. I think transparency is. what brought down in many aspects of Soviet Union. and what will bring down what negative aspects. of the regime we have here. When you see the machinations behind the scenes,

and then when you see the rationalizations after the fact, you realize, oh, these people are not acting in good faith. The fact that, for example, the New York Post article about the Hunter Biden laptop. and how the, the New York Times covered it as well. They didn't mention any kind of dick pics. Twitter made it so I couldn't even DM you. the link to the New York Post article, which was a tool they had previously used only. to prevent child pornography. So that shows to what extent they were.

willing to put their thumb on the scale. But it also shows that. for any layman when they're looking at this. to realize what you are perceiving as news or information. is very much sculpted, edited and guided. by powerful people who have a vested interest. in maintaining their power. - I think to me, the important lesson.

is this not a left or right thing. - Oh, not at all. It's power versus powerless, yes. - And, but, and also the important lesson there, I think at least in the case of Twitter, in our society, it's a, it's a slippery slope. You don't get there overnight. You start-- - Right. - You start using those tools a little bit, a little bit to slow down misinformation, to just a little bit that you start. sending emails to each other, a little bit and it becomes more and more, you start forming justifications,

you're still getting a little more and more comfortable. kind of talking about the stuff. I think there's several ways to fight that. One is having hardcore integrity up front. So don't, don't even open the door. But I think realistically, human nature is what it is. And so I think the only way is through transparency. is this is why the nice, I hate the fact they got politicized. I really hate that the right has have run with it. Like look, the left is planning, they rig elections and so on. To me, that's it shouldn't be left or right.

It shouldn't be about politics. It's that transparency is good. - Yes. - Other companies. should do the same. Facebook should do the same. And in fact, that transparency will protect Facebook. It will protect Google. Like look like this is our situation. Tell us what to do and and we'll do our best. - I remember when I was writing "The New Right", Twitter's line was, we're not gonna tell you guys what the metrics are. by which we ban or censor people. because then bad actors are gonna navigate around them.

And it's like, what are you doing? Like just tell people in any establishment, what are the rules for which behavior is permissible. If I go to a store, if I return the sweater, is it cashback, no refunds, or if I get store credit, you know what I mean? So that they were having this place which was presented as a. huge international space for public discourse. And they're not telling you ahead of time, this is what we will tolerate. This is what we'll warn you about. This is what will kick you out overnight.

That to me was crazy and outrageous. and I'm really pleased with, to what extent Elon is look, is being open with their policies. And what I'm really wanna commend him about, is now I'm triggered, because one of the things that he took over, he's like, our first priority is getting rid of child pornography. and child exploitation. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - Right. That was, he's like, like racial slurs,

homophobic slurs, antisemitic slurs, yeah, yeah. That's cool. Kids, kids getting harmed is number one. And you know, he fired the old task force. 'cause they weren't doing their job. Eliza Blue, who you know, you know, she had been on this for a long time, but people who were victims of child pornography, child exploitation, were emailing Twitter being like, these are my images, get them off. And they're like, too bad. Porn is allowed on Twitter. He starts trying to crack down on it. This is a very hard problem. because these bad actors have mechanisms to evade,

you know, being banned. They, they wanna get their, for lack of a better term product out there. Forbes Magazine, who is an agent of the devil, had a tweet and they tweeted this nine times. You know, now that Elon's here, Twitter's child porn nightmare has gotten much worse. They tweet this nine times. I looked up, anyone listen to this can look up, look at Forbes and do a search. They never mentioned this problem before. So now that Elon is doing something about it, now it's a problem for you.

No, it's a problem. Elon's the problem. It's not the child porn that you guys had a problem with. And that to me is like, yeah, I understand that you think that Elon is a bad guy. 'cause he's upset your Apple cart. This isn't a political issue, this isn't a gotcha moment. This is all right, here are some tips. We talked to 10 experts, digital experts, and here are some techniques, Mr. Musk, that you might wanna take from us free of charge. that will help you solve this. That would be a great article.

- And I just wanna use this opportunity. to say quite clearly and strongly. that even though Twitter and other parts of the internet, are interpreting some of my statements. to mean I'm right in this case, meaning leaning right, right wing, and in other cases, leaning left, left wing. I'm not. I'm apolitical or at least I try to be in my thinking, take one issue at a time. I do take an opinion on each issue at a time, but I hate camps. I try to avoid political camps in general. It just, it sucks that.

promoting transparency in this case. or celebrating transparency. is somehow connected to being right wing. - No, it's being made. into so supposed euphemism for being right wing. - It just, it sucks. It sucks, even though I'm wearing a red suit. and this is a very red themed conversation. - Well, it's, I mean the revolution was the color of blood.

- I'm just gonna let it sit on that for a second. Okay, you mentioned New York Times bestseller list. You chose to self-publish. - Yes. - Can we just linger on that decision? What's, what are the pros and cons of self-publishing? - The cons are, it is acceptable. in our current business climate or cultural climate. for corporate media outlets. to pretend the book doesn't exist.

- Yep. - So basically, and there's reason for it. I can make the case to them pretty easily. if someone's doing it themselves, who is this guy's some crackpot. writing crazy stuff from his basement, right? It's a little different I think for me. 'cause I'm an established author. CSPAN gave me an hour on Book TV. - Still a crack pot, but yeah. - Still a crackpot. - Established. - For "Dear reader", I think I was the first one. to get an hour on Book TV for a book that I did myself. So there is space for that. It didn't go through a vetting process.

the way a book going through a corporate publisher did. So those are the minuses. The pros are I can drop it and publish it immediately. If you go through a corporate publisher, you have to wait a year. You can do what you, you could have the book you want. instead of the getting past the editor. And some editors are very, very good. and there's a whole spectrum. Some of them not so good, some are good, some are not. I know the best. The Real Killers. - All right, let's beat,

the is good people on both sides. - Yeah, there's plenty of good people on both sides. - Yeah. - And I don't mean. the white nationalist who I condemn totally. So, but the thing is, in terms of money, you get six times as much profit when you self-published. then when you go through a corporate publisher. The buck stops here. It's, you know, in one of my books that I co-authored, I won't even mention the name, there is a typo and they didn't, they don't care. They didn't fix it for the paperback edition. Here, since I'm going through Amazon, if there's a typo, I can fix it live and it updates.

- Oh yeah? - Yep. - You can just update it. - Yeah. So that's very useful. - Can be like a "Fight Club" thing. where you can insert like a dick pic in one of the pages. - Okay, why are you so, why do you keep texting me to send you dick pics? - I didn't. - Talk about--. - Just suggesting. All right, all right. - [Michael] All right, get, I get it. - That's why I'm not the editor. - I get it, North Pole. I get it. - Yeah. - The other advantage, just socially is I think people are like, I found this with the Kickstarter I did for "Dear Reader". People are much more excited to buy it.

and promote it and talk about it. when they know you're doing it yourself. Instead of you're getting a big check from, you know, St. Martin's, Harper Collins, Penguin, whatever. - Are you also trying to use some kind of service. to get it distributed to bookstores? Or are you just going to do Amazon? - [Michael] No, just Amazon, yeah. - And that's probably where most sales happen anyway. - The vast majority, yeah. So it's not gonna be in bookstores. - So what's, how difficult is the process. of getting it on Amazon? - So, I'll tell you a funny story about how Amazon works.

and 'cause this was a, I always planned for, because everyone, people's, here's another piece of advice I will give people. Your life will be a lot easier. if you realize that the majority of people. in every industry are bad at their jobs. Like once you have that realization, everything else makes sense and you, your life will be a lot easier, right? So when I did the "Anarchist Handbook", which was a collection of essays. from various anarchists throughout history, when I submitted it to Amazon, there was a lot of copyright issues.

'cause they're like, do you have the rights to this essay? Do you have the rights to this essay? It has to go back and forth with them a lot. to make sure I had copyright. where everything was public domain and that, and the thing is, you forward, you know, you update it, you give 'em the information. Three days, there's another problem, it's another three days. So it's weeks. The other thing with their Create Space program is. the paperback and the e-book, the Kindle, are approved independently. So just 'cause it's approved for one, it's not approved for the other. After I published "Anarchist Handbook".

and it was a big success, they unleashed, unrolled, excuse me, a hard cover edition program. So I'm like, oh great, I'll, I'll put in hard cover. They're like, sorry, this is too similar to Murray Rothbard's. "Anatomy of the State", which is a pamphlet or short book. that Murray Rothbard wrote. I go, wait, wait, I have the entirety of "Anatomy of the State" in here. I have permission from the Mises Institute in writing, which I'm giving to you to reprint it. And you guys already have it been published for a year.

as a paperback and ebook. - Yep. - And they're like, too bad. Blocked. - Yeah. - So it's not available as a hard cover on Amazon, even though it's available, maybe now it's gonna be pulled, as paperback and ebook. So with this book I was anticipating, all right, there's gonna be some whatever. I, the thing with how it works is. you have to upload it and hit publish. and then you gotta wait for the approval. - [Lex] Yeah. - I'm like, okay, this is gonna be, who knows, I just wanted to get as fast as possible. 4:00 AM, less than 24 hours, I get a notification.

Congratulations your book's available for sale. and I have run downstairs and pull it--. - Yeah. - From publication. because otherwise it was out and I, I didn't finish editing it. - Yeah. - So that's, that's the situation there. - Oh, that's fascinating. But that's like powerful. That's like your, it's all in your hands. It's all on you. - Yes, and I think the program is great. It charts just like any other book. The quality of the books is great. I am very happy with,

I have no, I have no contact with them. My buddy Tucker Max, he had a company that did this. and they basically helped people self polish their own book. They did Dave Goggins book, I think you've talked to him, haven't you? - [Lex] Yeah. Or yeah, maybe they emailed me or something. - Yeah, yeah. And he said, I have done dozens, maybe hundreds of books with them. I have never been able to get someone on the phone, so I don't know what's going on over there. But guys, if you wanna reach out to me, please call me. It's Michael@lexfriedman.com.

Friedman is spelled wrong. - Yeah, I, if you ever have any complaints, please just at me at Twitter about Michael. No. Why do you, why do you think so few established authors. self-publish? I mean, why, it seems like it makes perfect sense in this modern society. to be able to, when you finish the book, to publish it within a few days, a few weeks.

- I think I talked to Jordan Peterson. about this at length and Mikhaila, his daughter, who I'm also good friends with. She's actually named after Gorbachev, who's the big hero of this book. - [Lex] Also a friend? - Mikhaila Go, you know, I was in talks. to interview Gorbachev and then COVID hit. and that's when the big regrets of my life that didn't get, I think if I met him I would be. on my knees literally kissing his feet crying. 'cause of you'll, I mean one of the big points of "The White Pill". is there were so many moments when they were calling him up,

send in the tanks, we want another Tienanmen Square. And he's like, fuck you. So when you have anyone who has the capacity. to murder thousands of people. and chooses to withhold that power, like all I could do is applaud. - He resisted the cynicism. - Yes. Wait, so the the why the the authors, why don't I publish self the books? I think they're still in the, you know how like there's this whole idea.

how if you're a movie actor, you don't go on TV. 'cause that like kind of ruins your brand. So, and that's kind of going away. There's a lot of shows where the lead. is now like a former movie actor. and this is kind of like the, a big thing. Like Matthew McConaughey, you know, he had a TV show on HBO, I believe. So I think there's this kind of like, wait--. - All right, all right. - What's that? - I said all right. You see, all right. Alright, alright, alright. Matthew McConaughey, all right, all right. - I don't, I don't, I don't know what that is.

Sorry. - Just I'll explain it. This is what, look at the context below. - Okay. So I think for them it might be A, a loss of credibility to some extent, but B, their agent whose job is to sell them. and get a big advance. wouldn't be encouraged them to self-publish. 'cause they're agent, you know, so I don't think it's percolated to powerful people yet. how feasible this is. and how profitable it is. - Yeah. - And how they'll still be able to reach their audience.

And I feel if, you know, I don't, if "Anarchist Handbook" wasn't such a gigantic success, I would be much more nervous about "The White Pill". But the fact that it was, and that I saw it from start to finish. and I know the ins and outs now I'm like, what are you guys bringing to the table. besides taking a year of my time. and introducing edits that I would not otherwise agree with. - I think for some people, a book is a, is a sort of beacon of reputation. So like, so it's really important to not, there's somehow not as much reputation.

associated with a self-published book. unless it's successful. - Yes. - And then, and then like the, it's success out shines the actual, however it was published. I think David, I guess David Goggins. self-published his book. - Because it used to be. you self-published when you can't get a book deal. So it's like an admission of failure. - Yeah. So you would recommend it as something for for authors? - No, I would recommend it as something for authors. of a certain stature, for lack of better term.

- Got it. - Because it is still, in terms of your resume and your experience, it's better to get a crappy advance. and have a book with St. Martin's that goes nowhere. than a self-published book that goes nowhere. So the other thing is you have to make sure. you have enough an audience that you can move some copies. - What about Only Fans? Would you recommend authors? How much money do you think you and I could make. if we did like, bathtub scenes in Only Fans?

No, just chilling, just reading, like reading like "Animal Farm". Just like while sitting in the bathtub. - Bestiality, (chuckling). - I don't know. - Okay, Snowflake. Snowball, sorry, Snowball. Okay, Snowball. - All right. - What was his name? - Snowball. - No, the horse. - Boxer. - I'm hung like a boxer. - I will, I will work harder. Yeah, that guy, I think about that guy a lot. - [Michael] Boxer? - Yeah, he's, his motto was, I will work harder.

Anything that happens. So like the, the pigs would take advantage. and his response to everything it, you know, he was inspiring to me. because he never gave in to the cynicism. - [Michael] Right and they killed him. - Yeah. - Spoiler, sorry. - But that's a good way to die, never giving in. - Well, yeah, there's a lot of that in this book. about the people who were like, I'm not, you're not gonna break me. Like I am bigger than this. - Did you ever believe in Santa?

- I remember the day I woke up on New Year's. and there was a president under my pillow. and it was like, holy shit. 'cause Ded Moroz left it. That's the whole thing, he leaves you present under your pillow. - Right, so you believed, but what I thought the story was gonna be. when you first realized he's not real. - I don't remember when I realized he wasn't real. But that story was, I did think it was real. I was like, oh my God. - And okay, there's this. 'cause I did too. And I don't remember,

I don't think I can put myself in the mindset. of the kind of person that believed he was real. because what did I think? What was my worldview that allowed. like a giant person in a red suit to be real? Although I do remember, I think the first time a Santa Claus showed up to our, like, lived in this very small apartment. and when he first showed up to our apartment, I just remember. 'cause he was really drunk and smelled. It was like a party,

it was like a New Year's party or whatever. So one of the, one of the people dressed up with Santa Claus. and I just remember this, wow, this this gotten like real fast. Like I, I remember like thinking of course, of course it would be like, what was I thinking? What was, what was I thinking as gonna be some perfect, like-- - Being. - Perfect being, like better than like the best of humanity. He was just a regular dude, kind of fat, but like not sexy fat.

It was like-- - Yeah, yeah. - Not really that jolly and kind of exhausted. Really have not showered in a while. But also funny. - I remember, I love telling the story, how old I was and I must have been five or six. And it was just that age. where you distinguish between what's real and what's not. So like vikings and knights and ninjas are real. and dragons and mermaids and elves are fake.

And I was on the corner of Shore Parkway. right before the park and Bensonhurst in Brooklyn. and around the corner wearing a denim vest. was a little person, a Dwarf. And I saw him and I was like, all right, back to the drawing board. Like I don't know what's real or not anymore. 'cause I just saw a dwarf. So I don't know what's going on. - And since then, given your relationship with Alex Jones, you've continued the journey of not knowing. what's real or not. - That's correct. - All right, let's talk about the next steps. After Stalin took power,

he started to actually implementing some of the economic, some of the policies and this idea of collectivization. - [Michael] Yeah. - What's the story of that in the, in the 20s leading into the 30s? What was this idea? What was the relationship between the regime, the ideology in the farmers? - Well, there's always been, and obviously very much this day, an enormous amount of enmity, for lack of a better term, hatred between Ukraine and Russia. I mean this is, you know,

centuries in the making if not more, and the Ukraine, or Ukraine now, but at the time the, I'm speaking of the region, is and still is the bread basket of Europe. It was very fertile lands. This is where the food comes from. And this was a issue also for Lenin. as I discussed in the book. 'cause when you had famines there, you know, you have famines throughout. what later became the Soviet Union. And the problem is, this happened in North Korea as well in the 90s,

when they don't have food, if you let in foreigners and feed your people, all of a sudden you as the government are either superfluous. or downright, you know, deleterious to their wellbeing. And that's a threat to your power. So Lenin led in an American organization in the early 20s, which was actually headed by Herbert Hoover of all people. And after a while, Hoover left because he found that the, the Bolsheviks were just taking the grain. that the Americans were giving to feed the people. and selling it for export while the people suffered.

And one of the people who grew up in these starvation times. was a young Mikhail Gorbachev where he had, you know, I think it was like a quarter or a third of his village. starved to death during one of these periodic famines. Stalin's idea, this was a good mechanism for him. to break the idea of Ukraine being an independent nation. within its own identity. And you know, he had this kind of liquidation of the Kulaks. you know, very famously,

which thankfully is much more discussed now. than it was maybe when you and I were kids. And a Kulak, the real meaning. or the literal meaning. is kind of this wealthy landowner, right? But very quickly it's kind of like it becomes out group. So you know, it, there was a, a big incentive to call someone you didn't like a Kulak. and then good luck to you. 'cause now the eyes of the state are on you. and you have to prove that, you know, you didn't hire people, you didn't have four cows or how many acres.

or so and so forth. They took a huge percentage of the population, the Kulaks, and they just deported them, you know. These are lands that they had for generations. and they just spread 'em throughout. broader Russia. Many of them never made it. and many of them were killed. This was by design. - And the dark thing about the Kulaks, like you said, when it becomes abused, when it becomes the, the out group is. the Kulak is supposed to be wealthier.

than sort of the general farmer peasant. And so basically it gives you a mechanism of resentment. Anybody that's better off. must be better off because they're Kulak, let's get rid of them. And it has a, just from an economics perspective, even leaving ethics aside, it basically completely de-incentivizes productivity. And it wants you to fail because if you succeed, you're a Kulak and you're going to be tortured, you're gonna be deported, you're going to be derided all that.

- And also you are poor 'cause he's rich. Like that's a big part of it. So while this was going on. and food was becoming a problem because you had, you know, poor weather conditions, there was a campaign about oh, the reason you're hungry. is 'cause the Kulaks are hoarding all the grain. And if you are somewhere else in, in the Soviet Union, how are you supposed to know any better? 'Cause you're being told every year. the crops are bumper crop, bumper crop, bumper crop, and now there's no food, there's no bread.

And so you see, we, we produced all this bread, it's not getting to you 'cause the Kulaks. are hoarding the grain. So they're, they came like. in what became known as the Holodomor, Anne Applebaum, who's a great historian, who unfortunately I disagree with a lot. in contemporary politics, but who's done so much great work about the, the Soviet Union that I pretty much give her a blank check. on whatever she wants to say nowadays. You know, she great wrote a great book about this. called "Red Famine". And these activists descended.

on these villages like locusts. And their job was to requisition as much food as possible. And they would come back, you know, at all hours of the night. to make sure you weren't hiding food. And this is what was so pernicious about it, your own body would betray you. They could look at you. and see that you're not losing weight. You're got those chubby cheeks, that means you have food and that's the government's food. That is the food of the people. And if you are keeping food for yourself,

you are stealing from the people. You're an enemy of the people. and you deserve whatever comes to you. And it got to a point where they're eating, they didn't have grain to plant for the next harvest. And what was even sicker is, you know, one of the big criticisms of of communists. of the Czar was his internal passport system. that I can't go wherever I want within Russia, the Russian Empire without permission, Stalin reintroduced this. So if your village was targeted, you can't leave.

Now, some people got away, they tried to get to the cities and so on and so forth, but you get to the city and you're starving, you have no clothes, you're a Kulak. I'm hungry 'cause of you. And, and now you're too lazy to work. Get the F out of there. And there were stories, you know, you know, I have them in in "The White Pill". of this like starving teenage girl. and she's begging for food and the guy knocks the, the Shop Keep knocks the food outta her hand. and she dies on the spot. And everyone in that line knew not to, you know,

give her any food or any sympathy. because she's a Kulak sympathizer. And very quickly, if you're a Kulak sympathizer, all has to happen is someone has to call, I think it was the NKVD at the time, you know the different names. So the Cheka, the secret police. And they had to be like, oh, you see whatever her name was Jena, she was a Kulak sympathizer. We saw Kulak who was trying to shake us down for food. 'cause too lazy to work. And she felt so bad for them. So you might wanna check in on Jena, so yeah. - But in '32 and '33, Holodomor,

it wasn't just. small injustice here and there. It was mass starvation. - Yes. - And suffering. - Yes. Millions starved to death in the Ukraine alone. And by design. - So you mentioned Anne Applebaum's book, "Red Famine". - Yeah. - Stalin's war in Ukraine. But another excellent book on the topic, and by the way, thank you for recommending that to me. So it was. - Her work's amazing.

- Yeah. It's a, it's a really, really powerful book about, not just about Holodomor, but like the context of Ukraine, basically the history of Ukraine that's relevant for today. - [Michael] Yeah. - To understand, understand the, the relationship between Russia and Ukraine. But another great book is "Bloodlands". Europe between Hitler and Stalin" by Timothy Snyder. I don't know, I think you also recommended that to me at some point, or maybe not. - I haven't, but I'm familiar with that. I haven't read it. - So he, he does quite a bit of its brief,

but extremely well researched writing. about cannibalism there. - Oh God. - And that it was not uncommon. during the Stalin imposed famine in the Soviet Ukraine. for parents to cook and eat their children. He writes, quote, "survival was a moral as well as the physical struggle. A woman doctor wrote to a friend in June, 1933. that she had not yet become a cannibal, but was not sure that I shall not be one. by the time my letter reaches you".

The good people died first. Those who refused to steal or to prostitute themselves died. Those who gave food to others died. Those who refused to eat corpses died. Those who refused to kill their fellow man died. Parents who resisted cannibalism died. before their children did. And there's stories in there about. yeah, cooking, cooking your children. The other thing about cannibalism, about famine in general, that stood out to me that unlike a lot of atrocities,

is the people that are starving are exhausted. They're basically unable to think. so they don't even have the energy to protest. It's a strange kind of way. to kill thinking in the populace. That, that it, it kind of, I suppose it was obvious, but there's something fundamental about starvation. where it slowly removes your humanity.

- Yeah, there's a, there was a scene in the book where. a lot of times people literally go crazy. and there's a scene where mom, it's some nursing, a train station was nursing her kid. and she was, you know, going mad from hunger. and she just starts beating the crap outta her baby. and kicking it and then she just reverts to normal. like nothing had happened. - [Lex] Yeah, madness. - Yeah, yeah. - Like you lose, yeah, you lose your mind. - Yeah, and I mean, I dunno what the physiological cause of this, it's not just, I think it's, you know,

if someone has dealt with like glycogen depletion, it affects their mood, things like that. So taken to an extreme, who knows what happens when. parts of the brain start functioning and start imploding. But yeah, it's, what I wanted, what just happened, this is something that's really cool. regarding the Holodomor. So there was one. western journalist, Gareth Jones, who was like, all right, something's not adding up here. So he was supposed to take a train through Ukraine.

and he got out early. and decided to start walking through the countryside. to go from village to village. And I'll get to his story in a minute. Right before we started recording, I got this book in the mail. I ordered on November 28th from Great Britain. It was the only copy available on the whole internet. It's called "Experiences in Russia in 1931". It is anonymous. and it's Gareth Jones wrote the introduction.

It was published by the Elton Press in Pittsburgh. It was self-published. And see it just says forward, it just says by the author. So it was the author who went alongside. Gareth Jones was someone by the name of. Henry John Heinz who was heir to the Heinz fortune. And you only know that if you start looking the internet.

'cause his name's not anywhere near this book. Well I open this book up right when I got it. right before we're taping. and it's signed by him. And it took me a second. I'm like, wait a minute, who is this signed by? And it's HJ Heinz 'cause his name was Jack Heinz, but it was Henry John Heinz from, so this is, I'm very excited that I had this little miracle in the mail. - A Christmas miracle. - It's a Christmas miracle. - They traveled, they traveled together? - [Michael] They traveled together. So this book's a diary of their travels. - Why do you think so few journalists. was able to do what he did?

- So there were several reasons. First of all, if you were a western journalist. in the Soviet Union, you were under very strict circumstances. First of all, you could be deported at any time. You had no, there was no pretense. that you have a right to be a journalist in, especially as a representative of a capitalist. by which they meant Western paper. Second, it was a complete nightmare. getting your articles filed.

because you had a censor that you had to go through. And the censor's job whose life depended on it. was to make sure that your story. was advantageous to the Soviet Union, or at least neutral. And they had all sorts of techniques, you know, they could spy, they spied on you all the time. They followed you around 'cause you know you're a foreigner. But also that censor had to answer to somebody. So all the censor has to do is be like, look, I am having trouble with my supervisor. And the reporter could be like, well, can I talk to the supervisor? It's like, well, I'm sorry that's not possible. And he's on deadline, but it's too bad. Bureaucracy doesn't recognize the needs of deadlines.

So there was a big pressure, a lot of pressure. on Western journalists to have to get through this net. And that's literally constant, you know, every story you're, it's gonna be a fight. So at a certain point you're just gonna be like, all right, and you're gonna pre-censor yourself. You know, if you know, all right, if I include this, it's not gonna get through. What are you supposed to do? I think human beings are naturally, and also a lot of these journalists were pro-Soviet. They thought this is the society of the future.

At least everyone's trying. to make it a better country for everyone. Not like back home with a poor, poor slip between the cracks. We gotta do what we can to make this work. And you know, there was a lot of, I don't wanna say conspiracy, but within the industry, there was a consensus. that the Stalin was the good guy and we were, if not the bad guys, certainly not as good.

in certain regards. So when this news of the famine started percolating, all the other Western journalists besides Gareth Jones. and Malcolm Muggeridge were saying this isn't true. It's nothing that they haven't seen before. The paper that took the lead in this was in New York Times. with their guy, Walter Duranty, who had previously won a Pulitzer. and had interviewed Stalin, which was a enormously rare honor for a Westerner. And he, because he had so much experience.

covering Russia and the Soviet Union, he basically took the lead. and other people followed his lead. You know, he was kind of the dean. of the Press Corps in Russia. And he made a point, and the thing, there's so many quotes I have from him. where he's not only denying. that this mass starvation is happening, he's also going after journalists. who are questioning the narrative. And he, you know, he says things like, look, this is nothing that the Russians. haven't experienced before. They're simply tightening their belts.

And it's like, you only have to tighten your belt. when you don't have enough food. It's not like they started a new exercise regimen and, and now their body fat's dropping. That's, why would someone tighten their belt? So that was one. And the New York Times had a 13 page article, big headline, "Russians hungry, not starving". And he went after Jones, he went after Muggeridge, I believe. No, he did go after Muggeridge. But the point being that. this is just propaganda. from people who want the Soviet Union to fail.

You know, they don't understand what they're building here. You know, he had so many excuses like, oh, you know, the reason all these Russians. are supposedly leaving their villages to go to the cities. isn't 'cause there's no food. It's because they're nomadic, it's tradition. They, they go from town to town looking for new experiences. And it's just, you know, at a certain point, and I think it was 1941. where he was eventually like, or '51 rather, I don't remember. He was like, oh, well I guess I was kind of wrong.

And it's like, he's like, any journalist worth his salt can admit when he's wrong. And it's like, well, were you worth your salt? Because you sure you, he explicitly said, there's no point. in sending out journalists look for themselves. I've been through the countryside and everyone's fine. And it's just that the loudest people are making noise, whereas everyone else is doing the work and, and, you know, trying and, and this isn't about famine, but it's about western, skeptical about collectivization, which is just simply a new way of farming. And yeah, it was a new way of farming.

And there's results were by design. and also accidentally absolutely catastrophic. - How hard was it. to see the truth at that time, do you think? Do you think that was a mistake that, that's understandable to make as a journalist? - If my job as a journalist, I have two bosses if I'm in Moscow. I've got my reporter in New York or London or whatever, but I've got my censor here.

and he is making sure I have a house, an apartment. - Yeah. - He makes sure I have food. He makes sure I have access to dignitaries, he's my lifeline. If I piss him off, I'm on the next plane out of town, so. - Is that enough? Is that enough to. slowly suffocate the integrity of a journalist? - I don't think it was slow at all. And it was clearly enough. And because what are they gonna do. - I disagree with that. I disagree. I think the failure of integrity.

has to come from the New York, on the New York, on the American side. That it's just the flock of fish or whatever. that all move in the same narrative. - Right. - I think journalists. would like to be the kind of people that have integrity. So if they are conscious of sacrificing their own integrity, they wouldn't do it. If they're conscious of an act that's doing it, they wouldn't do it. So it has to happen like a lobster slowly boiling. - No, I think it happens when everyone else is,

it's a, it's a Greek chorus, right. - Right, right, it's a chorus. But that's exact, that's right. So it's not about the act, but they will, I mean, I have, I've talked to, you know, journalists where. I get the sense that they will sell their soul for access. - Because that's their job. - Is it though? Because what they do, what journalists do, I've seen American journalists, they take a huge amount of pride for having gotten the, the interview. - Yeah.

- Or whatever that is. The Putin interview. And first of all, they, they're gleaming, they're, they're glowing with pride. It seems like they're always showing off. to the other journalists back in America. So they're glowing up, like showing off, like, look, I got the access, you didn't. And second thing they're doing. when they show up to that interview. is they ask all the questions. that signal to the other journalists. that we're on the same side. They ask the most generic, aggressive questions to which they know the answers,

to they, they just, they want to, they want to basically get the access. and ask the quote unquote hard-hitting questions. that they know will not be answered. And this is, this is the entire machinery of it. It's not, it's this modern journalism. And I suppose at that time. - [Michael] It was worse. - It was worse? They weren't even doing the hard-hitting the, the display of hard-hitting questions. - [Michael] Right. - Because PR pieces. - Think about what high status that is. if I'm an American journalist in Moscow,

I'm allowed in this secretive country. I'm in a, I'm the, I'm the guy. who's very privileged to have access. to live in Moscow and tell Americans, which we're all fascinated. about this new society of the future, what it's like. And as soon as I kinda start questioning the narrative, I'm gonna get kicked out and humiliated very publicly. It whoa, whoa, I thought you were in Moscow. What am I supposed to say? So, you know, they, Eugene Lyons was, you know,

he's one of the heroes in the book. He was a young communist and I think it was United Press. he was working for, they set him there. And when he went there, he's like, oh, this is not what I thought it was gonna be like. This is horrible. And he's, he turned very heavily against it. But he talks about how. they would write one thing. and say another thing. and then think another thing. And each of those steps was just more and more like. kind of lying in terms of maintaining your sanity.

and maintaining your narrative. - So you reference Anne Applebaum. and say that "starvation was not simply a consequence, it was the goal and it was the law. Stalin intended to break the Ukrainians once and for all, it thus became common for villagers. to spy and inform on one another. Turning in a neighbor. for having a sack of grain. might be the easiest and safest way to procure food. for one's family.". - [Michael] Yeah. - To what degree was this the intention?

To what degree did Stalin anticipate this kind of suffering. as a consequence of the collectivization policy? - I don't know that he intended the suffering. to be consequence of the collectivization, but he, it was quite apparent, and I think there's a pretty heavy consensus nowadays. that his goal was very much, 'cause Ukraine again, you know, resented the Czar and, and had this kind of very contentious relationship.

with Russia, which obviously very clearly remains today. I mean the hatred of Ukrainians for Russians. preceded Putin's war. I mean, this is, even when I was a kid, this, you know, I obviously don't remember it, but my parents just told me like the hatred that they had. And understandably, I mean, they're basically under foreign occupation, what they regard as foreign occupation for. - [Lex] So your parents talked about a hatred. by Ukrainian towards Russians? - Oh yes. Oh yes. - I mean I, you know, I, I certainly having visited there this year,

because of the most recent invasion in February, in February, that hatred is nationwide and very intense. But I don't know, I think the feeling, the emotions were much more complex before. - But at the same time--. - At least-- - They were under. occupation before, right. And they couldn't speak Ukrainian. They had to speak Russian. So this was a thing. - But because of the forced intermixing, it's a, it's a more complex story. - Okay.

But I mean, they weren't certainly fans. - Yeah, but there's. people that came from Russia, they're living there, they're marrying, they're falling in love, they're working with each other. So like there is a, the bigger atrocity of the genocide of it, but there's also the reality. of intermixing of a peoples, right. - [Michael] Well, sure. I mean-- - There's the atrocity. of slavery in the United States, but then there's also a reality. that there's now an intermixing of a, of a peoples. And now they fall in love and they live after, after slavery is abolished.

That's, that's just the reality, like after the genocide. - Right. - Precedes a kind of generational integration. that still remembers like the, the suffering reverberates. But there's still, it's a different culture that's created. And now I think, I mean, I have complex stories. Most of my family is from Ukraine. So I have a, and it's my understanding.

is grounded in Soviet Ukraine. But there is something. in the last 30 years that's different. Where now after the collapse of the Soviet Union, there's a true, maybe renewed fight for independence. And that's a different thing. - But there's also a difference, like, you know, if I go to North Korea as an American, right, they're very friendly now, right. They don't perceive me. as part of the Yank devils. They're like, okay, you're an American, but you, you know,

you come from America. So yeah, there's gonna be inner marriage. But that's a big difference between. the perception of Russia as an entity. as opposed to some individual Russians. - I just, that wasn't the, the experience I've had. talking to a lot of friends and family in Ukraine. until the war started. - Really? So they really didn't have. this kind of low key animosity toward Russians? - No, there was a lot of. factional conflict inside Ukraine.

- [Michael] Okay. - Now the whole country is united. I think, I think there's a clarity now. The war gave a clarity. that wasn't there before. - Well this is, I was saying earlier. how humans define themselves by opposition. So now that there's a war, it's like, okay, this, all this little stuff doesn't matter. We are all united 'cause we have a common enemy. - But there's also, as you know, there's regions and there's, there's just groups of different people, and then one of the big divides of course. is the city versus rural.

And then in the case of Ukraine, it's, it's Eastern Ukraine and Western Ukraine. It's very difficult to know what the truth is. 'Cause my personal experience is sampled. - [Michael] Right. - You know, I don't, I don't know how many Ukrainians I know, maybe like 30 or 40, before this trip, like 30 or 40. And then I'm close with just a handful. But then it's hard to know. 'cause you get a lot of western press perspective. and you get the Russian perspective. and you get other perspectives. And it's very hard to know how much hate there is. outside of this conflict.

So my primary question is, and this is what I ask a lot of people. when I visited Ukraine, is. will you ever, will you ever be able to forgive the Russians? And a lot of people said never. Never. So this isn't just about assuming, assuming we win, they would say, assuming we win, will still not ever forgive. Never, never forgive. And and they said it in a way where like,

not only us, but our children will never forgive. And that, and it wasn't just, you know what, it wasn't just about Russia. or the Russian leadership, it's about the Russian people. But a lot of people also said that this is where, this is our feeling currently. We understand like you, you're lost in the, the rage of war. - [Michael] Yeah. - Because you lose so much. - But I mean, if you asked Americans, would you ever be friends with Germany or Japan? It'd be like, are you kidding after Pearl Harbor? - Yeah.

But of course most Americas. didn't feel Pearl Harbor is different. It it's a good point when it's your own land. But when imagine it wasn't just Pearl Harbor, but it was New York and-- - Right. - And Chicago and, and Dallas and all these cities being, being bombed. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's. just to linger on this war in Ukraine currently.

Does it break your heart to see what's going on there now. that it's on the same land. as the same cities, the same stories are now like brought back to the surface. Like the generational pain as it was in the, in the time that you're writing about? Do you think it's a fundamentally different country, different war, different situation? Or does it, do you, do you hear echoes of the same? - I don't think it's the same because.

I think there is no one, or I mean there, there is no one who is like, I'm glad this is happening to the Ukrainian people, right? So even the people who are for Putin and for the invasion. and whatever justification they might have for his war, no one is like, yeah, let's get those, you know, darn Ukrainians. I think there was that sense in America after 9/11. when we invade Afghanistan and Iraq.

and there was like F those Iraqis, F those Afghan people. Whereas now I think it's completely opposite. I, I don't, I also think a lot of Russians, I'm sure if I ask them, they're not thinking like, let's wipe the Ukrainian people off the map. I think whatever reasons they have, it's, it's not kind of going after this. Even if you have to kind of rile up people. against the citizenry, it's not to that level. of the hatred of the Kulaks hatred of,

of those villages. - There's still a belief though, amongst the soldiers outside of the big cities, their belief that the Ukrainian people. who the Russian soldiers believe. are their brothers and sisters. are occupied by an evil regime. - [Michael] Okay. I bet that-- - So you need to save them. from the evil regime. - That's also very different from, you know, The Holodomor. And also there is dispute in the press. about the causes, the consequences, the victims, the villains of Putin's war.

But when it came to this, no one, no one is denying that the war is happening. The New York Times isn't saying everything is fine. And the only reason. people are saying it's a problem. is 'cause they hate Putin or they hate Zelensky. That that's not a thing. And the fact that we have so much footage. of what's happening in Ukraine and you know, you have, it takes two seconds. to go and Google and you have a map of, you know, Russian advancement, what are they, what parts are they occupying,

what parts are not under their control. You know, I did a little live stream, I raised money for Ukrainian refugees to feed them. 'cause that's my concern is just keeping people fed. There was none of that, you know, and the, the two people who kind of spoke the truth, Gareth Jones was shot, I think the day before his 30th birthday, while he was undercover, uncovering news, I think it was in Mongolia. Malcolm Muggeridge had problem finding work. when he exposed this.

And I think the, like we was talking about earlier, the ubiquity of things like cell phones and camera phones. would make something like this, I don't know, I wouldn't say an impossibility. They could still do it, but it would be really hard to cover it up. - Well, so to, to push back on that, if you just look at Iran, I would draw a different, so I agree with you mostly, but I would also draw a different distinction. when the atrocities happening to your own people.

versus there's a war. Ukraine is a sovereign, independent nation. There's now a war between two nations. It feels like it's easier for journalists. to somehow reveal the truth in that. When the atrocity is happening within the Soviet Union, for some reason, that's easier to hide, that's easier for journalists to deceive themselves. and easier for the authoritarian leader. to hide the information. - [Michael] I think that's, I agree with you. - And so that's, that's the dark. I mean that's why people, maybe, maybe you can educate me on this, but this, this is why I think.

people don't talk about Holodomor. and other atrocities, the, the Great Leap Forward, because it's inside the country. - [Michael] Yeah. - Versus the Holocaust, that's part of a war. Why, why is that that we, there were two almost like, what, afraid, too polite, to what is it that we don't want to cover the atrocities. inside the country? Like it's their business. So we don't want to touch it, I don't think.

- Is that-- - What is it? Why? - I think it's that what we refer to as the news. is in the business of selling narratives, right? And the narrative of the Holocaust is a very powerful one, which is if you let hatred of a subgroup in a population. get outta control, this is the ultimate consequence. And this is something that we all have to be scared of. and do everything in our power to void in the future. for any out group. Whereas what's the narrative of the Holodomor?

Sometimes governments kill their own citizens. There's nothing you could do about it. There's nothing we, I mean, they wouldn't have let us send food. They wouldn't acknowledge, like the newspapers, even Russia weren't acknowledging it. Like what's the, like, this is some of the issues I had. with regard to trying to advocate. for the North Korean people. The reporters would be like, well, what can I do as an American? It's a very natural question. And I'm like, I don't know. I like, all I know is how to speak to what is happening. But in terms of next steps,

I don't have a good answer for you. So that is where the news kind of does break down. If there isn't a story or a call to action, the kind of, you're kind of almost like. having a movie with a cliffhanger and there's no sequel. It's like, what am I supposed to do here? Like, this is not scratching that itch, which for me, what as a consumer of news, you know, a layman is like, okay, here's the story. There was a bad guy and the cops shot him, or they took him to jail, and now the bad guy's caught. Beginning, middle, end. Here, it's just like Mao did this,

a lot of people were executed and starved. Isn't that awful? Well, and Mao's still in power. and now Richard Nixon is raising a toast to him. Like, that story is just like, how am I supposed to feel about this? - Yeah, it feels like when there's tanks. and there's war and this military conflict, then it's more actionable. You can cover it. - Yeah. - And it did seem like Nazi Germany. I don't know if Holocaust was this thing. that made it most comfortable. I think it was that this is a threat. to the entire civilization. - [Michael] Well, yeah, we're at war with them, yeah.

- This is, that's what makes it coverable. And if the Holocaust was happening just inside the country, inside of Germany, or even if it didn't expand beyond Poland. - Yeah, it would be like a footnote. It was in many ways a footnote. Like many of the early steps toward it. was like they didn't cover. It's just like, all right, they're, they're being oppressive toward their own people, okay. - Especially given some of the, maybe if you negotiate certain peace treaties. with the Soviet Union and would jump, like you're too, the basic, the pacifist imperative.

Oh boy. - Sorry, Santa. - Is that what you say every time you masturbate? No. After you're done, you know, sorry? All right, all right. Now see, I hate it when you don't "yes and". because it leaves me in a hole I dug for myself. and I sit there in a hole. in my sadness. How long have you been writing this book?

I mean, two years. Mentally, it was like two years. since you spent with the time with it. What? - No, almost three, it's 2 1/2, yeah. - And I, I suppose it stages you much longer, like you said, your family. So in many ways, this is a book you've been writing your whole life. - I think that's fair. that all my work's been leading to this, yeah. It's certainly the most, in my opinion, the most important thing I've done. - What stands out to you about Holodomor? What moments?

What aspects of human nature stand out to you? - I don't know, I think that story is, I don't wanna say story, but I meant like that incident is, I mean, I was familiar with it before, you know what I mean? So I kind of knew about it, you know, in part thanks to kind of the North Korean work. and coming from Ukraine. The thing that was also kind of insane about it is. that they were taking all this grain. and not using it even to feed the Russian people.

They were selling it for export for hard currency. I think what the takeaway there, and I think again, this is something Westerners. and especially the Americans don't appreciate. They think that evil often has. like a logic to it, right? And it's like, why would, like, because it makes no sense to them, like why would they kill their own people. Therefore, it probably didn't happen, right.

There's that thing. They really think like, okay, they can understand, you know, country A. conquers country B. and slaughters a bunch of people in country B. as a means of conquest. Like, that kind of makes sense to them. They know that thing. But like, why are you starving all these people? Like what are you gaining out of it? That doesn't make sense to them. And because it doesn't make sense, there's kind of like, well, it's probably more this story that I'm hearing. And a lot of times there's not, it's just like evil for the sake of power.

And we don't really have that. certainly anywhere near that scale and never have. certainly, you know, since it's, since America. has been a thing. I mean, it's. and the fact that this is like the 30s, you know what I mean? This isn't that long ago. But I think also the, the narrative in some ways is how, you know, technology is also something that kind of,

people have mixed feelings about. Like I said this before, and I, this is something I really believe very strongly. The ability of information to be captured and spread easily. is such an effective tool. in exposing humanity at its worst. Because that, it's one thing if I sit here. and tell you what I saw in these villages, it's another thing that I sat you down. and showed you a YouTube and you know, you and I don't know what it's like. to look in the eyes of someone.

who's thinking about eating their own kids. I mean, and you see that face. and you know, it's, you know, not something, some CGI. It will haunt you forever. - Just looking at the different mechanisms. that made all of this happen. So this is not just one guy, Stalin having a policy. There's a whole system. I mean, one of it is just a system of fear, but how do you implement that system of fear? - [Michael] Well--. - There's a giant bureaucracy of fear.

- Yeah. So what he implemented with the great terror is--. - [Lex] That's in the, in the 30s, in the late 30s. - It, well, it's throughout the 30s, but yeah, like it starts in the mid to late 30s. Basically, you know, communism was based on the common good. and the public good. And anything private, which was bourgeois was a problem. When they were started, you know, when the revolution came, the October Revolution, they wanted to recreate society entirely. And that included like, okay, let's make it so.

everyone eats in the cafeteria. so they're not eating by themselves. Let's design buildings so everyone has to share bathrooms. Like their whole plan. was to have eliminate any kind of concept of privacy at all. They also had this bizarre kind of radical idea. of like attacking shame. So many of these, you know, before the 1917 people were also very, very involved with like free love. 'cause the idea of like having this private bond. between husband and wife was also bourgeois. and old fashioned and, you know, we're the society of the future.

That changed relatively quickly. But they were talking about things. like raising kids communally and, and so on and so forth. So for Stalin, if you and I are friends, we have a bond, that's a threat to him. The family's a threat. Any kind of organization's a threat. 'cause it's a power center that is not between you, a relationship between you and him. Now you have a relationship with somebody else. So he systemically. went through that whole society.

and you know, it became, there's certain things that became a crime. Then it became a crime to be a spouse. of the enemy of the people. Now right away, I as a child become an orphan. 'cause my dad was an enemy of the people. My mom is married to an enemy of the people. Now I don't have parents. They get arrested or executed or whatever. But now I have nowhere to go. but I can't go to my friend's house. because their family doesn't wanna take in a child. of the enemy of the people. You had this culture.

where everyone was very much encouraged to turn people in. and if you turn, if you're arrested, you know and tortured, you're like, okay, who are your accomplices? And now you just gotta name names, people you knew. And then it becomes this whole chain. and it's like how am I gonna protest my innocence. if Lex just said, you know, I worked with Michael. and we were working with Trotskyists, and we were plotting to overthrow Stalin. Lex testified to this, he signed a confession. What am I supposed to do now, right?

So it worked its way in a almost viral fashion. through the whole society. There was this amazing moment where. these poor people, peasants, 'cause obviously the powerless are often. gonna be caught in the web. They were going to jail for being Trotskyites. and they had to ask themselves what's a tractorist. They didn't even know who Trotsky was. And the thing, other thing is. ethnicity was a problem, right? If you were an ethnicity, you have more power with other members of that ethnicity.

than you have with this kind of broader Soviet culture. So he would just deport entire populations. from their ancestral lands to other parts, A to spread the population around, but also to break that link between the peoples. and their lands. There was this 1937 and NKVD order against Polish people. where it's just like if you had come from Poland or had a, been a, just this whole list. and basically people were being arrested. 'cause they had Polish last names. and I think it was a million people were killed,

like some astronomical number. So there was this, anything that was a bond. was a threat to him. And the, it went systemically. So after he had all these kind of executions. of people who were like Lenin's people, the old Bolsheviks, then he went after, he started arresting the secret police, you know, he arrested all the cops, he arrested all the judges. And all these prisoners. got to see the judges who yelled at them. for being counter-revolutionaries in spies. Now they were in the jails.

If you were a foreigner, if there was a huge push from the Soviet Union. toward African Americans, right. 'cause they're like, look, you were living in a racist country. Here we have no. racial inequality. Come, come live here. A bunch of them went and they were all vanished. You know anyone who knew information. about the outside world, if you were a foreigner. Andre Babel, I forget his first name. He had a French writer he was friends with. He was arrested in Cheka 'cause he's a spy. 'cause you're friends with Mel Roe.

And if you, that means if you know a foreigner, you're a spy. Speaking Esperanto became a crime, having a pen pal, literally anything that was some kind of chain. between yourself and someone else. was a threat and was grounds for arrest. It was, the Russians would joke. about how relieved they would be. if someone knocked on your door in the middle of the night. to tell your house was on fire. 'Cause it wasn't the NKVD coming to arrest you. - And of course most of the accusations probably. were completely false. So not only could you not do all of those things,

you were also a victim of just--. - Being late to work became a felony. and also not doing your job became a felony. 'cause now you're taking. food or product away from the people. and you're supposed to be there working for the people. There's this one story which, you know, I was re doing the audiobook and this is like, I still trying to get through without crying. This was 1920. They were a bunch of kids in Moscow who were pick pockets. between ages 11 and 15. They rounded them up.

and they're like, all right, point out your accomplices. And they would take 'em in the trams. and you have to point out people. Then they would take 'em back to the cellar, beat the crap out of these children. and then they take 'em out again. And if they didn't point out to anybody, they'd beat them. And they're like, all right. So they just start pointing at random. And the thing that was really sick about this story, if I wasn't sick enough, is that the screams that the other criminals, the adult hardened criminals had to hear from these children. as they realized they were being taken back to the, to the cellar. It was just horrifying.

- And they, so they tortured people, they tortured confessions out of people. - [Michael] Yes. - At scale. - Oh yes. - I mean the, and the dark aspect of this is, it's all, it's like this weird, it's a bureaucracy of torture. - Yes. - So like, it's not like that there's, what is it, the torturer is afraid of, like does it so that he doesn't become the prisoner?

- Right. Basically because then it's like, oh, you couldn't get a confession out of him. Are you an enemy that people now as well? And the thing that was even crazier. is that a lot of these interrogators. were frustrated 'cause they're like, look, we both know you're innocent. Just sign this confession and make my life easier. They knew it was crap. Stalin joked about, Stalin joked about this, this is one of his little jokes. There was a kid who was arrested and he was said, oh, was forced to say you wrote Eugene O'Negan, which is a play.

He goes, that play was by Pushkin. And they tortured him. and they tortured him and tortured him. And then his parents are walking down the street. and they run into secret police. and they go, congratulations. And they go for what? They go, your son wrote Eugene O'Negan. Like he admitted to it last night. Like it's just like they could get you to say anything. And what else was really, really sick, which they understood, is it, they lowered the death penalty for kids. I think to either 14 or 12. I don't remember off the top of my head. And what Stalin's head of the secret police did.

is when you were interrogating someone, they, you either had to have some of your family member. of that family member's possessions on the desk. or a copy of the decree that's saying, you know, that that that they can go after your family. And the amount of people who would confess to anything. when they saw their family was in danger. and they knew this wasn't a bluff, was astronomical. And then it becomes a chain. 'cause if you confess, and I have your confession, how hard is it to get your neighbor?

- What do you make of the for a time, for most of the time the NKVD was about the head of NKVD, Lavrentiy Pavlovich Beria? - Oh Beria yeah, I have a, I have a, a death warrant signed by him hanging in my kitchen. that I acquired. He was one of the most evil people who ever lived. The thing that Americans don't appreciate is how clever. some of the sadism is.

So there was one actress, I think he took her back to his, his house. and he asked her to, he tried to get her to sleep with him. and he promised her that. if she did her father and either her husband. or her grandfather, which ever one it was, is gonna be released from jail. Well they were already dead at that point. He had them executed. They're still finding the bodies of the women he murdered. in the grounds. of his (speaking in foreign language) embassy now. And the thing is, Stalin knew, 'cause at one point Stalin, there's a picture of Stalin's daughter in his lap, you know, and she was at his house one day and Stalin calls up,

he goes, get out of there immediately. So he, like a good bureaucrat, he kept a list of all of his sexual partners. It's still sealed, but both him and his bodyguard had this list. - So just to clarify. - Yeah. - He headed the operation. that did this whole giant mechanism of forced confessions. - [Michael] Yes. - He was part of expanding the gulags. So he wasn't the head of the gulags, but he was part of this giant mission. - And his famous quote was, "show me the man and I'll show you the crime". - Yeah.

But on top of that, what you're describing is he was also, related or not, was also just a mass rapist. - Yes, and there's some dispute, right, whether he went after kids with his rapes, but there's plenty of adult women. that were targets for this. There was also another little joke about him, about how Stalin is looking for his pipe. and he can't find it. And he calls Beria and he's like, okay, I can't find this pipe. And then the afternoon he calls Beria again, he's like, oh, I found the pipe. He goes, but, but Comrade Stalin, we've got four people to confess to steal it already. So you have to laugh,

but then you think about the nature of, of how it operates in--. - Well, and also the fact. that this kind of person was allowed to run. I mean, I suppose. it's all different kinds of evil. and rape was just a part of the story. His own personal willingness to. oversee torture and commit torture himself and rape. - But it's also what happens when you are in a country. where has no rights of any kind. - And by the way, I should mention.

that people should get your book and audio. When is your audio book coming out? - It's in a couple weeks, so it'll be out shortly, yeah. - You gave me the great honor of voicing this man. - [Michael] That's for the promo. - Yeah, for the promo. - Yeah, the video. - Excellent. I appreciate that. For a moment, I actually, it was really difficult. - Really? - Yeah. - It was just a sentence. - I understand. I understand.

'Cause it takes you to that place. - Oh yeah. Because he told her scream if you want, doesn't matter. - [Lex] Yeah. - And he was right. Like that's the thing, he wasn't bluffing. You could scream, these women could scream their head off. No one's gonna come help them. He would drive around Moscow at night in his limo. looking for victims. - But somehow me saying those words was tough. - [Michael] I'm sure. - Is, it is tough. - Because this is where we came from. Do you know what I mean? This isn't just like some kind of Tolkien villain. - But it also was tough 'cause I could see myself.

being somewhere in that machine somewhere. Like somehow that put me right there. Like I, any like there. any cog in that machine is committing evil. - [Michael] Yes. - That's the dark thing. I think the high, the higher you are to the top, the closer you are to the top, the more ability you have to stop it.

But the less, the more freedom you have to stop it, I suppose. - [Michael] To a point, yeah. - But like the little things, so Beria had the freedom to commit rape. or not to, and so he chooses to. sort of increase the amount of evil. he's putting out into the world. - But then you have to counterbalance that as, as dark as calculus is, after Stalin dies, like that week,

they start making the gulag shrink. They start pulling back on the concentrate, the labor camps. So the, I mean, so that is a big plus in his side. Like, you start liberating, having this mass amnesty and freeing people from work camps. That's not minor thing. So it's crazy. Like, it's like I'm not, I'm not St. Peter, right. I don't, I don't know, I'm not saying he's a good person,

but it's kind of insane. that someone can do things that everyone listening to this. would regard as pure evil. And at the same time, this guy also, when the time came, saved tens of thousands of lives. - So in some sense, Stalin is a kind of cancer that permeates all the--. - Yes. - All, all the Soviet minds. And once it's gone, you almost like wake up, wait a minute, what the fuck was I a part of? - And, and Khrushchev in, was it '56 when he gave a secret speech,

you know, behind closed doors. And he's just like, all this criticism of Stalin was true. This is complete on what Marxism, you know, he tried to salvage the system. This is not what Marxism is about. We can't have a personality cult. You know, Stalin killed all these top generals. and when Hitler turned his, betrayed the pact and invaded, Stalin didn't believe his buddy Hitler was gonna do this. And as a result of this, we lost a lot of territory and lives. This is not a military genius. This was Stalin being an idiot or a moron,

whatever you, whatever term you wanna be. So, you know, yeah. But the thing is, Khrushchev also was a butcher. You know, he had a lot of blood in his hands. You don't become, you know, take Stalin's seat. without having overlooked a lot of murder and chaos. So it's such a, that's why it's called, the subtitle of the book's "A Tale of Good and Evil". There's so much malevolence to go around. - What do you think was going through Stalin's mind. in the 20s and the 30s?

Like, did he directly. like allow himself to acknowledge the reality. of the suffering he was causing? Like what does it take to be that human? Like, I'm almost interested. to extract lessons from that for leaders of today. Like how hard is it? Is it that Stalin is evil. or can you just dilute yourself gradually.

into where you don't have a sense. of the effect of your policies in the populace? - Well, you're not deluding yourself. because you have around you. an entire government. of people telling you 24/7. how great you are, how thankful they are for you, how awesome you are. You're the best. So that is certainly gonna play into it. I've asked myself that question as well, like, do these people believe they're own bullshit? And at a, and I think the receipts are. when Elena Ceausescu,

who's one of the four women on the cover, when she's being taken away to be executed in 1989, she's yelling at the soldiers, "how could you, I raised you like a mother.". So she at least believed her own bullshit. With Stalin, he was obviously extremely intelligent. I think it's kind of easy for us to kind of psychologize. and say he's a sociopath, he's a narcissist, he's this, he's that. But at this, at a certain point, like if you're surrounded.

by a culture dedicated to glorifying you. and everyone you meet is so happy to see you, and oh my God, all your pronouncements are so good. And it, you know, what if some, if you make a decision that's wrong, the people around you, it's their job to tell you why it's not your fault. It's the fault of the wreckers. or it's the fault of, you know, Hitler or whoever it is, the Kulaks. At a certain point, the human mind. wants to believe how great it is, especially someone in that vaunted position.

But he had his, there was this one funny, I'm using the word loosely quote, when Hitler invades Russia. and he couldn't believe it. and he's just missing in action for days. 'cause how could Hitler betray me? We had a deal. Birds of a feather. And he had this quote about like, we've taken Lenin's legacy and shit it out our asses. I think he was very aware that, that's no question that he was aware. that in terms of being a philosopher or a thinker, he wasn't on Lenin's level, right.

So that was, I'm sure played a lot into his psychology. - That he never quite lived up to the, like everything he tried. I mean there's some sense of that the collectivization, that this idea was a failure. The way he responds to the economic policy being a failure. is to lean in. and basically torture anyone who says it's a failure. and double down on the policy. Like that says something about--.

- But it wasn't a failure. It broke the Ukrainians. - You don't think he believed early on, that's what it turned into. But you don't think in the very early days. there was a thought that collectivization. is the right mechanism by which. to enact communism in the nation. - I think his goal. was to break their spirit. and getting them fed was secondary, right. And given the fact that they stopped complaining.

'cause they're dead, he got what he wanted. He got a compliant population. - I mean that's really interesting. I didn't, I wonder how much disagreement there is about, because if that was the goal from the beginning, that's a different level of evil. - I think that was clearly the, so his, what, like I said earlier, right, he broke with Lenin. 'cause he wanted socialism in one country, right. That was his vision. Right. And he was also very aware. that what became the Soviet Union was extremely diverse.

First of it's gigantic country. It was the big country on earth. It's not only gigantic. You had all these peoples, these nationalities within it. that have had historical enmity and they're, they're not gonna have loyalty to Moscow. He's a Georgian himself. This was always a big problem. So that was what he wanted to do as well, is the homogenize and have them be standardized. And I don't see how you do that. without either massive reeducation, which is only gonna go so far,

or really just crushing people's spirits. - So like a forced homogeneity. - Yeah. And the the other big thing, a big element of Soviet culture. and the Soviet mythology, I mean, he called, his name was, he changed his name to Stalin, I can't even pronounce his Georgia name. Jughashvili, or something like that. It means man of steel. So a large part of the, and this still remains in Russian culture to this day.

I see in my family too. And like other Russians, I know. There is this pride in ruthlessness. and this kind of like, I'm so tough, like nothing's gonna affect me. Like yeah, we're gonna suffer, but it's for a greater good or for the long term. And not to be kind of sentimental or squeamish about things. Like that was a big part of it. - Don't take that away from me too, Michael. - What do you mean? - Taken everything. - Am I wrong? - I admire, not, not stoicism, but that kind of hardness. I look for it in myself.

That has nothing to do with Stalin. - But not to the extent that like if some, like for example, like if you see. someone suffering-- - Oh yeah, yeah. - And that's being used as a mechanism. to get you to change your opinion. You're like, they're not gonna get to me. Like that is very much part of that Russian psychology. - Right. At least at that time. - Yes. I think still largely, no? I'm not gonna be manipulated. by someone else's suffering or weakness, that kind of thing. I think that's really part of it to this day.

- I don't know, I don't know how much of his character, how much of it is reality. - Sure, sure. I remember, I knew, I knew as someone who was, him and his fiance were Russian. and they had this big fight, she took off the ring, right. And she's like, you know, and he's like, that's it. And just like the way he he told the story to me, she's like, what do you want me to say? Oh, don't leave me baby. I can't live without you. Like that nasty cruelty, which.

- I don't know man. I know, I know. You're, I don't know if there's a Russian thing. That's just, that's just a people thing. - [Michael] I don't think it's an American thing. - I think there's all kinds of flavors. and they're different by region. of the way that people are cruel to each other. - [Michael] Sure, I'm not arguing that. - In America, in America, New Jersey is different than Texas. is different than California. - You don't think Americans are a higher trust, more kind society than Russia even today?

- Higher trust? Listen, I'm not going to, so first of all, I have a very complex. feelings about Russia today. - [Michael] I'm talking about, let's talk about generally, before the war. I'm talking about nowadays. - I think it's a complex psychological dynamic. of what trusting means. I think Russians are generally less friendly, but have more intimate friendships. - Yes, I think that's true.

- So it's, it's just a different. - It's not different, it's just one is more trusting. - Which is more trusting? - [Michael] Americans. - But then that's define trusting different because--. - I'll give, okay, I'll give you an example. If someone's having a party in America and people come over. - Yeah. - Okay, that's fine. Everyone's welcome. If it's in Russia, it's like, who, who, who's that? Who'd you bring? And there's much more of a like, let me be sure that it's okay if this person's here. - I don't know. I maybe, that's there. - You don't have parties. - I have, I have never been at a party. - And you don't come to mine.

Ben asked, but was very sad. - Well, I love Ben. I love Ben. - Well, you should have showed it by showing up. - Just man, I'm, I hide from the world. and I'm afraid of social interaction and, and I just lay on the ground instead. and feel sorry for myself. - It's not bad Santa, it's sad Santa. - Well, I conserve, I conserve my emotional energy. towards this one day of the year. - Okay. - Where I can. intensely spread my joy. All right.

Speaking of which, you tell a Christmas story in the book. - Are you spoiling that chapter? It's called Diehard. - All right, well I'm not gonna spoil it, okay. It's really good. - I was very proud of that chapter. - [Lex] Why? - Because the ending that's a Christmas story. is just like, I know everyone reading it's gonna go Google it, be like he can't be, he can't be real. But it was real. - Then it was like Christmas yesterday, yeah. I mean that that this has to do with the bigger picture. We don't have to do the big reveal, but the bigger picture of there, there was an Iron Curtain and it was coming down. in complex ways.

How would you define the Iron Curtain? There's a, there's this, a set of ideologies, a set of countries united by an ideology. and a set of countries united by a different ideology. And there's a curtain that divided them. and it eventually came down. So how, how would you describe how it came down? - It came, I hate that I can never remember ever, ever remember if this was Hemingway. No, it was Hemingway. - It is Mark Twain. - No, it came down two ways, gradually then suddenly.

The thing with the Iron Curtain and the Warsaw Pact, these were a bunch of nations with, you know, run under communism, but they were all, almost all, under the sway of Moscow. So if they were going to make big changes, Moscow had to approve it. It was in 19, in the earl in the 50s were in Hungary, decided to rebel, or not rebel, liberalize.

And they even were thinking of leaving the Warsaw Pact. and the Russians send in the tanks. And you had the development. of what was called the Brezhnev Doctrine, which was the idea that. it is the duty of all the Warsaw Pact nations, if another country tries to, and this is also in '68 in the Prague Spring. in Czechoslovakia, if a nation wants to leave socialism, it is incumbent those socialist nations to, to do whatever's necessary. to make sure there isn't a counterrevolution.

So they were very much under Moscow's thumb. And one of the big ways it changed was one man, and that was Mikhail Gorbachev. And he was the first Russian leader. to be born after the October Revolution. He grew up and his grandfather. was arrested for being a Trotskyite. And the other one, you know, was arrested for this or that. He saw his village starve as a result of Stalin.

So even though he was a very committed communist, he also was very. and increasingly skeptical of authoritarianism. And you know, in Poland for example, you had the solidarity movement. and this is a labor union movement. And the government didn't know what to do. They were getting a lot of support from the peoples. They had strikes, that in the Gdansk shipyard was, was when one of them started. And basically Moscow told them,

either you crack down or were cracking down on you. And they're like, all right. And they declared martial law and they, you know, arrested the leaders, put them away. But then when Gorbachev, you know, was in charge, there wasn't a gun to their back. And it was the communist leaders themselves who were like, you know what, there's this really funny moment where. Lech Walesa is meeting with Margaret Thatcher and she's, he's telling her what solidarity the movement wants. And she had been meeting with the Polish government as well. And she's like, look like, tell them like, what.

Because they, they had you tried, they they wanted, the government wanted her to tell them. that we wanna negotiate and work with things out. She goes, alright, tell the government what is that you're asking for. And he just points to the ceiling and she goes, he's like, oh yeah, our meetings are bugged anyway. But they then had the freedom. because they knew that Gorbachev. wasn't forcing them to drive solidarity underground. So they had the idea of like, let's work together with these people. And as a result of this, you know, Poland liberalized and freed itself fairly easily.

and with a minimum of bloodshed in '89. And it, there was this whole argument. for the Vietnam War with something called domino theory, which is if you lose Vietnam, then you're gonna lose Laos, then you're gonna lose Cambodia. One by one, the countries. are gonna turn communists like dominoes. But people didn't realize the reverse was true. 'cause after Poland liberalized, then you have, you know, Hungary, then you have, you know, Czechoslovakia then, then you know, you had East Germany and, and the fall of the Berlin wall. So it's a great thing because as this is happening,

the people are looking around and they're like, wait, well like that's, that's, that's it. Like this has gotta be a trick. And it wasn't a trick. So one of my favorite books, which was a big inspiration for this one, was by my favorite historian, I apologize to Victor Pietrusza, David Pietrusza and Arthur Herman, my second and third, they're tied. But Victor Sebestyen wrote a book called "Revolution 1989". And he just talked about that year. and how all these countries,

one after another liberalized. And it's just such a beau, and none of them thought this was possible. One of my favorite, favorite moments in this book. is Helmut Cole, who was the head of West Germany, is in Warsaw with Lech Walesa. discussing the Berlin wall. And Lech Walesa's like, I don't think it's gonna be around for like another, you know, few years. And, and Helmut Cole laughs in his face. and he goes, look, you're young. This isn't how things work. Like this is gonna take some doing.

It fell the next day. And Helmut Cole literally says, "I'm at the wrong party". And he got in a plane and got out of Warsaw. So there are, why this book has a broader message than the actual stories. of these incidents is that. as these wonderful things are happening, the universal consensus at the time is. it's never gonna happen. Or if it does gonna happen, it's gonna happen only through an enormous amount. of carnage and blood.

And when it doesn't, then everyone's like, oh, it was inevitable. You didn't say it was inevitable at the time. You only said it was inevitable after the fact. And the other thing that I was really. brought me a lot of joy. is there are so many moments. of men with guns saying we're not shooting anyone. 'Cause they wanted several Tienanmen Squares. They wanted it in, you know, East Berlin. They wanted it in Romania, they wanted it in Moscow. And these strong, tough trained men with guns.

were like, no, we're not shooting the civilians. And then everything else was history. - Yeah. Just as surprising as the mass violence. committed by like police and the army on its own citizenry, equally surprising as when they choose not to. - Yeah. - Somehow. - [Michael] Yeah. - And what is that, what, how do you explain 1989, how do you explain this progress.

that happened so suddenly, how do you explain that in the, at the beginning of the 20th century, so much revolution happened. that created communism? And how do you explain then the collapse of that. across so many nations at the same time? - I think a large part of it had to do. with the closer interconnections. between people like Gorbachev and Thatcher. and Gorbachev and Reagan. Because both of them visited Red Square.

and you know, in the years before, these are, these are enemies, you know. They wanna invade, they wanna kill us. The Americans thought this about the Russians. The Russians thought this about the Americans, obviously not so much the British. And they got on really well. When Gorbachev came to Checkers, which is the prime minister's countryside estate. Thatcher sat him down and she's lecturing him. about human rights and she's lecturing him about economics. and she's lecturing about this and that. And then she's lecturing him about.

why he isn't eating while he's yelling at her. And he goes, Mrs. Thatcher, like I know you have a lot of strong opinions. I do too. I haven't been sent here to recruit you. to the communist party. And she just started laughing. But right away there was. such a sense in the air of we can do better. We're spending all this money on missiles, we're spending all this money on the military. It's expensive. And for what? We don't have to be looking at each other as enemies.

We can try to work together to kind of, at the very least lower the, the the the volume and, and the heat. - How much credit do you give to Gorbachev the man? So meaning how much power does a single individual have? - I could not give him more credit. I had a tweet last year where I said, who do you think is the greatest person alive right now? And my answer by far would be Gorbachev. Then he died. I don't know who it is right now, but. - Which is funny because Gorbachev also had a tweet. (laughs). - But it was, it was--.

- And he said, oh sure. That would be a good, now I wish I interviewed Gorbachev and asked him the, the famous question. of what would you like best about Michael Malice? - Look the transition after the Soviet Union fell to Russia. and Yeltsin was not a smooth one by any means. You know, as I say at the end of the book, it's not like they lived happily ever after. - [Lex] Yeah. - But my point, broader point is. you take the wins when you can get them. People now had access to passports.

They don't have to have, they can leave the country. They have food, they have access to information. It's somewhat censored, but it's certainly nothing like it was. under the Soviet Union. and they didn't have to live in this kind of. constant fear and they had opportunities and it's, it's such a step forward. And there was this one great moment and I'm, there's a super. Boris Yeltsin became president of Russia, he's also mayor of Moscow at one point, or the equivalent of mayor. And he came here to visit NASA on in the,

in the capacity of one or the other. And while he was there, he went to visit a supermarket. It was a Randall's then. I think it's a Food Town now. It still exists. I'm gonna go there, I'm gonna start bawling. And as he's looking around, like he had never seen so much food. and this is food that like even wealthy people in Russia. don't have access to. And there's pictures of him just like this, like what the. And the scene that really was poignant to me. is on his flight back, he's sitting there on a plane like this.

and he's like, they had to lie to the people. because if they knew. they wouldn't have been able to get away with it. And that's the moment where it's just like, oh this wasn't like skewed propaganda, you know, this was like, they knew. and it was a lie from A to Z. and he was just like, holy crap. Just like, and you could just imagine him on that plane, his brain reprogramming. because if you're taught since you're a kid. and he was no, he was an older man, he was no dummy. You think, okay, the Americans are starving and poor.

and they're lynching people every day. And then you go to a supermarket, the most banal place on earth, and you see like, I think when the articles said like. they couldn't believe how big the onions were, something like that. And you're seeing this. and you're seeing these like janitors, school teachers, these aren't dignitaries. and they're regular people just picking whatever they want. and you're just like, like, like you, it's like the equivalent of having a stroke. - Yeah, I do think that that's one. of the most powerful things is the grocery, the grocery store.

as like, in terms of drawing a distinction. between the two systems. - Yeah. - 'Cause, you know, you can have like technology, you can show off technology and so on, but you can kind of sign, write off technology is like, okay, that's the mechanism of the devil. But when you look at just. fruit and veggies and like very big fruit and veggies. and like yeah and fruit in particular, like certain kinds of fruit, they're just not available in Russia. I mean it's, yeah, that really shows, wait a minute.

- [Michael] Yeah. - It's interesting like when you're older. and you have to face the reality that. what you believe to be true, like your whole life has been based on a set of lies. - And you're tough, not mistakes, not like a little bit like blatant lies from top to bottom. start to finish. That, I don't know what that's like. - How much,

you've, you start the book, I think you started the book with Ayn Rand, yes. - Yes. - Yes. As one does. So before the Revolution, she was born in Russia. and she witnessed the revolution. and moved to the United States in the 20s. - '26, 1926. - 1926. I remember like it was yesterday. Anyway, she, you write that she spent a lot of her life. trying to convince Americans and the world. that the negative effects of totalitarian government.

just, you know, maybe using her as an example, but also this question, can we draw a distinction between. authoritarian regimes and communism? Is it possible to steel man the case that. not all implementations of socialism and communism. would lead to the atrocities we've seen in the Soviet Union. and in China under Mao? Or like when you, in studying all of this, how much blame do you put. on the ideologies, on the Marxist ideologies.

versus the particular leaders and dictators? - Well, you have to blame the leaders a lot. because they had different leaders. and different countries were different from each other. Dubcek, who took over Czechoslovakia. and he tried to introduce socialism with the human face. in the Prague Spring of 1968. He was like, all right, we gotta do away with this authoritarianism. We gotta have more free speech. He was thinking of introducing elements of democracy. Now then the Russians sent in the tanks. But the point is he certainly was someone who was like,

all right, this, this has gotta stop. This is just absolutely crazy. Khrushchev and Stalin were not the same animal at all. So I think the problem with communism in, in the Marxist sense, is that you're going to have an introduced an element. of authoritarianism simply because. you can't have economic planning. If I don't have a price mechanism, I don't know how price is, what is me knowing as a consumer or a producer,

what should be produced or what there's a shortage of. As prices increase, that's a signal. that we have a shortage here. As prices decrease, that means that there's a surplus here. But if I'm setting the price, I don't really have, know how much weed I need to produce. If I'm compared to corn, as compared to shoes, as it compared to Santa costumes. So that is a big problem. The other issue is if you have one agency, the government having a monopoly on, let's suppose the news, like you were talking about earlier with Twitter,

it's gonna be really hard. to have any kind of objective discourse. because everyone is gonna be working. for the same organization. That is gonna cause a problem. in terms of having a feedback me mechanism, even in a best scenario, in terms of this is a problem, this isn't a problem. And when you have a a monopoly, which is what a government is, I think people are very familiar. with what the problems happen with monopoly. This lack of accountability, bureaucracies are faceless and then no one's to blame, but you know, and yet everyone.

kind of suffers as a consequence. So it doesn't necessarily have to be. as authoritarian as Stalinism, but you can't have it, a government which is authority by its nature, be this pervasive. without a strong amount of oppression. And same thing with, even if you just have like, let's go with socialized healthcare, you're gonna have to make it illegal for doctors. to practice privately. You're gonna have to have rationing, so on and so forth. Now that might be a price that people are willing to pay.

'cause you can't have infinite spending. on healthcare, right? So something's gonna have to give somewhere. So there is an element of authoritarianism there. and people are comfortable with that. And I can wrap my head around it, but if you're going to have one organization. running literally everything in society, I don't see how you do that. and have any measure of liberalism. - Why do you think Ayn Rand. had so much trouble. telling people the danger of Soviet Stalinism?

- Well, I think. a more pertinent question is why did Emma Goldman. and Alexander Berkman have so much problems? So they were hardcore. - These are anarchists. - Yeah, they're, Emma Goldman's on the cover. They were deported. from the US, J. Edgar Hoover saw them off at Ellis Island. They were sent to Russia. They were blood thirsty revolutionaries. They had no shortage advocating violence when necessary.

And when they went there, they were just like, this is a complete nightmare. They both individually had meetings with Lenin. complaining about political prisoners, complaining about lack of free speech. She told them, you know, this is a revolutionary time, you could do that later. And when they both left, they, she wrote a, her memoir was split into two books, "My Disillusionment in Russia". and "My further Disillusionment in Russia". He wrote "The Bolshevik Myth". and she was in England and she gave a speech. and she's just like, if you guys think this is for the workers, this is the biggest lie I've ever heard. Like they're oppressing the workers.

like no capitalist has ever imagined. And you know, as she described it, like people just shifting their seats, they're interrupting her. And she, when she opened her talk, she had a standing ovation. and when she was done you could hear a pin drop. So they didn't want to hear it. because this was this kind of, and Eugene Lyon talks about it later. This was like the Guinea pig theory of the Russian people. Like we're gonna experiment on them over there. If it works, great, we're right. If it's wrong, it's their problem. And sure these animals squeal, but they're beneath us.

And of course they're gonna make some noise. But you know, this is a noble experiment. But they're experimenting on a country, several countries. So I think an ideology like this, which appeals to intellectuals because you know, if it works or if it's implemented, they're the ones who are gods. in effect in a society. Like their status cannot be higher. They really want this to work. Like they want a society where they are the new aristocracy, they're the most important people. And their criticisms of America,

if they had a binary worldview, if America's bad and this is the opposite of America, then my definition, it's good. And the the other binary that they bought into. is, you know, the Nazis and the fascists. hate the communists. And the communists, it's true to up to a point, hated the fascists and the Nazis. Okay, well Hitler is evil. So this guy's against Hitler, we're with him. So that's an argument that's still made in, you know, schools growing up when you talk about World War II. where they're like, we've seen up with Stalin.

and they don't really talk about Stalin being a bad guy, but it's like, you know, we worked with him to fight Hitler. 'cause Hitler was a unique evil. Now that is certainly true that Hitler's unique evil, but that doesn't mean, or even imply. that Stalin is somehow an angel or a saint. - Do you think some of the lessons of history. are forgotten here in our, in our modern political discourse. that are important to remember? - I was so triggered. 'cause I was in the supermarket and there was like a company. that's selling Russian ice cream. 'cause it meets these high level Soviet standards.

And I'm just like, you think this is some kind of joke? You think this is some kind of kitchy punchline. that you had decades of people. who were taught in school. to turn their parents into the police. if they were hoarding grain, even if it cost them their own lives, where it was a crime to be married to someone. who was an enemy of the state. where you had torture being the norm, where people institutionalized. because they were politically disadvantageous. and they were called insane. Like this isn't just like, like, oh, this hammer and sickles this cool wacky symbol,

like the amount of blood under this symbol. was just enormous. And so yeah, I think that lesson. has very much been forgotten. - How did the ice cream taste? - It was fine. - Okay. - I'm a Baskin Robbins guy to be honest, but Van Leeuwen does some great work. - Baskin Robbins doesn't have any Soviet flavors? - No. - Those, those, dark jokes. Dark, dark jokes. I'm gonna, I'm gonna self-publish a book of jokes.

(chuckling). coming out. in a grocery store near you, okay. What was the hardest part about writing this book? Spent two years writing it. - So when I write books for celebrities. and I was co-authoring them, I did it kind of like method acting. I tried to get into their head as much as possible. to kind of speak in their voice. And when you're dealing with.

children being tortured, harmed, starved. and you're trying to empathize with the characters, it's, it's hard to take. The other big part I had, like I was saying earlier, is just, I was just very, very concerned. that I told this story and that it did it justice. 'Cause I think this is something that is, I still don't understand and I'm kind of angry about it,

that it's fallen on me to tell this story. This isn't some minor incident that happened. in some random town in pick a state. This is half the world for, you know, 70, 80 years. And the fact that it's, this is the 80s, this isn't, we were, I mean you and I are old enough to remember the 80s. There's a show, I remember the 80s. The fact that all these things have just kind of, we have this collective amnesia. and if not even amnesia, I think a lot of this stuff even I like was not known.

even at the time or was kind of obscured. This is, I remember I was at The Blaze, which is network run by Glen Beck, and they're conservatives. and I have a lot of fun there. and I'm just sitting there and, and you know, sometimes Dave, you're off, they, they're like, oh, Biden's a communist. I'm like, okay, okay, Biden's a communist. But I'm like, we talk so much about, you know, slavery and the Civil War, the atrocities, we talk about World War II and the Holocaust. I'm like, how is no one talking about this?

And this was, can very easily be portrayed. as like Conservatism's big victory. 'cause Reagan and Thatcher were so instrumental in, in guiding this to a safe landing. And I'm like, how is no one telling this story? And then one day my brain is like, you know, you write books for a living, this is kind of your job. And I'm like, all right, but I still don't, I still, I gotta tell you, I'm kind of confused. that I'm the one who has to do this. because this should be, this should be, you know, this should be 30 books like this.

And this is a model to follow. - Yeah, and it's also. that it's such recent history. - [Michael] Yeah. - But it also kind of makes you realize that there might be. other fights. for progress going on right now. - Oh yes. - In the world. that we don't know about. So you wrote about North Korea. I don't know to what degree there is, could possibly be fights. there for progress. But there could be, there could be boiling up in China,

there could be boiling up battles for progress. in other parts of the world. Russia, there could be. - [Michael] And in America. - And in America. And these are all different kind of battles for progress. And they're all, sometimes, sometimes I, you know, we, sometimes tend to criticize these battles of progress. Like if it's on the left,

we'll call it like wokeism or whatever. And we pick extreme elements of it. and show how silly and ridiculous it is. Not realizing it, not acknowledging that there's a, a more civil battle going on underneath for actual, for respecting human dignity. from all for people, for all walks of life. And the same, we tend to call anybody who questions mainstream narratives, conspiracy theorists, we dismiss 'em immediately.

Like, and they're ultimately fighting for progress. So people who criticize Fauci and everybody else, I don't know if they're, I think they want. institutions that serve the public. They're fighting for progress too. And we tend to dismiss them. Like each side tends to caricature the other, but the, the battle for progress is happening. And I guess that's what you're, that's the hopeful message with "The White Pill", right? Is that there there's progress being made. Somehow we're all making progress here.

- I think more the hopeful message is that. it's not possible that we have to lose. Like if someone tells you the straight face, you can't win, the enemy is too impressive and strong. I'm like, what are you talking about? We, I mean look, this was the Soviet Union and it, it happened, you know, relatively quickly and relatively peacefully. I mean, again, and it wasn't because. Honecker in East Germany was like,

oh, I'm just gonna, I'm just gonna vacate my seat. He was like send in the tanks and the military guy said no. - Yeah. - So they wanted blood. There were plenty of people who wanted blood. and would've been happy to have it. - So to you, maybe if not the fall of the Soviet Union, then the, the fall of the Iron Curtain is, is a great leap of progress in the 20th century. - I don't see how anyone can argue against that point. with a straight face.

- So that gives you hope that, that we, that we humanity were able to do that. - Yes. And at the same time, we were told at the time, give it up, be realistic. It's utopian to think this is going anywhere, maybe in a hundred years. Look, there's a reason Chekov was on "Star Trek". because the idea is even for our future, you're gonna have America. and you're gonna have the Soviet Union. Like this is the reality. It was called real politic. We're gonna have detente 'cause it's, you know, it's this permanent stalemate.

We had the Vietnam War, we got our asses kicked. Russia's not going anywhere, America's not going anywhere. We gotta learn to live each other, blah, blah, blah. And Reagan said, you don't wanna hear my strategy for the Cold War. Some people might say it's simple or even simplistic. Here it is. We win, they lose. And the people who won. were the Russian people and the Ukrainian people. and the Lithuanian people and the Polish people. and the Romanian people especially, and the Hungarian people. And, and it's just,

just there's so many moments of great joy. that, you know, just tears coming down my face because. you're go, you're like in Prague. when Dubcek, who again who tried to liberalize in 1968, and then when they set in the tanks, they deported him to Slovakia somewhere. to do some forestry job. Like he appears in their big squares. just waving from the balcony. like this ghost from 20 years prior. being like, look, you know, the spirit of '68 is still alive here in Czechoslovakia.

And it was like a matter of weeks, the entire government resigned. and then they liberalized. It's just so many things about. just overnight just change for the profound better. And you know, people are so committed. to making sure you don't have hope. And if things get better, oh it doesn't really matter. 'cause the broader picture never gets better. And there's lots of data to the contrary. where that's happened before.

And this isn't some magical faraway place. This is the opposite of magical faraway place. It's Eastern Europe. - And to me, I think one such narrative that. people assume will always be true. or just to a degree will always be true, like in American politics, is the extreme levels of division. And it seems to me like that too, we can overcome. So the division in American politics, that seems to be counterproductive. I think that can be overcome.

And I think the, the division in geopolitics currently. with Russia, China, and the United States, particularly China and the United States, can be overcome. And I think that requires great leadership. that galvanizes the populace. to the better angels of their nature. Like I have hope for that. People have become really cynical on social media.

and elsewhere in the, in the way they talk. The liberals are destroying this country. The conservatives are destroying this country. This kind of language is becoming more and more popular. I think that's, I have hope that that's temporary. At least that's, that's my white pill. I don't know if you have that kind of hope for, like what does hope look like for you in American politics? Forget American politics,

American, the nation, the country, the people. - My hope, which I don't think is an unrealistic one, is that the next generation. has a better life than you and I have had in this country. And I think anyone who thinks. that America is over.

or is one president away. from being destroyed. cannot in good conscience call themselves a patriot. Because if you think America is so weak. that it takes a Biden or a Trump. or an Obama to irrevocably destroy it, then it's already a rap. And I think that's just absolutely ridiculous. If you look what this country has survived, Great Depression, World War II,

the Civil War, I mean, my God. So we've been through worse before. It wasn't always easy, certainly not, but I am, I, it's so hard for me as someone who's a hopeful person, not by my nature, I'm not, you know, Michael Kindness. who does work for Random House, or at least he did last time I talked to him. I look at even like this, the thing is, when you speak positively, it sounds corny. That's how screwed up our cynical culture is. - [Lex] Have you seen my Twitter?

- Are you, oh, you're verified now, so that's good. But even like something like Etsy, like you can go and Etsy--. - I paid $8 for that verification. - [Michael] Did you? (Michael laughs). - I earned it. - It's an opportunity for independent artists. to create something special and cool. And I've bought a lot of stuff from them. That in and of itself is something that's pretty awesome. There's so much, I'm into shaving soaps, right? - [Lex] Of course you are. - The point is there's like dozens of artisans.

every day when you have a shave, it brings you some joy. So there's just so many things that are wonderful. and I know there's people listening to this, rolling their eyes. How can you talk about shaving soaps. when my daughter or when my wife or when blah, blah, blah. And I'm not disparaging or dismissing. what you're regarding as a problem. My point is hope means the belief. that it's not at all a certainty.

that this problem will be insurmountable. That's all it means. - What do you look forward to in 2023. since this is a holiday special? - Honestly, like if I, I look forward to a lot of young people. realizing that they still have lots of opportunity. in this country. and taking control of their own selves and realizing. they can be a better person tomorrow than they are today.

That the entirety of their identity. is not a function of a culture. which they may not identify or government, which they may not identify with or like, or think is deplorable and realize, you know what? I have it in me. to improve and find joy and happiness. And also that fact. that that is so compelling and contagious. That is what I would want in 2023. And also for New York to get nuked. - So those two things could be accomplished.

- Can I go back and switch the order because I think. - New York, one. - Oh, the jokes, the jokes. And one day friends, if you, if you work hard enough and believe in yourself--. - You too can nuke New York. - No, you too. can spend your. days dressing up, grown men dressing up, in a Santa outfit. and putting on lipstick.

and having hours upon hours of conversation with each other. and loving every second. Thank you for writing this really, really important book. Please buy "The White Pill". I love you, brother. - I love you too. - Thanks for listening to this conversation. with Michael Malice. To support this podcast, please check out our sponsors in the description. And now let me leave you with some words. from Shel Silverstein. Listen To the mustn'ts, child. Listen to the don'ts. Listen to the shouldn'ts,

the impossibles, the won'ts. Listen to the never haves, then listen close to me. Anything can happen, child, anything can be. Thank you for listening. I hope to see you next time.