 So I end up saying, when we deal with other people both in the material realm and in the spiritual realm, we should be traders, always seeking to better our own life through interaction that betters the other party's life as well. We're creating win-win relationships. That's how we should behave in a social setting. Now how do we formalize that? How do we formalize that in a state, in a country? How do we formalize that through a government? A government that follows certain principles. And the principle, the fundamental principle is that government is limited to only doing one thing, protecting us. So a government that protects individual rights, and what do we call that system? What do we call the system of government that protects individual rights and does nothing else? A government that does not intervene in the economy, that does not redistribute wealth, that does not regulate businessmen, that leaves people alone to be free, to be free to pursue their own rational values based on their own judgment, based on their own choices. And as long as they're not violating each other's rights, leaves them free, alone. What do we call that? What's the name of that kind of system? Capitalism. That's capitalism. Capitalism is not the system of competition. It's not the system of markets. Those are all consequences. But capitalism is the system that respects individual freedom, respects it so much that it only grants the government the ability to protect that freedom and nothing else. It's a system of individual rights. It's a system where the government protects individual rights and where one of those rights, the right to property, where property is all privately owned because only private individuals can own property. And of course property is necessary for survival. That's why it's so important. We can't survive unless we can benefit from the things that we produce. So capitalism is fundamentally the system of freedom, the freedom of the mind, the freedom of the individual. To choose his values, to pursue those values for the purpose of what? Happiness. Individual happiness. So capitalism is this ideal which we can make real. I have no doubt about the fact that we can make real. In which a society is created in which violence, force, coercion, authority are outlawed. And in which each individual is then responsible and free to pursue their own life in pursuit of their own happiness. Now to me that's a beautiful message. Capitalism is about happiness. Capitalism is about the pursuit of values. Capitalism is about freedom. All the economic stuff is all true, but it's secondary. That's the essence. That's what it's about. That's worth, you know, really fighting for. And it should be a message that we can convince people about. And every attack on capitalism is an attack at the end of the day based on altruism. It has to be. Because it's obvious that capitalism is what's good for the individual. It's obvious that capitalism is what's good for thinking, productive individuals. So the only way they can undercut capitalism, the only way they can convince us to abandon capitalism is by convincing us of the morality of altruism. Because the fact is that if altruism is true, then what about the poor? There's always going to be somebody who's poor. They need as a claim against me. They need as a moral claim against you. How can we allow society to have all this immorality going on where some people have and other people don't have? The whole discussion of inequality in the world today. I mean, my response to inequality is always in a free market. Who cares? What's that got to do with anything? But if you're an altruist, the fact that some people have less than others is an offense. It's bad. And therefore, it's okay to take from someone, give to others. Altruism also tells us that being selfish is what? Being self-interested. Being an egoist is what? What do egoistic people do? What do selfish people do according to the altruists? Because they don't think of... I think of egoism as thinking. I think of egoism and self-interest as thinking for yourself, pursuing your own values and being a trader. But that's not how the altruist thinks of egoism. How does the altruist think of egoism? You do what? Yeah, you exploit. You do whatever it takes. You lie, cheat, steal. You exploit people. What does business do? Is business altruistic or self-interested? Just... almost every business. Altruistic or self-interested? Obviously, everybody knows that. It's self-interested. But the altruist has convinced us that self-interest is lying, cheating, stealing. And business is self-interest. So business must be about lying, cheating, stealing. Now, if business is really about lying, cheating, stealing, what must we do to business? Well, we could destroy it, but we like the stuff that they produce. So we don't want to completely destroy it because we like the taxes. We like the stuff. So we can't completely destroy it. Well, if you knew there was a group of people that you had to interact with, but they generally were tempted by lying, stealing, and cheating, what would you do with them? Regulate them. You would want to control them. You would want to look over the shoulder. You would want to check their numbers. You would want to tell them what they can and cannot do. You would limit them. You would constrain them. That's exactly what we do to business. And it's not because businessmen are bad, objectively. It's not because there's a history of food companies poisoning our food. But we think, oh, businessmen, they're self-interested. If we leave them alone, they might poison the food. So we better watch them so they don't. Because we really believe altruism teaches us that the way to make money is to kill our customers, right? The best way to make money is poison your customers, kill your customers. But we treat businessmen that way. The whole regulatory regime that we have is based on altruism. It's based on the idea that self-interest always leads to bad behavior, to destructive behavior. And therefore we must control. The only way to get rid of regulations. I mean, really get rid of regulations. Not play at the edges, but really get rid of them. Because we don't need them. The market is a much better mechanism to guarantee that our food is safe. Much better mechanism to guarantee that buildings are safe. Much better mechanism to guarantee that everything we have is of high quality than the government ever can do. But if we got rid of those regulations, the only way to get rid of those regulations is to say, being selfish is not about lying, stealing, it's about pursuing values, it's about trade, it's about win-win relationships. If people understood that, then they'd say, well, of course we don't need regulations, we don't need to watch over businessmen. They're not evil people. But right now, the assumption, the implicit assumption, when we talk about businesses, as soon as we let them free, as soon as we let them loose, as soon as we give them a little bit of freedom, they'll cut corners, they'll take stuff away, they'll distort. So this moral question is not a theoretical question. It doesn't just apply to the individual's life and individual choices. Although that, I think, is the most important application to it. The most important question about ethics is how to apply it to your life. But it has massive social consequences. If you believe in altruism, you cannot, at the end of the day, consistently be a capitalist. And they're not. That's where they compromise. They give in a little bit. The consistency requires that you actually believe that morality is a guide to a self-interested life, to a good life. And that being self-interested is not being a lying, cheating, stealing, thieving. It's about thinking and trading and producing. So capitalism is a system of individual rights. It's a system of individual freedom. And it's a system in which we separate government from economics. So one last issue that comes up when we talk about inequality and comes up when we talk about capitalism. Everybody says, yeah, but businessmen, they manipulate the government. Certainly in Brazil they do. Government and business are going to be in bed together. And they're going to dominate everything. The businessmen are going to use force that the government has in order to control all of us. Right? What do they call that? What do we call that? Corruption, cronyism. But think about it. Why do businessmen lobby government? Why do businessmen get involved in cronyism? And I never say crony capitalism. Please, just one little change, if you can make in the way you talk. Never talk about crony capitalism. Cronyism is a feature of statism. Cronyism is a feature of socialism. The more socialism you have, the more cronyism you have. Why? Because the more power you grant the state over businessmen, the more they're going to lobby. The more they're going to try to influence. The more they're incentivized to actually gain political power. But if you make politicians impotent, impotent politically, not impotent, impotent, right? I know there's some politicians here, I don't want to imply that. If you make the government only do what it's supposed to do, which is protect individual rights, then what am I going to lobby them for? They can't give me any favors. They can't give me any goodies. They can't give me protection from competition because they don't have the power. So the only way to get rid of cronyism is to end government power over business. And the only way to do that is to separate completely and thoroughly state from economics. There should be no state economic policy. None. No economic policy. No finance minister. No economics minister. No treasury minister. None of their business. Economics should be determined basically by our individual decisions and the trade that we do among ourselves. Free of any intervention, free of regulation, free of redistribution of wealth, free of the state centrally planning our activities. It's about freedom. And that means it's about the pursuit of happiness. And this is what it's going to require. For us to be free to pursue our lives, free to pursue our happiness, free to live wholly as human beings, free to live up to our potential as human beings, we must be free. Free of coercion, free of force, free of authority. And that's why we must fight for capitalism, the only system that gives us the freedom to achieve our happiness. Thank you all. What we need today, what I call the new intellectual, would be any man or woman who is willing to think. Meaning any man or woman who knows that man's life must be guided by reason, by the intellect. Not by feelings, wishes, wins or mystic revelations. Any man or woman who values his life and who does not want to give in to today's cult of despair, cynicism and impotence and does not intend to give up the world to the dark ages and to the role of the collectivist. Using the super chat and I noticed yesterday when I appealed for support for the show, many of you stepped forward and actually supported the show for the first time. So I'll do it again. Maybe we'll get some more today. If you like what you're hearing, if you appreciate what I'm doing, then I appreciate your support. Those of you who don't yet support the show, please take this opportunity, go to Iranbrookshow.com slash support or go to subscribestar.com, Iranbrookshow and make a kind of a monthly contribution to keep this going. I'm not sure when the next...