 All right, this topic they gave me. This is a fun one because I could do anything with it. Libertarian culture wars is the topic. And that may sound like I'm going to spend all my time talking about internecine culture wars among libertarians. And since I hate to disappoint people, I will say a little bit about that. But then I have a lot more to say about other things because we're engaged in culture wars not just among ourselves but in relation to the regime under which we live and I'll have a lot to say about that as well. But I guess I do need to start with a little bit of this, but only a little bit because I do on an almost daily basis write an email newsletter and a lot of times when I just can't think of anything to write about, I think, what is the latest innanity going on in the libertarian world that needs to be corrected, right? People join the Republican Party, they don't stop, they don't say, I can't criticize the chairman of the Republican Party, you join any group, you want that group to prosper. And sometimes the correction of errors is necessary for that group to prosper. So what I recommend you do is on your smartphone, believe it or not, if you text the word snowflake to the number 33444, you will get my book called Sane Space, see it's a play on safe space, right, except this is for libertarians. But my book Sane Space is an example of me kind of going after some people who need correction, that's all. We all need correction from time to time, nothing wrong with that. So text the word snowflake to 33444 and you'll get that. So anyway, I'm going to say only a little bit about this here. What we believe in and as when we talk about our view of society, I mean abstracting from Austrian economics, but just thinking about our social philosophy, how society ought to function, the core bedrock of that is private property. And that helps keep our version of libertarianism grounded in something specific and concrete. And it is upon private property that the other features of civilization are based. So the international division of labor, for instance, economic calculation and human cooperation itself, all these things have their foundation in private property. And private property helps us resolve a lot of disputed questions. Who is the owner of the property? So for example, the old saw about shouting fire in a crowded theater, well that's supposed to be an exception to the freedom of speech. We're told of course we can't be free speech absolutists, why would you allow someone to shout fire in a crowded theater? And the person interrogating you in this way thinks, I got him. He doesn't favor shouting fire in a crowded theater. Doesn't that go to show that we can have wise regulation of the freedom of speech? If it's dangerous for you to be speaking against our troops during wartime, well that's just like shouting fire in a crowded theater after all, isn't it? You wouldn't support that? All right. But you know what the answer to the old fire in a crowded theater question is? Private property. See how it resolves everything? Whose theater is it? The theater belongs to some guy. That some guy probably has some terms on which you are permitted to use his theater. And one of them is when you're here, don't shout fire if there ain't one. And you see that resolves it. It's his property, his rule. Now there could be, maybe Walter Block would conceive of some crazy lunatic person theater where the object is to scare everybody for no reason and shout, and it's a positive virtue to shout fire in that theater. Maybe that would be up to that theater owner. Again, resolved, problem solved. Well I happen to hear, I don't want to mention names, none of the names matter, okay, none of the names matter. But I heard somebody not too long ago say libertarians should not emphasize too much their opposition to anti-discrimination law because this will undermine our pro-LGBT position. See this, here's the problem, again. Instead of just conceiving things as matters of property, these people are thinking in terms of identity politics and that society is made up of a series of warring groups and we have to show that we also pander to each of these groups. That has nothing to do with what libertarianism is. At root it's private property and everything that follows from that. Whatever you want to do, you got your private property, you go ahead and do it and that resolves it. Now private property, when you believe in it strictly and absolutely, it can take you down some very radical roads. For example, if you believe strictly in private property that means that some explorer from heaven knows where cannot show up on some continent, plant a flag in the ground and say I hereby claim all the land as far as the eye can see for good king so and so. You can't do that. That's not how you acquire land. So that makes us seem like we must be on the left but then on the other hand we say private property also means no transaction occurs unless both parties consent to it because that's how civilized people interact with each other. They don't use other people as means to their ends. We view each other as ends in ourselves and so that makes us seem very right wing and I just say just another day in the life of a libertarian. I have this one I'd like to read to you before I leave this section of my remarks. This is a tweet so you know this is going to be top notch, this right here. This was from my Twitter feed from somebody calling himself a libertarian and he says this is a person, again I don't want to mention his name, I believe he's mentally ill. He has a habit of calling other libertarians Nazis because that's a plausible thing to say right doesn't sound like something somebody mentally ill would say. He says he's speaking about my podcast which I have the Tom Wood Show and he says I was told you don't have people on your show who call you a Nazi. See I have these crazy requirements for the show. He says let's make a deal. I retract the word Nazi that's very generous by the way. I'm the exact opposite and he's going to retract that very good and then so that's what he does for me that's the big faith this guy with 12 followers is going to do that and then what do I do in return I give him access to my entire platform of many many many thousands of people. He says I'll retract the word Nazi and you have me on to learn about why watchdogging right wing populism is so important for gender and sexual minority liberation. And I said you know what I'm going to say no to that I see no upside to this whatsoever. So that to me that I could spend my time just talking to you about that but what would really what would the point be right I don't I don't think most libertarians are going down that particular road. I think the more important culture wars that we find ourselves engaged in are not not with the oddball crazy people but I suppose a different brand of oddball crazy people namely the regime under which we live and the culture of this regime was laid bare to us under with the passing of John McCain. Now I'm not here to say terrible things about John McCain but what I do want to do is observe what we can learn about the regime we live under based on what happened in the wake of his death. Here's what we read from probably future Congresswoman Ocasio-Cortez she said and she's a social she's a democratic socialist this is what she tweeted out John McCain's legacy represents an unparalleled example of human decency and American service. As an intern I learned a lot about the power of humanity in government through his deep friendship with Senator Kennedy. He meant so much to so many my prayers are with his family now you may say to me woods she had to say something she has to acknowledge his passing no doubt but did she absolutely have to say John McCain represents an unparalleled example of human decency is that what happens automatically to you when you pass from this veil of tears. So I wonder about this here we have a democratic socialist and yet she automatically knows exactly what the rituals of the regime are that when one of its favorite sons passes this is how you speak now even if you thought McCain's war service was something to honor then at least just go ahead and say that but this language is bizarre and cultish not normal this is not the way normal people think and so I thought this was an opportunity to reflect on the regime and the media culture in which we live she's learned that the regime showers with preposterous honors those people who served the interests of the empire and so no matter what enormity is a normal moral reckoning would condemn someone for he is to be canonized and anyone like her who has ambitions within the regime had better join in the hazzas I frankly am astonished that Trump somehow managed to refuse to be steamrolled into these creepy canonization rituals I didn't think even he could resist and there there was a CNN reporter standing there in the Oval Office barking at him Mr. President are you going to say anything about John McCain Mr. President Mr. President can you hear me Mr. President you just ignored him this is bizarre I can't believe somebody resists the regime and this guy runs the regime one person now I know we're supposed to respond he's supposed to respond with platitudes he's supposed to say I deeply respect John McCain's life of public service and his commitment to human rights around the world but you know what I don't I don't I don't respect any of these people or their BS public service or their laughable so-called commitment to human rights I don't believe a word of it now I don't like to see anyone suffer and I don't rejoice in that but I'm not going to say some something that I would have to have a lobotomy to believe and yet we're taught to believe that what has happened now is that we've lost a maverick the media all got the memo you are to refer to this man to everyone as a maverick and so they did everywhere all the news magazines on the cover maverick maverick maverick and I know I I honor Ron Paul a lot and you know maybe that's one of my big faults you know how you go to a job interview and they say what is your biggest fault and you always give some ridiculous response I work too hard you know you give like some fake compliment to yourself so I because I don't think it actually is a negative thing to say nice things about Ron Paul but think about a real maverick and then think about Ron Paul they're the same thing aren't they here's somebody who stood up to the entire establishment not just its left-wing version and the all of its beloved institutions here's a man who cast the sole no vote in the house more than any other congressman and in fact more than all other congressman combined that's a maverick he opposed the Federal Reserve when nobody else so much as mentioned it much less criticized it he stood up to the Empire the whole rotten system not just one particular intervention somewhere and he even got it through the thick heads of some conservatives that the bipartisan foreign policy consensus represented the very opposite of conservatism so will our gatekeepers of approved opinion have such kind words for Ron Paul the question answers itself for these people a genuine maverick is like a crucifix in front of Dracula the very last thing the regime and its media want is a maverick a true dissident who asks the questions we are supposed to keep to ourselves McCain loved the regime and the Empire at no time did he adopt a position that the New York Times or the Washington Post would consider a fundamental attack on the state and that's why they loved him he played by their rules they were thrilled to call him a conservative all the better to police opinion in America why if you're conservative why we have this John McCain fellow for you McCain's legacy lives on in every politician and journalist who jumps on every propaganda report to justify another round of bombing and intervention it lives on in every politician who after 15 years after another idiotic intervention has occurred finally admits it was a mistake never apologizing to the people he smeared at the time who tried telling him as it was a mistake and who predicted every obvious consequence at any damn fool should have known it lives on in a media that craves bipartisanship but bipartisanship in the service of the state and bipartisanship in which the left gets what it wants and the right gets a nice photo op it lives on in the families who are missing children because of a war that McCain finally admitted had been a hideous mistake and a ludicrous expenditure of scarce resources McCain was a man of the state in every fiber of his being and that is why they cheer him and that is why we on the other hand have to tell unpopular truths about McCain and about the the empire he served now I say these things because this shows how culturally radically different we are from the entire mainstream they respond one way we think the other when we look at our heroes we think about the things we might say about them and how we might honor them and our heroes are scarcely to be acknowledged at all even though our heroes truly are fearless they weren't going to get a favorable profile in the Washington Post and yet they said they spoke the truth they said things that no one else would say for no reward other than the reward that comes from knowing you've done the right thing how about the culture of the universities we find ourselves in opposition to that because well half the time we find ourselves in uncomfortable positions on universities some of our folks don't get promoted they don't get hired they get harassed they get the terrible office in the corner with no window they get screamed at when they appear on campuses they get called all kinds of crazy names that make no sense and meanwhile the people in the universities doing these things portray themselves as dissenters we are the resistance we are the resistance so these are the people who hold and push for push views that are held by the entire media all of academia all of the entertainment and cultural world the intelligence agencies and the deep state this is hardly Guinness Book of World Records level courage going on before our eyes you want to see real resistance how about standing up against ideas that are relentlessly pushed by the media the political classes academia and the culture etc now that's resistance and as we've been seeing all it takes is one high-profile figure saying no and the foundation begins to totter now Ron Paul was that example in politics he stood there and refused to apologize when he was told by Rudy Giuliani why you can't say such a thing I hope he'll apologize not only did he not apologize he doubled down on what he said nobody does that in our society we all know that you stray from the 3x5 card of allowable opinion you get called on it instantly and you are expected to go get the official 2018 version of the liturgical book of apology where you stand and say I deeply regret what I said and how insensitive and hurtful it was I deeply regret the pain I cut and you say it and then they come back with it was very good of you to say that and then it's a back and forth is liturgical act and we all know we're all expected anybody goes off that 3x5 credit we immediately expect the apology for having been truthful we know that's gonna come forward it's an apology for being truthful and he wouldn't do he would not apologize for being truthful and if you asked him unfashionable questions you ask him questions that any focus group would have told him stay away from change the subject run away he just give you the answer no I'm gonna tell you that I don't believe in this this or this even though by telling you this I'm causing myself all kinds of avoidable grief I could have avoided if I just ran away from the question like everybody else does but I refuse to do that now I'm gonna get back to him again in a moment but within the university context we've seen that one man who simply says no I am not going along with the leftist cause of the day and I won't be steamrolled into doing it and that's of course Jordan Peterson now Jordan Peterson is saying things that two generations ago we're just common sense that everybody knew and today we've got left libertarians who are appalled by Jordan Peterson and how right wing he is he's just saying be a decent person try to get your life in order do sensible common sense things and this is incredibly right wing and yeah okay it just goes goes to show our completely out to lunch the left libertarians are this is a professor he teaches psychology at the University of Toronto after having taught at Harvard he is the most unlikely hero you can imagine and he just refute now he's became well known because of the whole transgender pronoun issue but obviously that issue went well beyond the surface matter of mere pronouns but on Canadian television Peterson said I'm not doing this if they find me I won't pay it if they put me in jail I'll go on a hunger strike I'm not doing this he said those four magic words I'm not doing this and suddenly people realized wait a minute there's one person who standing up and saying nope I'm not going along and I'm not apologizing because I unlike you people have nothing to apologize for and everybody rallied to him now if the left had any sense they'd stop attacking him because every time they attack him he just earns more money in fact he used these very words on Joe Rogan's podcast I have figured out how to monetize the social justice warriors he used those exact words but they can't they can't help himself even though they're just fueling the fire they say they want to extinguish they keep throwing gas on it they don't know what else to do well people who admired him just for bucking PC pressure started watching everything of his they could find and we see countless young men crediting him for helping him find meaning in their lives and getting their lives in order so again it takes only one articulate dissident to spark a true liberation movement and Peterson has been very much that now I just saw footage it was from earlier this year but I only just saw it from a Peterson event in Ontario Canada at Queens University earlier this year and the usual antics went on because I mean you know that the university system is all about the free exchange of ideas where we politely address each other and see where that takes us well you'll you'll be surprised to learn that there were students yelling there holding signs on stage one of them was opposed to bigotry now that's a really bold statement I'm against bigotry what now I think one of these days they're gonna really come out boldly and say they're also against cancer they really can summon all their strength and courage so the protesters were finally removed physically removed and as one shouting protester was escorted out Peterson told the audience matter of factly that's pure narcissism at work by the way and the crowd roared and the beauty was no one could distinctly make out what the protesters were saying because they didn't have the mic the only thing they could distinctly here was Peterson saying that's pure narcissism at work by the way and everyone cheered and the protesters were helpless they were being mocked and there was nothing they could do and Peterson went on to say to hijack an event like this and he said this in an even tone not even as animated as I am now to hijack an event like this that other people put time and effort into and to use the civility of the crowd and the civility of the organizers as an excuse to blatantly yell out your ill-informed opinions is no way to conduct a civil dialogue it's absolutely appalling the people who do that should be embarrassed of course they have no capacity for embarrassment these people but the audience cheered again a little later the savages outside that's my editorial comment started pounding on the doors and windows and they began chanting lock them in and burn it down another woman who broke a stained glass window was found to be carrying a garret which is used to strangle people these people are not your friends Peterson said to the crowd huge cheer and then the pounding continues and he said that and mark my words that's the sound of the barbarians pounding at the gates so again he's smashing them left and right there's nothing they can do all they have is and he's articulately smashing beautiful and he says that use of inchoate sensation is the best formulation of their argument and there's not much difference between knocking on the doors and knocking on you now during the entire episode he remained cool and collected speaking in an even tone and defying the character of him that they were trying to paint that he was the winner of that exchange in every way every person who came to see him is now twice as strong as supporter and he provoked the SJW crowd into revealing its hand even a mild mannered professor can't be allowed to speak without incident and without intimidation what normal person is going to side with an angry mob pounding on the building from outside so again with Ron Paul and with Jordan Peterson and as I'll note later the Mises Institute what do you have people who are fearless who do not care what people who are going to hate their guts no matter what they do say about them they just carry on promoting the truth they're not bootlickers they're not looking for the approval of those in power they just speak the truth and look what happens Ron Paul spoke the truth millions of people rallied to him Jordan's Peterson spoke the truth he now earns over a million dollars a year in donations by people who know he's making a million dollars a year who maybe earn one tenth one hundredth of that and they send it to him because they just want him to have it thank you for doing this thank you for doing this now let me say a little something about another let's say another cultural war we have and that's against one of the regime's alleged values the regime says it believes in equality ha ha if it believed in equality then it wouldn't say that it lives by a separate set of moral rules in the rest of us but it loves ideas like equality because they can never be attained and therefore the state can get its tentacles into everything forever because it can never be attained even if you could reach absolute material equality that equilibrium is uprooted the very next moment as soon as people once again begin to enter into voluntary exchanges that rearrange resources that was Robert Nozick's point so you have this unattainable goal that's why the state loves it that's why the great Emmy Bradford who was a conservative rather than a libertarian but but a man with very great insight that's why he warned about this concept I mean of course there you can think of a way in which concept of equality could be used sensibly like equality before the law but it's almost never used that way and once you begin using it there's no way to bottle it it begins to be perverted for all kinds of bizarre causes now when I pointed this out on my email list I got a I got a criticism oh woods you're exaggerating people who talk about equality we don't believe in absolute equality well then why are you using the word what do you mean by equality less inequality than we have now what kind of non-rigorous inane idea is this you see you don't believe in absolute then what do you believe then don't if you just want to help the poor then just say that what does equality have to do with it if you don't believe in absolute equality and there are philosophers who call for absolute equality I'm not making that up Larry Temkin calls for absolute equality Michael Atzuka calls for absolute equality there are such people or my friend Jared Casey has this wonderful history political thought and in there you find reference to the philosopher she's still with us Cecile Fabre and she has a series of papers and books one of them is called justice fairness and world ownership okay not quite sure what that means but okay then a book called whose body is it anyway justice and the integrity of the person all right well that's starting to sound a little bit ominous and then her paper justice and the compulsory taking of live body parts because after all after all if it's true if equality is the mission then what we very often see is the sort of argument that runs like this you're not entitled to the things you have you're not entitled to your attributes you're not entitled to luck that you may have had these things ought to be redistributed you don't have no you have no moral dessert here these things just came to you and you may say but I worked really hard for them and they'll come back with you don't deserve your work ethic either you know that's just something that you are just lucky to have and so this idea of we have to make everything equal means that well you even get to John Rawls who could barely bring himself to admit that yeah okay I we can keep the family I guess we don't really need to abolish the family even though the family is also a source of inequality oh I'm really relieved at that ringing defense of the family so there are no institutions that can't be destroyed perverted in one way or another in the name of implementing so-called equality and they say you may say but woods I believe in equality of opportunity not equality of results that's what a republican politician will say that's what I believe in okay then what they'll say to you is if we're going to give people equality of opportunity we have to redistribute wealth how do you expect a poor child to have equality of opportunity so try as you might to put a lid on it equality takes on a life of its own it was used to justify busing kids 90 minutes each way in order to achieve racial balance in schools what was the result the schools became war zones the students hated each other the local patriotisms built around local school systems atrophied and eventually even the NAACP declared this to be a stupid and destructive policy that should be immediately discontinued now if you didn't predict that that was precisely what was going to happen you're probably not entitled to an opinion on any of these issues equality has been cited as the reason for throwing out standardized tests it looks like the LSAT may be next or dumbing down civil service exams to the point where everyone scores a hundred so they can no longer claim that the tests are discriminatory the only sense in which equality can be useful is this everyone is equally forbidden to initiate physical force against anyone else there it is that's the usefulness of the term now finally let me say a word about how to carry on these wars where we find ourselves up against everything and everybody which by the way I positively relish and thoroughly enjoy and by the way I don't say that in the sense that I want to be gratuitously belligerent and unreasonable and not persuasive I want to talk to every audience I have in a language they can get so that they come on board with me I went on an evangelical Christian radio show in 2012 to defend Ron Paul against a you know what was a very unsympathetic audience and I think by the end I had made some pretty good inroads there so I can do this but I'm not going to back down even if you ask me a tough question I'm going to give you the honest answer I don't see what the benefit of not doing that is well I want to make reference once again to the example of Ron Paul because of what he teaches us in this respect how he carried on in those presidential campaigns is highly instructive there's a fellow out on the west coast you've never heard of named John Arden and he was watching in 2007 when that whole exchange with Rudy Giuliani over foreign policy took place and he said this Ron Paul without a friend in the world nothing but hostility aimed at him from all directions stood his ground and did not back down just reiterated his points even stronger I was blown away I felt at that moment that the world changed forever that here had been this massive shift in reality and what could happen and of course it wasn't the last such moment I mean he goes to Florida of all places and says we ought to open up trade with Cuba he goes to South Carolina and says we ought to end the drug war at a speech before an Arab-American association when they asked him do you have a special speech prepared for us well every politician has a special speech for every group he speaks to and Ron Paul said I have the same speech for you that I deliver to everybody who is this man so why did he do these things why didn't he just take the path of least resistance just speak in slogans take no political risks all right well one reason is obvious he's honest he's an honest man but the other reason may not be so obvious and that is he was seeking out what Albert J. Nock called the remnant and once in a while we used to hear Dr. Paul talking about the remnant and what did he mean by that he's referring to a famous essay by Albert J. Nock called Isaiah's job and in that essay Nock borrowed the example of the prophet Isaiah to describe the task of the honest man in public life and now he adopts the Lord's instructions to Isaiah into a modern of adapts them into a modern vernacular let's say so this is what he has God saying to Isaiah tell them what is wrong and why and what is going to happen unless they have a change of heart and straighten up don't mince matters make it clear that they are positively down to their last chance give it to them good and strong and keep on giving it to them I suppose perhaps I ought to tell you that it won't do any good the official class in their intelligentsia will turn up their noses at you and the masses will not even listen they will all keep on in their own ways until they carry everything down to destruction and you will probably be lucky if you get out with your life well then what's the point of doing this ah the Lord said you do not get the point there is a remnant there that you know nothing about they are obscure unorganized inarticulate each one rubbing along as best he can they need to be encouraged and braced up because when everything has gone completely to the dogs they are the ones who will come back and build up a new society and meanwhile your preaching will reassure them and keep them hanging on your job is to take care of the remnant so be off now and set about it and that's what he was doing he's looking for this remnant he's giving them comfort he's making them aware of themselves he's providing them a rallying point if he's sold out for the sake of mainstream respectability he would defeat that purpose entirely that kind of approach repels the remnant but the truth teller who appeals to the remnant will find them now a lot of people probably the majority don't want their worldviews challenged what they want are endless goodies they want checks with their names on them they want to be flattered they want to be told you are the awesomest of the awesome and that's why your government is hated around the world because of your awesomeness now somebody at that level of moral and intellectual development is not going to understand iran paul much less support him and it is frustrating and fruitless to appeal to such people nox says and he says they ask you to give them what they want they insist upon it and will take nothing else and following their whims their irrational changes of fancy their hot and cold fits is a tedious business the remnant on the other hand want only the best you have whatever that may be give them that and they are satisfied you have nothing more to worry about and what's more you will repel the remnant if you offer one of these ritual apologies for straying from the three by five card of allowable opinion you rally them by burning that card because they get a whiff of the smoke and they come running now ron paul had so much fundraising success because the remnant had never been deliberately sought out by a presidential candidate before here was a man of intelligence who defied all political convention taught the public about things they didn't even know they should be concerned with and could boast a record of consistency that impressed even the most hardened cynic that got their attention now knock had things mostly right but i would amend his presentation just a bit he appeared to speak as if the remnant were a fixed number of people they might be sought out but that's it but dr paul has shown that the remnant can be increased not just found and inspired his commitment to the truth even when it seemed to yield him only grief seized the attention of a great many apathetic americans and added them to the ranks of the remnant now knock described the task of finding the remnant as a largely thankless one a job for which one would search in vain for tangible results he said this in any given society the remnant are always so largely an unknown quantity you do not know and never and will never know who the remnant are nor what they are doing or will do two things you do know and know more first that they exist second that they will find you except for these two certainties working for the remnant means working in impenetrable darkness now knock lived before the internet ron paul now knows who the remnant are he has a sense of their numbers he knows some of the things they're doing he knows he's had an impact knock didn't think this was possible in his his day it wasn't but today we live at a moment of opportunity we could scarcely have imagined even a generation ago a revolution in information transmission is underway anyone can express his ideas before the world all of a sudden ideas books and people shunned by the three by five card can get a worldwide hearing one way or another next to this guttenberg looks like a lazy bum ron paul did his job he found and built up the remnant and it's there rather than in the fleeting passage of legislation the genuine long-term change will emerge and this is how the mesas institute has been proceeding seeking out the remnant not caring about what idiots say just ignoring all that is so much flotsam and jetsam seeking out the remnant by being consistent and fearless not clamoring for respectability not inviting the fed chairman to its events that's your strategy good luck but what we with the mesas institute are doing are finding and building up the remnant that's the only strategy that can possibly work we appeal to people who want the truth told to them who don't want political correctness who don't want people who crave mainstream respectability but who will tell them the truth come what may and we are not able to carry out that mission without you folks here in this room and we're deeply grateful for your support if this sounds to you like something appealing like something history making like something that makes good sense then i urge you to continue your support for the mesas institute which i frankly consider to be the most important thing in the world thank you very much