 Hey guys, this is the 41st episode of Patterson in Pursuit and a continuation of the fantastic conversation that I had with T.K. Coleman about race relations in the United States. So this is part two of our conversation. So just to give you a little bit of context, we're in the middle of talking about intentions in the race discussion. Should discussions on race be focused on people's internal racism, their internal feelings, whether racist or not racist, or should the discussion be focused on action? My position in the first half of this discussion and a little bit in the second half, though my mind starts to change by the end of our conversation, is that talking about intentions matters. If somebody's accusing me of racism, I feel like I have to explain, defend and justify myself and explain why that's not the case before we even move on to square two of the conversation. T.K. has been explaining why focusing on intentions is kind of a waste of time and maybe doesn't even matter. And in fact, we don't need to worry about building a society that is free of any shred of prejudice. What matters to T.K. is that people act correctly, not that they're feeling this way or feeling that way. So as you can imagine, this is just a ripe and timely field for discussion. T.K. is the education director at Praxis. And what I think makes these conversations so valuable is he's got a background in philosophy. He appreciates the importance, the necessity of clear thinking, clear communication, clear conceptualizing. And there's a base level of respect between us when talking about difficult topics like race that you just don't hear many other places. So I hope you enjoy the rest of my conversation with T.K. It certainly affected the way that I think about these topics and I'm sure it will you as well. T.K. I think it's far more important, rhetorically, pragmatically, to place the emphasis on right action because even if we can change these things internally, we change them because of right action. But even if we can't, they don't prevent us from right action. T.K. Now let me challenge you a little bit on that. But to put forward a theory that I'm not claiming is true, but I don't know. The reason I think it might be important to talk about these things is because it causes a great deal of anger and tension from those individuals who I'm claiming are out there whose biases are virtually non-existent or largely irrelevant when we're talking about genetic differences in skin color and so on. T.K. So give me an example of this so I can understand. T.K. Sure. So just a personal example, right? When people claim, because I engage in discourse about these ideas, and people claim that really deep downstate you're a racist. You do have these biases and then they draw political conclusions from that but there's still that claim that's there. That is very frustrating because it puts me immediately on the defensive where it's like, well, hang on, you're claiming a character flaw or you're claiming something which I'm saying isn't there. You're claiming an internal state that isn't there. That's a very unpleasant and I would say that carnal state that it isn't there. You can call me out for a bunch of other internal states that aren't great. Yeah, okay. But that one, it's not true. And so maybe part of the reason that you have so much tension is because people don't like to be called on that claim when it's not true. I mean, we have two obviously very plausible scenarios where we have multiple but one is everybody, virtually everybody really has these racial biases and we're just, when we say that everybody has them, we're just acknowledging reality. And those people who say that some people don't have racial biases, well, they're just self-deluded. But there's another scenario here. There's another scenario which a lot of people in the world have these subconscious racial biases, that's the way it is, but maybe a lot of people don't. And if a lot of people don't, that means there's a lot of people who are getting accused of having a bias about how they react to people with large feet or with dark skin or whatever it is that isn't there, that that causes that right there itself is a sticking point because the claim is you're a racist and maybe you're so deeply racist, it's so deeply nestled in your subconscious that you're not even aware of it. All right. I mean, but surely this is an epistemic problem because when you're trying to analyze people's hidden intentions, invisible motives, what's going on deep down in their subconscious, when you try to analyze that stuff, clearly it's very difficult to do. But let's go back to my earlier point about not putting race on a pedestal. Isn't this just a problem that occurs in all sorts of philosophical discussions? Or isn't this just a problem that's inherent in human relationships and the complexity of communication and the complexity of knowing where people come from? I mean, think about all the times when you have probably been called something like a liar, a deceiver, a scam artist, someone who's deliberately misleading people simply because people disagree with your position. Now, some of those people are trolls. They know better. They don't really believe that. They're just saying something to get a reaction out of you. But another reality is that some people just can't make a distinction between misinformation and disinformation. Some people just can't say I disagree with your position and I think you're wrong. Some people have to add something else to it, like you're a sellout or you're a scam artist. So, you know, I don't identify with political conservatism, but take a look at a common complaint among black conservatives. If they argue against the welfare state or argue against minimum wage, well, you're a sellout, you're a sellout, or take a common complaint amongst black liberals. If they argue for some kind of liberal policy, people accuse them of being manipulated and deceived by race baiters and race hustlers and democratic leaders. And that's kind of an insult to people's intelligence, right? It's kind of like saying you black democrats don't know how to think for yourselves. This isn't what you really believe on your own. You know, you're being misled by, you know, race baiters and so forth. And both sides, or all sides of any debate, even outside of politics, everybody's complaining about the people on the other sides who can't just accept that we disagree and we have different difficult conclusions because people are too busy calling each other, you know, races, Uncle Tom, sellout and all these other sorts of things. Look at Steve Harvey right now, who's being called a sellout by a lot of people because he met with Donald Trump. Now, we don't know why he really met with Donald Trump, apart from what he said. And he said it's because he's got some concerns about some things going on in the inner cities. And he felt like having a conversation gives him more possibilities than not having a conversation. He made it clear that he isn't really a Trump fan, but Trump is president. And so he's trying to have a conversation. And, you know, not that I am the one who thinks that conversations with politicians is the way to change the world, but that's his explanation. And some people, a lot of people can't just accept that either it's OK for him to do that, or maybe he's just mistaken. Maybe he thinks it's going to produce a result that it's not going to produce. No, some people have to take it to that extra level and say he's a sellout. You know, he's an opportunist doing this or that. And how could you possibly know that? But isn't that just what people do in a debate? I mean, I mean, do we really need to have an in-depth conversation about people who dismiss your arguments by calling you a racist? Are you really experiencing anything other than what everybody else experiences? Again, I think I think it comes back to the discussion about scale. So I wouldn't. I mean, I get called, as you know, I call all kinds of things about insulting my intelligence. I'm actually stupid or something I get called racist for. I've seen you called a liar by people of your own race. Yeah, all the time. I've seen I've seen you called arrogant by people of your own race. And in many cases, I've seen it as a direct response to you simply saying you disagree with people. Yes. But here's the thing. I can say and I do say this and this is what I believe. On one level, I don't care that they say these things. On another level, it's good that they say these things because it causes controversy, which is good marketing. However, on another level, it's still fair to say that. I want to participate in a community. My ideal community has barriers to entry. And the people that are going to be my friends that I want around me, that I want in my circle, I have. I deserve a measure of respect about my internal status, about my own intelligence, about my motivations for things that. If somebody is not willing to grant that actually what's going on is not a case of stupidity or racism or me being a bad person. When I say these things, if you can't grant me that, then I don't want you in my close community. Now, we can still be in the same society, right? As long as we have legal system where they say those things doesn't affect me politically, whatever, I don't really care. I don't want to associate with us people in any kind of deep, meaningful way, but it's really important that when you and I are talking that I really want to communicate and I want people to know, anybody, I have the belief that regardless of your external characteristics, that's not the thing that I'm going to be judging. I want people to judge me and have feelings about me, not based on my external characteristics. And so I do the same to them and I want the same for me. So it becomes really important when people are throw around these terms like you're a racist or your racism is impossible to get away from because everybody has that, so therefore we just have to accept it. It's like, no, that value, I have a really deep value in me, this desire for colorblindness, for rational reasons, that it does bother me, it is counterproductive to assert that I don't have that internal state and that they don't believe me that I don't have that internal state. They're not willing to give me that when I tell them that's the case. And I think, again, based on my conversations, I think a lot of people really do feel that way. And so though it may seem like, I'm not arguing for the kumbaya position here, but I'm saying there is something to be said where I think it's unifying to be able to say like TK, I envision a society that is free politically that it's going to be populated by a lot of people that have a lot of shitty beliefs. That aren't going to like you because of your skin color. They're going to have some bias toward you. Yep, I envision that society politically. I think that's a better political system that we're in. However, I also envision a society where you and I can recognize each other for relevant characteristics that we can control and race isn't part of that. Isn't that unifying? Doesn't that, doesn't, I want you to be a human brother and the only way I can have that happen, I really think it's possible is if you and I both say, look, I will return that feeling towards you. I'll share that same perspective that I see you in a more deep way than skin color. Even though it's a small community, maybe it's a small group of us that feel this way, that still is a possibility and it's worth talking about. Yeah, man. This one's tough for me. This one's tough for me, Steve, because I, number one, I'm just not sure I agree with your description of that world as being a better world for reasons. I think I already stated here, even when it comes to things like color, blind, blindness, MLK is something for saying he dreams of a world in which people are judged by the content of their character rather than the color of their skin. I don't think he meant being colorblind in a literal sense, like I don't see color, you know, but he meant you do right by people regardless of what their color happens to be. And I agree with you that it is certainly a better world in which people make rational judgments. It is certainly a better world in which people mostly or only think in accordance with propositions that are true and only assert such propositions where they act in accordance with principle and so forth. But I also think there's just a lot about human instinct, a lot about human emotion and impulse that we still quite haven't figured out, that we don't quite understand. And I'm not convinced that we need to believe, or it's very important for us to believe, that all of that stuff can be changed. And in fact, I truly do believe that the pressing for that view is precisely what makes discussions on race really difficult because I think there is an easier ask of humanity and this easier ask really solves most of the problems. Even MLK talked about how even if he can't get a man to like him, it means something. It's great progress to get that man to do the right thing. I think that the important ask is a much easier one and I think one of the reasons why a lot of people feel divided, a lot of people feel like they can't get involved in something that really should be very easy for everyone to get involved in is because there are a lot of people who seem to have this view that everybody's got to feel the same way or that everybody's got to feel a certain way deep down inside. And I just don't find great value in that. I'm not very concerned with how you feel deep down inside. Some of my greatest allies, some of my best friends are people of a very good character, wholesome individuals, but some of them are jerks, man. Some of them are filled with all sorts of vices, but there's no one I would rely on more to get certain kinds of things done than that individual. There are some people who will complain about it the entire time they do it, but they'll do a better job than anybody else. Maybe we just fundamentally disagree on that when it comes to what should be prioritized. From my perspective, and I think from a lot of people's perspective, that seems like it is putting a boundary between people that doesn't need to be there. So if it's true, I'm not saying it is true. I mean, it's totally possible that I'm tricking myself on this. I acknowledge that. But if it's true, what I'm saying is true, where I'm saying like I want that mutual, rational, tolerant, open-minded respect with you, who is somebody who has these genetic characteristics that I'm saying, I don't view those as fundamental. T.K. Coleman is not fundamentally a black man. I don't have that. I desire for you to not see Steve Patterson as fundamentally a white man. I have a positive side for people not societally, but for how I talk with respect people that I associate with. It is really valuable for me and it feels from my perspective. Welcome to Patterson Pursuit, where I talk about my feelings. It feels like you're putting a boundary between us. And if the boundary doesn't need to be there, and just because other people put that boundary there, and I acknowledge that they do, can't we say, look, all right, I'm going to be open-minded to it. I'm going to say, okay, maybe there are some people who can get over this. Like that's great. You and I can agree on all the other stuff, all about the political stuff, but I really feel like there's a measure of connection that you and I are unable to have and unable to share. If there is always that arm's length like, okay, let's be realistic. I want to have biases. You're going to have biases. We can't go over them. And I'm trying to say, no, I really want to get to that other state. Yeah, so I feel like you're kind of putting up the boundary, because if someone's listening to you right now and they don't accept that as a possibility, or they don't think that we can change that, it's a little bit more difficult for them to work together with you to create positive changes, because you still think there's something lacking in them that needs to be changed. And what I'm saying is, we have lots of things going on in our hearts that are capable of dividing us. Lots of things. You know, if we had the ability to broadcast everyone's private thoughts on some huge television screen, we would all hate each other. None of us would trust each other. You know, we would all be afraid of each other all the time if we could see what all the craziness that goes on in people's private thoughts and private feelings. And I'm saying the existence of such a thing doesn't have to be a boundary at all. In fact, you don't even need to be open-minded about the possibility of changing that. In fact, in any context where you are not artificially insulated from the consequences of your actions, reality will inform you of these things in ways that are surprising and in ways that are character-building. So I'm saying these things don't have to be a boundary. And not only that, I think the view that you're advocating, too, about how we fundamentally see people, in spite of a lot of the fear-mongering that's going on, I would say that that's the dominant view. I would say if your war is against the view that we are fundamentally different, you've already won that one. And I would say the problem of race in this country has very little to do with the existence of people who feel deep down inside that we're fundamentally different. Not only are those people in the minority, but that feeling is actually very powerful. Very powerless. Racism is like an ugly beat-up car. Without an engine, that ugly beat-up car would just sit there and probably get towed in a few days, but people would walk around it, look at it, and move on. But if you put an engine in that car, it can get around, and it can perhaps wreak a lot of havoc. And I think statism, I think authoritarianism, is that engine. And I think racism is very weak. It cannot cause problems, it cannot cause very many problems without authoritarianism being a force that insulates racist behavior from its natural consequences. And that's the war that hasn't been won, the war against authoritarianism. But I would say you've already won big time, man. If your goal is to just make the people who feel this way a minority, because they are indeed a small, but perhaps vocal minority. So you just blew my mind, TK. So let me try to restate that, your position. And if I do, you can correct me if I make an inaccuracy. All right. So you're saying that the internal racism is not the issue. That the idea that you have that large amount of people in society have those internal feelings of any significant category, that actually isn't the case, that we've already, a lot of people already moved past that, that battle's over. And it's a distraction to keep focusing on that side of the racism debate. That's what you're saying? I am saying that, but it comes a big but. Okay. I am saying that, but even if it is flat out wrong, even if the majority of people do have internal racism, I'm saying racism by itself, or at least racial prejudice, because some people define racial prejudice as the harboring of discriminatory attitudes based on race. And they define racism as the combination of racial prejudice plus the power to oppress. I'm not saying that's how you ought to understand the words, but since some people do use it that way, let me be precise and say, racial prejudice is such a weak force that even if 99% of the people in the world felt it, it wouldn't be able to have that great of an effect without authoritarianism there to legitimize it and make it powerful. So I think I agree with you, but the reason this is surprising to me is because from the outside, being a white male, what is heard incessantly in the media is that the problem is precisely that people have this racial prejudice, that that is the issue. And so there's so much effort expended by people trying to say, look, that doesn't apply to me. Maybe it applies to other people. I don't really hold it. So perhaps this is why I think I have such trouble with the emphasis you were placing on internal fillings because that is kind of how the media portrays it, right? The media often portrays it as the problem is so many people are, you know, they exist in an ontological state of racism, right? But it's an ontological issue. And when you talk about an ontological solution, it just kind of makes my bells ring because regardless of what the media has to say about this issue, all of the problems that result from racism are problems that are fueled by statism. That's true. Now, I'm sorry, go ahead. Is that perspective, of course, you're not a representative sample for all the black community, but is that a perspective that you think the majority of people in the black community share that the ethical, the internal debate is largely over but the practical debate is far from over. So I want to be remembered as the guy who said the internal debate is irrelevant. I want to be that guy. That's what I want to go on the record of saying because my position does not require you to believe that the internal debate is one, okay? My position doesn't require you to believe that. So I'm making a much more modest argument right now, at least, which is the internal debate is irrelevant. Do I believe that's a majority position? Well, I think to be a non-status is a minority position everywhere. So we live in a world where black, white, male, female, whatever you are, whoever you are, everybody believes in the existence of problems. And people who believe in the existence of racism, I don't think they're hallucinating. I think racism is real, just as jealousy and all sorts of other vices are real. And I believe that not because I'm obsessed with race, but because I don't feel the need to put race on a pedestal. I don't feel like I have something to lose by acknowledging that it's real. So I don't have a politically vested interest in denying it because I'm afraid of what somebody's going to do. So I think racism is real. And just as most people are right about the existence of problems, but the real problem is that when most people seek to resolve problems, they seek to do so through the lens of authoritarianism. And when they do that, two things happen. Number one, they cause more harm than good. And number two, they make it less probable that we will experience the way in which markets harshly and quickly correct these things. So for instance, there was a story. I wish I could remember the name of the department store. I'll have to look this up. But I remember reading about a young man. He was about 16, 17 years old. And he went into a department store. There was this designer belt that he really wanted. And I think the belt was just like a ridiculous amount of money, like a couple of hundred dollars or whatever. But he saved up for it. And he goes into this place and he pays for the belt with the wad of cash. So you got a young black guy like 16, 17. You know, got his pants sagging, whatever. And what do people think? I'm not naive. I wasn't born yesterday. Young black guy, 16, 17 years old. Walks into a really wealthy store, pulls out a wad of cash. Come on, man. I wasn't born yesterday. But if you don't want to believe we live in a world where people have those kinds of thoughts, you go right ahead. But anyway, the store clerk calls the police because she said something was suspicious was going on. And the police comes and the police come and they question him and so forth. And the boy was pretty upset about it. And he complained about it. And other people started to complain. And you know, this is racist and so forth. Now, check out what happened because this is what typically happens in markets. And it had nothing to do with anybody loving one another or being enlightened. The CEO of that company immediately came forward and apologized for the incident. He apologized for the fact that his customer felt as if he was being mistreated. And he made it a point to say that his company's services and products are for everyone, that if there are any doubts about it, they want to serve everyone. And everyone who walks into that store deserves great customer service. And then he promised that there would be a meeting with the staff to discuss ways they can improve customer engagement in order to avoid these kind of interactions again. Now, I don't think that CEO did that. Maybe you're more optimistic than me in this regard. I don't think he did that because he happens to love black people. Maybe he does, but I don't think that even matters. He did that because that's how things work in markets. Because he knew that in order for him to get what he wants, he's got to make sure that he respects his customer because that's what happens in the world of business. When you don't keep your customers happy and you don't keep a good reputation, well, what happens is you lose. In fact, I look at this from an entrepreneurial point of view. As an entrepreneur, when my customers are happy, I don't have debates with my partners about whether or not they're hallucinating. When my customers are happy, my partners and I don't have debates about the existence of the problem. All that matters is that they're unhappy. And are we capable of satisfying them? Are we capable of creating an experience in which they feel good again? And if we don't, if we're not interested in that, then we incentivize competition to enter the marketplace and do a better job as satisfying our customers. Now, contrast that with any service rendered by the state. You take the issue of police brutality. I'm not even asking you to stand on one side of the argument or the other. I'm not even asking you to accept that any of these incidents are real. So for the sake of being devil's advocate here, if you are one of those people who say, yeah, but the video footage for all of these incidents are finite, we don't know what happened before. We don't know what happened afterwards. We can't say whatever. Go ahead, maintain that position for now. In all these instances, do you think there is any private industry where you could have thousands of unhappy customers saying, we don't feel good about the way we're treated? And the service provider has the luxury of standing on the street, waiting for people to come by and give them hugs. The service provider has the luxury of saying, you don't know what it's like to do my job. I'm not saying that I can't understand why they would feel that way because I'm an entrepreneur and I also feel defensive when people criticize how I do business. But I don't have the luxury of staying in business and responding to my customer's anger by telling them they're hallucinating or telling them they don't know what it's like to do my job. I either have to find a way to do the hard work of satisfying them or I have to be willing to suffer the loss of losing their business to someone who will. That doesn't exist for services rendered by the state. And if you look at all of the issues, all of the problems that make these discussions on racism come up, these are issues where people are complaining about the way in which a service is rendered to them and they are doing so outside of the free market because when these complaints happen in the free market, they tend to get resolved. And usually when there are inefficiencies in the process of resolution, it's because the state is already involved with complicating things. So when you say that, you give the overwhelmingly clear impression that you are treating this as an entrepreneur, that you're saying, like you said before, the perception of the problem is the problem. That makes a lot of sense with everything that you're saying. And not just as an entrepreneur, but as someone who understands the nature of the free market and as someone who recognizes that the incentive structure of free markets is non-identical to the incentive structure of the political process, which is what most people seek as the solution. So would you say that another way you could phrase that is let's not make these discussions personal? The problem, let's just put the personal side of everything off to the side and let's view it as a entrepreneurial problem to solve or a problem to solve, not by having discussions about your personal beliefs about how you feel this way or you don't feel that way because that demonstrably doesn't seem to make anything change, let's have the discussions where we can probably come to pretty strong agreement about what kind of systems are causing the events to happen that a great number of people are upset with. Is that fair to say? Exactly. And I would say if you make this discussion about anything other than race, people get this. They already know this. It becomes abundantly clear when I substitute something else for race. Nobody is so naive that they believe everyone who has ever served them at a restaurant or a grocery store or a fast food place or at a Starbucks loves them, thinks pleasant positive thoughts about them. People understand that a lot of people that have served them and treated them respectfully probably didn't care about them one bit or were probably annoyed by them or probably didn't like them at all. But their behavior took place in an incentive structure that rewarded them for doing the right thing. So I think we need less conversation on how people feel about each other deep down inside, and we need more conversation about what is the force that makes the way people feel about each other such a powerful thing. What is it that gives that the power to oppress, the power to inconvenience? And I would say it's the state. You take the state away. These things become very weak problems. Now, in case anybody is all too prepared to point out the obvious, I want to say this. If I had a daughter and she went to school and some kid called her ugly and she came home crying to me, daddy, somebody called me ugly, I wouldn't tell my daughter, oh, that's not a problem. That's just your feelings. No, no, no, that's a real problem. I care about people's feelings and I care about the way in which various forms of bullying or hatred or whatever affect human beings. And we have to deal with those things when they come up. However, the market already has a history of being really good at actually dealing with those things. And it's actually very hard for people to get what they want when they behave in these sorts of ways consistently. But when people discuss race, we often talk about systemic broader problems like wage inequality or discrimination and hiring and so forth. And we completely overlook the political things that are in place that make this possible. Now, I agree with almost everything that you said, except we have an entrepreneurial problem because it is true to say that it is almost a waste of time entirely to be talking about these feelings and motivations and it's almost irrelevant from a practical standpoint. However, that's not really true because we're already in the middle of a race discussion as even evidenced by this discussion where I feel pressure to explain my internal state because it's focused on on both sides. So right now in this conversation, I'll accept that some people, maybe a lot of people, I don't know, think that my statement about my internal state is wrong. I'm tricking myself. I can accept that. As long as they're willing to say, maybe I'm wrong. If from my perspective, I think you're spot on and this is going to change my approach and how I think about these things and how I talk about these things based on this conversation. But what was really necessary for me and in order for me to get to that standpoint and be persuaded by your point of view is when you say, look, maybe that's the case. Look, Steve, I'm not going to say you're tricking yourself. I'm not going to say you're not tricking yourself. Just say, I have an open mind. Maybe that's the case. Now I feel like, okay, the personal, I have defended my personal character and now boom, we're on the same page. So here's the trouble though. If this is representative, then in a sense, we still got to keep talking about the intentions of people because on the other side of the spectrum, when people keep getting called these names that they think don't apply to them, you still got to talk about it. It's almost like the example you gave with the bullying. There's a lot of people who feel like they're being bullied. People are saying, well, you have this internal state. No, no, you have this internal state. Admit you have the internal state and then we'll talk about the other stuff. And they're saying, no, I'm not going to do that because that's not the case. So just in this conversation, we started with that intentionality because that's how the issue has been framed. So how are we supposed to get to that step two about the practical stuff when people really need to feel that kind of honest open-mindedness from the people that they're discussing with? So I actually don't buy into the argument that since this is what most people are focused on, we have to be a part of that discussion. I actually think there are ways we can influence the direction in which the discussion goes. And we can do that by accepting certain premises of the discussion as legitimate like, hey, I get that you're unsatisfied and you have the right to be unhappy with whatever you want to be unhappy with. But where I disagree with you is your belief about what's going to solve the problem. So let's use an analogy that some of your viewers might agree with, some of them might disagree with. But I think you and I, given some of our political philosophy, might at least agree with it. Let's take minimum wage. Why do most people advocate for minimum wage? Because it's supposedly supposed to benefit those people who are low skilled or who make the minimum wage. Correct. And if we were to ask those advocates why they believe business owners are not already voluntarily paying these employees more money, what would their answer probably be? Probably something like they don't respect being enough. They don't, they're greedy. There's some kind of moral flaw in why they're not getting paid for the great work that they're doing. That's correct. So then you would agree with me that most advocates of minimum wage are advocating what they're advocating precisely because of beliefs they have about the intentions of those who pay employees. Yes. They believe these people have bad intentions. In some cases, they may be right. In some cases, they may be wrong. But you and I would agree that it's actually irrelevant because if they understand how economics works, they would know that there is a check and balance in the free market between the greed of an employer and their ability to profit. With an exception, I wouldn't go so far as to say that it is irrelevant. I would say if you're talking about the macro level, it is irrelevant. You're exactly correct. The market punishes irrational discrimination. Yes, however, it is important if you're talking about the community of people that you want to be around. If you're talking about, if it's true that there's some racist hiring practices just based on the bias of the employer, then that says something about whether or not I want to be really close friends or have that person in my personal circles. So in that respect, it does matter. Well, sure, sure. I get that, but I want you to stick with the scenario that I'm setting up here because in this case, I'm not asking you about whether or not you want to be buddies and have beer with the guy who's greedy and trying to save as much money as he can. Okay, fair enough. I'm saying that you agree with me that people who generally advocate for minimum wage do so because they believe that the ones who are doing the paying have bad intentions. And it is that belief that leads them to fight for a statist solution that if you look at the economic argument, it actually fails. It does more harm than good. It actually makes it harder for the poor. Yes. Okay, so should we address the minimum wage problem by trying to convince all of the advocates for minimum wage that the business owners are well-intentioned people? I think that debates a waste of time. I think if we want to address those advocates, what we have to do is we have to show them how free markets function. And we have to demonstrate to them that even if the business owner is as greedy as they think the business owner is, that these policies that they're invoking to resolve the problem only make things worse. Would you agree with that? I agree with that. And I would, you go ahead. So in a similar way, there are lots of discussions happening on race right now. And I know you're focusing on the discussion about intention, but people aren't just talking about intentions. They may begin the discussion there, but they're advocating for specific action steps to be taken in order to deal with this, in order to deal with what they perceive to be the problem. I agree with you how most people see intentions and so forth. But if that were all it was, we wouldn't have the problems that we have today. People want to see certain individuals elected as a result of it. People want to see certain policies enacted as a result of it. And in many cases, this isn't about reducing the size of government at all. In many cases, it's about expanding it. And I think you have a productive discussion when you can say to people, I get your concern, your concern about intentions because you believe that evil intentions lead to this result. Well, let me show you how we can create a society where you don't have to worry about people picking on you, even if they do have those evil intentions. Would you be interested in that? And that's a much more productive discussion. Yeah, and one piece of the puzzle though that I think helps to add to that because I think everything you say is correct, but we can add more. In that worldview, in that society that we're painting, the free society, we can also say let's not act like intentions don't matter. They matter in your personal life and who you're going to associate with. So in that society, which we're saying discrimination gets punished professionally in a marketplace, even if people have those beliefs, not only do they get punished, but you don't have to associate with them. Like that other part. So let's include intentionality and explain as well how you can deal in your personal life with people who you think have crappy intentions because I think that's, I think what people do is they conflate their personal circles with society at large. So they see a problem that racism is a problem personally. It's like an ethical problem. Therefore it's a system-wide problem and therefore they get these conclusions about how they want the state to operate. They don't have policies of the state. But in that free society, you still have the ability to not associate personally with people that you think have ethical problems or belief systems that you find ignorant. I think that's also, I just don't want to overlook that there is merit to say who you associate with, it's okay to evaluate who they are based on your perceptions of their intentions. Because I have met people who I don't think have the best intentions and it's important that I can identify and say, yeah, those are pretty stupid and ignorant people that I don't want to include in my personal life. But that doesn't mean I can't still be in a broader free system with them. Now, okay, but let me push back on that. I mean, who's making that argument, man? I mean, look, perhaps I'm being ambiguous and not clear enough when I say such and such a thing is irrelevant. When I say intentions are irrelevant, I don't mean that in an absolute sense that nothing you ever think or feel matters, period, because at the, you know, but I mean that it's irrelevant in relation to a specific kind of goal or in relation to a society in which people can live in peace. It's irrelevant in relation to solving most of the problems that discussions on race are aimed at solving. I think it's irrelevant in that sense, but who are the people making the counterargument to your belief that we have the right to go where we're celebrated, not where we're tolerated? Who are the people that disagree with this notion that we can not associate with people that we don't want to associate with? So I think there's a powerful, loud voice coming from the left or maybe the more extreme left that gets a lot of airtime that claims the actual problem is racism as understood as an intentionality problem, as an ethical problem that if people had the tolerant, open-minded beliefs that they did that that would solve the issue and one of the ways that they try to craft that society is through let's say racial quotas or through hate crime. They have that special distinction in the law to say, oh look, if you did this crime with this motivation you get additional punishment so we're trying to dissuade people from having that motivation. So what I'm saying is I don't want to dismiss the idea that intentionality doesn't matter. It does matter. It just matters in your private life. Intentionality, I think, can to a large extent not matter when we're talking about system-wide political solutions. Does that make sense? Right, right, right. I get you on that. And you know, I mean, I agree with Thomas Sowell that we should judge a policy not by the intentions behind it but by the outcome that it produces and I definitely don't think we should give moral high ground to people who say, hey, I care about black people or I care about women or what have you. No, I don't really care about your feelings towards black people because there's a lot of people out there who have good feelings about black people and they want to be the enemy of my freedom. They don't want to mind their own business. They don't want to let this black man live his life the way he wants to live it. So I don't really care about your feelings. I do care that you do right by me. And I agree with you in private life and private life intention matters. I guess it's not clear to me what you're responding to when you emphasize that. So it's very similar to the discussions that you and I might have with people who are arguing for the existence of big government in general that I think there is, at least from my impression, there is a positive argument or even an accusation might even be a better word for it that the problem in the country is the intentionality. So I agree with you that, practically speaking, you and I care about the results of policy. But what I'm saying is, in the public discourse, it seems like people actually care a whole lot about the intentionality. Just like you and I might be able to make a very sophisticated argument for why government might even be entirely unnecessary, it's still the case that we're dealing with people who want that emotional satisfaction, that emotional feeling of having the big government to take care of them. So it is true to say that intentions, you and I and Tom Sowell, I think are all in agreement that, look, intentions don't matter, but in the public discourse, that's what everybody's focused on. So it seems like I could see an argument, and in fact, I don't know what I think about this because you've challenged me in a way that I haven't fully sort of through yet. But I could see an argument in saying, if we don't address the intentions, this argument's never going to go away. It's just, it seems like you got to talk about the intentions because that's the thing that everybody's talking about. So you have to have some engagement with the actual debate that's going on. You know, I don't know how much of a sports fan you are, but one common thing that will be evident to any sports fan is that when you are winning as a team, a lot of the gossip and internal turmoil doesn't really matter. But when you're losing, oh my gosh, every little thing matters. I remember during the Lakers, heyday when Kobe Bryant and Shaquille O'Neal were teammates, when those guys were winning, everything was cool. But then when they were losing, you know, I mean, Kobe's got problems with Shaq reporting to training camp overweight and Shaq's got problems with, you know, Kobe's attitude. It's amazing how much of a big deal we make out of all sorts of little things when we don't feel free, when we don't feel happy, when we don't feel satisfied. I mean, imagine walking down the street, you're having a good day, things are going well at the job, you and your wife are doing well, and somebody steps on your toe and they say, oh, I'm sorry, Steve, you know, you chuckle and you say, hey, it's okay, man. You didn't kill anybody, it's all good, and you keep on moving. But then let's say you have a day where you got fired from your job, your wife is mad at you, you're not feeling good about yourself, and then someone steps on your toe and you say, hey, watch where you're going, punk. You know, same problem, different day. You know, in one set of circumstances, you feel good about your life, you're doing well, and that's just something small. It doesn't even matter. On another day, you don't feel like you're doing well, you don't like your life, and now you're making a really big deal out of it. There is no limit to the degree to which people will make a big deal out of all sorts of things when they are not living freely. I agree with you 100%, man, that lots of people make your invisible intentions a big deal. But why do they do that? Why do they care so much? Because those people aren't living freely. Their lives are restricted by all sorts of policies, man. You have people that are stuck in cycles of poverty, not because you have evil intentions, not because all white people are deep down inside races, but because they don't even have the freedom to educate their own kids like they want to. You know, they're victims of a compulsory public schooling system that makes it hard for them to have options. They've got all sorts of things that put restrictions on their ability to start businesses. We are getting to a place in this country where you almost have to be rich to get rich, and it wasn't always like that. But there are so many statist regulations that make it difficult for poor people to gain advancement, that make it difficult for certain people to get ahead in life. And of course, when people are oppressed by the state and they don't understand the source of that oppression, of course they're going to be frustrated and make a big deal out of every possible thing. And of course, their anger is going to be misdirected. But I don't think you do those people a service by accepting their assumptions or by treating the basis for the conversation as if it ought to be what they think it is. I think the best way to serve those people is to say, hey, I understand your pain, man, but we have a common enemy. Or hey, I don't understand your pain, but I can see you're unhappy and I can hear what you're saying. But I'm not your problem, man. Here's what your problem is. And I truly do believe that not only are you not going to convince everybody, and you wouldn't be talking about this if you had a whole lot of success in it. I think you know from personal experience that you're not going to convince people about your intentions. But what you can do is you can take action steps to help create a freer society. And when people start winning, when people start knowing the possibilities of freedom, you'll find a lot of those debates go away because people just won't give a damn about your intentions when they are getting their way, which is precisely why the same people that tell you intentions are everything don't talk about that when they go to their restaurant to eat. No one talks about it in that context. They only talk about it in the context where they don't feel free. So I love that, and you're bringing me around here. So let's get more concrete. This is something that I found in my own philosophy. I was just talking to my wife Julie about this. I spend a great deal of time focusing on inaccuracy. So for me, maybe this is my bias towards Cartesian skepticism, but I really hyper-focus on the inaccuracy. And then I feel like you sort out the inaccuracy and then whatever you get left over is going to be the accurate. So if it's the case that there's a great number of people out there of all races who are insisting that the problem is intentional, what can I do? What can people do? Because I'm sure I'm not alone in this to say, look, okay, I'm not going to respond to that. I mean, it's not correct, but I'm not going to respond to that. What do I say? We have a common enemy. If I argue for political solutions that you and I would probably agree on, they're going to say, oh, you only have those political solutions because you're a racist white man who wants the free market to exploit people. How can I make those arguments if the people are still painting me in the picture of being this intentionally bad person? Well, I don't think, I mean, if you take a look at history, I don't think you're going to find a single example of any kind of revolution that took place as a result of the majority of people being convinced that a certain way of looking at reality was right. Revolutions are usually the product of a small minority, a small remnant of people who are willing to fight for something that they believe in, who are willing to have different conversations that everyone else is scared to have, who are willing to try creating things that no one else will create because they're afraid to look stupid. These are the people that create change. These are the people who cause revolutions. And I don't think this is that difficult. Look at what you're already doing in your own life. You chose to not go get a PhD. You chose to try to be a philosopher in a world where being an analytic philosopher typically requires a PhD. And not only, not only are you practicing your discipline in a way that is outside the mainstream, not only are you having your conversations outside the mainstream, but you're actually doing it in spite of the fact that a lot of people who are part of that mainstream don't like you. They talk smack about you. And what do you do? You continue to focus on your path. You continue to be a radical individual. So I don't think changing the world ever begins with conforming to mainstream conversations. In fact, I think you have to do like Terrence McKenna said and create your own road show. You have to unplug from the matrix and say, success isn't about doing what everybody else is doing. It's about doing the opposite. Or it's about doing what everyone else is afraid of doing. So I agree that most people are having that conversation, but isn't that true of pretty much everything? I'm in the realm of alternative education, and I'm a big proponent of unschooling. I'm a big proponent of homeschooling. I'm a big proponent of people having choice and how they educate their children. That's not a mainstream conversation. There are lots of conferences I don't get invited to because of that. There are lots of people who get angry with me because of that. I mean, what else can you do other than say, hey, I've got thick skin. I would be doing this if I needed to be liked by the majority of people. But I'm not here on this earth to see how many friends I can possibly make. I'm here to do something that I believe in. I'm here to fight for something. That's worth fighting for. I'm here to promote a freer society. I really like that answer because a big part of my own investigations into any area of thought so far is the discovery of what I call framing errors. That however the orthodoxy, however the mainstream, is thinking of any particular problem, any fundamental problem, they're probably doing it wrong. And the actual way to frame a particular problem might be unorthodox, but if you get it, then you're going to be light years away from resolving the problem. In the minimum wage, should the minimum wage be raised or should it stay the same? That's a framing problem. Neither of those are actually the solution to the problem. The minimum wage should be eliminated. One article I recommend people read is by economist Peter Becky. You maybe can find it online. I found it in a journal, but there is an anthology called Markets in Civil Society, and I know that it's included in there if you want to buy the whole book, but it's called an entrepreneurial theory of social and cultural change. He lays out some important thoughts for anyone that's interested in creating a freer world, in spite of the fact that most people's only conception of how to do that boils down to political activism. You know, he helps flesh out some ideas for how to do that. But I think those are the kinds of conversations we have to have. Those are the areas where we have to invest our efforts. Maybe another way we can frame this is if people are busy accusing me of being racist, or being stupid, or being whatever the personal attack is, just like I genuinely don't care that much, or if at all, if they are calling me professionally if they say I'm stupid, I get that one all the time. I think it's hysterical, whatever, that means nothing. Maybe I should have the same reaction to people saying, oh, you have these beliefs that must mean you're a racist, where it's like, well, if that's actually what you believe, that's your problem, that's not my problem, that's not true. But not so, maybe it will mean something to me if somebody has those beliefs, and they're in my circle of friends. So maybe I'll let the water roll off the back and say, okay, let's work towards that ideal society that we want to be in. But those people in my life who have differences in skin color, like UTK, if you genuinely thought based on some action, or something I said, that I had these feelings towards you, and I was one of those type of people that is going to judge you based on skin color, that I want to talk to you about. I genuinely do, because I want what I consider to be a barrier. I want that in our friendship to be overcome, that I'm not being you that way, and it's important for me to let you know that. And I would contend in that realm you have a tremendous amount of power, because when you already have social capital with people, you already have a relationship with them, they'll give you their time, you could have in-depth discussions. If you had some sort of problem with me, perhaps we could talk it out and reach some sort of compromise. And you also have the option too of amending or terminating relationships and so forth. That's a realm where you have a tremendous amount of power, but in the broader world where you're debating somebody on Facebook or YouTube, or somebody at the mall, I don't know where your debates take place. And if someone is not interested in having a rational discussion with you, or if they're just not capable of having a rational discussion with you, I say, hey, man, opportunity cost is real. The time you're spending trying to get this person to become rational is time better spent hanging out with your wife or talking with someone that is actually capable or willing to have an intelligent conversation. But no matter what you talk about, man, if you're talking about something that's true, if you're talking about something that promotes freedom, you will attract a crowd that's all too eager to tell you that you're an idiot, that you're a scam artist, that you're stupid, that you're naive, that you're a racist, that whatever it is. And I'm really big on not wasting your time thinking that you can convert everybody to your philosophy. You can't always change how people see the world, but you can't always change the world that people see. And I think that's really the most important part anyway. One of my favorite examples of this is in the movie They Live, you have a good illustration of how we tend to approach the process of social change versus how it actually happens. You have the lead of the film, he discovers this pair of shades. And when he puts on the pair of shades, he sees through the matrix, so to speak. He looks at a magazine cover and instead of it being a model on the cover, he sees the words obey. Like whenever he puts on the shades, he sees that the world is really all in black and white and there are all sorts of subliminal messages on everything that says obey, conform, and so forth. And so the first thing he does is he tries to show his friend. So he finds his buddy and he says, look, man, put on these shades and he tells his buddy and his buddy thinks he's insane. And as easy as it is for his buddy to just put on the shades, the guy refuses to do it. And he's like, come on. And he argues with them and they literally get into the most ridiculous fight scene in cinematic history where these two bumbling idiots are fighting with each other for like 10 minutes. And his buddy's like, I ain't putting on no shades. And they go back and forth. And his buddy ends up giving him a great butt whipping. And the altercation ends without him achieving his goal of getting his friend to put on his shades. But he's a lot more hurt, a lot more worn out. He wasted a lot of time. But near the end of the movie, he discovers that the reason why most people can't see the world as it really is is because there is a tower that is broadcasting a signal that sort of alters people's perceptual faculties. And he realizes that if he can find a way to shoot at that tower and destroy that, then everyone else's perceptions would fall into line. And it would be easier for people to just get it. And he begins to devote his efforts toward that and he actually achieves the goal and he changes the world. But he doesn't do it by arguing with people that aren't interested in what he has to say. He does it by in changing the incentive structure of the world in which he lives. And this is not an argument against philosophizing because I think doing philosophy is important and we have to. Ideas matter. But I think it's a good metaphor for how we tend to approach social change. We come across a new insight, a new idea, and we try to argue everybody into believing in it. And people say you're insane or maybe for you it's your racist, whatever. You're insane. And then we get in a huff and puff. We get our feelings hurt. We get upset. We get disturbed. And we try to change the way those people see it. And a mind convinced against its own will is a mind of the same opinion still as the saying goes. We get nowhere. But then we begin to realize, wait a minute, man. I can create change at a level that's more fundamental. I mean, think about what it was like to try to get people to go on Facebook five years ago or 10 years ago. Think about how many people were like, Twitter, what's that? And now they're all over it. Or think about Uber. I mean, do most people do Uber and Lyft now? Because someone came along with a philosophical argument and said, look, look, look, there really is an alternative to taxicabs. No, sometimes you just have to sew the seeds of freedom by creating alternatives. While everybody's having the same old conversation, you criticize the world by creating. And you put alternatives out there that will cause people to see the world differently without you needing to argue them into it. I mean, to me, that's how you get things done. That's how you make the world a freer place. And I think that's how it's always taken place. Even if politicians are really good at taking the credit for it. And I'm on board with this. I think this is correct. So the practical question is, though, to go back to the glasses analogy of shooting at the tower. What happens when the solution is to shoot at the tower, in this case, the government, not literally, by the way, and to say I'm not saying shoot at the government, figuratively. What happens, though, when the people who are being propagandized by the tower try to restrict you from taking down the tower? So if the solution to a lot of problems is the minimum, or if the solution is to get rid of the minimum wage, what happens when people who are being hurt by the minimum wage think that they're being held by the minimum wage? How do you, and if you try to change that, or you try to make the argument for that's the case, then they think the only reason you're doing it is because you're a bad person who's trying to oppress me. How do you deal with that? Yeah, so, okay. So I agree with you that at one level, the solution is to take away the minimum wage and allow this to be determined by market forces. And certainly, most people are status, and you're probably not going to succeed in that regard. But there's another way, too. So think about it in this way. Why do people believe in the necessity of the state? There's one observation, say what? Confusion. Confusion. Well, I think there's an even more charitable interpretation. There's a very charitable interpretation. First, let's acknowledge something that we tend to all agree on, and that is the state should not be involved in the business of controlling and regulating everything. Most people, the overwhelming majority of people, would agree with that. Nobody wants the state telling them what kind of music they should be able to buy or listen to. Most people don't want the state telling them what kinds of movies they can watch on Netflix or what kinds of shoes they could buy or what time they have to stop watching sports for the evening or if they're allowed to watch the Super Bowl. Most people don't want that. People don't want the state involved in areas where they feel confident the market can get it done. But in areas where people want the state involved, it is because they believe it's a necessary evil, which is why, as you're probably all too familiar with, when you make arguments for why something should be privatized or why something should be outsourced to the free market, people don't say that's a bad argument. They generally say you're being too much of a purist. You're being unrealistic. You're being too theoretical, or that would never happen, which means I get the logical purity of your argument, Steve, but we would never make it without the state, the whole Who Bills the Roads thing, right? We need the state to do this. That means if people can be convinced that the state is not necessary, or people can be shown that the things they value can be better produced by alternatives, then you kind of go through the philosophical backdoor of de-incentivizing their loyalty to the state in that particular area. So most people are not for free choice when it comes to watching Netflix because they've been convinced that way by argument. Most people are for free choice when it comes to what they watch on Netflix because somebody is doing a really good job in the market of making things available to them in a way that the state couldn't possibly compete with. So one example of this would be common example, USPS. We still have not gotten rid of USPS, and we are probably not going to get rid of it. But what do we have now in terms of allowing people to communicate with one another across vast differences, allowing people to send each other messages? We have email now. We have FedEx now. We have Amazon shipping now. We have UPS now. You know, we're developing drone technology. We are already at a place where the unthought out loyalty to USPS is far less than what it used to be. And it's not because we have successfully argued those people into it being unnecessary, but rather we have created so many options that do a much better job than the state that people are just too busy enjoying those other options. And the more we do that, the less people feel that the state is necessary. And since people only advocate for the state when they believe it's necessary, that is an alternative way that we win. Win. It's hard. It's difficult. It's not easy, but what other option is there besides just sitting around being upset all the time? But what do you do with something like arguments for affirmative action? Or what do you do even something like specifically the minimum wage or welfare payments or quotas or the criminal justice system? How do you create something which is so superior that people choose that over the governmental system? Yeah, man. You know, I mean, this is really difficult because one of the things I believe about entrepreneurship as a theory of social change is that your focus doesn't have to be creating businesses or technologies that are explicitly designed to change the world. I do believe in the invisible hand. I do believe that when you pursue your own self-interest that you're led by the invisible hand to serve the interests of the general public in ways that you cannot anticipate. And I do believe it's necessary to have a little faith in that. But I think we look for opportunities one at a time and we devote ourselves to creating whatever we can. So let's take a look at some of these things like you talk about affirmative action and so forth. So why are these things demanded? We always got to come back to that. Why? Why do people care about that? Why do people want that? Because people feel marginalized. People feel like they don't have a fair shot at life. People feel like they don't have opportunities like they're being oppressed in all sorts of ways. Well, there are certain senses in which they're right, especially where the state is involved. And we can create alternatives and we won't succeed overnight, but take for instance the movement in homeschooling and unschooling. So compulsory education, state-ran education is a big problem. And it's no surprise that people grow up to be statist when they're educated by the state. And not only that, it's no surprise that people tend to not be very good at creating wealth when they're educated by a system that prides itself on not even prioritizing that. It should be no surprise that people are often ill-equipped to handle the nuances and complexities of the real world when their education is determined by bureaucrats who will never have to live their lives, who will never have to know the uniqueness of what they have to deal with. So there are a lot of problems being caused by that, but yet it's extremely difficult to argue people out of that because people are sold on the notion of public meaning free. They don't understand that to say something public is public doesn't mean it's free. It means that you're robbed to pay for it and it means that the government gets to decide how it's ran, even if you don't like it, which is why we have all these silly debates about common core. In a free market, you would not have that debate. People can just learn how they want to learn whatever it is they want to learn. But one of the reasons why people are so sold on the necessity of that is because when they look around the world, they just don't see a lot of alternatives. They don't see a lot of options. And it's still very difficult to answer people's question in a way that sounds pragmatic when they say things like, yeah, but what about someone who's really poor and what about someone who can't afford this or that? And the more we create alternatives, the more we can show that homeschooling and unschooling can produce equal results or superior results, the more people begin to gradually wean themselves off the system. So if you look at the last 10 years of education, the numbers have gone up significantly for families who homeschool their children and unschool their children. And that has not been because of the arguments of philosophers alone. It has been because of the growth of homeschooling options in communities by people that were willing to take initiative. So are you saying, I really like this, are you saying that maybe we're, especially philosophers like myself, are treating this too linearly? So for example, like with the affirmative action, the problem isn't actually in reality that the issue that people have is racial quotas and hiring. The issue is that they're disaffected by the system for a bunch of other reasons. And if we solve those other reasons, then affirmative action, it's a non sequitur, it doesn't follow. So it's almost like the government has created a false problem to say, oh, the trouble is the intentions of the employers. And so the way you solve it is by having mandatory racial quotas. Really the trouble is the economic situation that the government has created for a very large group of people. You solve that and then the other thing kind of goes away by itself. Absolutely, man. And we're not always as honest with ourselves or just perhaps as nuanced in our views as we should be when we judge the way in which oppressed and marginalized people behave. And yes, the state does indeed oppress and marginalize. That's not a statement about white people. That's a statement about the reality of authoritarianism. So for instance, we're all too eager to make comments about some woman who lives in the inner city living on welfare who has five kids. We're all too eager to say, stop living on welfare or get a job. We're all too eager to say, stop having so many babies. But then we're not as willing to be honest about the fact that if this woman who lives in a horrible neighborhood, because that's maybe the best that she can afford on her own, but wants to create opportunities for her children by taking them to a school in a nice neighborhood where there's better funding, she'd get arrested for that. So she's boxed in by the law that says, you only have so many options for how you can educate your child. I mean, that's how you create wealth. I mean, one of the ways that we create wealth is by providing for our own, providing for our children opportunities that we ourselves didn't have. And people are prevented by the law from doing this. So we only focus on the way in which people try to exploit the state to cope with their problems. But we don't focus on the fact that most of the problems they're trying to cope with are the result of the state itself. And I think there's a natural alliance here of libertarians in the way that you phrased that because it's tempting to say, I think, especially if you're part of that group that is being oppressed by the system, that it's white people. I think that's very tempting and it makes a lot of sense because a lot of the people who are pursuing these policies are indeed white people. And it's easy on the other side to say, oh, look, it's a problem with the actual people themselves. They're being oppressed, but it's by their own fault. But in reality, libertarians, people who are very skeptical of the value of government intervention can say, look, these people are genuinely, as you point out, being oppressed. But the misidentification of who's oppressing is a huge part of the error. It's like the government. If it's caused these problems, they've almost created a scapegoat or a straw man to say, oh, yes, the problem in this particular community is that the intentions of the employers and its white people, it's very easy for politicians to say that and to get elected because of it. But in reality, that's a bait and switch. The problem that everybody should acknowledge, and if you don't see it, then I encourage you to dive into economics and learn how government intervention works is that it's the system itself that is oppressing them. It's not even necessarily the intentions of the people in the system. Maybe the people are trying to implement something that they think are going to help, but it's the actual system, not the skin color of the people in the system that is doing the oppression that is causing this issue in the first place. I feel like that's such a huge part as well of what I see as this unifying between different races is to say, look, I see you as a peer. I see you as a fellow human. You and I really honestly do see similar problems. We just see a different person behind it or a different, if you could like an anthropomorphize government. It's a different enemy. Let's unify and identify the problem and we'll have probably the same conclusion that these problems might dissolve if we change the governmental system, not by giving more power to government and have a bunch more regulations, but the exact opposite of that having the market step in here. Absolutely, man. It doesn't require as many concessions as we often think. It doesn't require self-compromise. Imagine if you're in a McDonald's and there's a guy there who doesn't like burgers and he says, I hate burgers. I don't like burgers. I hate this McDonald's. If there's a subway across the street, you can just tell that guy, hey, man. I don't know if you know this, but there's a subway across the street and you can point them the way. You don't even have to say, hey, man, my experience is different from yours, but I totally understand. I understand why you might not like burgers and we're actually after the same thing. No, we're not even after the same thing. I like burgers. I think you're crazy for not liking them. I've got all sorts of judgments going on in my mind about you, but since I hear you complaining about not getting something that you want and I'm aware of another option, I just want to let you know there is a subway across the street. No, I don't want to be your buddy. No, I don't relate to anything about you, but there's a subway across the street. You've got options. And, you know, and so when I see libertarians for instance, who will in one context argue for the privatization of the police force and then in another context, you know, get into arguments with the black people who complain about the police. It's not about race. It's not about race. I just think to myself, oh, my gosh, what a waste of time. You are not going to convince people that their problems are not about what they think their problems are about. So why even go down this path? How about you just let people be unhappy with whatever they're unhappy with? And since you are aware of another option that could benefit them and it's also in your self-interest too, why not talk to them about that? Because the real problem is that you've got unhappy customers and it doesn't even matter why the customers are unhappy. When people are unhappy with a service, they should have the option to arbitrarily take their business elsewhere. You don't have to have a logical reason for not wanting to eat at McDonald's. You can be as arbitrary and as irrational as you want to be. It's your freedom. It's your money, you know. So anyway, man, I think it helps to for people to develop a sense of imagination with some of this stuff for how these sorts of things could work. So here's an example. Since we're talking about police brutality, which is a big issue in race. I mean, I would say it's the leading cause, the leading cause of the discussion in our day. The emergence of Black Lives Matter and so forth. But I think the first interesting thing to point out about this is why is this discussion so big right now? People don't realize it, but entrepreneurs and innovators should be getting the credit. You know why this discussion is so big? Why? Because of the because of the cell phone. Social media and the cell phone. Social media and the cell phone. Like even though people are looking to politics for the solution, the existence of the debate, which is more heated than it's ever been, is the direct result of more people using the the fruits of entrepreneurship and innovation to shine a light on something that's worth talking about. So that's the first thing that's interesting. But I take a look at some emerging positive externalities that can provide a glimpse of how the market might be able to contribute to these things. And this is just the tip of the iceberg. So you take for instance, Uber and Lyft. I mean, we tend to remember things like this as if they've been around forever. I mean, for whatever reason, it seems like Uber was around when I was 15. But 10 years ago, we didn't even have Uber and Lyft, man. You know, we didn't have it. We didn't have it 10 years ago. But the existence of Uber and Lyft has all by itself raised the risk of pulling people over for arbitrary reasons. Now, you don't even have to believe at this point that police officers do that. You can you can go ahead and hang on to the belief that all officers are really nice people. But let's say you're the person who believes that some police officers are racist, that some of them are hell bent on abusing their authority. The existence of Uber and Lyft has slightly raised the risk of those people arbitrarily pulling you over. Because now when I see two people writing together, I can't make the kinds of assumptions that I probably could have made 10 years ago. Right. The likelihood that two people at random might be two different individuals with two different networks, two different philosophies, two different levels of income and all that kind of stuff is pretty high. So that raises the risk. Secondly, take a look at something like self-driving cars. We're not quite there yet. But the data seems to indicate that we're moving there and that we may very well in our own lifetime get to a point where a significant percentage of cars on the road are self-driving cars. I don't know, but let's just take a look at it since it's in development. It's happening in some places. What happens when the people in a car are being driven along by the provider of self-driving car services? Now, there isn't a need as much to pull people over. Because if a tail light is out or if a car is speeding, first of all, the likelihood that that'll happen will be less. If, let's say Uber is the one providing self-driving cars, they'll probably be more meticulous with taking care of their business. But even if they didn't, and you have an Uber car with a tail light that's out or that's going over the speed limit, there's no need to harass the passenger. Because they're just the passenger. They're not responsible. There's likely going to be some place where you send that ticket or there's going to be some other means to contact them. The existence of self-driving cars is going to change the game in terms of how traffic is policed, which means that the risk of arbitrarily pulling people over will be higher. The need to pull people over is going to be lower. This is something that no one's creating self-driving cars in order to deal with this. If you are someone who is afraid of driving in your car because of something like that, you are witnessing in your own lifetime new possibilities. If you're afraid to drive, you actually have the option of taking an Uber. And Uber raises the risk of doing it. And self-driving cars is changing the game. Now, when people hear that kind of stuff, they say, oh, that's a great TK. You think the problem of racing America is going to go away because we have self-driving cars? No, that's not what I'm saying. I'm saying that it's the convergence of all of these little things that have exponential effects, that have ripple effects. And everything from alternative schooling to innovations in technology to something as simple as the camera phone, the only reason we are having these discussions today is precisely because of entrepreneurship and innovation. I encourage anyone to read David Friedman's book, The Machinery of Freedom, Guide to a Radical Capitalism, where he actually takes different aspects of society and paints somewhat speculative picture of what a free society looks like and how it could function. And I think it's useful for anyone that's trying to increase their faith in free markets and trying to develop a vocabulary for how they can contribute to a freer world without spending all their time worrying about people that are trying to take away their freedoms. Right. And you use the term positive externality, which is so applicable to this, is just the idea that it's a positive unintended consequence, really, where the creation of cell phones, also you combine the creation of cell phones with Uber and you have an even stronger disincentive to be a racist cop because not only might you be pulling over people for the wrong reasons, but now somebody can record your interaction on a cell phone. And you can be one of the many videos that are out there on YouTube of genuine racist cops. You can be called out at it and you feel the social pressure from that. And I think we're seeing an interesting anti-market response specifically from the police departments. So though I said earlier, yeah, so I said earlier, I think a lot of people don't have this racist intention. The area just in my evaluation from the outside, the area in which you can make the strongest case by far is in the police system. You do see, I've seen lots and lots and lots of evidence and had plenty of conversations with people who, yeah, I think they are pretty dang racist and they abuse their power based on racial lines. Yes, I think that's the case. And what's interesting is what we would expect to see is the pressure on that system, try to force them to using the power of law to cover that up. So you see laws where, oh, now you can't fill cops, right? Now you'll even see them when somebody pulls out a cell phone because they're recording a copy, but you can't do that. You can't do that here. That's against the law. Well, why do you think they're doing that? It's because they're trying to counter the pressure that you're correct in pointing out, the new pressure that's put on them to behave just because of this new technology that people have. Absolutely, man. And they're not going to be able to stop that. I mean, the train has already left the station. And this is why I think it's so important. So look, I don't believe you should orient your life around not offending people or go out of your way to not say anything that will take people off. But I don't think, I often say creativity is not a democracy. You don't need to get the majority of people on your side in order to create change, in order to do amazing things. And most of the things that we value, we got out of the creative process. And so even when it comes to the police thing, you don't need people to stop believing that cops are racist. You don't need people to... I mean, I'm sorry, let me change that in reverse. You don't need more people to believe that cops are racist. What you need is a system where whether people are racist or not, they are rewarded for doing the right thing and punished for doing the wrong thing. You need a system that renders that debate irrelevant. We don't have that same debate about is the service provider racist when it comes to other things. So I think there's just such a key thing. But by the way, when you were talking about the Uber thing and the incentives, we didn't even mention the way in which Uber itself could get involved. Companies would have a financial incentive in their drivers not being afraid to drive or in their passengers not enjoying the experience of being pulled over. So that's another example of how it raises the risk by getting more people involved. Then let's flip it a little bit. Let's leave the cops out of this for a second. Just think about the existence of Uber and the way in which it has created jobs for so many people that didn't have options. I mean, my last Uber driver was someone who worked at Starbucks full time and she told me how she now drives Uber and because she has control over her work schedule, she's able to start working on some business ideas and some writing ideas that she's had for a long time but she was too busy trying to work to provide for herself to do it. All the different ways that technology and innovation is happening and for anybody that would criticize that, I would say think technology and innovation for giving you the ability to criticize me like that. All right, TK, this is an awesome note to end on. I really appreciate the conversation. I've kept you way longer than I said I was going to. So thank you so much. This has been great. Oh, man, it's been fun. Thanks for having me. All right, that was my conversation with TK Coleman. I hope you guys enjoyed it. Gosh, I did. As I said at the beginning of the last episode, before talking to TK, I wrote down maybe eight or so different topics that I was planning on talking to him about and this is not even one of them. This is such a huge area that we're about halfway into the first part. So I'm hoping to have it back on the show because I think these conversations really have to be had, especially with all the crap that's going on in the United States right now. I think the time for this conversation is more ripe than it ever has been. If you enjoyed the show and this conversation, then could you do me a favor? Could you go to iTunes or Stitcher and leave a rating and a review on the show? It makes a big difference, helps improve the ranking of the show, which brings more and more people into these valuable conversations. All right, that's it for me. Enjoy the rest of your day.