 What he represents is patriarchy. We're here to do work as men, as patriarchs. There's nothing more natural than being a father. Welcome back to the 21 convention 2020 here in Orlando, Florida. Patriarchs edition red man group. We have 65 minutes where we're going to cover fathering during fallout. How to lead your family with all the chaos that's going on in the world. So this is the patriarch's edition of the red man group. We just wrapped up a great weekend of parenting, of fatherhood, of becoming a better father, of what to expect when you become a father. On this panel, to my far right, your left, I have Ivan Throne, Big Tex, Phil Foster, and to my left, Tanner Guzzi, Michael Foster, and the George Bruno. With that, we're going to dive into how the convention went for the speakers. And then for the last 15 minutes, we're going to have a Q&A from those in attendance. So first, Ivan, how was the convention for you? Well, I think the 21 Conferences has been a fundamentally different thing now because it's not been done the second year. Man are actually making the changes now. We're seeing the results out there with people. Guys are coming back. They have more children. Families are happier. Families are stronger. The men are more confident, more responsible. The leadership is changing the times and we have the privilege and the honor of being a part of what drives that with practical, real-world action on changing men. It's not an idea. Reality, and as men our job is to make reality. And it's beautiful to see it finally being done again, especially as the world burns and it's needed. People all agree with that. Tex, how was it for you? It was fantastic. I cannot think of a better time for us to have gotten together for this with everything that Ivan just alluded to with the world burning right now and by gosh it really is burning right now. There's never been a better time for fathers to get together and reinforce their resolve and reinforce their commitment to their families and pick up the life skills that you need to make that happen. And what we saw again was a group of men coming together like we did last year, roughly 18 months ago. We were able to get back through it again, get through COVID, get back out here and come together and learn from each other. And even as the old guy in the group, I'm learning from these younger guys as well, giving up tips on how I can help my grandsons do better in life. Things that I wish I had done with my son, that type of thing. So there's generational knowledge going up and down the spectrum here. So I hope we continue to do these as the years go on. I think it's a very valuable resource and this year was even better than last year and last year was superb. We keep raising the bar. Absolutely. Before I toss it to Phil, I'd like to make a first-time announcement and a special announcement. You know, during the first 21 convention patriarch's edition, I had the privilege and the honor of being the chief patriarch. And who could go after that and bring it up and do justice to it? Nobody but Tanner himself. And he went up there and he set that bar. He set a high mark. And then Tanner said, well, we've got to choose the next guy. And he did. And he came over and asked. He said, hey, what do you think? I said, oh, absolutely agree. So it doesn't make any more sense then to talk about raising the bar than to give it to the man who's known for raising the bar, the barbell man himself. Phil Foster is next year's chief patriarch. Right. Thank you, gentlemen. Phil, you're a first-time 21 convention speaker. Then you went to 22 con. And now you're back on the stage. Yeah, that's been an interesting ride for me this go around. I attended the patriarch's convention last year and 21 con the year prior to that. And what I've taken away from this conference is it's great to see the amount of true heart and soul that a lot of the gentlemen that put their butts in the seat, so to speak, in front of the camera and bear their soul to help gentlemen continue to grow on their past to being better fathers, men and husbands. It's amazing to see the gentlemen get together after the speakers, with the speakers and with themselves and exchange ideas and improve themselves year after year. So this is, like I said, my second patriarch's to attend and first time to speak at one. And it has been an amazing experience to be a part of it all. That's great. It's an excellent selection and there's nobody better than that torch and carry it. Thank you, sir. All right. The chief patriarch himself, this is your ship to navigate and from what I've seen, you did a damn good job. So, Tanner, how was the convention for you this time as leading the way? Man, best one it ever was. Best one it ever will be. No, I was kidding. I absolutely loved it. There was a, man, the level of hope and energy and intentionality and earnestness that I saw in the men who were in the audience and especially because the majority of them are men who have been here before. There's a tribe that's being built here and from a very selfish perspective that I got to spend four days having my batteries recharged being around men who are unapologetically pursuing wanting to be better men, wanting to be better fathers, wanting to be better in every single facet because it can feel really lonely when you're the only one in your neighborhood or in your community or in your workplace or anything else that even cares about this stuff when it feels like everybody else is just more interested in what can I consume or what can I lull myself away with or anything and to be in a room full of men who take it seriously, who are earnest about it and are genuinely, we're genuinely seeing the progress that they're making, all these guys have already mentioned this. They come back in better shape and they've got better body language and they carry themselves better, they're dressing better, they are, everybody's leveling up their games and it's putting pressure on us to keep leveling up our game and it's the best, so I absolutely, I've loved it, it's been great. I really appreciate what you said about watching the tribe form because before our eyes and before the men who attended the patriarch's eyes, you see men who are going from consuming as you said to using technology to connect with other like-minded men who now they're no longer confined by proximity. They're from all over, getting each other's contact, like hey man, how you doing, you know what's going on, you're still working out, still leading the family, still dialing things in. And there's evidence that they are doing all those things. Exactly. Absolutely. Michael Foster, first-time speaker and your speech was talked about quite a bit since you gave it. How was it, how was the convention, how was your experience? It was great, man, I had a great time. It's Tan and I were talking about a little bit what I expected as a Presbyterian Christian family man, bastard, I didn't know what I was 100% getting into so I thought there would be bad elements and good elements but it was almost all good and very, you know, I've just, I've grown, right, I've benefited from it. The way I kind of look at this, having on the backside of this, it's kind of like cross-training, like in the early days at UFC it was like, always grace, he would come in there and just choke everybody out. Then people learn how to do Brazilian jiu-jitsu and then there was a time when all the strikers got really good and then it really started to grow and make complete fighters and so when you come here, you go to these different sessions and I don't look what they're going to be on. I'm like, what am I going to learn now? And it's something that comes from very different perspectives and it causes you to think about things differently. So it's just like when you change up your training physically, you get benefits from it. So I love that there's guys like me that are going to come at this from a very spiritual, biblical perspective and guys are thinking about it from a physical or financial. All those different pieces are challenging guys and I found myself challenged in almost every one I went to and after I got to teach after YouTube, you guys were really intense. So I was like, all right, I am taking the gloves off. I'm going all in. So it's been really good. You know, I really like the term diversity because I'm taking it back and using it in my way. And on this panel, you could not see a more diverse group of men. Age, history and background, religion, all coming together for the sole purpose of one focus and that is helping men improve, helping fathers improve, helping families improve. And our collective strength on even opposing views, those who had 10 are able to pick and like, all right, I need this. I don't need that so much, but I need this. And like you said with UFC, the all-around fighter is the one who's going to win. Not the one who's only leaning on one. When you get these different perspectives and it's all, like Anthony doesn't give us any rules. It's free to go. You made a point of that. I'm glad you did. Nothing is off the table. And that's just, I mean, having you here has been a great addition to the team. And it's not that it's relativism. Like truth doesn't matter. It's that we're men and we can argue and be friends and go have drinks and take stands and it makes everyone, whatever their position is, it's going to be stronger at the end of it because you're going to actually be challenged and think through it by guys that don't, they're not, we're not here. It's not a pissing contest. It's men having real hard conversations about subjects that matter. And it's been good for that reason. Making family strong again. George, the professional, I witnessed many of your speeches, saw many of your interviews. How was this convention? Was it any different than any of the last years, I guess, they only want to compare it to? Yeah, I think so. I noticed that further along we go as an organization. Now this is the second patriarch event. But even as an organization, the less reactive it is, we're just kind of leading the way. Rather than, it's not like we're commenting on what happened in the past year. I don't care what happened in the past year. We're literally, we are creating the agenda. Who was it that said, a woman says, well, what do you bring to the table? And the guy says, I am the table. You know, and it's like, this is not a panel. You look at panels and it's like, well, what do you think of this event or this headline or like what this professor said? It's like we are creating the agenda. This is not knee jerk. This is a masculine group. Someone just said to me, reacting is very feminine. And responding is masculine. And we are responding to the world and initiating the conversation. I'm not answering a question. I'm the one who is literally creating the question. And we are initiating it. And we're kind of leading the way here. And I think it's, it's even going to grow more than this. We really are going to be raising the bar. We are the bar. I like that. So to that point, I'd like to go a little bit deeper. You know, you say, we're responding. We're not reacting. You and I had a discussion about, we've got three months left of 2020. And 2020 has been a very interesting year. And you asked, well, how are you going to finish it? And one of my responses is, it's the only way I can see we can finish it as men. You know, we decide how it is. We aren't going to be told, well, how is the election going to change? The election doesn't matter. Well, Blacklet doesn't matter. The protest, that doesn't matter. What matters is what I choose to matter. What I decide matters. So how have you been filtering all the news coming in and not allowing it to hold you down or get you down? I don't watch TV. That's the first thing. I don't have a television. Like I read my news because when you read it, you read, you read data free of emotion. I don't, I don't want to pick up on some reporters, psychological nuance when they're speaking. They're the dead air space. They're silence. They're the raising and lowering of, you know, how they modulate their voice, which is manipulating the public. I read my news, number one. And I distanced myself. And when you kind of distance yourself from the propaganda, and there's a lot of propaganda, I believe nothing is random in 2020. Nothing is random. And I refused to be a chess piece. And what everyone was saying was very jocco-ish in the sense it was like that whole extreme responsibility thing. When I asked all you guys, and I still have a few guys to go, you know, how are you going to finish out this year? And, you know, we've had a lot of people make decisions for us. I can't go shopping unless I have a mask on. I got to do this. I got to, it's like, what? Like, I never had Big Brother intrude in my life in my 60 years as much as it did this year. I never had the government tell me what to do. Like, the government tells us what to do in some area. You know, like, when we have to get taxes done. It tells me, this is how fast you can drive. There was some serious ass overreach this year. Telling me where I can go, where I can't go, what I have to wear, how far I have to be away from people, use hand sanitizer, you know, just... And it was just... And there's some people who don't see that and they're absorbing that and manifesting that stress in their bodies. And I see a lot of people stressed out from it. A lot of people. And I think guys who were men prior to this didn't absorb it as much as the guys who just believe everything they hear in the news. And it really, I think, exposed a lot of weakness in men. A lot. And strong men became conspiracy theorists. And strong men became, you know, rebels. And I've never been so proud to be a conspiracy theorist than a rebel in my whole life. That's my answer. That's excellent. And I like how you touched on the way our routines have been shaken up. Because men with families, and especially kids who are still in the home, when the routine is mixed or messed with, it messes with them. How come all of a sudden we're not going to stores? Why is the news always angry? Well, you know, why are you always turning it off? Why do we have to wear this piece of cloth in our face? And kids start to get worked up. So Ivan, how are you filtering or how would you advise parents to filter all the negative information coming through the news and the media? Every case is going to be individual. But there's some principles that I would recommend here. When you are attempting to filter information, the news, the media, propaganda, all of it, that comes into your children, your spouse, your loved ones, your family, do you have the ability to protect them physically from bad news? Russians are coming. I'll take an example. Can you stop them? If you cannot protect them and you filter and conceal that from them, what are you doing to them instead of them up for disaster? Now, in between the spectrum of age appropriate, that's all the four-year-old Russians are coming. I can't do anything about that. And in between, as a parent, your job is not just to protect, it is to allow them to survive while they stretch their own envelope. It's very important. You cannot stretch an envelope without risk and fear while stretching and not just opening. As a parent, you have a very fine and very difficult and very challenging line to walk between unfiltered truth and age appropriateness and also reality. You must lead them. They must come away stronger, more confident because of your protection. Your job is not to keep them safe. Your job is to keep them alive. And safety is their responsibility. On a gradient, obviously a two-year-old is not responsible for their safety. But if they touch fire after they've been told twice, maybe the kid's dumb, felt it more. Real life is messy. This is my view. Children must grow to be not just functioning adults, functioning as what, breathing, paying taxes, not getting arrested every other day. No, no. We have an entire generation of people who believe that functional now is the idea. That's the goal. Look at our society. Generate on fire, violent, full of hate, primed and desperate, finally to go to war with itself. What happens instead if you keep children alive while you let them determine how, when and like, how. Not everybody gets a trophy. No. Some people are shot on the field and left there to rot. There's a warning. That is the reality of life. I'm not going to tell a four-year-old that. Again, age-appropriateness. Most of the time, real life, things are not that intense. But as a parent, it's my job to see all the intensity that may happen and guide them to be a replacement for me who sees and leads. Bells does what I do. You have to find a very uncomfortable, awkward, scary place. And in practical terms, I can tell you what my parents did. They never felt anything. I was allowed to read and watch anything I wanted. I was not allowed to harbor questions without asking them. At a very, very young age, I was exposed to a lot of very significant material. Look at the Holocaust pictures when I was six or seven. What happened? What's the truth? People do bad things sometimes. A seven-year-old can digest that. We give a 12-year-old a different explanation. Maybe with more politics in it, you'll find how that happens. Not that it does. You've got to find the space for the children's spouses' family. Maybe it's a parent who's trying to help understand things and not their way they used to be. You're not safe here anymore. Always been safe here. Your neighborhood will be burned down next week and your shop smashed. You've got to get your head around it. As a patriarch, everybody, they're alive. No job is too long. Make the learning survivable. You've got the next generation of it. That's my tip. But I don't repeat it. I love hearing you speak. You know, somebody told me that Ivan speaks epic, and honestly, it's an honor every time he delivers an answer because it's such a unique perspective, so keep that going. I want to tell us this one a little bit your way, Mike Foster. So you have the most kids on this panel, and while you delivered an amazing spiritual speech to the men who attended patriarchs, I want to bring a little more practical on how you're managing so many kids, and your wife, and you're looking to build up yourself while the world is telling you to do the exact opposite, almost 24-7. Where are you finding that energy? I think there are a lot of other family men who are just feeling burnt out because something goes wrong and something goes wrong. Yeah, well, I mean, there's old saying, men are like trucks, the more weight you put on them, the straighter they drive, right? So with those responses, you step up to your responsibilities. I mean, the good things about kids is generally they come one at a time, right? And you're upping your level with it. So M and I, we have a goal. M was my wife. This is, we set out to do this. We used to joke while we were dating that we wanted a bus full of kids, which was a joke, so I had to buy something like a bus. I didn't have all my kids in it, so I got a big E 350 to stick them all in there. But this has been the plan, and we've been preparing ourselves for this for a long time. I think in terms of what's happening in society, this is not new. There's civil wars, nations rise and fall. There's trouble like this all the time. And if you're raising your kids up, teaching them history, just walking them through the Bible, watching the fall of nations and rise of kings, letting them know this is normal. God has kept people through it before. He'll keep you through this. We got this. Our house isn't a bubble, it's a castle. It has a wall around it. It's our base of operations that we come out. So we let the kids know these things. And I think the main thing is that you have to have, your goals have to be like a bull's eye with concentric circles. The whole target matters, but the bull's eye is the main thing, and each circle becomes more and more derivative and emanates. And so sometimes when things are crazy, those outer circles just drop by the wayside and you stay on the main thing, right? And so we're always talking about where are we at? Where are we at with these kids? How are we doing with our discipleship with our kids? With our family culture coming back around to it. And so I think it's the mission that you have to continue to revisit and just really keeping tabs on where your individual kids are who are different and they process. We had a Black Lives Matter protest come in front of our house and one of my sons he's like calling up the police, the other son is looking for the gun, right? So we have very different kids that have very different solutions. One's like call the authorities, the other one's like I am the authority. It's like Judge Dredd or something. I am the law. But we're together. A very capable wife is a wonderful thing. Everyone talks about how awesome it is that women can be CEOs or whatever. When you see a woman be a wife and a mother you see the full capabilities of a woman, right? What they can do, she disciples my kids, she helps me, she was harassing me about... I said you're nagging, but she was harassing me about getting registered in Ohio because the vote actually matters unlike South Carolina, it was going to go Trump anyway. But not in Ohio, we don't know. So yeah, she's a talented woman, we're on the same page and sometimes we focus on the main things and get to the other things as we can. Excellent, and Tanner, so to continue on that theme, a lot of these men who attend these, they're exposed to us through social media, somebody's YouTube channel, somebody's Twitter, what have you seen as a key player in I've been watching your Twitter and your feed and your Instagram, it's like life is normal you're still doing what you do, you're still training how are you maintaining that and what have you seen the man as fear? Have you seen any changes with the election rolling around? Is it all politics? Are the men going crazier? How is social media treating you with regards to what you're seeing as a wave of men? As far as our ability to maintain normalcy we largely have and part of that is that we've already been in a position where the changes that a lot of people experience as far as maybe you work a white collar job and rather than going to the office you work from home I already work from home maybe your kids can't go to school anymore and so you have to deal with them being home all the time we homeschool our kids and so we always kind of joke in our neighborhood and our friends have joked around about this that everybody's now living the guzzy lifestyle because we're the ones who are already doing this and they're the ones who get to follow that but one of the things that 2020 has been an awesome year for the guzzy family it's been a great year for us and part of it is that we've been able to reframe what's been going on as rather than we're freaking out and we don't know how to handle this or anything but it's allowed us to see blind spots that definitely existed but we weren't aware of a situation where we can start to clear those blind spots we've been able to take care of some things within our financial house or our preparatory house or the way that we're parenting our kids or things like that and one of the reasons why my social media feed looks the way that it does and you and I have talked about this Zach and I wish that we were average we really do we want to normalize what we do as much as we possibly can non-exceptional in the way that you and I live that would be phenomenal and the more that we can use social media as a tool to be able to demonstrate that and the more we can attend events like this and you can meet people face to face and you can help them recognize that Zach actually walks the walk like this is not some fake Pinterest level totally perfected version that you see on Instagram or something I try to embody that as well then the more social media can be a tool to help people realize yeah the world is burning around but I'm prepared for it or I can be prepared for it because I can see how other people have been prepared for it and so we're very I'm very intentionally trying to capitalize on the time being what it is to strengthen my family to develop myself more to build my business to improve my community and see all of the chaos that is 2020 as an opportunity rather than seeing it as a problem that we just have to hunker down and survive absolutely and I completely agree on that recently you were talking in your speech you shared life lessons you would tell your younger self we were talking about changes men could make this aligns quite well with what's going on in the world I mean there's quite a bit happening and men have an opportunity to rebuild themselves and alright here's where I started doing it right what are you hoping men are taken from all of this the election black lives matter approaches corona start now we have 37 minutes just so you know keep it in that limit there's quite a bit to that question I understand but what are the main takeaways you're hoping men are going to have I mean it's starting out I started two years ago maybe two and a half years ago I saw what was going on in Washington I saw what was being done to the Trump administration good bad or ugly you choose your side on politics but you know there was a silent coup going on against the man and I saw it happening I started preparing my kids and my kids were 30 and 36 so I started talking about what confirmation bias is because they're adults they should know that I started talking to them about things that were happening in the media so my point is not how I did it so good two years ago trust me because it freaked them out a little bit but I see things that started to come true then all of a sudden they're thinking dad's not so stupid after all he really is not such a whack job conspiracy guy that we're starting to think he is right so we go through all of that and we prepare them so that like I haven't said you don't filter anything so when the things are going to come through again they're adults they're grown ass adults so this is what I see happening and try to protect my kids but I got three grandsons right so I want to make sure that the people that are living with my grandsons understand what's going on as well so they can prepare them and have that going try to be normal we did everything we could this summer to be normal we flew them down for our trip to the beach because that's what we do just because there's COVID and this and that and the other we flew them down they took their precautions they had the little mask on and all that picked them up to the airport and we had a couple of weeks of the beach because the kids needed normal the kids have had everything so bizarre going on around them right now that a little bit of normal to latch on to is very comforting for them so going forward this isn't going to stop just because someone's going to get elected president eventually this by the end of the year hopefully this isn't going to stop we're in the middle of something bigger than just this and my grandson was asking me about a book I was reading at the beach this summer and he's like what is that and I said well it's a book that talks about how every 80 years a major world war happens it goes all the way back to 1450 battle of the war the roses and he's 12 years old he's like what how's that work we got discussion and so he's like what's going to happen now we're in the middle of it right so we're trying to talk about it like I don't know what's going to happen and he got this look on his face and it was a look of consternation mixed with fear and anxiety and I said but don't worry because we'll be okay and he says how do you know that because we make things right we do the right things and that we prepare for no matter what's going to happen we don't worry about every single possibility that can happen we prepare ourselves so that when it does something happens we'll respond in the right way and we'll do the right thing and he got this nice calm look on his face again and just kind of smile and went off and did some more stuff right but as kids do and one ear and out the other a little bit when things get bat shit crazy I'm telling you this is my not so humble opinion this isn't going to stop expect this for another couple of years I don't care who wins the battle is not going to be over just because the election is over so that's I'm kind of going off into the whole conspiracy angle but I'm just telling you be prepared and so what you can do right now as fathers what you can do as men is to start preparing your family right now for a longer siege than what you think it's going to be this could go on for a couple of years just find out who Q8 on is so there's a running theme here Mike was talking about how the heavier the load the straighter the truck Tex was talking about being called a conspiracy theorist and all of a sudden it's coming true Phil for the men who are leading families the men watching this the men in attendance who they're listening they want to make a change pushback either from friends maybe their wife family how do they stay the course even though the whole world is saying you don't need ammo you don't need to stock up on food you don't need to worry about this or that it's almost like they want them to get caught you know flat footed so my advice on that right there is stealth you know don't worry about getting any kind of confirmation from someone else in your circle of your family coworkers friends whatever what you need to do is privatize your preparations and that's what I've done with my family you know when this whole silly virus thing started I called my father he doesn't live anywhere close to me and I said look if this gets really bad you and mom need to get in the car and come home come to my house I have everything in place and I don't want any argument that's just what you need to do I called my mother-in-law I said if this gets really bad and ugly which it could possibly well do so you need to get in the car and come to my house there is no discussion on preparations and filtering and keeping the general generalization of anybody giving me a hard time about what I've done I don't care what anybody else does for their family I care about what I do for my family first and foremost so it's not divulging too much and sounding too crazy I've hardened my position in our home our food stores are well up we have plenty of ammunition we filter all of the social media that my child is able to view and it's limited heavily but we filter for any kind of political information I guess you would call it that would come through and balance that out with zero TV like Mr. Bruno we don't watch TV we don't watch news and I go as another step is I don't even read the news so the only information news wise I get is from my general peers and it's been filtered through them you're getting plenty from us when it comes to text I'm getting some info so I think as far as filtration goes I really don't worry too much about what the next guy is doing I'm more focused on how I can protect my family long term and I'm in the same boat with text I don't think this is going to go away any time soon I think that you need to continually when you think you have things squared away all the way keep going you need more and as far as security goes you need to definitely keep your family especially your women and children in these situations compromising situations could mean hey for a while you kids and the wife I'll just go ahead and run to the grocery store because you don't know what's going to pop off at the silly grocery store hey babe let me go fill your car with gas you don't need to run up to the gas station I saw on Twitter yesterday where I live really close to where I live some guy getting knocked down in the parking lot you just never know where this thing is going to start up and I was alluding to I mean these people they are they're burning they're bashing businesses they're burning homes so not to go to doom and gloom on everyone I think that you need to be conservative and make a serious effort to look at every angle possible of weakness good point at the end of every one of those 80 years cycle events there is an era of good times that come after and if you saw Stefan Arneo's speech last year at 21 con he touched on this for a little bit there's a good times coming we just have to get through what's going on right now absolutely I might add something hard times and good times come and go they do right now this very moment in time there is more wealth more information more opportunity more vacuums of power more vaults of heaven and open with gold showered out long buried wealth is now bursting open everything is blowing apart and being remade what an glorious time to be alive why would I want to live in any other time the entire world is spread and begging for new rulers they will arise I guarantee you that well learn to look teach your children to look to recognize those men will crash and die and take everyone with them watch that's pretty unfiltered but that's what they need to know if they want to make it to the good times maybe even run the good times there always will be man who wish to become Caesar there's no shortage of it there never will be and right now one of the things that I see happening is that so many who they believe they can be the next Caesar if they just put it off by thinking now, now's my chance and that alone enough of them close things apart whether it's a marriage a company, nation a culture look at our culture now is it tearing itself apart or not? are they struggling for who will rule of course are the narratives competing and clashing and irreconcilable that's how it works and how you know I can pick my phone out and within seconds I can move all the wealth in the world or take, find out anything in the world I need instantaneously and I can reach the globe in seconds don't mileage me about it right? but the point, my point is right now oh my god I get to be alive now holy crap imagine when Alexander with Caesar with Durr who sat them down you're here right now you can actually set the entire world on fire push a button, blow up a continent there's never been a better time to be alive and that my friend on top of everything that happens all you have to do is live that's what we teach them that's the job of the patriarch not just me but it's not a selfish your patriarch my line my legacy the lineage that I inherited must live do it have fun man unless there's a truth to that and actually to Tanner's point he was talking about how the guzzies have had a great year I have peers that are struggling and constant complete and I can't help but not be able to relate whatsoever because in my world it's been great I dropped a pen name I created more things this year than I've ever created and I've had a great time doing it I came out into the world, I had a blast 2020 I'm looking back on 2020 as the year I taught my kids to swim and ride a bike I'm looking back on 2020 the year I dropped the pen name and had a blast with my FUE men and went to patriarchs got to see Tanner kill it again see him and his bride have their Q&A and do these great things I'm like families are coming together families are being represented and in my world 2020 is awesome and there's nothing stopping you or any of you from saying the same I'm crazy I'm the crazy guy with so much going on but I'm having a good time I'm fully aware of what's going on but that doesn't influence me because I'm not reacting but again that's the power of an event like this in an organization like this is that you aren't the only weirdo who's concerned about this stuff and the earnestness nor are you the only person who's capable of thriving in circumstances like this and none of us are able to thrive you know I my wife and I were looking at one of the pictures that I took with some of the guys here and I think about the fact that the amount of money that I have brought in from these guys that I took a photo with was more than a year's worth of my salary at the job that I worked when we first got married like I'm not doing this on my own it's because of the network of people that are in here the attendees, the speakers and if we're not capitalizing on that you're missing out on all the potential that can come and you won't have the opportunities to make these be the good times like Ivan is saying they can be absolutely and George through the videos you've been making I've seen you taking on a broad angle of you're talking about what you want to talk about you've not allowed anybody to force you into this mold of you're going to talk about what's popular and react how have you seen or have you seen a change in the responses you've been getting have you brought normalcy to the lives of others and they're starting to wake up to it or is it a large base still trying to figure out what's going to happen at the end of this year? What I've discovered with my channel which is the majority of my income comes from my channel, my social media that the people that needed to drop off have dropped off and the true fans have stayed around and I went from a I guess I can call it a lifestyle channel on YouTube because I will do interviews with guys interviews with women talk about treasure hunting, metal detecting New York fashion models prize fighters theologians it's so random and it's kind of like cross training for me in a sense and it's also teaching my audience that they can appreciate so many different things in life and that the people who have suffered from a crystallization calcification of attitudes have kind of disappeared and stopped hassling me and I feel really good about that and I just feel a lot freer and this was the year that it happened for me I broke free from what was expected of me and like I'm in the driver's seat now with my content and that's probably the biggest thing for me I love listening to your content as well as your brothers like on drives and workouts and I never knew I was interested in fountain pens until you introduced me to the world of fountain pens and I was like oh man I'm all about it like fountain pens are awesome so it's one of those things like that's going on in the world but people are so caught up and looking at what's popular and hot and I'm going to trigger and not well what's interesting to me and what do I enjoy and what can actually bring peace to my life it's too much of a focus on the macro and they're not enjoying the micro joyous moments they could otherwise have you know circling back around to kind of the broader conversation we're having here but what I like about patriarchs is that the unrest that's coming that seems inevitable at this point the greater unrest that the individual can face down it's going to take a community and it's going to take knowing your neighbors and that's society is a collection of households that's how you get society so we're calling men the step up to build up their household to strengthen it and then the next step is to get more connected to other households and to build something if things break apart and go some crazy direction there's little towns these little city states that we could start to build where there are people that share these same values and commitments you know early America was fairly diverse but it still had a core that it shared so a big part of what is happening here is not just men are improving themselves but they're stepping up as leaders of their households but also as leaders of a community of households working together and I think that is where we have to go for you can't take down a mob all by yourself maybe you can take down the first one but bullets run out and it takes people working together it's interesting so that's also been another theme I've seen in patriarchs is it starts with you the man the man who's attended you know you start to improve yourself and change and you start to look at well aren't the kids you know I'm getting some pushback possibly from my wife well they don't have a panel in their pocket they don't have the patriarchs they now have 22 con but they don't have all these tools you've been afforded but here's the thing you're being afforded these tools and you're incumbent to take all this knowledge and pass that to your children pass that to your spouse pass that to your friends you've got all the tools you can start passing them around and that was a theme of yours is the responsibility of man to find that intensity again you know and it's when it starts with the man for the men listening what does that mean when they start if they're looking to find that fire again yeah that's a fundamental issue I believe in this day and age with the American male is they lack intensity and finding that intensity is finding your passion it's kind of like when you see Zach or Tanner or Tex or Ivan or any of these gentlemen speak up on stage and they really get going and it really starts flowing and they get intense and they get wound up and you can hear it and it's starting to really come from their heart it's that passion the passion is what fuels your intensity and as a man in this day and age you have to have that passion you have to have that drive within you whatever that may be whether it's being the best father in the world the best husband in the world being the best bodybuilder in the world being the best communicator in the world whatever that might be you need to find that passion and home in on it and incrementally build it and once that intensity starts to build within you it becomes something so like nebulous something so powerful that it's contagious and as that intensity builds you share it with other men and then they feed off of that intensity and it just keeps going going and going before you know it we're all on fire bonfire can come from a match we're going to open up the Q&A so if you have a question if you want to address an individual panel member if you just want to ask a broad question the microphone is back there in the middle aisle if now we're just going to keep riffing so when it comes to lighting yourself on fire getting yourself motivated how do you find yourself with the kids the wife where's your motivation coming from is it driven externally is there a mantra it comes from a couple different sources for me one has to do with the fact that I recognize that it's my responsibility to to be aspirational in my role as a father and if I have any right to expect anything of my kids then I need to live up to what it is that I'm expecting of them if not I'm a hypocrite and that hypocrisy is I have no business being a hypocrite in that regard and then another one really has to do with my relationship with God and what my eternal potential is because I also have no business bearing my full potential because I'm falsely modest or because I am afraid of the work or I'm too complacent or I'm too anything else and so I've got pressure both coming from below with my children laterally from my spouse from my relationship with God and from all these directions there's this pressure to just be better and as soon as I stopped resisting it as soon as I started to embrace that you realize that that kind of pressure is a phenomenal thing and the happiness that so many of us seek and we seek it by trying to dive back into ourselves and seeking pleasure or anything else pales in comparison with the happiness and the true joy that comes from living up to all of that pressure from all of these different sources when these men come together, when the patriarchs come together inside the convention you can't help but just feel like what you once thought was holding you back or potentially an anchor is actually your fuel you know we had that discussion where there's no way I would be at the temple I'm at or have the achievements I had if I didn't have kids and that sounds kind of counter because it's like oh you don't have to worry about time and energy but that's my fuel so go ahead good afternoon gentlemen can you hear me good afternoon gentlemen fantastic time this weekend I want to touch on something most of the talks at patriarch have been what I call intra family how a man leads his wife and kids that dynamic I was wondering if you talk about inter family dynamics so you can build that community with other like minded families I'll speak to that a little bit from my perspective one of the things that's beneficial is being around families that are in similar positions and we're lucky we're blessed to be in a position where that's the case but you also can't rest on your laurels if that's the case it requires going out of your way to go out on couples dates with other couples or when your kids friends come around here's a really small and simple example whenever my kids bring new friends over because there's 300 kids that live within the quarter mile of where our house is because there's that many young families and it's wonderful so there's always new kids that come over and when they first address me or my wife they'll just say hey lock's dad or something and it's just no I'm Mr. Guzzi or she'll say I'm Mrs. Guzzi and it sets that kind of expectation of respect and something else and we found that even just with that tiny little thing that it changes the way that they treat us and they spend more time wanting to be around us because there's boundaries in our home and they're not dictatorial but there's boundaries that are comfortable or we've communicated with other families where we know that our kids spend a lot of time over there and we'll say whatever you need to do if our kids break your rules tell them by all means we give you full permission because we trust you that you're not going to be physically or emotionally abusive or anything else like that so if you need to discipline our kids do it and the parents will always say and please do the same for us and if it gets to the point where it escalates and we need to communicate with each other it does but then what it does is from that inter-family sense from that broader sense it helps the kids and the families recognize that one our parents communicate with each other and they trust each other that they depend on each other and then two these morals that I'm being taught these patterns of behavior are not just unique to my family but this is how we interact with society and culture in general and so we get to reinforce those attitudes and behaviors within our entire culture within our entire neighborhood so that's how our relationship with it is. That's excellent. Alright next question. Hi guys thanks a lot for everything you had to share. Tex I'm wondering if you could pass a lot of thank you to Ivan for me and tell him thank you for highlighting what time it is to be alive. This is a phenomenal opportunity for all of us as men if we choose to see it that way and for those of us who do choose to see it that way the potential is limitless so I just wanted to thank Ivan for saying that and a question for the group I'm part of Alexander Cortez's Telegram channel and over the past few months that channel has become very personally meaningful to me because it's a community I call it an anti-fear community it's a community full of men who are growing stronger amidst these challenges and I discovered in that time how important it is to be part of communities of men that are working to grow stronger and cultivating anti-fear communities so I wonder if you could each speak to what this particular community the 21 convention community the Manusphere has meant to you personally and your families during the past few months. So I gave my first speech at 21con in 2017 and I felt I didn't know how I was going to be received I'm a family man who talks about my family the red pill world and I'm married so I was like whatever let's do this shoulders back unapologetic let's go and I got a standing ovation at the end of my speech 21con is not about a segment of men it's about men it's about helping men and bringing men together and that's only grown over the years we have a patriarch's edition now this is a patriarch's panel we're talking about family men prior to this the first red man group is all men and it wasn't focused so much on family it's focused on all the issues men face your mind, your body, your spirit as a man we have 22con now making women great again we're going to speak to women in their roles and how this all is going to work for them coming up in the modern world 21con is hitting every angle of what it is to be a man and that in itself is building our little families and I think I speak for everyone when we see the guys come back year after year and they're improving so they're dressing better there's no greater feeling in the world to know change is occurring things are growing having your network, the three of us are in the fraternity of excellence men should have a network they're involved in your AJ's telegram group that's excellent, you should be working with men you know that's absolutely a healthy thing and 21con is embodying all that it's only growing it's learning each year how to do it better and better, I mean look at the hats they're trying to find every box to ensure nobody's left behind, I love that about 21con I'm watching the Christian community interact with the Manisphere and it's not been deep dives sadly some of the articles are like the Manisphere has come into an end for the last two years they didn't really know what they're talking about the reality is that men we are pack animals pack creatures we always are going to find a gang of people to run with and there's guys out there that are looking for help and they're finding their community it's good that things like this exist to build people up I would encourage everybody telegram is great, YouTube is awesome but to go local as soon as they can to find people because you need when you do these consultation or coaching calls someone calls you and I always tell them if you lie to me everything I tell you is worthless let's say what's going on with my wife and my marriage if you're not giving this to me honest all my advice is not going to be very helpful to you and one of the things I really enjoy about this that I'm pretty new to this world has been I wouldn't call it a brutal honesty it's not brutal, people are just honest and they lay it out there and they're talking about where they want to change where they're making mistakes people that can also call you on it in your everyday life they see how you interact with your kids and interact with your wife because sometimes you're just unaware you need someone to say hey why do you always take that kid with you to the store not the other kid or do you know that you cut your wife off you don't let her talk you need people that do little things like that and so let the benefit of this inspire you to get more of the intense thing, the thing locally I'll tell you what I can't believe they let me keep coming back here I'm having so much fun I mean really I am sitting up here I'm friends with Ivan Throne I'm friends with all of these guys Michael's a new friend but the other six of us are sitting here these guys have been my friends for a couple of years now there's guys in this audience that are like seriously good friends of mine my friends at home suck I'm probably partly me and I'm busy and all that but I'm saying I've got these guys are all friends these are the guys I want to go to war with if I have to go to battle 21 I could have paid you to ask that question back there 21 means the world to me absolutely means the world to me because we're making a difference talking to guys in the hallway creating new friendships there listening to what they have done over the last year knowing that the men here, there, everywhere coming together have inspired each other to get better and that's what it's all about next question integrity doing the right thing when you can get away with doing the wrong thing that's a value that I plan on instilling into my children I'm about to be a father I just want to get just one value or principle and how you define it from each and every one of you that you have taught to your children and you hold true to your hearts and no copying each other from each of us? each and every one of you consistency just literally even if it's just a text once a week like I talked about in my speech I love you and believe in you and you do that regularly enough let's say once a week let's say every Thursday morning you send to your kids I love you and I believe in you the week that you don't do it they're going to be like what happened to dad he's usually sending me that text just little things like that obedience so God is my father he calls me to obey him because I love him and I would say the way you define obedience is all the way, right away and with a happy heart that's what I expect from my kids because it's what God expects from me I'm going to say faith and most of you are going to hear that within a religious context and that's certainly the framework with which I operate but it's more than that it's a loyalty it's kind of like integrity it's a loyalty to a set of principles or morals that you may not understand or you may not know if it's going to work out but you choose to be loyal to that anyway and faith is when growth happens when you choose to operate on the belief that this black area this sense of darkness that I don't know what's going to come from this and you're loyal to what it is that you think can get you to the other side that kind of faith is where real growth and real development comes from I'm going to say love and we're at the 21 con talking about masculinity, red pill truths I'm going to say love not something I ever thought I'd say in this stage but that to me is what drives all I do I love my wife, I love my children I love myself I love my fellow man, I want to see them win I love all the women looking to build themselves up and others taking care of their kids so when I instill love in my children I want them to feel the same I want them to find that same passion that same purpose in life because you can't be down, you can't be depressed and you can't quit if you have things that you love that you don't want to let down Yeah, the integrity is talked about heavily in my home and it's a belief in yourself I tell my daughter all the time even when no one's looking and we work together through things and I tell her it's like teamwork through excellence excellence you carry my last name you represent our family you need to operate from a position of integrity she's a teen girl and that's not easy to do in this day and age excellence I guess for me it would be truth truth is the fundamental thing that I want him as my son to recognize in this world and to espouse to approach everything with the truth in mind because I think that's the one thing that well there are many things but that's the one thing that is no longer revered in the society truth and it's you know it when you see it it's what you do when no one's looking but you tell the truth you stand by the truth and if you have to you die for the truth you know I go back a long way to think about the most important lesson that I got from my family it really boils down an experience some of you know about most of you have read that's true as Texas pointed out the world doesn't count no one is coming to save you get up and walk teach your children that they understand that everything they do is imbued with adulthood very adult thing say it to a 40 year old but it's uncontrovertibly true no one is coming to save you Petrolcks do not expect to be saved they know that mercy is not the currency of the world get up and walk get there everything flowers open all the joy all the pleasure friendship brotherhood love wealth all of it you have to walk get up you because your wheat comes to those who fell and protect, sacrifice, die for it, so that the next generation loves and has their own chance to get up and walk. There is nothing to me more powerful than that, and at the end of any devastation, a celebration the next morning perhaps, get up and walk. Go into it. Live your life. The men here teach principles. We're a little different. Our message is all the same. You are responsible. Trust us. It's really good being responsible for your life and your family. Really good. That's an honor to be here with all of you. Thank you. We have time for one last question. Yeah, as a man as a father, this conference is amazing. You talk about legacy and masculinity and all those things that the world at large would rather have us not talk about. However, as a father of two daughters, I was wondering what are some things for us men who are fathers of daughters could pass along to their daughters to carry them through life. Future chief, chief paycheck. And then then the future chief. Daughters are not defective sons. And they shouldn't be treated as such. They should not be made to believe that their role is to compete with their brothers or compete with the boys in their lives. Or that there's something wrong with them because they don't want to or because they may fall for the fact that they've been convinced that they need to. Daughters require a very special nurturing to be able to embrace what it is to be a daughter and then what it is to be a woman. And most of that will come from their mother just like for sons. Most of it does come from us as their fathers. But it's our job to celebrate to reinforce to love to appreciate to engender to do as much as we can to foster that budding femininity in them and do it in a way that isn't just limited to their value to us as fathers or their value to their future husbands, but their own inherent value in what it is to be a girl and what it is to be a woman. And there's something very special about that when that comes from dad instead of coming just from mom. Yeah, that's a solid question. You know, I have a teen daughter myself and a lot of the times I just remember as she has grown up into the young woman that she's become that she is a direct reflection of me even though she's a little lady. She reflects the love that I've given her back on to me and everybody around her by showing grace and dignity. And I believe that if you do have young girls in your life and you're a father, especially if you're a single father and I know if you're a divorcee like I was that that happens. Sometimes you have to play both roles of mom and dad and that can be difficult at times. And in those times of difficulty you need to express to them kind of like what Tanner was saying that they aren't faulty boys, but they are true gifts. What an opportunity to be able to raise a young woman in this day and age in an appropriate fashion to show her that it's okay to be different. And I tell mine all the time to be the best in all you do. You have to be different than everyone else and it's okay. That would be my advice. So we've run out of time. I'm going to leave you with this. Your son may be your heir but that does not make your daughter a spare. Don't ever let that into your mind. Now this concludes the red man group patriarch's panel. Fatherhood's coming back strong and fatherhood is thriving in 2020. So if you enjoy what the panelists had we'll go around find talk about where you can find them more of their work if you want to reach out. So starting with George where could people find you if they wanted them more or getting contact with you. Yeah probably the most active place would be my YouTube channel which is my name George Bruno. There's something there for everybody. Michael. For me for fatherhood stuff Twitter and Instagram are the best. Tanner Guzzi. T A N N E R G U Z Y Ivan. Where can people find Phil? There's one question. Where could people find you? You can find me on Twitter at Evolved Phil at Evolved Phil. Tex. People looking to touch base. Yeah so fell off the old note keeping thing over here. One job. So absorbed. Why did they keep inviting you back? One job. One job. Way to go Tex. Way to go. TexasDOM.com to exasdom.com is where I post my writings and news and that sort of thing and then I'm on Twitter way too much at at TexasDOM 1 with the that's the number one and that's how you would find me the most easily or you join the fraternity excellence and you'd hang out with me every day. I've been thrown.com. That's where you found me. It's that easy. You should do it today. All right my name is Zachary Small. It's a pleasure to host these gentlemen. You can find me on Twitter Instagram at Zach Small underscore. Or my writing at thefamilyalpha.com. My brother hit up fraternityofexcellence.com. Thank you for your time. He represents his patriarchy. We're here to do work as men as patriars. There's nothing more natural than being a father.