 Welcome to the 21 Convention Podcast. My name is Steve Maeda and today we have Socrates and Greg Swan, two powerhouse speakers, alumni's of the 21 Convention. And today we're talking about a lot of crazy stuff. We're talking about masculinity. We're talking about the roots of philosophy. We get into feminism and we get into just how to be the ideal man, what that actually means and how to live it. If you're a fan of the podcast, be sure and click the subscribe button, leave a comment, share it on Facebook, on Twitter, or whatever other social media you prefer. And let's get into this amazing dialogue with these two great men. Greg Swan, Socrates, this is the 21 Convention Podcast. What's happening guys? Hell of a weekend. No kidding. Hell of a weekend. This is wonderful. I love the joke drinking from the fire in our house and I made it for the boys yesterday. I knew it would be new for them. I can't remember how long ago I heard it. I was an inviscid. Am I that old? I was gonna use it and then a son of a bitch if you didn't say it the second one I had and I was totally fucked. Dr. McGuffin took my biohack and I was I was disturbed about that. There were other jokes that ended up showing up that I didn't use. I was I was planning for but the beautiful thing, Socrates and I were both just remarking that we're self entertaining, that we can keep ourselves in use. Even if nobody else thinks it's funny, I think it's funny as long as I think it's funny, it's fine. You know somebody needs to do a word count of this podcast because if then you saw the graph it would be it would be pretty The real deal is to find out how much we can overwhelm him. Yeah that's gonna be a challenge. That's gonna be a challenge man. I've been doing this so right now it's I don't you might be the 10th or 11th person I've interviewed today. That's today. You've been going at it for three days and we're on the tail end. And according to you I'm the most social person in the room which I don't know if that's the truth. I don't think that there's any challenge to that. I think that Steve is an extrovert which is rare in this crowd. It's a 21 convention attracts a whole lot of introverts. You're an extrovert in the first place and you're sociable and you're very highly sociable. And everything you talk about is being more sociable. We gotta get more connected. We gotta get more social. We gotta get more sexual. The important thing is to get more sexual and I mean right now and I mean everybody with everybody right now because that's how we're gonna get more connected. I should have added that next time. Especially in a room full of men and that would be a new breaching of that expression. It would certainly inform their fantasies from now on. Well hey you know the most popular by far type of pornography is transsexual pornography. By like 20 times. I wouldn't know that either. Daddy knows a sweetness but it ain't that. Maybe defining people who are really into it are the people that deny it. Oh my god there it goes. So ask me about Master Vision. I said that somewhere in another podcast that all men watch pornography and if you think they don't it's only because they're denying it. Guys never watch pornography. Oh yeah. So let's get into this because people might be watching this and this is very very very important. I know we've been joking around and I always like to get into the meat of everything. But we have two guys that at the convention probably some of the most influential speeches. And I don't want to take away from anybody else's because in order to be on that stage you are speaking from a point of like real excellence. But you guys impact men in massive ways. You know what first off you got up at 5 a.m. today to say goodbye. No no let's rewind that back. I went to bed. No I left you at 4 in the morning. 3.45. 3.45 after everything going on in your absolutely emotional injury. Imagine the ending of the speech that I gave and everything that I showed and I told them to kind of release that video. Take that emotional energy what that means and I was internalized in that already. That just had an outlet. It had an outlet and then you sit down and say we had a whole dinner we're talking we're engaging. Right. Going and going and going to 4 in the morning and honestly we would have kept going and you stopped us rightfully so. I then turned right around to make room to meet these guys in the morning because they had a 7 a.m. flight and I thought there's no other time to do this. I'm not going to be here again. I need to honor that. I can remake money. I can get more sleep at another time. This is going to happen now. This is all I've got. Let's grab it. The other thing is I also know that had we tried to meet it for lunch or dinner or anything else. So many things are taking place. You're just thrown in the current. So now you get up at 5 in the morning and you just keep going. You make room for what's important. And so that is an action but the purpose, the philosophy behind that action is that God these men, these people that are in this awesome force of life, this great expression of themselves because in my opinion this 21 convention was the best balance of speakers and attendees. Everybody was on the same wavelength or almost everybody. It was pretty amazing. The dialogue was incredible. The dialogue was incredible. You could relate to it. So why is that important? Why is that necessary right now with men who are in this movement of change? Because I don't think it's being expressed. There's no outlet. So for example, you can only speak from my own vantage point. When I write, when I do these things, I'm in complete isolation and many times I'm literally in the dark doing it because I prefer to work in the dark because I hate fluorescent lights. But I'm in the dark writing these things. I'm in the dark thinking about these things and I'm not necessarily sharing these things directly with people. I don't know how this is going to be feel literally played. I mean I can release a little bit here and there and trust me, I test it out. But you don't know how it's going to be received until you put it out there. How does a product sell? How is it received? Then you know. And the 21 convention is an incredible platform for testing that out, putting that out there and having that return. You would think that for example, my crowning achievement would have been the standing innovation I got. That's typical. But I wish the cameras were rolling and I don't think they were. As I was getting off that stage, there was a line of men to embrace me. To physically hold me, embrace me, call me brother, tell me I wasn't alone. And to share in that vulnerability because it was an incredibly raw moment of letting myself be vulnerable and being received in that you don't have. You don't have express. We only applied at a distance. I was embraced coming off that stage. I don't think anybody could have done what you were all our individual expressions but what you did at this convention having the responsibility of the keynote speech. I was talking about this in one of the previous recordings. I was like, you know man, when I brought sock on stage, I said this guy is known for giving the... After every convention that I've been and then you said that's tough to live up to. It's terrible. And you blew it away. And I did not think so. And we can talk about... You have to see it though, sock. You don't know until you see the video. You won't know. I haven't seen it. You have your impression of what you did and part of that is clouded even to you because when you're doing it you're not doing anything else and therefore you can't self-supervise. I can tell you that it was wonderful. It was remarkable. And when you see the video you'll understand how remarkable it was. I would sit down and say this. Compare any of the speeches I've done compared to that last one. I did something distinctly different than the last one. Absolutely. And I hate to say it. God damn you guys. It's one thing to give advice. It's another to take it. But can you imagine how bitter and difficult it is to take your own damn advice? To actually put it out. To sit down and say that. I'm going to sit down and do this. I'm going to do a step out of my comfort zone. I'm going to release myself to a moment. Instead of over-analyzing, overdoing things. I'm going to sit down and say, you've got this. Allow the moment to come in. You both stole my damn lines. And I sit down and go, not only that. Come on. And honestly God, I was tired. I was drained until you get called out during your speech. And I told you after saying it's asshole for a shot in the ass. I'm not wired up on a caffeine and a drink. Having not only been called out for how long during your presentation, but girlfriend been brought up on. You called out. This is how you say that that way. And you said it about the 2012 thing too. I don't see it that way at all. In fact, I think it's helpful. Because one of the things. I mean, number one, you're a speaker. Number two, you're an exemplary speaker. You are literally an example that's being held up for these men. And I am just continuing with that. I am showing what is exemplary about you. And it's not calling you out. If I was calling you on your shit, then I'd worry about that. And you'd be right to do it. But I'm not. I'm calling you on your virtues. And it's trust. But you're not comfortable with it. Because guess what? We're not showing each other's virtues. We're not showing. And because of that, I'm not used to it. That was one of the things I was really glad. I could sit down and contrast. War machine, when we talk about when you're only alpha and you only have alpha to go to, not only here's the dangers of it. And point to a direct example. But then to show a positive experience and a positive alternative from one of the alumni speakers who's physically in the room, who's physically available. You sit down and say, we're talking about mixed martial arts and combatives and defense skills and everything Ed talks about. And how does that deal in masculinity and in his role appropriately? Here's a man who's living it. You know, I joke that he's all art, no martial. He's coming. Dude, you're killing my vibe. And I'm like, no, but he exemplifies it. Most guys that do these things, it's all martial and no art. There's no philosophy. There's no sense of being. But we recognize men are transformed. One of the things I've talked about knowing you during your worst years, you've talked about that. And I sit down and say, yeah, but I also see when Ed started having an influence in your life and dramatic transformation. And I was able to say that too. I don't know. Now, the only thing I miss in that whole thing, honestly, was scenes. This is what he means by being called out. And this is one of the scenes where the only thing I miss in that is I actually want to see Ed hit you in the head. You should see when I hit Ed. I think honestly, that was part of the percentage. I know TC actually brought that up. Where is it? I know exactly where this comes from. This is when men are brought into a culture of men, whether it's a pickup organization done healthily, whether it's a dojo or anything else, or the 21 convention. When you make room for male culture for men to respond to have examples to raise the bar of expectation. We're talking about virtuous behaviors. Well, so this brings us to a point like whenever you're working in a men's group or in any sort of group, I mean, even if it's not a men's group, who cares if it's the Church of Splendor. And we're interacting, right? We are getting to know one another. We can never see growth in ourselves. And we can't see failure in ourselves. We can see regret. We can see the past, all that sort of stuff. But we can see it in other people. And when we can know that other person's story, or we see somebody come in, or we see somebody transition. Like you brought up the example of Anthony. You see that transition. Or you see somebody right when they get started. You see like maybe the confusion or the doubt or whatever it is. It doesn't have to be bad. That's when we get the reflection of ourselves. I keep pointing out to young men who are here, the difference in my impression of them yesterday, last night or this morning compared to Friday when I first saw them. The change that was affected over the weekend, and I hope it's not like Chinese food. I don't mean to be discriminating against the audience. No, not even that. 20 minutes later you're hungry. This is one of the arguments that you hear in inspirational speeches is that an inspirational feature feels you right up and 20 minutes later you're hungry. I hope that tomorrow they reflect the way they look today rather than the way they look Friday. There's no way you can control for that. But this is one of the things I like about the 21 convention is that it shows young men how to do better from where they are right now. The goal is not perfection, the goal is simply better. If you're better every day, eventually you will be perfect in your own estimation. But if you set the goal of perfection tomorrow or a perfection a year from now, set a date certain I'll be perfect by then, you will not achieve it, you'll give up. But if you just identify what it's going to take to get better from here and do it step by step. You asked me this question in 2012. This is the answer I gave you then. Figure out the steps and get better step by step. And as long as you're getting better every day an infinite series converges eventually you'll get where you want to be. So I was going to ask another question. Let me jump right in. I would say there's three things. Two of them are very closely tied. You're absolutely right that it's a reflection. Most times though, most men and most people don't look to see their own reflections. When I use the analogy of vampires, vampires don't see themselves in mirrors. They don't see the reflection. So having male cultures, you're put in a situation in which they see themselves to others and they can see you. That's interesting. That goes into your idea of empathy. If a vampire could see themselves, maybe they could... People actually, individual people typically do not see themselves. They see what they want to see. What you see in the mirror is what you want to see. What you see in a photograph that's taken recently is what you want to see. And one of the ways you have of identifying change in your life is to look at older photographs and this is where men will discover that they're putting on weight slowly and gradually and they're not aware of an award that they're getting more and more slumped over. I always look for the tight line right here straight across, horizontal with the floor. This is a way a man has of saying I am unhappy with my life and I am not doing a damn thing about it. And if you look for that in photographs, I love Facebook because people will put up photographs and they don't know what they're showing me. You can't save from Facebook so I take screenshots and save the screenshots. And I can't really use them. I mean I can't humiliate people but I want these visual records of how people are showing what's going on in their lives when they are completely unaware of what they're doing. They think they're showing you a picture of husband and wife on our 17th anniversary and they're both like that. The lines are straight across, horizontal to the floor. They're both miserable and neither one is doing anything about it. On their anniversary. On their wedding anniversary. This is the picture we put on Facebook to show everybody that we're celebrating our 17th anniversary. We stuck it out another year. We endured another year. There's only 33 years left in this sentence. It really looks like prison photos. It's the class picture at the prison. Everybody looks just like that. Their eyes straight ahead, the 1,000 yard stare and the mouth straight across. This is one of the things you look for when you're looking at pictures of young boys. You want to know when a young boy hates his father? He's wearing a 1,000 yard stare and straight across. That strikes down. I bet it does. There's some imagery there for me. This whole thing, what we're doing, and Saq, you've always said that the 21 convention and the internet and the information being passed, I would say nothing replaces face-to-face communication. Human connection. You've got to get more connected. Whatever. That's how we're meant to do. There's no person in the room. I interview people online all the time, much different than sitting face-to-face. My question for you to think about, because we're going to take a break here in just one moment, so just let this process you know? But how do we take this dialogue that we've built with the 21 convention of all this information? You can get it and turn it into the empathy and the exchange so that people can influence their own groups or do their own thing, you know, and have that discussion face-to-face. But right now, let's take that break and we'll be back in one moment with these two guys. All right, we are back with the 21 convention podcast with these two guys, Saqutis, Greg, Swan, and let's pick up where we left off. We have this culture that we've communicated or we've created. We've built with the 21 convention with speeches, then networking out, starting to podcast, the Church of Splendor, all this great information, great information, but how do we communicate it? And let's take this back to an interview I did with Don Watkins and with Eric Daniels earlier today. We were talking about philosophy. How does it express itself? This is actually interesting. Now I'm going to change this is a second take and we screwed the first one and you'll never get to see it. Thanks Greg. I'm completely It was a beautiful intro. Where was my thought train on this? What is my skill trained for with the great Swan of the Room? I'm never going to do it the same way twice and I'm always going to be completely transparent and you can count on me to tell you what's going on behind the scenes. But actually I was talking to Don Watkins last night. Don Watkins is associated with the Iron Rand Institute. Iron Rand said her goal as a novelist was the projection of the ideal man. Projection is outside of your brain. It's outside of you. And there is no ideal man outside of you because that man is imaginary. The ideal man that you're thinking of when you're thinking of the ideal man is in here and that's what I was talking to Don about. It's not the ideal man. It's the ideal Greg Swan. It's the ideal Socrates. It's the ideal Steve Mayetta. It's the ideal Don Watkins. That's kind of like the myth of the alpha male. Indeed it is. Because you're attempting to emulate behaviors that you think by emulating these behaviors to become that guy. You're never going to be not you. The question is how do you become a better you? And that's what the 21 convention is all about and one of the things that Socrates and I were talking about last night we were joined by Ali Khan for a while one of the volunteers very successful businessman in Northern California has built a big business very impressive entrepreneurial effort and he's looking to escalate that to the next level. So he's not so much interested in men's issues relationship issues. He's interested in what he can do for his business and because I'm perfectly willing to leap completely without any sort of support at all I suggested a mastermind group having never been involved with one but the expert on mastermind groups was right there with us and so we talked about how he could set up a mastermind group related to business when he gets back to California both to improve his own skills and to help share what he knows with the people who are interested in doing better as business people and that's really the I've talked again and again and again to the men at the 21 convention about getting involved with Toastmasters International the speech club it's their 15,000 Toastmasters clubs all over the world you go once a week typically you'll speak a six minute speech once a month but often you will have speech responsibilities every week and it's how to get over the social anxiety of speaking in public how to learn how to prepare an address how to make a persuasive address how to get better and better and some of the best speakers on the speaking circuit professional speakers came out of that Toastmasters experience but one of the other benefits for young men who are looking to meet admirable and marriageable young women is that every one of those Toastmasters clubs is going to be approximately 50-50 in age distribution it may not be the women that you're looking for not meeting the women that you want to meet in your Toastmasters club becoming more confident becoming a better speaker having that that frame they're not looking for the ideal alpha male somewhere over there but they're looking to express that frame from the inside out and the way that you Usus Esmagister Optimus Kikaro said practice is the best teacher if you want to have the frame of a man who can hold his own in any group in any conversation in any social situation Toastmasters is a great way of getting better at that to get at me non-carborombo don't let the bastards wear you down it's all fucking great to me so how does philosophy this philosophy that's being put out there how does it express itself in men today I'm still stuck on the original question of how you actually do it and I would sit down and say it's probably I'll take a two prong response the first one is steel sharpened steels about two knives sharpen each other the reality is if Ali in our example wants to improve that intentionally find somebody that he can relate to they share that similar interest and dedicate specific time to a specific intent don't just sit down and say we're going to meet up and talk no, we're going to meet up and talk to talk about this and make sure it's only framed around that to hold each other accountable the mastermind concept is at least three it grows an example of what happens when you want to surround yourself with like-minded men let's look at the 21 convention Anthony Johnson did just that for that sole purpose I want to surround myself with excellence in men in all areas that I'm interested what did he do? he did this and then he opened it up to others that's incredible that's how large this concept to go and that's an original permutation for it that's something that we had never discussed even when I knew we were doing masterminds earlier and it might opening speech kind of discuss some of that this is what occurs the second is going to be based on the individual speakers we have to tell better stories we have to tell more better stories and not just in an arbitrary way we have to tell better personal stories and Greg's going to hate this part you're driven you love the fact that I'm an introvert learning extrovert skills well look in the mirror of course I do all the time you're driven and you need to be more social I roll over people I know I do it's not the sermon it's not the sermon you need to increase your flock if we talk about church of splendor and that obligations on this tell me this is an ancient day getting called on my shit I totally agree with you and that's why the conversation we were having last night was Socrates trying to recruit me into his army hell yes I was I don't join organizations I don't do the social stuff I really don't I'm an introvert I am very introverted you see me and you see this I'm willing to look the camera straight in the eye and say this is what you're not being told I'm going to kill you down I'm being incandescent for driven purposes I want to get into your head and because I do I know that the only way I'm going to get into your head is penetrate it I'm going to hit you like a nail gun but it's not natural to me I am an introvert I am alone and if I'm alone for 14 days in a row I was 4 months on the road last summer away from my wife which is terrible because I love my wife desperately and I love her phenomenally well I love her frantically like that not hitting her no but hitting yeah hitting that hitting that and it was that part was horrible but the other part was not at all I'm in hotel rooms dismal cheap little shit cheap shit hotel rooms for 23 days at a time and to be that alone for that amount of time except that I was lonely and my balls were blue I'm trying to make him laugh it's easy to make him laugh because he's so sociable he likes to reward affection I just wait when I'm afraid of somebody that chimpanzee reaction he's afraid I'm going to want to hit it with him this guy's been away from home for 5 days who knows what he'll do but being alone like that is not a problem you're absolutely right you're calling me on my shit and I deserve it you need to deliver I know I need to deliver the goods you need to deliver and last night incandescent for social for driven purpose is not a problem cautious when I need to be for driven purpose is not a problem sociable for driven purposes oh is that a problem we'll take this offline I can give you more feedback but last night you can say whatever you want you can always say whatever you want to me there is no wrong answer dude I know that but last night was truly not so much just a recruiting drive it was a recruiting drive I'm recruiting to have people go forward I'm recruiting essentially what you got was a preparatory command you got a warning or this is where I'm going I'm telling you this is what we have in front of us this is our objective this is why it's important now follow me I'm going to go over the top he says once more onto the breach once more onto the breach and if the men follow he's a leader and if the men shoot him in the back he's a casualty and I get a hero's funeral right I think that was the right you're on star yeah he was a hero because you know here it is I live my values and I'm willing to die for that and you're absolutely right and a number of the men if you ever considered coaching absolutely not are you kidding me I love talking to you now because I know it's going to end there's your comfort zone I know it's going to end it's not growth if it's not painful you can say the same thing about yourself oh hell yeah you're absolutely right then that's what he's up to that's what we were talking about is for both of us to rise to the challenge that we're issuing to other people this is something which is amazing because again you have moving speeches but online it doesn't have the same presence I intentionally say it's small and this is what's interesting I think there's beauty in anonymity but I really think that I think that there's a level of honesty that can come out of it when we can come together as men as equals and as our identity that it's so much better actually I think that the speaker audience paradigm is not it's helpful to a degree but it's not fully helpful and that's one of the things I was bitching about the breaks with my wife because I hate to wait let's just keep moving we'll take lunch if you want another bottle of water we need to make the breaks bigger but no exactly people always say that the action is in the hallways no if the action is in the hallways I can stay home if I'm not the action is what the action is between the words in the book no the spaces are there to separate the Romans didn't even separate words they didn't use word spaces they didn't use a hyphen at the end of the line I'm so comfortable with Latin just a machine gun I can't read it that way but they could read it that way they didn't need word spaces but no the interaction between the presentations is valuable because then it's equal as opposed to being lecturer audience that lecturer audience and hero acolyte hero flock and that's a bad thing too one of the things I kept saying to the volunteers is each one of you should be making a presentation I have no presentation I don't have a presentation I'm going to put you in front of a microphone and you're either going to fold or play and if you play you made a presentation that actually unconferencing you know the idea of unconferencing everybody sits in a circle and maybe there's a basketball you're holding the basketball you're speaking when you're done you throw it to somebody else and who you throw it to is who you want to hear from next and that actually maybe is an after an afternoon I'm a part of more men's groups like that are more influential which influence my teaching massively I think it would help so many people they did that I want to interrupt guys masculinity we have this thing masculinity where men we have to think about it I believe it's completed when we interact with femininity we come back to some sort of one gotta get sexual gotta get sexual actually gotta have a refraction period though Steve you can't do it continuously gotta have a refraction period everything ebbs and flows but when man and woman come together is one what are the things keeping that separate keeping them separate all of the issues unresolved issues that they brought with them to the bedroom yeah anything you have not talked the things you're afraid to talk about the things that you cannot be honest about because you're afraid to offend me I'm not just talking about sex and relationships I'm talking about masculinity what is keeping that we're opposites we are opposites a woman is the thing that I am least confident to understand however what I'm saying here is when a man can swim, mix, engage whatever with a woman he becomes the true definition of man when a woman actually when a man becomes a father and follows through on his fatherhood that's when he's living up to his masculine so what keeps that separate what keeps it from happening all kinds of different things sock is a greater authority on this than I am we you're right I will finish this in order to not be dominated by you we had a contract we came in, I had a certain amount of time you're over you're over we're living in a culture that is attempting to become a matriarchal society matriarchal societies don't exist they do not exist but we've offered we've surrendered so much masculine authority not so much to women but to the state that men are afraid to assert their masculinity which I think is a mistake and it wrecks their relationships before they're even fully made because a man the man isn't confident enough to assert his masculine authority in that relationship and say we're making love because I am leading us to that ecstasy and once you get there that you're in that n-loving state I call it n-loving you're playing with your dog to the extent that all you're doing is playing with your dog you are in loving with your dog your dog is in loving with you you're not acting to express your love he's not perceiving your love he's not expressing his love you're not receiving his love you're in loving together you're both doing the same thing and you're doing it together and you're not aware of doing anything else other woman when you're making love with your wife you are in that in loving state and if you are you just it's just I mean it's like an orb of endless energy it's like swimming in hot butterscotch I don't know how to describe it it's it's perfect it's perfect and it's it's it doesn't last forever I'll last but while it lasts it's wonderful and perfect and what you come away with from that is something that continues to glow on afterward there's an afterglow in that refraction period but that glow can persist until the next time you come together to do it again and you can be making love that way all the time you're only making love well you're only hitting it every so often but if you're making love all the time then you're constantly constantly in that state of in loving and when you get to that level of ecstasy there I don't think there's anything better than that so now socrates can tell me why I'm wrong started actually let's take a quick break for this commercial contract violations we're taking this shit up okay gross violation gross violation might be exactly right I'm just gonna go away anyway driven's break up by flight I'll be gone or by combat cautious break up what you're gonna take I got you as in Roman times this is anti-gregs one and this is Socrates part three of our interview hey what completes masculinity oh god it completed where we talking about what separates you just make sure I'm still on time yeah yeah honestly what happens is anything that infuse with biology you know and those are gonna be the cultural factors you know I I know I really hammered the biological factors pretty freaking heavy yeah you know really have a really heavy because I think it's they're highly over over-emphasized in our society and we don't value the cultural elements but what I think ultimately happens is culture does get into our head we start having to try to manifest ideas and concept of what is masculine and it means and how do I represent that and ultimately I think we can let a lot of that go and embrace I kind of it sounds cheesy but too intense thing you know and it's paraphrased by saying into me see and if you are truly naked and raw and vulnerable and just me whatever that is whatever form that takes there's nothing interfering with that nothing corrupting that it is flawless it is me okay whether I'm male or female whether I'm you know heterosexual or I'm gay whether you know I said I'm a male or female I can be transgendered you know we can just know that's natural as an architect I recognize one of the greatest threats architecture is under critic it's nature ultimately water will win you know and jobs and architect just to make sure that that doesn't happen in my lifetime not my client but mine but you sit down and say okay if I firmly believe nature will win all this will self-correct one way or another right it may not be the form we like it may play havoc and it may destroy millions and millions lives because ultimately we recognize that to get to this point right now nature has done a tremendous amount of fucking okay just and human compost yeah to get here and it's one of the jokes I was telling the guys down here cultural complex yeah and complete you know generations and civilizations and it just keeps churning and churning until you get it right until it becomes natural and when it gets natural it can go astray again okay and nature doesn't care yeah nature just wants time in nature like time will keep going forward it will keep going forward so I think that if the more that we can get down to our natural cells and not having a month just a tremendous amount of these constructs up and I know we talk about these things but a lot of it is we're trying to create a better vision we're trying to tell a different story an alternative so we have these alternative constructs ultimately I think if we can get down to our true selves and socrates you know I chose that name chose one of the bits of advice is know yourself probably some of the best wisdom I ever know you know and read and the more I understand the man his thoughts that the wiser he becomes in my eyes and the greater and more in-depth of his shadow I can I can I talk about Socrates the philosopher of just for a minute because you mentioned philosophy can I see hold on can I release he didn't he didn't make three minutes of my time I really wish three minutes of my time but you're right he didn't write anything everything we know socrates was written by Plato or other followers but the the I see Socrates as the father of two sons one was bookish who was Plato and the other was practical was Aristotle this is the way of thinking about the hemispheres of your brain very often men will be really good really handy or they will be very bookish my attitude is gain strength on the weak side so if you are bookish then you need to be more practical if you are the guy who spent his entire high school years repairing cars you need to gain strength on the bookish side but I'm I'm Rand was a bookish woman who celebrated Aristotle no my attitude would be let's celebrate Socrates because he was the one who was whole in himself he had both going for him he was strong on both sides and his two sons split his estate but each is the mirror of the other and a mirror is always the reversed image of reality a mirror is not a reflection of reality a mirror is just reflected light and both of those reflections are wrong and they're both asked backwards as far as I'm concerned what I want to see is a reintegration of those two ideas and we have the living personification here he took the name and he's trying to live up to it that's the beautiful thing about that is virtue the live up to not only the name the convention the obvious I tell you every time I get on the stage and I'm literally fearful because you sit on say when you get pedal solos there's only one way to go I know and I'm afraid of heights it's like all of us might be saying you know certain philosophies need more promotion or attention but all of the greatest philosophies including Socrates what did he have yet a school right then people from that school carried on but he didn't write anything and whether I don't believe in Christianity but Socrates and the idea or story of Christ where they're both killed by the Romans both of them wrote nothing you know but both did the same thing but they both added a third act but they put it out on the open or marketplace they went directly to the people and they sold it directly sold it directly exactly Socrates didn't have a school he just walked around the agoray yeah yeah that's free market directly in a different way I like that you didn't hear that but you said yes no okay so yeah yeah I said it yeah I'm waiting for the light and wait till the wife and you're watching this Maria's gonna live here for that one so anyway that that cross in our room is gonna have a different use but anyway the one that was intended okay so the I didn't realize you were a hangar I thought you were a nailer there's actually some jokes going I wanted to change my name to Steve Christ and then I'd have all this maybe we should stop you're not for this moment right yeah until you've been nailed by Steve Christ wow that's a pickup line like it really is it really starts with a starts with a pickup line and my name is a pickup line so it's a very very well that's actually you're kidding me really day game is not it's not I never knew I would not have guessed that let's let's let's bring it back sorry to take it into the gutter but okay so we at this convention I heard a lot of background noise about feminism and you can't run from it I I actually love sharing that topic with you guys because you guys have a lot to say but you know I think when women are that extreme they're not speaking a language I think when men are that extreme they're not speaking a big language you know how can we as man like get more in touch with who we are and what we should be doing rather than listening to these extreme movements of the the MRAs and then the you know the feminists and all this confusion back and forth fatherhood fatherhood every problem that we see out in the social world comes back to an under fathered generation the second or third generation of under fathered American kids and as far as I'm concerned feminism exists to destroy fatherhood that feminism is the the women's auxiliary of the Marxist movement it is part and parcel of Marxism and Marxism wants to undermine all social institutions but the perfect social institution to undermine is the family and the way that you under for undermine the family is remove the father and this is what feminism whatever goals feminists insist they're seeking what they have successfully done is remove fathers from the family and an unfathered family is is an arm of the state because mom and the kids have nowhere else to turn but to the state whether it's family court or the welfare system one way or another they become yet another agency of the state because they have nowhere else to go our civilization was built by hoplite Greeks by fathers serious dedicated fathers who were fully married fully committed to their children fully committed to their lands and if necessary they would fight to defend their lands and if they needed to defend their territory they would join together in phalanxes and fight as armies to repel invaders this is the story of the 300 a wonderful movie for men to see if you want to see masculinity at its finest but I think that's that's what feminism is and if people want to send me hate mail about that feel free it's I'm easy I'm not going to give you my email address but just Google Greg Swan you'll find me I'm not trying to be confrontational or provocative I'm trying to defend the fatherhood because that's what's going to repair civilization what I hear you saying is an enforced culture that's the alternative terrible thing well that's the alternative to two father-led homes there is no alternative to father-led homes except tyranny and it may not happen right away but if you're moving toward tyranny eventually you get to North Korea well and I'd say we have clear examples of where that's at now I I'll say two major problems on thoughts I'm normally very vocal against feminism I I find it at just a heinous immoral proposition it's for a number of reasons but I would sit down and say the phenomenal thing about the 21 convention is James Marshall speech covered a lot about feminism I was directly offended by some of the things he said I thought they were outrageous I found them repugnant I had an opportunity to address that in the hallway remarkably enough and it in not necessarily I was directing him it was a question but we're standing together a little and for the first time and I know many times guys who deal with human rights issues or any of those things where you talk about things we're just not heard and that's our big we're just and so I literally spoke at length because the James's were there the James's yeah yeah and they all six six-foot monsters yeah yeah I know it's a you came right up on the tail end of them so James McLean was literally asking well tell me about this and the story led directly to these things and I had to acknowledge James Marshall and some of the things he did absolutely very very clear he was right but he did something a feminist never has done before with me I've never experienced before he listened right he truly listen now I don't know what he was thinking but I don't care okay he respected me and created room for dialogue and right now there is no room for dialogue absolutely not room for dialogue I have been threatened I've been put on FBI watch list because of just the fact that I spoke up that I wanted a voice to be able to talk about rational things in a rational same way and so we can sit down and say we can argue all those things but the reality is I can't get to the future if I keep looking in the past yeah see I mean like I really agree with you you know James told me his speech was going to be very controversial like a couple months ago and so I was interested here I think that the more anything is seen as a black and white then it can't be social you know that it can't be it can't there's the gray areas what makes like work and so I was talking earlier like I did this documentary when I was 26 or 7 or whatever you know actually it was just it was before I got involved in any of this and I want to know about American culture I interviewed all these people all these office that I was actually pretty disappointed with what I saw from them you know these academics these like heroes like there was no 21th adventure to seek out with all these great minds coming together and I was like fuck and so then I started interviewing everybody else and I'd interview these crazy you know these people that I didn't agree with people that were saying something that was like like racist stuff you know I'm like just like talking about you know like well my family but when I sat and talked to them I could understand them and then I would be like okay yeah I don't agree with hating black people but we can talk and interact and and and have a discussion was so meaningful and then these guys that were like Israel and Palestine or whatever it was I could not have a conversation with and so I think that that's that's such an one of the things that I say all the time and I don't live up to it enough is that no one was ever scolded or scorned into better behavior that if you want better behavior reward better behavior if you want to yell at people and put them in their place they will hide from you they won't behave better they'll just hide their bad behavior from you but if you're saying that you want to help men or women for that matter or children do better the way that they're going to do better catch your dog doing something right catch your kid doing something right catch your husband doing something right ladies because that's the way that everybody grows you grow toward the better you don't you don't grow by killing weeds you grow by cultivating better flowers and I'll throw this on my keynote speech yeah literally was designed with that intent don't look at the past provide a better alternative and vision and it's not just a vision I actually was showing reality so I started and ended that presentation with that vision and reality and I was given a concrete example of what I wanted what I expected and what I'm aspiring to and helping lead that movement to I'm not sitting down and combating anything I'm saying provide a better alternative in two sentences what message would you leave us with now you put me on a spot I'll do it yeah grow my two sentences are this is the completion of this podcast my two sentences are God bless Anthony Johnson for putting the 21 convention together and God bless him for inviting me to speak I am endlessly grateful inviting Socrates he introduced me to Socrates Socrates I have become good friends and you want to talk about social engagement that's why I stayed up half the night last night and again this morning hours today with Socrates I am endlessly boundlessly benefited by this convention Greg Greg's one sentences last 845 another contract violation thank you just I'm I'm immensely grateful for the experience for the intent at the attendees the experiences I've kind of come with come into and I will be taken away and it's it's quite a feast of ideas and thoughts and personalities awesome signing off guys we'll get you next time thank you guys so much for watching as you can see we have a lot of fun in this podcast and man it it would it's always awesome to build that dialogue you know about these people talking about how to build that foundation of yourself who you are and applying it to the world and there's no two better people than these guys if you liked what you saw hit the subscribe button that'll keep you in touch with everything that we're doing here and of course shared on social media I'm Steve Maeda signing off thank you so much for watching