 convention 10-year anniversary event in Orlando, Florida. Our next speaker is the best-selling author of The Way of Men, Becoming a Barbarian, and Becoming a Barbarian. He is also in my opinion and my judgment the world's best masculine philosopher. Please help me welcome Jack Donovan. Alright, I've been writing and speaking and talking about masculinity for more than a decade, and I don't teach men how to fight or how to lift or how to make money or how to get laid, although I think we can all agree that those things are important. I realized a few years ago that what I actually do is talk about words and the meanings of words and the way that those words and ideas associated with them shape the way that we see ourselves and how we see the world around us. And then asking the question, is that what we want? And if not, how do we change the way that we use these words and ideas so that we can better become who we want to be to reach our full potential? How do we change the way we think so that we can change the way we live? Technically, that's philosophy, so I guess I'm going to talk to you about philosophy. Specifically, I'm going to talk about Friedrich Nietzsche and his concept of nobility, which is also called master morality and how I think you can apply it as an aspirational ideal to guide you as you strive to become the best version of yourself as a man. Nietzsche wrote, at the commencement, the noble caste was always the barbarian caste. Their superiority did not consist first of all in their physical but in their psychical power. They were more complete men, which at every point also implies the same as more complete beasts. When I worked the way of men, I wanted to break down what men really identify as masculinity. How do we evaluate each other as being more or less masculine? What are that criteria for being masculine? And I found that when you look beyond the cultural differences between men, the fundamental criteria for what is considered more or less masculine is essentially the same. It's universal. Men always and everywhere have been seen as being more masculine if they were strong, if they were more courageous, more daring, more able to overcome fear when necessary. They were expected to be competent and to be able to perfect the skills necessary for them to be able to fulfill their role as men. And they were expected to care what other men thought of them, men specifically in their group, and how outsiders perceive their group. All of these universal criteria had to do with what men needed from each other to survive throughout most of our evolutionary history. The tactical, survival virtue associated with masculinity today and 3,000 years ago had to do with what a man is as an animal, as a beast. These tactical virtues, strength, courage, mastery, and honor are echoed and informed by our structure and physicality, and the way that that physicality differs from between the average female and the average male. They define what it means to be good at being a man, to be good at being what a man is as a beast, to nurture and develop and test and let loose those characteristics is to become what we are, to realize your potential as a man. But these criteria alone don't have much to say about how to approach life, especially in the modern world, as a man who wants to be good to be better at being a man. And I think what Nietzsche calls master morality can help to develop and complete our idea of how a more noble man, a more complete beast approaches and negotiates the challenges of living. But first I need to make a point, your masculinity is no longer required. Masculinity is optional. It was born out of necessity but it is no longer a necessity for 90% of us. We didn't make this choice ourselves, we didn't choose this personally, but our role as men is outsourced to small groups of men. And a lot of it is automated and done by machines. You can work to become stronger and faster and more competent. You can get a black belt. You can acquire enough tactical and firearm skills to be comfortable and to thrive in a war zone, but most of you will probably never use them. When I talk about the tactical virtues and the perimeter, I tell men to imagine what would you guys need from each other right now if the zombies attack? And I think that's an easy way to realize how men judge each other in the past when you had to survive. But the reality is the zombies are not coming or they're probably not coming. Civilization could break down and the shit could hit the fan at any minute and it seems like it should, but it never does. It keeps limping along like a drunk that should have passed out hours ago and it may keep limping along and getting dumber and more annoying for the rest of your life. It is possible, even likely, that no one will ever need you to step up and be a man. Today, if you want to be better at being a man, it's because you believe that being good at being a man is better. Because you believe that becoming better at being a man is the best way to become the best possible version of yourself. Because you believe in your own potential, because you believe that you can rise, life in this empire is easy. The way of men is hard. Becoming better at being a man means making your life harder. For men to become the best possible versions of themselves, they need resistance. Pressure is required. And eventually I realize that this pressure really has to come from other men. You know, masculinity is a muscle and to some extent muscle defines us. You know, we get more of its stock without doing anything at all. And if we don't use it, it atrophies. But if we do apply resistance, it gets better. It becomes more powerful, more beautiful in accordance with the nature of what it is. And personally, I can't think of anything more beautiful, more right than seeing a man rise, and seeing him overcome resistance and become what he is. To see him become heroic. To see him do something that he didn't know that he could do. To see his force, his hard and nerve, and sinew, to serve his term long after they are gone. And to hold on when there is nothing in him except the will that says, hold on. I mean, I can't think of anything better than that. I can't think of anything higher. That's religious. That's spiritual to me. To seek resistance, to work, to become better at being a man. I believe that that is a higher path. No one was telling me that I had to do that. No one was forcing me to do it. I went out and found a group of men to hold me accountable to that idea because society, society does not care. It makes people uncomfortable, actually. And most people would prefer it if you just learn to love yourself just the way you are, whatever that is. But my point here is that the way of men is a choice. Masculinity is a philosophical value. It may not be a necessity, but it can continue to be a noble ideal. When the way of men first came out, a philosophy professor came to me and he said, you know, you're saying that the way of men is a moral, these tactical virtues, because they're just survival virtues. But what you're actually talking about is Nietzsche's master morality. And I looked into it a little bit. And master morality is how Nietzsche articulated the mindset and the worldview of powerful people, barbarians, knights, aristocrats, nobles, men who believed in themselves in their own worth. They weren't worried about what was fair and they weren't worried about social justice. They cared about themselves and their people. They cared about living and exerting their own strength and winning. Now, master morality, it's not exactly the same as masculinity. It does overlap a good bit. But I think Nietzsche's concept of master morality, of premoral nobility, as he also called it, is a useful way to think about how to live a more masculine life. So we're going to talk about some of the concepts that are involved in his idea of nobility. You know, first, there are two opposing ideas. Master morality or nobility and what he called slave morality. And I don't think master and slave are a really good way to talk about this in the modern world. We don't really have slaves in the first world. And, you know, it upsets a lot of people. I don't think it can be an abstraction. So I think it's better to talk about it in terms of what is noble and what is anti-noble. And even Nietzsche believed that we all have a little bit of each of these things competing for real estate in our head. And so, you know, we just want to talk about how to, you know, bring out the best, the most noble instincts, and suppress the things that make us behave, you know, in an anti-noble way. But before we talk any more about Nietzsche, I need to make a point that Nietzsche was just a man. He's just a fucking guy. He's just like me. He's a self-published author. You know, he actually said politically incorrect things and was un-hierable in his lifetime after being very successful very early on. And, you know, but he's just a guy. And so when people, they had the philosophy course in college, or maybe they're a philosophy professor and they'll tell you, well, you're misusing Nietzsche. You're misunderstanding what he really meant. This isn't what he really wanted us to do. And my answer to that is, I don't care. I'm going to take what I find in Nietzsche and use it in a way that I think is best. You know, because Nietzsche's just a guy. He didn't have everything figured out. I think he was wrong about some things. And, you know, we're not following him like the Bible. And so you don't have to say, like, figure out what Nietzsche really meant. You know, I studied him a good bit and I think that you can just take what you need. And that's really the fucking point, is that masters make their own values. I choose what's good. And, you know, according to Nietzsche, that is what masters do. They make the values. They aren't looking for an external source of values. Someone to tell them what is good and what is evil. They say, you know, because it comes from inside. This is good and this is bad because I said so. And here's a quote from him about it. He said that every aristocratic morality springs from a triumphant affirmation of its own demands. And so what it really means is that, you know, again, these values are creative. They come from us. And external values, the anti-noble values, are a reaction to something else. Like someone has something, they're oppressing me and so I'm going to be different. I'm going to be good because they're oppressing me and I'm different from them. It's a way to kind of make yourself feel better. And, you know, masters really don't have time for that. Another quote from him, the aristocrat system of values, it acts and grows spontaneously. It merely seeks its antithesis in order to pronounce a more grateful and exultant yes to its own self. It's negative conception, what is low and vulgar and bad. It's merely a pale, late-born foil in comparison with its positive and fundamental conception saturated as it is with life and passion of we aristocrats, we good ones, we beautiful ones, we happy ones. And that brings me to something that I like to call the noble equation. Nisha actually set this up in a sentence with little equal signs between all the parts and, you know, good, noble, mighty, beautiful, happy and loved by God or the gods or destiny or whatever you want to make it. And you can exchange all these things if these things are really equal. We are good because we are beautiful. We are happy because we're noble. We are loved by the gods because we are mighty. All these things cross-reference each other. And what a beautiful, inspiring way to see life. I am alive now and that is right. It's so affirmative to believe that you are all of these things and to want to be more of all of these things because you believe that you are worthy of being more, stronger, higher, better, more beautiful, happier, luckier, more favored by destiny. Now, there is a trap here. You don't want to get into an affirmation trap where you just sit in your house and think about how noble and fantastic you are. You know, because that doesn't mean anything. You know, what I'm really talking about here is believing that you're worthy and capable of achieving your goals. And again, I'm taking what Nisha wrote and using it the way that I think is best. And Nisha actually didn't believe that men today could actually think like that anymore. At least not completely. But I know guys who think this way, you know, who approach life like they are the chosen ones. Like they are meant to be great. And why not you? You don't have to jerk yourself off about it. But why not approach life as if you were meant by the gods to be strong and happy and beautiful and successful? Of course, on the other side of this, we have the anti-noble equation. You know, it's reactive. So, you know, the evil people are the powerful people and they're covetous and greedy, and they're oppressing us and they're godless and they should be crushed or cursed. I'm sure they'd prefer other one. And, you know, so what's good means that we're pious and blessed and wretched and poor and weak and suffering and needy and sick and loaths them. You know, whatever, it's a very, it's a great little cycle because no matter how shitty your life is, you can always say, well, I'm better because my life is shitty. And that's kind of like the core of resentment. And resentment is actually a key concept here. And basically, what it comes down to is jealousy at the end of the day. I mean, it's a little more complicated than that. But this desire to see that the world is unfair and, you know, you're going to get what's yours later. You know, the noble instinct, you know, is life-affirming. It's like, I'm living now. I'm focused on living now. I'm here to win. No matter what happens. Okay, something bad happened to me. I'm still here to win. Whereas the, you know, anti-noble instinct is life-negating. Everything is later. You know, my treasure is in heaven. After the revolution, everything will be okay. You know, when true equality has been achieved, we can all be happy. We can relax. You know, when, you know, no one is free until everyone is free. You know, like, everything is about some kind of external other and something that's going to happen later when everything can finally be good. And again, the noble mindset has no time for that. Why not now? You know, I could die tomorrow. Like, let's make it happen now. And ultimately, you know, one of the things that the anti-noble mindset wants to do always is called transvaluation, which means to turn all the noble good values that we're talking about upside down. Because if weakness is really seen as strength, then I can be strong. And, you know, you see that all around you, right? I mean, that people do news speak back and forth and, you know, like, suffering is the new courage, you know? Emotion is the new intelligence. We have to turn things upside down to make ourselves feel better. And when I see we, I mean them, because that's how it's not me. But you see that all around you, these messages of how you're supposed to, you know, rethink what strength is and rethink what beauty is. And that's just to make people who don't have it feel better. But, you know, like, for the nobleman, in the foreground, there is a feeling of plentitude, of power, which seeks to overflow the happiness of high tension, the consciousness of a wealth which would feign given bestow. The nobleman also helps the unfortunate, but not or scarcely out of pity, but rather from an impulse generated by the superabundance of power. And this is something, these aren't Nietzsche's words obviously, but this is something that I think you're probably already familiar with. And so the noble instinct is associated really with an abundance mentality. You know, you're always seeing and looking for opportunities to win, whereas the anti-noble instinct is looking for, you know, reasons, reasons why they can't win. You know, excuses for losing. And obviously, to be noble is to be more aggressive. And you want to face the world in an aggressive way. And, you know, that's your preference anyway. You know, you want to deal openly and honestly. And that's not to be confused with not having any strategy at all. But, you know, it's, Nietzsche associates the slave morality or the anti-noble morality with, you know, passive aggression. Manipulation, lying, duplicitousness, you know, the kind of people who would stab you in the back, whereas I guess the noble instinct, you know, they wanted to do a duel, you know, and face their opponent. Another thing which I think is really important is something called, he calls, golden laughter. And he calls it the Olympian vice. And here's a quote about that, you know, an inability to take seriously for any length of time enemies, disasters, misdeeds. That's the sign of full strong natures who possess a superfluity of molding plastic force that heals completely and produces forgetfulness. You know, laugh at misfortune. Forget those who have wronged you. Let it go, let it slide into history. You know, I can tell you as a man in his 40s that I have spent a lot of time hating people whose names I no longer remember. You know, obsessing about the bad things that happen to you, that just, it's not productive. It leads to hatred and envy and a focus on the external, on other people, not on your values and not on what you want. You know, sometimes other people really are to blame and they really do suck. But obsessing about it doesn't help you. So that's the comparison and contrast there, the golden laughter versus obsession and vengefulness and scapegoating. You can acknowledge problems, but you know, when you focus on them forever, it becomes very poisonous. And you know, that leads to another concept that I think is really important, because I think that, you know, if you're politically incorrect in any way, and I think to be alive in the world, you almost have to be. You know, if you're not lying to yourself, you're getting accused of being hateful in some way. And I think that that's projection. People who say that everyone is a hater and you know, people who accuse everyone of hate, it's really because that's how they are. They focus on everything externally, and they can't imagine not seeing the world that way. Whereas the noble instinct, and I try to stick to this myself, you know, it just has contempt for things you don't like. I mean, that's a, there's a difference there. There's a difference between like sitting around obsessing about something that someone who is, you know, making the world a bad place, and just kind of being disgusted by them. You know, there are a lot of people out there who I don't want to be associated with, who I don't want to hang out with, you know, who I think suck. But I don't hate them. I don't have time for that. Self mastery. The nobleman honors in himself the powerful one, but also him who has power over himself. He takes pleasure in subjecting himself to severity and hardness. He has a reverence for all that is severe and hard. You know, that's again the opposite, you know, taking control of your own life versus blaming other people. The nobleman believes that he has a duty only to his equals. You know, the anti-noble instinct is that you owe something to everybody. It's very democratic. You know, there's a line from the Habamao that goes, you know, speak not three words to a lesser man. And, you know, respect your enemies, but don't have enemies that you don't respect. Enemies should only be your equals. Somebody who you respect and possibly even admire. I mean, think of two athletes, you know, Olympian level athletes competing against each other. At the end of the day, they know more about each other than the people in the stands. They're more alike. And I think that's the kind of enemy you want to have in your life, not just anyone who doesn't like you. I mean, I think especially if you've been a writer and dealt with people on the internet, there's a lot of people who don't like you. And, you know, all the people who don't like me are not my enemies. I do not honor them in that way. You know, feminist, crazy people, anonymous strangers, reporters, especially not reporters. You don't owe anyone a response. You know, and that's a lesson it took me a long time to learn. You know, we all want to be nice guys if we were raised well. But you don't owe every single person on the planet your time or attention. Now, this is something actually that doesn't come from nature, but it comes from my own experience. In running a tribe, as I do right now over the past couple years as being a leader, something that I ran into, you know, we're talking about morality that's beyond good and evil because evil is external. You know, masters just judge things as good or bad. And what I came across in dealing with some problems that some of my guys had and some just all the situations that we've dealt with together is that, you know, like put aside whether I think, I don't think what you want to do or what you did is evil. Who cares? What we need to talk about, if you're actually going to deal with the problem, is actions and consequences. So, you know, beyond good and evil, there are only actions and consequences. You know, you have to take a sober objective and realistic assessment of what the actual consequences are. And consequences are not always fair. And they're not always proportionate to what someone does. You know, you could do, you know, someone wants to do something and it's really just a little thing. But, you know, we have to talk about how it's going to affect, you know, them. You know, is that going to lead to a chain of consequences and a chain of desires that's going to take them down a road that's harmful to them? You know, how is what they do going to affect everybody else around them? You know, all your choices, especially when you're involved in a group. And Nietzsche's philosophy, it's not really well designed for groups. He doesn't really feel that out very well. But I think a lot of it can be applied if you finesse it a little bit. And, you know, it comes to the group. Like, you have to look at, you know, how this is going to affect every single person in the group. You know, whether it's your family, whether it's your tribe, whatever. These little things that people do can have a big impact. And so, you know, rather than focus on, you know, like, that's a bad thing that you want to do, I tend to look at problems and say, you know, okay, well, you can do that. And that's fine. You know, I don't care. It doesn't hurt me, you know, or maybe it does. But it doesn't, you know, it doesn't upset me that you want to do it in an emotional level. But we need to sit down and talk about what the pros and cons are and, you know, how it's going to affect all of us. Another thing that you'll see, you know, a lot in the media and in the way that you deal with people in the world is this concept of fear. The anti-noble instinct sees everything in terms of fear. You know, everything's a phobia. Now, you have homophobia, transphobia, xenophobia. And when people say that you have a phobia, what they're saying is that you're a coward. Because that's how they want to frame it. So that because it's meant to be an insult. They want to say that you're afraid and that's what motivates you. And that's because that's what motivates them. They're afraid of things. I can make a judgment about whether I think something is good or bad or productive or unproductive or people I want to be associated with or not. And it's not because I'm afraid of them. But, you know, that's the way they see the world. And, you know, so you have to, I think, negotiate that modern world because so many things are framed that way. You know, it's very counterproductive to see things in terms of fear. And this is something that actually got me thinking just while I was creating this presentation. Nietzsche says that the anti-noble instinct, the slave morality, it focuses purely on the utility. You know, you look at something and, you know, how can we do make this the most efficient? And the noble morality looks at greatness. How can we make this amazing? And, you know, I was thinking about it and I think architecture is a really good way to see it. You know, what is the, you know, architecture of greatness? And, you know, it's pretty obvious what it is. It's a fucking castle. Like this, great and noble men. This is what they built. This is what they did. And is it useful? Are there functional things in here? Sure. But it's not just useful. It's a higher vision. And I think, you know, the contrast to that is pretty stark. You know, what's the architecture of a sentiment? Of wanting to make everyone the same so that we can all be happy. Well, it's, you know, fucking Soviet architecture. You know, like here's a row of boxes that we can put people in so that they're all the same. And no one has more than anybody else. And no one's better than anybody else. You know, it's, this is the dream. You know, of course, no one really wants to live that way. So then you get the fancy version. You know, this is the expensive version. But it's still a fucking box. You know, and, you know, you can make it a little bit of homey, a little bit more family oriented, a little bit warmer. But this is the architect's vision of it, of course. But it's still a row of gauges. You know, if there's nothing really great about it, aside from fitting everyone into a little place, you know, into their little hamster cage. And see, that's the fitness center. That's known as an amenity. And this brings me to, you know, because there's a, when you talk about minimalism like that, you talk about this, people have this desire like, if everything was really pure, it would be better. And I think there are two kinds of asceticism. Either strength-based asceticism, which is very noble in its orientation. The best example I can think of for that would be like Sparta. You know, people who want to live a hard life and have less so that they're ready for anything, so that they can be stronger. They want to subject themselves to hardness so that they can be better. And that's really what you have to do, you know, to be a better man. You know, every once in a while, I mean, I like to be comfortable. But, you know, the anti-noble instinct, that's a different kind of asceticism. Seeking purity. Like, if I strip all the worldly things away from myself, I'll finally be happy. I'll be a better person. I'll be one with the universe. And so I think it's interesting, because you talk about asceticism, and right away, like, I cringe when I hear it. But I think there are two, a good and a bad kind, at least in my moral evaluation. And, you know, the noble spirit has an honor for greatness and a reverence for hardness. And the anti-noble spirit, you know, has more concern for losers. You know, let's not talk about who won. Let's talk about, like, who felt bad. And, you know, there's a lot in modern society that's organized in that way, and it really drags everybody down, because it actually makes it more valuable socially to become a victim, to be the loser. And so everybody will hear, you know, hear your sad story about it. And, you know, they just assume that the winner has just had some lucky chance. And, you know, they don't really hold up the fact that they worked their asses off as well. And this, you know, we come to a point where, okay, we talk about all these noble virtues, and, you know, I don't know how you could look at the noble virtues and not say that's a better way to be. I mean, that's just me. Yeah, I might be, you know, you might have a different opinion, but, you know, you talk about the masculine virtues, strength, courage, mastery, and honor. That sounds better to me. Why would I not want to be those things? Why would I not want to be, like, happy and noble and beautiful and loved by the gods? But our society is upside down. You know, Nietzsche's solve is coming, but I think that he would be amazed at where we're at right now. You know, the transvaluation of values is complete. If you look around you and what is valued in the world, it is not the things that we've talked about. And that's difficult to deal with. I mean, you talk about the noble values and a lot of them are regarded as toxic. Masculinity itself is regarded as toxic. You know, all of the anti-noble values, you know, sympathy, you know, charity, you know, obviously, like, you know, concern for the losers, you know, it's social justice. I mean, these are the norm. These are what govern us. You know, and I mean, I really feel like the moral compass of our society is a blue-haired lesbian fat girl who's, you know, like, it works on a university. Like, because if you really think of what we have to, what we're supposed to be mad about in society, whatever she is mad about is actually the barometer of what society is going to talk about today. You know, like, people on ESPN will sit and argue, like, have you made her feel uncomfortable about her body issues? Like, that's the normal discussion. That is the national discussion that is actually happening in America. And it's basically catering everything to really someone who's kind of at the lowest rung of society. And who wants to talk about being a victim and all that kind of stuff. And so that's very frustrating. And I think that, you know, and the reality is that these people, as you try to make yourself better and be stronger, these people actually run you. I mean, they are in charge in a lot of ways. And you know, petty, sad, vindictive little bureaucrats, if you try to do something in this world, I guarantee you will need their signature. You know, that you'll need one of their signatures, or you'll, you know, one of them will have power over you in some way. And that is really frustrating. And you know, that's why you can fall into the trap of resentment yourself of thinking that the world is upside down and I need to trans-valuate values of the current society so that everything will be okay. I can't succeed until society is different. And, you know, then you kind of become what they are. Like the world is wrong and, you know, it won't be good until it's right. So I'm just going to sit here and believe in my own goodness while, you know, these bad people rule us. And obviously that's pretty counterproductive, and you don't really want to go down that route. And, you know, so it leads us to the question of how do we live a life of masculine nobility in a world that is upside down. Now Nietzsche actually said at some point that, you know, the noble, because the noble instinct comes from who you are. If you simply believe that you're noble, that's enough, because the nobility believes in itself. And that sounds good. And I understand why he said it, and it's true on some levels, but I don't know, I think Nietzsche was wrong about that. I've obviously been involved in a lot of politics on the far right and dealing with a lot of people. And there are a lot of dudes who read a little bit of Julius Avola and think they're aristocrats of the soul. And they sit in front of their little computers all day and argue with each other online, and they suck. And they're not aristocrats of anything. Just because you believe that you're an aristocrat and you're noble and you believe in a certain way of life doesn't mean a goddamn thing. You can sit and believe that you're as fantastic as you want to be, but I don't think that's enough. I think that you still have to go out and do the best you can to earn that. If you have to embody the thing that you want to be, you can't just believe that you're better than everybody else. That's a really good way to get delusional and silly. I believe that the best way to fight the empire of nothing, which is what I've talked about, especially in my book Becoming a Barbarian, is kind of the anti-identity world, the world that hates masculinity, this kind of leveling society that we all have. The best way to fight this nothingness is to create an empire something. Become a creative force in your own world. Become a namer of names, a maker of values. You may never have the opportunity to take part in some great battle. The world may never collapse and the zombies may never come, but you can put all of that energy into building a world around you that is better, into creating your own positive culture, instead of focusing on everything that is wrong in what I would call a comic book dystopia, because it really is. Our world is ridiculous. I was talking about all these problems about, because if you write about these things, the people that are in league with the blue hair lady, they'll shut you down. I've known people who have lost their websites, they've been shut down, like you're saying something, we won't tolerate anymore. I was talking to a friend who's very familiar with these problems, and he said to me, the answer to all of these problems is creation. You don't like what the media is doing, make your own media. No one wants to talk about your project that you're working on, make a website, talk about it yourself, put it out there. We have that capability right now for as long as that lasts. Rather than focusing on these problems, how are we going to fix these problems, come up with your own solution and put it out there. I kind of think that this is a different aspect of masculinity. It's something that people have associated with masculinity for a long time, this kind of generative aspect of masculinity. Throughout history and in many religions, masculinity has been seen as a generative force in the universe. It's the creative spark, the initiator, the inseminator, man as a maker of worlds. So I'm calling this generative masculinity. I don't want to confuse it with the tactical virtues because I think those are kind of basic masculinity. I didn't associate when I wrote The Way of Men, I didn't talk about raising a family or things like that. The reason why is because there are plenty of 18-year-old heroes who died and never had families and I'm not going to say that they're not men. So this is part of masculinity, but it's kind of an add-on module and it's an important part of life. For some of you, that's going to be raising a family. That's going to be the creative thing that you do in your life. And that's where this idea of generative masculinity really comes from throughout history, but that's not the only thing. I was on a podcast one time, this guy retarded. He said to me that Nietzsche was a failure because he didn't have any kids. And I'm like, well, that's the dumbest thing I've ever heard. It's great to have kids and I can't say that I wouldn't like to have family myself. I don't think it's going to happen. But I think it's a great thing. But all the people who were having kids at the time when Nietzsche was alive, most of their descendants probably don't know their names and don't know anything about them. But we're talking about Nietzsche right now. So I think that there is more than one way to give your seed to the world. There's more than one way to create a lasting legacy. And there's more than one way to do something great. Once again, masculinity is what it is. You don't have to be a leader or creator to live a masculine life. There's a problem with any group you don't have too many chiefs and not enough Indians. But some people just aren't wired that way. And it's enough to be strong, courageous, masterful, and honorable. I mean, that's a manly life. But if you want to live nobly, you can't just sit around telling yourself how noble you are. You have to demonstrate your nobility through action by being a leader or a creator. And I think in many ways this is the solution, the way to overcome the trap of resentment instead of focusing on the problems of the world. Focus on making your own solutions, your own vision for the future. I think a lot of you are probably familiar with the sales motto, always be closing. Always be creative. It's a good way to focus your life. Where a lot of people make mistakes, and I think this is just sometimes a way to excuse their own weaknesses, is ignoring then other aspects of masculinity. Like, well, I'm creating something, so that's all I have to do. And no, it's like, if you want to think of yourself as a man, you still have to behave in a certain way. I don't think you can get past just because you're doing something magical. You don't get to let all the other stuff slide. You aren't better at being a man because you're creating, and you have that aspect of masculinity. You still have to care about strength, courage, mastery, and honor. They're the basics. And for some men, they're plenty. But as a way to develop who you are as a man, and as an antidote to living in a world where men aren't really called on to be strong or courageous, and they may even be penalized for it. I think the way for men in the path of nobility is to focus on this generative aspect of masculinity. For some men, this is going to mean building family. For other men, it might be building a company, or a museum, or great work of art. Maybe you put all of your time and money into building a Shangri-La for your pagan death cult. Everybody has their own thing. You might want to do something different. That's just what I'm doing. I bought some land recently, and with my buddies, I've been out building all kinds of structures, and that's what I do every weekend. That's what I care about. And I promise you, if you devote everything that you have into realizing some sort of unique vision, you aren't going to have time to care about the absurdity of this comic book dystopia, this world that's upside down. None of us really has much control over the world. If the world is upside down, it is what it is. All we can do is choose our own values and choose how we want to live, and live that way, demonstrate our nobility to the best of our ability. Maybe if we lead by example, people will agree that our values are, in fact, better, and change the world. Maybe they won't. But choosing is the way of masters, and by choosing the path of nobility and creation, and avoiding the trap of resentment, I believe that we can become more complete men. And by that, of course, I mean more complete beasts. Thank you. And I thought that was going to go over, but it didn't, magically. So I guess, questions? What's your take on iron rand and objectivism? Because what you're saying sounds like it's got a lot of objectivist thought in it to me. There's probably, there's probably some overlap. I have a really good friend who spent a long time. Actually, I think he was involved with the objectivists and so forth. And he eventually realized that he was wrong. And he has a great thing that he says about that. It's very important to understand why you don't believe in something. But as for me, I read some iron rand in high school and so forth. And there is an aspect of that there. I hadn't really overlapped that myself. She has so many economic theories and things like that that I don't know if I would be in line with or not. So I have to go back and look at that. But I probably don't want to go down the objectivist route for myself. But yeah, I'm sure there's some overlapping values. Cool. Okay. Basically, the question is how would I define honor? And it's a very tricky topic. There's a really good book about honor by Thomas Bowman, or James Bowman, I think, about honor. And there are a few different kinds of honor. And it's very confused in Western society. Because Western society has a very moralized idea of honor that's gone through several different cultures along the way. When I talk about honor, I'm talking about the most basic. Sometimes he calls it reflexive honor in his book. But mine's a little bit different. I'm talking about it in terms of this trod, in terms of a group of men. And so I see honor as loyalty, basically. Because the simplest way to think about it is if you don't respect the opinions of your friends about how you conduct yourself, then why would they want to be your friend? I think that's the simplest answer to what honor is. Like, why would you want someone in your group who doesn't respect your opinion? And that's what honor really is, in a bigger sense, is your reputation as a man. So everyone doesn't get to talk about my honor. In modern society, there's like whatever, 7 billion people. My honor is not concerned with all of them. It's concerned with the people who are in my life and share my values. Because people with different ideas of honor will say, oh, that wasn't honorable. Well, by whose definition? But it's the values of your group and your ability to live up to them. Cool. Hey, Jack, that was amazing. Thank you so much. Thank you. I'm curious if you have advice for developing a group of men who are interested in becoming better men like you have found yourself. I mean, I saw one out because it, you know, especially if you're starting a group, because no one wants to be in the Cool Kids Club until you already have the Cool Kids Club. It's like, I'm going to start this great thing. It's just you. That's hard. So I found it was more helpful to go find some people that were already doing that. But one of my pieces of advice that I give to people is that, you know, if you're talking about a group of men that you're really going to have as a tribe, a lot of people approach it as if they're building a superhero team, which is a great way to do it. You know, like, okay, this is going to be the guy that's good at this, and this is going to be the guy that's good at that. You do want to have people with different skills and whatever, but at the end of the day what you're really picking are your best friends. So, you know, don't worry so much about, you know, like who has all the skill sets that we need at the beginning. I think what you really need to pick and care about is, is do I like this guy? Do I want to hang out with him all the time? You know, and then, you know, if you share a certain set of values, that's what's important, and you work on the rest. Mr. Donovan, we've heard from various speakers throughout this entire week, and we learned a vast amount of knowledge that most people do not, but all of us tomorrow, most of us have to go home. What would be your take on how to start or restart our new journey? Well, it depends, obviously, what's most important to you and what your actual goals are. You know, like, obviously, you know, from what I'm talking about, my take away would be that, you know, like, you know, find, you know, look at some of these values and see how you're embodying them, because they're all kind of models and ways to look at life. And so, you know, as you face problems going forward, you can kind of weigh what's a nobler path. And I think that that's, and obviously, from what I'm talking about, maybe you want to find, you know, something to do with your life aside from, you know, work and make money, you know. But, you know, I think everybody else will have a different take away. So, thank you for your talk. I think you lay a very wide and interesting philosophical view of manhood. I thought it was really interesting that you talk about greatness and you mentioned the castle as compared to, let's say, condos or whatever. That, for me, I think also a good example of greatness are cathedrals, like a grand vision of God and the universe. And so my question will be, what is your taking regards to religion and rescuing religion in modern times, because I kind of feel that there is a very precise correlation between the collapse of religion and the rise of the comic book dystopia. Yes. Well, I mean, yeah, I agree completely, because religion, really what that is, is a shared set of values. And that's what modern society doesn't have. Except for, you know, kind of lowest combative nominator values. But, you know, religion is like its identity at the end of the day. If you have the Catholics, they're Catholic and they believe this set of things. And we're all in this because we believe the certain set of things. And so we can look up and this is our higher ideal. And when you have, pluralism doesn't work because you have all these people with these different higher ideals working together. And that is why there's a lack of cohesion in society. If you have a whole bunch of people who share the same values, then, you know, you can, towards building something great and realizing those values. I mean, that's what I'm doing. I mean, my thing that I'm doing is kind of religious in its own way. And, you know, I was actually just in Germany a week or so ago. And I didn't expect, but, you know, as someone who's building kind of religious thing, I didn't expect to go in cathedrals and enjoy them. But, you know, now I'm kind of like, yeah, I look at that. I'm like, wow, they did an amazing job of doing their thing. You know, they're beautiful. They're amazing. And so I think that that can inspire you. You can take those things and you don't have to become what they are, but you can inspire, like, how did they realize their vision? So earlier this year, you had a blog post. I think it was around February. And it was titled, I'm Not Your Brother. I wanted to ask you about that because I found that real inspirational. If I actually use that as inspiration for a blog post myself. But can you, like, go into that a little bit more and explain how we kind of are too quick to say to call someone into our brotherhood or call someone into, like, our group or our clan or our tribe? Yeah, yeah. I mean, that's very, again, the kind of democratic, kind of post-Christian kind of way that we look in the world, like, everybody's my brother, man. And it's, you know, this kind of, you know, it comes from a lot of places. I think, you know, it comes from, you know, kind of 60s, like, let's all feel the same kind of culture, this kind of surfer kind of mentality. And, you know, I have people do that all the time. People who like my work, they call me my brother. And that's actually what, you know, a lot of times blog posts and things, I try not to do this as much anymore, but they're inspired by something that kind of pisses me off. And, you know, I get a lot of time. And it's not, I know what people mean. They mean something good by it. Like, they're saying, like, I identify with you. I identify with something you're saying. It was important to me. You're my brother. I'm like, no, we're not brothers. Like, you know, like, because I feel like brotherhood is a reciprocal thing. I mean, that's, it's not just a set of likes. It's a set of obligations. You know, if you have someone who's actually your brother, like if it's your actual family brother, you have to go and help them when you don't want to. And that's what brothers do. And so I feel like when someone calls me brother, you know, just kind of haphazardly, like they're setting up a system of obligations that I did not agree to. You know, so I took, I mean, the group that I belong to, like, you know, I had a prospect for a year and I took an oath. And those are my brothers. I'm oath to those people. And, you know, if they get into trouble, I have to help them even if I think what they did is stupid. You know, and I think that that's, you know, that's really what brotherhood is all about. I mean, you know, that shared obligation. So I, you know, I don't get offended by it, you know, because getting offended is dumb anyway. But I don't get offended when people call me brother, but you know, I do wish they'd think about what that means. Because I, it's important to me. So, okay, cool.