Andrew T
Appearances
Behind the Bastards
Part Five: Is Oprah Winfrey a Bastard?
God, there's like this trend that's going around on TikTok right now, but it's like, it's like, oh, you're so beautiful. And then it's like, thanks. And then you list something that you grew up with that made you the way that you are. And it's like, this is exactly what that is. It's like, oh, you're so beautiful. You're like, thanks.
Behind the Bastards
Part Five: Is Oprah Winfrey a Bastard?
I grew up in the era where grown men tracked how old the Olsen twins were.
Behind the Bastards
Part Five: Is Oprah Winfrey a Bastard?
Once again, I checked under my chair and there was nothing there.
Behind the Bastards
Part Five: Is Oprah Winfrey a Bastard?
I remember... No, because I'm the one that was like, no, Robert, you're going to D.C. You have to hit up Bridget.
Behind the Bastards
Part Six: Is Oprah Winfrey a Bastard?
Some kind of charisma. Dr. Oz, it's like he's so repellent. You're just like, oh my God, without Oprah's cosign, he is- There's no way this man is a star.
Behind the Bastards
Part Six: Is Oprah Winfrey a Bastard?
This, I think, is is the place where I'll try to drop my my my quote, which is, I mean, it does seem like like Oprah is she's like the enzyme for bastards. Like she just makes she takes she finds the worst people or the worst people get into her orbit and she makes them a million times stronger than they ever had any right to be.
Behind the Bastards
Part Six: Is Oprah Winfrey a Bastard?
I mean, on some level, she has to be following what she believes the audience wants. But why pick those specific people? It is a little baffling.
Behind the Bastards
Part Six: Is Oprah Winfrey a Bastard?
I mean, we'll never know because it's not like there's like whistleblowers from the Oprah camp, but like surely there had to be discussions. Yeah. Like Oprah, why these guys?
Behind the Bastards
Part Six: Is Oprah Winfrey a Bastard?
I mean, I guess that's the other side of Oprah is like because she's gotten so far on gut. I mean, maybe it's just a charming five minutes at a fucking cocktail party or a meeting.
Behind the Bastards
Part Six: Is Oprah Winfrey a Bastard?
Man, that's, it's wild to have a vibe spaced empire. I mean, I guess we're, we are living in one. So what do I know?
Behind the Bastards
Part Six: Is Oprah Winfrey a Bastard?
150 degrees. When when the room gets closer, it goes like that's closer to my oven controls than my thermostat controls. Yes. Which is real bad.
Behind the Bastards
Part Six: Is Oprah Winfrey a Bastard?
I just double check. Yeah. One fifty is medium is north of medium rare.
Behind the Bastards
Part Six: Is Oprah Winfrey a Bastard?
It is impressive that she's able to scrub so much shit off the internet, I will say.
Behind the Bastards
Part Six: Is Oprah Winfrey a Bastard?
If anyone's just listening to this also, I didn't realize he was such a Timu-ass, Wolf Blitzer-looking motherfucker.
Behind the Bastards
Part Six: Is Oprah Winfrey a Bastard?
It's a little, though, also, like, I mean... Listen, I'm coming at this from a place of utter non-belief in this, and I do understand that parts of this industry have helped people in certain ways. But the idea of advocating for regulations on... I guess this is the same as the FDA technically has to have a handle on the supplements industry, or casinos have some guardrails.
Behind the Bastards
Part Six: Is Oprah Winfrey a Bastard?
But it is so dark, because it's like, this shit is fake. Yeah. So like what regulation other than this should not be, these should not be claims that you can make because they are lies. Can there possibly be, I guess, I guess you shouldn't kill people. You can lie to them, but you can lie to them, take their money, but you shouldn't kill them. I don't know. It's very dark.
Behind the Bastards
Part Six: Is Oprah Winfrey a Bastard?
I'm loving hearing a kid did something and being like, I'm so much more money than you, kid.
Behind the Bastards
Part Six: Is Oprah Winfrey a Bastard?
It's still Pontiac. Honestly, there's a part of me. That's like the, the bigger thing is like, That will never be in an era where any media is consolidated enough that it's worth that level of outlay. Like, what is it like a hundred cars? Yeah. 50 cars, something like that.
Behind the Bastards
Part Six: Is Oprah Winfrey a Bastard?
Speaking of the publishing industry, though, is there is there no like like fact checking?
Behind the Bastards
Part Six: Is Oprah Winfrey a Bastard?
Yeah. There's also a thing that like white audiences, like white Americans assume black Americans know, have special insight into Africa or Africans. Right. But why would they?
Behind the Bastards
Part Six: Is Oprah Winfrey a Bastard?
Yeah. Well, and the other thing is like just knowing anything about the media and entertainment industry, those readers were two to three white people who were just doing their best speed reading like 80% of the books.
Behind the Bastards
Part Six: Is Oprah Winfrey a Bastard?
Yeah. I mean, it's sort of like the question is like, do you create the market or does the market create you? Because it's like... Even from the early stories, it's like... It was also clear she was just trying a bunch of shit, and the thing that worked was the thing she gravitated towards and more and more and more and more, which is just like, you know, how you do it?
Behind the Bastards
Part Six: Is Oprah Winfrey a Bastard?
But also, like, just on its face, how stupid is that statement? Like, what do you think the fucking moment of opportunity is, you dummy? That's luck.
Behind the Bastards
Part Six: Is Oprah Winfrey a Bastard?
But it's the, like, everyone's grandpa survived the landing in Normandy. Like, yeah.
Behind the Bastards
Part Six: Is Oprah Winfrey a Bastard?
You shouldn't want to have to be a warrior. It's...
Behind the Bastards
Part Six: Is Oprah Winfrey a Bastard?
Uh-huh. It's bleak. It's also, though, like, I mean, so much of, like, what's wrong with America is, like, can just we make everyone learn basic statistics just once?
Behind the Bastards
Part Six: Is Oprah Winfrey a Bastard?
Yeah. It's starting to feel like the five parts have been leading to this. So, yeah, I'm ready. Okay.
Behind the Bastards
Part Six: Is Oprah Winfrey a Bastard?
Like, hey, we should get some local artists. Great, make it happen.
Behind the Bastards
Part Six: Is Oprah Winfrey a Bastard?
God, it's so deeply idiotic. I mean, the thing that's coalescing now is like Oprah has like a professional credulity verging on idiocy that is just what audiences want because that's what everyone is.
Behind the Bastards
Part Six: Is Oprah Winfrey a Bastard?
But I guess neither do most of the bastards, at least from their point of view.
Behind the Bastards
Part Six: Is Oprah Winfrey a Bastard?
Yeah. Well, like, that's what I'm... Like, the credulity, the, like... I mean, look, at least as far as, like, all this anti-vax and, like, anti-science and anti-reality stuff goes, it's like...
Behind the Bastards
Part Six: Is Oprah Winfrey a Bastard?
you know, while she is like an enzyme for this stuff, like she herself is also just like down the line from like, if there wasn't medical racism, it's unlikely that she would have a foot to stand on or, you know, would have even delved into this like anti-vax, anti, you know, or like any other number of structural things that exist.
Behind the Bastards
Part Six: Is Oprah Winfrey a Bastard?
So it's like the bastards are still the people that set up all the inequality in the first place. And she has really done some part to intensify it. But I do think if it weren't her, it would have been someone else. Like, it's just a niche that exists. And like someone would have fallen into it.
Behind the Bastards
Part Six: Is Oprah Winfrey a Bastard?
I guess to me, the pushback on that is that is what the audience likes. And someone would have filled that role if it wasn't her.
Behind the Bastards
Part Six: Is Oprah Winfrey a Bastard?
Yeah. Yeah, but I'm just like... I mean, we as a society, species, I don't fucking know, are inclined to believe this stuff because it is the path of least resistance on how you perceive reality and solve problems. Yeah.
Behind the Bastards
Part Six: Is Oprah Winfrey a Bastard?
I am like part of her calculus of amplifying this stuff is on some level. I don't even know who the competitors would be, but she was like, if it's not me, I'm just going to pull an analogous, I think talk show host, like fucking, it's not Jenny Jones, but Kelly Clarkson will do it. Sally Jesse Raphael.
Behind the Bastards
Part Six: Is Oprah Winfrey a Bastard?
It's just like, someone is going to put these people on and this message is going to make waves because the fucking idiots who watch my show crave this. You know, that's the version where at least she's kind of an aware person and
Behind the Bastards
Part Six: Is Oprah Winfrey a Bastard?
We had our bong hits in the commercial break. So now we're just going for it.
Behind the Bastards
Part Six: Is Oprah Winfrey a Bastard?
Yeah. I don't actually know anything about this director, but does it have anything to do with his last name?
Behind the Bastards
Part Six: Is Oprah Winfrey a Bastard?
I just have a sinking feeling that maybe the reason one of the incentives has to do with the number of buildings his name is on.
Behind the Bastards
Part Six: Is Oprah Winfrey a Bastard?
No one said rich kids can't make good stuff.
Behind the Bastards
Part Six: Is Oprah Winfrey a Bastard?
It's just that they get a lot more chances to do it.
Behind the Bastards
Part Six: Is Oprah Winfrey a Bastard?
I will just say, I feel like this should be said, even if literally every single charter school had better test scores or even a good measure was a better school.
Behind the Bastards
Part Six: Is Oprah Winfrey a Bastard?
They are still a net negative on the education system. Literally, even I mean, it's the same example with the Oprah school, which is like, yeah, OK, you can make a good school, but it comes at an immense opportunity cost. And that's what's like the problem here.
Behind the Bastards
Part Six: Is Oprah Winfrey a Bastard?
Oh, we're resegregating the education system? Cool.
Behind the Bastards
Part Six: Is Oprah Winfrey a Bastard?
It's also like these fucks will like, I mean, you see it on so many other places where they're trying to reinvent the wheel where they like, I feel like transportation is such a clear one where it's like, they're going to try to do self-driving cars before they try. Oh yeah. Properly funding a subway system in Los Angeles. Yeah. Oh, yeah. And it's like, I don't I'm sorry, guys.
Behind the Bastards
Part Six: Is Oprah Winfrey a Bastard?
All the solutions for these ills were invented in like fucking whatever, 1800. We're just electing not to do them because you're a billionaire.
Behind the Bastards
Part Six: Is Oprah Winfrey a Bastard?
Listen, if he had even like an ounce of like self-belief, his ass should be on Mars right now.
Behind the Bastards
It Could Happen Here Weekly 170
Hello and welcome to It Could Happen Here, because it could. My name is Andrew Sage, and I'm also Andrewism on YouTube, and at time of recording, the year is still technically new. So I wanted to start it off with some refreshers on anarchism. In the first episode, we'll look at the meanings of anarchism, authority, and anarchy.
Behind the Bastards
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And the next time, we'll look at free association, mutuality, mutual aid, and the role of solidarity. And don't worry, next month I'll be getting back into the Latin American anarchism series, as I still haven't done Uruguay and Mexico yet. Oh, by the way, I'm not talking to myself. I'm here with the one and only... Mia Wong.
Behind the Bastards
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So I suppose to start off with, I want to find out, and I ask this question with tongue in cheek, of course, how familiar would you say you are with hackathon?
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Yeah, I mean, we'll see is right, because let's say I've been an anarchist. When I was first introduced to anarchism, I would say somewhere around 2017, 2018, through Christian anarchism, actually. That was during my deconstruction.
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I stumbled upon Christian anarchism and briefly flated with it, but didn't really get seriously into the studying of anarchism until like late 2019, early 2020, around the time, and late in 2020 is when I started my channel. let's say I've been studying anarchism for about five years, seriously, I feel like I'm now getting started. You know, like I'm now starting to like grasp what it is.
Behind the Bastards
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And the thing is, there's so many interpretations of anarchism, you know, so many different schools of thought. I mean, that's not to say that it can't be defined or that any attempts to define anarchism is like exclusionary or un-anarchist. And I see that argument floating around that like, well, no, you can't define anarchism because that's actually authoritarian. But, you know,
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There are such a thing as definitions, but there is room, of course, for a negotiation of meaning.
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Yeah, exactly. But let's say, if you had to define anarchism right now, what would you say is a non-negotiable ideology? basic fundamental definition for you?
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Yeah, I think that's, that's pretty solid for me. I find it fairly similarly. I would say that I think the opposition to authority is the most important part. You know, I would say the definition I've been sort of workshopping, sculpting over time, um, And as a writer, I really like to play with words a bit and find the best ways to put things.
Behind the Bastards
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So for me, what I've come up with is that anarchism is the political philosophy and practice that opposes all authority, along with its justifying dogmas, and proposes the unending pursuit of anarchy, a world without rule where self-determination, mutuality, and free association form the basis of our society.
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And so basically the rest of this episode is going to be me breaking down how I came to this definition, what I'm expounded upon with this definition. So for one, just taking a look at the structure of it, we are looking at an oppositional stance and a propositional stance, opposing and proposing. You know, we're not just...
Behind the Bastards
It Could Happen Here Weekly 170
for the negation of all things, although there are schools of anarchism that do lean in that direction. We also, of course, we want to be constructive. We're not, as some people seem to presume, you know, obliterating the state and then leaving warlords in their wake, you know?
Behind the Bastards
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Exactly. And as you know, Bakunin is one of the earlier thinkers of anarchism. Though I've never really been partial to him, you know? To me, usually I've been more of a Kropotkin and Malatesta kind of guy. But lately, as sort of problematic as he is as well, I haven't gotten into a bit more Proudhon. I recently got the pictures of Proudhon Reader that Ian McKay put together for AK Press.
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Yeah, but he certainly wrote a lot. And so I want to dig through and see what gemstones of his work I can find, you know?
Behind the Bastards
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I think that's... That's important to sift through.
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Marx also didn't always understand Fridon's definition. Honestly, I don't think Fridon necessarily always had a very consistent application of his ideas. Hence the misogyny despite being an anarchist and becoming a politician at one point in his life and all that jazz.
Behind the Bastards
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Yeah. Unfortunately, the US's cultural hegemony has sort of propagated that American version of the term as the popular one. But yeah, whether you're talking about anarchists or libertarians or mutualists, You're all getting it from basically that same sort of original pool of late 19th century, early 20th century thinkers.
Behind the Bastards
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And we're sort of using their sort of explorations to build something of a political philosophy. But in my definition, I call it a political philosophy, but that can be a contentious way of describing it, you know. Anti-politics is a term that's used to describe opposition to or distrust in traditional politics. And social politics is usually associated with the art and science of government.
Behind the Bastards
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So there are anarchists who would argue that anarchism is not a political philosophy. It's actually an anti-political philosophy.
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I feel you. I feel you. To me, it's like... It's what I like to pick up. look around at, you know, play with for a little bit, put it back down kind of thing. You know, I'm not committed to it. But I think it's like, it's good to look at more than one angle of definition and understanding. Yeah.
Behind the Bastards
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I mean, of course, I suppose a critique that could be made of the finalism as anti-politics is a sort of a narrowing of the definition of politics to just that sort of art and science of government when politics can also be defined really broadly as just about the relationships between people and groups. which anarchism is concerned with primarily so.
Behind the Bastards
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But I do find it an interesting point to wrestle with. And so other than it being a political philosophy or anti-political philosophy, we could also define anarchism as a practice. This is something that I believe Graeber did in his life. He saw anarchism in one interview.
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He said, quote, It's possible to act like an anarchist, to behave in ways that will work without bureaucratic structures of coercion to enforce them, without calling yourself an anarchist or anything. In fact, most of us act like anarchists, even communists, a lot of the time.
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To be an anarchist, for me, is to do that self-consciously as a way of gradually bringing a world entirely based on those principles into being. End quote. So this is basically the idea that anarchism is not just something you think in your head. It's a method of change. It's something that you practice.
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It's something that, in fact, some anarchists don't even want to call themselves anarchists because they see anarchism as something that you do rather than something that you are.
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Yeah, that's possible. That sounds really familiar.
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Yeah, for sure. Another part of the definition of anarchism that I put forward is the opposition to all authority. And that statement could actually get me some pushback, get me in some trouble with some anarchists surprisingly. And I'm sorry, I blame Noam Chomsky. Oh my God. As a historian, as a linguist, okay, whatever, sure.
Behind the Bastards
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But it was not historically controversial among anarchists to say that you were opposed to all hierarchy and all authority.
Behind the Bastards
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yeah the definitions of those terms do get confused often because like a lot of words in the english language they do have multiple meanings you know you don't want to fall into the equivocation fallacy where you use a word or phrase in one way and then you use it another way in the same argument so someone might say for example anarchism opposing authority is stupid because authority just means having a difference in expertise or a difference in influence
Behind the Bastards
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Or that hierarchy, opposition to hierarchy is stupid because, you know, food chains or, you know, the hierarchy of needs. But as you know, anarchists are focused on very specific things when we use these terms. So arguing against it with other definitions doesn't make sense. And bi-hierarchy is...
Behind the Bastards
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Anarchists are for just stratification of society, which gives some individuals, groups, or institutions authority over others. And authority refers to the recognized right above others in a social relationship to give commands, to enforce obedience, to control property, to exploit, and so on.
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And I really don't see the benefit in Chomsky's sort of unjust authorities or unjust hierarchies approach to define him. And I feel so.
Behind the Bastards
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Exactly, which is why I say opposition to all authorities and their justifying dogmas. Because all of them have dogmas, including the example that Chomsky uses, which is typically of the parent pulling their child away from traffic. That is not an exercise of authority. And the relationship between a parent and a child is something that can and should be interrogated.
Behind the Bastards
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You know, that is a caretaking relationship primarily, a relationship of responsibility. It does not have to be a relationship of authority in the sense that I suppose.
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Exactly. Because then it also makes it harder for people to sort of question the authority they're more comfortable with, or the hierarchies they're more comfortable with. So you'll see that where so-called anarchists say, oh, no, we don't actually oppose all hierarchies. You know, parents think, and it really...
Behind the Bastards
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You're seeding ground in a sense because you make it harder to identify and really question those things because you're shutting down that avenue of questioning. And so when we speak of authority, we're really speaking about that right, the rights that authority gives to certain people over other people, privileges that are recognized and enforced.
Behind the Bastards
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and a right being a sort of a priority that is above others. You know, the right of authority is a guarantee to actions or resources that absolve the individual holding that right of consequences. The right of authority compels and subordinates the desires and needs of those below that authority. So, you know, authorities have the right to command, recognized and enforced by their underlings.
Behind the Bastards
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You know, they have the right to enforce the obedience of their underlings. They have the right to control all the properties the earth has been carved into. You know, the right absolves them of certain consequences and sort of goes in one direction. It's a unilateral sort of thing.
Behind the Bastards
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So the authority can take your house, you know, the bank, the government, the landlord, they can take your house, but you can't take theirs. You know, an authority can assault you, whether you're a soldier, a police officer, whatever. You cannot assault them. An authority can take the fruits of your labor. They can take from the wealth of what you produce. But you can't take from them.
Behind the Bastards
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That's theft, right? Authority cannot be an authority by themselves. They have to have authority over. They have to have a hierarchical social relationship that deprives some to their benefit. And anarchists oppose authority because, you know, among other reasons, those subject to authority become controlled.
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They become dependent, exploited, prevented from accessing their full potential and even their bare necessities. And really that prevented from accessing their full potential is why a lot of anarchists have spent a lot of time targeting our approach to parenting and our approach to education.
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You know, just this morning, I was reading a bit of Emma Goldman and she was talking about Ferrer's schools.
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The way that she speaks, honestly, she was an excellent writer, an excellent speaker, but the way that she did so and the way she approached and recognized this need to tap into our potential, particularly from young, to prevent it from being limited by the impositions of authority is just...
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extremely profound it's necessary it's necessary to start at particularly at that age but really at any age to to break away from that condition that that recognizes and enforces and obeys and accepts authority and the right of authority you know if everybody if everybody including their underlings decided tomorrow not to recognize and enforce the authority of presidents of kings of capitalists
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that frag would be gone in an instant. It ultimately starts with us being able to actually question, to challenge, to resist authority. And that's something that has existed since humans have been humans. Throughout history, we see this sort of compulsion to resist authority. And that sort of seed of resistance is what anarchists hope to have flourish.
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We are back. So like I said before, authority gets confused with a lot of different things. Force and violence is a main one. It's one that Marxists in particular love. That's a conflation of authority with any use of force. You know, the slave resisting the slave owner is actually an example of authority.
Behind the Bastards
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Yeah. Yeah. I mean, force and violence are associated with authority and they can be a mechanism of defending authority, but they're not in and of themselves authority. They're not the source of authority. They don't constitute authority. And you could just as easily use them to resist authority.
Behind the Bastards
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Exactly. Exactly. And really, we have to understand violence forces are things that are used by authorities. But if I punch somebody in the face, that doesn't make me an authority over them. You know, if I defend myself from being a punch, that doesn't make me an authority over the person trying to punch me.
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The source of authority is really about that right, that position, that recognized right above others, that position, that social relationship above others. That's what grants authority. It's recognition. The general of an army is not an authority because he's holding a gun to the heads of all the other soldiers and making them do things.
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The general is to be recognized as authority because of his position and the privileges and rights and powers that that position gives him. If tomorrow all the soldiers decided to turn on their general, as has happened historically, that is 100% possible. That is an instance of force or of violence being used to resist authority rather than being used to be authority.
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Another thing that gets confused with authority is
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influence or or respect so influence is really something i mean i might find somebody's abilities or qualities or achievements admirable right i respect that about them that doesn't mean they have an authority over me i might be inspired by someone in a way that affects my character or development or behavior but again that doesn't that influence doesn't automatically translate into authority
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You'll find that a lot of the anarchist thinkers of the late 19th or the 20th century, they were very influential. They were not authorities, but they had a profound impact on the people around them. And they were a profound inspiration to us even to today.
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For those who have listened to some of my Anarchist History episodes, you'll know that he kind of shows up sometimes. He shows up in Egypt. Literally everywhere. He shows up all over the place.
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And that really gets into some of the interesting conversation around anarchism and leadership and the different ways that you can sort of interpret the concept of leadership. But I'll save that for... Another discussion. There are two other things that authority gets confused with that I want to address. The first is coordination.
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And what's interesting about coordination is that it's very much tied to authority a lot in the present day. You know, a lot of the rules we have in the current system, coordination and authority get tied up together. So you have a manager of an enterprise and that manager coordinates all of the workers in that enterprise. But the manager also has authority over those workers.
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You know, to fire, to... to discipline, to do all these sorts of things. Or a general in an army might have a coordination role of ensuring that there's communication between various militias or various regiments and that the soldiers within that regiment know exactly what their goal is, what their task is, and how they can go about accomplishing it.
Behind the Bastards
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That is in many ways a coordinating role, but it's also tied up with the authority of the general as in the right above the soldiers to command them, to enforce obedience, to punish, and that sort of thing. So we get tied up between a coordination and authority a lot, but coordination does not have to be tied to authority.
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In its simplest form, coordination can just be the communication of information between parties to ensure they work together smoothly and effectively. That can and already does take place between equals. Okay, here's a good example. You're trying to move a couch into a house or an apartment.
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And for those of you who have had to squeeze a couch through a doorway, you kind of know what I'm talking about already. Because you have to kind of come at it at a certain angle. You know, the size of a doorway and the dimensions of a couch require a very particular approach. So you might have somebody who stands to the side and they tell that person, okay, all right, turn it slightly this way.
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Because when you're lifting a heavy couch, You kind of just want to put it down. You can't really think, okay, what angle should I take it at? So you might have somebody in a position to say, all right, back up. Okay, come forward. Okay, turn it slightly, turn to the left, that kind of thing. That's a coordinator role. But that person doesn't have authority over anybody there.
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It's just communicating information to ensure that the shared task that the people involved have can be executed effectively. So that's a long way of saying that we can't have coordination and organization in anarchy. It doesn't have to be, or doesn't have to involve authority. Finally, one of the pet favorites of confusion is the confusion between authority and expertise.
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Authority and expertise is really the example of the equivocation I was talking about earlier. Because authority is a synonym for expertise by certain definitions. But the kind of authority Anarchist opposed has nothing to do with expertise, which is what Bakuyan was talking about with his authority, the bookmaker argument.
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Now, if I could go back in time, I would just go and tell Vic Huden, listen, A lot of people are not going to read this in full and understand the full context. So maybe don't use the word authority here. Maybe be more specific and use the word expertise or something so people don't get confused. Because when you read it in context, it becomes very clear.
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But there are people who take the title of that article, or they take one quote or one passage that's taken out of context from the whole, or they take like, for example, there's a version of that article that is cut off from the entire thing on Marxist.org, I think.
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So it's like an incomplete version of that text available in one page and then the full version is available in the anarchist library. Incredible. So you have people who basically use that article to argue that actually, you know, Bakunin wasn't against authority, but in context, it makes sense. What he's talking about authority there, he's specifically talking about expertise.
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He still says that in the end, he's not going to be commanded by that expert. He's just going to take their perspective into account because he understands the incompleteness of his own perspective. That is a very different relationship from the sort of command and subordination that we see in an authoritarian relationship.
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And while expertise often gets conflated with authority in positions in the current system, that often is damaging to authority itself.
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If you think about the relationship people have, for example, with, and this is a sort of a contentious one, but if you look at the relationship people have with like their own like personal doctor, their family doctor, this is the relationship that they might have with a public health professional.
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When people go to their personal doctor, it's very easy for them to sort of, you know, accept that sort of expertise. They have a relationship with them. They understand that they trust them, whatever the case may be. Of course, there are places where, because healthcare is inaccessible, people don't have that relationship with their doctor. But, you know, I'm speaking internationally here.
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That is true. That's the influence of, you know, cis-hetero-patriarchy and its impact.
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Exactly. It often just means that the person has been given the stamp of approval by an institution that has been granted authority. But the institution being granted authority does not necessarily or should not have monopoly on expertise and often does not in practice have the full understanding.
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The people who are produced by that institution do not necessarily have that full grasp and everything to see that they can be treated as an unquestioned authority or expert.
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Yeah. And that's exactly the point I was going to make to the institution of authority and the fact that authority so frequently... you know, mess up and so frequently like abuse the trust of people, increase the sense of mistrust, a rightful and valid mistrust in authorities that can often be misdirected or exploited towards ends that are not necessarily equivalent.
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So because these people in public health positions are tied up with the government, people already don't trust any legitimate expertise that they may have gets soured, essentially, by that position of authority, poisoned by their association with a government that has clearly proven itself to not have the best interests of people in mind. Alright, so, just to get back to the definition again.
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Anarchism is a political philosophy and practice that opposes all authority, along with its justifying dogmas, and proposes the unending pursuit of anarchy. A world without rule where self-determination, free association, and mutuality form the basis of our society. So, I mean, I've spoken a bit about that those justified dogmas came at Chomsky a little bit.
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And we spoke about how that's sort of incoherent because every ideology opposes unjust hierarchies. So I think it's important that anarchism calls out, you know, all the justifications. I'm sure you could think of some of the main justifications that tend to be used. One of the oldest justifications is, of course, the divine rights of kings. Yeah. That one's mostly been broken.
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Hopefully, we don't have to deal with that shit anymore.
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I don't know. Maybe the American people yearn for the Trump dynasty.
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Yeah, it's imperial presidency. But yeah, I mean, in more liberal circles, the justification for authority is usually the social contract theory that individuals implicitly consent to authority. But I don't know about you, Mia, nobody asked for my consent. And also, I don't have any way of relinquishing my consent. So is it really consensual?
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Yeah, exactly. And it's not like I can step out of it. I mean, you hold a monopoly on literally every inch of territory on Earth. Some state leaves some claim to some part of the world. There's no escape. So it's not a contract you can opt out of, you know. Another justification that authorities tend to use is this idea of meritocracy and economic Darwinism.
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That the best of the best, they rise to the top. That there aren't really any systemic inequalities or structural barriers. That there is a survival to the fittest, and the fittest win, and the losers are losers. And they fail because they're losers.
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That's a very cynical sort of take that I don't think many people openly espouse outside of like right-wing circles, but it's definitely one of the justifications for authority that gets used. Another one is also in conservative circles, the idea of natural hierarchy. The idea is that hierarchies are part of the natural order.
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You know, people will use evolutionary biology or religious texts or pseoscientific claims to justify the inequality between genders or races or classes. Colonial and imperialist powers, for example, would justify their dominance by claiming cultural superiority. They would use ideas like the white man's burden and civilizing missions to enforce their authority over other peoples and their lands.
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And that justification, while questioned and challenged to be, still is at the basis, at the root of almost every institution in our modern world.
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The necessity of order and efficiency tends to also be used as a justification for authority. You know, the idea that authority is needed to maintain order, to keep things in place, to make decisions. And this is really ignoring the capacity that people have already proven historically and presently to organize cooperatively, to organize without authority.
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to take on horizontal and decentralized approaches, because it's something that is treating complexity as synonymous with hierarchy, that you have to organize this way. It ignores all the inefficiencies of bureaucratic systems. It ignores all the harm caused by authoritarian systems. It just says that, you know, we need these things to function, but we don't.
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Like, what are you talking about? You know, this is all people who make these arguments don't necessarily have an understanding of our systems. The internet is not organized by one central body. The internet is already fairly decentralized. It's become more centralized upon certain platforms.
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But as an infrastructure, the internet is really a network of nodes that are all over the world and all over space. Or we could take, for example, the international postal system. All the mail that gets distributed around the world internationally is not one central global body that's in charge of that. It's multiple organizations that coordinate their activities to ensure that you get your mail.
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Or if you look at even basic supply chains of goods and resources, it's not all handled by one central industrial body. It's not all handled by the government or by one corporation. It's a set of relationships between groups, between companies, between mining companies and resource extraction companies and shipping companies and processing plants and factories and all these networks.
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already not undertaken entirely by one central body. They may be organized internally hierarchically, but that can very easily change. Finally, final justification I want to get into is this idea that authority is the lesser evil. That authority might be imperfect, but it's preferable to boost alternatives, like total anarchy.
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And of course, when people say anarchy here, they mean it in the pejorative sense. They don't mean like actual anarchy in the sense of the political philosophy. They mean it in the sense of, instead of having one central authority, they have one to compete in authoritarian powers, a bunch of warlords fighting for power. That is not anarchy in the sense that anarchists pursue. That is...
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you know, petty authority fighting for dominance, which is, if you think about it, really how historically states came into being.
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So the more positive side of the definition of anarchy is one that I haven't quite gotten into yet, and I haven't broken down the ideas of mutuality and free association. But I'll save all that for the next episode. If you can't wait until then, my videos on how anarchy works and what anarchy needs should whet your appetite. But until then... I've been Andrew Sage.
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You can find me on YouTube at Andrewism and Patreon at St. True. This is It Could Happen Here, the show where we chronicle collapse as it happens and explore how we might build a better future. And in my case, occasionally take a look at the past as well. And that's it. All power to all the people.
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G'day, g'day, this is Andrew Sage bringing yet another episode of It Could Happen Here. As my granny used to say when she answered the phone, what's happening? And the answer in this case is anarchy. Last episode, I gave a definition of anarchism.
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That anarchism is the political philosophy and practice that opposes all authority, along with its justifying dogmas, and proposes the unending pursuit of anarchy. A world without rule where self-determination, mutuality, and free association form the basis of our society. Then we took that definition and we broke it down a bit further.
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You can go back to that episode if you want to hear how, but I left my explanation a bit incomplete. I didn't get into the positive side of the definition.
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Let's go. Swankism proposes the unending pursuit of anarchy, a world without rule where self-determination, mutuality, and free association form the basis of our society. The unending pursuit element is another important part of the definition. You know, it's ongoing. It's a strive. It's not some perfect utopia that we reach and stagnate with it.
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In fact, it's not even assuming that people will become perfect anarchists. It's about currently and constantly pushing to be better, to create systems that produce better outcomes and greater anarchy, to continuous redevelopment of the values necessary to maintain anarchy, to never get complacent, and to understand this is a species-level project.
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The idea of anarchy being a world without rule is actually something that gets some pushback from some anarchists as well. There's this sort of rules-not-rulers version of anarchism that has a lot of sway in some circles. Ah, the anarcho-constitutionalists. The anarcho-constitutionalists.
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It was popularized by the sort of direct democracy, libertarian Marxist crow that kind of got their popularity in the 80s and 90s. But it's not something that I consider an accurate representation of what anarchism strives for.
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You know, now that we have access to more historical anarchist literature than ever, if you dive into any of it and you get to the root of what anarchy is, it becomes very clear that anarchists were not into this whole terror of democracy thing. They weren't really into any form of democracy as in the rule by majority or the rule by some abstraction called the people.
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Anarchism is really about, it's not just no ruler, it's also no rule. I've been brought into this understanding by the efforts of the translator and sort of scholar of anarchist history, Sean Wilber, who in my opinion is putting forward some of the best historical analysis of anarchism today. He's actually who inspired a lot of my definition of of authoritarian anarchism.
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And so I'll have his work linked in the show notes, of course, but in this get into this sort of no rules definition of anarchy, a lot of people might ask, you know, wouldn't we still need rules? But of course, Enforceable rules are just really a form of laws that are backed by authorities, which anarchism opposes. And unenforceable rules are not really rules at all.
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They're closer to norms of behavior. And if living in a society tells you anything, you should know that norms should be as open to questioning as the most rigid of rules. In fact, norms can be even more dangerous if we let them slide as just the way that things are and the way we do things around here.
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We tend to speak a lot of, you know, the people and the community and stuff in anarchist circles, but I think it's important to make sure it's clear that there's nothing special about quote-unquote the people or quote-unquote the community. You know, what the people or the community thinks is right and wrong should not be a litmus test on what is right and wrong.
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There's no virtue in being a majority. And there's also no virtue in being a minority. Because we can see with instances where there are minorities, such as the elite, the rich, who obviously have us over all the time. And then there are instances of majorities that just exist to reinforce a lot of the rules and norms and authorities that are keeping all of us down.
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So a litmus test is not what a majority votes for, what a majority wants, or what minorities desire. It's really the absence of authority, the absence of this sort of power over others at all. And it's also inevitably the absence of permission and prohibition, the ability to permit things, the ability to prohibit things.
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When a thing is allowed and a thing is disallowed, yes, people can do what they want, but but everybody else can also do what they want. And so that creates the incentive to be thoughtful and responsible in what you do. And to be thoughtful and responsible in how what you do affects other people. You do things and your things are open to any number of consequences.
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And so if you want to avoid negative consequences, you gotta get informed. You have to learn about how your actions might affect others through communication with individuals and groups. And you have to find compromises and solutions to points of conflict. You're not an island. You're part of a web of mutually interdependent relationships.
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And that's something that exists in every kind of society at mutual interdependence. The problem with hierarchy is that in a hierarchical society, to access that web of mutual interdependence, you have to obey authority. You have to take part in authoritarian systems to have access to human community.
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So in an anarchic society, you don't have us obeying authority, but our behavior is still regulated, in a sense that we are dependent on other people. And we want to have, as much as possible, a harmonious relationship with those other people. Perhaps controversially, I could say that it's actually the absence of rules and rulers that makes anarchism work.
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Because, for one, harm can never be fully captured by rules, and rules cannot capture all the possible circumstances where harm could occur. But also for two, the existence of rule often provides protections for authorities. This is something we talked about in our definition of authority in the last episode. This idea that authority is the right that grants it privileges and protections.
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You know, the idea that the police officer can beat you up, but you cannot raise a hand in defense of yourself.
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you know the bank can evict you from your home but you can't be throwing molotovs into the bank you know that sort of thing is a very unequal relationship that is enforced and defended by rules by the rights granted by those rules and so rather than approaching society with a one-size-fits-all approach to rules that are enforced by some type of authority we can instead create solutions that are tailored to specific problems
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And yes, we might approach concepts like best practice and solving problems and conflicts, but that'll be different from rules. You know, that's something that's not enforced, something that's constantly in negotiation, something that's constantly taken into practice and developed and shifted, and it's far more flexible.
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And I know that it can be difficult to break away from the idea that we need rules and that the rulers are essential, but it's necessary that we can conceptualize anarchy from that angle, with that implication. And it's difficult because of how we've been socialized, how we tend to view human nature. And I take time to develop these ideas, to dwell on them further.
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I'm still grasping some of these things and trying to understand them. But between this episode and the next and all the books and all the work that is being put out there to sort of develop anarchism, to bring it to more people. And of course, through practice, we can get a clearer sense of how anarchist organization can work in all of its harmonious complexity.
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I say organization and complexity specifically because it is often assumed that the presence of anarchy is the absence of organization or the absence of complexity because those terms are often associated with or synonymized with hierarchy and authority. But you can't have organization and complexity without them.
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So, on the next part of the definition, we get into the idea of anarchy being a world where self-determination, mutuality, and free association form the basis of our society. Self-determination is probably the easiest to explain of the three terms that are used to define such a society because it's just the idea that individuals can define and pursue their own paths.
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It's the belief that people, individually and collectively, have the capacity to live and organize themselves in ways that reflect their own needs, desires, and values. It rejects the notion that others, whether they be states, corporations, religious institutions, or other elites, should have the power to dictate the lives of individuals or impose structures of exploitation and control.
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Self-determination is the basis of autonomy, which is necessarily followed by free association. But first and foremost, I want to get into the idea of mutuality. Mutuality is feeling and action in a relationship that is based on shared benefit between individuals and groups in a society. It is reciprocity, it is communication, it's a sharing of sentiments and an exchange of positive actions.
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And it's not unique to anarchy. Mutual interdependence, which is a component of mutuality, is also not unique to anarchy. It can be found in pretty much every society. Because we rely on mutuality to survive and progress through our day-to-day life.
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Whether working together to clean the house for Christmas, or troubleshooting a problem in the workplace, or taking part in a club or sport, or sharing resources following a natural disaster, mutuality happens constantly, informally, and often without recognition. This is something that Kramer talks about. In Debt to First 5,000 Years, he says this is the glue that holds society together.
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Not contracts or power, but solidarity, empathy, and the natural human inclination to care for others. Our world is so divided and yet we still find ways to care. And are there obstacles to that care? Of course. There are various prejudices, propagandized mindsets, socioeconomic systems, and material conditions that limit our practice of mutuality.
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But these are problems that Anki seeks to rectify. Obviously, issues like colonialism and white supremacy have fractured societies along racial lines and created distress and competition where mutuality could flourish.
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The propaganda perpetuated by states and corporations also limits our capacity to imagine mutuality and create this sense of scarcity in this competitive mindset that creates an unnecessary dichotomy between the success of the individual and the success of the collective.
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Because of the very nature of these hierarchical systems forcing us into exploitive relationships, things like mutual aid end up being replaced by transactional exchanges. Care and community become commodities. Basic human needs become profit-driven markets. And the state takes on a lot of the role that was formerly filled by mutuality.
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Now, just the idea of disaster response, for example, is dominated by bureaucratic agencies that monopolize and direct the resources
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that could be used and more effectively used by people addressing their own needs locally and of course with the implementation of the property regime with privatization fencing off the commons that once supported communal life it creates that sort of scarcity that limits our interpersonal practice of neutrality and when people are poor when they're struggling to meet their own needs they often lack the resources or energy to extend help to others
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Food insecure families may not have the capacity to engage in community support networks. Or, you know, if you look at how cities are often designed, they're structured to isolate people. They make it harder for people to form bonds of trust.
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The existence of all these non-places like highways, the absence of third places, and the prevalence of suburban sprawl all make it more difficult for us to form bonds of trust and solidarity. And then of course you have the intervention of the state into people's efforts to engage in mutual aid. You know, the state punishes and criminalizes mutual aid efforts for migrants or for homeless people.
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You'll often see the police or border authorities preventing people from helping those people, charging them with criminal penalties just for trying to help their fellow human. And all these are things that limit the free and full flourishing of mutuality. But we shouldn't look to the limits of mutuality in our current system as an indication of how it might be limited in another system.
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In fact, we can look at these limits and see what ways mutuality could flourish even further when they no longer exist. By taking the time to dismantle prejudices, to challenge propaganda, to build alternatives, and to create abundance, we can start to recognize the potential of our mutuality.
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And so really, getting from point A to point B, it becomes a matter of expanding our solidarity, which will expand our capacity for mutuality to drive our social organizations. Solidarity is about establishing and recognizing the bond between all people. Understanding that I sense a gain from you doing well and vice versa.
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Remember that our system incentivizes selfishness that acts to the detriment of others. So anarchy doesn't need perfect people. It just needs systems that have better incentives. So anarchic systems would incentivize generosity and selflessness, of course. But the real trick is really in creating systems that utilize selfishness to the benefit of others.
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Making it so that even the most self-interested and self-observed people are a net positive or at least a net zero on the impacts on the rest of society because they will find themselves acting in ways that are generous and that are selfless in order to get the gains that they desire for themselves. You could call it a kind of a selfish selflessness.
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And so clearly the system of capitalism has these systemic incentives and structures that allow for selfishness to not only expand and propagate and be reinforced, it also ensures that that impulse, that inclination has an extraordinary impact on the lives of millions of people. An individual selfish person alone cannot do that much to impact others.
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but put them in a position of power and all of a sudden their decisions can impact the lives of thousands, millions, even billions. So the practice of anarchy is a way of creating a society where no one stands above another and where lives are built on cooperation instead of domination. Reshaping how we practice mutuality by building new habits of cooperation that work without rulers.
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And that's what social revolution is all about. It's an ongoing and intentional transformation of our society, of our economy and culture and philosophy and technology and relationships and politics. It's the ongoing negation of all forms of authority and prejudice and the ongoing affirmation of freely associating equals.
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It is in many ways a reconstitution of our natural initiative, our capacity for mutuality and our responsibility for ourselves and each other. And that starts here and now, not at some distant point in the future. It won't be easy, but it's necessary to unshackle our mutuality, to create a society where it can flourish. And this is where we get into things like mutual aid.
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It's confused with charity very often, but it's a manifestation of our mutuality. It's a voluntary and mutually beneficial exchange of services and resources in a society. And so it's not about tit-for-tat payback or measuring each person's contributions.
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It's about taking responsibility for one another as members of a society and building social relations that sharpen our ability to collaborate and share. To paraphrase Peter Kropotkin, practicing mutual aid is the surest means for giving each other and to all the greatest safety, the best guarantee of existence and progress, bodily, intellectually, and morally.
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With mutual aid, like I said earlier, it derives its basis from our interdependence, which is another component of mutuality. Mutual interdependence is the very basic idea that we rely on each other for various aspects of our lives in every kind of society. And in anarchy, our mutual interdependence is unrestricted by authority and instead guided by complementarity.
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So we are all approached and appreciated as unique equals, cooperating on that basis. Mutual responsibility is another manifestation of mutuality. And it's the idea that in the absence of legal order, in the absence of authority, when society is no longer guided by laws that are binding and enforceable by some authority, we must be guided instead by responsibility.
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That actions are not pre-authorized or pre-judged by external rules, but that each action is undertaken freely and subject to any number of responses, positive and negative.
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If you're curious about this idea of legal order and permission, prohibition, and mutual responsibility, I recommend Sean Wilbur's A New Glossary on the Libertarian Labyrinth, as it offers the exploration of that concept and a lot more to synthetic anarchism.
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So anarchy demands a high degree of self-awareness, care, and reciprocity from individuals and communities, not through coercion or enforcement, but through voluntary, continuous, and conscious negotiation incentivized by the nature of the system itself, with its basis in cooperation and the desire to prevent unnecessary conflict.
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In hierarchical systems, a community of justice often escalates conflict. Imprisonment, for example, tends to breed resentment and resistance and further criminalization. In anarchy, the absence of pre-authorized retaliation encourages us to find dialogue and to create restorative practices.
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If a conflict arises over a resource, people have an interest in reaching a resolution that benefits both, rather than escalating things into prolonged disputes. So such a society will necessarily require responsibility. They're both responsibility for the environment and responsibility for other people.
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You know, if you are costing the ecosystem its resources, you can't just offload that cost onto everybody else, as is common in capitalist systems. You have to be in dialogue with other people to ensure that your actions are balanced by replenishing the resource, by mitigating harm, or by securing some kind of collective agreement.
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And if somebody is creating a disruptive situation, if they're blasting loud music at night, we cannot rely on an external authority to mediate, but we have to mediate in some way.
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We have to find ways to ensure that they bear the costs of disturbing others, whether that involves apologizing or making amends or adjusting their behavior, or if they don't want to take on other people facing other consequences as necessary. So social revolution really aims to prepare us for that responsibility.
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It's, as Wilbur describes, a basic principle for encountering, recognizing, and engaging with others. It's our beefed up and extremely demanding version of the golden rule. The organic emergence of this responsibility and the incentives of this system could create a sort of a mutual understanding, which is another aspect of neutrality.
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As people will necessarily form norms of behavior that will guide the interactions between them, they'll facilitate consultation and negotiation, they'll restrain the escalation of conflict, they'll maintain the viability of shared commons and libraries of things.
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And similarly, our desire to prevent the escalation of conflict, to prevent threat to our being, and to prevent threats to our social harmony or society's integrity, would thus develop a sense of mutual defense.
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It's in all of our interests to minimize the potential harm of our actions, to proactively seek out solutions to potential and actual conflict, to ensure that we won't get flak and pushback and negative consequences to the things that we do and threats to the sustainability of our society and our lives.
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And for yet another manifestation of mutuality, we come to the idea of mutual interests, which are what make free association as the basis of anarchic social organization possible.
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Free association is the founding principle of anarchic social organization, and it refers to the ability of each person to move around, to associate and disassociate with others as they so choose, without being subject to authority. Free association is free from the impositions of wage labor, from the boundaries of citizenship, and from all other hierarchical relationships.
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This is different from the sort of liberal idea of freedom of association, where under capitalism, that freedom of association is the freedom that comes with signing contracts and controlling private property. So being free from authority, we still have to do what we have to do because we're still mutually interdependent.
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But that free association empowers people to connect with others and to form groups based around shared interests or desired actions to pursue those interests or actions.
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So our interests might be as broad as wanting to eat, or as niche as wanting to maintain the traditional Japanese art of wood joinery, or they might span the globe, or they might be unique to a particular interest, such as those who are interested in maintaining the cleanliness of a local river. So groups don't just exist for the sake of existing.
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They don't exist to perpetuate their own existence. They exist with a particular goal in mind, whether that is maintaining roads, producing and distributing food, or building housing. And then such groups may exist for a long time, or they may dissolve frequently. They may split or they may merge. They may overlap or come into conflict.
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And the spaces where they interact could be called spaces of encounter. They can place in factories or in gardens, specifically tailored online platforms or some sort of community center. So free association may occur on the level of networks of individuals or federations of groups.
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But I need to explain the commune and the federation because those are things that can be interpreted in a few different ways. You know, federations, people might think of government, communes, people might think of, well, local government or counties or something of that nature. Yeah, hippie cult. That too.
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So Anarchy is about finding ways to cooperate in ways that are not bound by the traditional boundaries of authority. And that includes the traditional boundaries of shared territory. The anarchist commune has been confused very often with things like intentional communities or administrative divisions. But if we're going by Kropotkin's description in Words of a Rebel, chapters 10 to 11...
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He makes it clear that commune describes any group formed on the basis of free association. In fact, he juxtaposes the free commune with traditional conceptions of the commune. He says for us, quote, commune no longer means a territorial agglomeration. It is rather a generic name, a synonym for the grouping of equals which knows neither frontiers nor walls.
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The social commune will soon cease to be a clearly defined entity. Each group in the commune will necessarily be drawn towards similar groups in other communes. They will come together and the links that federate them will be as solid as those that attach them to their fellow citizens.
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And in this way, there will emerge a commune of interests whose members are scattered in a thousand towns and villages. Each individual finds the full satisfaction of his needs only by grouping with other individuals who have the same tastes but inhabit a hundred other communes."
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So Kropotkin's commune is essentially a fluid collective of individuals and groups, wherever they find themselves, coming together of their own volition and according to their shared interests, projects, and activities, without being bound to territorial designations. So you don't expect to see like a bunch of like mini governments all over Anarchy.
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A bunch of mini community governments all over Anarchy. Because an abstract group in the community may not even necessarily share many real interests in common. And so trying to put them all into one body, one polity that is responsible for identifying and enacting their will, it tends to be dominated by the group's most dominant voices.
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It tends to subordinate individuals to the will of a nebulous collective, a nebulous majority. And so the alternative to this sort of polity form, as Wilbur describes it, is the federative principle, understood in its most radical anarchic senses.
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So not in the sense of networking conventional static polities like a confederation of city-states, but instead bringing together the information and perspectives necessary to facilitate the dynamic process of free association.
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We can look to Antinomies of Democracy, another bit of writing by Wilbur, which further explains how the federative organization is the process by which we identify specific social selves as an interest or needs and establish their involvement in large-scale collectivities that are formed on the basis of those conversion interests.
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So these collectivities might exist on a sort of a consultative basis as they seek out and disseminate information or advice that relates to interests at the recognition where relevant of expertise. So there might be such associations based on armed defense or co-housing construction or agroforestry.
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There might be consultative associations with a journalistic focus or with a rewilding focus or an accessibility focus. They may exist on any scale, depending on the specificity of the information needed, from as a local as an apartment building to as far-reaching as a continent or even the entire globe.
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Consultative associations could create blueprints, they could document the available labor and expertise, they can source resources, and they can share feedback, all so that interested and affected individuals and groups can easily access everything they need to make informed decisions.
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So in anarchy, we'll see a variety of individuals grouping together and interacting in ways that are perhaps illegible from a top-down view of society, but in ways that work to accomplish their goals, resolve their conflicts, and maintain social harmony. It can be difficult to imagine this possibility due to how thoroughly our disempowerment and domestication has been.
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You know, we live under a global order that seems to deny any alternatives and extols its understanding of human nature as the only valid interpretation. The propaganda of our education, our mass media, and our inherited understanding as subjects in hierarchical society has limited our consciousness of our situation, and thus our drives and powers to transform our situation.
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There are those of us who can overcome this through theoretical and historical study, but there are others who can only overcome this conditioning through demonstration. Some are not convinced by intellectual anarchist arguments. They have to be transformed through experiences.
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So to borrow the terminology of innovation adoption, it is up to us early adopters, those who are into the revolution before it becomes cool, to convince the majority of the possibility of freedom by example. And furthermore, as William Gillis wrote in The Distinct Radicalism of Anarchism, quote, To reach a moment where we sit back, entirely satisfied, would be to abandon anarchism.
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To the radical, there is no litmus for due diligence, no final finish line, no moment where we pat ourselves on the back. The vigilance of the radical is never satiated. End quote. And that's it for me today. We'll get more into revolution, powers, drives, and consciousness, and more in future episodes. In the meantime, you can check out my channel, Andrewism, on YouTube.
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I talk about things like this all the time. I've been Andrew Sage. This is It Could Happen Here. All power to all the people. Peace.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
You know what? That's just cool. You know, blood of Jesus, that works. It's fine. It's antiseptic, largely.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
This guy would be like an amazing character in like a Batman video game, I feel like. He feels like real final boss energy.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
Boom. Too soon, but boom. Yeah, I mean, I'm not making a joke. It clearly didn't do the trick. Yeah, seriously.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
I guess I was going to say, like, what does it take to have the confidence to just cut people with a fucking rusty knife? And I guess it is you just have to you have to break a few eggs to make a gomlet.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
Oh, my God. Really threatened the needle. Thanks, Doc. My favorite is... That reminds me a little bit of... I've known various people that have gotten out of Scientology, and the worst of them sometimes say shit that is basically akin to like, well, I don't agree with all the homophobia and all the cult stuff, but obviously Xenu is real and controls our lives through a series...
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
Shit like that, where I'm like, you know, it's just about the practice of it, not the underlying logic of it.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
But either way, shit was... Yeah, he had to do some shit. He got up to some shit and did some shit at the age of seven.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
the fact that he's he's a pool hustler as a kid makes total sense so i think that's what's actually going on here is he's like yeah yeah he learns how to hustle at a pool hall well it's also like you can the range of predictable items of things that could happen in a pool hall is like yeah finite and like less than 30 i would say i feel like you could just shoot shoot a lot of shots of the dark and that shit's gonna come true eventually yeah pretty quickly
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
The old dude, the old, old dude from the Bible, he probably got up to some shit. Nebuchadnezzar or whatever.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
It is so weird to think about the band of grifters welcoming in a new... I mean, this is in the retelling, welcoming in a new grifter. What the fuck was actually happening?
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
So it is like so juvenile to find confusing medium with medium. But I know it's funny.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
So he's shifting the blame to literal King Solomon, essentially.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
That's a that's a hell of a loophole. That's a genius.
Behind the Bastards
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Well, especially the baby chopping thing, because that's he's got a baby chopping. He's got previous ammo on that.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
You know what? There's a lot of bureaucracy. You can't just insert like which doctor, surgeon general. Yeah.
Behind the Bastards
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You just have to. Yeah. You have to work within the available structures. Yeah. Until such time as you don't.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
like spiritual slavery system it's like i i mean i guess it makes it sound more plausible on some level like oh how could you possibly do this no we need you know the help of thousands to to cure your fucking whatever oh yeah no i got nurses yeah is it ever like oh i'm sorry no the guy who could help you he's out on vacation we just have like the dude who helps me cut people's eyes do you need an eye cut yeah
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
Oh, that's the other side of it is if you were like if I were designing my own version of some cockamamie bullshit, I feel like it would be it would involve as little true body horror as possible. Like, no, no, people love that shit.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I don't I don't have the willingness to put in the reps to really get good.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
Yeah. That's not happening yet. I'll see. We'll see where life takes me.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
Oh yeah. That's, I mean, I guess you need like desperation tourism sometimes, but Jesus Christ, that's. That is actually Jesus Christ's business model also, so you know what? Maybe it's just a good one.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
Yeah, yeah. Render into Caesar about 38% and you're fine.
Behind the Bastards
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Yeah. This is like some midsummer shit. This is like insanity. Yeah.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
Oh, God. Yeah. Oh, well, I mean, I guess it's like if you're going to be a main grifter, at least bring up your little grifty town around you. Yeah.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
Yeah. Yeah. Make everyone invested in you. And yeah, one way or the other, you got leverage.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
Yeah, don't snitch. This is the fucking godfather of the town. Don't snitch.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
The entities don't like weed. Yeah. That's... Can't be true, but fair enough. Entities.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
Yeah, I I can't decide. Are you I'm like debating whether to just shoot the moon and grow it to like donatable lengths.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
So... I mean, this has to also be, like, something... Like, the underlying, like... you know, faith in Christianity, like, you know, it's like, oh, you gotta, you know, can't question religion, can't question religion, takes you all the way to, well, this could be real. This clearly fake shit could be real. It's gotta be real. What else could it be?
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
I mean, I think I think it's like critical to point out that like physicians are not fucking scientists like you can be a doctor. Ben Carson believes in fucking, you know, doesn't believe in evolution like doctors are just like high stakes technicians.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
Yeah. Shave my head. I don't know. It's it's unpleasant. It's it's at the very unpleasant point of the growth like it. Like, yeah, I hate it. Back of my neck. It's fucking disgusting.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
Yeah. I think, I think it's just like worth pointing out that the T E M in STEM is
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
Yeah. And who have like who are highly rewarded for it. Yeah. Like, yeah, you watch like any Silicon Valley person make a pronunciation on anything outside of business. And it's like, oh, you are you are less educated than the average person. You are bad at reasoning. Yeah. Yeah.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
I mean, it could be like sort of an only fan situation. Yeah. The recording of that will be will be useful to somebody.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
Oh, magazine, everybody. The mention of the wine is particularly choice. Oh, it's got to be. Yeah. Yeah. Revolting.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
Well, it's like sort of like... It's like... It's like whatever the PR version of money laundering is. They clean it. They're the cleaners.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
Although, to be fair, actually, if she were to graduate to the level of American president, she would once again be in company where, probably relatively speaking, her hands are relatively clean.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
Yeah. Both things are true. You can be the friendly face of a lot of horror and still be the best president.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
Even before the podcast, that's the fucked up part.
Behind the Bastards
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I mean, is it like because it's like so generally there's this like a vested interest in promoting like spirituality and Christianity on some level. Because it's like when you encounter these people, are you not at any point like, hey, this seems fucked up? It's so wild to me that they don't have that instinct.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
The hand waving of naked eye into evidence is fucking revolting.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
That's, yeah, that is exactly, that is what abusers say. That's fucking insane.
Behind the Bastards
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Oh, have these guys ever been sued by the estates of these? This feels a little bit like Mormons baptizing people in... Like post-mortem?
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
Yeah, yeah, exactly. It's like, hey, my grandpa, you know, admittedly, my my Nazi grandpa probably wouldn't have supported this, I guess, is not the best court case, but. You know.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
Oh, shit. You know, just go to the Yo is this racist podcast. I met Andrew T. Last name is spelled T.I. everywhere. Yeah, that's it.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
What's up? The J-O-G, ready to hear about the rest of this motherfucker.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
It is abuse. Yeah, that's well, that's fucking horrendous. It's almost worth buying so you can have it for whatever happens with the election just to have this fucking horrible thing.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
Reveal is like so... I like going subtle on the final landing. It's just like, yeah, we can do a normal last name.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
If I could just do a tiny poll and just point out that Sophie's idea of a sexy man is Popeye and we can just live in that for a second.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
You hit your world like a cruise missile at your wedding.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
Um, incredible. Incredible. I mean, the one thing watching the clip is that, um, um, what is, sorry, what is, what is the journalist? The quote unquote journalist name again?
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
The one thing watching that is that Susan looks almost exactly as I thought she would.
Behind the Bastards
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Exactly the type of white woman that would promote this shit. Yes.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
Yeah. It's and then also like this, this thing where she's like, he's not going to do a heart transplant. But yeah, he's like, you might have to go to your regular doctor for that is like, yeah, just like key, like sweeping shit under the rug. It's like, well, of course, you will need real medical care also.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
Yeah, it's even like the way that like they can claim they've addressed the infection risk by saying, oh, because they brought it up. It's fucking revolting. That's crazy.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. It's like perfectly explicable and like lending essentially the name of your institution and by claiming to be baffled to give it like credence is like, God, truly pathetic. It's also like even accepting his words at face value until the end. It's like, okay, yes, the brain can do a lot.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
Yes, psychology is more powerful probably in terms of physiological stuff than, you know, we give it credit for. And then pivoting to I want to have a spiritual life is like just an abdication of curiosity. Yep. It's just like, what do you... Yeah. I mean, it is remarkable that some of these people don't feel pain, probably.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
It's documented in other media, you know, other types of formats of this kind of shit. And sure, worth exploring. But being like, yeah, I want to see... I want to learn more about these spirits is like...
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
Yeah. That is... I guess it's sort of like a French version of sort of like an animist type religion, right? Yeah.
Behind the Bastards
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Science doesn't work when you don't do it. That's a remarkable conclusion. Yeah. Thank you, doctor.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
Oh, but it's also just being like the arrogance of being able to say, I can't explain it. So it is there. I won't explain it. Yeah. Won't find out how to explain it. So it's therefore inexplicable.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
Well, it's also like the, you know, not acknowledging that spontaneous remission is a severe outlier event.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
And like, yeah, it's possible. But like putting your treatment faith in that is insane.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
I guess that's kind of the shit that happened with Catholicism in South America where it basically became saints became a pantheon. Yeah. Or the polytheism. It's like, yeah, it's fine. Just a slight demotion and everyone's the same.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
Yeah. Well, especially like all the other shit. It's like, who the fuck knows what's happening there? Yeah.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
Oh God. It's always like the most obvious shit. And yet there's still going to be years of like, of where they're like, Oh, I don't know. He just, you know, he was just interested in heart surgery. Like, yeah, it's, it's always so transparent when the shit finally, like when the mass starts to slip, I feel like. Yep. Yep. It is. But you know what?
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
Oh yeah. I mean like that, the handler for this sort of situation is always like, it's so fucking sinister. It's so crazy to me that people get sucked into this shit. It just seems like on the face, like get the fuck out of there.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
And then this woman's like, but I spent fifty thousand dollars here, which is like, I mean, I guess to that end, that's not that different than any religion. But no. Yeah.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
Yeah, of course it will. And like and having someone confidently say this is helping with your grief.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
Yeah. I mean, honestly, just like I could prescribe just don't be in Australia. Come on. Yeah. Get out of Australia is a general rule. Get out of Australia. We all know. We all know what you you people get up to.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
Yeah. And, and the uniform like starts to take away your identity and makes you more easy to manipulate and all that shit.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
I really like imagining like the fucking like entity sweatshop where the guy just has to like or the spirit just has to. Oh, yeah. Like just, you know, for 40 gross crystals or else they can't go home.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
Yeah. I mean, that's like the homeopathy grift. You know, it's the it's that you can put magic in whatever. Yeah. And if you have a line on passion fruit flowers, which does sound good. Yeah.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
Oh, shit. I feel like I can imagine it, but I can't think of one. But yeah, yeah, yeah. It's kind of like laying on of hands type shit.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
That's fucking awesome. I mean, I guess if you're going to pass the buck, why not? Jesus Christ.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
Yeah. I mean, look, he had an answer and the right answer ready to go, I guess. Yeah, that is the right answer.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
They'll take this cancer from your cold, dead hands. Yeah. Fucking, I don't know. I don't know. Who knows what's happening anymore?
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
I mean, it is it is like nice how the state of the art of like 16th century magic has kind of remained the same. If you can palm a chicken heart, you can get away with a lot.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
Yeah. Something, I guess, resembling justice. Yeah. If you like squint. Yeah. Oh, it's OK. So, Robert, as someone who spends a lot of time looking at men like this, is there ever a case where it's like it just feels like these men. Like the patterns of this shit is always the same. And I guess it's maybe self-selecting because it's the shit we hear about. Yep.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
But it always feels like it follows like such a similar blueprint. It's like, you know, like every cult feels the same.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
Yeah. Jesus Christ. This is fucking dark as shit, man.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
God. Yeah. God, that's fucking horrible. Yeah, it's not great. Yeah, another successful episode of Behind the Bastards. Yep, we really nailed it today. Just grim shit. How often does it end in anything resembling justice? Can't be that often. Yeah, not all that often. Most of them don't wind up in prison. I guess everyone dies, but still.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
Someone run the stats. Run the stats on the bastards. Yeah.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
Only one, only one. You can't do both. Yeah, no, absolutely. That's the key.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
Yeah, God. I guess, I mean, look, this is probably the only podcast that I can comfortably say that, yo, is this racist? Where we take some of the worst, you know, just situations and shit in the news. People's, like, questions on racism. It's horrible often. Not horrible, horrible. But I can definitively say we're less depressing than this. Word. Check it out.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
Damn. Have a good day, everyone. Thanks for having me. I can't say it was fun, but it was certainly something. Yep, it was certainly something.
Behind the Bastards
Bonus: The Bastards of Oprah
So that's a cool wrinkle. That's fucking crazy. Oh, God. I mean, I guess it's like on some level, it's got to be a little bit similar to like, you know, an alchemy thing where it's like, you know, sometimes the problem is just a little bloodletting is needed or like, yeah, sure. It's building up and like that will work occasionally.