It's poor old, poor old producer's just going to have you wedded out those
bits, so he's the one having to pray a price for the preservation of
our marriages. This is London Calling, London Calling. The situation in the
Ukraine has become even more devisive than Brexit lockdowns and vaccine mondates. Many people
who were awake to the media manipulation during the former seem to be completely falling
for the approved narrative on this one. Hook Line and Sinker, welcome to
London Calling with me. James Dunipo. I'm a very good friend, mister
Tavy Young. What have you been up to this week? Well, James
m on Thursday, I think of last week, the Higher Education Freedom of
Speech Bill received Royal assent, So that's been something the Pre Speech Union has
been lobbying for for about three years and finally got it over the line in
the House of Lord on Wednesday, received royal ascent on Thursday, So there
was a sort of minor celebration on Saturday night for some of those people who
have been involved in trying to get this legislation past. It's going to marginally
improve the protections for free speech and academic freedom in universities in England and Wales.
And not only will it impose these slightly more onerous legal duties to protect
free speech on campus on universities, but it also creates a couple of enforcement
mechanisms. So there already are, or there already were, various protections for
free speech on campus, but they were the rules were more often honored in
the breach than the observance because there were no very few enforcement mechanisms. So
one of the benefits of this new legislation is it creates these two new enforcement
mechanisms, a new statutory taught which will enable academics and students who think they're
free speech has been breached by universities to sue those universities in the county court.
And in addition, it creates this new office holder in the Office for
Students who has been described as a free speech czar, whose job will be
to investigate complaints and if necessary, if he upholds those complaints in post fines
on universities. So that should focus the minds of university diversity crats and make
them slightly more conscientious. We think about defending the speech rights of students and
academics anyway, So it's it's pretty much the only piece of legislation past I
think, in what thirteen years of conservative led governments which is unequivocally pro free
speech. So it's definitely something worth celebrating. And on Saturday night there was
an event actually which which predated this, but which was happening anyway, which
I went to, which was going to see Matt Goodwin interview Douglas Murray at
the Overseas Club in Saint James's and then after that we went out for a
celebratory dinner, and then after that James we went to a nightclub called The
Box in Soho's first time I've been to a nightclub in quite some time,
and it was very crowded, and I'm not sure I have a rather a
hazy recollection of what took place. But have you ever been to the Box?
I think it's been going for about twelve thirteen years or so. No,
no, um um. So did you throw some shapes on the dance
floor? I think I must have done. Yes. I think I have
a vague recollection of throwing some shops. What were you all? Ecstasy,
cocaine? Just just alcohol? M far too much alcohol. But yeah,
I didn't get home till quite late. But no quite fun to you know,
go to a nightclub, even at our advanced age. But I would
feel perfectly comfortable getting off my in the nightclub. I think I wouldn't feel
When was the last time you did it? You had it? You had
an event with Danny? Danny? So the last time, yeah, the
last time. In fact, the last two occasions i've I've thrown shapes to
repetitive beats would have been both occasions Danny Rampling. The first would have been
at the Hope Freedom Festival and then at my own, my own after show
party. Yeah. And I don't know the thing about my generation, well,
our generation, although you weren't there, we invented, We invented the
dance scene. So I think that it will always be ours that anything that's
come, anything that's that's been invented since it's been a bit of a pale
invitation with those of us who were there. And eighty seven eighty eight,
um, well, you know, starting with acid house and stuff and the
Abtha sound we made that made this world possible. But we wore the Smiley
T shirt and the red bandannas and I think that it will redound to our
credit throughout history. It was probably the last, the last great moment in
in in British history. In fact, I would say before everything went to
ship in the history of British pop culture anything. I think. I think
that area was probably that was the last time when this country was worth worth
living in and they were. Interestingly, there was a kind of libertarian component
to the kind of acid house um phenomenon, wasn't there. It was sort
of countercultural and unapologetically headonistic, but it also had this kind of anti state
theme running through it, didn't it. We want to be free, we
don't care about whether premises or licensed or not. We're going to take drugs
and let our hair down and dance till dawn. There was this kind of
but it was almost a sort of um semi divi developed libertarian credo, wasn't
it. Yeah, I think. Um. I think it's interesting that certainly
on the marches when we were marching against the lockdowns and the death jab and
so on. Um, I think a significant proportion of the crowd were rave
generation that that the kids somehow are have been they've had that their spirit crushed.
Depending on what generation you go for, where the Generation Z or whatever
or millennials, um. But Generation X, which is my generation, your
generation. I think we have punched above our weight in in the revolution,
and I think it's partly due to the spirit of rain was Ray was great
because it's sort of it broke down It broke down barriers between between classes and
races and all the things that the diversity industry loves to love to talk about.
We actually did it without without being coerced into doing said by the government.
We just had the right pills. Um. But there's there's another theory.
If you listen to somebody like Mark Devlin, for example, Mark Mark
Devlin, who's a DJ who writes about the secret history of the music industry,
would argue that even as we were celebrating freedom, that the the sort
of the dance revolution was really just another means of another sile can conduct the
powers that be. I mean, the music industry is very very heavily controlled,
but as it is the entertainment industry, generally it's controlled by the people
I call the predator class or or the kebal or whatever, and they use
it as a form of mind control. And it's interesting that the if you
look back at the imagery on the flyers and stuff of those early clubs that
are the Second Summer of Love and so on, that they are very much
illuminative mind control symbols, you know, for example, the single eye within
the pyramid and so on. And I think that it was called the Second
Sumber of Love. It was echoed the First Sumber of Love, which was
which was the first mass use of popular music to to control the minds of
the populace and steer them in a particular direction, make them more more malleable.
The First Sumber of Love, the way it was used to break up
the family, to destroy Christian values, to divide children from their parents,
to encourage rampant drug use, and so on. Things things that that in
my early early decades. You know, when I was in my twenties and
THIRTI I thought were a great thing, because you know, we were hey,
we were a sexually liberated and finally we could wear our head how long
and take drugs. But actually I think the consequences have actually been deliterious to
our culture and were starting to witness them the bad side effects today. Did
you look looking back and reflecting on your own participation in that cultural moment.
Do you feel in retrospect as though you were manipulated, that you were effectively
a non player character just doing the well that it's a bit like I feel
a bit like about Rave, as they do about my time at Oxford.
Um, inasmuch as almost everyone from my Oxford generation has failed and failed utterly.
They've they've betrayed, they betrayed their race. I mean by which I
mean this human race. They've they've betrayed their people. They've failed and failed
utterly. They've sold their souls to the devil. Um they've brought into that
they've decided to become like courtiers and the Babylonian Babylonian court that they've looked after
that They've they've sought to suck up to the rich and powerful and have solved
their souls rather than doing the right thing and tried to benefit their fellows human
beings. UM. I'm one of the very few people from our generation that
hasn't done that, has rejected it. So I feel like I went through
a system which is designed to condition you, and somehow I didn't do what
they want us to do. And I feel the same way about about the
rave scene that, yeah, some of us, some of us got through
it without being without being brainwashed. Yet you have you have you encountered any
good films or documentaries about that era which you felt have kind of accurately captured
it. Uh? Yeah, there's been a few of what the yeah,
twenty four hour Party people? Was that good? I forget man um?
Was that the one about the about Tony Watter's face and the formation of Fast
Yeah? Yes, with Alan Partridge playing, Yeah, it was pretty good.
Yeah, there's been a few with it helps when you've got when you've
got a rave of soundtrack, I mean, Train Spotting captured something of the
excitement of dance music, even though they were all on heroin and stuff.
But it was still informed by the by that sound and by those beats.
Wasn't there with Underworld doing that born slippy and stuff. One thing you said,
you said that you and I are members of Generation X. Interestingly,
I remember looking this up. I don't know if we've had this conversation before.
We probably have, but I remember looking it up and apparently I'm I'm
in I'm in the tiny period in which Baby Boomers overlapped with Gen X.
So I think anyone between born between the eight years of nineteen forty five and
nineteen sixty three are technically boomers. But then I think also, if you
were born in nineteen sixty three, then you're also a gen xer. So
I think I'm both, but rather embarrassing me, I'm also a boomer,
and maybe you just escape that. I don't know you. You are younger
than me. I think you are. Yeah, I think I think I
escape that. So nobody can say to me, okay, boomer, even
even though I am really crap at technology, and I know I'm not ashamed
to admit it. You're not the systems personal in your household? Then it
is it? Is it your son? Well he's a bit crap as well.
They've got they've got the skills, but they can't be bothered to use
them because they don't accept that they ought to be cheap labor. They just
think things that they would do if they were staying at a friend's house and
the friend's dad said, oh boy, can you help me with this?
And he'd be terribly charming and helpful and eager to please. I don't know,
well, this is your experience. I find that children with their own
parents do absolutely sold all. They're just useless and there it is, and
you just have to accept it. Um well, I'm I'm the I am
the system's manager in our household just about. But I can see my eighteen
year old son taking over if he if he doesn't move out. So what
did you do at the weekend? Anything exciting? Yeah? I went to
um yeah, was it yesterday? Yeah? It was. I went to
the edge cut point to point, which is I think, I think the
point to point of the graft and graft and hunt, which is one of
our local hunts. So I I think we go to these things partly because
we want to support the local, local causes and partly to see people on
horses jumping over fences as a kind of vicarious form of displaced hunting activity because
obviously we've got a long wait till the season started. And it was it
was good. I was I would you do on a point? What does
that involved? Will you go? Well? You go through three times around
a track and you go over over fences on horseback? On horseback here I
mean not I didn't, but watch people do it. There's there's a there's
a scene in Memoirs of a fox hunting round, where so Soon describes entering
his first point to point, It's very exciting and very very dangerous, and
I mean, unfortunately I'm too old to really do it now. I don't.
I don't. I'd be lucky to get around. I was looking at
the fences and thinking, yeah, I could, I could, I could
do them, but I couldn't. I couldn't do them at a lick on
a on a on a thoroughbred. But I was watching. I was trying
to watch how the riders jump the fences. And the fieldmaster when I was
last hunting, I said, can you give me any tips? And he
said, well, you watch watch jockeys when they go over over hurdles.
They they keep their hands very still that they let the horse get on with
it. And it's true. It's it's you've got to let You've got to
learn that you're not jumping the fence, that the horse is doing that and
your job is to is to get out of the and then it got on
with them. No, it sounds fun. And I saw I saw um
Christian Horner and Jerry halliwell, do you do watch f one drive to survive?
No, I don't but my my entire family does. Okay, Well,
well, I can tell you that that in next season there will be
a scene where Jerry and Christian Horner go to the educate races. Because I
could see that they had a mini film crew with them. I imagine that
Netflix just has this huge budget where they send round cruise with all the various
characters to get a bit of um, get a bit of color off off
the race racing circuit. And it was it was quite interesting to see how
how quickly they moved, moved through the crowd, like they really are very
keen that nobody should stop them and ask for selfies, which is what one
was tempted to do. I mean, I wanted to send send a selfie
of me and then well Horner. I don't think daughter daughter cares about halliwell,
but seven one to my daughter and shared to impress her. But and
what were they But they were they filming themselves at a point to point you
know they were, Yeah, they were, they were sort of going through
the crowd. They're they're into horses. I think I think Jerry came to
horses. Okay, did I ever tell you my Jerry halliwell story you didn't,
did you what before she got red? No, no, no,
no, no, nothing like that. No that this was a friend of
mine. Um in. So he went to Los Angeles at the same time
as I went to New York in nineteen ninety five, and um and I
contrast his extraordinary success with my lack of success in how to lose friends and
alienate people. So he's a sort of running character of Foil to me.
But at one stage he was involved with Jerry Halliwell um and um uh.
They they so they were in a relationship and then they broke up. And
then she asked to meet him at this coffee shop on Sunset Boulevard, and
she insisted on meeting outside rather than inside, but she thought was rather odd.
And when they met outside, she broke the news to him that she
was pregnant with their child. But she didn't want him seemingly to have didn't
want alimony from him, child support, didn't want him to have anything to
do with it. She was just informing him. And he was obviously pretty
taken aback by this and didn't quite know how to respond, and it was
all a bit of a shock. And then a couple of days later,
some pictures appeared shot with a kind of telephoto lens of her telling him this
news outside at this coffee shop. And he, I think concluded that she
had had effectively sold the story to a tabloid, or at least given the
story to a tabloid. And and and that's why she had wanted to be
outside so she could be snapped with him telling him the story, so it
could be aware of breaking the story that she was pregnant, and also identifying
who the father is. Um. And so that was that was not a
great experience, not a great way to discover that. So she's got this.
So was your friend the celebrity. He wasn't a celebrity exactly. I
mean, he's sort of he's become a moderately successful filmmaker, screenwriter and filmmaker.
Okay, let's see um and she's bloomerly it's one of the children in
the US. Interesting. Yeah, Yeah. And I think she's you know,
I think she's perfectly happy and well adjusted. The child. I don't
think, you know, she's suffered from And I think I think that he
may have, he may have had some contact with, you know, over
the years, perhaps since she's turned eighteen. I'm not sure it han't full
of the story, but yeah, it was a pretty shot experience for him.
Anyway. Should we hear from one of our first sponsors, I think
everybody, James Lilas here reminding you that ricochet dot com, which has been
around for a long time, has been around for a good reason. It's
great. It's the community that once you find out, you realize I've been
looking for this all my years on the internet. The member side is where
we get to have conversations on our own. The public side is worth some
of the brightest people you're ever going to meet, write great articles, and
we talk about politics and art and sports and everything you can possibly imagine.
It's a sane, civilized community from the center right. And like I say,
once you find it, you'll say, where has this been all my
life? Well, it's been at ricochet dot com. Why don't you go
there? Now? So? Did did? Did you? Did you follow
the brew haha? About Donald Trump's appearance on CNN at a at a town
hall, I think that called in which he supposedly did very well. It
was just him being interviewed by a CNN presenter and anyone Biden wasn't on there
to debate with him, and CNN got a big ratings boost from it,
and he was generally thought to have done quite well because he kind of projected
power and he didn't let the questioner kind of skewer him on anything. You
know, he sort of railroaded over her, and he got all his kind
of talking points out there and generally, you know, put in a kind
of vintage Trump town hall performance, and CNN were then subsequently criticized for kind
of giving him this platform. I don't know if did he follow any about
UM. I liked what he said about, but Ukraine. He seems to
be one of the few world leaders who is talking sense on the subject of
this mispeicotten Well the West Water crush Russia using the excuse of Ukraine. I
was quite surprised you published a very vigorous hit piece by by your your your
very very pro pro Ukraine pro Zelenski writer Ian Ron's attacking Calvin Robinson. But
for having having dad to suggest that that it was a case of player played
on both their houses, that that, you know, while he was supporting
neither Putin nor Zelenski, he really felt that the ward run its course,
and we ought not to be staking it up by sending more bunk bunker busting
missiles and so on. Um. And I'm sort of slightly puzzled by that
chase, because you've got this excellent CYC call the Daily Skeptic. But the
one thing you're not skeptical on it seems to me is as a sort of
an institution, it is the West version of what's going on in Ukraine.
Well, I think, my, my, I think we should distinguished between
a few things here. I guess there is no um official editorial position that
The Daily Skeptic takes on the war in Ukraine. Um. I mean,
I'm I'm sympathetic to the Ukrainian side and think the problem with calling for an
end to the fighting and a negotiated peace settlement is that from the Ukrainians point
of view, the only acceptable piece is if the Russians completely withdraw from Ukrainian
occupied territory. But there's a distinction, I think between my position and the
editorial position of the Daily Skeptic. I haven't imposed that position on contributors to
the Daily Skeptics. So we publish a range of views about the war in
Ukrainie So Noah car for instance, is much more closely aligned with Calvin and
I've ever read the piece that would would I would consider remotely close to Team
James, or indeed actually a lot of you. And you get a lot
of flak in the comments and on Twitter for your for your position, I
would say that your readership is way way more antipathetical to the Zelenski regime and
to nature than your articles. And I'm sort of slightly puzzled by that now.
I think on many issues, the readership, certainly those readers who comment
on the Daily Skeptic are more Team James than they are Team Toby. And
this is one of those issues that they're more Team James on, I think.
But that doesn't necessarily you know that we don't necessarily allow that to influence
the overall content. You know, we try and respond and take criticisms into
account, but obviously they don't dictate the editorial content of what's the Russian arm
behind that? I mean annoy annoying your readers, I mean, I mean,
well, this is what possibly takes. I can understand why you want
to take the line you do, because it's it's within the overgent window and
all that, but we've got we've got a media. For example, I
look at a glance at my wife's daily Telegraph every day and occasionally even mail,
and I'm sure it's the same in the Guardians. So the entirety of
the mainstream media in this country and in America has been absolutely hot for war,
to keep keep stoking up the war, to push the NATO narrative,
to wave the blue and yellow flag. And I'm thinking, surely there's room
for a counter narrative and and I mean, yeah, skepticism perhaps of the
official narrative. And I'm not really seeing that that skepticism in your current coverage.
Well, I think I think, I guess one reason why we don't
publish more skeptical things about the war in Ukraine, although we have published some
gems. And I do think that that that Noah's line is I've never with
it's quite quite skeptical. But I think, I mean, I think probably
this is one of those issues on which you know, I part company with
the lockdown skeptics, and it's been interesting, but that the that the lockdown
skeptics kind of segued quite seamlessly into becoming vaccine skeptics. I was an unqualified
lockdown skeptic, But I say I'm a qualified vaccine skeptic. We're just talking
about the the COVID vaccines, not all vaccines, obviously. And then but
I then there seemed to be this kind of seamless segue again from the people
that I've been in the trenches with over the lockdown to becoming skeptical about the
war in Ukraine. And I really part company with most of my former comrades
on that issue. I don't think it's been orchestrated by the West in order
to punish Russia. I think, you know, Russia's to blame. Russia
invaded the Ukraine. We can go on to discuss it a great length,
but it seems to me there is, you know, a clear aggressor who
is behaving unspeakably and needs to be pushed out of Ukraine. And we,
you know, we should, I think, for humanitarian and you know,
reasons of moral justice, support the Ukrainians in every way we can, short
of actually endangering our own populations or getting drawn into the war ourselves to any
greater extent than we already have. So I part company with a lot of
my former comrades on that issue. But I guess one one slightly troubling thing
about the reaction to publishing pieces like the piece critical of Calvin's plague on both
the houses position. You agree with that it was very it was really it
was quite adominant as as Ian tends to be. Well he I guess he
yeah, he feels very passionately about this particular issue. So not surprisingly that
passion finds it finds its way into the pieces he writes about it. But
uh, it's I think I think, you know, if let's let's talk,
let's let's kind of call this kind of movement the anti woke coalition,
and I think it is a coition, and there are different components within that
coalition, and they are always they're never going to agree on everything. They're
particularly not going to agree about what might be preferable to woke. I mean,
there's a kind of there's old fashioned liberals. I'd probably put myself in
that camp. There are there are kind of Christians like you. There are
there are Catholics in particular, there are orthodox Jews like uron Hazony. You
know, it's it's it's a broad church. And of course there are going
to be disagreements within that church. But it's disappointing when those disagreements become um
well, when when when? When? When you know, people get angry
with me or with the daily Skeptic for not towing the line when it comes
to you know, I don't know U the Andrew bridging, freyer Meyer's schism,
Fraser Myers schism, or a piece critical of Calvin. I mean,
aren't we aren't we isn't. One of the things which distinguishes our side from
the other side is the other side get kind of sucked into these purity spirals.
They don't tolerate dissent. You're either with them or you're against them.
There are these rigid party lines. No one's allowed to depart from them.
And that's one of the things which makes it such an unattractive movement. You
know, they're constantly looking for traitors rather than allies. Whereas our side isn't
Our side supposed to be a bit more intellectually tolerant. We can accommodate internal
critics without kind of excommunicating them. We don't believe in canceling people for not
towing the line. There isn't really a line on many issues, so it's
disappointing to me that sometimes people do get swept up into these kind of and
become much more intransigent, to start behaving more like the other side, you
know, as though because they've been fighting monsters, they're sort of in danger
of taking on some of the vices of the monsters they're fighting. But it's
interesting the two examples you give. I read Fraser Mars's piece that provoked that
led to that debate with Andrew Bridging, and I read that Ian Ron's piece,
and it seemed to me that both of those pieces were trying to cancel
the target of their of their attack. That Fraser mars Is assault on Andrew
Bridging was designed to unperson him, was designed to rule him out of the
debate as being some ready so extreme that he could not be taken seriously.
And I didn't see any substantive points made in his argument against against against Bridging.
They were just sort of slurs. And I felt very much the same
way about Ian Rons's piece. I think, I think, I think the
reason people may have been aggressive towards you and on that particular instance because they
read this piece and they thought this is a really nasty piece and it's making
some really quite trivial criticism. I mean, like, this is the point
Calvin Robinson made that. I mean, I think it was a shame that
he had to conflate the free speech union with any skeptic, because I recognized
that separate bodis. Nevertheless, he's he made the point that that isn't it
odd that here is this writer at Zonny skeptic trying to decide trying to tell
somebody else how you are supposed to pronounce Kif, which apparently is now Kiev,
and also whether or not you're allowed to use the phrase of the Ukraine.
I agree with at that point, it was it seemed to be a
nasty piece. It went beyond the realms of legitimate criticism and into personal invected
Well, I don't think the point he had made about language being politically charged
in this conflict was a particularly illegitimate one. It certainly wasn't an ad hominem
attack. Well, that wasn't That wasn't a bit that was that hominem.
The rest of it was that ad hominem. It went l in places actually
and stuff. It was. I mean, you conceded that point earlier on
the point, sort of backtracking and saying, well, actually it wasn't at
home. After all. The example you gave of, you know, of
going of being over the top was the language point. And I think that,
I mean, I think that's a legitimate, legitimate argument. And you
know, I think his argument was that the calling Ukraine the Ukraine evokes the
name given to it within the Soviet Empire and so implies that it's still in
some sense belongs to Russia. And that's why, you know, it's become
so contentious to put the definite article before Ukraine. Well that was his that
was his gloss. I don't think it means any such thing. I think
he decided that that's what it meant, but I don't think it does.
I mean, Ukraine just means border. And I think that actually, historically
the Ukrainians are quite like the fact that that's kind of disparate, this this
sort of non specific area that they don't want to be categorized by borders.
But that there you are. I mean, you can make these these nice
points about geography and language, but I think I'm not sure that that I
was particularly taken by this point. I mean, you know, the idea
this idea that why do we pronounce why are we supposed to suddenly pronounce PF
take Kiev as the Russians don't even spell it here they have they have the
similar alphabet, so it's so it doesn't even doesn't even count anyway, It's
a nonsense line. That's it seems to have been invented by the propaganda machine
of the West. Well, Um, just going back to an earlier point
you made about Andrew Bridging and Fraser mars Is Pieter about Andrew Bridging, I
didn't think it was an attempt to cancel um Andrew. I mean, I
thought it was a pretty rot just amize him critique. But I don't think.
I don't think Fraser was was trying to cancel him or you know,
excommunicate him in any sense. And incidentally, the Daily Skeptic we ran a
piece which was quite critical of Fraser. Mays's piece in spiked by Will Jones,
the editor of The Daily Skeptic, pointing out that many of the criticisms
Fraser made of Andrew weren't fair and he had got a few things wrong.
Yeah, but I think quite, But I think I think but I think,
yeah, I think that that that was that was, you know,
all in the spirit of, you know, a lively sort of internal debate,
if you like, within the anti woke coalition. And I don't think
Fraser Myers was upset by Will Jones's piece. And but again, you can
go anywhere in the mainstream media to find Andrew Brigon being either rubbished or ignored,
and yet here you are only skeptic, and the best you can do
to defend him is to do a piece quite in favor of him. He's
just saying that maybe maybe I mean, I thought phrase munt was his pieces
are outrageous and it deserved a very robust rebuttal which which yeah, I mean,
okay, you you were generous enough to concede that Andrew Bridgton had some
points. But but Bridgion is right. Everything he's saying is true, and
I don't know why, well, well, I think that isn't that the
kind of essence of why there doesn't seem to be much tolerance for internal descent
sort of on our side if we can, you know, say that we're
both on the same side. Maybe you might for me, but you you're
just to we finished the point. Your view is everything he says is true,
and therefore if you dissent from anything he says, then you know you're
part of the problem. You're on the other side. Can't you agree?
Can't you agree that? I mean, can't you agree to differ on some
points? I mean, I'm perfectly willing to say that Andrew Bridging has some
valid criticisms of the vaccine. He's drawn attention to vaccine harms in a way
which has been quite morally courageous. He's jeopardized his own career. I think
it's great that he's found a birth now in the Reclaimed Party, and it
was brave of Lawrence as well to give him that birth. So I think,
on balance, he's definitely a good thing. His contribution to raising the
salience of vaccine harms in the kind of national conversation has been invaluable and he
should be congratulated for that. But I don't agree with all his points,
you know, I think he does overstate the case. He sometimes seems to
traffic in what appeared to be not every I don't think everything that that he's
been accused of being a conspiracy theorist about, in fact conspiracy theories about But
I think he sometimes does allow himself to be carried away by some of the
more inflated and harder to do that doesn't. But can't we be can't we
can't we all be on the same side and not agree about everything. I
mean, your your position seeds to be either you just affirm everything Andrew Bridge
and Calvin Robinson and others on our side say, or you're part of the
problem. You're basically paid opposition, you're a cut And that seems to be
a bit extreme. Isn't there kind of room for internal debate and discussion.
We can broadly agree about many things. We don't have to agree about everything.
It's I suppose it's what I call the dogshit yogurt fallacy, which which
is this this idea that somewhere in the middle between these two positions the truth
lies. But if one side says you should put fruit in your yogurt,
on the other side, it's as you should put dogshit in here yogurt.
Even if you reach a point in the middle, or even close to the
fruit party, you're still putting a bit of dogshit in the yogurt. So
I'm not sure that I would I would never feel compelled when making a defense
of Andrew Bridging to go looking for things of it that he said that I
disagreed with, because I think that the points he is making a far too
important and far too minority at the moment in this climate for us to have
the luxury of nitpicking about those little bits where we all I don't like this
phrase or that phrase, and it seems to me that what you're doing is
what I use. When I used to appear on oh Any Questions and the
question time programs like that, I noticed that when I would appear on the
panel with a conservative MP, the conservative MP would breathe a sigh of relief
because he knew that he that I was going to make all the aggressive points
that needed to be made and tell it like it was without fear or favor.
While he could occasionally or she could occasionally show themselves to be reasonable by
making a few checking a few lefty points into the mix and sort of undermining
conservative values and making me at the extremist, and they could disagree with my
point. I don't believe in that. I think we have only one mission
and really the only thing that matters is the truth, and if it makes
us look look foolish. Well, there it is. We live in a
culture where the truth is not valued. But we should be courageous and honest
and not seek to put down in any way people who are who are brave
enough to speak the truth. That's that's my position. Is it putting them
down? Though? To take issue with some of the things they say that
you disagree with. Yeah, well, but it's not even that you're fuibbling
about phraseology, really, aren't you. Well, you're you're throwing into Oh
I thought his hot Holocaust analogy was a bit a bit much. Sure,
I mean, I don't know. I think that so few people are calling
out very serious issue of vaccine injury, for example, that we we on
the truth speaking, freedom loving anti authoritarianism side of the argument should not be
UM should not be trying to sort of weaken them in any way by by
nitpicking over tiny points. Yeah, we've been around this, We've been around
these houses before. But I guess um, like Andrew, I think there
should be a proper public debate about vaccine harms, and primarily so you know,
we don't have a repeat of what happened over the past three years.
We need to be more circumstance about approving vaccines. Clearly, the attempt to
suppress any legitimate criticisms of the vaccines has been, you know, a disaster.
There are lots of people who are suffering from vaccine injuries because they swallowed
the propaganda whole, because people who wanted to draw attention to the risks were
effectively silenced. I've just been banned again this morning, James, the Daily
Skeptic Facebook account once again banned for drawing attention to vaccine harms. Ridiculous,
it's still going on. But I don't think I don't think that unlike you
and unlike Andrew, I don't think it was part of a deliberate plan to
actually harm people. I think that that that that that's been an unintended consequence
of the rapid vaccine rollout and the suppression of public debate. I don't think
it was all part of a deliberate plan. I part company with you and
him in thinking that the vaccine itself, that the virus itself was manufactured in
order to give the authorities a pretext to roll out this vaccine because they wanted
to harm populations on a large scale. I think, I think I don't
think it makes I don't think there's much hope and therefore it doesn't make much
sense to talk about bringing you know, big farmer CEOs, people like Anthony
Faucci to justice. They've so arranged it that that was never going to happen.
So I agree with you there, that's pine in the sky. I
mean, they deserve to be they deserve to be behind bars, they deserve
worse. But but they they're not going to get that. But yeah,
I mean, I know the wrest points about the death job that you agree
with and you don't believe it was a conspiracy. You think it was cocked
up and sort but I often feel with it with your defenses of people like
like Andrew Pridion there, they're a been a bit little war by the way,
I don't think Andrew is perfect. I noticed that on his web page
bizarrely is a is a sort of fundraising thing for for Ukraine. I mean,
I don't know what he's doing there. I think that's really really disappointing.
Um and there as Yeah, you're you're right, there is there is
a tendency I'm one the awake seekers after truth that that they do tend to
purity, spiral um and and and um a far too far, too eager
to judge anyone who who shares deviations from the from the pure position. I
mean even I get it, you know, I mean even I've been accused
really being yeah yeah, but but but you know, I don't want to
make because that would make us I look look like they're they're even worse than
they are. But I have been I some some people, I said,
I can across one one woman once who who who'd looked at my hand gestures.
I mean, I've seen this done done for you as well. Apparently
the way when we fiddled with your glasses is a sign that you are part
of the Masonic free Masonic conspiration, which you maybe maybe I don't know,
but but I know that I'm and and and my even these hand signals,
I think I don't know, So there is Yeah, of course does it
give to be a parentlel. But but then who can blame them when there
is this massive conspiracy and and there are things called Judah scouts and controlled opposition
and limited hangouts and stuff. I mean, you know, if you are,
if you are where I am, and you understood the truth, you
would realize that this is a world of deception, and it is multi layered,
and that there are um or manner of infortraits. Touse to me that
the the dismissal of UM critics as paid opposition, which obviously has been directed
at me quite often. Yeah, it's m It seems to me that it's
a way of sidestepping any engagement with the criticism has been made, a sort
of unwillingness to argue. And I see it in the you must have encountered
at yourself, James, when you were when you were kind of, you
know, a leading climate contrarian and drawing attention to some of the um shortcomings
of the anthropogenic global warming hypothesis very effectively. Um, you were often accused
of being paid opposition. Weren't you? You were you were? You were
supposedly in the pay a big oil that must have been that that's the only
explanation in the eyes of the kind of climate zealots as to why you would
be drawing attention to these shortcomings of their kind of religious belief. Yes,
and just as it just as it wasn't true of you then, obviously it's
not true of me now. And I don't think it's true of most people,
most internal critics. They haven't become Apple states, they haven't sort of
gone over to the other side secretly, and they're accepting kind of money from
I don't know, the Gates Foundation or whoever it might be. I think
there are degrees. There's just there's just legitimate debates and arguments. I mean,
I know, I think we know for a fact, we know.
I think the Stish Scholish government that's what it calls itself, has admitted this,
that we've seen it, and it's it's budgeting that it actually paid was
it had a six million budget I think, to pay influencers to promote the
vaccine, the death job. And we know, although we can't prove that
there are people that we rub shoulders with and that what will have rub shoulders
in the past in the various kind of in sort of so called right wing
circles that sort of the right wing chatterati, various members of that would definitely
hate to shield for the Vats. So I think, really I don't think
they were. I think I think I think how much fisers put into how
much the spiser made was it I think thirty nine billion? Was it?
Or more. Yeah, I think it was thirty. They've got a huge
it was a huge budget. That's the main We published a piece on this
in the Daily Skeptic the other day. The main beneficiary was Beyond Tech rather
than Fiser who were making the vaccine whatever. So what I'm saying is there
has been a lot of industry went floating around and there's gonna, there's gonna
they're gonna have a budget and marketing budget, and and some of that budget
is you can if you let's let's suppose let's suppose you're let's suppose your Andrew
neil Um. They usually testing and Andrew was one of those, was bright,
it might be some of the you might think is might he's got loads
of money and probably yeah. I also, I mean someone someone a journalist
with a reputation and a career to protect. I didn't think under any circumstances
would risk, you know, even if they were so inclined to accept money
from big farmer in order to it would be it would be the risk.
The risk of being found out would be utterly catastrophic for their career. How
would anyone find out given that given that the establishment, given that fois email
leaks, you know, same way. A lot a lot of information that
people like fouci Um and you know, the former head of the Welcome Trust
and various big farmer executives would would prefer to have kept secret has leaked.
Well, people, stuff does leak. There are whistleblowers, there are dissenters,
people, and I don't know, I think it would have been quite
possible too for these to be paid with and be given assurances that they weren't
going to get no I know, I dispute utterly your your notion that journalists
generally, particularly journalists now are so high minded that they would not take bribes.
And perhaps who knows, perhaps at the time when they took the money,
they even believe that they were they were doing the nation as a service
because they weren't getting the country working again by persuading everyone to take the necessary
measures. I'm not saying that lots of people would have been if big oil,
if big oil, I mean, I don't know. I'm assuming that
if if big oil had ever offered you, you know they're talking about think
grand you would you would have you would have you would have rejected it,
right because not least because you have your integrity, but also the risk of
it getting out would be catastrophic. But and they just own you after that,
they effectively own you. They could blackmail you unless you did exactly what
they said. How do you think how do you think politics works? How
do you think that most most people people in politics have compliments on them are
m like they have been ribed in one way or another. I'm sure it's
the same with with journalism a greater or less degree. Even if it's any
a question of saying stuff to keep your job. I mean that would be
the low level, the lowest level of corruption. Then I think people go
hard on them. And also, I mean it's it's self evident from from
how I've behaved in the last a few years that probably you're wasting your time.
I've said that I would, I would if you paid me. Well,
you couldn't pay me enough to take the death jab um. But other
people are not that. Other people don't value the truth so much. So
whatever, I don't think you're that exceptional, James, I'm sure. I
mean, I think that most most of most of the journalists I know,
um and have known for decades, UM, I wouldn't they're a bunch of
company. They're a bunch of they They may, they may, they may
not be everything we'd hope they'd be, But I don't think they're They've been
take themselves at the bottom of the foxar, haven't they know? We're not
going to name names because it's too embarrassing and too shaming, But lots of
lots of our comrades did not. Were remarkably silenced during the lockdown. They
they've never spoken out against the vaccines and so, and it's shaming. And
I don't know how they're going to live with themselves. I couldn't. Well.
I think they probably thought that they were they were being responsible and acting
in the national national interest. Um, I don't think it's because they were.
They were literally paid to shill for Big Farmer. But listen, we
should probably break for another message from some of our sponsors. Hello, I'm
Dennis Neal, and here's what's bugging me. The media are burying some of
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conversation teptally. Just pick you did that because you do it quite a lot,
and and and and people were always always commenting on it. And on
my telegram channel. You make your your your your cheap shot and then go
to the break. And by cheap shot, I mean that what you were
doing there was a strong man. I would like to differentiate between our comrades
who wet the bed and who are cowardly and refused to call out the vaccine
with the people I was suggesting actually took money to show them behalf of farmer
that they're They're not necessarily in the same category. And you don't don't misrepresent
my position, Okay, but I thought you were suggesting that I'm saying journalists
took money with bribe to you. There you get you see senior journalists,
I particularly I would say that it wouldn't be senior journalists. I mean,
I don't think Andrew Neal, for examples, as you mentioned his name,
took money from Big Farmer. I don't think that some of the other established
columnists took money. I'm saying that slower down the rung, people who are
sort of sort of just earlier on in their career maybe would have been or
working in the margins, maybe in alternative media, might have been quite ready
to accept money in their role as influencers for shilling for the backs. That's
all I'm saying. Maybe, Um, I still think it's I still think
it's unlikely, um, because of the risks involved, because it would effectively
mean they'd be owned by Big Farmer thereafter and so forth. I do think.
I do think that if anything like that, if they're they're having a
program like that in place, it would have leaked by now. Which isn't
to say that that you know they don't engage in shady activities to try and
get their message out there and support activities well, you know, I expect
they. We know that, you know, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.
Maybe maybe shady is too strong, but we know that. No,
I think it's not too strong. They give they give large sums of money
to the see into various newspapers. And whilst I don't suppose there's an explicit
instruction that if you receive the money you can't criticize any vaccine ever, but
nonetheless, of course that that that must be in the back of the mind,
or I would have kind of editors overseeing the work page. But I
think, I mean, I think one reason why I don't think there is
a kind of program of that nature within companies like Visor any more than there
is, you know, in big oil companies to kind of attack climate change
alarmism is that they don't need to, partly because you know, group think
just kind of keeps most journalists, commentators, opinion formers, influencers in line.
Partly because you know, the kind of disinformation that what is it with
the the the the the censorship industrial complex, which is which which Michael Schellenberger
and various journalists have been drawing attention to the Twitter files. Matt Tybee,
Um, you know they are funded by governments, the various NGOs and shadowy
state agencies which are engaged in trying to suppress dissent on a kind of massive
scale. They're funded by you know, by by by the Department for Defense,
by the Foreign Commonwealth and Development Office, and so for all organizations like
the um you know, the News Guard, which is one of the reasons
the Daily Skeptic finds it very difficult to attract advertising, so they don't Big
Farmer wouldn't need to bribe anyone in order to make sure that kind of criticisms
or the COVID vaccines are suppressed because that's all take that's all taken care of
already. Yeah. I think they're probably like the mafia. They'll they'll they'll
work with their materials. So if they think you'll respond to blackmail, they're
blackmail, you know that. There's I think you'll respond to bribery. They'll
bribe you and the thing threats whatever whatever works, baby, okay, Um,
all right, So should we go into culture corner? Oh? Yes,
yes, yes, perhaps we should. Um, well, I've got
I've got a top recommend you. Have you seen the Silo yet? No?
The Silo? Oh what is it? I think it's called the Silo
rather than Silo. Um, it's I saw Apple TV. Oh yeah,
it's it's sci fi, isn't it. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah,
yeah, I think it isn't. Yeah, I'm wrong. It's called
silo. Um oh, just googled it. He published the work through Adam
Amazon's Kindle direct self published it, and it's been turned into a TV somebody
called it. This is a nice story. He's called Howie right who wrote
it, And it's good. It's good dystopian stuff. So there has been
some unnamed apocalypse which nobody can remember, and ten thousand survivors of this this
this thing have been for the last one hundred and twenty years been inside this
giant silo thing where they they've got this a sort of a growing area,
you know, a sort of greenhouse area under artificial light, and they've got
the power thing at the bottom, and they've got different tiers and only so
many people per year are allowed to breed and so on, and they don't
know what's outside. And if if you do decide, if you do say
the forbidden words, you know, I want to go outside, then you
are forced to make the walk and go out into this supposedly toxic world.
And it's it's not clear at the stage whether the world outside is toxic or
whether actually this is just an illusion which has been promoted by the people who
run that the silo to stop everyone and everyone leaving. They've got sort of
vested interests in keeping this community in their throull. But it's it's it's good.
It's it's got a it's got a good cast of stalwarts. It's got
Harriet Water for example, and um, that really hot. I think she's
sort of Norwegian English or something. She was she was the mother in June,
you know, the mother of the Yeah is it Rebecca Ferguson something like
that. Yes, she's impossible films, Oh okay, And yeah, good
cast. And it's not a not annoyingly work. I know, just that
Harriet Walter's character is a lesbian. And you're kind of thinking, when did
I last watch a series on Apple TV or Netflix or whatever where one of
the characters wasn't in a lesbian relationship? And how does how is this?
If if this will reflect it in the real world, then almost every other
person knew would be or every sort of fifth person one knew would be a
lesbian. It's just not true, is it. It's not. No,
it's getting tarsan. Yes, it's it's it's I recommend it. Do watch
it, Okay, I'm definitely gonna watch that, James. So I've got
a recommendation to make. So I started watching The Diplomat. I don't know
if you've seen that, but it's about Kerry Russell, who used to be
the woman in the Americans, and she's married to rufus Sewell and she's on
her way to take up a posting in Carball. She's a career diplomat when
suddenly gets to call up to become America's ambassador to the Court of Saint James.
So she flies to London. It's because there's been a terrorist on a
British aircraft carrier. But I don't think we actually have an operationally implausible it's
deeply implausible. The whole thing I have to say, anything involving terrorism,
I've come. I've come to the end that kind of inciting incident is rather
implausible. But once she arrives in London, um, it kind of it's
it's quite it's quite entertaining, and it's it's not quite a kind of comedy
thriller but almost. And rufus Sewell is very good. He's a he's a
former ambassador himself now having to play the ambassador's wife role, which not terribly
comfortable with. And she's sort of a career diplomat who doesn't like kind of
the kind of frippery of being a kind of more high profile ambassador, so
like posing for the kind of Vogue photos story, you know, as she
goes to kind of be formally appointed to bucking In Palace in a carriage and
the rest of it. But actually, as the kind of plot unfolds,
it becomes apparent that the reason she's been given this plumb posting, even though
she's seemingly not qualified for it, is that she's being eyed up as a
potential successor to the vice president, who, for some reason we don't know
why yet is and this all comes out in the first episode. This isn't
a spoiler. She doesn't know that she's being assessed as a potential successor to
the vice president, but rufus Seule knows he's trying to. He can't tell
her because if he tells her, she'll of course immediately reject it, so
he has to kind of coax her into it. But he's sort of in
kind of he's in this sort of conspiracy with someone in the White House to
try and groom her and get her to accept this position, but overworts,
they're also assessing whether she might be suitable by plunging her into this kind of
geopolitical crisis. Anyway, it's quite good, it's quite entertaining. I'm only
see one episode, but which which channel? It's on Netflix? Okay,
um, yeah, I'm I'm thinking I'm not very tempted. However, I
can recommend another Netflix series, um folled. Is it called Sanctuary? It
is? It's the Japanese series about sum a sumo wrestler. And already you're
onto a good start, because how do you know about sumo wrestling? It's
not like a fascinating subject for a good drama or not. You're not you're
not interested in that. Oh no, I could, I could? I
could? I could? I could stand to learn more about exactly well,
well exactly because you think about it. So they have all these these um
um sumo or whatever, I forget the terms of zumo schools or whatever that
where that it's very hierarchical. So the most established sumo wrestlers are waited on
hand and foot by by the junior sumo wrestlers and there's an early scene where
this this junior trainee has to get a pair of chopsticks to break up the
the enormous turn of the supermo wrestler, which is, you know, go
and go and break up my turn. Otherwise it's blocked out. So it
says being Japanese there they are quite quite old school and traditional and so um,
I mean it's I mean, it's, it's, it's it's very engaging
so far. No, it's thing like I have this. I have this
problem with with Korean drama as well, quite often, and it seems to
be the case with the Japanese that one is never quite sure of the register,
whether it's whether it's supposed to be a comedy or whether it's supposed to
be I often couldn't work out although I was watching our friend in the in
the North level of seriousness or Benny Hill level of comedy. And because because
there, because in the East, their their body language and intonation and everything
is so different, their culture is so different from us. It's often quite
hard to get a handle on any particular scene, whether this is being played
death straight, whether it's tongue in cheek, whether it's high comedic satire or
whatever. But apart from that, it's it's, it's it's just it's just
great. I mean, Japan is I think, a really interesting place.
It's it's because it's so unapologetically Japanese. One of the few cultures, isn't
it, which in the world which has been absolutely allowed to keep its identity.
Good luck to the Japanese with that. Yeah, that sounds good.
I'll check that out. Yeah, insidantly you're puzzling over the genre. Reminds
me that I think it was last week we were talking about a genre which
we couldn't decide what the correct term of art for was. It was like
the Mummy films and the Indiana Jones films, and I think i'd said action
comedy and you you disputed that. So um, someone very helpfully has been
in touch. So he's someone who occasionally donates tom to the Daily Skeptic and
actually regularly donate. And he's he's also he also said, I worked on
a couple of those Mummy movies know as a screenwriter, and I can tell
you what the term of art is for the genre. It's action adventure.
And now we know James action adventure. He should know he should know.
I'm not disputing that that would be the new show it fits into, although
I would say it doesn't capture the differences in tone between the Mummy films and
the Indian on Genes films. Um. I don't like the tongue in cheapness
of the of the Mummy films. It's two it's two camp and knowing,
whereas the Indian on Genes are just that that that does the right side of
camp. Yeah, I don't know. I think it feels it feels like
a kind of I don't know. I mean, I think the The Mummy
films are maybe slightly more campy, yes, Indiana Jones, but I still
like them, and I don't mind that kind of the fact that it doesn't
you know, they don't take themselves very seriously, and you know, it's
it's not supposed to be the action sequences and aren't supposed to be particularly realistic
or plausible. They're just kind of fun. Um. I always quite enjoyed
them, but I also enjoyed the Indiana Jones films, So I don't mind
a bit of you know, um camp send up of kind of I think
that's my problem, my serious grueling. Yeah, I like Norseman. Now
I didn't. Norseman was absolutely try, wasn't it? I didn't see it?
Actually, did you not see it? That? Is that the Hamlet
thing? The Hamlet? Yes, yeah, that was stupid fighting by bloody
lava flow and ridiculous. Yeah, we should go to one more break to
hear from sponsors and then come back. There's one just one thing, the
last thing I want to discuss with you. I am Andrew Gutman and I'm
Beth Peely, and we're a couple of accidental activist parents who woke up and
started speaking out about issues that we saw in our children's schools. To join
us every week and take back our schools on the Ricochet Audio Network or wherever
you get your podcasts Ricochet. Join the conversation. So, James, did
you see the rather wonderful news that Queen Cleopatra this controversial TV series on Netflix,
Yes, about the Young Cleopatra. And it's controversial because a black actress
has been cast as Cleopatra. And as we know, Cleopatra was in fact
Greek, she was ethnically Greek, so it would not have been black.
Um, I don't know. I don't know if she would have been blonde
that they wouldn't that be funny if they discovered that the blonde with blue eyes
really paleski? Well, I think the news is that it's it's again.
It's critics score on Rotten Tomatoes is currently eleven, and its audience score was
one, but it's gone up to two. But that's pretty bad. That's
like we always know that. I mean, as we've often discussed before,
the audience score is way more reliable than the critics score. But yeah,
if the audience are giving this one or possibly two out of a hundred,
that is pretty damn it. But also, but also if we know,
we know critics are so woke these days. I mean I read the other
critics reviews and I just think, by what planet you coming from? It
is just woke on it. But if they're if even the critics are giving
it eleven percent, how about even the critic It's a docu drama, so
it's sort of a combination of talking heads and actors re enacting scenes as they
might have unfolded. And isn't it I saw it was produced by Will Smith's
wife, Jada Pinkett Smith. That's right, Jada Pinkett Smith, Um,
Yeah, we can't be rude about her, James, because yeah, I
get slapped. She's the one that's getting bored. Yeah, I didn't say
that. If you're listening, that was James that said that, Well,
you must have a lot of empathy with the Toes. Well, yes,
maybe maybe maybe she went bored when she realized just what a what a turkey
she was in the book. Do you think she was making Cleopatra at the
time when her hair fell out, when she realized it was all going,
this ain't gonna fly? She was thinking, I don't I think, I
think, I think. Isn't it related to I think she got alopecia.
Wasn't it related to some kind of stressful episode? I don't know, but
there is, there is, There is a reason why we're not supposed to
joke about it. I wasn't. I was just observing, observing, well
are you going to watch it? Just sort of tempted. Now it's sort
of it's so bad, it's I'm a little bit curious about it. Category.
It's a bit like shoving you woody into a vacuum cleaner to see what
happens. You've done that, haven't you? Now? I really haven't.
I mean, but you do you do hear from surgeons that, yeah,
that they have to do it. I mean it's like horrible, don't do
it? Okay, well now you put me off, yeah, up in
the emergency room here. But but before we go, m and the corona
still good. And there was a fantastic scene where I thought of you.
I thought of you. There's a there's a character who's clearly based on the
character with whom Tolstoy most identifies is called Levin, and Levin is is a
you know, sort of junior aristocracy, and he wants to he wants to
live on his state and just living on his horny handed tool, simple life
away from the world. He's very much as I am now. And that
his elder brother is I think would be team Tobes and the elder brother.
There's there's a great conversation that they have. I instantly thought of you and
me. Where um, it's at a time in Russian history where they've started
to set up these these local sort of town councils to try and improve the
lot of the peasants and improve their education and their their healthcare, and into
generally interfere in the Lives of the Peasants, and Um Levin, the me
character, has a conversation with the you character, the elder brother, and
the older brother is massively into the idea that that that the serfs should be
educated because education is in itself a good thing and so on. I mean,
correct me if I'm wrong, if this wouldn't be your position. And
he talks about, you know, what a wonderful the education is, and
Levin says, you know, it's really not worth it, that these are
serfs, that that actually it's it's only going to mess things up that they're
not it's not what they do. Um, And he's going to have these
meddling bureaucrats deciding this and that, and it's going to actually not and the
healthcare system isn't going to make them any healthier. It's just going to bring
these quack doctors into an imposed burden on that. I mean not right in
thinking you would have been the elder brother saying well, education it's important and
we should. Yeah. I probably would have been the the old fashioned liberal
arguing him. Yeah, the told stories. Actually you can tell he's quite
scathing. Ah. He understands that the aristocracy are doomed because of their their
sort of being impulsal liberal attitude. They're wet liberalism. Yeah, they're wet
liberalism. And he's right, it wasn't he wasn't. Tolstoy also quite liberal
when it came to serfs. I mean he was, he was. He
was very kind of dutiful. Oh yeah, that's a landowner. Oh absolutely,
And that's that's that's see, that's it. It's a bit like the
thing we didn't discuss, a bit like the Archbishop of Canterbury, the appalling
welby quoting citing the Bible is evidence that we should allow more immigrants to come
in because it's what Jesus would have done. And the point she completely misses
is that Jesus was not saying the state should impose these values on people.
He was talking about individuals and doing their own form of charity in the same
way. The fact that Tolstoy treated his serve as well, it is not
an argument for statist ventures to improve the lot of the completely different thing,
right, Yeah, no, Well, maybe maybe the various welfare measures rolled
out in late nineteenth century Russia were insufficient to avert the Russian Revolution, But
I think the enfranchisement of the British working class by Israeli and others in the
late nineteenth century in Britain, the passing of various measures to protect pensions provide
unemployment benefit, the kind of embryonic formation of some kind of socialized medical of
this, and so people say all of that, I think did successfully an
equivalent revolution here in terms. Well, I mean, we obviously argue about
another podcast, But there were already these friendly societists. There was already a
community welfare state. We didn't need the government. The government actually moved in
and destroyed a system was already working. You're you're, you're, you're repeating
the kind of the socialist narrative that we needed this massive government. We never
needed it. But let's say that for another podcast, to pay that for
another day, Okay, James, okay, great, all right, Well,
I'm good to talk to you. Quite nice to have a fairly good
humored exchange this. Oh yeah, what's why what would you going to?
Now? What's the parliament thing you're going to? I'm going to go and
testified before an all party parliamentary group on coronavirus and vaccines. Will you tell
them all from me? There are a bunch of useless bastards amission or be
imprison These are these are people on our side, James, I'm not going
to say that. No, stop antagonizing your fellow your comrades in arms.
Okay, all right, but it's under could Ricochet joined the conversation.