#633 Independent Thought Is A Superpower with Zuby

Zuby is a rapper, author, speaker, and coach. He graduated from Oxford and has quickly become an international sensation. In this conversation, we discuss freedom of speech, independent thinking, problem solving, social pressures, education, bitcoin, decentralization, and how the world is changing rapidly. ======================= Choice is a new self-directed IRA product that I'm really excited about. If you are listening to this, you are likely part of the 7.1 million bitcoin owners who have retirement accounts with dollars in them, but not bitcoin. I was in that situation too. Now you can actually buy real Bitcoin in your retirement account. I'm talking about owning your private keys and using tax-advantaged dollars to do it too. Absolute game changer. https://www.retirewithchoice.com/pomp =======================

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:02Anthony Pompliano?

  What's up everyone, this is Anthony Pompliano. Most of you know me as Pomp. You're listening to the Pomp Podcast, simply the best podcast out there. Now let's kick this thing off. Zubee is a rapper, author, speaker, and coach. He graduated from Oxford, has quickly become an international sensation. In this conversation, we discuss freedom of speech, independent thinking, problem solving, social pressures, education, Bitcoin, decentralization, and how the world is changing rapidly. I really enjoyed this conversation with Zubee, and I hope you do as well. Before we get into this episode, I want to quickly talk about our sponsors. First up is BlockFi. BlockFi provides financial products for crypto investors. Those products include a high-yield interest account, a US dollar loan product

• 0:47Anthony Pompliano?

  against your crypto collateral, a no-fee cryptocurrency trading platform, and the brand-new Bitcoin Rewards credit card. I'm an investor, and I'm a happy user at BlockFi. I think you'll really enjoy that Bitcoin Rewards credit card. It's a normal credit card, that when you swipe it, you get Bitcoin back, rather than cash back or airline miles. Go check it out and start earning today by visiting blockfi.com/pomp. Again, blockfi.com/pomp, and you can get the Bitcoin Rewards credit card, start swiping, and start getting Bitcoin back. No-brainer, in my opinion. Blockfi.com/pomp. Next up is Choice. Choice is rebuilding the way you approach retirement, which starts with making it simple to include Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies in your savings.

• 1:31Anthony Pompliano?

  More than 20,000 Bitcoiners, including me, yes, me, I have a Choice account, have already signed up to start investing. Whether we are talking about crypto or stocks, Choice lets you trade real Bitcoin and Amazon or Tesla in the same place, all without paying a dime in capital gains taxes. That's right, it's a tax-advantaged account. And if you want to hold your own keys all the way to the moon, you can do that, too. Either way, Choice is on a mission to give you full control over your retirement savings. So head on over to retirewithchoice.com/pomp. Again, retirewithchoice.com/pomp, and sign up for an account today. And one more thing, you know how I feel about this, but if you have a pro that manages your money, don't take any BS. Choice has tools for them, too.

• 2:14Anthony Pompliano?

  Take back control today and visit retirewithchoice.com/pomp. Again, retirewithchoice.com/pomp. Alright, let's get this episode with Zubee. I hope you guys enjoy this one.

• 2:25Speaker 01

  Anthony Pompliano runs Pomp Investments. All views of him and the guests on his podcast are solely their opinions and do not reflect the opinions of Pomp Investments. You should not treat any opinion expressed by Pomp or his guests as a specific inducement to make a particular investment or follow a particular strategy, but only as an expression of his personal opinion. This podcast is for informational purposes only.

• 2:48Anthony Pompliano?

  We talked, I think, last year, if I remember correctly, maybe a little bit before Corona and all this stuff. I think we've done two recordings, one's on your podcast, one on mine, which means like we're helping each other. You know, you help me help you, vice versa.

• 3:02Speaker 02

  As it should be.

• 3:04Anthony Pompliano?

  A lot has happened. Why are you in the United States? Let's start there first. You're coming for multiple months, I think?

• 3:10Speaker 02

  Yeah, I'm going to be here up until the end of October. So there's a, without a visa coming over, there's something called an ESTA, which is a British citizen you can get and it gives you three months in the US, up to three months in the US. So I actually got booked to do a couple of big speaking events. So I got booked by the Young Americas Foundation, which is a big student conservative organization here in the US. They booked me to do a speech at their 43rd Annual Student Conference in Houston. So I did that. And then I also got booked by Young Americans for Liberty, which is a big student libertarian organization. So I spoke there, did a keynote speech in Orlando about a week ago now. And then after that, I've just been booked to do a whole ton of podcasts. I haven't been to the States.

• 3:54Speaker 02

  I was supposed to come here three times last year. Everything got canceled because of all the Corona restrictions. And yeah, I've just been booked for a lot of stuff. I'll be on Joe Rogan on Tuesday. Was on Fresh and Fit here in Miami a couple of days ago and going to be doing some, I'm going all over. I'm going to like 10 different states.

• 4:11Anthony Pompliano?

  I feel like everyone wants you to come on their podcast because you're one of the last reasonable voices and you're willing to tell the truth. So let's just start right there. It feels like there's an entire contingent of the world, whether it's individuals, organizations, governments, politicians, just everybody that gets put in this bucket. They essentially still try what I call old World tactics. So they try to mislead. They try to obscure facts. They don't own mistakes. Like everything that you would expect in the old world, they still do. But there's a new contingent, kind of the new world, you know, population, if you will, that just says, look,

• 4:53Anthony Pompliano?

  I have opinions. I'm right. Sometimes I'm wrong. Sometimes I'll tell you when I'm right and I'm wrong. I'll take my victory laps, but also own my mistakes and I'm not scared to share my opinion. I don't necessarily just need to pretend to be unbiased because nobody is unbiased. And it feels like you are one of a couple of people who are kind of leading that charge, especially on Twitter and other places. So how do you think about like the tactics that you use from like a new world perspective rather than those old world tactics?

• 5:22Speaker 02

  It's an interesting question, man. I think human beings always value authenticity. While they should, there's a contingency of people who actually quite like being lied to because comforting lies make people feel good emotionally. But I think when someone is willing to cut through that and do everything you just said and be real and be honest and not lie. Right? Like when you're talking about mainstream media, politicians, et cetera. It's just lies upon lies upon lies. And once you start lying, you have to continue to lie to keep your house of cards together. Right? If you're just honest and you're truthful and you're authentic, even if you're wrong, sometimes it's better to be honest and to be wrong than to intentionally lie.

• 6:06Speaker 02

  Right? People trust me because I don't lie. People like you because you don't lie. People like guys like Joe Rogan, et cetera. Because they don't lie. It doesn't mean you're always correct. That's a different thing. And like you said, if you're wrong, you can own your mistakes and say, okay, this is my opinion. This is what's fact. This is what's opinion, et cetera. Be clear on all that. And I think there are billions of people out there who, of course, who are online, are on social media, are watching YouTube, listening to podcasts. They themselves don't have the platform to have their voice and their opinions heard by thousands or millions of people. So for those of the people, so for those of us who do and are willing to put something. On the line and to be authentic and to be truthful.

• 6:48Speaker 02

  I think people gravitate to not just because it's real, but also because it's it represents them. So I only speak for myself. I can only speak for Zuby, right? I can't speak on behalf of a whole community or the whole world. You speak for yourself, but in doing so, you inadvertently actually also speak for millions of people. So even though it's your own unique voice, there's millions of people out there who are like, man, like he's saying, he's saying what I'm thinking and he's articulating it in a way that maybe I'm not able to, or I don't have a platform to do it. So I think that's why people like it.

• 7:17Anthony Pompliano?

  I know a number of the people that you're mentioning here, and I think we could have come up with example after example of other folks who follow similar kind of path. What do you think gives those people the freedom or the confidence to tell the truth, to own mistakes in public versus kind of the old world tactics? Is it a individual like confidence, you know, and kind of just the belief that like, I don't care what people think. Is it a freedom, like I can't get fired from my job type thing? Like what drives that?

• 7:49Speaker 02

  I think it's a few things. I don't think it starts from the freedom angle because there are plenty of people who have FU money who are not authentic and are not truthful and are willing to lie, manipulate people, so on and so forth. Right? This goes for a whole class of political and media elites, shall we say even. So I think it comes more from personality, character and principles. I think that's what it is. I mean, you can have somebody who starts out broke, you know, I mean, every, most people don't start out with tons and tons of money, right? And so you don't start out with that freedom. I mean, I get people now who are like, oh, you know, you can do what you do and whatever, because you're, you've, you've got this big platform and you're independent and whatever. It's like, bro, like

• 8:33Speaker 02

  the first year, so I used to twenty, two thousand and eight to two thousand and eleven, I worked in the corporate world. Okay, I was a management consultant. Twenty nineteen. Oh, uh, no, not even 2019, 2020. Last year was the first year that I made more. I, I went to become full-time independent, self-employed in November 2011.

• 8:53Anthony Pompliano?

  Okay. So 2008, basically to 2011.

• 8:56Speaker 02

  Eight to 2011, I'm working in corporate world, doing my music stuff on the side. 2011, I'm like, okay, I'm leaving this. I'm going to go become a full-time musician, see what I can do with my music. 2020 was the first year that I made more money doing what I do now than I used to make in my old job.

• 9:11Anthony Pompliano?

  Nine years.

• 9:12Speaker 02

  Nine years, right? And throughout this whole period, I'm having people, oh, Zuby's in music for the money. I was like, bro, I was making more money in the corporate world and I was on a much clearer trajectory, whatever. So when people are now saying, oh, you're doing this because like, you know, you can't get canceled. I'm like, bro, I, I've, it took me 10 years, literally 10 years plus to get to that level. This, this didn't happen by accident. It was conscious choice, you know? And I think people, I, I think we have an epidemic of cowardice, right? There's a pandemic of cowardice going on in the world. Forget any other pandemic, cowardice is the major pandemic going on in all, all levels.

• 9:49Anthony Pompliano?

  What do you mean by that?

• 9:51Speaker 02

  I mean, people are afraid to, we're supposed to have free speech in this country, right? We're supposed, we're supposed to have free speech in the Western world. People are terrified to even, why are people anonymous on Twitter?

• 10:03Speaker 02

  Why, what's the main reason people are anonymous on Twitter?

• 10:05Anthony Pompliano?

  They don't want to link their name to what they're saying.

• 10:07Speaker 02

  They don't want to be accountable for what they're saying. They're afraid, right? Everything's based on fear. Why are people running around with masks on outside? They're afraid.

• 10:16Anthony Pompliano?

  They're afraid of the virtue signaling of you see me without one and therefore.

• 10:20Speaker 02

  They're more afraid of the social stigma and social ostracization. You're not wearing a mask outside because you're afraid of a virus. That doesn't even make sense, right? So everyone is just living in fear all the time. Like I get DMs every day, emails, and it's, it's fear, it's fear, fear, fear. I'm afraid to say I voted for Trump. I'm afraid to say I voted for Brexit. I'm afraid to not wear a mask. I'm afraid to, uh, people are now willing to inject something into their body that they don't want because they're afraid of what will happen if they don't. That's insane. Now, if you want to take. Medicine you want to take, that's fine, but the you shouldn't be doing it because of fear or bullying or coercion. I literally had a guy DM me saying it. His girlfriend said she won't,

• 11:03Speaker 02

  she won't sleep with him unless he gets the vaccine. I'm like, bro, like, come on, man, the girls and balls, dude. And I know, and he went with it. You know, I'm just like, dude, like, what's this world we're living in?

• 11:14Anthony Pompliano?

  Is the fear driven by the lack of social acceptance? So let's say, forget like the virus and all that for a second. It's like a whole other Pandora's box.

• 11:23Speaker 02

  I hope I didn't get that demonetized, by the way.

• 11:25Anthony Pompliano?

  No, you're fine. We're gonna talk about it. We're definitely gonna talk about it. Let's say that voting for Trump is a great example, right? Somehow, it appears that the American flag became politicized in that if you had an American flag, that means that you voted for Trump, you voted for Trump, you're racist, right? That is one talk track. It's not the only talk track. There are some people who agree with that statement. There are some people who disagree with it. All up for debate. But with that said, there are people who voted for a candidate, and they do not want anyone to know that they did that. On the other side, there are people who might not have even voted, but they want everyone to know that they support

• 12:05Anthony Pompliano?

  a certain type of candidate. And so is that a new phenomenon? Like, has there always been fear of the crowd? Or is this something that now is being exasperated by social media and kind of the mob mentality? And frankly, what I would call like the ultimate cyber bullying, which is if you say something that is not within the mainstream talking points, you are attacked from all sides.

• 12:28Speaker 02

  Yeah. I don't think it's anything new. There's nothing new under the sun. Human beings are the same as we've been for thousands of years. We just have more stuff. The technology has evolved and improved. We're the same human beings. There's something I often hammer home, and which I think it's important for people to realize, we're not You know, there's something C.S. Lewis called chronological snobbery, which is this assumption that people in any era think that they're so much better and smarter and wiser and more evolved than their ancestors, which in some ways, to some extent, there's some truth to it, because obviously we build up off the knowledge and lessons from the past, or if you're intelligent, then you do. But fundamentally, we're the same people.

• 13:09Speaker 02

  We have the same emotions, same desires, same cognitive strengths and weaknesses, same susceptibility to group think or whatever it is. And so I don't think any of that stuff has changed. And there has always been social stigma and social shaming and the fear of that, which is, by the way, is not inherently a bad thing, right? There's many cases where some things are shameful, right? It shouldn't be socially accepted to do absolutely anything and everything that you desire. But it can go to a dangerous level. I'd say something similar with human beings are tribal, right? Tribalism is innate in human beings, and that's something that's neutral. It's not positive or negative.

• 13:53Speaker 02

  It can manifest in fantastic positive ways. Friendship, community, family, right? Like tribal nationality, feeling pride. I'm, hey, I'm proud to be British. I'm proud to be American. Like, that's positive. But if it becomes this, okay, like, either you're with us or against us thing, or, okay, it's us versus them, this whole division thing. It could be along racial lines, gender lines, ethnicity, nationality, religion, politics, whatever it is, when it gets to an extreme level, it can literally lead to genocide, lead to the worst thing, which is pretty much the worst thing possible that human beings can do. So with all of this, it's just about moderation and making these natural feelings that we have, I think, work in the right way.

• 14:37Speaker 02

  And I think there's been, if I could sum up the last decade, I think it's been an overcorrection, right? I think the pendulum has swung way too hard in one direction, where the Overton window has really, really shrunk down to people feeling afraid to, literally voiced, we're not talking some extreme views or radical stuff, just... I mean, look, how many people voted for Trump in the last election? Seventy something million?

• 15:01Anthony Pompliano?

  A big number, yeah. Tens of millions of people.

• 15:03Speaker 02

  It's not, so it's not, so regardless of someone's feelings about, like, no one's afraid to say I voted for Biden. Right? So why should someone be afraid, no one was afraid to say I voted for Hillary. So why should someone be afraid to say I voted for, for Trump? Right? Uh, whether, again, whether someone agrees, disagrees, whatever. But this notion, I can't, I can't say that, like, I might lose my job. I'm like, what? You live in America. How are you gonna lose your job for saying you voted for the president? What?

• 15:27Anthony Pompliano?

  For the existing president.

• 15:28Speaker 02

  Yeah. A lot of you clearly did.

• 15:32Anthony Pompliano?

  He won. He won the first time.

• 15:35Speaker 02

  It's not a dictatorship, so, you know, you're not alone here. And that level of fear to me is, is just crazy. And it goes into all sorts of things. People are afraid to get canceled, but I think collectively, individually, everyone just needs to be like 10% more, at least 10% more forthcoming and bold in that sense.

• 15:54Anthony Pompliano?

  I think, and we talked about this before, so I'm cheating here a little bit in that, um,

• 16:00Anthony Pompliano?

  everyone who watches this knows, uh, I'm not really into politics. I don't like politics.

• 16:04Speaker 02

  Good.

• 16:04Anthony Pompliano?

  Uh, yeah, I, I don't identify with a political party, like, like I have a very kind of like unique view, which I actually think is becoming more popular, where people are just like, okay, all of you are the same. Right? All of you are lying to us, misleading us, like, doing all this stuff.

• 16:19Speaker 02

  I don't think that's true.

• 16:20Anthony Pompliano?

  Okay, go ahead.

• 16:21Speaker 02

  I don't think that's true.

• 16:22Anthony Pompliano?

  By the way, I know what you think, so go ahead.

• 16:24Speaker 02

  Yeah, no, it's, it's not true. And there's never been a clearer time to show that that's not true, because you can look state to state right now. What we're doing right now is illegal in some states.

• 16:33Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah, well, so, so this is gonna be my point, is that, uh, the politicians, for the most part, have used the old world tactics forever. Trump, I think, was the first person who got up there and just looked people dead square in the eye in the camera, and basically was like, I'm lying. Right?

• 16:49Anthony Pompliano?

  But did it from like such a capitalistic and clear way that the people who were still under the guise or the charade of like the politicians don't lie were, oh my God, this is ridiculous. He's lying, whatever. It's like, this is just clearly stating what they've been doing the entire time. It's just doing it out in the open.

• 17:08Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 17:08Anthony Pompliano?

  Right? And I think that the number one stat, when I look at this is the state by state migration, where California literally lost so many employees that they're losing the severity of their say in the governance process, right? They're losing seats. They're doing this stuff. New York as well. There's data that shows people are leaving California, New York, and they're moving to Texas and Florida. And at the same time that there is this migration, people are voting, not with their words, not going to a ballot box down the street. They're literally picking up their lives and moving them and their family and friends to another state. At the same time, the narrative seems to be saying something completely different.

• 17:49Speaker 02

  Right?

• 17:49Anthony Pompliano?

  And so it's, how do you balance those two things? Like the actions don't seem to match the words online.

• 17:55Speaker 02

  Sure. That's a, that's a great question. And I think it's that people's actions tell you more about what they believe than what they say.

• 18:02Anthony Pompliano?

  Mm hmm.

• 18:02Speaker 02

  Right? Actions speak louder than worlds, than words. So someone can be talking out this side of their mouth, saying, I don't know, defund the police. All right. Defund the police. Let's abolish the police. Let's raise the taxes. Let's do this, whatever. And then in their actions, they have private security. And they are doing everything they can to minimize their tax burden. Maybe they're even offshoring some money, et cetera. So that person's a capitalist. And that person believes in armed protection, right? They're saying, border, border walls don't work. You live in a gated community. You've got a border. You've got armed guards. You don't, you believe in this, but it's rules for thee and not for me. Right? Look at, again, I just think this past year has been so interesting.

• 18:46Speaker 02

  Are the governors and the mayors and the political class, people in media, etc. They don't believe in their own rules. They don't believe, how many, how many people at Obama's birthday last week? Right? They don't believe their own rules. You've had all throughout this thing where they've been locking people down, shutting down businesses, restaurants, whatever. They've been going around maskless, they've been having parties, they've been going to restaurants. It's like they don't believe what they're saying. Like I'm watching the actions, so you're, you're saying all this stuff, right? Oh, there's this deadly thing sweeping around, like everybody should be scared, whatever. And then I'm watching you and I'm like, you're not afraid, like you're not afraid of this. You're trying to set these certain rules and boundaries for others and then you're flagrantly ignoring them. And so that says a lot. It's, it's the same as, uh, I mean hypocrisy is not new. Hypocrisy is not new.

• 19:31Speaker 02

  It would be the same as, I don't know, anyone, it, it would be the, I don't know. Uh, I don't, I don't know, like there, there are just so many examples of this. But I think if you watch what people, watch what people actually do and how they carry themselves and interact with people, et cetera. Then, okay, here, here's, here's another, another example is when, when you got someone who's, I've been on Twitter. And obviously people know like I'm, I'm more right leaning.

• 19:58Anthony Pompliano?

  Truth teller.

• 19:59Speaker 02

  Yeah, I'm a truth, yeah. And I'm, you know, obviously I'm, and I'm a black guy, right? I've, I've had someone, you know, I've had people where, I don't know, I get in some, they take issue with something I say or whatever. I go on their profile, they have hashtag BLM, hashtag be kind, hashtag anti racist, um, et cetera, et cetera. And they call me like the N word or something, right? And I'm like, oh, okay. So you had anti racist in your bio, but because you disagree with me politically, you're cool with calling a black person an N word? Interesting. That tells me what I need to know, like I, I'm not watching the hashtags in your bio, right?

• 20:39Speaker 02

  If you put hashtag, if you put, I'm a, you know, loving husband and God fearing Christian in your bio. And then you're sliding into girls DMs who aren't your wife. And you're like trying, then your actions are, are betraying what you're claiming to be. And that's an, that's an incongruence and people recognize that. And I think when people see that, that's when people really lose trust.

• 21:02Anthony Pompliano?

  I, I have this, uh, theory and I haven't fully flushed it out and I feel like you can help me where, um, Religion has been on an absolute downward trend for, you know, years, if not decades, specifically in the United States, but I think globally as well, but definitely in the United States. And this is measured in a couple of different ways, from religious participation to those that identify with a certain religion, et cetera. But that is a narrow definition of, are you Christian? Are you Muslim? Are you Jew? Right? You know, whatever. And to me, they're just being replaced by other religions. I agree. Right? So I'll give you two kind of extreme examples. Berkshire Hathaway, people have heard me talk about this before. It's a company.

• 21:45Anthony Pompliano?

  But this got a lot of religious elements to it. Warren Buffett is Jesus. He has disciples. He sends down the good word off the mountaintop. People go on Mecca every year to Omaha, Nebraska, to his annual meeting. Right? There's a way of thinking, a morality that is assigned to it, all this stuff. Mind you, he was married and had a woman move in with him and, you know, there's some questionable things that he's personally done. But there is a religious aspect to it. People adhere to that belief system, that kind of way of living. And there's some very unique elements of the pilgrimage to Mecca, like all this. If you go on the other side, all the social justice issues that came up.

• 22:29Anthony Pompliano?

  It almost felt like there was a bifurcation of the audience. There were some people who were legitimately concerned, really wanted to make a difference and were acting in good faith. Yes. And then there was a bunch of people who kind of felt like, hey, I either need to do this for social signaling purposes, or I want to feel belonging to something and therefore I will participate. And so, again, these are two of the most polar opposites that I can think of on the spectrum. There's a whole bunch of examples in between. But it just feels like humans innately need belonging to a group or to a religion or to something. There's like a psychological desire.

• 23:10Anthony Pompliano?

  And so whether you find that in a investment, whether you find that in a social issue, whether you find that in a specific way of thinking, or literally your book club, right? Like, there's, there's just this like need for it. And if the traditional definition of a religion is declining and people identifying with it, there's replacing it with other stuff.

• 23:30Speaker 02

  Oh, yeah. It's, it's nothing new. I mean, it's not by accident that the, in the 20th century, all of the crazy regimes that rose up, whether you're talking Nazism, Communism, Alism, et cetera, they were all very anti-religion because they didn't want the competition. If you have a nation full of strong Christians, or strong Muslims, or strong people of any religious faith, it's very, very hard to plant the seeds to worship the state and to worship a dictator, et cetera. You'll actually find that people who are traditionally religious do not, are less likely to get religious about lots of these other things. The same thing, I mean, one of the most obvious ones is, is politics, right? You've got people

• 24:12Speaker 02

  who will shun their own family members, or shun their own friends because they voted differently. Right? So you're literally saying that the Democratic Party, or the Republican Party, or the Conservative Party, Labor Party, is more important than my own family, right? My brother, my brother voted for X. I don't talk to my brother anymore. I'm like, wow, so you think that's more important than your relationship to your own brother? Like, that's crazy to me. You've now got the same thing happening. I've been calling, I said, I put out a tweet which went viral saying COVID-19 is the world's fastest growing religion. Right? Where you have these adherents, you have acolytes for a freaking virus, who will,

• 24:51Speaker 02

  if you are not 100% on board with all the measures and the masking and the, the rituals, then you are a heathen, right? You're, you're literally unclean, you know?

• 25:02Anthony Pompliano?

  What was their response to that?

• 25:03Speaker 02

  Vaccination is baptism.

• 25:04Anthony Pompliano?

  What, what was their response to that tweet? Probably a lot, lot of people were real excited about that one.

• 25:10Speaker 02

  I tend to get, I tend to get stronger responses on both sides of all this, but, but it's true, you know, because look, if you think about it, we're on a, like, human beings desire certain things, right? You, you already said, community, of course, right? But purpose, like, why, why are we here? Like, what's, what's, what's the point? Well, maybe that's more meaning, like, why are we here? What's the point? And we've, you've got philosophy, you've got religion, you have various things that try to answer these questions, and we've had this for thousands of years. Then also morality. What is right and wrong? What are the guiding principles of how I should live my life? Like, what, what's right, what's wrong, et cetera? And then also, purpose, like, okay, what, what am I striving for?

• 25:54Speaker 02

  What, what's optimal? How should I orient myself? So, any, any major religion answers these questions, right? So whether this, this isn't, whether or not someone listening to this is religious or not, that doesn't matter, but religion answers these questions. It lays it out. It's like, okay, look, here's literally a book, and this is how you should live your life. This is the purpose. This is the meaning. This is your community, so on and so forth. And in the absence of that, people still, people still seek it, because we are, whether you, whether you believe that human beings are evolved, or created by, by a god, or some combination of the two, then we still have biological wiring,

• 26:37Speaker 02

  right? Just we have a biological wiring to, for sexual attraction, and for social interaction, and for, you know, wanting food and water, like, all these things. So, that, that's a natural craving, and as people get older, you're still gonna, you're still gonna wanna seek that from somewhere. So, some people find that in politics, right? You get people who are religious adherents to politics, like, you could be super conservatives, super liberal, like, super anarchist, whatever, and you have, that gives you a community, gives you some sense of purpose and meaning, certainly gives you a sense of morality, in terms of what is right and wrong, et cetera. So I think that it's just innate in humans. I think there's like, a very small percentage of people who can truly be, sort of atheistic

• 27:22Speaker 02

  on all levels, shall we say, like, truly, truly atheistic and secular, but, dude, oh, man, we didn't even talk about, in the, in the past year and a half. The science, right? The science has evolved into a secular religion and it has nothing to do with science itself.

• 27:37Anthony Pompliano?

  Of course.

• 27:37Speaker 02

  Right? Trust the experts, follow the science. Nobody's ever wrong anymore. If somebody's wrong, they say the science changed. Right?

• 27:43Anthony Pompliano?

  But we talked about this yesterday.

• 27:48Anthony Pompliano?

  The people who are changing their mind, which I think most intelligent folks would say, I don't care that people change their mind. Actually, it's a good sign that you're willing to change your mind, right? We should celebrate the fact that you're willing to change your mind.

• 28:00Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 28:02Anthony Pompliano?

  But it is okay to say you're wrong. It goes back to why the authenticity works on the internet, right? If you're wrong, you say, hey, I thought X, I was wrong. Okay, now I believe Y. And guess what? Nobody prosecutes you for it because they're like, oh, wow, he said he was wrong. Okay, like, but he took the air out of our attack or our critique. But it feels like if you are in a position of power or influence in the legacy system and you use old world tactics in order to engage, saying you were wrong is not allowed. It's out of bounds. You cannot, as a politician, come up and say, we were wrong. Or if you look at like a, kind of the mask situation, in March of 2020 and February, March, we were told they don't work, don't get them, etc.

• 28:46Anthony Pompliano?

  And I think most people said, well, that's a little weird. I'm not a scientist, so I don't know exactly kind of what's going on. But like, that would be a weird statement to be told. Now we're told something different.

• 29:00Anthony Pompliano?

  It feels like people would have way more trust if they just came out and they said, hey, we were wrong. Not the science changed.

• 29:09Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 29:09Anthony Pompliano?

  Just, we were wrong. And it feels like that accountability, like there's a thirst for accountability in a way that the people of power and influence don't feel like they can actually adhere to because they feel like it shows them to be weak.

• 29:26Speaker 02

  Yep.

• 29:27Anthony Pompliano?

  But I think you and I understand that, no, in today's day and age, you actually get power from having the accountability, admitting you were wrong and kind of being authentic.

• 29:35Speaker 02

  Yeah, I agree. And, you know, on that particular point, it's like, well, when were they wrong? When were they correct? Right? I think they were correct the first time. Right? I think when they were telling people masks don't work, like, if you're not sick, there's literally no reason to be wearing a mask, etc. I think that was the truth. And all the real world evidence also suggests that that's the truth. We're 18 months into this. There's no evidence, real world data, that mask mandates have helped to save anybody's life. And it doesn't logically make sense wearing a mask unless you actually have got the virus to begin with. And even then, it would have to be a particular type of mask. So, but you know, like people, people can have different opinions on that. But coming back to the wider point, it's, it's true. And this is why people lose faith.

• 30:20Speaker 02

  Like, why do millions of people not trust the media? Why do millions of people not trust politicians, et cetera? It's because you've kept on lying. And if you, if you, if you lie, then it's sort of, you know, someone who's a murderer doesn't kill someone every single day. Right? Like they could go, you know, five years without killing someone and then they kill one person and that person's now a murderer. Right? So if you lie, then it only takes like one or a couple of lies, let alone dozens and dozens or hundreds and hundreds for people to go, mm, okay, well, I now need to, I can't just trust what this person is saying, especially because they won't. And again, there's a difference between being wrong and lying.

• 31:05Speaker 02

  Lying is you know, the truth and you choose to say something that you know is false. Being wrong is you're saying what you believe is true and then it turns out factually, oh, okay. Like that wasn't actually, that wasn't actually correct.

• 31:18Anthony Pompliano?

  There was a situation recently where in the infrastructure bill, which got probably way too much attention in terms of, I think they thought they were just gonna get it pushed through and then all of a sudden everyone started freaking out. Cause there was a component of it around Bitcoin and cryptocurrencies and tax. And some definitions were up for debate. And there's an 87 year old politician who has already said after this session, they are going to retire. And when the bill was put forward, there's basically a, a political process in order to vote on, should we make amendments to specific parts?

• 31:59Anthony Pompliano?

  And the way that this political process began to unfold, which I'm not an expert on, but my understanding is, it got to the point where the only way that an amendment could get passed is if 100% of the politicians agreed on it. So you need full agreement. And most people think a democracy is 51%, but through this very kind of unique process, you need 100%. And so the 87-year-old politician voted no on changes to this crypto amendment that had bipartisan support, had had, you know, weeks of debate and, you know, hundreds, if not thousands of people calling politicians and like, all this like really big effort behind it. And they finally all came together and said, we all agree. And this is what we're

• 32:44Anthony Pompliano?

  going to put forward. And when it came up to the vote, the 87-year-old voted no. And when asked why, other people said, oh, it was in spite because he had an amendment where he wanted $50 billion more for defense spending.

• 33:01Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 33:01Anthony Pompliano?

  That did not get approved. So he basically said, if I don't get my amendment, no one here is going to get an amendment. Of course, there's massive blowback online. He's 87. I don't think he's on Twitter, but you know, there's a Twitter account that that somebody is running for him. And he also has basically said, somebody on his staff, he believes they should be the next person to fill his seat. And so he's kind of backed them. That person immediately came out and said, hey, I think that we should have passed this, you know, they kind of doing damage control. And then he eventually comes out and says, oh, I have no problem with the amendment. Like, I actually think it was a good amendment. I just voted no because I didn't get my defense bill. And so it was like, so cut and dry, so black

• 33:40Anthony Pompliano?

  and white. Somebody was voting against something they thought was a good idea for other purposes. And I think when people saw that, they just said, that's all I need to know about politics.

• 33:53Speaker 02

  It happens all the time.

• 33:54Anthony Pompliano?

  Right? Is, I actually think this is a good idea, but I'm voting no.

• 33:57Speaker 02

  It happens all the time. It's not rare. I mean, I'm not even from the US, but oftentimes, Republicans will propose something and it'll get full support from their side and Democrats will oppose it simply because it was proposed by the Republicans and vice versa. The Democrats come up with something which bipartisan is like, okay, cool. Like, that's a good idea. But it'll get 100% support in the Democratic Party, like 2% support in the Republican Party. They'll oppose it literally based on who proposes it. And then later, six months later, it gets proposed by the other side and it, it just switches around. And I mean, I know some people who think that this is a good part of US politics because the gridlock means that things move more slowly.

• 34:37Speaker 02

  Um, I don't know. It seems very immature to me because again, that's the toxic tribalism. Right? Instead of thinking of, okay, what is, think of what politics is supposed to be. Supposed to be, you're not, you're not rulers. You're supposed to be representatives of your areas. You're supposed to do what's best for your community, what's best for the American people. That should really be the question. It shouldn't be what's best for the Republican Party. What's best for the Democratic Party? By the way, it's insane. You guys have 330 million people and only two like big parties. But anyway, that's, that's off the point. Uh, that, but instead it, that's, that's what it falls down to. I mean, last year, so much stuff was based around, oh, how would this affect Trump's

• 35:22Speaker 02

  chances of reelection, even when it came to the response to this pandemic, right? People were thinking, is this going to help Trump get reelected or not? Right? And that is insane, right? If you're actually worried about like doing right by the American people, in this case, actually protecting people's lives, but uh, say, you know, potentially saving people's lives, et cetera. The last thing on your mind should be this red, blue, donkey versus elephant nonsense.

• 35:52Anthony Pompliano?

  Well, we've been better off without any political parties. Like i- if you had to go in as a politician, you were not allowed to identify with any political party. And you basically had, uh, to participate in the governance system without every time your name being listed. It says, you know, R dash South Carolina, D, you know, dash New York or whatever. Like, would that make the system better? Or is there actually a net positive to having the political parties?

• 36:19Speaker 02

  I don't know.

• 36:20Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah.

• 36:21Speaker 02

  I don't know.

• 36:22Anthony Pompliano?

  Fascinating to think about.

• 36:23Speaker 02

  It's a, it's a good idea. And I think that people, I think a lot of people would hear that and sort of by reflex reject it just because they're so used to this binary system.

• 36:35Speaker 02

  Um, but I don't see off my off the top of my head, I'm like, that's certainly an idea that is worth exploration because it a a big problem at the moment is it's incentives, right? At the moment, people are incentivized to toe the party line, go along with the party, everything, you know, the party, the party, the party. And again, the focus is on the wrong thing, or or people are even thinking, okay, how does this? Is this gonna get help me get in in power? Or is it gonna help me to become more popular or more wealthy, et cetera? And again, if you're in politics, you're supposed to be representing the people. People always forget that both citizens and those representatives, they forget that they are civil servants.

• 37:20Speaker 02

  From the president to a congressman, to a mayor, to a governor, you're not supposed to be a king. You're not supposed to be a dictator. You're not supposed to just be our leader. It's like, okay, I represent. And to to to his credit, I think the the governor here does a pretty good job of that. Ron DeSantis, right? I think he does a pretty good job. I think he's one of the few politicians. I'm sure some people like him, some people don't, whatever. But it certainly comes across like he's actually trying to do right by the citizens of his of his state. And he's actually, you know, he'll take a lot of flak, he'll take a lot of metaphorical bullets. For, you know, people out there calling him, oh, he's letting people die, that sense, whatever. And he's like, look, I'm trying to protect people's freedom and liberty.

• 38:02Speaker 02

  We've done this rollout for, you know, the vaccines, we've done this with the hospitals, and we're gonna allow our citizens to make choices. We're not gonna like try to bully them or force like that's anti-American. We're not China, we're not North Korea, we're not gonna roll like that. Whereas a lot of other politicians are not doing that, that kind of again, just going with the top down party line. So I think this whole idea of not having the parties in the way that it currently is.

• 38:29Speaker 02

  I mean, maybe it's a pipe dream, but um, it's, it's certainly an interesting idea. I think you'd always want this, you want the incentives to be not perverse. You want the incentives to be lined up so people are rewarded and incentivized to do what's truly the right thing, or to, to represent their constituents properly, not just to do what gets them more fame and power and Instagram followers.

• 38:57Anthony Pompliano?

  So for everyone who's watching live right now, if we get to 500 likes, we'll take questions from the audience.

• 39:02Speaker 02

  Yeah, let's do it.

• 39:03Anthony Pompliano?

  I see lots and lots of questions coming in. We're not taking any questions till we get to 500 likes. So make sure you smash the like buttons.

• 39:08Speaker 02

  Smash it.

• 39:09Anthony Pompliano?

  Uh, we have, yesterday I tweeted two quotes. The first was from Albert Einstein. He said, "Blind belief in authority is the greatest enemy of truth." Albert Einstein, who so far has not been politicized, I don't believe has been accused of anything that kind of cancels Albert Einstein.

• 39:29Speaker 02

  Ah, he's a white man.

• 39:30Anthony Pompliano?

  Uh, he's white. Yes, he is.

• 39:31Speaker 02

  Was he straight?

• 39:32Anthony Pompliano?

  Uh, depends who you ask, probably.

• 39:35Speaker 02

  And I know there are some pretty big sins right there.

• 39:38Anthony Pompliano?

  But he, he said, "Blind belief in authority is the greatest enemy of truth." And then we've got a second quote from Benjamin Franklin. He said, "It is the first responsibility of every citizen to question authority." And I felt like these two quotes go hand in hand with each other.

• 39:53Speaker 02

  Yep.

• 39:53Anthony Pompliano?

  So we've got Benjamin Franklin, Albert Einstein, again, I'm sure someone, someone, somewhere has issues with both of them, uh, because they're just historical figures. But, uh, blind belief in authority is the greatest enemy of truth, and it is the first responsibility of every citizen to question authority.

• 40:07Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 40:09Anthony Pompliano?

  Is it now taboo to question? I- is it now out of bounds? Are you a, uh, an outcast of mainstream society if you question the mainstream narrative or question authority?

• 40:21Speaker 02

  I don't know. It's made me pretty popular. So.

• 40:29Speaker 02

  No, it's it's not, but there is a perception. There's a perception that it is. And firstly, those quotes are very much on point because

• 40:41Speaker 02

  rules should exist for a reason. And if someone is in a position of authority, they should always be able and willing to explain their decisions. Right? This this goes with the starts with the most fundamental leaders we have in our society, which are parents. Right? I'm not a parent yet, but I know growing up, if there were rules in the household or things I was told, and I asked my parents, like, God bless them, rather than them just sort of slapping me down and telling me not to. They'd explain why. Right? Okay, why is there? Why is there this rule? And in fact, do you know something that I think planted a seed for me to maybe be the way I am is I went to boarding school when I was 11. So I was living in Saudi Arabia. I got sent to boarding school in the UK from the age of 11.

• 41:26Speaker 02

  So from that age, I was flying by myself and, you know, parents thousands and thousands of miles away from me. And something, there were some pros of boarding school, but one thing I grew to really resent about boarding school was there were just some stupid rules that made no sense. The rule existed simply because it was the rule.

• 41:46Anthony Pompliano?

  Like what?

• 41:48Speaker 02

  First and last five minutes of every meal had to be in silence.

• 41:55Anthony Pompliano?

  Just control, pure control.

• 41:56Speaker 02

  Yep. The first and last last five minutes of every meal had to be in silence.

• 42:00Anthony Pompliano?

  Did you like sit down with like a timer?

• 42:02Speaker 02

  The headmaster would have a bell. He'd stand up after five minutes and ring it.

• 42:05Anthony Pompliano?

  And then you could talk to your friends.

• 42:06Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 42:07Anthony Pompliano?

  And then at the end, because you know, actually, you can't digest your food unless you're silent. That must have been.

• 42:12Speaker 02

  Science, right?

• 42:17Speaker 02

  And so like, like that, that's one example. I mean, there were a lot of.

• 42:20Anthony Pompliano?

  That was pretty stupid.

• 42:21Speaker 02

  Rules, right? And if you asked why it was because because that's the rule. It wasn't, they could have at least tried to explain, even if the explanation didn't fully make sense. But it was literally just, we have power over you. Shut up, you little kid.

• 42:36Anthony Pompliano?

  This is the problem with education in general. And usually I focus on the United States, but I think globally is I invested in a business called Synthesis and their entire thesis is we ask kids to go to school for eight, nine hours. And we literally tell them, sit down, don't move, shut up and listen to us. Like, like that is the general premise of it. We also put people in prison and say, sit down, shut up and listen to us for 23 out of 24 hours a day. Right? Uh, and so I'm not going to go as far as to say, school is prison for children. But there's a lot of similarities. Yeah.

• 43:18Anthony Pompliano?

  Including, I don't know if you've seen, uh, there is a website where it says prisoner school. So it's like a quiz and they take pictures of the outside of the buildings. And literally, if you take it, I promise you'll fail. Like, like there's not, like, it's impossible to tell the difference between the prison or the school. That's so funny. And, you know, some of them just look like, I call like Eastern European, uh, kind of facades of buildings, whatever. So when you think about what actually leads to innovators, problem solvers, entrepreneurs, all this stuff. It's the exact opposite training, right? If school is training you for the real world, uh, and yes, you have to get some base level of knowledge. Right? You have to know two plus two equals four. That is still true. You have to understand that gravity works.

• 44:01Anthony Pompliano?

  Uh, you have to understand that supply and demand is a economic concept that everyone still buys into for now.

• 44:11Anthony Pompliano?

  But if you can't question authority, if you can't question the problem. Yeah. If you can't be encouraged to try to solve a problem and it's okay to fail. Actually, failure is a good thing. It should be celebrated to some degree. You end up just being basically a production of a system that was meant to go work in a factory. Where there's a hierarchical structure and you're just told move A to B. Yeah. Right? And do it over and up. So there was a purpose for this education system. But I'm going to paraphrase the quote, um, and I forget who says it, but it's basically like. Learn to think because most people are too lazy to do it.

• 44:53Anthony Pompliano?

  Right of just like we go through life and you just kind of do what you're told to do. You just kind of go through the motions, but actually sitting and critically thinking is actually a pretty difficult task. Like it can be mentally taxing. You have to stop like call timeout on life and like do it. And the third thing is like, it might lead you to some uncomfortable places.

• 45:11Speaker 02

  Yep.

• 45:12Anthony Pompliano?

  And so when you talk about the boarding school and let's compare it to like maybe a monastery type school or the synthesis program, they're like diabolically opposed to each other. Right. Where they literally say, sit down, be quiet for five minutes before you start eating versus in like a monastery environment, question everything.

• 45:29Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 45:29Anthony Pompliano?

  Like those two things do not jive with each other, but it feels like that's where the bifurcation in society goes is almost some people believe we should have a world where it's the equivalent of school just extrapolated out to reality. And then there's this other group of people who believe, no, that's not how we get progress. It's not how we solve problems. It's not how we, you know, kind of continue to move forward. We need to question everything.

• 45:53Speaker 02

  Yeah. Yeah. I'm, I'm big on look, because the thing is all good ideas, all good, all good ideas can be explained, right? They can be explained and there's also evidence that they are good ideas. So if someone challenges, good, good ideas are not afraid of challenge. And people who are actual experts and who are honest and who are confident in their abilities. I mean, if you go to a doctor and I don't know, you have a problem with your leg, you have a problem with your stomach, you have some issue, you can, if you have a decent doctor, you can ask them, there's no stupid questions, right? You can ask them as many questions, they say something, of course, they are the authority, they are the expert. But if you had a doctor and you ask him something, you know, oh, you know,

• 46:37Speaker 02

  he prescribes a medication, like, well, okay, well, what are the potential side effects of this? And he's like, just trust me. You'd be like, I'm not taking it. I'm not taking that. You'd be like, like, okay, well, what's this? Like, can you tell me more about that? Like, you're not gonna maybe be able to fully understand it at his level, but a good, decent doctor will be willing to sit there as long as they can and answer all of your questions. This goes with with with everything. And if people are not willing to do that, then it's a big issue. Coming back to looping back on something else you said, actually, which was interesting, when you were talking about critical thinking, is it's also why free speech is so important, because your capacity to think is limited if you're by yourself, right?

• 47:19Speaker 02

  Like us conversing right now, we're both, we're like doing this sort of verbal dance where we're both like strengthening our own ideas and getting new ones and having them challenged. And we're able to think better right now than we are if we were just sitting in a room by ourselves, thinking about the same topics, because I'm like, okay, well, let me, let me float this idea out here and I get feedback and I'm like, oh, that sparks another thought. And then we both leave being smarter. And that's also why it's so important, online and offline, for people to have these conversations. And I think that it should always be encouraged when you get this thing of, oh, I disagree with this person on X, and so therefore I'm gonna block them,

• 48:04Speaker 02

  or I'm not gonna speak to them, or I'm gonna cancel them, or whatever. It's like, no, have that conversation at the minimum. Even if you still disagree, you'll at least have the empathy. You'll at least be able to understand why someone feels that way.

• 48:18Anthony Pompliano?

  Twitter also does this. Twitter is like an attrition of ideas. And most people who are quote unquote, successful on Twitter by being able to build a large audience, they have survived kind of the battlefield, the intellectual battlefield, if you will. And it forces a clarity of thought. It first, it forces you to think critically about what you say before you say it. Anyone who's got a big audience will tell you, they know, like, hey, one time I tweeted something, like, it was stupid and I got attacked, right? So like, there is this like feedback mechanism to it. And it also, it forces you to learn to articulate ideas in a very unique way.

• 49:00Anthony Pompliano?

  That goes back to whatever the thought is like, you know, oh, it would have been shorter, but I ran out of time. On Twitter, like you only get 280 characters, like you have to do it. And so when you're talking about the, the doctor, there's a book Malcolm Gladwell wrote, Outliers, and it reminded me of a section. So this is coming from Calvin Rossier, I think is how you say it. He basically has notes online of this book and it's around practical intelligence. And the notes that he took from that section was, he says, "A big driver in different outcomes between the rich and poor is that rich receive training in practical intelligence. Practical intelligence is the soft and social skills that help you more easily navigate society.

• 49:42Anthony Pompliano?

  Negotiation, comfort, questioning authority, respecting your place in the work, et cetera. Whereas poor parents typically let their kids develop independently. Rich parents understand the importance of the practice, intelligent skills, and find ways to cultivate these skills in their children. For example, a rich parent may tell their child to ask questions at the doctor, which while seemingly trivial, develop that child's comfort with questioning authority figures." And Gladwell calls this practice by the rich, concerted cultivation, which is a pretty two big words. And it's a practice that gives rich kids a big advantage over poor kids. Now, these are ideas Malcolm Gladwell wrote in a book, et cetera. But this idea that as a child is being raised,

• 50:28Anthony Pompliano?

  the doctor is probably one of the biggest authority figures that they come in contact with, right? They wear a uniform, they have the white coat on, they're told about their health, et cetera. And literally, whether it's rich or poor, or whatever the kind of societal dynamic is, questioning that authority or not, as a young child, there's probably a pretty big impact over, over time in terms of your critical thinking skills, et cetera. And that seems stupid. That seems like most parents would just say, hey, shut up, listen to what the doctor says and let's get out of here. But there's a value to it.

• 51:00Speaker 02

  There is, and I think that's one of the, it's like, that's one of the great things about kids as well, until you...

• 51:08Speaker 02

  Children by default are, they do this by default, right? Like they ask questions, they're very, very curious, you know, to the point of it being annoying, right? What's the most annoying question kids like? Why, why, why, right? And but that shouldn't be like threatened or beaten out of them, right? I think it should be, I think it should, it should mostly be encouraged and entertained because again, if you have a rule or there's something out there, you should be able to explain it, right? If you have a rule in your household, okay, you can't do, take something obvious, right? You, you, you can't hit your sister, right? You should be able to explain why, right?

• 51:50Speaker 02

  You should be able to explain why it's wrong to hit your sister, right? Would you like it if she hit you? No, okay, so don't hurt people because you don't like it when you are hurt, right? Pretty, on a, on a basic level, you could even just explain it like that, right?

• 52:05Speaker 02

  But if you have rules where, I remember growing up, like there, there'd be weird rules. I remember something like in some of my friends' houses, there were weird rules. And it was like, um, you're allowed to drink in the, you're allowed to drink in this room, but you're not allowed to drink in that room, right? They, they're both rooms have the same flooring, they have like the same, it's like, why can't I drink water in this room? Like this was, this is a real rule. And I'm like, so even as a kid, I was like, this is stupid. It doesn't make sense. And I, I asked, I asked my friends' parents, why? And they, they just said, well, that's just the rule. It's our house, that's the rule. And I'm like, yeah, but you know, like it doesn't, it doesn't make sense to me. And this is when I'm like seven years old or whatever. I'm like, that doesn't make sense. And it's the same. I mean, what are the biggest rules? The biggest rules are laws, right?

• 52:50Speaker 02

  So every law that exists, you should, there should be a decent explanation as to why it, why it exists. In the UK, you have, still have some of these silly rules, like, you know, you can't, I think in London, there's a, there's a rule in London that you, it's illegal to handle a salmon in suspicious circumstances.

• 53:08Anthony Pompliano?

  Like a fish?

• 53:08Speaker 02

  Yeah, salmon.

• 53:09Anthony Pompliano?

  Isn't it also?

• 53:10Speaker 02

  I'm not sure what that means.

• 53:11Anthony Pompliano?

  You can't talk in an elevator?

• 53:13Speaker 02

  Is that a? I don't think that's a law. I know you're not, it's, you know, it's illegal to be drunk inside a pub?

• 53:17Anthony Pompliano?

  Really?

• 53:18Speaker 02

  Yeah, it's illegal to be drunk, drunk inside a pub in England. Like, it's not enforced, but and then they have like all these weird rules, right? Yeah, where, I don't know, on a, on a Thursday, you can't do X. It just, these bizarre rules, which don't make sense.

• 53:30Anthony Pompliano?

  Sorry, in New York.

• 53:31Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 53:32Anthony Pompliano?

  Uh, it is against the law in New York state to speak to anyone in an elevator.

• 53:37Anthony Pompliano?

  That's why, that's why nobody, when you get in the elevator, nobody talks.

• 53:39Speaker 02

  That's funny.

• 53:40Anthony Pompliano?

  It's literally against the law. This is from 2017, so maybe they changed it, but uh, yeah.

• 53:44Speaker 02

  That's hilarious.

• 53:45Anthony Pompliano?

  Literally illegal to talk to anyone in an elevator in New York.

• 53:47Speaker 02

  Yeah, like I just don't like, I don't have a problem with authority. The authority just has to make sense. Right? I think some people think like, oh, you know, like it's just an anti authoritarian, like I'm anti authoritarian, but I'm not anti authority. It's just like the authority has to make sense, right? It takes another thing that's absurd that's been going on in the past 18 months all around the world. You're supposed to walk in a restaurant, you're supposed to wear a mask because you walk into a restaurant, but then sitting down, you can take it off. It makes no sense, right?

• 54:18Anthony Pompliano?

  When you sit down, it goes, you ever seen the meme? It uh, it goes over your head. Yeah, it's only if you're sitting, it just.

• 54:23Speaker 02

  I was in, I was in Portugal two months ago, in Porto. And uh, you know, there was indoor dining, there's like 30 people sitting inside, eating or whatever, uh, eating, smoking, drinking. I was eating outside, I finished my meal and I'm going, I'm going in to use the bathroom. And I get stopped at the door and they want me to put a mask on. I literally, I literally laughed, I pointed, I literally just pointed at everyone and I was just like, just shrugged my shoulders. And then the person at the door laughed and was like, okay, come here. Uh, cause they, cause they themselves are like, yeah, that makes no.

• 54:55Anthony Pompliano?

  Well, in those situations too, here's the crazy part about it is like, I always, uh, I always say to myself, um, the person who stops you at the door and says it, they didn't come up with that role.

• 55:08Speaker 02

  No.

• 55:09Anthony Pompliano?

  In nine out of 10 cases, right? They're not the owner of the business, they're not the person who, the guidance from the government or whatever.

• 55:15Speaker 02

  No.

• 55:15Anthony Pompliano?

  They're just like, hey, man, I don't want to get fired.

• 55:17Speaker 02

  I know, I know.

• 55:18Anthony Pompliano?

  So I'm going to be the good soldier and I'm going to carry out the, the orders and, and you know, can you please put a mask on? And then when you're like, hey. You could like see them like kind of like get shocked at it like like, oh yeah. All right. Uh, just hurry up.

• 55:33Speaker 02

  It doesn't, they know, they know it doesn't make sense. So they're just like, yeah, I can't even, I can't even come up with something here.

• 55:38Anthony Pompliano?

  One of the concepts I really like is, uh, it's called five whys, which is like a really bad name because it's so, uh, easy, but, um, it comes from Toyota, I think is the one who really kind of pioneered this, uh, and it's an iterative interrogative, uh, technique used to explore the cause and effect relationship underlying a particular rule, et cetera. And so the example that they have here is, uh, your vehicle won't start. So the first thing, why the battery's dead. Yes. Okay. Why is the battery dead? The alternator is not functioning. Okay. Why is the alternator not functioning? Right? The alternator belt has broken. Why did that happen? The alternator belt was well beyond its useful service life and not replaced. Okay. Why did that happen? Well, you didn't maintain the service of the vehicle based on the periodic

• 56:23Anthony Pompliano?

  servicing you're supposed to do to the vehicle. So you could just say, oh, the battery is dead. And that's kind of the elementary, you know, Band-Aid. It's just fix battery. Or you could figure out like, hey, if I want to prevent this in the future, the root cause is actually that I wasn't getting the vehicle serviced, you know, as I was supposed to. And so if I start doing that, then I won't get to this point. And when you think about an easy example, like you said, of, uh, you can drink in one room, but you can't drink in another. If you were to sit there and ask your parents or your friends' parents, why? And they say, because that's the rule. And then you said, why? Right? After like three times, they'd like smack you, right? They'd be like, shut up. And the reason why I present

• 57:02Anthony Pompliano?

  it that way is there is an element of, uh, in order for rules to be, uh, effective and to be openly adhered to by the masses, there has to be an expectation of intellectual rigor applied by the rule makers. Yes. So if the rule makers are intellectually lazy, they're going to create bad rules. Those rules then are easily identified by anyone with any sort of intellectual critical thinking that says that rule doesn't make sense. And then you just get this weird thing where you then have to basically ask the person who has figured out the rule is stupid. Please adhere to it just because it will, you know, make society more cohesive, whatever. And, uh, jaywalking is also one of my favorite examples where

• 57:47Anthony Pompliano?

  it makes sense that they would create a rule where walk on the crosswalk so that people don't get hit by cars and die. Okay. Sure. I would love to see in New York City, people hit by cars, how many of them are in the crosswalk versus not in the crosswalk? I don't know what the date is, but I'm assuming that there are plenty of people who get hit in the crosswalk as well. But you can't enforce the rule. And so you also get into this weird thing of you have to create good rules, but then also you have to be able to enforce the rules in order to actually have the intended impact that you want, right?

• 58:22Speaker 02

  Jaywalking is interesting because that's, that's, that's not in the UK.

• 58:25Anthony Pompliano?

  You guys don't have a jaywalking?

• 58:25Speaker 02

  No, there's no jaywalking law.

• 58:27Anthony Pompliano?

  Interesting.

• 58:27Speaker 02

  UK, you can cross the street anywhere.

• 58:28Anthony Pompliano?

  And there are crosswalks.

• 58:30Speaker 02

  Yeah, there's crosswalks.

• 58:31Anthony Pompliano?

  It's not illegal to cross anywhere else.

• 58:33Speaker 02

  No, you can't cross a motorway, obviously, but I don't think you'd want to try anyway. But no, jaywalking is, uh, that's not a thing in Europe. Europe in general, I don't think has jaywalking as a law.

• 58:42Anthony Pompliano?

  There, there is an element of, uh, some rules are created with the idea that, uh, the population is stupid.

• 58:50Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 58:51Anthony Pompliano?

  And then there is an element of, uh, the highway is a great example. There's nobody trying to cross the highway.

• 58:59Anthony Pompliano?

  You don't have to have a law that says, don't run across the highway, right? That's illegal. People are like, oh, I think I might die. And sure, there is some like gray area of, oh, it's a busy street. And so maybe people try it. You only need two or three people to get hit and then everyone realizes like, don't run across the street.

• 59:15Speaker 02

  Yep.

• 59:15Anthony Pompliano?

  Right? And, and so it's almost like in some crazy way, humans are smarter than the rules.

• 59:19Speaker 02

  Yeah. I mean, it's something that's really important when it comes to laws specifically. And libertarians tend to think about it this way, but I think most people don't is that how are laws enforced?

• 59:31Speaker 02

  Right? Every law is ultimately forced, is ultimately backed by a threat of imprisonment slash violence. So before people go crazy on making laws, they should think, am I willing for agents of the state, primarily police, to use force and threats of force and violence to enforce this? And people don't think this way. And this is when you start getting, you know, when people start making tons and tons of stupid laws, um, which can lead to escalations, altercations, and even people getting killed. Oftentimes it starts with something that's, that's very frivolous, right? Selling a loose cigarette, right? Because there's a law that you can't sell loose cigarettes in, I don't know, New York City.

• 1:00:15Speaker 02

  Um, the police now are engaged and now there's an altercation and there's now a potentially lethal threat in the case of non-compliance. So I think people would agree, are you okay with the police using uh, force to stop a murder? Yes. Stop a thief? Yes. Stop a rapist? Yes. Um, to stop someone walking across the street like in a place not, um, no, I'm not, no, actually I'm not okay with that. Smoking a little bit of weed? No, I'm not, I'm not into drugs myself, but someone wants to smoke, do I, do I, it makes no, someone's, someone's, someone's smoking some weed in their apartment. Do I think the police should come kick down their door, waving guns like, no, right? It's, it's

• 1:00:56Anthony Pompliano?

  Well, if they, if they got grass, this is always my favorite one. If they literally went and picked up grass in New York City from Central Park

• 1:01:02Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 1:01:03Anthony Pompliano?

  and put it into a wrap and lit it on fire and smoked it, they're allowed to do that.

• 1:01:07Speaker 02

  Interesting.

• 1:01:07Anthony Pompliano?

  But if they go get a different plant, it's illegal.

• 1:01:11Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:01:12Anthony Pompliano?

  And again, there's science that would suggest there's difference between the grass and the weed and all this stuff and everything. But it leads back into, do people actually care? And there's two, there's two examples that come to mind. Uh, there's a new documentary on Netflix, uh, called Cocaine Cowboys. This guy, uh, Billy Corbin, uh, uh, created, and I think they've been working on this for actually a pretty long time.

• 1:01:35Speaker 02

  Billy Corbin, isn't he the guy from, is he a musician? Or am I mixing, mixing?

• 1:01:39Anthony Pompliano?

  That's a great question. I don't know.

• 1:01:41Speaker 02

  Maybe I'm mixing.

• 1:01:41Anthony Pompliano?

  Um, but, but he's, uh, I think the executive producer on this thing.

• 1:01:44Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 1:01:45Anthony Pompliano?

  And it looks at the eighties into the nineties of these two guys, uh, Willie Falcone and, uh, the other guy's name is, uh, Sal Magluta, I think is how you say it. And they're based in Miami. They bring in estimated seventy-five tons of cocaine.

• 1:02:05Speaker 02

  Wow.

• 1:02:06Anthony Pompliano?

  Lot of money, even back then, right?

• 1:02:08Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:02:09Anthony Pompliano?

  Tens of millions, if not hundreds of millions of dollars. But they're nonviolent. They're not known for killing people, screwing people over, et cetera. And it's actually from what the way it's presented in the documentary, it's a family business. So they employ their brother, their sister, their cousin, their cousin's, you know, husband, blah, all this stuff.

• 1:02:29Anthony Pompliano?

  And

• 1:02:31Anthony Pompliano?

  They end up helping the local community to the tune of they're donating money. They're paying for people to go to school. They're, they're doing all these things that like, if the money wasn't coming from drugs,

• 1:02:43Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 1:02:44Anthony Pompliano?

  You would say that's an upstanding citizen. Right? The second it's, oh, they have drug money, allegedly, right? Immediately bad people, right? And the other example is if you ever watched American Gangster with Denzel Washington?

• 1:02:58Speaker 02

  I have, yeah.

• 1:02:59Anthony Pompliano?

  He, uh, during Thanksgiving, basically goes to the hood. He opens up the 18 wheeler, right? And just starts handing out turkeys and he's like, loved. There is this element of, uh, what society labels a bad person could do some good, right? So it's not just completely black and white, but also going back to the cocaine Cowboys documentary. At one point, it becomes clear that these two guys have been pulling off this scheme or this business, and they have like a lot of police officers.

• 1:03:32Speaker 02

  Yeah, they must.

• 1:03:32Anthony Pompliano?

  And public officials.

• 1:03:33Speaker 02

  Yeah, they must.

• 1:03:34Anthony Pompliano?

  And, and others on the payroll. And so this is an enterprise. But somehow nobody who, you know, wears a suit and tie and goes to a public office or, or is a police officer gets in trouble for this specific thing, right? Some of them get in trouble for other things, but you start looking and it's like the way that society categorizes, oh, you're an elected official. Good person, good person who did bad thing. Drug dealer, bad person, who maybe you did one good thing, but you're a bad person. I don't know if there's that big of a difference if they're both participating in the same scheme.

• 1:04:07Speaker 02

  I think the government's a gang to begin with, but that's a whole nother conversation.

• 1:04:14Anthony Pompliano?

  Go ahead, explain.

• 1:04:16Speaker 02

  It, it's simple. Everything that the government does. Take the most obvious one, taxation. What happens if you don't pay your taxes or you underpay them?

• 1:04:26Anthony Pompliano?

  You go to jail or you're fined.

• 1:04:28Speaker 02

  Okay. If a gang did that, what would it be called? Extortion.

• 1:04:32Anthony Pompliano?

  True.

• 1:04:33Speaker 02

  Okay. Right. Or even imprisoning, it would be called kidnapping, right? So the government does everything that a criminal organization would do, both domestically and internationally, um, that if it were not the government, if it didn't have that label that makes it legitimate, it would be the mafia. It would be like an obvious, it would be, it would be a racketeering.

• 1:04:56Anthony Pompliano?

  I didn't want to talk about it. We're going to, we're going to talk about it. Ready?

• 1:05:00Speaker 02

  Assassinations?

• 1:05:01Anthony Pompliano?

  Well, let's just go to Afghanistan.

• 1:05:03Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 1:05:03Anthony Pompliano?

  Right? Because that's a timely topic right now. The United States invaded Afghanistan in 2001.

• 1:05:12Anthony Pompliano?

  Majority of people, the social consensus, I think, would be that was a a good reason to go and invade Afghanistan to try to take out the Taliban, which was led by an individual or a group of individuals that orchestrated an attack on America, right? And 9/11.

• 1:05:32Speaker 02

  Wasn't that Al Qaeda that did 9/11? Or am I mixing things up?

• 1:05:35Anthony Pompliano?

  So you're already starting to get into which group actually is the one who did it, etc. But

• 1:05:44Anthony Pompliano?

  the United States sends soldiers. Originally, if you've ever watched the movie 12 Strong, which is literally, we spent, we sent specially trained, kind of special operations soldiers, they land in the mountains, they team up with warlords in Afghanistan, that the United States has deemed you are going to be our friend as we go fight the other warlords, right? Who are not our friend.

• 1:06:11Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 1:06:12Anthony Pompliano?

  How they are selected, who's good, who's bad, all up for debate, all up for, there's plenty of people who are much smarter than me, much more educated than me on that stuff, and we'll analyze it. And the US, 20 years later, almost to the day, is pulling out now. And over the last 20 years, we've spent trillions. There's been thousands of American lives that have been lost.

• 1:06:36Anthony Pompliano?

  And we went from invade and topple the Taliban to nation building. Nation building is, it sounds like a great term. Lot of nuance in there. Who's side are you on? Who are you against? All up for analysis and debate. But as we leave, there is a Western world belief that we are taking away

• 1:07:07Anthony Pompliano?

  The order, the law and order of this country. The constant patrolling of American soldiers on the street to protect the citizens and do all this stuff. Afghanistan has made incredible progress from many different measurements in terms of women in the workforce, women educated, business creation, economic output. Like, like, there's a whole bunch of metrics that you can look at, both that involve social issues and also do not, that, that, that there has been progress made. As we leave, there's now stories where the Taliban, basically in a week, has gone from control in the mountains and, and kind of the places where the US had pushed them to,

• 1:07:50Anthony Pompliano?

  to they have now, as of an hour ago, have taken the second, third and fourth largest cities in the country back. That would be the equivalent of taking back everything but like New York City, basically, right? There are reports coming out that they're going into schools and telling women, "You are not allowed to go to school, go back home and do not come back." Going into workplaces, saying, "Go home, do not come back. One of your male relatives can fill this position, but you're not allowed to be here." And there is this Western worldview that the Taliban is going to come in, kill everyone. This is really bad, the destabilization of the country, etc. There's a lot of truth to that, right?

• 1:08:32Anthony Pompliano?

  As we, we know the Taliban is not necessarily adhere to the Western values, etc.

• 1:08:37Speaker 02

  Sure.

• 1:08:39Anthony Pompliano?

  With that said, there's been plenty of reports over the last 20 years of citizens in the country who said, "Hey, we actually preferred when they were in charge, because there was a, a power structure, there was rules." And sure, I don't like the rules, but I followed them. Like, there was the rules. Equivalent, the mafia in New York in the 50, 60, 70s. A lot of people who just said, "Hey, those are the rules." Like, they, they are the cops, right? They, they basically act like the government. I pay a tax, they protect me, they have certain social rules, whatever.

• 1:09:14Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:09:16Anthony Pompliano?

  I want to be clear that I'm not claiming either one of those groups are good people, right? But what I am saying is that when there is a vacuum of power, somebody will always step in, right? You saw this even in, I think it was Seattle during the lockdowns. Yeah. What was that guy's name?

• 1:09:33Speaker 02

  Oh, the warlord. The rapper.

• 1:09:36Anthony Pompliano?

  Right. Like some guy all of a sudden just had AK-47, took a photo and he's the king of Seattle, right? And it was like, holy shit, right? Like there is no difference between that guy and somebody who does that in a foreign country when there's a power vacuum. And so it just starts to ask the question of like, what is the difference? Where is good and bad? What is good or evil? Like, like, I don't, I just don't think it's as clear as people want to make it seem. And the world is really, really messy and there's lots of gray area.

• 1:10:08Speaker 02

  It's complicated, man. Well, I mean, some things are, some things I think 99% of us would agree are, are cut in dry.

• 1:10:17Speaker 02

  But then there's stuff that's complicated and there's also a difference between morality and legality. Right? Just because something is illegal doesn't mean that it is immoral and vice versa. Right? Sometimes in fact, the immoral thing to do is to follow the law. If they created a law in some country saying you should go and beat up your neighbor. Right? That's obviously immoral, right? It's legal. And even if they said, you know, it's, it's illegal to not beat up your neighbor. You like, you are compelled to beat up your neighbor, right? That would be immoral, right? This happened in Nazi Germany, right? There were, it was illegal to hide a Jew in your house. It's morally the correct thing to do to protect someone from someone who is trying to execute them.

• 1:11:02Speaker 02

  Obviously that's the moral thing to do, but they made that illegal. So the boundary, which also is why I, I don't subscribe to the, you know, the government or the state is God kind of thing, right? Like that's the arbiter of what is right and wrong. You can think back, look, even in the USA, one of the greatest countries in the world, you guys have had some effed up laws back in the day. Obviously everyone, everyone agrees, right? You know, it was. Slavery, Jim Crow, segregation, and so like everyone agrees like now in 2021, everyone is like, that was obviously.

• 1:11:33Anthony Pompliano?

  Well, and those are just the race related.

• 1:11:35Speaker 02

  Oh, gosh, yeah.

• 1:11:36Anthony Pompliano?

  Oh, yeah. You just picked on one of many.

• 1:11:38Speaker 02

  Yeah, I took those because those are the kind of the most obviously egregious things that you can look back on now and be like, oh, my gosh, like, holy crap, like, you're allowed to just own a human being and like beat them and kill like, obviously, that's immoral, man. But this thing is something that went on for thousands and thousands of years and not just the USA, right? Slavery was a global phenomenon, which we can look back on now and say that's, that's obviously wrong. So it's certainly, it's, it's complex. I think there's some stuff to where it's like, okay, it's, it's, it's clear, right? And everyone agrees regardless of your political position, whatever, religious position, everyone's like, okay, like, that's, that's obviously wrong. Most obvious is murder. Okay, just killing someone innocent, no, no

• 1:12:20Speaker 02

  provocation, just, just killing somebody, right? Everyone agrees, whatever, like, there's consensus on that one. And, you know, people generally agree with that. I don't, things like theft, which doesn't directly, you know, physically necessarily hurt someone, but you're, you know, depriving someone else of their property, you know, taking what doesn't belong from you like that, that's wrong, etc. And then there's stuff where it's like, mm, and then you get, also get to the area where something could be strongly immoral, even, or, you know, at least maybe not, not as strong as that level, but something could be generally deemed immoral. Okay. I think most people, again, regardless of your political or religious orientation, most people would agree that if you are married, it's wrong to cheat on your spouse,

• 1:13:05Speaker 02

  right? Most people would agree. Should it be illegal? I would actually say no. Right? I don't think it should be illegal. I don't think it should be jailed for it. I think it's strongly, I think it's strongly, strongly immoral. But that doesn't necessarily mean it should be illegal, right? And, and that's where things get sort of complicated and different countries, different lawmakers, etc. will have different ideas on that. I mean, I grew up in the Middle East. I grew up in Saudi Arabia. So the way that things are structured there and the way the laws are, etc. There's a lot of stuff that is, that's different. And that in itself, country to country, that shows that some people don't really like this notion. What do, what do people call it? People call it, um,

• 1:13:50Speaker 02

  Ah, cultural relativism when they, when they say that, oh, you know, saying that some, but it's, and I, again, I can even understand that. I don't think that, you know, something bad shouldn't always just be something, something that's wrong just can just be, oh, well, it's part of the culture. So it's okay. Right. I don't, I don't buy that line of argument either. But what I'm saying is that as we both acknowledge, some stuff is, is, is gray and it is culturally influenced to some degree and it's historically influenced to some degree. And I am certain that a century from now, there will be, just like we can look back at 1921 and we can point at things in society where we're like, man, that was messed up or that was wrong or, you know, like that wasn't right.

• 1:14:33Speaker 02

  We can do that sometimes quite clearly. I believe in another hundred years from now, they'll be looking at us in 2021, like pointing at things and going like, hey, like, what were those guys doing? Like, that was, that was wrong, right? They'll be cancelling, just like they're ripping down statues now of people, the founding fathers, because they owned slaves or whatever, whatever it was at the time. There's, if there's statues of people who are considered heroes now, I guarantee you a hundred years from now, people there will be the progressives of 20, I don't know, where would that even be? 2121 will be wanting to rip down statues of this person or that person. And they want to change this school name or change that road name or whatever. Why? We will see, right? We can, we can kind of speculate on what we could be doing right now

• 1:15:18Speaker 02

  that is looked back on with such.

• 1:15:21Anthony Pompliano?

  You and I may get cancelled a hundred years from now for having this conversation.

• 1:15:24Speaker 02

  Who knows? Who knows? Um, it's, it's entirely possible. Here's something that's really interesting. Is that we're actually living in the first time period where everything we do from now on, assuming there's not some huge cataclysmic crazy situation.

• 1:15:41Speaker 02

  Everything is now fully documented.

• 1:15:44Anthony Pompliano?

  Can you imagine being like a 15, 16 year old kid right now?

• 1:15:47Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:15:48Anthony Pompliano?

  And every dumb thing you say, do whatever is documented and put on the internet and.

• 1:15:53Speaker 02

  Think about it, man. A lot, a lot of children are on social media prior to them being born. Right? People post like baby scans of photos. Hey, we're expecting, here's a, you know, 20 week scan. Everything is like, you can see that individual before they're even born. Like you're on, you were on Facebook before your zero with birthday. Right? That's, that's wild. So like someone who grows up from now, it's like, dude, you can literally track your entire life from then. I mean, our knowledge of history is it's a little bit fuzzy. I mean, how long is, how, when would, how long was, has video been around for? Hundred-ish years?

• 1:16:31Anthony Pompliano?

  Something like that.

• 1:16:32Speaker 02

  But obviously it wasn't, not a lot of stuff was captured on video and photography back in the day. You go back a certain time. You know, even if you're just looking at like 1800s or earlier, it's generally like, we just know what some people look like based, based off paintings, right? Like there's, there's like one painting of this guy, which is what we think Genghis Khan looked like. Right? Like one painting or whatever, or this king.

• 1:16:52Anthony Pompliano?

  Equivalent of the FBI, uh, you know, hey, here's what this criminal may look like 50 years later, right? Same thing is like, we think George Washington looked like this.

• 1:16:59Speaker 02

  So we have no idea. That's why I got like, we don't, all these historical figures, we don't actually even know what they look like. But from now on, not only will you be able to see them, be able to watch them on video, you'll be able to watch them on, you know, see their videos, listen to their podcasts, like our, our, our future, our great, great, great, great, great, great, great, great, great grandchildren will be able to go back and be like, oh, wow, look, that's my great, great, great, great, great, great granddad. And like, hey, he was a rapper and he had a podcast.

• 1:17:28Anthony Pompliano?

  Look at this selfie he took. Yeah. Look at this selfie he took that, you know, doing something crazy. Cause there's another thing that's interesting is those photos always present them in their best light, right? Always presents them with, uh, the best clothes. Always standing in a very, you know, powerful position or whatever. Even to the point, if you ever go back and look at like the Declaration of Independence, every single person has perfect posture. Every person in every painting is literally looking like they are, you know, about to run for president. Right? Whatever. It's like, I'm pretty sure it took a little while. Somebody just put their feet up on the table, right? Like somebody was like, like, this is like, we gotta chill. Like I'm tired, right?

• 1:18:08Speaker 02

  Do you know what else is funny from that?

• 1:18:10Anthony Pompliano?

  What?

• 1:18:10Speaker 02

  Is when you think back of like, people in history, I may, maybe I, I don't know if everyone else does this, but I always imagined them being like really serious.

• 1:18:19Anthony Pompliano?

  Always.

• 1:18:20Speaker 02

  Right? Because there's no pictures or whatever of people like having fun and being normal and laughing and joking. It's all like, even the family photos, it's like everyone, right? Like the, the mother that everyone's soup, like, because people didn't even used to smile in photos.

• 1:18:34Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah.

• 1:18:34Speaker 02

  Right? Everyone's just mad serious. So I'm like, geez, man, like life, it seems like people didn't. Yeah. So it seems like people didn't used to have fun, right? And I'm like, oh no, I'm sure like, of course they had fun, like they had celebrations, they partied, they told jokes, whatever. But what you see is just like this super stoic, super serious thing all the time. So, and then of course with stuff being in black and white, even it's like, it's like lax color and everything's just, it's weird.

• 1:18:58Anthony Pompliano?

  I, I always liked the colorized foot, like they took the old photos and they colorize them now. And you do feel different when you look at the black and white versus the color, obviously.

• 1:19:10Anthony Pompliano?

  How do you think about yourself? You're, you're like a very confusing person, I think, to, to the mainstream, right? You're a black man who was born in the UK, grew up in Saudi Arabia, went to boarding school back in the UK. You had what most people would consider a great job. You quit to pursue a rap career, but now you have this like intellectual dark web aspect on Twitter and elsewhere. And you have essentially broken the mold when it comes to work, the freedom to speak your mind and the things that you do from an enjoyment perspective. And I think that for like the mainstream, they could never put you in a box.

• 1:19:54Anthony Pompliano?

  There's great power, I think, that comes with that. Are there downsides as well?

• 1:20:00Speaker 02

  It's a good question. I think the, yeah, there are certainly downsides. I think the upsides massively, massively outweigh the downsides. And the thing is, I do what I love and my, my north star is wanting to have a positive impact on millions and millions of people through my words and actions. That's the through line through everything I do, from podcasts to interviews, to my music, to my book, to public speaking. I want to positively impact and, and influence people. When I die, I want millions of people around the world to be like, man, like that guy made my life better in some way, shape or form. So for me personally, that's what I feel like I'm

• 1:20:44Speaker 02

  here on earth to do, uh, which to some people may sound kind of like, ooh, that sounds a bit like egotistic or arrogant or whatever. Like I, I don't care. Like that's what I'm do, I'm already doing it. Um, and I'm going to do a lot more of it over the next coming decades. And in terms of the, in terms of the downsides, it's like, it, it can be a lie. I mean, as you know, you have, you have a very large following. There's millions of people who know who you are. The majority of people I'm sure who know who you are like you and you know, like you and respect you, et cetera. And there's going to be some people who are critics or who are haters or who misunderstand intentionally or unintentionally, et cetera. And that can always be frustrating. Like it's not, you grow, you grow a thick skin and you have to, but it's never nice to see someone telling

• 1:21:26Speaker 02

  lies about you or just like cussing you out for no real reason. Like it's not, it's not pleasant, but the love so much outweighs it that it's like, who cares? You know, it's, it's, it's 20 to one, right? For every 20 lovely messages or DMs or comments or whatever I get, I get one which is like, and of course as human beings, we're, we're, we're more sensitive to negative emotions than we are to positive. So the one you remember, right? All those, you, you, 20 people, eh, pump, I love you. I love your show. I love what you're doing. You help me do this. You help me do that. You know, and then that one where someone just like, you know, that's the one you remember just because it's how, it's how we're wired.

• 1:22:07Speaker 02

  So I think it's important to just acknowledge that and then focus focus on the positive. Cause if you focus on the negative, not only is it bad for you mentally, but it also it also interrupts what you're doing. It gets in the way of your of your hustle. And so many people don't do what they want to do. Coming back full circle to what we were saying before, the biggest human fear more than death, I believe, is social disapproval. So why don't people you get people? Oh, I want to do YouTube. I'm afraid of putting out, I'm afraid to do, I want to do YouTube, but like, I'm afraid I want to start a podcast, but I'm not so sure. I want to, I want to write a book. It's people, people are afraid of social judgment. They're, they're, they're not afraid of making a YouTube video. They're afraid they'll make a YouTube video and either no one will

• 1:22:49Speaker 02

  watch it, or if people do, they're going to tell you, hey, your video sucks. Right? They want to make music, but they're afraid of that person going, man, your music sucks. Stick to your day job, whatever. And people have to be able to get over that hump. If I can give people any encouragement, it's like, look, that's gonna happen. It's inevitable. But if you let that stop you, you're literally letting those people win. Right? You're, you're, you're letting them win. If you're like, you know what, I'm gonna stop tweeting because like, a bunch of haters told me that I should stop. So you know, I'm gonna stop rapping because someone told me my song sucks. So like, you know, that's fine. Well, 100 people told me they loved it. A thousand people told me they love. So just keep, just keep going, keep doing your thing. And you'll

• 1:23:32Speaker 02

  naturally attract the right people. There's not a single person in this world, in any genre, who everybody likes. And it's rare for even most people to like something. The most, who's, who do you think is the most liked musician in the world, would you say?

• 1:23:47Anthony Pompliano?

  The most liked?

• 1:23:48Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:23:49Anthony Pompliano?

  I would have to, it's definitely a pop star. And if you had to measure, you'd have to separate out English speaking or not. Cause my guess is actually, there's probably somebody from like a Latin, like Ricky Martin, or you know, somebody like that who has kind of global appeal in a different way. But right now.

• 1:24:06Speaker 02

  Or even historically.

• 1:24:08Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah, I mean, right now.

• 1:24:11Anthony Pompliano?

  Michael Jackson.

• 1:24:12Speaker 02

  Does everybody like Michael Jackson? Yeah, but how many people? No, I'm saying billions of people love Michael Jackson's music, probably hundreds of millions at least.

• 1:24:20Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah.

• 1:24:21Speaker 02

  But millions of people don't.

• 1:24:22Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah.

• 1:24:23Speaker 02

  Right?

• 1:24:23Anthony Pompliano?

  Dolly Parton's probably up there.

• 1:24:24Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah.

• 1:24:25Anthony Pompliano?

  I mean, right now, but you you gotta ask yourself, uh, the people like Drake or Kanye, if they both dropped their album on the same day, who who's top of the charts?

• 1:24:33Speaker 02

  But yeah, but my my point is for all those fans and for all that love, there are still millions of people who don't like Drake's music or don't feel like they like him himself. There's millions of people who don't like, who think Kanye West sucks. Right? So imagine if Kanye was like paid attention just to that and was, oh, you know what, like, SexyBoy6969 on YouTube said that my album sucks, so I'm gonna.

• 1:24:58Anthony Pompliano?

  I'm done.

• 1:24:59Speaker 02

  I'm done.

• 1:25:02Speaker 02

  I'm packing it in, right? It's it's over. Oh, man, my video got 4,000 dislikes. You know, ignore that it got 400,000 likes. Oh, man, 4,000 people didn't like it like and they didn't like it so much that they wanted to express it.

• 1:25:13Anthony Pompliano?

  Do you read the comments?

• 1:25:15Speaker 02

  Uh, sometimes, sometimes.

• 1:25:17Anthony Pompliano?

  Well, do you have a a framework that you use in terms of when you read or when you don't, or when you're reading, how you deal with the positive and negative? I think it was Rogan actually said, he's like, reading the comments is bad for you regardless of it's good or bad.

• 1:25:30Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:25:30Anthony Pompliano?

  Right? You buy the bullshit or uh, or you, uh, you know, succumb to the the haters as well. Like, how do you think about when you read?

• 1:25:39Speaker 02

  That's a good question. I I normally read it. I think things get to a stage where, I mean, like with Joe Rogan, I mean, on it's would be literally be impossible for him to read all the comments. When you're at the stage when you can, then I still will read the majority. I won't necessarily react to everything. And I think it's also important to be able to differentiate between hate and criticism. Right? Because.

• 1:26:04Speaker 02

  Most people don't like criticism in general, right? Like criticisms, even if it's valid. In fact, if it's valid, it's probably stings a little bit more, especially if it's coming from people who you care about. But there's a difference between criticism and hate, and that's also important for people to know. Some people call everything hate, and I'm like, no, that's not hate. That's just, it's a valid criticism.

• 1:26:22Anthony Pompliano?

  You need the critics, but also at the same time, there's a fine line between critics and hate.

• 1:26:27Speaker 02

  Yeah, I think, look, criticism is something you can do. The way I differentiate is you can do something with it. I think there's a differentiation in the intentionality. All right, I think hate is intentionally designed to harm you, whereas criticism comes from a place of care or interest.

• 1:26:43Anthony Pompliano?

  You suck versus that song, you could have added a stronger beat to it.

• 1:26:48Speaker 02

  Yeah, I didn't really like the beat on this song, but the lyrics were dope, right? Valid. Again, whether I agree or not, whatever, but I can't, oh, that's a hater. It's like, no, that's not a hater. That's just someone, you know, they like, oh, they love that song. They like the beat on that song. And it's fine. So I think like criticism, it's the intentionality, and it's also can you potentially do something with it? Right? I might find that, okay, like people are generally saying that,

• 1:27:16Speaker 02

  oh, the vocal, maybe even in the mix of a song, oh, you know, they're saying the vocals are too low. Like dozen people said that, oh, I couldn't really hear what you were saying. Like the beat was too loud. So, okay, that's not hate. That's like, okay, good, good, good. I can do something with that. They'll listen to the podcast, say, oh, you know, like, I can only hear it in the left, the left ear. Like there was a problem with the soundtrack. It's, oh, good to know. Okay, cool. Like I can build on that. If it's just, oh, you're an idiot.

• 1:27:45Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 1:27:47Speaker 02

  I disagree, but um.

• 1:27:50Anthony Pompliano?

  I always categorize the haters as future fans that don't know it yet.

• 1:27:57Anthony Pompliano?

  I was just like, you're a hater today, but like, I'll wear you down.

• 1:27:59Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:28:00Anthony Pompliano?

  Right? And like, if you keep watching, if you keep listening, then like, I'm just gonna eventually indoctrinate you to become a fan. And uh, when you do that, it's just like, oh, like, it's on them. Like, they just haven't consumed enough content yet. They'll get there.

• 1:28:14Speaker 02

  Yeah, or sometimes it's denial, right? Oftentimes, a hater is a fan in denial, especially if it's a dedicated hater. If it's one of those ones who like, follows you on multiple platforms, and they're subscribed to your YouTube channel, and like, I'm like, man, there's something you find compelling about me, like, clearly. Cause if you genuinely dislike something, you, it's, it's not hate, you respond with, it's actually apathy. You just don't, you just don't care. Like, you don't watch it, you don't listen, whatever, right? You're not, like, there's more music in the world that you don't like than there is music that you like.

• 1:28:44Anthony Pompliano?

  Of course.

• 1:28:44Speaker 02

  But you don't go around listening to all of the, going on all their YouTube videos and disliking them, and writing, "Your song sucks. You suck." You're so, like, no sane person does that. What you do is you just gravitate towards

• 1:28:57Anthony Pompliano?

  What you like.

• 1:28:57Speaker 02

  the stuff that you do like. But for you to do the former, it would be like, man, there has to be something you're finding compelling about what this person is putting out there. If you're going and commenting on multiple videos and you're like, follow, you're, you're still following, you know, it's like, you're a confused fan.

• 1:29:13Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah, it's just, uh, whenever I get any hateful messages, and I get everything from like, "You suck," to, uh, "You're wrong," which is like, okay,

• 1:29:21Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:29:22Anthony Pompliano?

  to like, "Go kill yourself," right? I mean, like, like the whole game, and I'm sure you do as well. And, uh, sometimes I just respond with, "Hey, sounds like you're having a bad day. Let me know if I can do anything." Like, feel free to like, reach out if you need help.

• 1:29:33Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:29:34Anthony Pompliano?

  And people get quiet. The other thing that shuts people up real fast is, "Thanks for the engagement."

• 1:29:45Anthony Pompliano?

  Cause that one is like, oh shit. Like, by me basically saying negative things, I'm actually propelling this piece of content in the algorithm, and people also get real gun shy, right? Cause it's like, I could say something, but to some degree, I'm actually helping this person, so like, maybe I won't say anything. And it's always like, one of those like, judo moves where they're just like, alright, fine.

• 1:30:04Speaker 02

  With, with actual hate, it's always a reflection. On the hater rather than the target.

• 1:30:09Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah.

• 1:30:09Speaker 02

  Always. It's like, look, no, no happy, successful content person spends hours online or in the real world, just hating on other people. It's, it's not, it's not a thing. If you're doing that, there's something going on in your own life, in your own mentality, et cetera, that is causing you to behave that way. And oftentimes you just happen to be the target of the day. You just, you just happen to pop up on their feed at their, this pump guy and his fricking grin and his thumbs up is just pissing me off. And like,

• 1:30:39Anthony Pompliano?

  You know, that's why I do it, right? You know, that's why I do it.

• 1:30:43Speaker 02

  Like, I just, he's just,

• 1:30:45Anthony Pompliano?

  You can never let him see you sweat. It's like, look, man, I got a great, I got a great life. I literally got nothing to complain about in life. You want to take a picture with me? No problem. Right? I got all is good on, on my side. And, and it pisses people off, by the way.

• 1:30:59Speaker 02

  I know.

• 1:31:00Anthony Pompliano?

  Like, there are people who are literally like, dude, this guy. And you're like,

• 1:31:04Speaker 02

  But that's the thing. It's, it's,

• 1:31:05Anthony Pompliano?

  Sorry that me smiling makes you mad.

• 1:31:07Speaker 02

  Yeah, you smiling makes me happy. I'm like dope. I love that. I love that pump is, is, is living his life and he's there with his wife and they're doing this. And they're like, oh, I'm like, awesome. That's,

• 1:31:16Anthony Pompliano?

  Can you imagine if I took photos with her, like George Washington, you took photos like,

• 1:31:22Anthony Pompliano?

  people like, damn, he really got a hard life at home.

• 1:31:25Speaker 02

  Do you know the funniest thing I find in, in old, not less photos, but in the paintings, in old paintings, when they draw babies? And you know, they just make the babies look like little adults. Like, like the babies never look like babies. They just like take the adult face and it's all serious. And then they stick it on this body.

• 1:31:44Anthony Pompliano?

  Got a big ass, like, like line across their forehead, got a full head of hair combed over perfectly, teeth all right there on a one month old, ready to rock and roll.

• 1:31:52Speaker 02

  I find that so funny in old paintings. I'm just like, why are the babies looking like that? Like, that does not look like a child.

• 1:31:57Anthony Pompliano?

  All right, we got 10 more minutes. I ask people for questions. They got all kinds of stuff in here. A bunch of people are commenting about Kanye, and not necessarily direct questions, but what's your general take on?

• 1:32:09Speaker 02

  I love that guy.

• 1:32:09Anthony Pompliano?

  Him, album not dropping yet.

• 1:32:12Speaker 02

  Oh.

• 1:32:12Anthony Pompliano?

  And then selling out the, the stadium twice for a listening show, which is, Incredible.

• 1:32:19Speaker 02

  Yeah, well, honestly, I haven't paid much attention to that stuff. When it comes to music, I tend to not focus much or pay much attention to the antics around it. I kind of will wait, like when the album drops, I will listen to the album.

• 1:32:32Anthony Pompliano?

  Yep.

• 1:32:32Speaker 02

  But like, I'm not really following all the ins and outs and drama and soap opera stuff surrounding the release. I'm just there like, okay, like, I'm just gonna wait until it comes out. Yeah, when it drops, I'll check it out. Kanye, though, like I've been a Kanye fan since like early, like when he dropped his, before college dropout. What was the Get Well mixtape that he put out when he did Through the Wire, et cetera? Back when he was producing for like Beanie Seagull, Jay-Z, et cetera, like Kanye, both as a producer and as an artist and as a human being, I just think is dope. And I think he's, I think he's authentic and he always has been. He's willing to go against the grain. And he's done this from the beginning. You have to remember that when Kanye came out, that was like in the 50 cent G-Unit era, like that was, yeah, that was like.

• 1:33:18Anthony Pompliano?

  Dude, the dropout was not what he's doing now.

• 1:33:21Speaker 02

  No, no, like he came out, you know, when he used to wear his backpack and his like polo shirts. And this is when hip hop was like, now hip hop is, some of it's a little fruity, but like he was like super ultra masculine and aggressive and whatever. It's like DMX and like, you know, the Rough Riders and G-Unit and whatever. And then Kanye just came out and he was rapping about, you know, I'm so self-conscious and Jesus walks and.

• 1:33:43Anthony Pompliano?

  You know who he reminds me of is Chance the Rapper today? How Chance the Rapper kind of does something a little bit different than the mainstream.

• 1:33:52Anthony Pompliano?

  He really, he really just had a different approach.

• 1:33:55Speaker 02

  Yeah. And I think, do you know something with Kanye as well that's important? He's not like, it's not like he's the first rapper to do this, but I think the fact that he uses his real name is actually quite important. Right? In hip hop, if you think back to pre Kanye, most rappers always had a persona. It was always a persona.

• 1:34:12Anthony Pompliano?

  Or Puff Daddy?

• 1:34:14Speaker 02

  Yeah, but it was, it was all personas. Kanye was like one of the first big artists who went, again, not the only one, but who went by his real name. And I think that that actually. Matters. I think it actually makes a difference. I think even as a creator, as an artist, I'm putting, I put my music out under Zuby. Like I am Zuby through and through, like in my music, in a podcast and whatever. This is Zuby. It's not like, oh, I step on the stage and I'm suddenly like Lil Z or like, I don't know what my

• 1:34:41Anthony Pompliano?

  Was that the other option?

• 1:34:42Speaker 02

  I don't even know. I don't even know. I have no idea what my rap name would be if I, if I weren't actually named Zuby. I've thought about, I don't know, like Young

• 1:34:51Anthony Pompliano?

  Did you ever think about getting a different name?

• 1:34:53Speaker 02

  No, I was just, my name's already Zuby. It's unique.

• 1:34:55Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah.

• 1:34:55Speaker 02

  I'll just be Zuby. But I think it makes you more real. Like it lends when you're creating.

• 1:35:02Anthony Pompliano?

  Lil Z, what is that all time?

• 1:35:05Anthony Pompliano?

  Cause like, do you go Lil Z or do you put Z E E? Like, what do you, you know, you got some decisions to make in there?

• 1:35:11Speaker 02

  No, there was a Young Z. Young Z is a rapper. The Young thing's a problem though, cause like, you're not always like, you'll, you've got older, right?

• 1:35:20Speaker 02

  But yeah, like it's

• 1:35:22Anthony Pompliano?

  Lil Wayne will always be short though.

• 1:35:23Speaker 02

  Yeah. So I think, I think what Kanye did is, you know, he bucked the trend. He bucked the trend on a lot of stuff. There's a lot that he, that he's done that people actually forget because people have short-term memories. I mean, I remember when um, he made like quite a strong statement against the level of homophobia in hip hop. Right? This is back when rappers were just throwing around the F word, willy-nilly and you know, just all these gay slurs, whatever. And Kanye was like, you know what? Like, that's not cool. Like, why are we, why are we doing that? And he got quite a lot of backlash for that. Like it was a very, this is, cause this is back in like 2003 or four or whatever, right? This is before, like now it's trendy and popular to, it's June, like let's rainbow everything up,

• 1:36:06Speaker 02

  right? But that wasn't like a popular stance to take at the time, particularly in hip hop. And actually it made a difference. It made a difference. Like people after the time were like, nah, reflected a little and yeah, maybe like, maybe we shouldn't just, you know, throw that word around so much, right? And people kind of forget that stuff. Even a lot of the people who will attack and like, they forget he did this, he did that. Remember when he did the, George Bush does, doesn't care about black people thing?

• 1:36:33Anthony Pompliano?

  Put it in the song, right?

• 1:36:34Speaker 02

  He just, yeah, but he was on TV and he just said it like after Hurricane Katrina and people are like, yo, like, he just, like, whether or not, and, you know, and George Bush, like, was like, you know, he went on the defensive. He was like, no, like, I do. But it made him sort of wake up. It was like, well, this hurricane just sort of swept through, you know, New Orleans, et cetera. And the, the response has not, has been very lackluster. But stuff like that, it, he just puts that out there. That's what he thought. It's what he felt. People can agree, disagree, whatever. It's authentic, you know? And now with him even, his conversion to Christianity and being like, you know what, like, I'm, I'm a Christian and this is what I believe and this is what I stand for. And, you know,

• 1:37:18Speaker 02

  I'm not really, I'm gonna stop performing some of my old songs because I don't actually like what they represent. And now that I'm a, he's a father, what, four children? Right? And then he's like, yeah, you know, like, I don't, I wouldn't want my kids listening to that or whatever. So that's just real, man. Cause it's, it's hard to do that, especially if it would have an impact on your, your finances, social standing, your cool factor, whatever, you know? And he just doesn't care about that. Like Kanye's just cool. And I think he's cool because of that.

• 1:37:42Anthony Pompliano?

  He's the only Christian who can be rapping about Jesus while wearing a bulletproof vest. And people are like, yup, makes sense.

• 1:37:50Speaker 02

  Makes complete sense.

• 1:37:53Anthony Pompliano?

  All right. Next question, Bitcoin. What are your thoughts about Bitcoin's future? I think this is more-

• 1:37:58Speaker 02

  Man, I'm, uh, I'm hyper bullish.

• 1:37:59Anthony Pompliano?

  You got the shirt on.

• 1:38:00Speaker 02

  I got the shirt on. I had to rep it. I had to rep it. I knew which podcast I was coming on. Um, man, I'm, I'm hyper bullish on Bitcoin. Like, as a, as a long-term asset, I think, um, I think Bitcoin's gonna do for money what the internet has done for information, what social media has done for communication. Um, in the short term, I, I, I look at Bitcoin as a, as a longer-term in, investment. I don't look at it as just, uh, I'm not a trader. I'm not there like every single day trying to time the markets and catch the dips and, you know, sell the tops, et cetera. Um, but I think every day it becomes more obvious to me why it's such a good idea.

• 1:38:44Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah.

• 1:38:44Speaker 02

  Right? The more that governments debase their currencies, the more that they do this, all the nonsense restrictions and infringements on rights and liberties that they've been doing. The more, um, you know, every time they pass these multi-trillion dollar bills every time that. And this is on a global level as well, right? Like not just the US. If you see what's going on around the world. I mean, some currencies, I was in. I was in Turkey before coming to the US. Like, I mean, the Turkish lira got battered. And if you imagine. One thing I find interesting with Bitcoin is the way that it's viewed as such a high-risk investment or such a high-risk play. And most people don't understand how risky it is to just like have all your money in cash, right?

• 1:39:27Speaker 02

  Some people think the safest thing you can do is just have all your money in cash and put it in the bank. Don't buy stocks, don't buy land, don't buy gold, don't buy Bitcoin, just keep your money. And I'm like, that is guaranteed to drop. Guaranteed. A decade from now, hundred percent guarantee, if you keep your hundred thousand dollars in a bank, a million dollars in the bank. It's gonna lose a lot of its value.

• 1:39:51Speaker 02

  Now, on a, on a day-to-day level, a month-to-month level, you know, Bitcoin goes up and down. It was like, well, twenty thousand, sixty thousand, forty thousand, like. But if you look at it over a period of years, I know it's still relatively young compared to most asset classes. But I think it's, to me, it's virtually guaranteed, borrowing some, I don't know what could happen, but. I think it's virtually guaranteed a decade from now, like Bitcoin is going to be worth, like five years from now, is going to be worth considerably more than it is today. And I think from a, it's interesting from a technological standpoint, a sociopolitical standpoint, economic, everything, it all. It just makes sense to me. And the fact that it's so global, we live in such a global world now.

• 1:40:36Speaker 02

  And the internet has really done that and broken all these barriers, et cetera. And. The currency should do the same thing, right? There it shouldn't be incredibly difficult or extraordinarily expensive to send money from here to Australia or here to Nigeria or whatever it is. And I think that the younger generation, people who, you know, people our age and younger, who are coming up in the world, I think the, a lot of people compare Bitcoin to gold and say Bitcoin is digital gold. I think that it's much easier to sell the concept of Bitcoin to a 10-year-old than gold, right? I mean, my nieces and nephews know what Bitcoin is because they see me wearing the T-shirts and stuff and they're like, "Zubie, Uncle Zubie, what's Bitcoin?"

• 1:41:21Speaker 02

  And I'll explain it to them and they're like, "Cool, can you buy me some?" And I'm like, "Actually, I will." Actually, yes, I will. And we'll see, we'll see if we're correct here. So I think, um, I, yeah, I think, I think Bitcoin's a big disruptor in a good way to the traditional legacy, old system of every, I mean, to be honest, the old, old system was better than what we have today, right?

• 1:41:51Anthony Pompliano?

  Of course.

• 1:41:52Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:41:53Anthony Pompliano?

  Today, today's the 50-year anniversary of Nixon taking us off.

• 1:41:57Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:41:58Anthony Pompliano?

  Temporarily, we're, we're going back, don't worry.

• 1:42:00Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah, okay, okay. So, and then even if you know, you think about it on a deeper level with like, I mean, how are all these wars and stuff, how are they all funded? All of this nonsense that goes on, it's like, it's just because you can just make, make, make all this magic money. So I think that people en masse owning Bitcoin is a peaceful, nonviolent protest and a vote to say, "Hey, actually, this is how we wanna, this is moving towards how we wanna operate."

• 1:42:33Anthony Pompliano?

  I don't think I could have said it better. I think you nailed it.

• 1:42:37Anthony Pompliano?

  The last thing I want to bring up is Alexander Amen, I think is how you say it. Just said, "World of Zuby is fire."

• 1:42:46Speaker 02

  Oh, thank you.

• 1:42:47Anthony Pompliano?

  So, give us, uh, give us kind of a quick overview of, uh, World of Zuby and where people can go listen.

• 1:42:54Speaker 02

  Oh, sure. So, yeah, my new album just came out worldwide on Friday. So, it's called, uh, "Word of Zuby." It is available on iTunes, Spotify, Apple Music, Tidal Deezer, wherever you get your music. If you want to get a physical copy, I've got CDs available. And you can also preorder limited edition, uh, 12-inch purple vinyl from my website, teamzuby.com. So, it ships out worldwide. Uh, the vinyl's gonna ship in Q4, but CDs are available now. So, go to teamzuby.com or go on your favorite digital platform, search "Zuby," Z-U-B-Y, and you will find me.

• 1:43:29Anthony Pompliano?

  I've been dropping your website in the comments as we're going, and I just put it in there again. Colton, who, uh, who works with us on a bunch of, uh, employment, uh, business, wants to know if Zuby or Kanye was gonna drop first, but you dropped first on, uh, on Friday, so you beat Kanye. He's like a gazillion weeks late. He, uh, he may never drop the album. I, I think that might be the strategy here.

• 1:43:54Speaker 02

  I don't know. Kanye's, uh, an unpredictable one.

• 1:43:57Anthony Pompliano?

  Teamzuby.com. Uh, I don't think I've ever seen you in person without wearing the Team Zuby hat. But I do want to call out, and I'll let you plug one other thing, which is the "Okay Dude."

• 1:44:10Speaker 02

  Oh, yeah.

• 1:44:11Anthony Pompliano?

  Explain real quick what happened with the "Okay Dude." Cause I think this is like, this is like the, uh, quintessential thing that I could point to. Like, "You wanna know what Zuby's like? Here, here's your thing."

• 1:44:20Speaker 02

  Okay, dude. So, I got, um, so I got suspended temporarily on Twitter for literally writing "Okay Dude" in response to someone. So...

• 1:44:31Speaker 02

  The full story is I'd written a list of five ways, five tips for girls on how to land a great guy, and the list went viral. And a lot of people liked it, a lot of people didn't like it. And someone, it was a verified account, responded back something like, "This is terrible advice, and I bet I sleep with way more women than you." And I literally just quote tweeted it and said, "Okay, dude." And that was it. A week later, I'm just going about my normal business. A week later, I'm on a train back from London, and I get an email from Twitter saying that your account, you've been locked out of your account. And it said hateful conduct. And the thing it said, you know, "You may not, you may not attack people based on their

• 1:45:13Speaker 02

  race, ethnicity, sexuality, gender identity, religion, etc." I'm like, "I'm pretty sure I don't do that." And then I was like, "This was the offending tweet." And I look at it, and it says, "Okay, dude." And I'm like, "Wait, what?" So initially, I thought, "Is this like a fake email or something?" Yeah, yeah, so I go on Twitter, and I don't know if you've ever been locked out of Twitter. I get a notification just telling me I'm locked out of my account. And to get it access again, like, I'll have to delete it, and then I'll be reinstated in like 24, 48 hours. So I'm like, "No, they've made a mistake here." So I made an appeal. I get an email back the next day saying, "We've manually reviewed this, and we can confirm that your tweet, in fact, did break our hateful conduct policy.

• 1:45:54Speaker 02

  So if you want to gain access to your account again, you have to delete the offending tweet." And so, you know, I wanted access to my hundreds of thousands of followers, so I deleted it. But then I made a T-shirt. There was a T-shirt printer near where I lived, and I just made a T-shirt that just said, "Okay, dude." And the first tweet I put back up, by the way, #FreeZuby and #OkayDude started trending during my time off Twitter. And then I came back, and I just posted a video of me dancing, wearing this T-shirt, saying "Okay, dude" on it. And everyone was, "I want that T-shirt, I want that T-shirt." So I started just taking orders from them, and ended up selling like hundreds and hundreds of "Okay, dude" T-shirts and hats.

• 1:46:36Speaker 02

  And so it became a thing, and then I made a song called "Okay, Dude", with a music video. It's actually one of my most popular songs now. So I just took it and turned it back. What could have been a bad situation?

• 1:46:48Anthony Pompliano?

  Dude, don't get us canceled off YouTube. We can't say "Okay, dude." You know how blasphemous that is? You're really pushing the edge of societal acceptance here.

• 1:46:58Speaker 02

  Of a hundred thousand tweets I've put out there. That was the one. That was the one they were like, nope, that crosses the line. That was the one.

• 1:47:06Anthony Pompliano?

  Okay, dude.

• 1:47:08Speaker 02

  They've never told me which of those two words. And maybe it was the ellipsis at the end, like the dot, dot, dot. I don't know.

• 1:47:15Anthony Pompliano?

  It is, uh,

• 1:47:18Anthony Pompliano?

  weird times we are living in. I think is how we can sum it up. You go to Austin next?

• 1:47:24Speaker 02

  Yeah, I'm off to Austin this evening.

• 1:47:25Anthony Pompliano?

  All right, and you're gonna be there for a week or so?

• 1:47:29Speaker 02

  Yeah, I'll be there for just over a week. Then I'm going to Dallas, Fort Worth, Maine, NYC, DC, Maui, LA, Atlanta, Nashville, and Raleigh, and maybe some other spots.

• 1:47:43Anthony Pompliano?

  Go follow Zubee. Add Zubee Music on Twitter. I think that you'll tweet out when you're gonna do meetups and stuff on this.

• 1:47:50Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah, I'm gonna try to do.

• 1:47:52Anthony Pompliano?

  Country tour.

• 1:47:52Speaker 02

  Yeah, I'll definitely do a meetup in Austin. I know I got a ton of fans in Austin. I'll do, I'm gonna try to do meetups in every city as long as I get the time to do it.

• 1:48:00Anthony Pompliano?

  All right. I appreciate everyone watching. Hopefully, we didn't offend you with all of our very scary independent thinking. Zubee is a very dangerous person. He thinks too much for himself. We must protect him at all costs, but at the same time, be very, very careful because he could hurt your brain. Make sure you smash the like button. I'm not doing any more of these on Sunday. We will be back to regular programming starting tomorrow at 11:00 AM. Kevin O'Leary is coming on. And that should be interesting because Kevin was a crypto hater. Now he's a crypto enthusiast.

• 1:48:42Speaker 02

  Love it.

• 1:48:42Anthony Pompliano?

  And, uh, you know.

• 1:48:45Anthony Pompliano?

  He's a shark, so we'll see. Any last words for everybody?

• 1:48:49Speaker 02

  That's it, man. I appreciate you, brother.

• 1:48:51Anthony Pompliano?

  Of course. Zuby Music on Twitter or TeamZuby.com. Go listen, go buy OK Dude. People are now responding to everything as OK Dude in the comments, of course. Somehow that is gonna now permeate over if we're gonna use that. Is it your birthday?

• 1:49:10Speaker 02

  On Thursday.

• 1:49:11Anthony Pompliano?

  Oh, alright. Somebody said happy birthday Zuby.

• 1:49:13Speaker 02

  Oh, thank you.

• 1:49:14Anthony Pompliano?

  Happy birthday. Wow, we're ahead of the curve. Amazing. First time ever. Usually we're late for everything, as you saw with the livestream coming on 15 minutes late. That was my fault. Literally, we were watching stupid videos on YouTube. Alright, man. Thanks so much for doing this.

• 1:49:29Speaker 02

  Appreciate it, bro.