Michael Malice: Freedom, Hope, and Happiness Amidst Chaos | Lex Fridman Podcast #150

1. 0:00 – 3:25

   Introduction

   1. LFLex Fridman0:00

      The following is a conversation with Michael Malice, his second time on the podcast. He's an anarchist, political thinker, podcaster, and author. He wrote Dear Reader, which is a book on North Korea, and The New Right, a book on the various ideological movements at the fringe of American politics. He hosts a podcast called You're Welcome, spelled Y-O-U-R, and in general, does a lot of live shows on YouTube that are, at times, profoundly absurd, and at other times, absurdly profound, and always full of humor and wisdom. He is the Joker to my Batman, and the caviar to my vodka. His masterful dance between dark humor and difficult, even dangerous ideas, challenges me to think deeply about this world, and when that fails, at least smile and have a good laugh at the absurdity of it all. This episode has much of that. His outfit, for example, the exact inverse of mine, (laughs) with a white suit and a black shirt, is just one example of that, of the humor, trolling, and brilliance that is Michael Malice. A quick mention of our sponsors, NetSuite business management software, Athletic Greens all-in-one nutrition drink, Sunbasket meal delivery service, and Cash App. So the choice is success, health, food, or money. Choose wisely, my friends. And if you wish, click the sponsor links below to get a discount and to support this podcast. As a side note, let me say that Michael is, in many ways, a man of radical ideas, but also a man with kindness in his heart. Those two things are great ingredients for a fascinating conversation. I hope to have several such people on this podcast this upcoming year who also have radical ideas about politics, science, technology, and life. At times, often perhaps, I might fail at asking the challenging questions that should be asked, but I will try my best to do so and hope to keep improving every time. Mostly, I come to these conversations with an open mind and with love. Unfortunately, that kind of approach can be taken advantage of in many ways. It can be used by reporters or just people online later to highlight how or why I'm ignorant or, worse, I'm generally not a good human being. In the context of this, I have two options. I could either be cautious and afraid, or second, be kind, thoughtful, and fearless. I choose the latter, hopefully while still being open, fragile, and empathetic. Again, I strive to be like the main character of The Idiot by Dostoevsky. That's my New Year's resolution, be kind and do difficult things, difficult conversations, difficult research projects, and difficult entrepreneurial adventures. If you enjoy this thing, subscribe on YouTube, review it on Apple Podcast, follow on Spotify, support it on Patreon, or connect with me on Twitter @lexfriedman. And now, here's my conversation with Michael Malice.

2. 3:25 – 12:10

   Conversation with Alex Jones and Tim Pool

   1. LFLex Fridman3:25

      Knock, knock.

   2. MMMichael Malice3:27

      (laughs)

   3. LFLex Fridman3:27

      (laughs)

   4. MMMichael Malice3:27

      You're stealing my bit? I'll kill your family. (laughs)

   5. LFLex Fridman3:32

      (laughs) That's not how a knock-knock joke works.

   6. MMMichael Malice3:35

      We're-

   7. LFLex Fridman3:35

      Knock, knock, Michael.

   8. MMMichael Malice3:36

      You don't do knock-knock jokes with Russians.

   9. LFLex Fridman3:37

      (laughs)

   10. MMMichael Malice3:38

       Because if we have a knock at the door, "Shh. Tickle, tickle, tickle. Turn down the TV." (laughs) You gotta sit quiet-

   11. LFLex Fridman3:43

       (laughs)

   12. MMMichael Malice3:44

       ... and then hope they go away. This is... You don't do that back-

   13. LFLex Fridman3:47

       (laughs)

   14. MMMichael Malice3:47

       ... in the motherland. You know this.

   15. LFLex Fridman3:49

       It's triggering. (laughs)

   16. MMMichael Malice3:49

       Who's there?

   17. LFLex Fridman3:50

       (laughs) I can't even do it now. Knock, knock.

   18. MMMichael Malice3:54

       Who's there?

   19. LFLex Fridman3:55

       (sighs) Leon.

   20. MMMichael Malice3:57

       Leon who?

   21. LFLex Fridman3:58

       Leon me when you're not strong, Michael. (laughs)

   22. MMMichael Malice4:01

       Well, well, that will never happen. (laughs)

   23. LFLex Fridman4:03

       I stole elegantly, eloquently that joke from you.

   24. MMMichael Malice4:08

       (laughs) The lie detector determined that was a lie.

   25. LFLex Fridman4:10

       (laughs)

   26. MMMichael Malice4:10

       Elegantly and eloquent... Oh.

   27. LFLex Fridman4:14

       (laughs)

   28. MMMichael Malice4:15

       (laughs) No.

   29. LFLex Fridman4:15

       Yeah. You crossed it out on a sheet of paper. That means it's real. The reason I bring it up is 'cause you had the guts, the brilliance to, to, uh, do a knock-knock joke not once, but three times with Alex Jones.

   30. MMMichael Malice4:28

       I think it was, like, six. I had a runner.
3. 12:10 – 20:31

   Michael's outfit

   1. MMMichael Malice12:10

   2. LFLex Fridman12:10

      Are we gonna address...... the outfit you're wearing.

   3. MMMichael Malice12:15

      We can address it, sure.

   4. LFLex Fridman12:16

      You know, for those who are colorblind (laughs) -

   5. MMMichael Malice12:19

      (laughs)

   6. LFLex Fridman12:20

      ... Mi- Michael's wearing the, or if, or if you're just listening to this, (laughs) Michael's wearing the exact opposite, the universe from a, From Another Dimension outfit, which is a white suit and black shirt. Ah, it's so genius. Okay, so, uh-

   7. MMMichael Malice12:36

      You should see the next two looks I've planned.

   8. LFLex Fridman12:38

      Oh, no.

   9. MMMichael Malice12:39

      Yeah, they're great. Well, obviously this relationship's gonna end today. (laughs)

   10. LFLex Fridman12:44

       It's a, it's over.

   11. MMMichael Malice12:44

       So, I'll, I'll put them on Insta. (laughs)

   12. LFLex Fridman12:47

       (laughs) Okay. Is there some deep ph- philosophy to the humor? Is, uh, let's go start a trolling discussion.

   13. MMMichael Malice12:54

       Sure.

   14. LFLex Fridman12:54

       Is, is there some, i- is there, like, chapters to this genius? Or is this just, uh, what makes you smile in the morning?

   15. MMMichael Malice13:03

       Well, I, I mean, I, I think you're honestly, in this case, using the word genius a little loosely.

   16. LFLex Fridman13:07

       I am.

   17. MMMichael Malice13:07

       I don't think this is particularly genius.

   18. LFLex Fridman13:09

       Yeah.

   19. MMMichael Malice13:09

       But I do think it is fun, it is exuberant, it is joyous. Um, I think the, the bigger my audience has gotten, um, and the more I actually communicate with, you know, fans, I do feel it kinda kicks in these paternal maternal instincts. It's, which is-

   20. LFLex Fridman13:29

       (laughs)

   21. MMMichael Malice13:29

       ... very, very odd. I did not expect to have them.

   22. LFLex Fridman13:30

       What do you mean? Who's the dad? Who's-

   23. MMMichael Malice13:32

       I'm the dad and the mom. I remember, and it may have been similar for you, I'm curious to hear it, for young, smart, like, um, ambitious men, like 24 to 27 for me was a very rough period because that's the window where a lot of people get married and they kinda check out. And if you're very much kind of finding your own road, um, you don't know what's happening, no one's in a position to really guide you or help you, and it's, it's, it's tough. It's a very tough window. And what I'm finding now is having these kids who are in that position, but now instead of them stumbling along, for some of them, I'm the one who could be like, "No, no, no, no, it's not you, it's everybody else." And to be able to give them that semblance of feeling seen, to use a cliché expression, to feel normal, and that, "No, no, you're the, you're the, you're the heroes here, they're the background noise," um, it's just really very, uh, flattering and humbling to be in that position.

   24. LFLex Fridman14:30

       You have many minds, right? There's the thoughtful kind Michael, there's like, "I'm gonna burn down," the powerful-

   25. MMMichael Malice14:38

       Yeah.

   26. LFLex Fridman14:39

       ... Michael. (laughs)

   27. MMMichael Malice14:39

       I do like... Yeah.

   28. LFLex Fridman14:41

       And then there's like, "I'm going to have this just lighthearted trolling of the world."

   29. MMMichael Malice14:47

       Yeah.

   30. LFLex Fridman14:48

       Which, and which of those are most important to the 24 to, uh, to the 27 demographic?
4. 20:31 – 30:19

   Self-publishing a book

   1. MMMichael Malice20:31

      it's so much better to-

   2. LFLex Fridman20:31

      I gotta talk to you about self-publishing 'cause that, you brought that up. And s-

   3. MMMichael Malice20:36

      I'm, I'm doing the next book's also gonna be self-published.

   4. LFLex Fridman20:39

      Can we talk about self-publishing?

   5. MMMichael Malice20:40

      Sure.

   6. LFLex Fridman20:40

      What, um, what's the, what's the whole idea of publishing, uh, like having a publisher and an agent? 'Cause there's a bunch of people who've been reaching out to me trying to get me to write a book, which is ridiculous.

   7. MMMichael Malice20:52

      Why?

   8. LFLex Fridman20:52

      There, there's people who are brilliant folks like you, like Jordan Peterson, that I think have a lot of knowledge to share with the world.

   9. MMMichael Malice21:00

      Okay.

   10. LFLex Fridman21:00

       I think what I feel I can contribute to the world in terms of impact is to build something.

   11. MMMichael Malice21:09

       Okay.

   12. LFLex Fridman21:10

       Meaning like engineering stuff.

   13. MMMichael Malice21:12

       Okay.

   14. LFLex Fridman21:12

       Like a book I feel-

   15. MMMichael Malice21:13

       A book has to be engineered, and I'm not using that loosely.

   16. LFLex Fridman21:16

       W-

   17. MMMichael Malice21:16

       You have to engineer a book.

   18. LFLex Fridman21:17

       No, for sure. I, what I mean is like literally a product with programming and artificial intelligence law. That's, I want to build a company. I want to... 'Cause there's, I have a few ideas that I feel I'm equipped... And, and it has to do with your like intuition about the way you can build a better world, you individually. Like what can you add to the world that's a positive thing? And for me, I feel like the maximal thing I can add to the world is at least to attempt to build products that would add more love in the world. And like, so I wanna focus on that. The danger of the book for me or any kind of writing, and even this podcast is a little bit dangerous for me, is like, it's fun.

   19. MMMichael Malice21:59

       Oh,

   20. LFLex Fridman21:59

       that's for sure. (laughs)

   21. MMMichael Malice22:02

       It's... (laughs)

   22. LFLex Fridman22:02

       (laughs) It's, it's fun. It's like it takes you into this place where you start thinking about the world. You start enjoying and playing with ideas. You start... And like, uh, just your book on, um, uh, Dear Reader, uh, but also The New Write. Like clearly, you and I probably think similarly in the sense that you did a lot of work.

   23. MMMichael Malice22:23

       Yes. This next book is cr- is killing me.

   24. LFLex Fridman22:25

       Yeah. As you mention often, it's clear like, uh, on your YouTube channel, which I'm a fan of, you often, it just comes out like you mention all of these books that you're reading.

   25. MMMichael Malice22:37

       Yeah.

   26. LFLex Fridman22:37

       It just comes through you that you're suffering through this and you've be- it changes you. And it's clear that you're thinking deeply about the world because of this book. And I feel like if you do that, that's like, uh, when I was, when I first came to this country, I read, read the book The Giver. I need to read it again. It's like, y- it, uh, the, the red pill thing, is it changes you in, where you can never be the same person again.

   27. MMMichael Malice23:04

       Sure.

   28. LFLex Fridman23:04

       And I feel, I feel about a book in that same way. The moment you write a book... But the moment, of course, it depends on the book. I could also just write, uh, like in my field, a very technical book about-

   29. MMMichael Malice23:16

       No, that's a terrible idea.

   30. LFLex Fridman23:17

       (laughs) Yes. But that, that's okay. That doesn't really change you. That's just like sharing information. But like something where you're like, "How do I think about this world?" Can you just leave that behind you?
5. 30:19 – 41:43

   The white pill

   1. MMMichael Malice30:20

   2. LFLex Fridman30:20

      Well, can- can we actually talk about the suffering?

   3. MMMichael Malice30:24

      Sure.

   4. LFLex Fridman30:24

      The darkest parts of writing a book. So, the, let's- let's go to the full Michael Malice, Stephen King.... mode of, uh, what are the darkest moments of writing this book, and what is it, maybe start The White Pill? What's the idea? What's the hope? And what are your darkest moments around writing this book?

   5. MMMichael Malice30:43

      So, people are familiar with the red pill and the blue pill. The- the red- the- th- they're from The Matrix. The red pill is the idea that what is presented as fact by the corporate press, entertainment industry, is in fact a carefully constructed narrative designed to keep some very unpleasant people in power, and everyone else under control. And I guess a c- one of my expressions is, "You take one red pill, not the whole bottle."

   6. LFLex Fridman31:05

      Yeah.

   7. MMMichael Malice31:05

      Because at a certain point you think everything's a lie, and then you're- you're kind of no capacity for distinguishing truths.

   8. LFLex Fridman31:11

      You're full of good one-liners.

   9. MMMichael Malice31:13

      Well, thank you.

   10. LFLex Fridman31:14

       Yeah.

   11. MMMichael Malice31:14

       I'm full of something, that's for sure. And what I saw in this space is a lot of these red-pilled people got very, um, disheartened and cynical. And one of my big heroes is Albert Camus, and he said, "The worst thing is cynicism." And that's s- that's something called the black pill, which is the idea that, you know, it's- it's all ƒ- it's- it's- it's just, we're waiting for the end. It- th- it's hopeless. And I- I don't see it that way at all. And I'm like, "All right. I have to address this, and not just with some kind of cheerleading, 'Everything's gonna be great, guys.' Here is why I am positive." And not that I'm positive the good guys are gonna win, but I'm positive that good guys can win. And that's all you need. Because if your, God forbid, kid is kidnapped and there's a 10% chance that you can save them, you're not gonna be like, "F- well, f- I don't like those odds." This is your country. This is your values. This is your family. Uh, and I think it's much more than 10%. And even if you lose, you will take pride in that you did everything in your power to win. So-

   12. LFLex Fridman32:31

       Is there a good definition of good guys, in the sense that-

   13. MMMichael Malice32:35

       The ones who wear white. (laughs)

   14. LFLex Fridman32:38

       There's layers to this. You're like modern-day Shakespeare. Is there a danger in thinking, um, uh, Adolf Hitler was probably pretty con- confident that he led a group of good guys?

   15. MMMichael Malice32:54

       Listen, if Hitler did anything wrong, why isn't he in jail?

   16. LFLex Fridman32:57

       (laughs) Uh-

   17. MMMichael Malice32:59

       My Czech friend thought of that joke.

   18. LFLex Fridman33:02

       (laughing)

   19. MMMichael Malice33:02

       He actually, he says it in his accent. He goes, "If Hitler's so bad, why isn't he in the jail?" (laughing)

   20. LFLex Fridman33:07

       (laughing) That's a good point. He's probably still alive, right?

   21. MMMichael Malice33:11

       And look, yeah. (laughs) Hopefully.

   22. LFLex Fridman33:13

       (laughing) Oh, boy. Two of the three people listening to this are very upset right now. Uh, what were you even talking about? Oh, how do you- how do you know the- what is good?

   23. MMMichael Malice33:26

       There's lots of standards of good. But if you're... For me, to be a good guy is if you want to leave the world a little bit better than you found it. That, to me, is the definition of a good guy. And I think there are many people that, that, that's not their motivation at all.

   24. LFLex Fridman33:43

       Oh, so it's about your motivation?

   25. MMMichael Malice33:45

       Well, it's also about if your motivation is at all, um, correlated to reality. I- y- no one thinks we're the bad guys. Th- that's correct. But are you taking steps to check your motivations and, and also take a certain amount of humility? Because if you're going to start interfering with other people's lives, you really, uh, better be sure you know what you're talking about.

   26. LFLex Fridman34:08

       The control of others, if you do have centralized control, and then you kind of, you become a leader of a group, you better know, you better do so humbly and cautiously.

   27. MMMichael Malice34:21

       And, uh, also have, uh, s- uh, steam valves, right? So if, in case things go wrong, let's have... I'm sure this is a lot happening with AI, whatever, with computers. Like, okay, if something goes wrong here, how do we have a workaround to make sure it doesn't cause everything to collapse?

   28. LFLex Fridman34:37

       Yeah, the- the going wrong thing. I mean, the- the whole, the feedback mechanism.

   29. MMMichael Malice34:41

       Yeah.

   30. LFLex Fridman34:42

       Like, uh, I wonder if people in Congress think that things are really wrong.
6. 41:43 – 43:06

   What did the volcano say to his true love?

   1. MMMichael Malice41:43

   2. LFLex Fridman41:44

      Hey, Michael.

   3. MMMichael Malice41:45

      He... Is it the... (laughs)

   4. LFLex Fridman41:47

      (laughs)

   5. MMMichael Malice41:48

      You don't have to say, "Hey, Michael." You just say, "Knock, knock."

   6. LFLex Fridman41:50

      No, it's not a knock-knock joke.

   7. MMMichael Malice41:51

      Oh, okay. Hey, what... (Russian) .

   8. LFLex Fridman41:53

      (laughs) What did the volcano say to his true love?

   9. MMMichael Malice41:57

      What?

   10. LFLex Fridman41:59

       I lava you. (laughs) I, uh-

   11. MMMichael Malice42:05

       These jokes work better when you know how to speak English.

   12. LFLex Fridman42:08

       (laughs) I- it was actually in Russian. I- I- uh, I did Google Translate.

   13. MMMichael Malice42:11

       (laughs)

   14. LFLex Fridman42:11

       Okay. Back to your book and the suffering. You, uh, you somehow turned it positive and as- as one who's wearing... who's a representative of the black pill in this conversation, what are some of the darker moments, what are the, some of the hardest challenges of putting together this book? The white pill.

   15. MMMichael Malice42:30

       Uh, content, content, content. So if I'm having a page-... in, about Reagan taking on Gerald Ford in the 1976 presidential primaries, I'm gonna have to read, like, 20. So i- i- i- it's the thing, like, if there'll be some times I'll remember some quote somewhere, and then I have to spend an hour trying to find it because I want it to be as dense with information as, uh, uh, possible.

   16. LFLex Fridman42:56

       Like, h- h- how do you structure the- the- the main philosophical ideas you wanna convey? Is that already planned out?

   17. MMMichael Malice43:03

       No. The book changed entirely from its conception.

7. 43:06 – 46:47

   Myth of Sisyphus

   1. MMMichael Malice43:06

      So, uh, my buddy, Ryan Holiday, had a series of books, still does, where he takes the ideas of the Stoics and he applies them to contemporary, uh, terms. He has this whole cottage industry that he's doing very well with. And I'd asked him years ago if I could do that with Camus and he's like, "Sure, go for it." And I was going to rework Camus's The Myth of Sisyphus, and I read it recently, I g- re-read it, and this wasn't the book I remembered at all (laughs) . Uh, and I'm like, "Okay, I'm gonna write the book that I remembered." But the more I was writing it, I... one of the things I always yell at conservatives about, and there's a long list, is they don't talk about, um, the great victory of conservatism, which was the winning of the Cold War without firing a shot. And I said, "You can't expect The New York Times to tell this story because the blood is on their hands." And I'm like, "Well, Michael, instead of complaining about it, why don't you do it? Why don't you talk?" That is a great example of the good guys winning over the bad guys. And that's become A, it's... the victory is beautiful, but also pointing out to pe- when people are like, "Oh, things are worse than they've ever been." Th- they don't appreciate how bad things were in the 30s, uh, what Stalin was doing overseas and how people in the West were advocating to bring that here. So that's kind of pointing out how bad things were and how good they became. And, uh, you don't have to be a Republican or Conservative to be delighted at the collapse of totalitarianism and the peaceful liberation of half the world.

   2. LFLex Fridman44:39

      So that's a picture of the good guys winning?

   3. MMMichael Malice44:41

      Oh, yeah.

   4. LFLex Fridman44:41

      Well, how does that connect to Sisyphus? And, uh, may- maybe to speak deeper to life and, um, whatever the hell this thing is, which is what I remember The Myth of Sisyphus being about. So like where does the thread of Camus sort of, um, lie in the work that you're doing?

   5. MMMichael Malice45:02

      So C- The Myth of Sisyphus, which I had remembered incorrectly, is actually just a five, like seven, five to seven page, uh, like coda to the whole book at the very end. Like you only need to read that little essay called The Myth of Sisyphus. The broader work is about Camus's concept of the absurd and the absurd man within literature, and he's goes... and it's just like I don't really care about this character, Dostoevsky, and all this other stuff that you're talking about. It's of no relevance. But what he... The Myth of Sisyphus, the myth itself, not the book or the- or the essay of his, is this Greek character and Sisyphus is forced in hell to, uh, roll a rock up a hill, uh, for an eternity. At the very last moment, the rock falls away. And Camus's takeaway from the story is that we have to ima- we must imagine Sisyphus happy. And there is several interpretations of this, but one is once you accept that you are living an absurdist existence, once you own your reality, it loses its, um, bite. And you can st- ha- start with that as your kind of baseline.

   6. LFLex Fridman46:06

      And bite is suffering.

   7. MMMichael Malice46:09

      A- and hopelessness. So I- I think when people look at how much ridiculousness is happening in America and it's escalating, you can either think, "Oh, all is lost," or you can... and I think you and I have lived our lives like this, you can live life more like a surfer whereas you're never gonna control the ocean, but you can sure enjoy that ride and stop tr- if you're trying to control the waves, yeah, you're done, but if you're like, "All right. I've got my board. I'm gonna see where this takes me," surfing, from what I understand, is a pretty fun activity, and also sometimes dangerous, but you'd have to ask Telsey about that.

8. 46:47 – 54:31

   Journalism failed to stop Stalin and Hitler

   1. MMMichael Malice46:48

   2. LFLex Fridman46:48

      So we were offline talking about Stalin and, uh, the evils of the Soviet regime.

   3. MMMichael Malice46:57

      Yeah.

   4. LFLex Fridman46:58

      One of the things I mentioned, I watched the movie, uh, Mr. Jones, but it's about the 1930s Holodomor, the... what would you say? The torture of the Ukrainian people-

   5. MMMichael Malice47:10

      Yeah.

   6. LFLex Fridman47:11

      ... by Stalin. One interesting thing to me that I'd love to hear your opinion about is the role of journalism in all of this.

   7. MMMichael Malice47:19

      Oh (laughs) .

   8. LFLex Fridman47:21

      (laughs) . And also about 1930s G- Germany. So what's the role of journalists and intellectuals in a time when trouble is brewing, but it requires a really sort of brave and deep thinking to understand that trouble is brewing? Like if you were a journalist or if you were just like an intellectual, a thinker-

   9. MMMichael Malice47:47

      Sure.

   10. LFLex Fridman47:47

       ... but also a voice of, uh, in the- in the space of public discourse, what would you do in 1930s about Stalin, about Holodomor, and what would you do about Nazi Germany in 1937, 1938?

   11. MMMichael Malice48:03

       So that's really funny that you ask that because currently how the book is structured, it's like, you know, books often follow a three-act structure, right? So act three is the '80s, act one is the '30s, and act two is gonna be like, all right, let's suppose you were in the '30s, are you just gonna give up? Like are you just gonna be like, "Well, we're screwed"? And you'd be right to say things are gonna be very bad for a long time. Or are you going to be one of those few who are like, "We're gonna do something about this," and, you know, "We're gonna go down swinging"? There are two books I can recommend which are just masterpieces that- that are written by women, um, that just, or historians that are superb. There's a book called Beyond Belief by Deborah Lipstadt.... she talks about the rise of Nazi Germany as seen through the press. And what was amazing, and she's does a great job empathizing with the press and understand their perspective, is we remember... And Chamberlain gets a bad rap, Neville Chamberlain, for kind of appeasing Hitler. Because not that long ago, they had the Great War. They had World War I, and they had, uh, the carnage that the earth had never seen before. And when you had people made out of meat meeting industrial machines, and plastic surgery was invented as a consequence of this. They're coming back mangled and disfigured, and for what? And this was a world where the Kaiser was the most evil person who ever lived. And we all had the Western propaganda about the Hun, and all the rapes, and all this barbarism, and blah, blah, blah. So not that long later, when you're hearing all this propaganda, which was factual, about Hitler, it's like, "We heard this. We heard this 20 years ago. This was all lies. Give us a, give us a break." And she has all the quotes from the different agencies and how they addressed it, plus they had very limited information. It's not like Nazi Germany was an open society where reporters can walk around and, and they were under a lot of pressure as well, you know, in those areas.

   12. LFLex Fridman49:56

       And Hitler himself was pretty good at, uh... He let some stuff slip, but usually he made it seem like he wants peace, he wants world peace.

   13. MMMichael Malice50:05

       Well, this was amazing. They were making the argument that because all these Jews were being beaten up on the street, this proved, this was the hot take of the day, that Hitler was weak because since Hitler's a statesman and he can't control these hooligans, that shows his control and power is tenuous, and this is all gonna go away quickly.

   14. LFLex Fridman50:24

       By the way, I mean, Hitler thought that too. He was kind of afraid of the, the Brownshirts or whatever. Like, he was afraid of these hooligans a little bit. Like, they were useful to him, but like, at a certain point, like yeah, they can get in the way.

   15. MMMichael Malice50:37

       Yeah.

   16. LFLex Fridman50:37

       That's why he wanted to get, get control of the military, the army, like their regiment. Like, if you wanna take over the world, you can't do it with hooligans.

   17. MMMichael Malice50:44

       Right.

   18. LFLex Fridman50:45

       You have to do it with an actual army.

   19. MMMichael Malice50:47

       And then you had Kristallnacht, which was a nationwide pogrom. And then all the news agencies universally were like, "Oh, crap. We were, we, we got this wrong." And the condemnation was universal. So that book traces, uh, the West's reaction to what's going on there, and including the reaction to the, uh, insipid Holocaust as people being... You know, what they knew, when did they know. There was not ambiguity about, uh, uh, people... I think there's this myth that she dispels that pe- that they didn't know the Holocaust was happening or they didn't care. They were aware, but they were already at war with Nazi Germany. Like, what, literally what else could th- they do at that point, um, you know, to, to rescue, um, all these Jews? So, so that's a superb book. And Anne Applebaum, I think the book is called Red Famine, came out fairly recently, and she brings the receipts. And she's a, you know... This is something I really hate with binary thinkers where they, people think, "Oh, you know, if you're a Democrat, you're basically a communist," but they call Joe Biden a Marxist. It's just like... You know, she's a hard lefty. She's, you know, has TDS. But this book just systemically lays out what Stalin did.

   20. LFLex Fridman51:59

       By the way, I'm triggered by the binary thinkers. And for those who don't know, TDS0011 is, uh, Trump derangement syndrome.

   21. MMMichael Malice52:06

       Yes. So they, you know, forced the starvation of this entire population, and they... It's not only that. It's like they knew if you weren't starving, by looking at you, that you were hiding food. So they'd come back to your house at night and break your fingers in the door or take, burn down your house, and now you're on the street without food because you lied, 'cause this is the people's food. You're a kulak, you're a landowner. And very quickly a kulak, which meant like peasant landowner, became anyone who had a piece of bread. And this was systemic and ongoing, and many people in the press did not believe it. Uh, there was a, um, a British journalist, I believe, who got out of the train, uh, Ukraine like one town earlier and walked, and he described all this. And he was mocked and derided. And this is just anti-Russian propaganda because at the time, in the '30s, this was socialism had come to fruition. This was a noble experiment. "I'd seen the future and it works" is, I think, uh, uh, Sidney Webb was the guy who said that. And the premise was let's see what happens. We've never tried something like that. And they were perfectly happy to have this experiment happen overseas at the price of the Russian people because it's like, "You know what? Maybe this will be paradise on Earth." And there's a, I address this in my book as well, there's a superb essay, I think, by Eugene Genovese, and, uh, he talks about the question, the question being, "What did you know and when did you know it? What did you know about the concentration camps? What did you know about the starvation? What did you know about children being taught at school to turn in their parents for, you know, having some extra bread?" And his conclusion is we all knew and we all knew from the beginning, every bit of it, and we didn't care because we were more interested in promoting this ideology. So when people are kind of thinking the worst thing on Earth is, like, Robert E. Lee statue being taken down in Washington, DC, we were being told on a, in especially a much more limited news information world, where now you have literally anyone can have a Twitter but how many outlets were there, that this is, uh, we're backwards, they're the future, they're scientific, we have the vagaries of the market which led to the Great Depression. And when you see what was being put over on the American public at the time, um, anyone who thinks things are as bad now as they have ever been is simply delusional

9. 54:31 – 58:27

   Good Germans

   1. MMMichael Malice54:31

      or ignorant.

   2. LFLex Fridman54:31

      Yeah, I, I would say just as, as a small aside, that's why reading, as I'm almost done with, uh, The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich-

   3. MMMichael Malice54:39

      Oh, yeah.

   4. LFLex Fridman54:40

      ... is, uh, it, it, uh, refreshes the, resets the palate of your understanding of what is good and evil in the world-

   5. MMMichael Malice54:49

      Yeah.

   6. LFLex Fridman54:49

      ... that I think is really useful-... n- now, like, you know, what helps me be really positive and almost naive on Twitter, uh, and in the world, is by just studying history-

   7. MMMichael Malice55:03

      Yeah.

   8. LFLex Fridman55:04

      ... and, and, uh, comparing it to how amazing things are, uh, today. But, in that time, what would you do? What does a brave mind do? And not just, uh, acts of bravery, but how do you be effective in that? That's something I often think about. It's sometimes easy to be an activist, uh, in terms of just saying stuff. It's hard to be effective at your activism.

   9. MMMichael Malice55:40

      One of the big questions historians have, uh, constantly is how did this happen? A, to make sure it doesn't happen again, but this is Germany. This is not some kind of weirdo cult nation. They're very advanced, very... The land of poets and philosophers. How did it get to that point that they're just shooting children and everyone's cheering for this? And, and-

   10. LFLex Fridman56:02

       Specifically on the antisemitism and the Holocaust and the-

   11. MMMichael Malice56:04

       But just the h... No, the hol- totalitarianism, the cult of Hitler and just this whole kind of thing and-

   12. LFLex Fridman56:09

       But there's, there's... Sorry to, sorry to interrupt, but there's two sides. I don't know if you want to separate them. One is the totalitarianism and the, the entire... the entirety of the Nazi regime, and then there's the Holocaust, which is like, uh, you know, going... I would say like very specifically, uh, a- as I think you're about to describe as like, you know, targeting Jews very much so. I don't know if you see those as two separate things.

   13. MMMichael Malice56:36

       I think they're very interconnected, but I think if you look at it, everyone thinks that they'd be the ones putting up Anne Frank, but if you look at the numbers, they'd be the ones calling the, the-

   14. LFLex Fridman56:47

       Right.

   15. MMMichael Malice56:48

       ... Stasi and her, or the whoever the people were at the time, not the Stasi obviously, uh, and patting themselves in the back for it.

   16. LFLex Fridman56:54

       So sorry to pause on that. That's a really important thing. If you're listening to this, that... and you were a not... and you were in Germany at the time, you would have likely been willing to commit, or at least keep a blind eye to the violence against Jews. Like, you have to really sit with that idea, that you would have been somebody who, uh, just sees this and is not bothered by it, and also very likely kind of understand this as a necessary evil or even a necessary good.

   17. MMMichael Malice57:26

       Yeah. A- and I think people think they would be the abolitionists or marching on Selma. The numbers don't add tha- add up to that at all. And, I think the question would be like, what social... I... My friend was on Tinder, my friend Matt, who's a great dude, and the question was, "What's the most controversial opinion you have?" This is in New York. And the girl wrote, "I hate Trump." And what people perceive themselves as being courageous in saying and doing, and what is the actual social cost of you saying or doing this are two very disconnected things. And we're also trained by corporate media to have completely vapid, uninteresting, banal ideas, and yet regard ourselves as revolutionaries. You know, there are people who still in New York will take pride 'cause they have a gay friend. And it's like, first of all, who cares? But second of all, you are not a hero, and that person's not your prop, by the way. That's

10. 58:27 – 1:01:58

    Richard Wolff

    1. MMMichael Malice58:27

       another big problem.

    2. LFLex Fridman58:28

       Which is why I'd like to give Richard Wolff a shout-out for sp- being an intellectual who talks about communism. I think it's, it takes kind of a heroic intellectual right now to speak about, like communism seriously. There's difficult waters t- to tread. Is that the expression? There's difficult paths to walk.

    3. MMMichael Malice58:47

       I love watching a robot try to use idiom in a language he doesn't even know.

    4. LFLex Fridman58:50

       Zero, zero, one.

    5. MMMichael Malice58:51

       (laughs)

    6. LFLex Fridman58:52

       One. I'm, I'm, I'm, uh, quite deeply hurt by the binary comment.

    7. MMMichael Malice58:57

       Are you? Your, your feeling has gone from one to zero? (laughs)

    8. LFLex Fridman59:02

       (laughs) Yeah.

    9. MMMichael Malice59:03

       What is love?

    10. LFLex Fridman59:03

        My buffers have overflown. Uh, though, but there's difficult... I, I, I feel like communism is, uh, like universally seen as a bad thing currently in intellectual circles.

    11. MMMichael Malice59:15

        Yes.

    12. LFLex Fridman59:15

        Or, actually, maybe some people disagree with that. People say like far-

    13. MMMichael Malice59:19

        Close.

    14. LFLex Fridman59:19

        ... far left people are trying to, you know, there's some people who argue the, the BLM movement is some kind of arm-

    15. MMMichael Malice59:27

        It's Marxist, yeah.

    16. LFLex Fridman59:27

        ... of a Marxist... I mean, I don't... I'm... I don't really follow the deep logic in that, whatever, but, uh, you know, it's just-

    17. MMMichael Malice59:34

        Well, they said they were formed by Marxism, the founder, co-founder.

    18. LFLex Fridman59:37

        Yeah, but stating that is different than, um-

    19. MMMichael Malice59:41

        There's, there's Marx the, the totalitarian, there's also Marx the revolutionary, and I think they're talking about more like, "We're revolutionaries, we're gonna overthrow the status quo."

    20. LFLex Fridman59:48

        Yeah, right, but like we, we, we can have that further discussion, but I, I, I just don't think they speak deeply about, uh, political systems of... and saying communism is, uh, is going to be the righteous system, like th... You know, the-

    21. MMMichael Malice1:00:01

        Correct.

    22. LFLex Fridman1:00:01

        There's not a deep intellectual discourse is what I mean. But if you were to s- try to be on stage with a Jordan Peterson, like to me the brave thing now, like it would be to argue for communism. It'd be interesting to see. Not many people do it. Uh, I certainly wouldn't be willing to do it. I don't have enough... I don't... first of all, don't believe it, but second of all, it's a very difficult argument to make because you would get so much fire, which is why I like Richard Wolff. He's one of the people who is quite rigorously showing that there are some good ideas within the system of communism, uh, specifically saying that, uh, attacking more the, the negative sides of capitalism. So saying that there is, uh-... that capitalism potentially is more dangerous than communism. I mean, it's, I, I, I disagree with that, but I think it's a-

    23. MMMichael Malice1:00:51

        I love how something is like, we've got a body count of 60 million, but this, everything is pote- and potentially, you know, like water can drown everyone on earth. So this is-

    24. LFLex Fridman1:01:00

        Well-

    25. MMMichael Malice1:01:00

        ... incoherent.

    26. LFLex Fridman1:01:01

        Well, I think nuclear weapons are bad, but nuclear energy is good.

    27. MMMichael Malice1:01:05

        Sure.

    28. LFLex Fridman1:01:05

        That's so-

    29. MMMichael Malice1:01:05

        Well, nuclear weapons are also, can be good. You can easily make the argument, which I don't know that I subscribe to, that nuclear weapons prevented, uh-

    30. LFLex Fridman1:01:14

        Yeah.
11. 1:01:58 – 1:04:50

    Could United States have stayed out of World War II

    1. LFLex Fridman1:01:58

       time. Uh-

    2. MMMichael Malice1:01:59

       Uh, let me talk, you wanna talk about Jeannette Rankin, who's one of my favorite people?

    3. LFLex Fridman1:02:03

       Mm-hmm.

    4. MMMichael Malice1:02:03

       So Jeannette Rankin was the first woman elected to Congress. She was elected before, uh, women's suffrage was passed in the Constitutional amendment, uh, from Montana. She was elected in 1916. She was one of a handful of people to vote against the US going into the Great War, which was the right call at the time. She was a pacifist, Republican as well, coincidentally. She lost her seat, ran again in, was it 1940? Got the seat again, uh, and was the only person to vote against getting into World War II. It was not a unanimous choice.

    5. LFLex Fridman1:02:40

       Interesting.

    6. MMMichael Malice1:02:40

       Jeannette Rankin was the one person, and she said, "You could no more win a war than you can win a hurricane." So she's one of these interesting fr... And talk about bravery, you're the one vote after Pearl Harbor to say, "We're not doing this." And I mean, the pressure she must have been under at the time is, uh... And of course, many people are not interested in hearing her perspective. "Oh, she's crazy, she's evil," blah, blah. It's also funny, someone on my Twitter when I talked about her goes, "Maybe she had Hitler sym- sympathies." Like, yeah, Ms. Rankin was a big fan of Hitler. (laughs) That's what, you, you figured it out, guys.

    7. LFLex Fridman1:03:14

       Do you think there's an argument to be made that United States should not have gotten involved in World War II?

    8. MMMichael Malice1:03:20

       Oh, easy, an easy argument. The argument, there's a, I talk about this in The New Right. So on internet circles, there's something called Godwin's law, which means the longer an internet conversation goes on, the probability someone gets compared to Hitler becomes one. Um, in certain New Right circles, the longer the conversation goes on, the more likelihood that the argument will become we shouldn't have been in World War II also becomes one. And the argument is at the very least, stay back, let Hitler and fi- Stalin kill each other off, and then go in and knock off the weaker one, and you're gonna be saving, destroying two nightmare systems. And I think that's an easy argument to make. Now, it's hard to pull off after Pearl Harbor, but in terms of strategy, I don't think that's a, that's a tough u- um, sell.

    9. LFLex Fridman1:04:07

       What about after Pearl Harbor?

    10. MMMichael Malice1:04:09

        I mean, that's what I'm saying. After Pearl Harbor, how are you gonna sell that to the people? The argument is blah, blah, blah, the Holocaust. The, the Holocaust is, there's no scenario where that doesn't happen, really, if you're, uh, unless you're going in way earlier. But even so, Hitler had said, "If the Jews launch another war, you know, we're gonna wipe them from the face of the earth." So the, the Jews were being held hostage by Hitler as an argument for this. Another thing he did, which was, you know, diabolical is in order to make it that people could not accept Jews as refugees, if they were gonna leave Germany, they had to be penniless. So now you have, it's not like they're coming over with money and they can take care of themselves. No, no, they're gonna be completely destitute who-

    11. LFLex Fridman1:04:45

        Makes it harder to accept them, yeah.

    12. MMMichael Malice1:04:47

        Millions of destitute people who don't speak the language, it's, it's, it's a tough

12. 1:04:50 – 1:06:36

    Trump Derangement Syndrome

    1. MMMichael Malice1:04:50

       sell.

    2. LFLex Fridman1:04:50

       So speaking of Godwin's law, what do you make of this condition, uh, Trump derangement syndrome...

    3. MMMichael Malice1:04:59

       Yeah.

    4. LFLex Fridman1:04:59

       ... and the idea of comparing Trump to Hitler?

    5. MMMichael Malice1:05:05

       I think it's despicable. And I'll give you an exam- uh, something parallel that I think more people should be regarding it, regarding as despicable. Earlier in 2020, we were all told that unless we were in Syria immediately, the Kurds were gonna be exterminated. They invoked the Holocaust. This is gonna be another genocide. And if you're not for this, you should, you're basically, you know, forcing another Holocaust. None of the people who used this argument, we didn't go to Syria, they, the Kurds weren't exterminated, they just vanished from the news, had any consequences for using this kind of, uh, uh, comparison. So I think it's, it's really kind of fatuous and I think it's amazing that people think Hitler's the only tyrant who ever lived, like everyone who's bad is specifically Hitler. Um, you know how you know he's not Hitler? Because you can tweet at him and no one comes to your house to kill your family. Like, that's kind of a big difference. Uh, also the difference between Trump and many of his critics is that his grandchildren will be raised as Jews. So that's also kind of a... Uh, and, and, and, um, Deborah Lipstadt talks about this a lot. The New York Times at the time, um, there's another book called, um, Buried by the Times, which talks about The New York Times into World War II. Because the idea that Jews weren't white was the Hitler idea, uh, The New York Times at the time, uh, um, Sulzberger, wanted to be against this idea. So they specifically downplayed the antisemitism as opposed to the Nazis are being

13. 1:06:36 – 1:09:18

    Nazism and Antisemitism

    1. MMMichael Malice1:06:36

       oppressive. So the argument that you can separate Nazism from antisemitism is a historical debate people have, and my perspective is, I think it's...I do not find it convincing that you can separate those two. I think anti-Semitism was essential to Nazism. I think Nazism and Mussolini's fascism have very big differences, um, and-

    2. LFLex Fridman1:06:59

       Do you think, uh, do you think anti-Semitism was fundamental to who, who Hitler was?

    3. MMMichael Malice1:07:04

       Yes.

    4. LFLex Fridman1:07:04

       Or was it just that... So this is the interesting thing is, like, it was a tool that he saw as being effective?

    5. MMMichael Malice1:07:12

       No, he believed it.

    6. LFLex Fridman1:07:14

       So why do you see those as intricately connected? Could, uh, Hitler have accomplished the same amount or more without the Holocaust?

    7. MMMichael Malice1:07:23

       Yeah. 'Cause think about how many resources you gotta divert-

    8. LFLex Fridman1:07:26

       Right.

    9. MMMichael Malice1:07:26

       ... at a time where you're having Operation Barbarossa with Stalin.

    10. LFLex Fridman1:07:29

        So why are they connect- why are they so connected? Uh, is it because Hitler was insane or was he a bad strategist, or what?

    11. MMMichael Malice1:07:38

        He was obviously a bad strategist. He took, he had no need to open a second front. His generals, to my understanding, told him, "This is crazy." It didn't work out for him at all. Uh, uh, I, I mean, to draw Russia and her resources into that war, it makes absolutely no sense in retrospect. There's a book about, I forgot what it's called, where it talked about him at that point was just high all the time on amphetamines and that could have affected his thinking.

    12. LFLex Fridman1:08:01

        Yeah, there's a really good book on drugs.

    13. MMMichael Malice1:08:03

        Yeah.

    14. LFLex Fridman1:08:03

        In the, uh, I forget what it's called. But yeah, it's-

    15. MMMichael Malice1:08:05

        Um.

    16. LFLex Fridman1:08:05

        ... it's a really good one.

    17. MMMichael Malice1:08:06

        But it was, I mean, scapegoating is a big part and parcel of, uh, the Nazi mythology and this kind of one universal figure to explain, you know, this kind of, you know, skeleton key.

    18. LFLex Fridman1:08:20

        But it could have been the communists. I mean, that, that could have been the source of the hatred. So like-

    19. MMMichael Malice1:08:24

        But the communists didn't get Germany into World War I, like you said the Jews did.

    20. LFLex Fridman1:08:28

        It seems to me that the atrocity of the Holocaust is the reason we see Hitler as evil.

    21. MMMichael Malice1:08:37

        No, the reason we see Hitler as evil is 'cause of World War II propaganda still, because we don't see Stalin as evil.

    22. LFLex Fridman1:08:42

        Right. That's my main point.

    23. MMMichael Malice1:08:42

        We don't see Mao as evil to that extent. Uh, I think the-

    24. LFLex Fridman1:08:46

        Why? Like, why would you say that's-

    25. MMMichael Malice1:08:47

        You know what? Because I-

    26. LFLex Fridman1:08:48

        ... the nature of that propaganda.

    27. MMMichael Malice1:08:49

        Be- be- because I think a lot of the problem for certain type of mentality is Hitler didn't mass murder equally. (laughs) So as long as you're killing just one group, it's a problem. But if you're murdering everyone equally, all of a sudden it's like, eh, what are you gonna do? So the fact, like you were saying, the Holodomor is not common knowledge. The fact that Mao's 50 million dead are not common knowledge, and Richard Nixon can be raising a glass to him in China, these are things that I think the West has not done a good job reconciling.

14. 1:09:18 – 1:15:58

    Knock knock

    1. MMMichael Malice1:09:18

    2. LFLex Fridman1:09:18

       Knock knock.

    3. MMMichael Malice1:09:20

       Who's there?

    4. LFLex Fridman1:09:21

       Frank.

    5. MMMichael Malice1:09:22

       Frank who?

    6. LFLex Fridman1:09:23

       Frank you for being my friend, Michael. (laughs)

    7. MMMichael Malice1:09:26

       And the heart attacks will say, "Frank you for being my friend."

    8. LFLex Fridman1:09:30

       Is it- is it- is it-

    9. MMMichael Malice1:09:31

       (laughs) Yeah. You gotta do like this.

    10. LFLex Fridman1:09:32

        Oh, okay. All right.

    11. MMMichael Malice1:09:33

        Yeah.

    12. LFLex Fridman1:09:34

        Okay. Now back to Hitler. (laughs)

    13. MMMichael Malice1:09:41

        (laughs)

    14. LFLex Fridman1:09:42

        Do you think Hitler could have been, uh, stopped? We kind of talked about it a little bit in terms of how to, what is the brave thing to do in the time of Nazi Germany, but do you think, I mean, I'm not even gonna ask about Stalin in terms of could Stalin have been stopped, 'cause probably the answer there is no. But on the Hitler side, could S- Hitler have been stopped?

    15. MMMichael Malice1:10:05

        I think a lot of these things, a l- lot of luck has to play with it. He was almost assassinated. Um, if you mean by like the West, it's very hard. Uh, I mean, yeah when-

    16. LFLex Fridman1:10:16

        But the German people too. I mean, c- could, like if, politically speaking, there was a rise to power through the '30s, through the '20s really, I mean, like can whoever, it's not about Hitler, it's about that kind of way of thinking, that totalitarian control that always leads to trouble, uh, and sometimes in a mass scale. Could that have been stopped in Germany or maybe in the Soviet Union?

    17. MMMichael Malice1:10:44

        Well, I think this is one of the best arguments against radicalization in the States, which is how do you engage when you have like 30% of the population who are members of a party which is dedicated to systemically overthrowing the existing democracy? Stalin gave orders that the communists who had a pretty sizable, um, population in the Reichstag, that their target shouldn't be the Nazis but the, the liberals and the Social Democrats, and they invented the term "social fascists" for them. So instead of S- they're just like, like jihadis, instead of taking their sights on Nazism, they set their sights on the moderates because they wanted, th- they figured the choice between Hitler and us, we're gonna win. And this was a huge gamble and it, they were all killed or had to flee, and the ones who fled were killed also by Stalin. So that's my understanding. So this is a easy way where he could have been, uh, certainly heavily mitigated.

    18. LFLex Fridman1:11:41

        What about, uh, France and England, that it was obvious that Hitler was lying and they wanted peace so bad that they were willing to put up with it, even after Czechoslovakia, like, w- like, this is the anti-pacifist argument, which is like they should have threatened military force more.

    19. MMMichael Malice1:12:04

        But then the other anti- the anti-anti-pacifist argument is if you're gonna, remember when Barack Obama had that, that red line? "If you cross this red line in Syria, we're gonna go in," and Assad or whatever was like, "Yeah, cool." And he's like, "Oh, okay, well, sorry." So if you're a threatening force, there's a great song lyric, uh, uh, "Don't show your guns unless you intend to fight," right? So if it, it's very clear with, with free countries through what's in the press whether the institutional will is there to follow through on these threats. So I think it'd be, have been very hard for Chamberlain to rally the British people to take on Hitler just after the great... I mean, the suffering that Britain s- took on, through the Great War, they still, you know, obviously it means so much more to them than it does, uh, does to us in the West.

    20. LFLex Fridman1:12:50

        What about-What do you make of Churchill then? Like, why was Churchill able to rally the British people? Why was he, uh... Like, do you give much credit to Churchill for being one of the great forces in stopping Hitler in World War II?

    21. MMMichael Malice1:13:08

        I, I don't think that's really in dispute. Um, I think he was very much regarded as this kind of the right man at the right time. Um, and I think Chamberlain took a gamble. He, uh, he... The expression, "peace in our time" was Neville Chamberlain when he signed the, the peace with Hitler, and he goes, uh, "We now have peace in our time. Now go home and get a good night's sleep." That's what he said 'cause he's like, all right, you know, he's gonna stop here. And it's not impossible that if you just gave... Like, if you gave Saddam Hussein Kuwait, it's not impossible that he's not gonna, you know, invade Saudi Arabia next or something like that.

    22. LFLex Fridman1:13:45

        But see... Okay. They... But everything I've read, it's like of course there's, there's, uh, it's not impossible, but when you're in the room with Hitler, you should be able to see, like, man to man, like, y- Like, to me, a great leader should be able to see past the façade and see, like, wh- Like, yes, everything in life is a risk, but it seems like the right risk to take with Hitler. Like, y- It's surprising to me, I know there's charisma, but it's surprising to me people did not see through this façade.

    23. MMMichael Malice1:14:23

        I, I, I really hate the idea of hindsight and everything being 20/20, and I think it's a very good idea generally. Now, I'm speaking generally, not in this specific instance, to give our ancestors more credit than they, than, than we tend to give them-

    24. LFLex Fridman1:14:37

        Yeah.

    25. MMMichael Malice1:14:37

        ... 'cause people often-

    26. LFLex Fridman1:14:38

        Sure.

    27. MMMichael Malice1:14:38

        Here's a great example from another context, which is, uh, lightning rods. People always talk about religious people being stupid and superstitious, and they weren't. They often were very well reasoned. An example of this is lightning rods, which is every year, whatever town, the church was the tallest building, and that's the one that always got hit by lightning and got caught on fire. Now, what, it's a coincidence that it's always the church? Like, that makes logical sense.

    28. LFLex Fridman1:15:06

        Yeah.

    29. MMMichael Malice1:15:06

        That they didn't realize, well, uh, it's because it's the tallest, and therefore, that attracts the electricity. And in fact, when they invented lightning rods, this was a controversy 'cause it's like, well, how is God going to show his displeasure if now it's striking this lightning rod and not burning down the church? So, a lot of times, things are a lot more coherent than we give them credit for. And again, Ch- Uh, Chamberlain didn't... He's the head of a parliamentary party. Um, so he does not have the f- the freedom in a sense that a Hitler would to be like, "All right, we're doing this again, boys." We don't know what it's like in a room with Hitler. Come on. That, that's, that's... We really have no idea.

    30. LFLex Fridman1:15:43

        But I, I think you have to think about that, right?
15. 1:15:58 – 1:23:38

    Putin

    1. MMMichael Malice1:15:58

       the real one.

    2. LFLex Fridman1:15:59

       Okay. So, let's, let's take somebody as an example. Let's take, uh, our mutual friend, Vladimir Putin.

    3. MMMichael Malice1:16:06

       Yes.

    4. LFLex Fridman1:16:07

       Okay. (laughs) I don't know why saying his name makes my voice crack. (laughs)

    5. MMMichael Malice1:16:12

       (laughs) 'Cause you're scared he could hear you.

    6. LFLex Fridman1:16:13

       (laughs)

    7. MMMichael Malice1:16:14

       It's like Beetlejuice.

    8. LFLex Fridman1:16:16

       (laughs)

    9. MMMichael Malice1:16:16

       Vladia. (laughs)

    10. LFLex Fridman1:16:18

        (laughs) So, there's a lot of people that-

    11. MMMichael Malice1:16:21

        Was he the one who built you? (laughs)

    12. LFLex Fridman1:16:23

        (laughs) No, that was a, that was a collaboration.

    13. MMMichael Malice1:16:28

        (laughs)

    14. LFLex Fridman1:16:28

        Um, well, it's, it's, uh, double-blind engineering effort. (laughs) Where I was not told of who my maker was.

    15. MMMichael Malice1:16:39

        (laughs)

    16. LFLex Fridman1:16:39

        There's a backstory, but, um-

    17. MMMichael Malice1:16:41

        There's a talking cricket. Pinocchio.

    18. LFLex Fridman1:16:46

        Hmm. (laughs) The-

    19. MMMichael Malice1:16:49

        He'll be a real boy someday. (laughs)

    20. LFLex Fridman1:16:52

        I talk about him quite a bit because I find him fascinating. Now, there's a, there's a really important line that people say, like, "Why does Lex admire Putin?" I do not admire Putin. I find the man fascinating. I find Hitler fascinating. I find a lot of figures in history fascinating, both good and bad. And the figures, just as you said, that are with us today, like Vladimir Putin, like Donald Trump, like Barack Obama, it's difficult to place them on the spectrum of good and evil because that's only really applies to, like, when you f- see the consequences of their actions-

    21. MMMichael Malice1:17:33

        Sure.

    22. LFLex Fridman1:17:33

        ... in a historical context. So, there's some people who say that Vladimir Putin is evil, and based on our discussion about Hitler, that's something I think about a lot, which is, in the room with Putin, and there's also a lot of historical descriptions of what it's like to be in the room with Hitler in the 1930s. There, there is a lot of charisma. In th- the same way, I find Putin to be, uh, very charismatic in his own way. The humor, the wit, the brilliance, the... There's, um, there's a simplicity of the way he thinks that really, if taken at face value, well, looks like a very intelligent, honest man thinking practically about how to build a better Russia constantly. Almost like, um, like an executive.

    23. MMMichael Malice1:18:33

        Yeah.

    24. LFLex Fridman1:18:33

        Like, he loves... He, he looks like a man who loves his job in a way that Trump, for example, doesn't.

    25. MMMichael Malice1:18:41

        Right.

    26. LFLex Fridman1:18:42

        Meaning, like, he loves laws and rules and how to, uh-

    27. MMMichael Malice1:18:46

        Well, he has no adversarial press, so that's gonna help.

    28. LFLex Fridman1:18:49

        Yes.

    29. MMMichael Malice1:18:49

        And he's popular with his people. That's also gonna help enormously.

    30. LFLex Fridman1:18:51

        But I'm talking about strictly the man-... directly the words coming out of his mouth.
16. 1:23:38 – 1:32:10

    The evil of Kim Jong-il and North Korea

    1. MMMichael Malice1:23:38

Episode duration: 3:02:52