Michael Malice: Totalitarianism and Anarchy | Lex Fridman Podcast #200

1. 0:00 – 0:32

   Introduction

   1. MMMichael Malice0:00

      The following is a conversation between me and Michael Malice. Michael is an author, anarchist, and simpleton, and I'm proud to call him my friend. He makes me smile, he makes me think, and he makes me wonder why I sound so sleepy all the time. And now, enjoy this conversation with Michael Malice in the Ədaləc language that I'm increasingly certain I'll never quite able to get the hang of.

2. 0:32 – 3:34

   Animal Farm

   1. MMMichael Malice0:32

   2. LFLex Fridman0:32

      Hello, comrade.

   3. MMMichael Malice0:33

      (laughs) Ələy gəlmisiniz?

   4. LFLex Fridman0:36

      (laughs) So Animal Farm by, uh, George Orwell is, uh, one of my favorite books. It's an allegory about, at least I think, about the Soviet Union and the Russian Revolution of 1917. So for people who haven't read it, it's, uh, animals overthrow the humans and then slowly become as bad or worse than the humans. So comrade, if we lived on this farm in the book Animal Farm, which animal would you most rather be? Uh, would it be the pigs, the horses, the donkey, Benjamin, the raven, Moses, the humans, Mr. and Mrs. Jones, the dogs, or the sheep?

   5. MMMichael Malice1:16

      Um, I'm gonna go with the Milton answer, which is it's better to rule in hell than serve in heaven, right?

   6. LFLex Fridman1:24

      It's better to rule in hell-

   7. MMMichael Malice1:26

      To-

   8. LFLex Fridman1:26

      ... than serve in heaven.

   9. MMMichael Malice1:27

      Yeah, so I would have to go with the pigs. So I guess I'd be a cop. Um-

   10. LFLex Fridman1:32

       At the very top, so the leader, the main pig, Napoleon, versus like the-

   11. MMMichael Malice1:36

       Snowball and the others.

   12. LFLex Fridman1:36

       Yeah.

   13. MMMichael Malice1:37

       I, I would say it's not s- it's, uh, sure it's an allegory about the Russian Revolution, but I think, um, Orwell's point was this is broader towards most totalitarian dictatorships.

   14. LFLex Fridman1:46

       Yeah.

   15. MMMichael Malice1:46

       I mean, it, it, it could very easily be read as an indictment of Mussolini or Hitler or many of these others. Uh, I'm a huge, um, George Orwell fan. One of the things that I think people on the right need to appreciate is the courage of many of these ind- undisputably left-wing voices who were the strongest ones to take on, uh, totalitarianism, totalitarian communism, and the three I could think of off the top of my head who are all in my top 10 heroes of all time are Emma Goldman, uh, Albert Camus, uh, and Orwell being the third. You know, something that, uh, leftists like to throw in the face of people on the right who constantly invoke Orwell is that Orwell said, and I don't have the exact quote off the top of my head, but something to the effect of, "Every word I have written is in, should be taken as a defense of democratic socialism against totalitarianism."

   16. LFLex Fridman2:36

       Mm-hmm.

   17. MMMichael Malice2:37

       So, uh, people like Truman, you know, was obviously very hardcore, in many ways anti-communist. Uh, we like to parse things out, um, you're gonna laugh, uh, into binary fashions that, you know, left good/right bad or right good/left bad, but historically speaking, it w- does not fall away into these camps as easily as people would like. Um, and I think it is important for those of us... It takes a lot more courage, um, to fight the right from the right or to fight the left from the left because, in a sense, a lot of your countrymen or your fellow travelers are gonna regard you as a traitor to the cause. So I, I, every chance I get, I will sing the praises of these three figures, a- among others, who not onl- even if they hadn't done what they had done, just lived just amazing lives that all of us can, uh, learn from and admire and regard as somewhat a, a role

3. 3:34 – 6:39

   Emma Goldman

   1. MMMichael Malice3:34

      model, so, uh...

   2. LFLex Fridman3:35

      What, what was the nature of their opposition to totalitarianism? Is it basically freedom?

   3. MMMichael Malice3:41

      Well, I th-

   4. LFLex Fridman3:41

      The value of freedom?

   5. MMMichael Malice3:42

      So le- let's go through the three of them. So Emma Goldman, she was an, um, early anarchist figure. You know, we'll talk about her later, I'm sure. Uh, she got deported from the United States with her partner in crime, Alexander Berkman, literal crime, he tried to assassinate, uh, Frick, who was A- Andrew Carnegie's main man in the Pittsburgh steel mill strike. Um, she got deported to the Soviet Union, and they're like, they're like, "Oh, you want socialism?" Because at the time, the anarchists were regarded as socialists. You know, "Go choke on it." And she's there, and she was watching in great horror, uh, what was going on, and she actually went to Lenin's office, and she goes, "This isn't what we're about. The revolution is about the individual and free speech and everyone working together to further society." And he told her that, you know, "Oh, you know, free speech is a bourgeois contrivance, and regardless, you can't have these circumstances in the midst of a revolution." And when she left the Soviet Union and, and, you know, she went to Britain, and at the time, before the, 1917, there was a lot of discussion among socialist circles about what would the revolution look like, right? Would there be the Bakunin anarchist model? Would there be the Marxist model? Obviously, the Bolsheviks ended up winning, but even then it wasn't obvious because there was the Bolsheviks and the Mensheviks and what people... Uh, you know, you and I know what those words mean, but Bolsheviks were kind of funny because bolshe means bigger and mensha means smaller. The Mensheviks had the numbers. It was sarcastic that they were called Mensheviks and the Bolsheviks were called Bolshe. And Lenin, you know, destroyed all his foes, um, in a very merciless way, obviously. Beforehand, you know, there was the idea like, uh, "Well, all these cockamamie ideas, we have to work together. You know, we don't know what it's gonna look like for the cause." Then as soon as he sees power, he's like, "Yeah, yeah, we're not doing that kind of pluralism anymore. This is going to be the right approach." So she left the Soviet Union, as did Berkman. She wrote a book that they titled, uh, My Disillusion with Russia, and I remember this one anecdote which I'm gonna discuss in a forthcoming book where she goes to Britain, and the British were very red at the time. They really, uh, had something called the Fabian Society, which was the predecessor to the British Labor Party, which were like, "All right, we're going to get rid of liberalism and have a, a socialist, uh, kind of nation." And she gave talks, and there was this one time where she gave a talk, and she started, and there was a standing ovation. By the time she was done, you could hear a pin drop because she dared to look at these people in the face, something they'd been fighting for all their lives and saying, you know, "We've been to the future and it works." And she's like, "Guys, this is worse than the tsar. Uh, you know, people are under house arrest. You're not allowed to have... You know, newspapers are being shut down if they have heretical views," so on and so forth. And, you know, she was just, uh, even more of a pariah than she had been previously. So she is, you know, deserves huge accolades in that regard. I brought her up when we were talking about with our conversation with Yaron. Orwell, uh, I think you don't need me to, to explain what he has done and continues to do to use fiction to demonstrate, uh, the horrors of a, um......totalitarian

4. 6:39 – 8:09

   Albert Camus

   1. MMMichael Malice6:39

      state. And Camus, who might be my all-time, you know, great, uh, lighthouse, so to speak, in terms of being a man of conscious, you know, he joined the Communist Party. And for a lot of people in the States you hear, "Oh, he joined the Communist Party. It's all I need to hear. It's all you need to ... He was a communist. It's all you need to know." He joined the Communist Party because they were the main ones fighting the fascists in France and other locations. And he took Nazism, as did many others of course, very, very, very seriously. He wasn't some committed communist, but this was just his mechanism to take on, uh, you know, uh, be part of the underground in Vichy France and so on and so forth. So he had the quote which is ascribed to him, which is kind of a misquote, Howard Zinn is the one who actually said it, that, "It is the job of thinking people not to be on the side of the executioners." And he very much felt, if you read his, uh, speech when he won the Nobel Prize, I forget if it's in the '50s, where he goes, "It's basically the job of writers to keep civilization from destroying himself." I don't think I'm ever going to be a man on the level of Camus and what he's accomplished, but I think that vision of it is the job of writers to be the conscience and to point out ... Uh, you know, this is the leftism at its best when, you know, giving voice to the voiceless, when you have the machine of the state crushing and marginalizing people. And they might not be educated, literate, or have any power at all, s- he's the guy who's like, "You are ruining humans. These humans matter. And I'm not going to let you look the other way and act like you don't know what

5. 8:09 – 15:15

   How to be a hero in Nazi Germany

   1. MMMichael Malice8:09

      you're doing."

   2. LFLex Fridman8:10

      So in this time, whether we look at, uh, the time of fascism or we look at the fictional Animal Farm, what's the heroic action then? So, uh, Camus joined the Communist Party. There's a bunch of different heroic actions, some more heroic than others, not just for the ... you know, hero's the wrong word, in terms of like effectiveness.

   3. MMMichael Malice8:30

      Sure.

   4. LFLex Fridman8:30

      What's the effective action, I guess is what I want to s- ask? As a writer, as a thinker, as somebody with a mind, what's the heroic action?

   5. MMMichael Malice8:38

      That's a tricky question, because a lot of times in the West, heroism is regarded as intertwined with martyrdom, right? So it's kind of this idea of like you have to speak the d- ... You know, Camus always talked about justi- let justice be done though the heavens fall. Uh, this is a common, um, kind of motto among people with conscience, and that you have to do the right thing even if the consequences might not be what you like. And I think that is a good loose definition of heroism. So if you me- ... I'll give you one example of heroism. This was on Twitter, and I really feel bad that I don't remember the guy's name. Uh, this was the line to Auschwitz, I believe it was, and, you know, there's the Nazi guards keeping everyone along. And, uh, if you were a cert- ... I think if you were under 12 they killed you or some- ... There was some age limit where some kids were killed or some were not. There were some circumstances. And he asked the mom how old this kid was, and she's like, "He's 14." And she's like, "No, he's 12." And she's like, "No, he's not. He's 14." She goes, "He's 12." And she realized what this Nazi was telling her even in that circumstance, and it ended up saving the kid's life. So I think heroism in this context is defiance and standing true to values of liberalism, humanism, and, uh, venerating the sanctity of human life. I think that, uh, a- and I think it's also important to pick your battles. Uh, I don't think if, you know, he got un- ... that Nazi over there got in a bullhorn and said, "Hey, this is the rules. Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah," that's not gonna help anyone do anything. Mm-hmm. So I do think ... You know, people a lot of times attack me for my anarchist views. It's like, "Oh, you know, would you call the police? Would you use the roads? Would you pay your income taxes?" Uh, you know, uh, I, I got in an argument with Tim Pool because there was that couple I think in, what was that, Missouri or Illinois, when they were f- ... uh, had their guns.

   6. LFLex Fridman10:22

      Mm-hmm.

   7. MMMichael Malice10:23

      And they were being arrested and they basically took a plea deal, and he said, "You should have fought." I go, "I- it's a lot easier to say you should fight, but we don't know what circumstance someone is under." And what these totalitarian regimes did very, very well, as, as you know, is if you were a target and they can't get through to you, that's fine. You have a family. So you can sit there, Lex, and g- gird your jaw and you can stand up to all the torture. Cool. What are we gonna do about your wife? What about your mom? One thing Stalin did, he made it a law that kids up t- uh, 14 and up could get the death penalty for certain crimes. So after that, the rule was, from the NKVD, if you were interrogating someone, they would have death warrants for the kid's child on the desk visible. So I'm interrogating you asking you to, uh, commit to, uh, I'm sorry, to admit to some crime that you've not committed, and those piece of paper, it's y- it's ... You know Svitlana, she's got a death warrant. You're gonna admit to any crime you want. So this is something Americans ... This is even the case right now in North Korea, um, which I know you had Yeonmi Park on. It's something I talk about a lot. Let's talk about instead of the hypothetical that this is happening right now on Earth. You can look at the map on Google. Uh, the Great Leader Kim Il-sung, the founder of North Korea, said, "Class enemies must be exterminated three generations." So North K- ... When people talk about individualism versus collectivism, uh, Rick Santorum, former senator, says, "The family is the basic unit of society." Unit. North Korea takes that seriously. The family is punished as a unit. So if someone does something wrong, three generations have to pay the price, and you often don't know who it is that got you all in trouble. There's not a trial. This, to Western minds, is something almost incomprehensible.

   8. LFLex Fridman12:06

      I- it's a lot easier to be brave when it's just your skin.

   9. MMMichael Malice12:10

      Yeah.

   10. LFLex Fridman12:10

       There's something when it's, when it's ... Yeah, when it's your child, your, your loved ones, your ... Every man becomes a coward.

   11. MMMichael Malice12:17

       But also th- what bravery is there for me to write an essay for The Guardian to say, "I don't vote." There's no consequences to me. There's no possibility of consequences to me. This is the wonderful thing about living, excuse me-

   12. LFLex Fridman12:27

       Yeah.

   13. MMMichael Malice12:27

       ... in a free country. Uh, it would take a lot of courage to be in the Soviet Union and say, "I'm g- not going to vote," and what would that courage accomplish? Uh, uh, very little. So I think heroism in the sense of kind of the suicidal stuff and taking a stance with no consequences is a bit overrated.

   14. LFLex Fridman12:45

       There is some aspect, like the way I think about heroism is something like you said about the Nazi soldier, which is quietly, privately in your own life, live the virtues that you want the rest of the world to live by.

   15. MMMichael Malice13:01

       Yes.

   16. LFLex Fridman13:02

       So, like, without... Like, writing about it is, um, is not as heroic as living it quietly.

   17. MMMichael Malice13:08

       I'll give you a great example of this. I sometimes give talks on networking, and I tell the kids, "If you know someone's in town and it's their birthday with nothing to do, take them out." And I say, "I do this for selfish reasons." And everyone laughs, and I go, "Think about it this way. The guy who takes people out for their birthday is awesome. That could be you. Like, you have that capacity to be that person and you're making that day feel special. They're gonna remember it for a long time. What's the cost? Dinner? 30 bucks? 25 bucks?" So, there, it's, it's very disturbing to me how often people have opportunities to slightly move the needle and make things a bit better at almost no cost, and they just literally don't think in those terms. And one of the things Camus talked about, you know, he's r- often described as a, um, existentialist, which he did not like that term, he regarded himself as an absurdist, is the idea that we're basically blank canvases. And this isn't something that is dangerous. This is an enormous opportunity, and you have the ability to become the kind of man or woman that you admire and want to be. You don't have to be, you know, I don't know, George Washington or one of these great heroes of all time. But l- everyone out there has the capacity to be, capacity, excuse me, to be a hero to their kids or to be a hero to maybe some... There's, there's nursing homes and there's old people who are lonely. I think that... You're taking a dog that's on its last legs. Uh, uh, uh, these are little things. Terry Shepherd does that a lot. I regard him as a hero. Um, these are... Not Terry Shepherd. I'm blanking on his name. These are things that people do, um, that aren't heroic in the sense of Superman, but that I find admirable extremely and I think are very underrated 'cause these people aren't championed.

   18. LFLex Fridman14:54

       Is this some kinda weird passive-aggressive indirect way for you to tell me that I should take you out for your birthday on Monday? Is that why you gave that whole speech?

   19. MMMichael Malice15:05

       That's, that wasn't it at all.

   20. LFLex Fridman15:06

       Oh, that was a joke, Michael.

   21. MMMichael Malice15:07

       No, it was a failed joke.

   22. LFLex Fridman15:09

       (laughs) Nevertheless.

   23. MMMichael Malice15:11

       There was no punchline.

   24. LFLex Fridman15:12

       (laughs) Without failure, we would not have triumph.

6. 15:15 – 21:17

   Camus on Existentialism vs Nihilism

   1. LFLex Fridman15:15

      Can we stick on the Camus absurdism versus existentialism?

   2. MMMichael Malice15:20

      Sure.

   3. LFLex Fridman15:21

      What do you think is the difference?

   4. MMMichael Malice15:24

      Uh-

   5. LFLex Fridman15:24

      Uh, in your ideas about, uh, anarchism, too, it seems like those are somehow intricately connected because, uh, existentialism is connected to freedom, and freedom is connected to anarchism.

   6. MMMichael Malice15:41

      Sure. But, I mean, Sartre was a defender of the Soviet Union. Uh, he said explicitly about things like gulags, like, even if it's true, we shouldn't talk about it. Um, so he, he... It's, what people don't appreciate is how, uh, human beings can have contradictory ideas in their minds at the same time. So, one would think, okay, someone's a Democrat, they think A, B, C, therefore they're gonna think D, E, F. People that have all sorts of contradictions and it's not at all clear and they'll, they'll have a clean conscience 'cause the human mind is very sophisticated, um, and is capable of doing this. So, Sartre, you know, was, you would think he's this radical individualist, you know, this sense of ultimate freedom, but he's defending the Soviet Union. Uh, Camus, on the other hand, would probably be, is, is, was very much like a social democrat. He didn't really talk about what politics should be so much as it shouldn't be. His essay, Reflections on the Guillotine, is one of the great masterpieces of all time, uh, an attack on the death penalty, not in terms of no one's evil or it's wrong to kill murderers, but in terms of what does it do for a society? If you have someone who sa- takes a person and locks them in a room and says, you know, "In two years, I'm going to murder you," and you lock them for that, this is not someone we'd regard as moral. We regard this as someone who's a complete monster.

   7. LFLex Fridman16:57

      Mm-hmm.

   8. MMMichael Malice16:57

      But that's what the state does, you know, on, with the death penalty, and he, and he challenges us to think, is this the kind of people we wanna be? Do... And again, he's saying, "I'm not saying killing a murderer is wrong. I'm not saying evil is wrong." His entire career was dedicated to fighting the concept of evil. But are we the kind of people who want to be doing these things that in any other context we regard as torture or depraved? So, I- I- I'm much more of a Camus person than a Sartre person.

   9. LFLex Fridman17:28

      So, he was probably against war in that same way. So, I don't, I have to, uh, admit I don't know much about the political side of Camus.

   10. MMMichael Malice17:36

       Well, and I don't think his political side is that interesting or relevant. What I find, uh, sorry to interrupt you, I, what I find fascinating about Camus and what I think about on a daily base from him is his insistence that you have to live a life based on conscience, that you have to be accountable to yourself when you put your pil- your head on the pillow at the end of the day and ask yourself, "Did I live a righteous life with integrity, true to my values? Did I, uh, not needlessly cause harm to innocent people?" Um, you know, that kind of mindset. "Did I... If someone is weak, am I using that as an opportunity to exploit them or to harm them, or do I feel, uh, a bit of sympathy or empathy for this person because maybe they didn't have circumstances that were, you know, as, as, um, uh, beneficial as other people had?"

   11. LFLex Fridman18:23

       Well, how does that fit absurdism, where everything is absurd, nothing has meaning?... uh, you know, it really borders on nihilism.

   12. MMMichael Malice18:31

       Yeah, so he, his, he regards ni... His, his philosophy, he explicitly said, is a response to nihilism and a, uh, attack on nihilism. He, you know, he regards cynicism as the, the worst value people can have, and I agree with him 100%. A lot of times people call me cynical online, and I push back very, very hard. Because to be a sy... I'd r- you know, I had this quote in The New Right where I say, "I'd rather be naive than a cynic, because a cynic is a hopeless man who projects his hopelessness to the world at large." Uh, Camus, this is the metaphor I use, and I find it very inspirational. I thought it was in his work, but I guess I thought of it and ascribed it to him.

   13. LFLex Fridman19:10

       Yeah.

   14. MMMichael Malice19:11

       There's two types of people. You imagine you go to a mountainside and you see a, uh, a blank canvas on an easel standing in front of this mountainside. One people would be like, "Why is this blank canvas here?" You know, "What, what, what is this? What's going on here?" Uh, and just be confused. Whereas the other type of person will be like, "There's a blank canvas here in this beautiful countryside. What a great opportunity. I can paint this river. I could paint that bird. I could paint my friends or myself in the background. Infinite choices, and this is a gift that I have been given." And I think that also ties very heavily into what I was w- I went to Yeshiva as a kid, which is Jewish school. What we were taught in- incessantly, uh, how to look at life is this beautiful gift that God has given you, and that God wants you to be happy. He wants you to live to the fullest in a moral way. I remember the first time I went into a church and they were asking questions about the Jewish concept of the afterlife. They weren't familiar with Jewish thought. And it took me a second 'cause I didn't really have answers, and then I remembered what we were taught, which is, let's suppose you're at this banquet with the best chef on earth. And the table's so heavy 'cause you've got steaks and you've got chicken and you've got sushi, and the wine's flowing and you've got your, uh, Dr. Pepper and, and Mr... and Mr. Pibb and the store brand, everything you want. And you're looking around at this amazing bounty, right?

   15. LFLex Fridman20:34

       Yeah.

   16. MMMichael Malice20:34

       And then you turn to this best chef on earth and you're like, "Oh, so what's for dessert?" I mean, the offensiveness of that is just so, you know, insane. Like, you have this... Eat the meal. Like, I promise you, if I can deliver this meal, the dessert's gonna be okay. So this focus on the afterlife when we've been given this amazing gift, uh, you know, on this earth, is, is a very kind of different mindset from both the Jewish tradition as I'd been taught and the Camus mindset. O- obviously, Camus was an atheist, didn't believe in an afterlife. But this concept that life is a, is meaningless, but that means you have that opportunity to find value, to seek for truth, to seek for happiness.

7. 21:17 – 26:24

   Cynicism is a lie

   1. MMMichael Malice21:17

      And Camus has this quote. It's ascribed to him as like a meme. I've never found the source so maybe he doesn't really say it. But he says, "Maybe it's not about happy endings. Maybe it's about the journey." And I think when you have that mindset, and as you and I... I think you and I both found this, because neither of us when we were kids thought we'd be doing this. Right?

   2. LFLex Fridman21:34

      Yeah.

   3. MMMichael Malice21:34

      But now that we are really fortunate...

   4. LFLex Fridman21:37

      Definitely this.

   5. MMMichael Malice21:37

      (laughs) Yeah.

   6. LFLex Fridman21:38

      And definitely that.

   7. MMMichael Malice21:39

      Yeah. But now that we're fortunate enough to do this and that we're blessed enough that there's people who find this of value and interest and we can pay the rent doing this, there's not a day that goes by where I don't think you and I r- are... think, "This is pretty absurd."

   8. LFLex Fridman21:52

      Yeah.

   9. MMMichael Malice21:53

      But it's also pretty wonderful. And as a consequence of us thriving, it also shows other people that happiness is possible on this earth. And I think cynicism is the lie. It's not just a worldview, it's the lie that happiness is not possible in this earth, or it's only happy- possible if you sell your soul and you're like a bad person, you screw other people over. I reject that in every aspect. You know what? As you said, my birthday's coming up.

   10. LFLex Fridman22:21

       Mm-hmm.

   11. MMMichael Malice22:22

       I've been feeling, um, just a lot of really great things have been happening very, very recently. So it, it, it affects me very heavily emotionally, especially when I see the response it gives to, uh, like the kids, right?

   12. LFLex Fridman22:35

       Mm-hmm.

   13. MMMichael Malice22:36

       So it's one thing to say this is what I'm for, but when you can provide proof of concept that what you've been advocating does result in positive responses... I got a message from this kid who had tried to kill himself a year ago, okay? And then he was like, "Look, I found your work. I found some other stuff. And now I realize... I'm gonna make something of myself. I was born in a meth house. You know, I'm whatever, 19, 20 years old. I should be in the garbage, but I'm gonna try to be a standup because I have opportunity on this earth." Even if he fails as a standup, you know, he's still such... Whatever he does, washing dishes, there's no shame in that. He c- Is it so bad to have a crappy job and a girlfriend who you don't really like? But as compared to the alternative of like, "I'm gonna kill myself," this is heaven.

   14. LFLex Fridman23:22

       Well, I think there's beauty to be discovered in all of it, in all of those experiences.

   15. MMMichael Malice23:27

       Yes.

   16. LFLex Fridman23:28

       So, but at the same time... So, I often think about, I just recently reread The Idiot by Dostoevsky. I often feel like the idiot. That's why when I say I'm an idiot, I often think about Prince Myshkin, that kind of idiot, which the world sees you as naive. I don't think he's naive. I don't think I'm naive. But I tend to see the good in people and the good in every moment. And the world often is cynical. And in fact, especially in what we do, often the intellectual is supposed to be cynical.

   17. MMMichael Malice24:03

       It's, it's, I, this is very much an urban, uh, elite-educated mindset, where if you write a book about someone who's, let's suppose, a drug addict or a prostitute, that has heft and that's valid. But if you're writing a book about a, like a love story, you know, two people fall in love and it's, they're on roller coasters or, or car- carousels, that's less legitimate. I hate that. I hate that. I hate that so much because the message it gives to people is, you have to choose between thriving and happiness and silliness and seriousness and depravity. And I'm not saying a drug addict or prostitute is depraved, but their, basically their worldview is if it's... unless it's dark and twisted, it doesn't really count as art. And I, I despise that mindset, that subtext.

   18. LFLex Fridman24:44

       So the internet and people around me often will call me naive 'cause I don't know.

   19. MMMichael Malice24:47

       I think the word they want is innocent, don't you think, is a better word.

   20. LFLex Fridman24:50

       But it's not that innocent.

   21. MMMichael Malice24:51

       No, but i- innocent in that you...... you genuinely in your heart, I know you fairly well at this point, believe that goodness is possible and that people can, if not be good, at least be better than they were yesterday.

   22. LFLex Fridman25:04

       See, even the word naive or the word innocent presumes that there's not wisdom in that, presumes that somehow that's, uh, "Oh, isn't that beautiful to live that life of a child who sees the world with these bright eyes and is hopeful about the future? But just wait until they grow up and realize that reality is much harsher than they think."

   23. MMMichael Malice25:25

       Right, it's very harsh.

   24. LFLex Fridman25:26

       But that child might be wiser than all of the adults in the room.

   25. MMMichael Malice25:31

       And don't you, don't you want to be ... If the world is like that, don't you want to be the guy who takes it on and changes it for the better, right?

   26. LFLex Fridman25:38

       Right.

   27. MMMichael Malice25:39

       So, i- it's like saying, "Well, you know, cancer's everywhere, it's inevitable." Well, don't you want to be the one who says, "Not anymore. I'm here, and I'm gonna make that change, and I can see it being better than it is now"? So, I- I- I- I think you and I have the same a- analysis of your worldview.

   28. LFLex Fridman25:57

       Mm-hmm.

   29. MMMichael Malice25:57

       And I don't think that there is a good word for it. So, I guess it's this idea of, uh, you know, inherent benevolence. It might be, you know, maybe wordy, but I think that's more accurate because, you know, you and I did not have such easy lives growing up, to put it mildly. Uh, you constantly talk about, um, just horrific aspects of life. So, to claim that you kind of don't know that they exist or you sweep them under the rug is completely not accurate to your work and your, your mindset.

8. 26:24 – 46:43

   Nazi invasion of the Soviet Union

   1. MMMichael Malice26:24

   2. LFLex Fridman26:25

      Can we talk about World War II in the Soviet Union?

   3. MMMichael Malice26:28

      Sure.

   4. LFLex Fridman26:31

      So, on Sunday, June 22nd, 1941, Hitler launched Operation Barbarossa, which was the surprise invasion of the Soviet Union.

   5. MMMichael Malice26:42

      Right.

   6. LFLex Fridman26:44

      If I could read to you a few lyrics from a song that for some reason has stuck throughout my childhood. Um, it was a famous song during that time. 22 июня, ровно в четыре часа, Киев бомбили, нам объявили, что началась война. Война началась на рассвете, чтобы больше народу убить. Спали родители, спали их дети, когда стали Киев бомбить. The song talks about, um, Kiev, like that moment as part of that operation that Kiev was first bombed, and it was announced on June 22nd, the song says at exactly 4:00, that the war has begun. For some reason, this song haunts me because the exactness of that time and this realization that at any moment you can have this thing happen to you in your own personal life, maybe we had something like 9/11 happen where everything changes, and it's just like haunting because it makes me think that at any moment something like, like that could happen that changes everything. And I just think about like normal life going on in Kiev at the time, and then all of a sudden, the bombs are dropping, and they announce that the war has begun, and you thought you were going to stay out of the war.

   7. MMMichael Malice28:14

      Um, (sighs) um, this is something that is very intensely emotional for me because you and I are both Russian Jewish. So, to know that my grandparents and my great-grandma were told, um, that the Nazis are coming, and this wasn't a dress rehearsal, and that if they get here, which they do, they did, Lviv is very Western Ukraine, that 100% you and all your relatives are going to be, um, murdered.

   8. LFLex Fridman28:52

      Yeah.

   9. MMMichael Malice28:53

      And, uh, there's a monument now in, in Lviv, where I'm from, about this, but I, I don't think either of us can imagine what it's like to know, to think that we're about, you know, minutes or whatever, hours, or there's just, there's just the Russian army standing between us and everyone, everyone we are related to are going to be murdered for no reason. And, um, y- you know, like, what's the closure here, right? Like, they evacuated a lot of people and, but they didn't evacuate enough, and to know that there is this force coming to 100% murder you, this isn't some kind of, you know, uh, the TV news being hyperbolic, they're coming to kill you, and they- if they get you, they will kill you. And you have to w- You know, we all think about war, like, "Oh, you know, we hope America wins in Iraq," rah, rah. But if America got their ass kicked kind of in Vietnam, it's not really gonna affect America in the sense that you're gonna have the body bags and all the kids being killed, and that's something that's- I'm not sweeping under the rug, but no one in America thought the Vietnamese are gonna come here and kill them, right? They were secure in their person. So, to have that sense of we really need to win because if we don't win, we are 100%, if we, they, the Russian army doesn't win, we are 100% all going to be slaughtered. And often, and not just a bullet to the head and in sadistic ways, is something that, um, to know that people who share my blood, uh, saw and went through is very hard for me to kind of, um, uh, wrap my head around.

   10. LFLex Fridman30:45

       And there's no possibility to delude yourself.

   11. MMMichael Malice30:48

       Yeah, yeah, yeah.

   12. LFLex Fridman30:49

       Because, I mean, they, they would, uh, as the song also talks about, but they- they would burn the factories. So, it's basically saying, "We're in the war now. This is..."... like-

   13. MMMichael Malice31:01

       This is your life, yeah. Like, you- you-

   14. LFLex Fridman31:02

       This is our life now.

   15. MMMichael Malice31:03

       You're, y- you know how you, yesterday you were worried about, like, "Oh, I misplaced my pen."

   16. LFLex Fridman31:07

       Yeah.

   17. MMMichael Malice31:07

       "Where, where is it?" Like, it's like, yeah, y- y- this was paradise.

   18. LFLex Fridman31:11

       Most of us are gonna ... Our life now is that most of us are going to die, and if we want to prevent all of us from dying, we, uh, we have to fight.

   19. MMMichael Malice31:23

       And we also can't sit down in some kind of weird, like, um, desert island, or, you know, s- plane crash situation and be like, "Let's decide between us who's gonna be the first to die." Maybe the m- like, Titana- the Titanic, right?

   20. LFLex Fridman31:36

       Mm-hmm.

   21. MMMichael Malice31:36

       They sat down and they were like, "Women and children get in the lifeboats." You know, they had this rational agreement. You don't have those choices-

   22. LFLex Fridman31:43

       Yeah.

   23. MMMichael Malice31:43

       ... in, in a war. So, um, it- i- i- it's- it's something that I, uh, uh, it- it- it's- it's just very chilling, and it's something I don't really have, um, the emotional space to understand or grapple with. Uh, even- uh, you know, obviously I've been to North Korea. You can see it and so on and so forth. Uh, uh, you and I can't, or anyone listening to this except for maybe Yan Mi and people like that, you can't imagine what that's like to live it. We can't ... I- I- we can't imagine what it's like to live in those situations where it's not like before Hitler came, everyone's, (laughs) you know, dancing around and having a great time. I mean, imagine how- what that life is like where your preference to Hitler is starving and waiting in line for hours for bread, and to have the secret police and your friends that turn you in and your phones are all tapped and you're a prisoner. But, to you, this is infinitely better (laughs) than the alternative. Like, these are the choices that, you know, our family had to deal with. It's something that no matter how much you ... It's like a ... L- let me put it in terms people can understand. You know what I mean? It's like your first bad breakup, right?

   24. LFLex Fridman32:53

       Mm-hmm.

   25. MMMichael Malice32:53

       Like, that's a much simpler thing to wrap your head around because it's like b- if you've never had it, you can't really ... But when you feel it, it's just v- so intense, but you can't tell someone what it's like. We could sit down for days and hours and have people tell us, but until it's the totalit- totality of your environment and your life and your mindset ... I remember my grandma ... (sighs) um, uh, she would talk about how it's like, (sighs) when you're, when you're that hungry, all (sighs) all you're thinking about is bread.

   26. LFLex Fridman33:32

       Yeah.

   27. MMMichael Malice33:33

       Because your brain won't let ... You know, human beings, you know, w- we're evolved, we have instincts, whatever, and the- and the mind is telling you, "Food, food, food, food-"

   28. LFLex Fridman33:40

       Yeah.

   29. MMMichael Malice33:41

       "... food, food." And that there's kids thinking this, and that there's ne- they're- they're not gonna get that food.

   30. LFLex Fridman33:47

       Yeah.
9. 46:43 – 58:21

   Lex and Michael argue: can most people think on their own?

   1. MMMichael Malice46:43

   2. LFLex Fridman46:43

      Every time I meet a weird person, somebody... To me, heroism is also taking a risk to, uh, rebel against mediocrity-

   3. MMMichael Malice46:54

      Yeah.

   4. LFLex Fridman46:55

      ... like, in, in the most simplest of ways, like the, the license address, like taking a risk to break the little bit of rule that nobody will know about-

   5. MMMichael Malice47:04

      Yeah, yeah, yeah.

   6. LFLex Fridman47:04

      ... to take that little bit of a, a leap, uh, of like, that, that little protest against the bureaucracy, the conformity-

   7. MMMichael Malice47:11

      Well, like that Nazi guard where he just spoke out. He's like, "Psh, hey, lady." Yeah.

   8. LFLex Fridman47:14

      But that's a big one.

   9. MMMichael Malice47:15

      Oh, that's a b- sure.

   10. LFLex Fridman47:15

       I mean like literally at the line at Starbucks or something like that.

   11. MMMichael Malice47:19

       Okay.

   12. LFLex Fridman47:19

       Like, even in the tiniest of ways, when I see people just, like, it's almost like that little, like, glimmer in their eye, a wink, like, "We're in this together." This, there's, there's all this conformity all around us that's, at a different time, could have been Nazi Germany, could have been, uh-

   13. MMMichael Malice47:38

       Oh, sure.

   14. LFLex Fridman47:38

       ... Stalinist Soviet Union.

   15. MMMichael Malice47:39

       Sure.

   16. LFLex Fridman47:40

       We're in this together. We're going to rebel against that conformity by just, just taking the risk, that little bit of risk against mediocrity.

   17. MMMichael Malice47:49

       Yeah.

   18. LFLex Fridman47:49

       I don't know. And that, and then, once again, I see this in companies too. When I see the mediocrity, um, I see this, you know, I used to work at Google, I see it in Google, that when the companies grow, that mediocrity is overwhelming.

   19. MMMichael Malice48:04

       The Peter Principle, right?

   20. LFLex Fridman48:05

       The Peter Principle.

   21. MMMichael Malice48:06

       Yeah.

   22. LFLex Fridman48:06

       Yeah. My hope is that all of us have the possibility for that glimmer, that, um, that risk-taking, the, the leap of faith or whatever the heck that is, the leap out of the ordinary, out of the conformity, out of the mediocrity.

   23. MMMichael Malice48:22

       So, so this is where you and I disagree. I, I think most, a lot of people do, are not capable of that.

   24. LFLex Fridman48:28

       They're accustomed to it. I don't know if they're not capable.

   25. MMMichael Malice48:32

       No, I th- I, my po- I understand your position.

   26. LFLex Fridman48:34

       You-

   27. MMMichael Malice48:34

       I'm disagreeing with it. I'm saying I do not-

   28. LFLex Fridman48:36

       You're saying you're not agree-

   29. MMMichael Malice48:36

       ... think they're capable. I think a lot of people effectively don't have souls. They do not have a conscience in this sense, where they're going to look at an issue, bring their critical thinking, and say, "All right. I am going to do the right thing, although I'm taking a risk." I don't-

   30. LFLex Fridman48:52

       Do you think thinking is involved or is it just taking that leap? There, there's something about that basic human spirit. Forget the thinking part. It's a, it's just saying, like, "I'll take that risk," th- the taking that adventure, the same thing that got people to explore the seas, you know, that, th- that, uh, throughout human civilization, explore land, explore the oceans, like, that explore, exploration. Like, "We've done stuff this way all this time, I'm gonna take a leap." And that comes out of nowhere seemingly for a lot of us.
10. 58:21 – 1:07:43

    How Lex and Michael use Twitter

    1. LFLex Fridman58:21

       (inhales) You know, my own flavor of a little bit of rebellion...

    2. MMMichael Malice58:25

       Sometimes I use the number two. (laughs)

    3. LFLex Fridman58:30

       (laughs) Is, uh, you know, you're very witty on Twitter.

    4. MMMichael Malice58:34

       Mm-hmm.

    5. LFLex Fridman58:36

       And-

    6. MMMichael Malice58:36

       Thank you.

    7. LFLex Fridman58:37

       My, and Twitter likes mockery and wit.

    8. MMMichael Malice58:43

       Yeah.

    9. LFLex Fridman58:43

       And, um, on the counterattack is, uh, Twitter loves that, somebody who's skilled at it. My own flavor of a bit of rebellion is to say things very simply, bordering on cliché, uh, with, with, uh, with, uh, authenticity and, like, genuinely meaning the words I say. But knowing that those words would be, are easy to attack.

    10. MMMichael Malice59:13

        Sure.

    11. LFLex Fridman59:13

        And that, sometimes those attacks can hurt, because people will just mock me.

    12. MMMichael Malice59:19

        Sure. People don't like earnestness, 'cause they've been taught to be, uh, too cool for school.

    13. LFLex Fridman59:24

        Yeah. So, like, there's this pressure for me to be, sound more, way more sophisticated.

    14. MMMichael Malice59:29

        Yeah.

    15. LFLex Fridman59:29

        Use bigger words, uh, sometimes throw in, um, a criticism of institutions or something-

    16. MMMichael Malice59:36

        Sure, sure.

    17. LFLex Fridman59:36

        ... like that. Like, uh, like almost as if I have a deep wisdom about the way the world is broken. But when you speak very simply about beautiful things in life, it's very easy to sound like you don't know what the hell you're talking about.

    18. MMMichael Malice59:51

        Sure.

    19. LFLex Fridman59:52

        And I kind of, I stick by that. (laughs)

    20. MMMichael Malice59:56

        One-

    21. LFLex Fridman59:56

        I don't know where that's gonna end up, but it's like the idiot from Dostoevsky. It feels like that's the right, uh, that's the right thing, even, even if it hurts when I'm attacked for it.

    22. MMMichael Malice1:00:05

        I, I do something similar sometimes, which is, I'll have some innocuous comment about, like, bubble gum. I mean, just, it's not even political, and a lot of times, people th- uh, few p- will respond with this paragraph of just invective.

    23. LFLex Fridman1:00:18

        Yeah.

    24. MMMichael Malice1:00:18

        About like, "Blah, blah, blah," and then this, "And you say this" and, "You're an ass," and, and just really trying to get at me. And what I, in those situations, they're very specific circumstances, I will respond, and I mean it every single time, I will say, "I, I wish your parents had been kinder to you, or your mom or your dad." Because if someone is, some, even if I'm some idiot on Twitter, right, who's just talking about bubble gum, and this is your res- I'm not talking about politics where I can see how-

    25. LFLex Fridman1:00:43

        Mm-hmm.

    26. MMMichael Malice1:00:43

        ... people get emotional. COVID, my grandma died, now you're talking about her. And you, I realize this isn't about me. Like, I'm someone you've never met making some inane point about nothing, and you're getting agitated about this. It's clearly something else that's going on here. And someone taught you, someone had to teach you, that this is how to respond, in this kind of very kind of harsh way. And a lot of times, they'll, you know, they won't say anything or get deleted, and I hope every single time, there's no asterisk here, that they take a second and they realize that the way that they were talked to growing up was not acceptable, that they don't have to carry this forward, and that they don't have to be kind to me. I'm nobody to them. But take a second and ask if this is the kind of mindset you want to be your norm, as opposed to a weapon you pull out of your pocket sometimes where it's warranted, or even when it's not warranted. So- I think there's a lot of those people out there, you know? And we forget, uh, how, you know, how, um...... hard it is for a lot of people to grow up, how they're trained from their- their parents or the single parent, that the only way they're going to get attention is by acting out, that when they do good things, it doesn't get comment, but if they do bad things, they get a smack upside their head. That, I think, is far more common than we realize, and that's such a, it's not even, it's not hitting the kid that's going to last. It's, the pain is going to give 5-5 seconds. But when you're training this child, helpless child, it's something that's really, really bad.

    27. LFLex Fridman1:02:18

        I don't know if it c- always can be mapped to that. I always wonder about them, like what their motivations are, and I just kind of, like whenever I think about them, I think only positively. And I don't even think about the childhood thing. I think... I don't know. I- I th- I kind of imagine that all of us can go through that stage where we enjoy the derision of others. We go through stages of being...

    28. MMMichael Malice1:02:44

        I- I enjoy the derision of others, but it has to be... You know, Billy Idol had that quote, like, "I like it when people are mean to me 'cause it's not pretending to be nice." But like, what's the worst thing someone could say about you? You're not... What harm are you doing?

    29. LFLex Fridman1:02:56

        Uh...

    30. MMMichael Malice1:02:56

        Maybe your podcast is garbage and the people are, the conversations suck and the people are losers.
11. 1:07:43 – 1:10:46

    Life is beautiful

    1. MMMichael Malice1:07:43

       love.

    2. LFLex Fridman1:07:43

       So what's the difference between joy and love, Michael Malice?

    3. MMMichael Malice1:07:46

       Uh, I think joy is easier to attain. It's more common. You could share it with everyone.

    4. LFLex Fridman1:07:53

       Give me an example...... of joy. Like, w- what was a moment of joy for you recently? Like-

    5. MMMichael Malice1:07:58

       I could give you a great example of joy, and this is part, in the absurdist mindset, okay? I love having a bad meal at a restaurant.

    6. LFLex Fridman1:08:06

       (laughs) Okay, yeah.

    7. MMMichael Malice1:08:07

       And I'll give you... and you can see why. You go with your friend, it takes you 45 minutes to get seated.

    8. LFLex Fridman1:08:13

       Yeah.

    9. MMMichael Malice1:08:13

       Okay, I'm starving.

    10. LFLex Fridman1:08:15

        Mm-hmm.

    11. MMMichael Malice1:08:15

        Waiter's not p- paying attention to you. They bring you water, it's got a hair in it. They get the food wrong.

    12. LFLex Fridman1:08:20

        Yeah.

    13. MMMichael Malice1:08:20

        It comes out again, it's right but it's cold. At a certain point-

    14. LFLex Fridman1:08:24

        Yeah.

    15. MMMichael Malice1:08:24

        ... you're like, "Okay, I'm hungry." I'm living an anecdote.

    16. LFLex Fridman1:08:28

        (laughs)

    17. MMMichael Malice1:08:28

        This is something that you, if you were at dinner-

    18. LFLex Fridman1:08:30

        Yeah.

    19. MMMichael Malice1:08:30

        ... we could talk about this for years, because l- how great is it that the worst thing that's happening to me is I gotta wait an hour for this meal-

    20. LFLex Fridman1:08:38

        Yeah.

    21. MMMichael Malice1:08:38

        ... that's gonna be cooked wrong, right? That, to me, is joy, is it holding on to that idea that happiness and thriving are possible, even when in the moment it's, uh, everything's going the wrong way.

    22. LFLex Fridman1:08:52

        Doesn't every moment have the capacity to, uh, fill you with joy then?

    23. MMMichael Malice1:08:57

        Yes, yes.

    24. LFLex Fridman1:08:57

        So, it's both the shitty moments and the good moments.

    25. MMMichael Malice1:09:00

        Yes.

    26. LFLex Fridman1:09:00

        But that, see, that's the way I usually talk about love, is like, I love life.

    27. MMMichael Malice1:09:07

        Yes.

    28. LFLex Fridman1:09:07

        And in that, because life can generate every- e- everything, the pain, the loss, but also just like simple or complicated bliss. All of that, I just love all of that, and that, because it fills me with a, with a kind of, I guess, joy, but, eh, joy has a connotation that it's supposed to be somehow positive, like you're supposed to be smiling. Uh, to me, you know, Man's Search for Meaning with Viktor Frankl, you know, just, it's, you're in, (laughs) you're in the Holocaust, you're in a concentration camp, just having a little bit of food that you didn't expect you will have, uh, or even just thinking about food.

    29. MMMichael Malice1:09:47

        Or what, or what about there's a kid there, you tell him a funny story and you crack him up.

    30. LFLex Fridman1:09:50

        Yeah.
12. 1:10:46 – 1:12:39

    Returning to Ukraine

    1. LFLex Fridman1:10:46

       You mentioned, uh, your grandmother in Lviv. You were thinking of returning there. The plans got a little bit delayed. But w- what are you hoping from, uh, that trip of going back to Russia, going back to Ukraine? What do you hope to get out of it, but what do you think you will feel?

    2. MMMichael Malice1:11:07

       Uh, a lot of things. First of all, I'm going with my buddy Chris Williamson. He hosts the Modern Wisdom podcast, he is one of my closest friends. We've never met.

    3. LFLex Fridman1:11:17

       Oh, really?

    4. MMMichael Malice1:11:17

       We've never met. He's Brit- he's in Britain. He's try- he's trying to get his ass over here to Austin, uh, he's filling out his forms right now.

    5. LFLex Fridman1:11:24

       He should. He's too good-looking.

    6. MMMichael Malice1:11:25

       I'll-

    7. LFLex Fridman1:11:25

       It's a crime.

    8. MMMichael Malice1:11:26

       We call him Ap- I call him Apollo and I'm Loki.

    9. LFLex Fridman1:11:29

       (laughs)

    10. MMMichael Malice1:11:29

        So, right away you have a buddy comedy, 'cause we're gonna film it, right? You have these two guys who on paper, they are very dissimilar, but we're-

    11. LFLex Fridman1:11:35

        Yeah.

    12. MMMichael Malice1:11:35

        ... very, very close. Um-

    13. LFLex Fridman1:11:37

        In which way are you similar and close?

    14. MMMichael Malice1:11:40

        Um, I think we're both very intense people, uh, very, uh, strong emotionally. Um, uh, we're both very ambitious in the sense that, uh, not in terms of career, but like we want to grab life by the short hairs kind of thing. Um, we just both like good experiences. Uh, we-

    15. LFLex Fridman1:11:59

        Did he, uh, bench more than you, or?

    16. MMMichael Malice1:12:00

        Oh, yeah.

    17. LFLex Fridman1:12:01

        Like in the gym?

    18. MMMichael Malice1:12:01

        He's, he's, he's a lo- of course. I mean, the guy's jacked, he's just-

    19. LFLex Fridman1:12:04

        'Cause, you know, he- he's so good-looking he could be one of those guys th- who is j- mostly biceps and-

    20. MMMichael Malice1:12:09

        Oh, no, no, no. He's n- if you look at-

    21. LFLex Fridman1:12:11

        Yes?

    22. MMMichael Malice1:12:11

        ... go to his Instagram, chriswilx is his handle.

    23. LFLex Fridman1:12:14

        Yeah.

    24. MMMichael Malice1:12:14

        It's like head to, head to, it's, it's head to toe is just sculpted.

    25. LFLex Fridman1:12:17

        Oh, so he's perfect in every way. That's great.

    26. MMMichael Malice1:12:19

        He, he, I don't-

    27. LFLex Fridman1:12:20

        What flaws does he have? 'Cause I need-

    28. MMMichael Malice1:12:22

        He has bad taste in friends. (laughs)

    29. LFLex Fridman1:12:25

        (laughs)

    30. MMMichael Malice1:12:25

        And his accent is all crazy. (laughs)
13. 1:12:39 – 1:16:45

    Michael is now an underwear model

    1. MMMichael Malice1:12:39

       gonna be a lot of fun. Although, to be fair, as you know, I'm an underwear model now as well, so.

    2. LFLex Fridman1:12:43

       Yeah. You're, uh, uh-

    3. MMMichael Malice1:12:44

       Yes, and we're gonna talk that in a second, may- maybe.

    4. LFLex Fridman1:12:46

       (laughs)

    5. MMMichael Malice1:12:46

       But, um, yeah SheathUnderwear.com.

    6. NANarrator1:12:48

       Promo code AliceFUNNY.

    7. LFLex Fridman1:12:48

       Yeah, this episode is brought, uh, this episode is brought to you by Sheath Underwear. Are we gonna get some pictures eventually?

    8. MMMichael Malice1:12:54

       I think we might, yeah. Uh, yes. I have them on my phone, and we're gonna, we'll have them, we could s- we could shit in right, uh, you could slice it in right here. So, to be able to go with someone who is a very close f- I mean, we, me and him talk like every day, right? So, does someone who generally cares about you, who, uh, who's, he's very, very grounded, right? So, like a lot of times I'll have like some concern, and he's really good, and if you listen to the show, at slicing through the noise and being like, "Hold on a second." I can't do the accent yet. "Have you considered A, B, and C? Because, you know, when I've had the situation, this is what I did." So, he's really good with that. Um, so to have a, first of all, just like two buddies on a trip is really a lot of fun. Second of all, I know that if it, it's gonna get, be very intense. So, for you, you left Russia much later than I did. How old were you?

    9. LFLex Fridman1:13:45

       I was 13.

    10. MMMichael Malice1:13:45

        13, right. So, you remember it, I'm sure, very, very well. I left when I was one and a half, two. I don't remember it at all. To go to the streets wh- where, you know, my family had to go through this stuff, to see the, you know, they s- they came to Lviv, they slaughtered all the Jews. I mean, to have that little memorial there that's there now, and to just look around and know yesterday, bas- basically-

    11. LFLex Fridman1:14:06

        Mm-hmm.

    12. MMMichael Malice1:14:06

        ... they came here, they rounded everyone up. And also, from the other side, you had the Stalinists coming in and starving all the people. It's- it's just to know that so much horror and death... There's this quote I saw once.... about a woman who went to Auschwitz, and she just made the comment like, "Grass grows here." 'Cause we think, you know, that when it comes to the nature of evil that you're going to go there, this is going to be this pits of hell or whatever. There's birds.

    13. LFLex Fridman1:14:30

        Mm-hmm.

    14. MMMichael Malice1:14:30

        You know, there, there's, you know, robins hopping around looking for their, the worms or whatever. They think it's perfectly nice and you, you, you stand there to understand that so much suffering happened here or there is gonna be very jarring. I know that it's going to be an issue because I speak Russian and not Ukrainian, and to speak Russian to Ukrainians is like a big deal.

    15. LFLex Fridman1:14:50

        Mm-hmm.

    16. MMMichael Malice1:14:50

        So, that's going to be a concern. I'm also worried about going to Russia because every Russian has this idea that even though they've just met you, they feel, uh, i- i- they feel they're in a position to tell you what you're doing wrong with your life.

    17. LFLex Fridman1:15:01

        (laughs)

    18. MMMichael Malice1:15:01

        What you should be doing, even if they're a cab driver.

    19. LFLex Fridman1:15:03

        Yeah.

    20. MMMichael Malice1:15:03

        I have no tolerance for unsolicited advice on...

    21. LFLex Fridman1:15:06

        Yeah.

    22. MMMichael Malice1:15:06

        ... on a basis at all. That's going to be horrible. They're gonna be telling me I need to speak Russian better because (Russian) . I'm not hearing it. I'm not interested in hearing it. So, that I think, and also, you know, given my upcoming book, The White Pill, and covering what happened back in the day with under Stalinism and later, to see this was the Lubyanka, th- this was the basement where they would... You know, you know when s- this is something that people might not realize. There's a superb film, uh, uh, The Death of Stalin, which was kind of, that's what I do with North Korea, you know, puts a humorous spin on it then when you take a step back and you realize what they're actually saying, it's just like it's very, very disturbing. How when Stalin was dying, he had a stroke. He's laying there in a pile of his own piss. He's unconscious. He be- right before he died, he thought the doctors were all plotting against him. So, they were being tortured, uh, to confess that they were trying to murder him. They had to get the doctors out of the torture chambers to attend to him, and they did it.

    23. LFLex Fridman1:16:01

        Yeah.

    24. MMMichael Malice1:16:01

        So, th- this kind of thing to like go there at like Red Square and see this is where it happened, to see Lenin's body, like this is the guy who Emma Goldman yelled at, it's gonna be really, um, 'cause I've worked so much in this space, jarring.

Episode duration: 2:37:21