The Jordan B. Peterson Podcast - 190. No Safe Spaces? | Prager and Carolla

Episode Date: September 6, 2021

Dennis Prager, an American conservative radio show host, and Adam Carolla, a comedian and a podcaster, join forces to discuss their documentary “No Safe Spaces.”Please support this podcast by checking out our sponsors:BioOptimizers: www.magbreakthrough.com/jbp Use code “jbp10” to save 10% when you try Magnesium Breakthrough. Plus a chance to get $50 of supplements for free with select purchases.ReliefBand: Reliefband.com Use promo code “JBP” to receive 20% off plus free shipping and a no questions asked 30-day money back guarantee.-Dennis Prager, is a nationally syndicated radio talk show host, heard on 300 stations across America and around the world. He is the co-founder and president of Prager University, the most prominent conservative video site globally, with over a billion views per year. 65% with people under 35 years, New York Times Bestselling author of 10 books. A biblical scholar with expertise in biblical Hebrew. Adam Carolla is best known as a comedian, actor, radio personality, television host, and New York Times Bestselling author. He hosts the Adam Carolla show that holds the Guinness Book of World Records for the most downloaded podcast. To talk about the documentary they were deeply involved in, 'No Safe Spaces,' and the problems it encountered with distribution, free speech, and beyond.Watch “No Safe Spaces”https://nosafespaces.com/watch-now/Dennis Prager:https://dennisprager.com/https://www.youtube.com/user/PragerUniversityAdam Carolla:https://adamcarolla.com/https://www.youtube.com/user/AdamCarolla-Subscribe to “Monday’s of Meaning” newsletter here: https://linktr.ee/DrJordanBPetersonFollow Dr. Peterson:Youtube - https://www.youtube.com/c/JordanPetersonVideosTwitter - https://twitter.com/jordanbpetersonInstagram - https://instagram.com/jordan.b.petersonFacebook - https://www.facebook.com/drjordanpetersonWebsite: https://jordanbpeterson.com/Visit our merch store:https://teespring.com/stores/jordanbpetersonInterested in sponsoring this show? Reach out to our advertising team here.

Welcome to the Jordan B Peterson podcast. This is season four episode 44. Quick update again. Dad is doing much better again. We spent some time at a cottage and on a boat and he's feeling better than he has in two and a half years. So thank God for that. In this episode, my dad is joined by two guests, nationally syndicated radio talk show host New York Times bestselling author and co-founder of Prager University, Dennis Prager, and Adam Corolla, comedian bestselling author and host of the Adam Corolla podcast. They spoke about their film No Safe Spaces, Freedom of Speech Religion, controversies in the film industry, and a variety of present day political and global situations. I hope you enjoy this episode and have a great week. We'll be back to two episodes a week very soon.

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promo code JBP for 20% off plus free shipping. Hi everybody, I'm talking today with Dennis Prager, who you might know from Prager You. He's a national syndicated radio talk show host heard on some 300 stations across America and around the world. I'm also talking with Adam Corolla, best known as a comedian actor, radio personality, television host, and New York Times best-selling author. I'll back to Dennis. He's also the co-founder and president of Prager University, the largest conservative internet video site in the world with over a billion views per year, 65% of which are by people under 35 years. He's a New York Times best-selling author as well, of 10 books. A biblical scholar with expertise in biblical Hebrew, the third volume of his five

volume commentary on the Torah, the third volume of his five volume commentary on the Torah, the rational Bible will be published in the summer of 2021. It's become the best selling Bible commentary in the country. Back to Adam. Adam currently hosts the Adam Corolla show, which holds the Guinness Book of World Records for most downloaded podcasts. We're going to talk today about a movie that these two gentlemen were deeply involved in a documentary, No Safe Spaces, and the problems it's encountered in distribution. And,

well, we're going to range out from there into issues of free speech and perhaps beyond that as well. So, welcome guys. Thanks very much for talking with me today. Dennis, maybe you want to start. Do you want to talk a little bit about, well, about Prager You and also maybe about the movie, no safe spaces about the documentary? Well, one relationship of Prager You and the movie that Adam and I are in is the suppression of free speech. I testified at the US Senate two years ago on what they were doing to a Prager You

videos. It may be the single funniest thing on YouTube, except for anything Adam Corolla does, and I'm not being cute. Adam Corolla is perhaps the funniest human being in the English language. He might even be the funniest in any language, but I my ability to assess that is limited. Well, I'm number four in Urdu. That's very impressive. limited. Well, I'm number four in Urdu. That's very impressive. I was wondering if it's impressive. That's not good.

No Urdu exists. That's the Pakistani life. Well, you want to crack the top five. You better be familiar with it. That's great. Well, you see what I mean, Jordan. I have a big problem when I appear on stage with Adam, and that is, I'm totally happy if he talks the whole time.

Well, I do, and then do you know that this is not even answering your question, but I just want to say this, you'll get a kick out of it. So Adam and I have gone around the country doing events on stage, and he may not even know this, but there are times during the event, well, I will say to myself, Dennis, they're also paying you so you should speak.

I feel a moral obligation to talk, but selfishly, I just rather laugh because we all need laughter. And anyway, his insights are just deep. Anyway, so what I said was the funniest thing on YouTube was this. I was at a Senate subcommittee on the suppression of free speech, testifying about what's happening to Prager U, where hundreds of our videos are placed on the restricted list,

meaning if you have a filter against pornography and violence, you actually can't see the video. So one of them was, in fact, one that I have given, I only give one tenth of the videos, 90% of other people. But I have given a number of videos on a ten commandments, for example. And so Senator Ted Cruz asked the representative of Google, why did you, you people could see this on YouTube, but it's still there.

Why did you put Mr. Prager's talk on the 10 Commandments, on the restricted list? And the man looked at Senator Cruz and said, because it mentions murder. and said, because it mentions murder. And I remember, I remember humming the Twilight Zone theme because I felt I had entered an alternate universe. So what do you think the reason was Dennis? I mean, obviously, look, that's gotta be a bit of a PR nightmare

for Google to do something like that. So it smacks of a certain degree of incompetence to begin with. And I like to hypothesize incompetence before malevolence. So why do you think it was censored that specifically? And then why, with regards to, is it reasonable to call what's happening with PragerU censorship? And why do you think it's happening? Well, I'll tell you the, I'll answer the last one first, and this will help you realize that I think there's more and more levelance than incompetence. There is never an instance in the history of the world, and this is my field of study

since I was in graduate school at Columbia. That's why I studied Russian was to read Pravda and visit the Soviet Union on multiple occasions and other, and other communist countries. There is no instance in world history that has since the Russian Revolution of the left gaining power and not suppressing speech. Liberals are for free speech, conservatives are for free speech. The left has never been for free speech. Okay, so let me ask you a clarifying question there, all right? Because, you know, I'm a Canadian, and I suppose, along with the Scandinavian countries, we're tilted a fair degree to the left compared to the US.

And so, I mean, freedom of speech is in reasonable shape in our countries, those countries that I mentioned. And so, when you talk about the left, tell me more specifically what you mean and how you would define that particular say, because you're not talking about the Democrats per say, I can't imagine, or perhaps you are. The Democrats used to be, I was a Democrat. The Democrats used to be liberal. The Democrats, when I was a kid in the 70s, Nazis, real Nazis, not people they just call Nazis. Real Nazis with swastikas demonstrated in Skokie, Illinois, because a lot of Jews lived there, especially Holocaust survivors, who was a particularly vicious act.

And Jewish groups, the ACLU, liberal groups, the Democratic Party, all defended their right because in America, anybody could say anything except Yale fire in a crowded theater. That is no longer the position. Look, why did you get in trouble? And you're wondering about that for a long time. Okay, so, well, no, well, if you're wondering, I'm not. You said something the left didn't like, that you were not going to be told by the government what pronoun you will use.

OK, so let me ask you another question. So when I look at political surveys, I see that there's a very limited number of people on the right that you could describe as extremists. And there's a very limited number of people on the right that you could describe as extremists. And there's a very limited number of people on the left who appear to support the more extremist leftist propositions. And so I do believe that in some sense it's more difficult for people on the left to draw distinctions between acceptable leftist ideas than it is for people on the right. I mean, on the right you draw the line with claims of racial superiority. On the left, there's obviously trouble brewing on the extreme, but defining exactly where it is and drawing a border around it seems to me a relatively complex task. And well, you ask me why I got in trouble. I mean, I got in trouble because I said, well, I'm not sure where to draw the line, but that particular law compelling speech with its implicit theory of identity, that's gone too far as far as I'm concerned. And I think that's the only way to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get the right to get sure where to draw the line, but that particular law, compelling speech

with its implicit theory of identity, that's gone too far as far as I'm concerned. But, you know, the fact that that caused so much trouble, I think, is indication of the fact that it's difficult to draw the line. And so, well, I'd be interested in both your comments about that. Well, I think you're on to something with the extreme part of the right wing party is pretty definable. And I think most reasonable people agree that the farthest right, you know, Jews shooting laser beams into the, into the sky and shooting down satellites or whatever crazy stuff comes out of Q and on or sort of far right stuff, racial things of that nature. I think we can all agree that

that's pretty definable and that most people on the right will not cross that border. And will you buckly help with that, wouldn't you say? I would. But on the left, I feel like there's a much greater sense of, well, we don't agree with AOC, but we're not going to say anything about it. Or we're not going to define it, or the squad. Yeah. So there's a much more, you know, I live in California, most everyone, I work in Hollywood, everyone's on the left. Their thing is sort of like, we don't like what Gavin Newsom is doing, but he's still

our guy. And you know, we'll go on. Well, that's part of this difficulty with drawing borders. Like I've had conversations with Democrats about the idea of equity, for example, which is no go zone as far as I'm concerned, because of its connotations of equality of outcome. But they insist, generally speaking, that most of the people who are using the term equity are really using it as a proxy for equality of opportunity. They're lying to you. They're lying. They're flat out lying either to themselves or to you and both are dangerous. either to themselves or to you and both are dangerous. Equity, if the word equity means equality, why don't they use the word equality?

Well, that's my argument. That's my argument. Doesn't mean equality. Well, what do you think it means exactly? I know what it means. It means equality of outcome, just exactly what you implied it meant. That's what it means.

Okay, so it means, why do you think that's so toxic? Because it means standards don't matter. It means results matter. Is there equity in the NBA? How many Jews are in the NBA? How many Japanese are in the NBA? There's no equity in the NBA. And there shouldn't be.

I only want the best basketball players. And I want the best pilots, and I want the best basketball players and I want the best pilots and I want the best physicists and I want the best, do you know that they are dropping the, I follow music, I conduct periodically. I'm very into music. So the New York Times has advocated the dropping of the blind auditions for the New York Philharmonic. No longer shall you choose the best violinist or oboist,

you choose based on the color of the violinist or oboist. That's equity. Okay, so you have your making two arguments about equity. One is that it flies in the face of a rank order of value with regards to competence and it's predicated on distribution of equality by immutable characteristics like race and sex and gender, perhaps sexual preference, all these things that become part of the cultural context. And that's equity. And the word is being used because it doesn't mean equality of opportunity, which means a playing field that's open to everyone who strives forward and who are then chosen on the basis of their merit. And how would you define merit just out of curiosity? Hey, me again, sleep problems. That's what we're talking about right now. One of the best

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than $50 worth of supplements for free. I hope you enjoy the rest of the episode. And how would you define merit just out of curiosity? Well, I think, I'm sorry, Dennis, but I think I think the blind, you know, it's really hard to quantify certain things like who is the best oboist. It's difficult, but that's why you put the curtain up and you decide. And you have experts listen. You have experts listen. It doesn't mean they're right. It just means the only thing they're factoring in is the ability or the perceived

ability of the oboeist on the other side of the curtain. And once you pull that curtain down, you sort of bring everything into question. Okay. So, so you know, if you're trying to hire someone in the U.S., the laws are set up this way. And I know these laws quite well. So if you want to hire someone, you're bound by law, first of all, to do an analysis of the job requirements. So you have to make a list of what competence means in that particular context. So that's merit as defined by that job. Then you have to have to use the most reliable and valid test that's legally available that's to do the selection or you can be

or you're liable under the appropriate employment law. So merit has this very specific definition. It's sort of within occupations, so you define it within an occupation, and then you have to use a selection technique that assesses for that, and that should be blind to immutable characteristics like race, et cetera. I mean, that's how the law was set up for years. And now we see this situation where this is restorative justice, that's the doctrine.

Is that what we're seeing? And why do you have a problem with that exactly? Well, I'll give you an example in my mind. You know, Dennis brought up sports. I try to think why is human beings are we so attracted to sports? Like everyone loves sports. But why does everyone love sports?

Why is the ratings for the Oscars plummeting every year and the ratings for the Superars plummeting every year and the ratings for the Super Bowl going up every year. If you just looked at a chart of the Super Bowl starting in 1970 and the Oscars starting in 1970s, 70, the Oscars, I think, outrated the Super Bowl. But at a certain point, the Oscars have, you know, less than 10 million and the Super Balls always, you know, 40, 50 million. So what is that as human beings? What are we

responding to? Well, what we're responding to is when we watch the Super Ball, we believe that the best players are on the field, regardless of whether the entire defense of side of the ball is black or Asian. There's never or anything. There's there's never been an instance of the owner's son starting on the defense or the coaches son starting on the defense. Now, it doesn't mean these are it doesn't mean there's not a 12th guy who's on the bench who was actually better, but it means in the coaches eye, these are the 11 best players to put out on the defensive side of the ball and the offensive side of the ball. And we never question it. When you then watch the Oscars and you see a lot of the diversity and a lot of the forced diversity, you think to yourself, are these really the

best seven or eight films of the year or are we trying to conjigger it some way to open it up for things that are better or different, I should say, than just the best film. And once you start down that path, I argue it's a very slippery slope. We tune out. We lose interest. What's the big beef on the on the Oscars best films every year? It's like I didn't see half these things and where they were

they really the best film. And then I saw two of them and I didn't like them. So you don't think we trust the selection process. So I wanted to answer your question. You said, why do we like sports so much? And that'll lead me to another question that maybe I can direct to you. So I wanted to answer your question. You said, why do we like sports so much? And that'll lead me to another question that maybe I can direct to you. So I think Dennis will find this interesting. Maybe he'll agree. Maybe he won't. But the word sin is derived from the

Greek word hamartia, which means to miss the mark. And so it's an archery term. And you know, people are very, very goal directed. And what you see in sports is the assemblance of teams of excellence, competing and cooperating, because they're playing the same game. So that's the cooperation to hit the target. And every time someone excellent hits the target, it inspires all in the audience. And that's why everybody leaps up, sort of not even of their own accord, right? They're possessed by the spirit of the game. And so there's something that's very, very deep going on in a sports spectacle because we're all participating in the celebration of the team effort

to facilitate the ability of the individual to attain the goal. And that runs through sports. It's dramatized in a way that's not rationally criticizable. And your point is if that's gerry-mounted, then people won't appreciate it anymore. But here's the question I have for you. Why do you think that the meritocracy of sport is so widely accepted and not a subject of public attack when there is a public assault

on the idea of merit in almost every other domain? Why does sports get a pass, so to speak? Why does sports get a pass, so to speak? As I believe in sports, we would all realize the absurdity if we tried to mess around with the meritocracy of it. If you said there's not been enough Jewish heavyweights in the last 30 years, we need to get a Jewish heavyweight and put them out there with Tyson Fury or whoever the current heavyweight belt holder is. I think we would all understand the sort of bizarre nature of that, and we all sort of

inherently understand it wouldn't work or back to Dennis' example if we took, you know. Why do you think it's more obvious to us? I think you might be right, but I can't figure out exactly why. We seem to accept, I mean, people suffer for the distinctiveness in athletic ability. I mean, it's a trope of many, many American films. You know, there's the,

the boy who would like to make the football team, but Kant and it's painful. And so we accept that that pain is real and it exists, but we don't use that to justify an assault on the meritocracy of sport. I just can't figure out why it's so self-evident. You just say it is, but Dennis, do you have any ideas about that?

Well, because it's more objective than subjective. If you hit 40 home runs, you're a great player. We don't have 40 home runs in almost any other area of life. So, you think it's a measurement issue? Yes, it is a measurement issue. That's exactly right. Stats are the fans are crazy. Best baseball fans can tell you the batting average of the first basement on the Detroit Tigers 12 years ago. This is what they live for. Stats, but there were no stats in much of life back to my old way. Right. So, so, well, so that also means that the people who are criticizing

our society for its, for its power base, say, rather than its merit base, they're partly led to that conclusion by the fact that the stats of life are not nearly as obvious as the stats in sports. Oh, I would, I would argue, sorry for cutting you off, Dennis, but I, I would argue that in this particular case, stats are on the other side. So they go Delta Airlines has less than 14% African American pilots. Delta Airlines employs less than 6% female pilots, and less than 1% transgender. So if you think about the stats, we do love stats, but they get used against us on the other side when they're constantly talking about police reform or the fire department is in a mostly Hispanic neighborhood, but yet the fire department doesn't represent the constituency

of the group that it serves, you know, because it's only 13% Latino. They do love stats, but they love them from a different side of the equation. Right, but exactly, but those are not stats of excellence. Those are stats of of what Jordan calls immutable characteristics. Right. The stats are easily measurable. That's the most interesting point. But yes, that's what I was pointing out about sports. But I believe that

other stuff is measurable too. I believe that it is that unless unless one enters the world of the absurd, which we have entered, Beethoven is greater than anybody composing music today, is greater for that matter than any non-German composer, whoever lived. The greatest composers were overwhelmingly Austria and German. So, what do I care? I only care about there being great music.

I'm a Jew. I know Wagner was a rank anti-Semite and Hitler's hero, and I love Wagner's music. I don't care when I listen to his music. When I hear the ring or any of his other operas, the man was a genius. So So I don't assess by that. At the University of Pennsylvania, they took down the English department, an Ivy League university, took down Shakespeare's picture because he was a white European male and they

put up a non-white lesbian instead, not because of measurable excellence, but because of immutable characteristics. Yeah, well, I guess Adam's point is that it's easy for people to default into easily measurable statistics when the alternative measurement systems are somewhat obscure. It's harder to rank order musicians by their quality. I mean, you could look at how often their pieces are played by major orchestras, for example, but you know, you could make a case that that's a consequence of systemic prejudice as well. So you have these stats that signal immutable group membership that are pretty comprehensible, and they lead people astray because they can't evaluate the broader context of excellence.

So easily, I mean, we have to look for cognitive biases, right, when we're trying to explain things, and they lead people astray because they can't evaluate the broader context of excellence so easily. I mean, we have to look for cognitive biases, right, when we're trying to explain things. As I said, before reaching for malevolence, even though I'm perfectly willing to reach for malevolence when I think it's there. So let's move back to no the justifiable reason for taking down Shakespeare at an English department? Well, that might be envy and resentment, that could well be. I mean, I talked to somebody interesting recently, Paul Rossi, who is the New York teacher who stood up against the political correct incursion into the private school, a Grace Church. It was, and he talked about the attraction that postmodern theory held for him

when he was an undergraduate. And he said he really wanted to be a creative writer, but he really didn't have the talent for it. And so it was kind of annoying for him, in some sense, to be exposed to all these great authors because it represented the pinnacle that he couldn't scale. And then when he was introduced to postmodern theory, which critiqued all of these great authors,

as perhaps not great at all, let's say, it satisfied some vengeful and resentful element of him. I mean, he grew out of that and was able to talk about it, but I think that that's, I think he made a fair case. And as I said, I'm willing to identify malevolence, but for me, it's a last, it's a last reach. You know, I look for cognitive biases and that sort of thing first. And, I mean, I think too, you look at so many people that are attracted to radical left ideas. For example,

they're predominantly young people, not only, but predominantly. And, you know, they're looking for a causal myth, let's say, they're looking for a myth and a causal explanation, and it's fed to them. It's not a surprise that they devour it. Some of that's malevolence because it gives them a target for their resentment and their anger, but some of it's just ignorance. They haven't been taught a more comprehensive viewpoint. And I mean, you're trying to do that, at least to some degree, on Prager You. And you're having some success with young people as well,

which is quite interesting. Right. I don't charge the young people with malevolence. I charge the people teaching them with malevolence. People who teach the 1612 narrative are malevolent. They load the United States and this is their way of destroying our society by teaching young people that it was founded in order to preserve slavery. It's a gargantuan lie.

And again, I just need to say this again. I, to the, it's may of many of my fellow conservatives, because I read comments on my pieces on the internet. I'm interested in comments. And many think I'm a fool, or, no, they don't say naive, for distinguishing between liberals and leftists. But it's a huge distinction. And the only way for the salvation of the West is to teach liberals that the left is their enemy

and not the right. That is the key task of all of us. Liberalism has nothing in common with leftism and it has everything in common with conservatism. So what do you think that liberalism and conservatism have in common? Where's the common ground there? Let's begin with free speech, the subject of this.

I also think an intellectual honesty, you know, a couple of guys in this town who I know who are, I wouldn't call them leftists, but I'd call them Democrats and probably progressive, who are also liberal in a true sense, are Bill Mar and Attorney Mark Erguss. They're both vote Democrat, but when subjects come up, they're intellectually honest. And you end up agreeing on quite a few things with these folks just because they're because they're having intellectual honesty. So, you know, they may be on the left when it comes to some social issues

or maybe some border issues, but they do understand governmental overreach and tyranny and oppression and things like that, especially as it pertains to COVID. And they have an intellectual honesty. A perfect intellectual honesty subject is Israel versus Palestine. If you're on the left, you have to side with Palestine.

If you're liberal, you can vote Democrat, be liberal, and intellectually understand that Israel's not the problem in that region. And that's a pretty good yardstick, I would say, to measure liberal versus leftist Israel. Okay, so Dennis, you're drawing the distinction between liberals and leftists, and that's the leftist that you're having the trouble with. So here's a question for you. So if the liberals and the conservatives have common ground, and they have the right behind them, so to speak, I mean, the correct, let's say, the honesty and the whole weight of, I wouldn't just say Western civilization, but the central civilizational tendency, because I think it's a mistake to identify this reflexively with the West.

But in any case, why has the left become so attractive? What are the liberals and conservatives doing wrong with regards to their, the education of young people or to the marketing of their ideas? I mean, what's going on? What's happened here? All right, you're right. That's a very fair question. I did a research on the five embassies that showed that the Black Lives Matter banner,

the US embassies around the world, five that were identified. One of them was the United Kingdom, the largest U.S. Embassy in the world. And I looked up in each case who the ambassador was. I was curious who would put up what I consider a hate group banner in front of the American Embassy. And it turns out fascinatingly that the UK, we don't have an ambassador to the UK, we have a charge A, Duffair, the head of the embassy in the UK, is a woman and in the Wikipedia entry, it noted in passing that her mother is on the board of the New York Civil Liberties Union.

And I mentioned that on my radio, you know, and I said, you know, leftists really do tend to perpetuate themselves better than we do. The number of conservative parents with kids are on the left is far greater than the number of leftist parents with kids on the right. But the reason is obvious. The reason is they have everything. They have kindergarten. They have elementary school, high school college, university postgraduate, the media, sports, late night television. There is nothing that we have except independent voices like the three of us here and thank God others in addition to us.

That's the reason, if the schools were all conservative, then the leftist parents would have a very difficult time keeping their kids. Leftist, this is not funny. When I talk to left-leaning people in the United States, they feel that they're on the defensive. They feel that they right has more power. They point more to state governments, for example. And it does seem to me as an outsider,

because I'm an outsider to all of this, that one of the things that does characterize the United States, maybe more than any other country in the entire West, perhaps not, because there are, there are countries that might be an exception is that there is a reasonably decent balance of power between the right and the left. If you, if you consider the totality of the system, I mean, you have Democrat power federally, but at a state level. But you are. Here's the deal. I'll make with all of the people who say that to you, the following deal.

We'll give you state governments. You give us elementary schools, high schools, and graduate schools and universities. And we'll take that. Let's make that. You can, we'll take the New York Times, make it conservative. You can have all the state governments you want.

I think it's such a, they live in a deluded image of themselves and the world. If that's what they believe, oh, you have state governments. We have the New York Times and CNN and the Washington Post and Columbia and Yale and Harvard and Stanford, but you have state governments, please. in Columbia and Yale and Harvard and Stanford, but you have state governments, please. So, okay, so that's interesting. I mean, you believe that these educational institutions, well, you also included the New York Times, and I'm not going to dignify the New York Times

by calling it an educational institute, but you believe that the educational institutions from kindergarten all the way up through the universities have the signal power in the American culture. You think that's a reasonable claim? I'm not disputing it. I'm asking you if that's what you believe.

How could it not be? That's where your kids spend most of their waking hours. Well, I mean, it's, go ahead. Now, go ahead. I'm just asking, sorry, I think Jordan's asking is it a foregone conclusion that all the universities and high schools and junior highs are left leaning?

99% yes. Yeah, well, I mean, it's certainly been something that's very disturbing to me. I think the objective evidence supports the supposition that they're overwhelmingly left leaning. And it certainly seems to me that these critical ideas, the idea, especially that the structure of the West is predicated on the arbitrary expression of power.

I think that's the most fundamental pathological claim that emanates from the West, is that power is the fundamental human motivation, and that our functional institutions are essentially predicated on the arbitrary expression of power. I always think that people who say that are confessing more than they are accusing, because most of the people I've seen who claim that seem to be perfectly willing to use power as their predominant mode of operation in the world. I guess I would also ask

you why is it that the story that power is the fundamental animating spirit of civilization, let's say, but we'll say Western civilization just to keep it narrower. Why do you think that story has such resonance, especially because to me, and that'll all answer your question, but I'm curious, what are the origins of schools and why to the left and not toward the right? So if you got a group and we've all done it, where they go, we want you to speak to a group of commercial property builders. You know, these guys do tenant improvement work

and they do commercial work and they're real estate developers and engineers and architects and builders. You'd know who you were talking to. I mean, you'd know what their politics were. Just a small example in my spare time, I like to race cars. All the guys who show up to the track, they basically have the same politics. And the reason they have the same politics is because they live in a world

where they have to prepare their car, then they have to go out, execute it, and they have to drive the car. And it's a real meritocracy because someone's going to get the checkered flag and someone's going to come in last. And they have a sort of collective mindset, just like you know, most people who run a small business have a sort of mindset. They went less regulation and lower taxes and breaks, and they tend to be Republicans. So what are we finding on school campuses? Well, school, who is attracted to be a professor? Who's attracted to be a school teacher?

It really is a little slice of socialism here in the United States. We're basically saying, you get a job, you don't get paid that much, but you can never get fired. You'll get tenure. It'll be an easy life. You'll never really have to hang your neck out or your shingle out. There's no chance you're going to go bankrupt. There's no chance you're going to be at the top and there's no chance you're going to be at the bottom. You'll just sort of have a job forever. So those are the people who are attracted to the profession. Nobody I know who's an entrepreneur is attracted to be

a schoolteacher, maybe later on, if they've sold their third company and have more money than they can, than they can count, they want to go back in and teach them business classes or something like that. But you're attracting people who have a little bit of a socialist bent or leaning just from the beginning versus folks who want to go into the military or folks who want to start their own small business. Now, how long would it take for those people to start indoctrinating your kids? I don't want to use a word that's that strong, but it's essentially getting them to sort of think the way you think. I use this example. What if all teachers were vegetarians?

This said, how long before your kid came home for Thanksgiving and said, meat was murder. It would be impossible for them not to sort of have that through osmosis or or beyond. Sort of push that agenda to your kids.

So it's going to go this way. It has to go this way because the campuses are inhabited with people who naturally lean toward that and lean away from the entrepreneurial spirit. Then once the kids graduate, they end up at the New York Times and now the New York Times is the New York Times. So this shall continue in my opinion, because it's at its fiber, that's what it's based on. I was talking to a group of Canadian dissident academics yesterday and one of them, Janice Fiamengo, she's a former feminist, former English professor and who abandoned her leftist ideology a number of years ago

and has become a very vocal and articulate critic of leftist activism in academia, she pointed out something quite interesting that's a bit different in terms of its causal pathway, let's say in the universities. Now back in the 60s, women's studies was established and women's studies punitively was about women, but perhaps it was mostly about critique of male dominance.

And so then perhaps it was particularly about critique of dominance. And that idea got a toehold in the universities and started out with women studies but spread to the whole grievance studies industry. And that's more or less taken over the administration and you know, pushed its tentacles out into the rest of the faculties as well, literature, English literature in particular,

the humanities more generally, the social sciences to some degree and now increasingly biology and physics, it's not so much a temperamental argument, you know, as a structural argument that we set up an institution that was based on what would you say, resentment and hatred, at least to some degree, and then that generalized across the disciplines. Well, yes, I agree fully with that. I just want to go back to the question you posed about power. You made it. You offered a throwaway line, which I thought was utterly correct and insightful,

that when the left talks about power, it's confession rather than accusation alone. And here is a massive disadvantage to people who are conservative. I'll use myself as an example only because I speak for many in this way. I have been asked to run for office all of my public life. And I actually once did file to run for Senator California and then I woke up a sober. And I don't even drink, but it was, it was a moment of non-sabriety. In any event, I have always said on the radio, I am infinitely more interested in influence than power. I have no interest in having power. How to distinguish them?

How to distinguish them? Yeah. Yes, because I can't, I can only influencing you is not the same as having power over you. I cannot tell you that you must keep your store clothes and go out of business because of a virus. I have no desire to have that power and I resent those who do. And if you used your influence, how would that differ from the expression of power? Power is coercive. Inf influence is not. Everybody will...

Well, let's expound on that a little bit, because this does get to this question. See, I'm staggered by the idea that a very large minority of the population now appears to believe that the guiding spirit of human civilization is the arbitrary expression of power, rather than something like influence or cooperation or negotiation. The left cannot influence. That's why they don't debate us. I have had the number of leftists who have accepted invitations to my radio show in 35 years can be counted on the digits of your hands and feet. I even had Howard Zinn came onto my show. I have extended to, I have said I will pay a thousand dollars to any New York Times columnist other than Brett Stevens who comes on anyway, to come onto my show.

That I will travel anywhere to debate them, but it doesn't happen. I'll pay $10,000 to have any black leader debate Larry Elder. They'll never do it. They don't debate. They, because they're crappy at influence. They're great at power. And that's what they know, power. And so they would say, you know, they would say,

well, you call it influence because that suits your moral, that puts you in the moral high ground, but you're a privileged person. You're white, you have a huge, you have access to a huge media empire, you can say what you want and you can talk to millions of people, you call that influence, but we call it power. And part of it is because you didn't deserve what you have. And that's a consequence of your privilege. And I mean, this isn't something I believe. So how how do you explain Oprah Winfrey?

I'm sorry. Did I? Are we still on? Well, because Jordan had to switch between the person that was trying to punch holes in your point and then back to himself. So I don't think Jordan knew how to reply in terms of should I reply as myself or the naysayer that is a- Well, I couldn't come up with an argument from the perspective I was trying to put forward. I mean, I think Oprah Winfrey was successful because she's credible and remarkable. That's my hypothesis.

But... OK, so... She's a token. How about that? She's a token. Yes, she's a token. So, it's the number of black influencers in our society. Is Don Lemon a token? I mean, it becomes an absurdity

after a certain period of time. Anyway, that's, it's a non-sequitor, whether or not I have an advantage being white is a non-sequitor to the issue of, I don't want power over other people. We conservatives want to be left alone. The left does not want to be left alone and they don't want to be left alone. The left does not want to be left alone, and they don't want to leave you alone.

I want to leave you alone, except for the most obvious things you can't murder, you can't steal, et cetera. But by and large, we want to leave others alone. I know they will raise abortion, but if they don't acknowledge that abortion is at least a moral issue, and there is an issue whether it should be banned, I fully acknowledge that, but there is no issue about whether it least a moral issue. And there is an issue whether it should be banned. I fully acknowledge that, but there is no issue

about whether it is a moral issue. They deny that it's even a moral issue, that the human fetus is worth less, literally worth less than a hamster. There are laws protecting hamsters. There were no laws protecting the human fetus. I mean, it's so, but, but other than that, they can't come up, we don't, we don't want to intervene in your life like they want to intervene in hours.

That is why the masks issue became one of a political. You would think it's just science. By the way, if we did follow the science, the New England Journal of Medicine last year, which nobody bothers quoting, did say that they were essentially worthless outdoors, and they weren't worth much indoors either. Then they went and said, oh, of course, we weren't saying people shouldn't do it, but they didn't take away their original case. They want the mask issue is in large measure what conservatives think it is, power, not science. Well, I think we, fortunately, in a, in a bizarre way, just live through this experiment called COVID-19. You pretty much could divide the country into red states and blue

states. So if you just sort of looked at it as a, as an experiment, just sort of looked at it as an experiment. Let's just see if we can remove the politics of sorts from it. And even the disease itself or any knowledge we have of it of personal people who died or people who got it or whatever it is. If you just sort of looked at it more as a metaphor, you take the country, you take the blue states and how they reacted, Dennis and I are in California,

or you could have Gretchen Whitmer in Michigan. She was telling, the blue states were telling you, don't go boating. California arrested a guy who was paddle boarding alone in the Pacific Ocean. I mean, the footage is breathtaking. It's literally a guy on a surfboard with a paddle standing alone. Nobody within yards, maybe miles of him and a boat pulls up and they literally arrest the guy on the beach, which obviously is much more dangerous than whatever it is he was doing alone. But if you just said, let's just do a little, let's have a little experiment.

This disease showed up, how did the right leaning states act and how did the left leaning states act? Well, that's all you need to know. I mean, it doesn't need to be a virus. It's the left snapped into action and started doing what they wanted to do, which is control. California's Gavin Newsom and Merrigar said, you know, they all jumped into control because that's what they wanted to do.

It's almost like we all had those friends and you guys know if there's any data on death rates between red and left and red and blue states? Any reliable data? Because that'd be quite interesting. Yeah, there is reliable data. And you may recall that when Texas dropped all of its mandates, the president of the United States said it was the andethal thinking and there was absolutely no spike in cases or deaths in Texas. Nobody talks about it now because the president said something incredibly stupid, but typically of the left, they dismissed all freedom-loving policies with regard to this particular disease.

We should have followed what Sweden did. I never thought in my life that I would use Sweden as my moral model in Western society, but the world is not fully predictable. But I think we have our answer as to which side once more control, because the outcome ended up being the same or in many cases better for the red states.

So it had really nothing to do with science and it really didn't have anything to do with data. It's just the left saw it as an opportunity to do what they want to do, what they're inclined to do, which is control. And the right is the argument that Dennis made tried some things, but they were trying to refrain from the sort of totalitarianity of what the left was doing, which is total control. So it was a little experiment. We just went through it. We got the results.

And I think it's pretty self-evident at this point. It is. All right, so let's go back to the movie. If you don't mind, we took a large detour and it was worthwhile, but you tell us about, tell us about no safe spaces first and then tell us about, you know, your attempts to get it distributed or the attempts to get it distributed. you know, you were your attempts to get distributed or the attempts to get it distributed. Well, I'll start with the movie and then Dennis will go on to the attempts to be distributed. But why actually wanted it to reverse? Okay. What would that be?

Either way. You know, Dennis and I are very different, we have very different backgrounds, but we do have common sense and common. And I have found more and more, and I'm assuming you guys feel the same way, which is just finding someone with common sense seems to trump all the other characteristics that we're constantly talking about,

about, you know, where, what region you're born in or who your team is or what color your skin is. Dennis and I always had common sense and common. And we struck up a great friendship. We've done many speaking engagements. We always had a great time in each other's company. And so when the producers came to us with this idea, I immediately jumped at it just because it selfishly seemed like we could spend a lot of time together talking about a subject that we're both pretty passionate about, which was free speech. And since the time we made this movie, I feel like things have gotten much worse. I think the movie was a bit ahead of its time in terms of what it is, the subject matter.

And now I feel like in just the three or four years since we started this free speech issue has gone into overdrive. Go ahead, Dennis. Yeah, we're're on the movie and then we're on the distribution. I've said from the beginning and I'm neither arrogant nor humble.

I just pretty much try to see myself in life objectively. And so I have said this is a great movie and it's not a great movie because I'm in it. It might be a great movie because Adam is in it, but the truth is it's a great movie. And Adam and I happen to be the quote-unquote stars, but that's not the point of the movie. I have watched this about five times. I have the attention span of a child. And so for something to keep me riveted five times speaks immensely about it. It is it is it truly is an important movie.

It's more important today, even than when it was made about free speech. And it's gotten movies within the movies. And anyway, people should see it. I should like to point out too,, just as an advertisement of sorts. There's a Canadian equivalent to that movie called Better Left Unsaid that has faced the same sort of distribution problems that you guys have faced.

And it focuses on issues that are more germane to Canada, although also relevant to the US. And so, well, they deserve a note. They deserve a mention. So. But I'm glad you pointed out. I happen to think that things are worse in Canada than in the US. But that's an interesting discussion for either another time or later on today.

So what was your impetus for making? I'm in the movie just however, we know about the distribution. Yes, yes. Netflix refused to distribute it. To stream it, which is incredible, given how popular the movie is. Okay, so make a case for that. Like why? Okay, so Netflix should have been incentivized as far as you're concerned by the fact that the movie was economically successful. And there are other streaming agencies too online that are fairly powerful. So Amazon, et cetera. Have you had any interest from any of the streaming agencies? Well, it's interesting.

I don't know if I'll look up the Amazon question. I know that Walmart doesn't sell it in its stores. They have the same thing. All you need really in Netflix or Walmart or any of these is one or two people who are woke to tell, you know, we can't do this, we're gonna get a bad name. And then, you know, what is it to Netflix not to listen

to somebody who says, oh, Dennis Prager, we know for a fact that it was my name, that was the trigger, which is an interesting thing, which I, one day would be fascinating to discuss, because whenever my name is raised as this bugaboo, I always say, well, can you say anything in 35 years of broadcasting, 10 books, literally 1000 columns on the internet, plus tens of thousands of hours

of the radio recorded, say one thing that I have ever said that strikes you as extreme. And so there's never an example. This literally never. The New York Times did a piece on me. They couldn't find one sentence. They made up something. In fact, they said,

Prager suggested, and I always tell people if they don't say said, don't believe the line. Suggested is the New York Times, not what I said. And then they had no quotes. But anyway, I've had the same experience, Dennis, you know, I have no idea. I know that I can't find a thing you've ever said that is an enobling. I love your work. I wrote the introduction to your biography. I love your work. I wrote the introduction to your biography. I had this experience as well.

And then I have another thought, which is, I got into a lot of trouble and I got out of favor with critics because it was widely said that Adam Corolla said women weren't funny. Now, this is perfect and you guys have experienced a version of it. I did an interview years ago and the person said, at the end, who's funny here, men or women? And I said, well, I think men are, I think it's based on them trying to have sex, essentially,

so they had to exercise that muscle a little bit. But I know many female comedians that are funnier than anybody, any guy ever want to high school with. That then turned into Adam Corolla said women weren't funny. And then they just ran with it. And that's up there with that. Well, look, it's pretty credible what you say, because my sense is that there's been a couple of things

I've said that have been blown up in the press, you know, and they were exaggerations of the sort that you're describing taken out of context. I think that in the current climate, if you've ever said anything reprehensible on public record that you will be slaughtered for it. And so if you haven't said anything reprehensible on public record, that you will be slaughtered for it. And so if you haven't been slaughtered for it, the probability that you haven't said anything

reprehensible is pretty damn high because people are combing over the utterances of people like you trying to find a smoking pistol. I don't know if you can comb over things to find a smoking pistol. But I will tell you another institution that's sort of been ruined. And I think Jordan was sort of getting to it. And it sort of gets back to the oboe or the cello player for the New York Phil harmonica. How do you say that one film is definitive, definitively better than the other film? You know, it is subjective and or objective. that one film is definitively better than the other film. It is subjective or objective and or subjective.

Sorry, but you are, so a lot of the answers is sort of make a better film and you'll get on a Netflix or make a better film and you'll get into the Sundance Film Festival. So I've had five films all turn down from the from the Sundance Film Festival. Now, Jordan, the way Jordan's mind is working, as you're thinking, well, how do you know? I mean, they could. No, I'm thinking, why don't you organize your own damn conservative film festival? But true. Well, but the, the, the, the, the academic in you is thinking, how do we define that? And, and as we spoke about earlier, when the guy hits 40 home runs in a season, that's

definable. And when the guy drains 14, three pointers in a playoff game, that's pretty definable. But how do we do it with documentaries? And there's a, with documentaries? Well, you could make the case with your film. I mean, it had reasonable success. I hope I've got this right? It had reasonable success at the box office. I mean, it had enough success at the box office, so it should have been economically interesting

for a place like Netflix or Walmart. Agreed. So another system that's sort of been corrupted is you used to be able to go on to the website, Rotten Tomatoes, and literally check the score of the film. And it's not an exact science, but your film gets a score and my film gets a score and her score. It's pretty good. It's a score and it's pretty good. Now, if you look at no safe spaces, the critics have it under 50%, somewhere 46%,

and the audience has it at 99%. And I would argue we now must remove the critics from the equation, because the critics are so left and so woke that there's nothing, you know, Dennis Prager could make gone with the win tomorrow and it would get under 50% unrotten tomato. So they've screwed up their own,

they've corrupted their own system or sort of polluted their own system. You must now go with the audience because there's two scores. There's the critic score and then there's what the people thought and we now have to throw out the critic. And by the way, it's a two way street. One of the, you know, films that would be an Oscar nominated film that started a young gay black man who was struggling with his sex. Well, that'll be 96% with the critics and 65 with the people. Well, you know, that's a testable hypothesis.

You could rank order films by discrepancy between critics and audience and then rate them according to their political affiliation. And you'd have the answer right there. You could try, you know, a good status tradition could do that in a day. Be a very interesting thing to do because you might be right. The tradition could do it in a day. Yeah, yeah. That's right. You're right. That's a great point, Joy. Yeah, it's very simple. It's very simple. It's not only what the theme of the film is.

It's does it have Dennis Prager's name on it? Take a look at the arc of Clint Eastwood directed films and watch how they shrank in the eyes of the critics over the years since he spoke to the famously spoke to the empty bar stool at the convention. I know his film about that featured the car and the Asian family next door, which I really liked. I mean, that's got slammed for racism. Yeah, Grant Turinot, even by some of the actors

that were in it who I thought were extremely ungrateful at my personal opinion, I thought that was a remarkably non-racist film. I mean, Eastwood was played a character who was a standard conservative with the Archie Bunker type, essentially. But as he got to know his neighbors, he placed his allegiance to them over that of his own family, who he saw as becoming morally corrupt. How in the world that's a racist film is absolutely beyond me.

But Jordan, I think you're not factoring in. You're, there's two factors. There is what is the film and then who directed the film? Yes, yes, yes. If that film was directed by Mark Ruffalo, there would be no issues. He's a progressive actor, Dennis. I know you don't know any actors. You pick the actor that's on George Clooney.

If George Clooney directed Gran Turino, it'd be 15 points higher percentage points higher with the critics. That's my assertion. And I've studied it. Well, if you fun to do the statistical analysis, maybe somebody listening could whip that up because a good graduate student in psychology

could do that very quickly. Maybe I'll have one of my people do that. That would be fun. So why were you motivated you guys to do no safe spaces? And what exactly is it examining? It's examining free speech, which alone, I mean, first of all, everybody involved in it, the directors, the writers, the producers

were a fantastic people. People I really admire and adore. And originally it was with me and then very early on they said, would you like to do without a corolla? And I don't know if your viewers are able to perceive this, but we really do adore each other. And respect each other. And so the thought of doing this with Adam was,

I was excited and it turned out that I had every reason to be excited. It's a great chemistry that we have. Just to hear Adam describe how different our backgrounds is, is worth the price of admission, which he does at most of the time when we go public. Adam, why don't you give a brief review of how different our backgrounds are?

Well, first our similarities were both over six foot, and that's where it ends. Dennis is, you know, a New York, he's an East Coast guy. I grew up in North Hollywood, California. Dennis is a scholar. I was put on academic probation at a junior college. Dennis likes symphonies. I like progrock. He likes gaffilta fish.

I like Philly cheese steaks. Where does it end, Dennis? Well, a lot about about the religious difference. Oh, yes. He's a very religious Jew. I'm essentially atheist slash pagan. So there's a again, but you know, the thing, the thing I always find about Dennis is an intellectual honesty and a pursuit of truth. And again, he's not interested in converting people. He's interested in having a dialogue with people. And, and I don't know what, I don't know what happened to that process. It feels, well, I know what happened to that process. It feels... Well, I know what happened to it. I mean, let's examine that for a minute or two.

Okay, so first of all, to have a dialogue, you have to assume there are two people involved at minimum, right, dialogue, and that there's a logos involved, that there's a logic there that operates within each individual and between them, and that they are of the sort that can be brought to a different standpoint, a different understanding,

by the mutual exchange of verbal information. And so you have to believe that there's an individual on both sides who has something unique to contribute and who can learn as a consequence of rational negotiation, and that that biological process is the means to that. And if you don't believe that there's an individual, you believe that there's group identity and you don't believe that there's negotiation

and goodwill in that verbal exchange, you only believe there's an exchange of power. There's no dialogue. And so that's why, at least normally, why the leftists that you describe the radicals won't debate with you. I mean, there's no debate. You normally, why the leftists that you describe, the radicals won't debate with you. I mean, there's no debate. You see, it isn't the people on the liberals and the conservatives think that free speech

exists. The radical critics don't. It isn't about whether or not there should be, that free speech should be allowed. It's deeper than that. It's whether or not there is such a thing as free speech. Like, you know, when the critical race theorists and so forth say that this is a, that they're offering a fundamental critique of Western civilization, I think the idea that it's Western, as I said, is somewhat an error, but that it's a fundamental critique. They mean that.

They mean all the way to the bottom. And so one of the ideas that's being criticized is the idea of individuals. The idea that we can have dialogue, that there is logic, that there is a logos that operates between people. That's all on the table. And that's why there's no reason for debate. Besides, you don't have anything to say out of them.

You're just an expression of your group. And if you don't know that, that's just your ignorance or perhaps your malevolence or your self-serving power, something like that. I mean, this really is a fundamental critique. Yeah, Adam is a representative of construction workers. That's right. I'm on the hard hat. Yeah, you're right. You know, I think there is a circling back to Israel and the trials and tribulations. I think we sort of make a mistake in

and we've run into this abroad with a lot of foreign policy is we assume they want what we want. You know what I mean? Like everyone wants to live in peace. Everyone wants freedom. Everyone wants harmony. And all we have to do is string together the right words and the right order. And we could express that to them. So we sort of treat it as if you're having an argument with your wife. And she just doesn't understand that you really care about her and love her. And so you will put that down on a greeting card. And we will somehow write the ship or repair this. But if she wants you dead, then what is it that you could say to her that would ever remedy that?

And we could we could we could modify that slightly because I think you could say that it might be the case that the values that are put forward as central in the West explicitly are the most essential human values and that that's universal, but that a dedicated minority in any place can put the boots to that pretty damn rapidly. And so, you know, when the foreign policy idea is, well, there is a desire for freedom that's part and parcel of the human spirit fair enough, but how much opposition does that have to run into before it's impossible?

And the answer might be, and I think it could well be, that it doesn't have to run into that much opposition to be in jeopardy, like a committed minority, and a committed small minority, can have a disproportionate effect. I think there's evidence supporting that proposition. I may, I want to comment on, as you did on what Adam said, I was a student at the two institutes

at the School of International Affairs in Graduate School of Columbia, the Russian Institute in the Middle East Institute. I did Hebrew Arabic and Russian. So I want you to know that Adam's analysis of the Middle East was more cogent than all of my professors in the Middle East Institute at Columbia. He hit the bullseye, the staggering error of the naïve that everybody wants the same thing.

And that's why, for example, I was taught the nonsense, and I talked about this on Fox News two weeks ago, and it sort of went viral. The battle in the Middle East, I always knew, was not about land. If Israel were the size of Manhattan, they would want to destroy it. It's not about land, that's all. No, no, but every single professor at Columbia said it was land. The New York Times says it's land. They all say it's land. You know it, I know it, and Adam knows it. It's that one side wants the other side dead. that one side wants the other side dead. That's it, and that's because of religion, because for traditional Islam, there is no room for Jewish or Christian for that matter, a Germany in the middle of the Middle East. Period and the issue. They want Israel dead. There was nothing Israel

Israel withdrew from Gaza, and all they got was Hamas. They Hamas. Let me ask you a quick question about that. Do you see any hope? I mean, Israel has been negotiating somewhat more successfully with many countries in the Middle East now than say 15 years ago. Is that true or not? Yes, enlarged measure thanks to the man that is reviled by the left Donald Trump. Okay, so you do think it's true. Why would you attribute it to Trump? Because Trump said, I don't give a hoot about the Palestinian radicals.

They are not the central issue in the Middle East. And as soon as the rest of the Arab countries saw that America was strong and not bowing to the most radical elements of Islamic life, they said, you know what? Israel's not so all that bad, frankly, and we would like to do business with it. Okay, so I'm gonna ask a meta question here. Why do you guys think that that conflict got dragged

into this conversation? I mean, the reason I'm asking that is because, I mean, that conflict, everyone in the world, their eyes are focused on it, in a way that isn't true of any other conflict. And it's certainly not a consequence of the number of people who are involved. There's something magical about that conflict, and that pertains to your statement that it's not about land, it's about religion, and maybe it's about even more than religion, who knows, perhaps not.

But, you know, what was that, what was, you think, that called for that conflict into this conversation? And I'm not going to say that. And I'm going to say that. And I'm going to say that. And I'm going to say that. And I'm going to say that. And I'm going to say that. And I'm going to say that. And I'm going to say that. And I'm going to say that. And I'm going to say that. And I'm going to say that. And I'm going to say that. And I'm going to say that. And I'm going to say that. And I'm going to say that. And I'm going to say that. And I'm going to say that. And I'm going to say that. And I'm going to say that. And I'm going to say that. And I'm going to say that. And I'm going to say that. And I'm going to say that. And I'm going to say that. And I'm going to say that. And I'm going to say that. And I'm going to say that. And I'm going to say that. And I'm going to say that. And I'm going to say that. And I'm going to say that.

And I'm going to say that. And I'm going to say that. And I'm going to say that. And I'm going to say that. And I'm going to say that. And I'm going to say that. And I'm going to say that. And I'm going to say that. And I'm going to say that. And I'm going to say that. And I'm going And that's, if you can't see the moral clarity of the Middle East issue, Hamas primitives versus a modern liberal democracy called Israel, there's something wrong with your moral compass. So why do you think the radical left is pro-Palestine, particularly? Why did they pick that?

I don't know anything about the region, but I do sort of know what animates people. My feeling is, and as someone who grew up with a mother who was sort of this way, and a grandmother who dabbled in communism a little bit, they want to push back against everything that is. So it's more of an anarchist approach than it is. Here's my plan. They always, no one can really say that out loud, but it's more, it's sort of like defund the whole part of revolution in, in a sense, just burn at all. It's just a extension of revolution. It's basically one house has a well groomed lawn and a white picket fence. And the other one has a sofa rotting on the lawn and a guy smoke and weed stand on the

porch. And I only have one Molotov cocktail. What direction do I throw it? It's always going to go toward the house with the white picket fence. If these people are lighting them all up. Yeah, well, one of the things I have noticed about when in my discussion with well-meaning people who tilt more to the left, say, than you guys, is that they are genuinely, relatively unwilling to consider the role of dark emotions in political motivation, right? They tend to think things like, well, the people on the radical left, their hearts in the

right place, but their, you know, their memes are wrong. But what they're trying to do is to stand up for the oppressed, however badly they're doing it. And I think, well, I had this experience, you can tell me what you think of this, but it really, it really, I just re-encountered it. I was looking at the discussion I had with Slavoj Žižek a few years ago about Marxism punitively. That isn't really what the conversation ended up being about, but I offered a 15-minute critique of the Communist manifesto at the beginning.

And at one point, I described it to the audience as a call to bloody, violent revolution, which is what it was. And there were a lot of people in the audience, disproportionate number, for my audiences, who had come to see, she's kicked a slats out from underneath me. And so there were a lot of people who were very far left in the audience. And when I said call to bloody violent revolution, a good fifth of the audience cheered and laughed. And it stopped me in my tracks because it was quite chilling. I heard the mob in that moment. And it was a Freudian moment. Freud noted that people often laughed at things that had deep psychological

significance. And also that you could express your true feelings when you were hidden in a crowd. Well, the true feelings were, well, the Communist manifesto, who the hell cares about its rationality and its justification. It's like it's a call for a violent revolution. And, ha ha, hooray, let's do it. And I thought, yeah, you bastards, you revealed yourself in that laugh, in that chilling, awful, unconscious, willfully blind,

malevolent, glee at the notion of the picket fence burning down. And the question is, well, what's generating that malevolence? And the surface story is, well, you got that through you, you'll got means. And so the right thing to do is to take it back. And that goes along with the claim that power is the fundamental motivation. What I can't understand is how the hell those of us who don't believe that have been so weak, let's say, that we allowed the educational institutions to be overtaken by the people who are propounding that preposterous doctrine. It's like what the hell's wrong with us? Conservatives and liberals alike. I don't know.

What did we do wrong? Well, they know what they're doing in that. They know everyone's Achilles heel is a claim of power, especially power that's ill-gotten, you know, your dad's rich, now you're rich. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And then your grandfather was a landowner. Right. And then race, right? So why do you think they weave race into every single subject? It

gets the other side to shut it up. And you don't have to prove your point. You just call everyone a racist. And we can, we can, well, yeah, you put them on the heels right away, right? Because if you're yelling about systemic racism and I object to it, I'm instantly a racist. It's so convenient. But that still doesn't excuse our weakness in the face of that. Now, Dennis, you put your finger on something. You know, you said the thing about conservatives is they like to be left alone. Well, so maybe that makes conservatives particularly weak in the face, in the face.

You see, we have fulfilled lives outside of power. I am fulfilled in so many arenas having nothing to do with political power or running the board of education in my local district. I am fulfilled by my religion, as you heard, I'm religious. I am fulfilled. I love America, I love my Judaism, I love my family, I love my friends, I have synagogue every week,

one that I helped found. I mean, my life is so rich, not to mention my music, but there isn't. Their richness derives from political activism. That is their raison d'ethe. And as Adam pointed out, the term I use is chaos. Okay, so let me bug you about that for a minute. So I have some sympathy with your argument. I think there's empirical data if I remember correctly,

showing that the most unhappy people are left-leaning men. Right. Okay, so but we'll leave leave that to the side. I'm really not left-leaning. Well, I think it's a tie. So I can't remember the data well enough to cite it with perfect accuracy. So, but look, so there's young people, they go off to university and they're looking for this sense of involvement that you just described. Okay, now, the leftist propagandists who are teaching them, let's say, are appealing to that and offering them a kind of romantic adventure. Now that matches

their developmental need at that point. That should be the point at which they're richly encultured by an intact myth, something like that. Well, the fact that that isn't being provided in a credible manner is what lays young people open to this kind of propaganda. So it still takes me back to the failure of liberalism. Right. Forgive me Adam, I just need to say, I have warned about this. I began lecturing at the age of 21. I have a very odd life.

And I remember telling audiences in my 20s, you speaking to my parents' generation, the World War II generation. You, your motto was, let's give the next generation everything we didn't have, and specifically material, wealth, education, and peace. And the problem is, you didn't give us what you did have. I knew this in my 20s. My parents did give it to me. It's not my parents.

But the World War II generation did not give their children Americanism or Christianity in any coherent manner and we are living the consequences. Okay, so justify that. Why would you point to Christianity? For example, I'm a German, look, I'm a Jew, but it's a dominant religion of the West, and certainly of the United States.

If Christianity failed in Europe, and we got Nazism, Fascism, and Communism, what's gonna happen in America when Christianity fails? Yeah, well, you know, I've been talking to some of the people associated with the rational atheist movement. And what I'm seeing there is some realization that whatever comes up to replace the religion that they decried is going to be a hell of a lot worse than the religion that they decried.

So it makes me think too, you know, that the way it is, go ahead. What we get is wearing masks outdoors and copious amounts of hand sanitizing, even when it's unnecessary. I mean, that is, COVID has taught us that this is the new religion. It transcends science in many cases. Guys, I've got to jump off because I have to begin my podcast,

but I thank you so much for having me, Jordan. You had a mix of pleasure talking to you. And I hope we can have you on my show as sooner than later, because I always enjoy speaking to you and I'll leave in the very capable hands of Dennis Prager now. I'd like that. So let's arrange that.

Okay, I'd like to do that. Okay, see you, Adam. All right, thanks you Adam. Bye, thanks Adam, thanks. So let's go down the religious route a little bit. And we still, you know, we still haven't talked about the censorship that no safe space has faced. I mean, we touched on it a little bit with Netflix and Walmart.

Well, that's the dominant arena. And obviously it's completely ignored by the mainstream media, which review nonsense. And this is not a nonsense film. Look, the most important answer to all of this is for your copious number of viewers to actually watch it. It's available online. It's so many vehicles.

No safe spaces. Just, you know, say them now. I know my syndicator has it. SalemNow.com or nosafesp spaces.com or it's easy to find. We have to, there are conservative films that I watch out of, out of duty. This one is not out of duty. This is out, out of, out of pleasure. It is, it is. It is quite powerful. So the only answer is to succeed without them.

But what they have done to the film is not economically, or certainly not morally justifiable. And it gives you an idea, although I think you have an idea of what we're living through today. Well, it's funny that a movie about free speeches have a time for distribution. In fact, you could hardly hope for a better outcome in some very perverse sense.

Just out of curiosity, what would happen if you just placed it on YouTube? What would happen if we just, that's an interest, I don't know the answer, I would have to ask the producer. I only know the content more than that. I mean, just free, just free freedom. Well, it wouldn't just be free because you could monetize it through ads. Now that's not a tremendous way of generating revenue, but it might be a way of it will also be

interesting to see what would happen. Well, look, the truth is, I mean, they have, they're very honorable these guys. I haven't gotten a penny just for the record. I didn't do this for money to begin with. I would have been happy to make money. I'm not anti money, but I didn't do it for money. I did it because I believe so strongly in the message and the greatness of the film, but their first thing was to repay the people who did invest in the film. And that's, I know that.

That's one economic constraint. It can't be shaken so easily. That's right. It was an expensive thing. As people will see, it is really well done. But we're living, I mean, Jordan, It was an expensive thing. As people will see, it is really well done. But we're living, I mean, Jordan, we're just living in a different world. I'll give you a great example. You'll find this fascinating.

I was on Bill Mars program. I know you've been. I was on a year and a half ago, right before the lockdowns. I never say, by the way, COVID, I would say lockdown. And I was on on October, actually, the lockdowns began in February or March. So he was talking about how much Donald Trump lies. And I said, you know, as much as you think he lies, it doesn't compare to left wing lies.

It's just really like what? And this is, by the way, you could see this, anyone could see this on YouTube. My appearance on his show. So I said, well, for example, that America systemically racist. That is one of the greatest lies in the history of the world. In fact, in my view, I think it's not a lie.

I think it's an anti-truth. Because lies just slip by, right? An anti-truth is lies just slip by, right? And anti-truth is a lie that so egregious that it's the opposite of what's true. I love it, I will cite you. And I will always cite you. I will never claim that I made up that term. That's great.

So in fact, you were like them when I have said, and written, I taught Jewish history at Brooklyn College, and I've written books on Jewish history. So I have said that this is the greatest national li-bull, since the bloodline. The medieval bloodline bull for those of your viewers who don't know is when Christians accused Jews, the Middle Ages of killing Christian children

to use their blood to bake MOTSA for Passover, which was equally evil and absurd. Massive numbers of Jews were tortured to death as a result, and the entire, all of the Jews of England were expelled from the whole country as a result of that libel. The second greatest national libel in my opinion is that America is systemic racist. America is the greatest attempt at non-racial, multi-ethnic, multi-racial country in the history

of the world. And one of the... But you don't deny the existence of races or prejudice. Okay, so why do you have such trouble with the term systemic? Because systemic is sort of like when Barack Obama said it's in the DNA, systemic means that the system is geared to hurting blacks.

The system is not perturbed. Right, so it's the central tendency. The claim is systemic means central tendency. Yes, exactly. It's built in. It's just that's an anti-truth to use your term. Okay, so let me ask you a question from the side here for a sec. Okay, I was looking at your work on the Torah. I've been thinking about this idea. So the idea of systemic racism is the idea

that the central animating principle of the United States is prejudicial and racist to the point of enslavement. That's the claim. And it's an analog of the claim that power is the fundamental motivation for human interaction, at least under capitalist conditions, let's say. But I think it's even deeper than that. And so now you've studied the Torah in depths. And I've been thinking, and you also claim that the Torah was, is the word of God. I've got that right, yes.

Okay, now. Is the ultimate author, yes. Okay, so I'm thinking of, the Bible is actually a set of stories that was told across a very long period of time, and they were looped together for reasons that we don't exactly understand, I'm not speaking as a religious person here precisely, but there's a voice there that's part of the central tendency of civilization. And that's, and it's not a voice that speaks of power.

That's right. Okay, what does it speak of as far as your concern? Good and evil. It speaks about a just God who wants us to be good. It is almost to the point of sounding corny. Every every profound truth is corny, you know, I mean, that's not all I'll live with that. That's right. That's why that's why I'm okay. So what does good, what does, I mean, that's not all I live with that. That's right. That's what that's why I'm okay. So what does good, what does what is the good that's represented in that book? How would you define it? Because you wouldn't define it as power seeking. No, of course not. In fact, it's it's almost anti-power. Remember, I know you know this, but God did not want the Israelites to have a king. you know this, but God did not want the Israelites to have a king. Ironically, that was the gift of theocracy. I'm not for theocracy in the modern age, but to be intellectually honest, the idea

that God is the ruler means that no man is the ruler. Yes, well, that's a very interesting work for you to manless power. Well, that's a very interesting issue too, because I've been thinking a lot about that psychologically is that one of the advantages to parsing off the idea of ultimate sovereignty into an abstract domain, which is what a religious claim does, especially when it's attributed to a god that's even outside of nature, is that the central core of sovereignty can no longer ever be identified with a single individual. Right. But we have no idea how Ness, I've been thinking about the analogy there with a parliamentary

or with a constitutional monarchy, you know, because the queen of Canada, the queen of England, et cetera, she bears a tremendous amount of symbolic weight. And your president also bears that weight. And that's actually a problem with the system, I think, because the president has to bear the symbolic weight. There's a tendency for him to become elevated beyond other mortals. I mean, you saw that sort of thing happening in Rome

with the deification of the emperors. And if it seems to me, if you don't parse off the idea of ultimate sovereignty into an abstract domain, you risk confusing it with proximal leaders or perhaps proximal ideas. Well, you know, you know me somewhat, but I don't expect you to know me well. And I can just tell you, I have often said on my radio show, which is now more than 35 years, that the overriding message of all 35 years has been to teach people the consequences of secularism, the deleterious consequences of secularism. Secularism is good for government and it stinks for everything else. And what you just raised was one of, not infinite, but an extremely large number of examples. We are living now through

leftism is a product of secularism. And there is moral chaos. Dostoevsky was right. I mean, it's just a fact, where there is no God all is permitted. We are living through it now. When you have tens of thousands of medical people saying that if you demonstrate against racism, it's healthy. After telling us to wear masks when we walk with our dog outdoors,

I mean, the corruption of every institution in the society has resulted. When there is no God, there is not only no good and evil, but there is no math. That even I didn't predict. The Oregon Education Department has announced. There will no longer be only one right answer in math. Did you know about that, Jordan? I've seen that sort of thing, you know, percolating. I didn't know it had become. Yes, it is specific. All the OEB, Oregon Education Department has announced this,

that that is the policy here to four, or not here to four, from here on. Yeah, you know, there's a reason that Christ was a carpenter, you know. See, God is measurements right. Uh-huh, that's, that's, there's a reason that Christ was a carpenter, you know, see God is measurements right. Uh-huh, that's cute. Yeah, well, it's more than cute, right? Because to build a house, you have to tell the truth.

Otherwise, it falls down and you need to build it on a firm foundation. Well, well, well, we don't have the foundation is being eroded. Oh, yes. So I was telling you about the Bill Marshow. So he said so he said, all the lies, the lies, the lies, I said, doesn't compare to the left wing lies that America, that's when we got sidetracked, which is on America being systemically racist. And I'll tell

you, I'll tell you another one, Bill, that men, men's true ways. And you got to watch this. It's actually, as I said, it's on YouTube. And he started laughing at me and so did the whole audience that I would make up something so preposterous and ascribe it to the left. This is October of 2019 that leftists, his audience and he were laughing at the idea that anybody would say men menstruate. Now if you deny men menstruate, you are a hater and you will be removed from public life. I have another question for you about your religious writing. I'm going to talk to a number of Islamic intellectuals

in the next month. It's something I've been thinking about doing for a long time, but I've been hesitant to for a variety of reasons, not least my ignorance of Islam. You write about the Torah as the revealed word of God. And so, you know, I have a tremendous amount of respect for biblical writings, and I've done my best to approach them in a humble

and open attitude, trying to understand what's there, assuming that there is something there, or the stories wouldn't have lasted as long as they have lasted and guided the development of our entire civilization. But there are plenty of claims to revealed truth. And so there's obviously tension and conflict between Islam and Christianity and Judaism and they're all predicated on the idea of revealed truth. And I mean, when you make a claim for revealed truth, how do you distinguish it from other claims of revealed truth, or how do you adjudicate between the claims? Because the way we adjudicate between the claims is through war.

That's not all that helpful at the present time. No, a lot. You adjudicate in this regard, I think you adjudicate using common sense. you would, by their fruit, you shall know that that's from the New Testament. And I am a big fan of that defraise and that verse. So the Torah and I do isolate the first five books as is the traditional Jewish view is that those are Primozlim through Paris, the first among equals. And that is what gave us everything. Let's put it this way. No Torah, no Bible, no Christianity, no Islam. So in a sense, I got a better case for the Torah's divinity than anything else,

because everything else is predicated on the divinity of the Torah. You know, I'm a fasted on your zipper. Okay. So then you make a case in some sense, I would say, an implicit case, that anti-Semitism, for example, is a marker of deviation from the path of the Torah, but the path that runs from the Torah through Christianity and through Islam as well. I mean, because you're, for your point, it's the fundamental text out of which these other systems grew.

Antisemitism is ultimately the hatred of the Jews for bringing a judging God into the world. People don't want to be judged. Well, that's understandable. You know, although the problem is, if you dispense with judgment, you also dispense with value, and you dispense with...

Right. That's a big problem. That's why I've been very... Yeah, it's a big problem. It is. I've been very... I tell my Christian friends that you don't get a more pro-Christian non-Christian than me in contemporary life, but I tell them you blew it with just talking about God as love.

It's not. Yeah, well, you know, Carl Jungson, I've been interesting about that, you know, because the Christ that's presented in the Gospels is a figure, I suppose, particularly characterized for his mercy, but in the book of Revelation, he comes back as a judge, and virtually everyone fails the judgment, and Jung's comment was, any ideal is a judge.

And so if you don't tell the whole story of the, so the question is, do we need ideals? And, you know, I would say to some degree, part of the critique of the radical left is that ideals themselves are discriminatory. And there's actually truth in that that ideals are discriminatory. Correct. The question is whether there are matrarily discriminatory. And if you say yes, then what do you strive for? And I guess the answer is for everyone to be equal. Well, all right, so that's so that's their discriminatory ideal.

It means it discriminates against excellence. Listen, the same crackpot the head of the classical music at the New York Times made a list. This is years and this is like 2015 years ago. And only because I follow music, the way I even know this, he made a list of the 10 greatest composers. And he didn't have, he didn't have handle in it, of course, composed the Messiah, he didn't have Hyden in it, the father of the symphony and the string quartet. And he

didn't have Schubert in it. And he said, oh, well, you know why? He said, but he did have Bartok in it. And he had Debussy in it who were fine, but they're not in the top 10. I don't think anybody could rationally argue that they are. But in any event, he said, why? He said, I just can't have that many Austrian Germans on the list. So it wasn't the list of the best composers. That's what all of this is. And it's anti standards. That's that. Well, it looked there's an attack on a meritocracy on the idea of meritocracy, right? So I mean, I've wondered, well, is that actually an attack on the idea of merit? And I would say, yes, it is. In fact, attack on the idea of merit. I never really, look, you know, you said something,

it was a throwaway line. You caught me on one of mine, I'll catch you in one of yours. That anti-Semitism is rooted in people's irritation at the idea of a judgmental god being brought into existence. I mean, that's a hell of a claim. So I mean, do you believe that that is the fundamental explanation? Yes, there are a lot of non-Jewish analysts. That would flattery a major Catholic writer and Ernest Von Denhag, one of the greatest

clearest thinkers of the last century. They wrote about this. The Jews introduced this God into history and they've never been forgiven for it. Also, I'll tell you another reason for anti-Semitism is people believe the Jews are chosen. Everybody acknowledges that Jewish chosen, this is a reason for anti-Semitism. However, as I pointed out, Jews are a two-tenths of one percent of the world. Who gives a damn if two tenths of one percent of the world thinks they're chosen? The Chinese think they're the center of the world.

Well, chosen and successful might be... Ah, thank you, that's correct. That's exactly right. So deep down, people don't laugh when Jews say they're chosen. They don't believe that Japan gets the sun before the rest of humanity, even though they are the land of the rising sun, and as the sun is on their flag. But nobody cares if the Japanese think they get the sun first. But they do care if the Jews think they're chosen. So there's been a tremendous amount of resentment of the fact that maybe they are, but of course chosen never meant better, never. By the way, one other thing that this is...

Yeah, well, you got to ask yourself, do you really want to be chosen by God? Well, as Tevia and Fiddlear on the roof, they wanted to choose somebody else once. For, yeah, yeah. Who's not benefited from chosenness? Give it, give it. Well, you know, you might say they benefited and suffered disproportionately.

All right, that's fair, yes. Yeah, and I don't know for sure if that's a fate that people would choose if they had the option. That is exactly correct. Then. Okay. So let's go back to this revelation thing because I'm going to have these discussions and I need some guidance. And so we've got, you know, you made a claim, you know, that the Torah is the source of these of Christianity and Islam and Judaism obviously as well. And so because it's the source, well then what what should be the attitude of other people of the book towards Jews and towards the Torah? Well among Christians there's a schizophrenic view gets a fronted view for many in the church and till modern, the modern period,

the Jews were a living rebuke. As one, I don't remember which Christian thinker said, that the Jews crucified Christ in every generation just by their continued existence. So there's been an animosity in Christendom because the Jews rejected their own. Jesus was Jewish, the apostles were Jewish, the claims were made on the basis of the Jewish Bible. Do you think that's distinct from a sort of intrinsic tribalism? Do you think there's more to it than I mean, we're tribal in a very deep sense like this this

transcended tribalism because it certainly wasn't ethnic it was ideological it was theological the the jesus Jesus comes to the juz and the very people that he came to were the ones who said he's not he's not god and he's not messiah so this this was this this created a fair amount of resentment. In American Christians were an anomaly and I love them for it. American Christians said they were the second chosen people. The Jews were the first and we Americans are the second, but which I believe by the way. Okay, so let me ask you another question. This is some one I this is a horrible question and I've been dying to to think it through for a long time. So there's a line of Christian thinking, I would say.

And Northrop fry, I think a Canadian critic who wrote some great books on the Bible, you might be familiar with fry. He wrote words with power and there's a second volume which I can't bring to mind at the moment, but he thought about the Torah as the story of the sequential rise and failure of the state and that the New Testament was a consequence of the emergence of the idea that salvation was to be found through the individual and not through the state. And that seemed to me to be parallel with the tension in the old testament between the proof between dogma and the prophets. So is it the case? Is there a difference between Judaism and Christianity with regards to the degree to which the state has seen as a primary mode of redemption? And is that tangled up with the conflict in Israel?

Well, there are a lot of issues that are tangled in one. First of all, you should know that salvation plays a minimal role in Judaism. And I know biblical Hebrew very well, and I cannot think of even term salvation. Second, seems to be more like the promised land. Well, Judaism is earthbound. Well, Judaism is earthbound. There's a belief, a tremendous belief in the afterlife, but it plays minimal role in the Torah, because as soon as you start focusing on the afterlife, the fear is that you won't focus on this life. And Judaism is extremely this life-focused.

Secondly, this is a very important point, and it is actually my biggest single reason for my adoration of the Torah and Judaism. It's the only religion that divides the world between good and evil and not between believer and nonbeliever. Right, right. So that seems to me from a psychological perspective as it moved towards a further abstraction. Well, it's not a psychological issue. It's a moral issue.

The God that's fine. An hour of you, God does not divide the world between Jew and non Jew or believer and non believer, but between good people and bad people. God sends good, good non Jews to heaven and bad Jews to hell. good non-Jews to heaven and bad Jews to hell. That's why Jews welcome converts, but never sought them,

because you don't have to be a Jew to be safe. But you do have to be a Muslim, and you do have to be a Christian. Okay, so, okay, so that's one example of, I think that's one example of the operation of the idea of salvation, the implicit idea of salvation, anyways, that there's a reward for proper moral behavior at the individual level.

That's right. Okay, what about my way to heaven? Okay, what do you think about my other proposition is that one of the things that distinguishes Christianity from Judaism is the relative role, the relative importance of the role of the things that distinguishes Christianity from Judaism is the relative role, the relative importance of the role of the state. Now, you describe Judaism as earthbound, and I actually think that's one of its great advantages

because Judaism does celebrate life in a rich and quite remarkable way and glorifies earthly life. And there's certainly strains of Christianity where that wasn't the case at all. But then there is this emphasis, there seems to be a continued emphasis on the idea of the land and the state. And then I said, there's fries notion that, you know, the Torah is a sequential story

of the rise and failure of the state as the entity of salvation or redemption. And then the emergence of the ideal, it's foreshadowed in some sense by the prophetic tradition. And in a Christian's read, that of course is Christ being first and foremost among the prophets. I mean, obviously, also the Son of God, but a continuation of that prophetic tradition. But the transformation seems to be something like a more radical or explicit emphasis on the individual as the locale of the redemptive battle. I mean, I might be wrong about this. That's why I'm asking.

The state, there is no state, so to speak. There are the profits and there are the priests. That's where power resided. One had moral power, one had cult power, if you'll cultic. I don't mean cult in a bad sense, but a cultic concept. And that was pretty much it. That's why, as I said, the king arose against God's wishes. So it's not exactly a big state-centered religion if you don't even want a king. There are, you know, Moses says that you shall appoint the policeman and judges in Exodus. That's important. You have to have a... Judaism is not state-centered.

It's law-centered. That's the interesting... All right. Well, let's look at Exodus, though. I mean, and so Exodus, Moses leads the Jews out of tyranny. And then into this interregnum, which is a very interesting development, I think, because the escape from tyranny isn't followed by redemption or salvation.

It's followed by an even more chaotic state that's even more dismal in some sense, which I think is unbelievably brilliant, right? Because we tend to think a state of tyranny will dissolve and everything will be happy as a consequence, but the Exodus story says, no, no matter how bad the tyranny, there's going to be an interregnum in the desert where everyone loses faith. And then there's a journey toward the promised land.

So that structures the narrative. And it's the promise, it's this idea of the promised land that while that I'm trying to focus on and understand, I mean, you characterize Judaism just now as law, partly law, and partly the cultic tradition, the priestly tradition. But there is this, I mean, the story of Exodus, as you well know, is an absolutely central biblical narrative. And it's a stunningly powerful story,

but it does involve, it frames life as a journey towards the promised land. And in that story, that being an actual land. And it seems to me that part of the Christian transformation, I do think it has its roots in the Jewish prophetic tradition, is this change in emphasis. I mean, I was convinced by Fry's arguments, which weren't anti-Semitic, by the way, in any sense. I don't sound that to me at all like that. It's not a way in which Jews understood themselves. Let me put it to you that way. The promised land is where the law will be

put to use and a holy land with a holy people. This will be God's locus. I view the Jews as God's third attempt at making a good world. The first was conscience that didn't work. The second was Noah and giving him basic laws that didn't work and then picking a people and giving them the role to be a model and that hasn't worked out too well either. Listen, I would love to continue. Can you give me five minute break and I will continue? Absolutely. OK, fine, nice.

Thanks, sir. All right. So I wanted to ask you further. So I'm hosting these discussions, as I mentioned, with a more liberal Muslim scholar and a more conservative Muslim scholar. And I'm woefully unprepared for it, because what the

hell do I know? But it seems to me that to whatever degree it's possible that all of branches might be offered when they can be. And so that's partly why I was curious about the this issue of revealed truth. I mean, what do we do when we have complete, competing claims to revealed truth? And apart from war, because war in some senses about axioms that can't be given up. And that war is just not an option for us in a sense, not an option like it was, because the possibility of a gated cap. I have thought about this a great deal.

So I have a quick answer, but it took me decades to develop. And that is, my criterion is not, is your religion true or mine true. My criterion, I have two. One is, what type of people do you produce? Nothing else interests me. I have two. One is what type of people do you produce? Nothing else interests me. If atheists produce kind and wise people, I would give atheism much more seriousness than I now do.

But the, so my criterion is one, what type of people do you produce? And two, do you bring people to the God of the Ten Commandments? That's it. If your religion affirms that God gave the Ten Commandments, I am a fan of your religion. If your religion does not affirm that, then it may be beautiful. I have, I don't

disqualify that possibility, but it is not, it is not divine revelation given that, remember, when we say divine, we're talking about the God that Jews introduced to the world. You can't hijack our term. And so you can make up your own God. But the God that was brought into the world is the God of the Old Testament, specifically the God of the Torah, specifically the God of creation, Exodus and Ten Commandments. If you affirm those, then you are a kindred religion to mine and have an essential truth to it. I don't believe in Jesus Christ, but I do believe that Christians who bring the world to the God of the Torah and to the Ten Commandments

are doing God's work. So, okay, so then that makes a broader question. I mean, we're not currently, there's no current major religious dispute that's worldwide between Christians and Buddhists, let's say. And so, where does that leave non, where does that leave religious believers who aren't allied with the central book of the West, broadly speaking. I don't have an issue. Remember, since I believe God judges people by their ethics, I don't care if you're Buddhist. If Buddhism is created in you a good person

and giving you wisdom. I see. So you're using adherence to the 10 commandments as an explicit description of what constitutes ethical good essentially. Yes, it is, but I admit I fully acknowledge Buddhists are not teaching the 10 commandments of such. I understand that certainly, you know, not a Sabbath day. By the way, not all Christians are teaching the Sabbath day either. 50% of the Catholic priests and Protestant ministers I've asked, do you believe Christians are duty bound to the observe the Sabbath have said no? So what do you think about Christ was asked and this is outlined

in the New Testament, which of the commandments he thought was first and foremost, which is an interesting question, right, because it presumes it posits that there's a central ethic that manifests itself across the ten rules that still implicit. And Christ had an answer to that. Right, love God, love man. Yes, which is, you know, quite an answer. What was the comment? And no one dared ask to many more questions after that, which I think is quite comical. And it's one of those little markers that makes you think that something was really going on. It's because the story is so interesting. But I mean, in, in, in, in Buddhism, is there an implicit array of, is there an implicit ethic that matches the ethic that's implicit in the, in the 10 commandments? And, and of course, there are many more commandments than 10.

I happen to have studied Buddhism in England under a Buddhist professor, traveling. And my take, and I'm not an expert in any way, but I have some understanding, I think, of Buddhism. This is not its question. Its question is ultimately how to avoid suffering in this world and to reach the light or whatever Nirvana would be translated out of Nabuta, whichever term you Sanskrit or otherwise. So for example, he said, and by the way, it changed my life when he said it in class, it was in England, he said, the Buddhism teaches that all pain in life comes from what is it desires and expectations that are not fulfilled or even not not not fulfilled just from desires and expectations.

It changed my life because from that day to this and I've written a book on happiness and I wrote a chapter on this I have no expectations and it is one of the reasons I'm happy. Everything, therefore, if I wake up tomorrow without an aneurysm, I think I'm the luckiest guy in the world. So I adopted the book. If you think that's equivalent, in some sense, to subverting your will to the will of God, is that the same idea? No, no, no, no, no, you don't think that. You can do with God, zero to do with God. As far as I'm concerned, pure luck. If I'm hit by a drunk driver tomorrow,

or not, is it matter? Sorry, sorry, that isn't what I meant. And as I must have phrased the question improperly, is the the Buddhist idea that desire expectation is the cause of suffering, is that analogous to the idea that in Judaism and Christianity, that people give up their own egotistical will and follow the will of God? It's an interesting read. I don't know because, let's see, I'll tell you why it's at least for Judaism, I can't speak for

Christians. And this was the second part which I rejected. I accepted dropping expectations. It was, it was, to me, brilliant. I utterly rejected dropping desires. I desire a family, I desire a cure for cancer. The list of desires I have is endless. And certainly Judaism would never want me to drop desires. Well, in Buddha, I mean, Buddha reached Nirvana, but then in some sense came back to bring the population along with them. I mean, he had desires. So I wonder if it's more a matter of like desires that are ego predicator or desires that are an expression of arbitrary power, let's say.

Well, that's a great question to ask, Buddhist. I will tell you this. I had a, I did, I was blessed. My first 10 years of radio, one of my shows was as the moderator of a three-chlorgy, a priest minister rabbi, different ones each week, and after five years, I did it for 10 years. I invited Buddhists and Muslims and Mormons and every religion on Earth. I asked the Buddhist one night, so I want to understand if I have a correct read of Buddhism and its ideal, he was among so I knew I couldn't ask him about a wife or children, but so I said, if your brother died, would the ideal Buddhist response be no sadness? And he said that is correct. The ideal Buddhist response would be things live and things die. And that detachment. Yes. And that begs the question, well, do you remain inactive in the face of suffering? And you would see me that you do with it.

Right, but then that begs the question of why Buddha didn't just stay in Nervana when he had the opportunity. It's an excellent question. So listen, I'm okay with inconsistency. Yeah, yeah, look fair enough. And we're not going to iron all this out. But so let's if you don't mind, maybe we could go back to this Islamic issue. So what do you see as a pathway? I know you don't know the answer to this, but no one does, but you've thought about these things a lot and you know you're a profoundly religious person and And you're a profoundly religious person. And like, what's the proper attitude towards peace? If I'm having a dialogue with these Islamic scholars, I mean, I have lots of people who view my YouTube videos

and read my books in the Islamic world. And I'm happy about that. I'm pleased about that. And many of them were annoyed, for example, when I talked to Ion Herzealee. And they said, well, you should talk to some other Muslims. I thought, well, I know that. And so I've decided to go ahead and do that. I mean, what needs to change, do you think, within each of us, perhaps, in order for these, the conflict that keeps raging, in the Middle East to start to moderate itself.

Why don't we open the door to that? I gave my answer earlier. The day, look, here's a rhetorical question. If the Israelis announced we are disarming, no more army, no more weapons, what would happen the next day? And if the Palestinian said, we are disarming, no more fighting, no more terror, no more rockets, nothing. What would happen the next day? In the first case, they would be the genocide of the Jews of Israel. In the second case, they would be peace. So why don't you ask that question of these people? That what would happen if both

sides announced that they are completely disarming? What would happen the next day? Do they really believe that there was genocide against the Palestinians? I think there are eight times as many Palestinians today as one Israel was founded. This is the worst attempt at genocide and the history of genocide. I mean, it is as ludicrous as it is evil to charge Israel with genocide. It is be the first time in history, as I said at my Oxford Union debate

on this very issue of Hamas and Israel. I said it'd be the first time in history that in a battle between a dictatorship or tyranny and a free state, the free state was the one that wanted war and the tyranny wanted peace. I mean, we're expected to believe nonsense. And I'm- So do you believe that this is baked into Islamic faith. Yes, I think.

I think. Yes, and I'll, yes, I think it is. Okay, so what is it that's baked in? I'll tell you, I have been called to in the greatest Arab writer whoever lived, I think was the 14th century. In the Khummukhadeemah, the introduction to history, he wrote, and he is again,

he's considered the greatest writer, not only the greatest Arab writer in history, according to AJ, well, it was just the great, the great British historian. He was the greatest historian who ever lived. That was, that was Taylor's take. There's a little romantic, but it doesn't matter. He's got a great reputation. And he wrote in the Mukhadima, the introduction to history,

that unlike Jews and Christians, the superiority of Islam can be seen in the fact that they were prepared to kill people to convert. That's baked in. Well, so then, where exactly does this leave us, let's say, on the road to peace? So if I said, I'm going to talk to these guys, and I don't know what will come out of that. Maybe we could have a conversation with you and them. I would love it.

I've dialogue with Muslims. I know. I know. I'm not questioning your intentions. I would love it. And listen, the bigger question to me is not, is it baked in? Is it, is Islam reformable? And this Lord, was it the Lord act in, no, no, another, another, maybe an Lord act in the British Viceroy in Egypt in the 19th century said Islam reformed is Islam no longer.

That's, see, that's not true with Christianity, which obviously did go through a reformation. And state Christian, although I don't know if Catholics would fully agree with that. But nevertheless, that... Yes, well, but we don't, we also don't know if that meant the dissolution of Christianity over the long run that's correct that that that is that is a very fair question I don't have an answer it may well be that the Christian the Christianity really does survive it will be African Christians who make it possible. Well, or Chinese Christians, since it's growing faster there, that's right. Yeah, that's right.

The ancient Rome, yes, it's very peculiar. So who knows, right? But all right, well, look, Dennis, I think that's probably a reasonable place to stop. Can I just, can I just make a plug for two things? No safe spaces, the movie that we began with and my rational Bible, which is written with atheists in mind as I write it. It is a use of reason to explain the five books

of the Torah, the first five books of the Bible. And Deuteronomy, the third volume is coming out this year, but Genesis and Exodus are out. And I know we could maybe we could have a discussion at some point just about Exodus. I would like that. That that would be Nirvana to me. All right, well, let's schedule it in and we'll do that

because I need the preparation. I like I said, I want to do a lecture series on Exodus in the fall. Right. So all right, well, anything else, Dennis? People should only know how much I admire you. I know you're self-conscious about that. You don't have to say a word, but I cite you often as one

of the handful of truth and goodness seekers I know. Thank you. That's a week. Thank you for that compliment. Much appreciated. It's all right. Thank you. Till we meet again. Thanks again. Be well. All right. you