This lecture explores the connection between personal beliefs, societal pressures, and political support, using Kamala Harris as a case study. It highlights how individuals seek validation through conformity to accepted narratives, often prioritizing social standing over genuine assessment of facts. The speaker critiques the notion of morality shaped by social consensus and emphasizes the conflict between truth-seeking and social acceptance. Through analogies of bribery and punishment, the discussion frames compliance as a survival strategy. Ultimately, the lecture advocates for introspection to distinguish true beliefs from societal pressures in political endorsements.
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00:00Questioned from Facebook.com, why are there still rational people who will vote for Kamala Harris?
00:07Well, it's not a question of reason. It's a question of self-praise.
00:12It is the oldest trick in the book. It of course comes straight out of advertising to some degree.
00:17It comes out of certain kinds of religious approaches and so on, which is
00:21only good people believe in X,
00:25only bad people believe in Y. Well, you want to be a good person, don't you? You don't want to be a bad person.
00:33So you better not believe in Y, you better believe in X.
00:38Otherwise, you're bad and people won't like you and you'll be attacked and rejected and you will suffer.
00:46Right? So this is, we see this happening all over the place, all throughout history with examples that are too numerous.
00:54To even really
00:56go through.
00:57So,
00:59sexy men use this soap, attractive women use this eyeliner and
01:04you don't want to be unattractive. You want to be attractive, don't you?
01:08Guys with abs drink a lot of beer.
01:11Right? I mean, it's all,
01:13this, this dress looks fantastic on this genetic abnormal woman.
01:18This 1 in 10,000 woman with the correct body fat and a high metabolism,
01:24this dress looks great on her. You want to look like this woman, so wear this dress.
01:29I mean, it is all, you know, when I have to go every couple of years to get my new prescription for glasses.
01:36These people look fantastic with these glasses on because they're really good-looking people.
01:43You want to be good-looking, so clearly,
01:46you need to wear these glasses. I mean, it's all just so,
01:49so ridiculous. Like when, when I get my boxers, right? I'm a boxer kind of guy, right?
01:55I get these boxers.
01:57This guy has a perfect torso. He's wearing these underpants. If you want a perfect torso,
02:04clearly, you need to read these underpants. Like, it's all just so
02:08ridiculous for words. This woman
02:11looks fantastic. Her face and bone structure are magnificent,
02:16so she can wear any goofy-ass haircut she wants to because she's still going to look fantastic.
02:22However, if you don't look like this woman,
02:25you're just going to look like a plain woman with a goofy-ass haircut. Like, it's all just so, so boring, right?
02:31Only good people believe this, and
02:33therefore, you need to believe this.
02:36And, and what, what is really being said is, we control who people hate.
02:41You don't want us to call you someone that people should hate, do you?
02:46That's very, a very common, right?
02:49The mob will attack anyone we point at. Do you feel like agreeing with the mob, do you?
02:56Well, do you, punk? Do you feel lucky, or do you want to go against the mob that we can point at you and
03:03have them attack you?
03:05You know, it's, it's like agreeing with some guy who's got a pack of
03:09well-trained or
03:11badly-trained pitbulls around, you know? These pitbulls will attack anyone I point at.
03:17Do you feel like approving of pitbulls, or not? I mean, it's all, it's all nonsense, right?
03:23I mean, and, and socially, it is, I like you if
03:28you agree with me.
03:30Right? Which is not liking the person. Like, one of the things, if you become any kind of prominent person or public person,
03:37you know, there was another question off Facebook, which is,
03:39why did I used to dislike you? Like, people don't like or dislike me. I mean, personally,
03:45I mean, I may have some sort of charisma or whatever it is, but certainly the people who dislike me don't dislike me.
03:50I mean, I'm absolutely certain in my perspective, and it's more than just an opinion.
03:55I have people who love me to death, who I love to death in life.
03:58So when I say, like, I'm a really likable person, I want what's best for the world,
04:03I really care about things in the world, and I care about human happiness, like, I care about people doing well,
04:09I care about the truth, and I know that without the truth, you can't have happiness or love.
04:16So I want the truth so that people can be happy, and so, you know, I mean, I know all of this about myself
04:22in a sort of very
04:23foundational way, right? I know all of this about myself, and so many people are like, he's a hateful, bad,
04:30you know, it's like, I mean, it's just not true, right? So when people can't
04:35disprove you, they just get people to hate you. Now, again, it's not me, you know, people in the
04:44machinery, they don't care about me, you know, nobody says, hey, man, how you feeling today?
04:49Did you, did you, are you overdue for your dental checkup? Like, people don't care, right? They don't care about me,
04:56but
04:57they sure know that the truth goes against their short-term interests, right?
05:04The truth goes against their short-term interests, and so they hate that, right?
05:08They hate that the truth is gonna ask them to grow up and put long-term happiness ahead of short-term
05:15joy, or,
05:17right? That you probably don't want to get diabetes, so maybe don't eat too much cheesecake, right? So you have to say no
05:25to yourself now, so you can say yes to a life that's not diabetic, you know, years down the road, and
05:33this is because people are punished, and things are grabbed from them, and then they, as an act of defiance,
05:38right? So if you're a kid, and your parents just,
05:41you know, punish you for eating sugar or fat, or, you know, just get mad at you, and call you lazy and greedy, like, you just
05:48get this whole twisted relationship with self-discipline. Like, external discipline
05:53breeds rebellion against self-discipline, right? Because if you're punished
05:59for
06:00wanting to eat sugar when you're younger, you're punished and insulted, right? You're abused and punished and insulted
06:07for wanting to eat sugar or eating sugar when you're younger, then eating sugar becomes an act of rebellion. Like, it's also
06:14clockwork predictable, right?
06:16So,
06:18people are just
06:21rebelling against the rules that are imposed upon them, and
06:26they become defiant, and
06:29that's the inevitable result of
06:32people imposing rules on them. So then, when I say to people, you should pursue the truth, even though it's uncomfortable,
06:40then they respond to me as if I'm a
06:45a-hole abuser who is imposing arbitrary rules upon them and punishing them, right?
06:51So people, they don't hate me. They hate the abusers. They don't hate the truth. They hate the control mechanisms
06:57they were subjected to.
06:59So, when I say to people, you should sacrifice short-term happiness for the sake of long-term happiness, which is really the story of virtue,
07:06then
07:08they react to me like I'm, you know,
07:10a jerkwad teacher saying you have to study because you've got to get into university. You've got to sacrifice. You've got to do all this
07:15homework now. You'll be happier later, and you'll be better later, right? So, it really doesn't have anything to do with me.
07:21They're just reacting to, you know, if I'm sort of stern or
07:25whatever it is, then people just react to all the stern people who just, you know, push them around and
07:31yelled at them and punished them and threatened them when they were kids. So, it doesn't really have anything to do with me at all.
07:39So,
07:41the reason that people
07:43praise, I don't know, it doesn't have to be Kamala Harris. It can really be anyone.
07:48But the reason that people do all of that, it has nothing to do with an objective evaluation
07:52of her policies or her history or her intelligence or her compassion or her virtue or her integrity.
07:58Like, they haven't started from a blank slate and said, okay,
08:02well, of these two candidates or these two ideologies or these two philosophies,
08:06which one is objectively more virtuous? They don't stop at that.
08:11They don't. What they do is they say,
08:15will people be mad at me if I say I think Trump would be better than Kamala or
08:21whatever? And, you know, there'll be people who will get mad at you if you say that.
08:24There'll be people who get mad at you if you say the opposite.
08:27But, you know, this is an old meme that said most people don't make decisions based upon facts, reason, and evidence.
08:33They base their decisions upon safety and greed, right? I remember some years ago
08:39talking to a very successful professional and his wife and they had all of the ease of like super upper-middle-class
08:46complacency and, you know, they were certain that they were
08:51the good people and the right people and, you know, they had kids and the kids were all doing well.
08:56And, you know, they had all of this, you know, boomer, smug satisfaction that they were the best people in the known universe in a way.
09:03And all of that, like, man, all of that gets threatened if you say, like, one wrong thing in professional circles, you're marked.
09:13And people forget the tenuousness of their success.
09:16So the tenuousness of their success is you put one foot wrong and
09:21you just don't get hired. You just don't get paid.
09:25People will shun you. Oh, can you believe he said this about this? And you just say one thing wrong.
09:31And so people's income and status and comfort are dependent upon
09:37not speaking the truth,
09:39but saying things that don't upset others, towing the line, right? People are bribed for compliance
09:46all the, all the, all the, all the, all the, all the time.
09:50People are bribed for compliance all the time. Threatened, right?
09:55You will have an upper-middle-class lifestyle if you say and do X, Y, and Z. If you do A, B, or C,
10:03you will be thrown out.
10:05What is it they say? Today's headlines and tomorrow's fish wrapping, right? I mean, this is before the internet, right?
10:11So people are bribed and threatened in compliance, into compliance all the time.
10:15Now, they don't like that. They don't like to feel that way. They don't like to feel
10:20that
10:21they like politician X over politician Y because they're bribed and threatened, that they're
10:27slaves to the opinions of others and to their own material greed. Everybody likes to think them, think of themselves
10:33as a moral hero, right? Look at me, singular to plural to singular in one sentence.
10:37So everyone likes to think not that,
10:40well, if I say something that other people don't like, I'm gonna lose my 200th hour year.
10:45I mean, I understand that concern. I understand that worry.
10:50I mean, it's happened, right? I mean, in terms of not the 200th hour year, but, you know, just in terms of the drop in income, right?
10:56So, I know all of that. And we've seen it happen repeatedly that if you say things that people don't like,
11:04then you are
11:07attacked and you are ostracized and you are deplatformed and you are whatever, right? So,
11:12people
11:13don't
11:14like to say
11:16that their view of themselves as moral entities is false,
11:21that they are simply trying to survive in a base animal way and they're trying to flourish in a base animal way.
11:28I mean, in this way, the animals are more honest than us, right? The animal, like the zebra, is pursuing grass and
11:35avoiding lions and it knows that. Well, I'm frightened of the lion, so I'm gonna run away from it.
11:41I like the grass, so I'm gonna eat it,
11:44right? The zebra is not lying to itself and saying, well,
11:47I just find the grass morally uplifting and virtuous and I find the lion to be bigoted and
11:54anti-stripest, right? They don't, they're just like, well, the lion is dangerous and I like the taste of grass.
12:00So, I run away from the lion and I run towards the grass. But people, they can't do that,
12:04it seems, and this is the big weakness of humanity and there's strength when it's put in the right way.
12:10But the big weakness of humanity
12:13is that
12:15people don't, they simply can't accept that.
12:18No, they just can't accept that.
12:21They have to say that they're in pursuit of virtue and
12:25running away from vice, that they are promoting virtue and opposing vice, right? That that's
12:32all they can stand doing, that's all they can say to do.
12:35And that's, you know, we have to have a moral story for ourselves wherein we are the heroes.
12:41And it's very sad, but people just can't be honest with themselves and say, well, I really haven't evaluated anything other
12:48than that which enhances or threatens my own material flourishing, right?
12:53I can't say, well, look, I'm just following, you know, bribes and
12:59threats. I'm just navigating bribes and threats. No, no, they have to say, well, no, you see,
13:04I'm surrounded by all these virtuous people and my moral choice is virtuous and I'm a super good entity
13:10in the universe. And they can't just say, well, I don't want to lose my income and I don't want people to get mad at me.
13:18They just can't say that. You know, when I was in Hong Kong, I mean,
13:22when it was just a matter of, I don't know, tear gas or whatever, it's like, yeah, okay, I can do that.
13:28But when, you know, they come down with the half tanks, it's like, okay, well, that's,
13:32I'm not doing that, right? So I wasn't like, well, I find the tanks immoral and I can't, it's like, no,
13:39they're just, that's like, that's bad, right? That's dangerous, right? So, and it's a danger level that I'm not willing to accept.
13:44So I'm just, you know, I'm trying to be pretty honest with myself about things and
13:49most people won't be. So, yeah, they're just following bribes and threats.
13:54They're just bribes and threats. They're trained the way that you train a puppy, bribes and threats, right? Kibble if you're good,
13:59rolled up newspaper if you're bad, right? A lot of people used to train dogs. I don't think it's the case anymore.
14:03But yeah, so you're not dealing with, you're just dealing with people who are lying to themselves and because they're lying to themselves,
14:09the bribes and threats remain hidden under a cloak of virtue and thus nothing can ever really change for the better.
14:14So yeah, sad but true, but I hope that that makes some sense and thanks for a great question.