Ep 394 | We're Taking the Culture Back | Guest: Rob Schneider

Summary

Kibbe on Liberty – Ep 394: “We’re Taking the Culture Back”
Guest: Rob Schneider
Date: July 8, 2026

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Episode Overview

In this engaging episode, Matt Kibbe welcomes comedian Rob Schneider for a candid, wide-ranging conversation on the failures of Marxism, the decay of academia, the dangers of collectivist ideologies, and the urgent need to reclaim Western culture through creativity, comedy, and open dialogue. The discussion weaves together sobering historical context, personal anecdotes, irreverent humor, and sharp cultural critique. Schneider and Kibbe challenge academic orthodoxy, authoritarian trends, and the prevailing narratives within popular culture. The episode ultimately centers on optimism—how comedy and independent media are breaking the elite’s monopoly on culture, and what it will take to reawaken an appreciation for individual freedom.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

Marxism, Mao, and Authoritarian Atrocities

• The Enduring Appeal of Marxist Ideas ([02:08]–[03:56])

  • Schneider criticizes the persistence of Marxist ideology:
    “It’s so funny though, that because some people are starting to acknowledge the idea of Marx as a Western idea, most people don’t associate that as a truly degenerate Western idealist… as if it’s a new idea that hasn’t been discredited and been responsible for the deaths of millions.” (Rob Schneider, [02:08])
  • They lampoon the refrain that “real socialism has never been tried,” linking it to failed socialist experiments and grim realities in cities like New York.

• Forced Organ Harvesting in China ([04:16]–[08:01])

  • The conversation addresses Jan Jekielek’s exposé on forced organ harvesting in China.
    • Schneider observes, “It literally is Monty Python… but that’s actually happening in China. On an industrialized scale.” ([05:49])
    • They discuss how the scale of dehumanization—from Mao’s Great Leap Forward to Tiananmen Square—creates a culture where such abuses become possible.

• Dehumanization and the Loss of Liberty ([10:26]–[11:53])

  • The path from dehumanization to atrocity is outlined:
    “You dehumanize people, then you isolate them and then you get the population comfortable with the idea of exterminating them. And that happens.” (Rob Schneider, [11:17])
  • Schneider underscores the fragility of freedom and the Western experiment as uniquely valuable yet under constant threat.

Historical Lessons & The West’s Vulnerability

• Lessons from Colonial History & Chinese Patience ([12:30]–[17:46])
  • Schneider provides a crash course on the Opium Wars and the geopolitical patience of China, warning:
    “The Chinese will wait and if we were able to continue to be unhealthy and uneducated… you don’t have to attack. Just wait for it to collapse and then clean it up. Don’t you think there’s something to that?” ([17:20])
  • He laments the “dumbing down” of American culture and education, suggesting this weakens society’s defenses.

The Culture War and Hijacking Narratives

• Culture as the Battleground ([18:16]–[19:54])

  • Kibbe proposes that the real fight is a cultural one:
    “Hijack the culture. And teach people that real socialism has never been tried. But don’t do it with a lecture—make a movie or make a bunch of movies…” (Matt Kibbe, [18:16])
  • They stress the need to rekindle excitement about freedom in popular storytelling.

• Dangers of Collectivism and Envy ([19:56]–[22:25])

  • Schneider identifies envy and grievance as the motivation behind collectivist movements:
    • “It’s really people who think they deserve something when they didn’t earn it. And that’s a huge difference…” ([19:56])
  • He criticizes academia and immigration policies that undermine appreciation for American culture.

• Economic Exodus and Policy Consequences ([22:25]–[23:58])

  • Discussion about the economic consequences of policies in states like California and Washington, as wealth and businesses flee high-tax regimes.

Academia: Grievance, Isolation, and Censorship

• Hayek, Intellectuals, and the Academic Elite ([23:58]–[24:53])

  • Kibbe references Hayek’s “The Intellectuals and Socialism,” connecting resentment in academia to hostility toward market success.

• Morally Superior Academics and Monoculture ([24:53]–[29:00])

  • Schneider: “They self identify as morally superior… These are ideas that are not tested in the marketplace… funded by the state.” ([24:53])
  • He details personal experiences with campus censorship, recalling riots at UC Berkeley aimed at preventing “the wrong” comedians from speaking ([26:43]).
    • “There was a riot to prevent a comedian from speaking because I represented particular point of view that was to them violent. And they had to be violent in their opposition to it.” ([26:43])

• Capture of Institutions ([29:00]–[31:47])

  • Schneider argues that not only academia, but also media and government agencies, have been “captured” by illiberal forces.
  • He asserts, “So we did get to see that and now what do we do about it?”—noting a lack of accountability for recent overreaches ([30:59]).

Comedy, Podcasts, and the New Counter-Culture

• Comedians as Counter-Narrative Leaders ([32:23]–[33:45])

  • Kibbe highlights the crucial role that comedians (like Schneider, Joe Rogan, Andrew Doyle, Russell Brand) play in reaching wider audiences and challenging orthodoxies.

• Firsthand Riot Experience: The Battle at Berkeley ([33:45]–[35:00])

  • Schneider recounts backstage moments at UC Berkeley as police, in full battle gear, search for threats during a riot:
    • “Andrew just looks over at me and he, he’s very stoic, and he's like, should I be concerned…? I went, yeah, I think you should.” ([34:22])
  • He details the breakdown of free speech on campus and the intimidation faced by non-conforming speakers.

• The Power and Threat of Independent Media ([35:00]–[39:59])

  • The conversation credits podcasting and alternative media (e.g., Twitter/X, Joe Rogan) for breaking the establishment’s stranglehold:
    • “Elon Musk may have saved Western civilization… buying Twitter for $44 billion. Very generous thing that he did. And Joe Rogan.” (Rob Schneider, [35:47])
  • Schneider likens Twitter/X and podcasts to the Soviet Union’s underground word-of-mouth networks, filling the trust vacuum left by mainstream news.

• Comedy, Courage, and Censorship ([40:03]–[41:51])

  • Comedy’s role as cultural resistance is celebrated. Despite blacklisting and cancellation attempts, comedians reach larger audiences independently:
    • “I don’t get invited on the late night shows, but I don’t have to… I can have 10 million people see it. Upwards of hundreds of thousands will see it. And that’s still twice… Jimmy Kimmel.” ([41:23])

Personal Risk, New Media, and the Collapse of Old Hollywood

• Speaking Out During the COVID Era ([42:03]–[43:32])

  • Schneider recalls the anxiety and solidarity of questioning COVID mandates:
    • “It was very frightening. Yeah.” ([42:23])
    • “When do I just come out and say this is all bullshit.” (Matt Kibbe, [42:39])

• The Collapse of Hollywood & Rise of New Creative Ecosystems ([43:57]–[48:27])

  • Schneider describes how old Hollywood is imploding under financial debt, lack of content, and creative malaise:
    • “Hollywood $32 billion in debt right now… the lots are empty.”
    • “Where is the new Hollywood going to come from? … It’s going to come from the ashes.”
  • Optimism for the “microcosms” of creative production emerging via podcasts, YouTube (with its own problems), and alternative platforms, though Schneider warns about YouTube’s share and the need for new alternatives.
  • He anticipates technological disruptions—particularly AI—will reshape labor and opportunity.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Marxism:
  “Most people don’t associate [Marxism] as a truly degenerate Western idealist… as if it’s a new idea that hasn’t been discredited and been responsible for the deaths of millions.”
  — Rob Schneider ([02:08])

• On Forced Organ Harvesting:
  “China is the only country where if you smoke and drink, it’s actually way better for your health, because… it lessens the likelihood of any of the government trying to harvest your organs.”
  — Rob Schneider ([06:47])

• On Dehumanization and Liberty:
  “You dehumanize people, then you isolate them and then you get the population comfortable with the idea of exterminating them.”
  — Rob Schneider ([11:17])

• On Cultural Manipulation:
  “Hijack the culture. And teach people that real socialism has never been tried. But don’t do it with a lecture—make a movie or make a bunch of movies…”
  — Matt Kibbe ([18:16])

• On Academia’s Insularity:
  “[Academics] self identify as morally superior… These are ideas that are not tested in the marketplace… funded by the state.”
  — Rob Schneider ([24:53])

• On the Power of Podcasts & Alternative Media:
  “Elon Musk may have saved Western civilization… buying Twitter for $44 billion.”
  — Rob Schneider ([35:47])

• Backstage at Berkeley, Facing a Riot:
  “Should I be concerned? I went, yeah, I think you should.”
  — Rob Schneider, to Andrew Doyle ([34:22])

• On Comedy as Cultural Resistance:
  “I don’t get invited on the late night shows, but I don’t have to… I can have 10 million people see it. Upwards of hundreds of thousands will see it… and that’s still twice… Jimmy Kimmel.”
  — Rob Schneider ([41:23])

• On New Hollywood Rising from the Ashes:
  “Where is the new Hollywood going to come from? … It’s going to come from the ashes.”
  — Rob Schneider ([44:34])

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Timestamps for Important Segments

• [02:08] – Schneider on Marxism’s dangerous legacy
• [04:16] – Comedy and the grim reality of organ harvesting in China
• [10:26] – Mao’s legacy, dehumanization, and the roots of atrocity
• [17:20] – Strategy: Undermining America from within
• [18:16] – The need to tell compelling pro-freedom stories
• [24:53] – Academic intolerance and resentment of success
• [26:43] – Berkeley riots and campus censorship recounted
• [32:23] – Comedians’ role as culture warriors
• [35:47] – The importance of Twitter/X and podcasts in narrative control
• [42:23] – Risk and solidarity in questioning COVID mandates
• [43:57] – The collapse of Hollywood and rise of new creative media

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Tone & Style

• Irreverent, candid, deeply knowledgeable, and combative regarding mainstream narratives.
• Blends sharp humor (at times dark) with intellectual seriousness.
• Schneider & Kibbe are united in their optimism about creativity and independence breaking through cultural monopolies.

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For Listeners New to the Show

This episode is both sobering and hopeful—a rallying cry for creative resistance against collectivist ideology and institutional decay. It is a must-listen for anyone interested in the intersection of comedy, culture, politics, and liberty. Rob Schneider’s wit and storytelling bring these urgent issues vividly to life, while Matt Kibbe keeps the discussion intellectually rich and solution-focused.

Transcript

[A]

Welcome to Kibbe on Liberty. I'm talking to the iconic comedian Rob Schneider about why Marx sucked, why academia sucks even more, and how it is that we're going to take the culture back from the idiots. Check it out. Welcome to kibby on liberty. Rob, good to see you again.

[B]

Nice to see you, Matt. It's a pleasure. Nice to be in your abode.

[A]

Yes. You've never been to the Evil Lair?

[B]

Well, you know, the people were shorter back then. You can just tell.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

That they didn't. They wanted things to be tight because. To retain heat. So if you had like a big ceiling, you were rich. If you were a Revolutionary War guy and you had like, you know, 12 foot ceiling, it's because you had money to heat that damn place.

[A]

Well, you can see I have no money then because it's beautiful.

[B]

I love it.

[A]

At least not in this studio. You know, we actually, we decided to redo this. So we had filled this space with 30 plus years of the crap that you get in a marriage.

[B]

Oh, yeah, yeah.

[A]

They were just boxes of stuff that we didn't even want anymore.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And we were up here filming a short video about Mao's murderous great leap forward because it looked dark and depressing up here.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And one of the guys said, hey, we should turn this into a studio that was like six months before lockdowns. So we did and it turned out to be a really good business decision because, you know, for the first year we did all that work here.

[B]

That's terrific. Yeah, you could. Mao. My goodness. It's so funny though, that because some people are starting to acknowledge the idea of Marx as a Western idea, most people don't associate that as a truly degenerate Western idealist. And he was an ideologue. And I think that's becoming. I'm trying to spread that as much as I can. He was a Westerner, so we see. But the idea that it's expressed as if it's a new idea that hasn't been discredited and been responsible for the deaths of millions of people is a testament to. There's. To a deep sense of grievance and envy in our society. And that. That's tough to. That's tough to extinguish. Yeah, it's there.

[A]

Wow. Real socialism.

[B]

The opposite of it.

[A]

Real socialism. Real socialism has not been tried.

[B]

It hasn't been tried. Just, just the fake ones. That hasn't worked because they haven't figured it out. But they're trying. In New York, you can just see by the piles of garbage that were stuck there in the wintertime. I don't know if that's Mondami. I mean, if I was in charge of the garbage in New York City, I would have gone out of my way to delay getting rid of it. You know, just like the. The snowball. The snowballs that were thrown in the faces of the police officers for him not to be angry about that. Like, would you want to work there as a police officer in New York City right now and that you want to go to Florida or you get appreciated and where it's warmer and nobody's throwing snowballs at you. No one's throwing anything at you because you could shoot them there, hopefully.

[A]

So I was thinking about bringing up last night the reason you were here for the event at the Kennedy Center. I'm a little hesitant to bring it up because I can never pronounce Jan's last name.

[B]

John Yakalik.

[A]

Yakalik and Kelik.

[B]

I don't even know. I actually. I'm pretty close. It's Jan Yekelik.

[A]

Okay.

[B]

And the way he talks, by the way, he's the driest. I will tell you, Jan doesn't know this, but I've avoided several times being interviewed by him because he's so dry, and when you see him talking, it's so deliberate. And I went like, I don't know if I could be funny around that guy. And then we've ended up being good friends. But I did. I avoided on several occasions being interviewed by him. And it's very heavy. I mean, like the idea of forced harvesting someone's organs when they don't want to give them away, that's very heavy. I mean, it literally is Monty Python. I mean, that very famous sketch in their last great film, a very uneven movie because it's a sketch movie. Sketch movies are very hard because the energy has to start over each sketch. So you build up to this funny thing, and then you gotta. So even a movie that has. That's linear, at least has a character you can stick with. Your energy stays the same, whereas it's divided. And into each new one, you start, kind of start over. But that said, there's some brilliant stuff. And I think it was in the Meaning of Life where he. They come to get the. The organ deliver of an unwilling recipient, played by, I think, Terry Gilliam. And they said, we're here for your liver, but I'm using it. And they just cut it out right there. But that's actually happening in China.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

On a. On an industrialized Scale. And I remember hearing about it around 2005, 2006, the. And especially around 2009, it became like, what was a rumor. Just like when I was in. In. In South Korea there, I got to step my foot, my little baby foot into North Korea and the demilitarized zone, which is still just. There's still a truce. There's no treaty. It's just a truce. That's all that they had. And. And I remember the rumors that I heard from the, you know, on our side. Well, let's just say the. The South Korean side, that there was this thing called black meat, which is cannibalism. And the idea that that's something. That's. This. That's something in the black market over there that happened. So you hear these things and you go, well, you know, whatever. And so we. Then you started hearing things about China and this Orban harvesting, forced Orban harbor, you know, involuntary organ harvesting, which just sounds crazy. And then I wrote a joke about it that Jan saw when it was. The joke is basically, you know, I said, china is the only country where if you smoke and drink, it's actually way better for your health because it's, you know, because it lessens the likelihood of any of the government trying to harvest your organs, you know, and it's always like, yeah, no, you don't want my liver. No, trust me, I drink. I'm a mess, and my lungs, forget about it. You know, and truthfully, it didn't. It's a funny idea, but it didn't really. It doesn't really murder, which. So, you know, in comedy parlance, doesn't get a big enough laugh worthy of the time that you're using, you know, on stage. But I've done it a few times. But it's. It's because there's no foundational belief in that. You have to have logic in your jokes. It has to have a, you know, something. A belief that. That really exists. And I don't think the audience can get their handle on it. Their mind around that. That's a real thing.

[A]

They can't comprehend it because it's.

[B]

Your rational mind can't come to the. You don't want to get to that place of this horrendous reality, which is that people are being murdered on demand for their organs, and people are flying over there needing an organ as some sort of organ harvesting tourism, and it's horrendous. And you have a group of people, the Falun Gong and now the Uyghurs that have been all if you can get the organization and get it what normally would take years in the west, the United States, Europe or wherever, Canada, South America to get on the list for that life saving procedure of an organ transplant. And if you can get it in two weeks. And China had advertised this for a long time, I don't know if they do it anymore, but they still have this procedure. They're still doing it upwards, 60 to 90,000 a year estimate. The only way you could do that is if you have an inventory. And the only way you can have an inventory is if everybody is isolated, imprisoned, and they all been biometrically tested and checked out so that they can go, okay, this guy. And so that's pretty dark, dark territory for humor. And this is Jan right here. I'm sorry to turn this off. Oh, this is Karen. She's. Let me just turn this. Sorry, can I give this to you over there, my friend? Thank you. So, Matt, that's about as dark as it gets and tough to come up with, with humor in that sense. But I think though, the, the best way is to put some light on it is what we, you know, what Jan is doing is, you know, he wrote a book about it, Killed to Order and it's number one bestseller for organ harvesting on the New York Times Oregon Harvesting book.

[A]

Yeah, I'm going to have him on to talk about that. And you guys were having this conversation last night and I was thinking about the reason that I find it credible, not really knowing much more than I heard last night is the long history of just radical disregard for individual life in communist China.

[B]

Yes.

[A]

And it's part of their ideological DNA going all the way back to the Great Leap Forward where Mao callously starves some dramatic percentage of his population to death. And then you get into the more revolutionary stuff. And cannibalism was a thing, and part of it was because people were hungry, but the other part was kind of a humiliation ritual to teach people not to question, you know, why am I so hungry? Well, you're against the regime at that point. And going all the way up to Tiananmen Square where they just mowed the kids down, chopped them up and washed them down the gutters. So like we actually had to stop doing this kind of work because my team was getting depressed.

[B]

No, it's true. But what you have though is there is something that we can't ignore. And that is how incredible freedom is. And the antithesis of that is the dehumanization. And that's how it starts. You dehumanize People, then you isolate them and then you get the population comfortable with the idea of exterminating them. And that happens. And that's why the United States is such a, you know, and the Western civilization itself is such an important, such an important step in the progress of humanity. And it's worth saving. It's not worth, you know, kicking out because you have, you know, it's, it's imperfect. I mean, Rome, Paris, New York, Washington D.C. freedom of speech, these are pretty good things. This is worth, worth preserving. And so when you do, you know, for, for in a society that's gotten fat and lazy and, and has taken their freedoms for granted. And I mean that, I mean the United States, we, we need to wake up pretty quickly because I mean if you want to, if you want to take America and undermine it in a few short generations and if the Chinese have, if the Chinese are anything, they're patient. Like the Chinese were happy to sign that hundred year lease for the new Territories because they got Hong Kong in the second. There was the Opium Wars, I believe 1841 and I think 1846 was the second one. Well basically the, you know, that the British had all this, they became addicted to tea and they were spending all their money on their silver bullion was going out on for tea. And they said, well, what can we give the Chinese that we have that won't cost us anything? And what we have, India, we've got opium, well, let's just turn China into 80 million opium addicts. And that's a pretty good idea. And so they did. And then eventually the Emperor of China through his emissary got a message to Queen Victoria like can you stop doing this? And of course that, you know, back then the real race theory is English. That's where it really started. And that's the Nazis race theory was, came from, from the English race theory. And so they didn't respond to that. And so the, the emperor, his emissary, I don't think they called him an ambassador at the time, but said to the Queen Victoria was would you give this to your people? I mean this is clearly something that is poisoned and you wouldn't do that to you, so why would you do this to us? And of course they didn't even think of, they thought of Chinese as less than human or certainly less than they were in the racial scheme of things. And so what happened was, was the Chinese refused to let the next shipment of opium get into, through the harbor in Hong Kong. And so they threw it, literally, you know, threw it out into, into the harbor. And so the English took umbrage of that and they blew the shit out of Hong Kong Harbor. And that was the first of the Opium Wars. And of course the greatest superpower on the planet at the time was still the United United Kingdom, England. And then there was a second group. So, and that first one, the, the first war, the, the Chinese to end that war gave in perpetuity Hong Kong to the English. And then they got a, a 99 year lease for the second war, opium war for the New Territories. Because Hong Kong by itself is an island. You really need something attached to it. So they got that. And so when there was a weak labor, weak labor party In, in the 19, I believe 1976, they went back to Deng Xiaoping and the successor to Mao and they did not do their homework, so they went to Dang. And the only thing was on the schedule was the New Territories getting that back. And one of the dummies who realized you don't mention things that aren't on the schedule for the meeting and one of the dummies of the Labor Party, of course it was the Labor Party that this up. They said what about Hong Kong? And Dang was like, we want that back to that one question cost them. They would have signed another 100 year lease easily. They would have just, they would have wait tomorrow if Taiwan says I will, we'll sign 100 year lease to give all control back to China. Absolutely, they'll sign. The bottom line, China can outweigh us. So in that one sentence, they lost Hong Kong. And then of course by 1986 they tried to quickly put in a parliamentarian system because it was basically a British ruled, I wouldn't say dictatorship, but whatever's close to that. So, and that was it. And they lost that. So the Chinese will wait and if going back to the United States, the Chinese will wait us out. And if we were able to continue to be unhealthy and uneducated and as far as the dumbing down of, you know, I used to watch Jay Leno's thing where you go, hey, you know, how you doing? What can you name the capital of California? And they go, Los Angeles. You know, you know, basically the like stripper knowledge. And you go, wow, there's some, a lot of badly or uneducated people in this country. And if you continue going down that line and then people don't, you know, take our freedoms for granted, you let in a few more million people. I think that would be the plan. Fatten us up Give us a lot of chemicals and then you don't have to. You don't have to attack. Just wait for it to collapse and then clean it up. Don't you think there's something to that?

[A]

Thank you for joining me today on

[C]

Kibbe on Liberty and for being part of our fiercely independent audience. Every week, my organization, Free the People, partners with BlazeTV to bring you this show. My guests bring smart perspectives on everything from current events to timeless philosophical debates. If you like what you hear, go to freethepeople.org kol and support Kibbe on Liberty so we can continue to produce these honest conversations with interesting people. Now, let's get back to it.

[A]

I think there's something to that. And I would add to that, you know, hijack the culture.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And, and teach people that real socialism has never been tried. But don't do it with a lecture like make a movie or make a bunch of movies. And then when you lock down New York City. Hear me out. You're going to lock down New York City. Anybody with money or common sense flees New York City. You repopulate New York City with all these young hipsters who have watched all of those movies and read all of those books about how real socialism is this cool thing where you don't have to work anymore and you're gonna get free health care and you're gonna get to practice your art and be your creative self. Those are the guys that elected Monda me at the margin. I mean, there's only one party in New York City and it's the Democrats. So, yeah, it strikes me that we have to figure out a way to tell the story, not just of why socialism sucks and why it leads to mass famine and why it leads to unspeakable authoritarian things like mandatory organ harvesting. But how would you get people excited about being free again?

[C]

That's.

[A]

It's, it's harder to. To sell people, I think. So you. You have this false promise of, yeah, you're going to be safe. You're going to get a universal basic income.

[B]

It's going to be free. Free stuff. Yeah.

[A]

And affordable. The alternative is. Can be uncomfortable. You're going to struggle a little bit to create something and build something, but

[B]

it's going to be yours.

[A]

It's going to be yours.

[B]

You own something. That's my biggest fear is you're going to have the grievance. And envy is what is behind that movement. They can say it's the warmth of collectivism, but it's really grieve. It's really people who think they deserve something when they didn't earn it. And that's a huge difference between the people who came in here. Up until 1921, up until the great immigrations that came in, people came in there and holding that American flag. We're Americanists. Soon as you could you learn English, you come over here. And whether it was Irish, whether it was Polish, whether it was Italians, they came in by the hordes who came in to make something of themselves, and they were proudly American. And I think you have people, you cannot have people come into your culture that hate your culture. You cannot have people in your educational, in academia who hate the culture and who teach against it. And you can have. See, what happens is you can have all the Peruvian midget intellectuals that you want an LBGTQ theory because it's not in academia. It doesn't have to be proved. It's theoretical. What is proven is how do you make that. How do you make society work when you leave the academia? They're not teaching people how to think. We've talked about this before. There's no making or helping kids think and think creatively and think as individuals. It's a group think. And it's basically just cranking out advocates for this illiberal policy that doesn't, that doesn't have to be proved outside of the academia. And that's. This interesting thing is if New York continues. And look what happened in California and now the state of Washington, just this month they passed an income tax, state income tax, which is what the Bill Gates father was trying to do for a long time. And Bill Gates. And they finally got it through. They got a state income tax of 9%, I believe. And what happens, People leave, they go. I'm gonna go to Florida. So, you know, the Mr. Starbucks, Starbucks guy said, you know what? I've always. It's time for me to retire. It's just, It's a coincidence that now I'm gonna have to pay a wealth tax, but I'm going to leave because it's. I need to be closer to my money and my money's in Florida, and

[A]

Florida accidentally doesn't have an income tax.

[B]

That is besides the point. My kids live there. My money's there. Yeah. So, I mean, you do have a. You know, it is happening. America's becoming fractionalized, and it is politically now, economically, what's going to happen to that state? What is happening to California? How many more Teslas? I mean, how can you afford to lose? That's the difference. I Mean like I just met, when I was a kid, they would do anything they want. I remember Planters Peanuts. Planters Peanuts left San Francisco. I remember there was an instant depression in the whole city. How do we lose this? They moved to la. Why? Because that's where all the good looking girls are. So I, you can't blame the, you know, Planters Peanuts for wanting to leave. But there was also, there was something depressing about San Francisco at that time. There was something, the weather, whatever. And it's just like, and, and it's happening, the exodus is happening. And if this wealth tax continues, you're gonna get out. You know, I mean, I mean even Zuckerberg has, has found another place. You know, he had his bunker system set up. You know, it's interesting, all these billionaires building bunkers. What do they know? Exactly. But then, you know, I think he's moved out too. So who's gonna, who's gonna pay those taxes? California is still beautiful. Yeah, but who's gonna, how is that gonna continue to work? And who's gonna take over and, and what is it gonna take for to get another political party in there? I don't know. People think, well, it's gotta have to change. I hope so. I don't see it anytime soon though.

[A]

So I want to go back and talk about academia for a minute. Before we started, we were in the kitchen talking about Friedrich Hayek and he's got this great essay that I obsess about called the Intellectuals and Socialism. And one of his arguments as to why academia sucks so bad is that they very much believe that they're intellectually superior. They're better people than these dirty capitalists that go out there. And maybe they didn't even go to college. And my goodness, they don't have a PhD and they're just making money. What about me? I'm the smart guy here. So you have this almost inherent envy in the intellectual class grievance. They resent people that came up with a good idea and ground it out and made a billion dollars.

[B]

Yes, absolutely. You have these I the term you're looking for. They self identify as morally superior. That's a fact. And they seem to be isolated in academia, which does, I mean, it is really nice to fly in a private plane, but you'd have to accumulate a certain amount of wealth and be successful at your chosen field to be able to have that extraordinary luxury to do that. And so you have a class of people and academia is up towards 97% liberal. And again, you don't these are ideas that are not tested in the marketplace. These are theoretical ideas, theoretical ideas that are funded by the state and be funded by, you know, by the Fed. These and also by the money that they have at the university. These are great ideas that they have, but they're not in practice. So it is spinning out, but I don't see it. I don't see the counterbalance to it. It's interesting to see there are a couple of states now that Turning Point usa, Charlie Kirk and Erica Kirk's organization now have Indiana and Arkansas. The state legislature now is. Has legislated that all the universities have to have that. And I think that's important. I mean, if you're going to have every university that shits on capitalism, that shits on America, that shits on Western civilization, that builds up these flawed systems of political theory that has never worked in reality, then you should at least have the alternative to it. And I would like to see that, but they don't even want that. They're not even open to it. Before Charlie Kirk was murdered by a crazy furry leftist who couldn't get a normal girlfriend. So we got one with a penis. These who Jimmy Kimmel said was one of theirs. It's like, sorry, it's one of yours. This. We're supposed to go to Cal Berkeley together. And there was a riot to prevent a comedian from speaking because I represented particular point of view that was to them violent. And they had to be violent in their opposition to it. So it seems crazy because I'm sure none of them have ever seen an utterance or any comedy show I've ever done. And I was clearly just there to. And open, like Charlie was to discourse. I mean, as Charlie said, you know, when the conversations stop, the violence begins. And so we were there to have discourse. And I'm telling you, the police were not helpful at Berkeley. They were not. The university insisted that this One group get 500 tickets for the sole purpose of preventing 500 people from attending. And that's what they did. They didn't let people through. They were throwing bottles, incendiary devices, making things sound like it was gunfire. It was a, you know, and the, you know, the security that was there, which was Charlie Kirk's. They were still traumatized from his assassination just a few weeks, short weeks before this. And I was thinking, this is Cal Berkeley. This is where the freedom of speech movement on university started in 1964, 65. So, wow, has this gone the other way? And that's representative of higher education in this country. That they were so worried about a comedian speaking. It was outrageous. And we're in the middle of a lawsuit with them. It's interesting what the part of the, that I really want to impress in the lawsuit, that's part of the free speech because there is two sides to it. One is the ability to speak your mind, speak freely without, you know, your free, your First Amendment free speech, without either to address grievances without reprisal from the government. But that's one, the other side of that is not just stopping somebody from speaking freely, but stopping somebody else from listening to that speech. That is an, that is an important part of free speech as well. So that's what's going to be part of that lawsuit. So we've, we've, we've told the university, the regents and the, you know, and to the dean at Cal Berkeley, hold all your emails. You're not allowed to, you still get money from feds, so you're not allowed to destroy your emails and evidence. And we're gonna gather all that. And that's important, I mean, because you have to fight back in that way. And thankfully we can still fight in the courts. That has to be done. This country, as we learned through Covid, was there's so much of it is captured. Academia is, has been captured. And that happened, you know, through the intellect. The French intellectuals, Michael Foucault and James Lindsay goes into this much, has a deeper understanding than I do, but they realized that the communists and the French intellectuals that realized that the revolution was not going to happen because there was no real, the grievances was not going to come from the worker because they saw that their lives were indeed improved and, and that of their children's. So they were going to have to work and use people who had grievances and envy and they're going to go through some other way with academia. And by 1970 they had infiltrated academia. And it kind of goes in 20 year cycles. By 1990 they were in and then by 1990 they got in through K through 12. And so you see the teachers union marching kids out. Now, you know, these are grammar school kids, high school kids, taking them out of school and protesting against federal police officers. That's different than when we went to school. We didn't have the teachers having us march against police officers. So that is another captured part. And then you realize that the media is captured. Then you realize that our government agencies are captured. So the veil was lifted and we got to see behind, in Covid, you got to see the wizard, you know, Oz, he's, he's, he's moving all the different things. So we did get to see that and now what do we do about it? And is there going to be a change? I've seen no accountability. I've seen nobody brought, I've seen no charges. I've seen no, nobody from the Biden administration brought up for their proved. They've proved that they did do that. They censored Americans. No charges were made from that. You know, Fauci's still free. So is it just going to just brush under the brush, under the rug?

[C]

If you've made it this far into the show, it means I must be doing something right. Key Beyond Liberty is just one of the amazing products we created. Free the People. We tell emotionally compelling stories and produce educational videos for the Liberty Curious. Our award winning documentaries personalize all things liberty, independence, creativity, hard work, integrity and perseverance. After the show, check out our [e-mail] and if you like what you see, donate to support what we do. That's freethepeople.org now back to the show.

[A]

You know, probably, and I'm not that confident in this Justice Department to do anything with Fauci, but one thing that I'm noticing in that story, and I think Peter Boghossian was with you.

[B]

Oh yeah, Peter Boghossian, Andrew Doyle, they both, you know, I needed some support and those are the smartest guys.

[A]

So you and Andrew are comedians. And I think it's interesting and I want to pivot into the work that you're actually doing right now because I think, I think it's a bigger threat to that intellectual monopoly that you're not an intellectual, you're a comedian. You have an ability to talk to popular culture and it's a double headed dragon or a double edged sword because they control academia, but I think more importantly they control the cultural narrative, they control the scripts that come out of movies. They control what jokes are allowed to be told, what comedians are allowed to tell jokes. And that second monopoly is crumbling under their feet. I don't think we really have a good hope of fixing academia, but I think we can do an end run around it and tell the stories about freedom. And you know, you're the tip of the spear and you probably feel that way sometimes.

[B]

I do feel the,

[A]

or the receiving end of the tip of the spear.

[B]

I felt that when I saw Police. Andrew Doyle and I and Peter Boghossian were backstage at Cal Berkeley and there's a riot outside and it's on tv and it's on our phone and we're watching, and all of a sudden, police come in in full battle gear into our green room and run through fully armed. They run through, don't say anything to us. And they just, they start going through the electrical closets and they run in there. And Andrew just looks over at me and he, he's very stoic, and he's like, should I be concerned,

[A]

the Brits?

[B]

I went, yeah, I think you should. I mean, let's see what happens. I mean, I said, so obviously, are they coming through? Do we have these antifa scumbags? Are they sneaking through the back door and trying to get in? And that's what they were checking to do. And I said, and when they finally, when the police finally came out, you know, it was less than a couple of minutes later, they came out, you know, in battle, Gary. And they're not talking. I said, excuse me, should we be. I mean, are they trying to come through there? I mean, can you. And they didn't really want to communicate anything. I said, can you at least help our friends and the students coming in? And they said, it's not up to us. Not up to you? You guys are the police. How is this, how is that possible? But getting back to your question, there seems to be a threat of wanting to monopolize all of the conversation culturally. And the fact that they, they have the late night tv, they have the news, they have, you know, they have a lot of the media, but what they, what they did not get and the core to what they're missing and what they're so frustrated at. And I know that they're frustrated because they even say it is podcasts and Twitter. Twitter is the number one news site in the world. People go to Twitter first thing in the morning, they say what's really happening? And you know, it's not an exaggeration to say that Elon Musk may have saved Western civilization. It's not that much of an exaggeration. I think people may look back on this historically and go, well, what were some of the linchpins? Well, Trump getting elected. And that was largely due to Elon Musk buying Twitter for $44 billion. Very generous thing that he did. And Joe Rogan. So you had like that moment during COVID where it was very much that totalitarian moment where if you talk to people like Ilya Baskin, who's the great actor, he was in Moscow, in the Hudson with Robin Williams. This is great. But he lived in the Soviet Union, he's a friend of mine. And he would say, rob, I don't understand your country, why you'd want to go to this. It's so obvious to see. But what happened is. And what happened to the Soviet Union happened here during COVID Very quickly they got exposed. And what got exposed was that we don't trust the news as it's being told to us. We don't believe it. And what happened then was they, like in the Soviet Union, it was very obvious. Before the collapse of the Soviet Union, people knew, like Pravda, the state newspapers, Pravda and Tass were government mouthpieces, like, blah, blah, blah. And then what did they do? They counted on word of mouth to like, well, what do you think? What did you hear? What do you, you know, what did she say? And that's where the news came from. And that's the same thing happened during COVID And that's what. And since COVID people go, you know, they listened to Joe Rogan. That's why he was such a threat. That's why cnn, to their utter, you know, eternal shame, making Joe lying and saying that he took horse paste and making him actually discolored to make him. Now that to me, they should have pulled their license from the fcc. The idea that they should be allowed to broadcast after that, blatant, they should at least have a. A lower third saying, this is propaganda. This is propaganda. So I think what happened was you had in this free country, people woke up to it. If you wanted to wake up, if you had the ability to think for yourself. You know, a lot of people are talked into getting the vaccine, but a lot of people even who were talked into it before, into it, they didn't get the booster. A lot of people tell me this, they come up to me all the time and go, robby, I was taught I. I had to get the first one, but I didn't get the booster. They're very proud of that. And, you know, here's to them for that. And I pray that. That I think in my heart of hearts, I think I was just saying, God, please let that not be effective. And sure enough, According to Peter McCullough, Dr. Peter McCullough, one of the brave physicians and one of the heroes who come out of COVID he said that 80% of the problems were directly related to 30% of the shots. So in other words, Pfizer, Moderna and AstraZeneca, they designed, they had the design for it, which is actually a military design that they actually got got and they, they didn't make themselves. They contracted it out the, you know, the pharmacies to make it. And, and if they didn't do it right or they didn't refrigerate it right, or they didn't use it, then it was mostly. So my prayer is, and still is, is that most of those shots had nothing in it. I hope so. But what did we learn from that? It was a real test case for totalitarianism and it was a test case to see how far they could take things. And it just. The first one. Are they going to do it again? Probably, we'll figure it out. But it was the comedians, I'm proud to say that, you know, were going around and performing and questioning it, the narrative. And, and by that time, you know, thanks to the social media and performing live, we're able to get enough people to question that narrative. And as you said before, by the time the Canadian truckers started protesting it, it really reminded Americans how to protest again. And that's when it collapsed. The beginning of the collapse was, was the Canadian.

[A]

We were embarrassed into defending freedom by the freaking Canadians.

[B]

I know. That's really humiliating. I know.

[A]

You know, I. Thinking about the, the army of. Obviously, Joe Rogan got his start in comedy and he platformed a bunch of these other guys, you know, Tim Dillon and Theo Vaughn.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Russell Brand, Jimmy Dore, Tony Henchcliffe. And those guys are so big now. Like, like Kill Tony is.

[B]

It's the biggest show on YouTube.

[A]

Yeah. And I think they're, I think the bad guys are panicking because how do they cancel all of you guys?

[B]

Well, you can't. The thing you hope that the decadence. That was the Biden administration. It really was. When Putin described the west as decadent under the Biden administration, I had to go, he's right. He's a murderer. You can say whatever you want about Putin. He's right. The west is decadent. Just look at the guy in the dress who's in charge of our, you know, Admiral of health or whatever that guy was, the guy in drag. I mean, it's just, it was a, it really was the Weimar Republic in 1929. It really was the Biden administration. So I, I'm hopeful that's all I can be. But it was, it was nice to see that there were certain comedians that couldn't be bought and they didn't give in on it. And it was also nice to see that, like, you know, I don't get invited on the late night shows, but I don't have to. I'll do a tweet or I'll do, you know, a little Instagram post. And I can have, they can have, I can have 10 million people see it. Upwards of hundreds of thousands will see it. And then, and that's, it's still twice that amount of people who watch Jimmy Kimmel. Yeah. As it's a, you know, I don't need it anymore. So it's, it's, the gates are open and we'll see what's going to happen.

[A]

I got, I gotta ask you this question because, because we got to know each other. I may have said this the last time we did a podcast, but we got to know each other. Like all good relationships, it started on Twitter.

[B]

All good lasting relationships, meaningful relationships.

[A]

Solid, trustful, human.

[B]

Something to build from.

[A]

But, you know, at the time, it was the dark days of 2020. 2021.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And it did not feel that comfortable speaking out against lockdowns and vaccine mandates.

[B]

Yeah. It was very frightening. Yeah.

[A]

And so that, like there was this, you know, this, this private group and, and we had conversations about like, well, I was more good listener than having any useful advice. But you're trying to figure out, like, when, when do I just come out and say this is all bullshit. And you, you have, by the way, you're, you're, you're, you're not in the closet anymore. I don't know if you know that. Like, people know.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

That you're not, you're not just going to spout the, the progressive dogma. How, how's that going?

[B]

It is not. You know, my favorite thing is when people say, you know, when they, you get accused of. You're a right wing grifter. There's nothing to grift. The only money, the only supermodels are on the left. The grift is to continue to go down the same tired, old, beaten, unfunny, you know, Trump things. I remember, like when Norm MacDonald was such a gigantic hero of so many of, of us in the comedy world, he was saying, yeah, you know, there's no bravery in making a joke about Trump. It's easy talking, you know, 19, you know, I mean, sorry, 20, 16, 17, 18, 19. It was just that insanity. It literally was like a liberal, A liberal kind of like when, you know, the anti alcohol movement that came through, that was like, it was the same kind of lunacy that just, it was a wave of it that you couldn't get away from. And comedians, the good ones, were always the contrarians. I want to Fight against what's happening. And. But they. They literally was what you really have and you still have in America. There was a blacklisting in the 1950s, and it was the, you know, the conservative. The. Was the Republicans that were blacklisting communists. And it turns out they were right to do it for the most part. Of course, it got out of hand. And the famous thing, you know, have you. At long last, have you any decency? And it ended thanks to an actor, Kirk Douglas, in 1959 at the Academy Awards when he said the real writer, Dalton Trumby, who wrote Spartacus and had to do it under an assumed name because he was blacklisted. So what you have now, you have communists and then liberals. And it is communism. It's a socialist communist, same thing. Blacklisting patriots, people who love this country. And that's what's still happening. So we are still blacklisted. And it's like, it's okay because we can still make a living. And thankfully, you know, in all my shows, you know, people kind enough to show up and. And do that. But I'm tired of the end. The system is falling apart. You have. You have Hollywood $32 billion in debt right now. That means. And the lots are empty. I went out to Hollywood. I was there three days ago. These lots are empty. You know, there's a TV show here, but I'm telling you, it is unsustainable. It is collapsing in real time. The guy who bought Radford Studios went bankrupt. There's not enough shows out there. And so where are these shows? I mean, Netflix is still Netflix, but where are the suppliers? How are you going to keep doing it? And where is the new Hollywood going to come from? And it's going to. It's going to come. It's going to come from the ashes. The. The last time we saw this kind of upheaval in Hollywood was the 1960s, when the start of the studio system collapsed. The studio system where you had. You had people contracted for specific Warner Brothers, mgm, and whether it was, you know, Fox, you were signed in, you know, Marlon, you know, Marilyn Monroe, she was Fox. You couldn't do pictures unless you. You got an agreement to go and do one picture for another studio. So that collapsed by 1966, 67. And then you had these. The advent of all these incredible filmmakers that came in, Scorsese's and Coppola's and Spielberg's and John Landis, these people that the new kids came because they didn't know what was happening. And so with the, you know, Paramount collapse, you had Gulf Western who come in and they brought in Robert Evans and Robert Evans saved that studio. And it was kind of the birth of the studio again. That's happening again. What is going to replace that? We don't know yet. But there's these, you know, micro. Microcosms of studios and, and these, these short, short things. And YouTube is bigger than any studio. And YouTube. It's so funny because I used to say YouTube takes half, 50%. They just share it with you and they're the, the broadcaster and they're still censorious, by the way, but they take 50%. And I used to think that's what the Colonel took. What a ripoff. The colonel took 50% from Elvis. You spoke. If you're a manager, you take 15. That's the most. The colonel took 50, you know, and now the colonel is YouTube. But. And that's still a good deal for a lot of people. They can get rich off of that, that 50%. And that is opening up the doors. But we need another YouTube too. We can't just have one YouTube and then Netflix. We have to have something, some alternatives to it. And we'll see how it's gonna. It's gonna shake out. And with AI, I think you're gonna see. You're gonna see unemployment double. My understanding we're gonna get it up to around 10%. That may not be the worst thing either, though. Those people gonna have to figure something else out and then that will be something new. But there might be a standing 10%. There might be a standing 10% unemployment in the United States and Europe, you know, who knows? But that's. It's going to be disruptive, but maybe in the best possible way too. And it's gonna, it's gonna provide jobs, but we'll see what happens. But like you were saying in the car earlier, I think the live stuff is still gonna be. People wanna see it. I hope so.

[A]

It's just like relationships that start on X, eventually you probably have to shake hands.

[B]

Eventually you do. And we did.

[A]

And we did. And we did. You see, my boss is over here. She's telling me that we have to get to the airport. So we're going to end this.

[B]

We got to do this again, though.

[A]

Yeah, we got to do it again.

[B]

This was great. The last time was, was fun. It was very interesting time in our culture. And it is again now.

[A]

Yeah. Thank you, sir.

[B]

All right, thank you.

[C]

Thanks for watching. If you liked the conversation, make sure to like the video subscribe subscribe and also ring the bell for notifications. And if you want to know more about Free the people, go to freethepeople.org.