
Zuby Interview
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Zuby
The only people who want to censor and want to ban, want to deplatform people are those who are hiding something. From music to media, Zubi has built a global audience by speaking his mind. A rapper, author, and entrepreneur, he's known for his unfiltered takes on success, culture, and personal growth.
Brian Rose
You first hit my radar when I saw you doing a deadlift, identifying as a woman and thereby breaking the world record. What's a dude with a computer science degree from Oxford doing that for?
Zuby
People across the world thought it was hilarious. In February 2019, it was not a popular position to speak out or even question some of this stuff. Now, in 2025, you can now say that it's goofy to have pronouns in your bio. You can now say that there's only two genders and that men don't get pregnant and women can't have penises and men shouldn't be in women's sports. Most people won't give you that much pushback. They'll be like, yeah, it's a bit silly, isn't it, saying that in mid-2020.
Brian Rose
Oh, boy, let's talk about Black Lives Matter.
Zuby
BLM was a scam. You are using tragedy to line your own pocket. It's all wrapped up under the idea of protecting other people and being empathetic. It's the same narrative that they used with COVID How was it? You don't want to go out and infect your friends, your family, your community. So just stay home, stay home, save lives. That's why it's effective.
Brian Rose
I guess most people didn't say something because they were worried about being, quote, unquote, canceled.
Zuby
I was just saying the things that I know other people were thinking, the things that I was thinking, and that was it.
Brian Rose
What's Zubi doing in five years from now?
Zuby
Everything that I'm already doing bigger and better and on a larger scale. Music, books, podcasts, and doing interviews. Lord willing, I'm going to have many more decades to make an impact on this world and encourage others to do the same. That's when we take the world and our species to a whole new level.
Brian Rose
The world is changing. Inspiration is everywhere. It has never been so easy to connect, share, and bring people together. We're learning from others and finding the best in ourselves. Challenging our beliefs, sharing our vulnerability, overcoming our fears, transforming ourselves so we can transform the world. How far can we go? This is London Real. I am Brian Rose. My guest today is. Hey, I know investing in crypto is scary. It takes a real leap of faith. Because there are so many scams, rug pulls and bad actors out there. It's a dangerous business. Which is why 95% of people lose all their money. Well, that's why I created the London Real Investment Club. So you can access the hottest deals on the planet and use the crypto bull market to create the generational wealth that you deserve. Join my team of over 100 people from around the world that are making millions of dollars behind the scenes, investing in blockchain, AI, web, three games, DeFi, Bitcoin and more. Don't miss out. Click the link below to book a call with one of my team now. But hurry, this bull market will end soon. I know investing crypto can be scary. That's why you got to join the investor club. Pull the trigger. Let's do this.
Zuby
This is London Real.
Brian Rose
I am Brian Rose. My guest today is Zubi, the musician, author, entrepreneur and public speaker. You are the host of Real Talk with Zubi where you've interviewed high profile guests like Elon Musk and Andrew Tate, amassing 2 million followers and 50 million views. You're known for your honest and inspiring perspective and promote responsibility, resilience and positivity. You've appeared on the Joe Rogan Experience, Tucker Carlson and the Candace Owens show as an independent artist. You've released six albums, performed over 100 gigs in 10 countries and shared the stage with industry giants like Tech9acala and the Far side. You're also a successful author, having published two books, Strong Advice, Zubi's Guide to Fitness for Everybody and the children's book the Candy Calamity. You've said that in order to build a better world, we need to have tough conversations and be open to other people's ideas. Ultimately, you believe freedom, discipline and critical thinking are the keys to success. And real strength comes from self mastery and speaking the truth. Zoubi, welcome to London Real in Dubai.
Zuby
Thank you for the intro, Brian. Happy to be here.
Brian Rose
Great to have you. I think you first hit my radar in 2019 when I saw a video of you that I think lots of people saw of you doing a deadlift. It wasn't a small deadlift, it was like 280kgs identifying as a woman and thereby breaking the world record. And that's the first time I ever saw you. And I was like, who the hell is this guy? And I'm just wondering, what's a dude with a computer science degree from Oxford doing that for sure.
Zuby
Well, I Wish it was 280. The video was actually 230. Although my personal best at the time was 275. And look, in the mid 2010s is really when I started to notice the Western world in particular shifting into a strange direction. It was in the very early stages of the mainstreaming of what people now refer to as wokeness. At the time, some people were calling it cultural Marxism. A lot of people were calling it the social justice movement. You were hearing about sjw, Social justice warriors. I never hear that term anymore now. But it was the relatively early stages of concepts like, I don't know, critical race theory, transgender ideology, super extreme elements of, I don't know, some people call it third or even fourth wave feminism. Strange ideas about race, gender, sexuality. All of that stuff was really coming to a head. It was coming out the fringes of academia and it was really going mainstream. One of the things that. I don't know if this was the. One of the things that was actually a major catalyst to it, particularly on the gender ideology side, was actually the whole Caitlyn Jenner situation. So I think that was 2015, when Caitlyn Jenner won Woman of the Year after being Woman of the Year, being a woman for less than a year. And one of the most bizarre things I found about that whole situation, which people seem to have forgotten about, was just that no one asked, what exactly does this mean? So all of the magazines, all of the newspapers, all of the TV stations, anytime it was being talked about, it was just like, wow, this is amazing. Stunning, brave, she, her, wonderful Kaitlyn, go. And I'm kind of like, isn't this the guy who was Bruce Jenner, who won like Olympic medals and has been a man for 60ish years? At the time, like, even the whole idea of I identify as a woman, what does that mean? It was like everyone just either tacitly accepted it or celebrated it or just shut up and didn't ask any questions because they didn't want to be called a bigot. Going a little beyond that into, you know, later 2015, 2016, is when I started noticing the situation happening in sports. So there was an MMA fighter, Fallon Fox, who had previously competed in the male category, who was then identifying as a woman and competing in MMA and causing some serious damage to some women. There were stories happening in the world of athletics and weightlifting, all of these different sports. I started to just notice this stuff happening early. And that's just one side of it. There was the strange conversations that were going on around race. So my entire life being brought up both in Saudi Arabia and in the uk and just being raised the way I was through the 90s, through the 2000s, even into the early 2010s, it seems like, you know, racism has been dying out for many, many decades at this point. And suddenly people were being told whether you're white or you're black or you're whatever race or ethnicity you are, all of a sudden you are supposed to care about race again. And you were supposed to judge people to some degree based on their race or treat people somehow differently based on their race. It was very antithetical to everything that I had been raised with and what I'd experienced in school and in university and. And again, this wasn't just coming from some weird fringe. These notions were being promoted in universities in particular, but also it was seeping into schools, it was seeping into the media discourse. It was starting to be pushed by companies, corporations, governments were starting to promote identity politics in all sorts of ways. Similarly, I mean, when I was a, when I was a kid or when I was a teen, you'd hear about the, you know, the LGB movement and then it became lgbt, and then it became lgbtq, and then became lgbtq. And they kept adding more and more letters. And again, for the past few decades, the notion had been, look, some people, some people are gay, some people are same sex attracted. They shouldn't be mistreated, they shouldn't be discriminated against, they shouldn't be bullied or gay bashed or whatever it is. It's like, yeah, cool. Like I've, I'm on board with that, right? I'm not on board with persecuting or discriminating against people. But then it got pushed further than that. It went beyond the whole gay marriage debate, which I think was mostly settled in the west by around the mid 2010s, and then it had just sort of. The train went past the station and it just started being, you know, men can become women, women can be men, you have to. People can make up their own pronouns. In fact, there aren't just two genders anymore. Now there's infinite. It just started getting really weird. And I started noticing all this and speaking about it to people, mainly in private, just everyday conversations with friends and family and stuff. And then it just got to a point, it kept increasing. 2017, 2018. And it got to a point where I realized that, okay, this is not just. There's something weird going on here. And it's strange that not a lot of people are pushing back against this because some of these ideas are nonsensical and are actually dangerous because you are asking and demanding people to even go as far as suspending reality and outright lying about something as essential as basic human biology. And this is going to have very severe consequences. So in late 2018, I just started to speak up a little bit more on my platforms, particularly on Twitter. So I've been on Twitter since now X I, I've been there since 2009. I've been on social media in general for 20 years at this point. I joined Facebook in 2004. So I've been on social media a long time, but I mainly was just using it as a vehicle to connect with my fans, promote my music, put out the occasional music video, let people know where I'm going to be performing, that kind of stuff. I never viewed myself as any type of cultural warrior or political figure or anything like that. I never thought that my ideas were even particularly interesting. I mean, to this day, I think 90% of what I put out there on social media and say on podcasts or say on stages is what should be common sense. I often joke that, you know, I'm not a, you know, I'm not a radical or an extremist, I'm a normal person from 2005. And yeah, I just started to, oh, at the same time, of course, you'd had Brexit happen in the UK at this point, you'd had the first Trump election happen. And all of the strange response to that of just, it was a very similar narrative in both countries where it was just like, oh, anyone who voted for this is racist or is a bigot or is hateful. And I was like, even if you don't support Brexit or you don't support Trump, that's a really stupid and asinine way to view your own country, your own population. But also this issue, it's just so closed minded, right? If there's an issue and 50% of people are on this side of it and 50% of people are on that side of it, and I'm going to simply conclude that, well, everyone who disagrees with me is not just an idiot, but is driven by some type of animus, they're racist, they're white supremacist, they're hateful, they're sexist, they're misogynist, I can't think of any issue where that is the case. Like, human beings are not quite so simple and big media machines were pushing these narratives as well. And people who I thought were pretty smart and intelligent were going with these Conclusions, narratives. So there were just all of these things happening simultaneously where I was just like, man, this is strange. We need more common sense, we need more voices. So I just started to lend my voice to it. Fast forward a little bit into February 2019. I'm standing at my pop up shop where I'd been promoting my music and my merchandise. And it was early morning. I'd just come back from the gym and the mall was quiet. It's like 9:30am in the morning. Not a lot of people are out shopping yet. So I'm just scrolling through my social media feeds and I see two different stories of males competing in female sports in the USA and winning medals. And I'm just like, this is so stupid. This is the dumbest thing. And then my brain just goes, huh, I wonder what the British women's deadlift record is like, I've got a good deadlift. I wonder what the record is in my weight class. So I just did a quick Google search and I saw that it was, I think it was 210 kilos was the British women's deadlift record. And I was like, oh, well, my PB is I can lift 65 kilos more than that. And I actually already had a video on my phone from one of my previous sessions of me pulling 230. So I just took out my phone. I had 19,000 followers on Twitter at the time, about 50,000 across social media. And I just typed a bit of a joke tweet. I just said, you know, I keep hearing about how biological men have no strength advantage over women in 2019. So watch me destroy the British women deadlift record without trying. P.S. i identified as a woman while lifting the weight. Don't be a bigot. I just put it out there like I put out all my other posts. I thought it'll get a couple of LOLs, you know, maybe a few likes, a few shares. And I created a monster. Within a matter of hours, the video had over 100,000 views. Then 200,000, 400,500. It went up to multi millions of views. By the following day, I was being contacted by mainstream media channels, the Sunday Times, BBC, Sky News, Fox News. Hey, we want to talk to you about your deadlift tweet. We want to talk to you about transgender women competing in women's sports. We want to talk to you about why you posted this. And I just said yes to everything, every offer, every radio slot, every TV slot, any podcast that wanted to talk to me. I was just like, sure, I'll Talk to you. And initially, the conversations were focused very much around the. That issue, which was actually very. Being hotly contested at the time because the Olympics was going to be coming up the following year, the 2020 Olympics, which I believe ended up being delayed because of the whole pandemic situation. But it turned out the timing of that post actually hit the intersection of a lot of things that were going on. So the tweet went viral in all of these different worlds. It went viral in the political world. It went viral in the sort of social, cultural commentary world. It went viral in the feminist spaces of the Internet. It went viral in the, you know, the whole weird trans community thing. It just uk, usa, Australia, Canada, any country that had been having this debate around transgender ideology, female identifying, men competing in women's sports, whatever, it just blew up. And I think because at this time, you know, six years on now, a lot more people are willing to discuss this issue and talk about it. But you have to remember that in February 2019, it was not a popular position to speak out or even question some of this stuff. We saw something very similar happen the next year with a different issue. And so I was one of the first people with a significant platform who just early on, didn't just go the route of giving the biological and logical explanation as to why this is a bad idea, but just took the idea and kind of ran with it. So instead of, yes, I can obviously explain to someone why it's stupid to have males compete in women's sports, but I'm just going to take your logic and I'm going to run with it. And it also ended up being a bit of a checkmate maneuver, because even the people who had been promoting this ideology, if you ask them, what is a woman? They'll tell you, a woman is anyone who identifies as a woman. And if a man identifies as a woman, he's a woman. That's been their whole narrative. That was the Caitlyn Jenner narrative. And so I was like, cool, I'm not gonna get mad at you. Cool, I'm taking that. Boom, give me my record. And so it was this checkmate move where you either had to go, well, okay, this person is not actually a woman, and this is silly, or you have to acquiesce and go, oh, well, I guess if she identifies as a woman, then this is valid. And so it just led to this gigantic wave of media opportunities. Joe Rogan discovered it, talked about it on his podcast, invited me on Tucker Carlson when he was still working at Fox News. He did a whole segment on it. Ben Shapiro did a segment on it. Steven Crowder, like, all of these people, predominantly in the more conservative media space, they, you know, people. People across the world thought it was hilarious, right? Like, even. Even people on the, on the more left and progressive side, like, it was just. It was just such a. I think, I think the post just kind of nailed it. So, yeah, it just went super viral. It went crazy viral. And I took advantage of the opportunities that were in front of me at this stage. Of course, I already had lots of music out. I started my podcast. At this point, I built up a good presence on social media. So it wasn't like the tweet came from investment club.
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Zuby
Someone who had nothing else interesting about them. So when I was able to do these interviews and speak about other issues and so on, people were, oh, okay, this guy's smart. Oh, he's got an interesting background. He's a British guy from, you know, British Nigerian guy, raised in Saudi Arabia, studied at Oxford University, a musician, so on. So people got to know me, people got to know my personality. And six years later on here we are, people still want to talk to me.
Brian Rose
And what that was the upside of that, perhaps, what was the backlash? Because I know at one point Twitter suspended you from maybe another comment you made, and I'm sure you got lots of hate on the back of that. And I'm sure also as you continued to talk about how you felt over the next year or two, because more events happened in 2020 that you got more of that as well. I'm just curious, what was that like? Also, Twitter back then wasn't owned by Musk. And we forget maybe the reason all of these narratives propagated was because of the tech companies and the media companies, which were almost all heavily left leaning or what Musk called the mind virus, you know, that it was exporting. I think we also forget how big that was. Yeah. What were some of the issues you faced there?
Zuby
It was 99.9% positive.
Brian Rose
Okay.
Zuby
And I'll tell you something interesting, Brian. I mean, when I was going on some of these mainstream stations, particularly with BBC.
Brian Rose
Yeah.
Zuby
Because, you know, with BBC in the uk, they are. They have to do their best to be impartial. And whatever issue they have, they try to present both sides rather than just one side of it. And when the cameras were off and the microphones were off, the people were like. The amount of people, women in particular. Women in particular were like, thank you. Really, thank you so much for what you're saying. Thank you so much. This is absurd. Thank you. You know, because they either can't or feel like they can't speak up on it, but again, in the background, they're looking at these issues and they're just like, this is absurd. The idea that a big man like myself or yourself can one day just say, I'm a woman. And everyone. No one's meant to ask a question. Everyone's just supposed to refer to us as she. Her, whatever it is. You could have fathered children, but you're just supposed to be a woman now. And everyone, society as a whole is just supposed to go with this, no questions. It's hard to think of something that's more absurd than this. But that was where we were. And so a lot of people were just afraid. A lot of people were afraid. And the thing is, as well is I'm very. I don't have any ill will in my heart. So when I talk about issues, whether they are contentious or controversial, I don't need to dance around too much or hide anything. I'm not some hateful bigot who hates some particular group or even individual and is trying to pretend that I don't. I don't. I'm simply someone who seeks the truth and aims to speak the truth and aims to maneuver in a way in the world that is. That is right and that is righteous. I'm not perfect. Nobody is perfect. But I just do my best with that. I don't have some evil ulterior motive. And I'm not trying to, you know. You know, I'm not hateful. I'm not a bigot. I'm not. Whatever name they try to throw at me, it doesn't stick. Because anyone who's met me, anyone who's spoken to me, anyone who's interacted with me, which is millions of people around the world at this point. You know, it's like, okay, pull it up. I don't even delete my tweets. Like, if you can find out of those 200,000 posts I have out there, you'll find me being hateful, right? You know, you won't find it. You'll find very much the opposite. At the same time, I can say that this is absurd and this is a bad idea. And so the backlash was, you know, there was some backlash, of course. You know, I've had people try to say that I'm a transphobe or I've been called a white supremacist. Strange one, you know, any ism or phobe, it's been thrown at me many, many times at this point. You know, how much of that stuff was even organic versus astroturfed? I don't know. But there wasn't really any real pushback because what would the pushback be? Like I said, if people are like, well, you're not actually a woman, they're undermining their own ideology. By their own definition, they're being transphobic. If I say I'm a woman and I insist that I'm a woman and they deny that, I'm like, hey, isn't that your own definition of bigotry and transphobia? Or like I said, they have to acquiesce, in which case, yep, I'm the strongest woman in Britain, which is also comical. So the pushback was not nowhere near as much as I think people may have thought. And I think it's because there was nothing aggressive or hateful or bigoted at all in not just the post itself, but the follow up interviews and things that I did, all these media appearances and some of the stations, you know, you could tell, they tried to insinuate somehow, you know how they do their interviews, right? They try to sort of push you to. They almost like want you to say something bigoted so that they can be like, ah, we got him, that's why he did it. And it's like, no, you're not gonna get me on that. Because I can just speak totally honestly and I don't need to guard my words too much because I know what my motivations are, I'll speak the truth. If I have a point that I make and someone wants to question it or challenge it or they feel a different way completely, fine. I'm not trying to censor anyone. I'm not trying to shut anybody down. I don't need to play that game. Truth is on my side on this one. So, yeah, it's fascinating how much things have changed in a relatively short time. And then, of course, going into 2020, that was a whole different era, which, again, I was one of the few people with a big platform early on who was asking questions about what was going on with these lockdowns and talking early about how, look, if this is not going to be the two weeks to slow the spread or two weeks to flatten the curve, whatever narratives they were putting out there in different countries, I was like, this is. If you give them that inch, they're going to take a mile. And that is exactly what happened. It went from suggestions to mandates to punishing people who didn't want to go along with certain narratives and do certain things. And again, across my different platforms, Instagram, YouTube, my podcast, Twitter, at the time, Facebook, I was just saying the things that I know other people were thinking, the things that I was thinking, asking the questions that journalists should have been asking if they were not captured and were not cowards, and that was it. So, yeah, it's weird how I've ended up in this position because I never set out to become, I don't know, a voice for the people or a voice of reason or whatever it is. There's a lot of people who view me that way now, and I guess I appreciate it, I'm honored by it. But I don't think it should be so rare. I don't think it should be so rare. I mean, I was brought up and raised to. If I see something that I don't think is right or someone is trying to push me or prod me to do something that goes against my values or that it isn't right, then I say something, I do something. I don't fear backlash in that way. I've had so many people ask, were you worried about being deplatformed? You worried about this? Worried about. I'm like, no, I'm not. Yeah, I don't want to be. I don't want my account suspended. And I'm not going to do anything that's such a clear. I'm not going to blatantly violate rules where. And give them an easy excuse to ban me or suspend me from something. But I'm also not going to be a coward. I'm going to say what needs to be said. I'm going to ask what I think needs to be asked. If I feel that it's important, and that's simply how I operate.
Brian Rose
I guess most people didn't say something because they were worried about being, quote, unquote, canceled. And maybe the first demonstration of canceling was me too. Maybe that was the first kind of mainstream thing where people were losing their jobs and they could see people in losing their entire livelihoods when they were accused, some rightfully, some wrongfully. And I'm guessing that's why everybody was a little freaked out at that point. They would let so many weird narratives go right in front of them without saying something.
Zuby
I don't. You know what? I think that's secondary or tertiary.
Brian Rose
Okay.
Zuby
I think the first thing is that what's interesting with the baskets of issues that we've talked about is they all fly under the banner of compassion and care. So most people, thankfully, are fairly compassionate and caring and empathetic. Most people don't want to hurt other individuals. Most people don't want to unnecessarily be mean or cruel or disrespectful or insulting. Like, that's generally a good instinct. So what I always found really insidious about everything that's under the banner of the WOKE movement, and I do think it's comparable to what happened during the COVID era, is it's all wrapped up under the idea of protecting other people and being kind and being compassionate and being empathetic. Right. That's how it's all framed. And so they kind of hijack people's natural instinct towards kindness and compassion towards their fellow man. So most people, they don't see how insidious it is. It's the same Black Lives Matter framing. Okay, why didn't people. How are you gonna speak out against something that's called Black Lives Matter? Like, I believe in that. Like, I'm not a bigot. Like, I. Of course. Like, you know, whether you're. Whether you're black, whether you're white, whatever color you are. Right? Unless you're actually a mean person. Like, if you just hear that name, you hear those words together, it sounds good. Why wouldn't you support that?
Brian Rose
It's genius.
Zuby
It's genius. And it's the same narrative that they use with all these different things. Right. With COVID how was it? It was like, you know, say, protect other people, the greater good, right? You don't want to go out and infect your friends, your family, your community. So just stay home. Stay home, save lives. Right? Don't go outside. Going outside, it's not about you. It's about everybody else. And so to stick your head above that parapet and go, nah, I think this is nonsense. I don't think this is right. I don't think that they're doing this out of compassion and kindness and public health. What, you want grandma to die?
Brian Rose
Yeah.
Zuby
What? You don't care about this. You don't like every. That's why it's so effective and so insidious. So most people don't even see through that first layer because they just accept it at face value. And beyond that, those even who do, most people don't want to be called names. It's not pleasant to be attacked online or offline or to be shunned by family or friends or to be called names in the media or just on social media or just in your private circles. People care about their reputations. No one wants to. It's why that thing of just, you know, I don't like that person. I'm going to call them a racist. I'm going to call them a white supremacist. I'm going to call them a Nazi. I'm going to call them a sexist. People don't want that label attached to them. That's why it's effective. Right? Remember they were going around calling everyone an anti vaxxer. I mean, I don't even think that's the worst thing to be. But it's just like we're just gonna stick a label anti science, right? You're anti science. You're a grandma killer. You're this, you're that. It's labels that will get you shunned by the rest of society. That's what the tactic is. It's the same tactic on all these different things. It's just different labels. So I think that is why it takes such a long time for. What's interesting with each of these narratives is that now in 2025, you can now say BLM was a scam. You can say that and you're not gonna get a lot of pushback saying that in mid-2020. Oh, boy. Oh, my gosh. Right? You can now question masks, you can now question lockdowns. You can now question the vaccine itself and certainly the mandates. You can criticize Fauci, you can criticize whoever were the public health officials in your country. You can question it all now. You can say that the social distancing thing was nonsense. You can laugh at the silly mask. But doing it at the time, being early on all that it wasn't popular. You can now say that it's goofy to have pronouns in your bio. You can now say that there's only two genders and that men don't get pregnant, and women can't have penises, and men shouldn't be in women's sports. Most people won't give you that much pushback. They'll be like, yeah, it's a bit silly, isn't it? Five, six years ago.
Brian Rose
Crazy, huh?
Zuby
Yeah. So we've actually made a lot of. It's weird to even call it progress, because it's stupid that we even had to have so many of these debates to begin with. But I think we're at a really different position now than we were as recently as, you know, 2021, let alone 2018, 2017. So I'm curious to see where we go in this next decade.
Brian Rose
Yeah. And I definitely want to talk about where you think we're going. Let's talk about Black Lives matter.
Zuby
Okay.
Brian Rose
Because 2020 was a crazy year. And then in the middle of a crazy year, it got crazier. And I remember this protest near Parliament Square where they had the horses out and the Black Lives Matter people were.
Zuby
Protesting in the uk.
Brian Rose
Yeah, it was in the uk.
Zuby
Isn't that even crazier?
Brian Rose
Yeah. And I think it was, like, May, maybe, or June, something like that. So in the middle of COVID obviously, everybody's freaking out. You're broadcasting, calling it out. We're broadcasting, calling it out. And then all of a sudden, Black Lives Matter happens, and then there's protests out there, and all of that's going on. And that was a whole nother issue where it got everybody asking them questions about race. What was that like for you? And what did you say? And what were. You must have had controversy around that.
Zuby
And, yeah, of all of the. I've said a lot of things over the last 20 years publicly. I've put out a lot of social media posts. I've said a lot of things on podcasts, on tv, on stages. My early pushback against Black Lives Matter was actually the most controversial. More than anything I said about anything to do with COVID more than anything I said to do with other weird race narratives or critical race theory, more than anything I said about the excesses of the LGBTQ movement or transgenderism or anything like that, my pushback against BLM was the one where, like some people, you know, people I truly love and respect were thought I'd gone off the deep end. And what's remarkable about it, perhaps even more, is that BLM is not a new organization. It wasn't started in 2020. BLM has been going on for about since the mid 2010s. If I remember correctly, I think it was after the Michael Brown shooting. I might be wrong here, someone can fact check me, but I think it was after the Michael Brown shooting in the usa, which I think was. I want to say that was 2014 or 2015. I think that's when the whole BLM thing started. And I'd looked into the movement early on, like in the mid-2010s, before anyone knew me, for any social commentary or anything. I'd just done some basic research on it and I knew that it was an organization quite literally run by Marxists and that it wasn't really about looking out for black people. They had weird LGBTQ stuff in there. They had lots of anti capitalistic stuff in there. Talking about wanting to dismantle capitalism. They had something on their own website, in their charter, talking about wanting to disrupt or dismantle the nuclear family, talking about abolishing the police. All of these ideas, like radicalactual, radical left wing ideas. So I sussed early on that, yeah, this organization is. It's not what it says on the tin. It's like a radical left wing movement run by actual Marxists. Just saying that sounds like some conspiracy theory, but it's not. You can find videos of the people at the top of a Black Lives Matter organization describing themselves as trained, trained Marxists on video.
Brian Rose
They're trying to weaponize an issue or hijack an idea and then pull their whole organization along with it.
Zuby
Yeah. And the reason I thought it was so insidious was for multiple reasons. Number one, because people are sending money to them, but also because you are using tragedy to line your own pockets. Right. So you're waiting for one of these high profile killings to happen in the usa, essentially white copy, black person. You're waiting for those incidents to happen so you can capitalize on it and then start pushing and campaigning and then you're funneling that money to wherever it's going. It now turns out that they were buying houses and buying stocks and paying off their family members and so on. But again, if you go back to 2020, none of this was known. 2020 is when a lot of people think BLM started. It's not. It had happened before, but I think maybe due to the situation we were in with the lockdowns and the sort of heightened tension and fear. Anyway, after George Floyd's death, it became, it was international. It went really, it went outside the borders of the usa. I think social media obviously plays a huge role in this. And you had protests from Berlin to Japan to the UK like countries where cops don't even carry guns and people are marching around. Black Lives Matter, Hands up, Don't shoot. So on. You know, like what the.
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Zuby
Again. How much of that is astroturf? How much is organic? I don't know, but I saw this all springing up again. Like, I've seen this happen a lot of times. And I just put up a couple of posts specifically criticizing the organization. And I actually explicitly said in my post that I'm talking about the organization, but that wasn't enough. A lot of people got very, very upset with me and mad about it. I had to do some. I had to do some cleaning up around that one. I won't go into too many details.
Brian Rose
But cleaning up as in getting rid of people in your life?
Zuby
No, no, no, no. Not getting rid of people in my life, but explaining. Explaining and not really being heard. Okay. But defending myself from accusations that I've, you know, switched sides and I've become personally with people.
Brian Rose
Yes, just personally behind the scenes.
Zuby
Yeah. Because people are looking at it like, how can. You know, sometimes I have to kind of put my. Try to put myself in other people's brains and shoes with the knowledge that they have. And they're like, how can a black man. After this thing happens with George Floyd? People are upset, understandably. People are angry. People want justice. And they're like, how is a black man criticizing something that's called a movement, that's called Black Lives Matter. In the aftermath of this, from my perspective, What I'm seeing is a whole bunch of people getting duped. I'm seeing a whole bunch of people, again, having their compassion and their empathy hijacked by bad actors who are then lining their pockets with quite literally millions, millions and millions of dollars in donation money, which is now flooding into the BLM organization. And it's going to not. It's not going towards improving black communities in the USA and investing in their neighborhoods at the same time. I'm also seeing one black man dies or is killed, depending on someone's narrative in Minneapolis. And, you know, in the riots that followed, you know, another 20 people died. So 20 more people get killed as a result of the anger and the backlash. I don't know how many hundreds of millions or billions of dollars of property damage is done, including damage to stores owned by lots of black and brown people in predominantly ethnic minority communities. You're just, you know, people are start. Then you've got people ripping down statues and just. Just doing all sorts of crazy stuff. You got white people bowing down to black people in their street and doing these weird. Like, there's just all this. It was so weird. Like, when you think back to it, it was just. It's just bizarre. You're like, what is. What's going on here? Remember the. Even the corporations, remember, they started all sending out, like, newsletters, talking about how much they like black people and how they stand against racism. You're gonna play a video game. There's, like, a notification comes up supporting BLM in the sports field. Basketball. They paint, like, BLM on the court and on the fields, and the players are taking the knee, and it was hysterical. And I'm just looking at this all, like, I think. I know that most people's intentions here are good, but your emotions are being hijacked here. You're not thinking clearly. You're not looking into what is this narrative. The money that you are sending, where is it going? There was that whole, you know, I have to put up a black square on Instagram thing. I had people unfollow me on Instagram for not putting up the black square. It's like, you people have lost your minds.
Brian Rose
I remember the black square.
Zuby
You've lost your minds. Like, if you don't think. If you think it took what happened in 2020 for me to realize that black lives matter, right? Me coming from the family, I'm from the friendship groups, I'm from being where. Being who I am really. Like, I've been walking around my whole life assuming my life doesn't matter. My parents. Lives don't matter. My siblings, my. Like, it's just so. Yeah, it's. It's. It was just very. It was very frustrating. It's kind of weird reflecting back on it now because the narrative has changed so much.
Brian Rose
It's tricky at the time because I'm guessing if you're a black man or a black woman, you think about a moment or many moments in your life where you might have felt that because of the color of your skin, you were treated one way or the other, you might have felt that. And when this happens and they crank up the emotions, it's so easy to just say, yeah, you know, hey, this is a racist world, and we have to fight back and we have to push back. And then you dial up that emotion, and all of a sudden the amygdala gets lodged and the cortex doesn't. And all of a sudden you get people that you would think that are reasonable that are going to that side, and then they're angry at you for taking a step back and saying, whoa, do you guys see what's going on here? We're being hijacked. So is that the way? Is that a correct way to look at it? Cause I'm seeing that maybe that would happen. Like, you could maybe weaponize any other issue with anybody else that might have had one of those issues in their life and said, oh, you remember that? And a lot of people might just go with it.
Zuby
Yeah. And I think it was so much more. I think that the lockdowns were actually a really significant factor. I think people had been stuck at home for months. People had been bored. People had been isolated. People had just been being fed fear, fear, fear every single day, every hour of the day. And then suddenly this thing happens, and people see the video. It's of kind caught on video. People see the police officer kneeling on George Floyd. And I mean, when I saw that video, I was upset. Yeah, I was. Before I even knew the name George Floyd, I had actually posted a few times about just seeing that video and my thoughts about it. Right. And then it was funny. I also had some people in my own audience, which is more conservative leaning, who are, you know, kind of, you know, really strong back of the blue type people who were then, you know, criticizing me for. And so you're kind of like just caught in this weird thing where you're like, yeah, that was bad. That shouldn't have happened. You know, there are now people. You know, there are people who think he died from the knee. There's people who think he died from overdose. Depending on where people are getting. We live in this weird world where there's these different narratives going on. And, you know, I don't know exactly what the final verdict on that one is. I know what the verdict amongst liberals and progressives is. I know what the verdict amongst more conservative leaning people tends to be. But regardless, I think that situation was unpleasant and avoidable and it should not have happened that way. Even if it turned, Even if it's. Even if he died of an overdose, let's say, I don't think it's correct conduct for a police officer to continue kneeling on someone for such a period of time if he needs medical help and attention. Right. So even if he didn't directly die from the knee, I still don't think that is correct and good conduct. Right. So, yeah, so I get the emotions. But, you know, emotions can be wildly inaccurate just because someone feels something. You know, we live in this weird world now where, particularly in the west, there's this narrative that your feelings are always correct and valid. It loops back to that same thing. Well, I feel like a woman. Well, then you are a woman. No, you could feel all sorts of things. It doesn't mean it's correct, let alone that everyone else needs to validate it and go along with it. Right. People can feel all sorts of crazy things. I'm sure we've all felt things that are not rooted in reality or are not the best things for us to act on. And we certainly don't expect the entire world and everyone else to be constantly validating our feelings and going along with them and so on. That's not. Maybe if you're a very small child, you should have that expectation, but as a grown man, as a grown woman, that's just not how the world works. So I get. I understand. It's the same with the COVID stuff. Like, I understand that people are fearful, people are emotional, people are watching videos and they're seeing scenes of people falling over people sick in hospital, on ventilators, seeing this, they're seeing this. And everything then gets framed through the emotions and the feelings. And people are no longer thinking logically and rationally and just taking that step back and thinking, do these things make sense? Do these dots connect? What about this? What about that? And that's all I was doing. I guess I was just doing it in a more public manner. Because even with some of these things, like, even when it comes to that whole situation, that 2020 to 2022 period, there's a lot of answers we still don't have. Maybe we'll never get them. But there's a lot of questions. Like, there's some really obvious questions starting from the absolute origin of the thing. Like, that's a question like, we still don't really know. We have ideas. And again, what happened with that? Right. And people initially who were even suggesting that it could have come from the Wuhan virus lab. It was like, you're a conspiracy theorist. People were getting banned for it. And now the narrative has shifted, and it's like, oh, yeah, probably. Probably came from there. Initially they were saying what it was like a bat soup or maybe a pangolin had escaped and spreading this. And so, man, I don't know. It's crazy how many strange things we've lived through in the past five or six years. And it's just been one after the other. It's like, there hasn't been much respite.
Brian Rose
Yeah.
Zuby
It's just been one after the other. And there's always a narrative to hijack the more emotionally charged people and to kind of pit them. There have been so many situations that have happened in the past few years that have pit family against family, friend against friend, neighbor against neighbor, citizen against citizen. And I don't believe it's all unintentional. I think a lot of people are useful idiots. But I do think that there are certainly narratives and ideas and propaganda that's pushed out there to keep people fighting, keep people angry, keep people scared, keep people divided. And I do know for sure that when people are feeling those negative emotions, it prevents them from thinking rationally. And when people are not thinking rationally, especially in large numbers, history tells me that that's always a dangerous situation to be in. So whenever I start seeing that mass formation happening, credit to Matthias Desmet for the term, I always want to ring the alarm bell of like, wait, hey, slow down. Let's think about this before people start firing at each other and trying to rip each other apart.
Brian Rose
Yeah, that's a good way to look at the world when you feel that shifting to maybe just take a step back. I remember the BLM stuff because I started asking myself questions. I'm like, okay, is there racism everywhere? And I, like, really thought about it. And I remember the black square day, and I remember not putting a black square up, and I remember thinking, okay, I want to have conversations on the show. I mean, we were kind of knee deep in Covid, but I was going to have on some guests that I had in the past that were black to talk about this. I had iced tea back on in 20. In 20, and it was one of my big favorites. And I was gonna have him back on, and then I was gonna have some black friends in London on. And then I think I just decided not to. And I was gonna post some videos about my feelings on it, and then I just decided not to. It felt like such an emotionally charged issue that I didn't know if I was gonna get anywhere with it.
Zuby
Do you know one of the weirdest things about it, Brian?
Brian Rose
What?
Zuby
Is the fact that people even viewed it and continue to view it through the racial frame to this day. As far as I know, even in the court, even in the trial itself, there was never any charge made about racism or evidence of racism. It just happened that the police officer was white and the man who was killed was black. Could race have been a factor? Sure, but we don't know that it was. So it's also fascinating that all of this happened after an incident where we don't even know to this day, we don't even know. It's not even clear. There has been no evidence that race was a motivating factor. Of course, depending on people's worldview, there will be some people. Come on, Zubi. Of course that wouldn't have happened if it was a white guy. But it's like, wait, that has happened to white people before. There's a guy. There's a man named Tony Timpa who was killed in pretty similar way. White man killed by white police officers in America not so long before the George Floyd. George Floyd situation. There have been, you know, guys like Daniel Shaver, One of the worst police shootings that I've ever seen. That was a white man shot by white police officers. That obviously wasn't racial. More white people are killed every single year by police than black people in America. Disproportionate, per capita, but it's still more people. But people don't know those names. So it's kind of interesting how even when that conversation happens, it's framed from the context of race and black and white, rather than around police conduct and perhaps police brutality and training or even agents of the state versus citizens. It's framed very specifically and intentionally through a racial narrative because then it forces people to think that way, right? So now white people across the entire Western world are like, wait, am I racist? Am I somehow complicit in this incident that just happened? What do I need to do? How do I need to make amends? And again, I do Believe for most people, that's coming from a good place. And then for a lot of black people in particular are thinking, oh my gosh, racism is alive and well, right? Because again, they're being told and being encouraged to see it through that specific framing. So the conversation which should have happened, as far as I'm aware, the predominant conversation should have been about police use of force. It should have been about police training. It should be about, who are you even hiring? It should have been, you know, what are the roles and responsibilities of police officers? What should conduct be around that? That's really the conversation that needs to happen if someone genuinely cares. Like, if Black Lives Matter were actually about what they claim to be, even if it were restricted to the conversations around police use of force against black citizens, the conversation would look very different. And you wouldn't. It wouldn't even be framed around the racial conversation. It would be like, look, police officers, there have been many, many incidents over the years of police officers of whatever color using unnecessary and sometimes lethal force against citizens. When it's not. There's times when it's necessary and people would put their hands up and be like, yep, that's a justified shooting or killing. And then there's other ones where other people would look at and it's very clear cut. No, that was not justified. Lots of them are more in a gray area, but people don't. This is where the virtue signaling thing kind of bothers me because I sometimes sense that people don't really want to solve these problems because they're having the wrong conversations. And if you actually, how do you get out of a rat race? How do you create wealth not only for yourself, but also for the generations to come after? I am absolutely amazed with the quality of companies that we're getting exposure to. We go on to zoom calls with the innovators and the folks who are building new applications in Metaverse, blockchain, artificial intelligence, decentralized finance.
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Zuby
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Zuby
I view it now as the best.
Brian Rose
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Zuby
And as a retail investor, I would never get this exposure anywhere else outside of investment club. See you in the investment Club. If your goal is to stop innocent people, let's say innocent unarmed people. We don't want innocent, unarmed people, regardless of their color, regardless of their background or their class. We don't want them being killed, period. Let alone by agents of the state with a badge and a gun. We want to reduce police brutality. We want to reduce these types of killings and deaths. Now that conversation is something everyone would be on board with. Conservative, libertarian, centrist, liberal, progressive. If you ask any sane person across the whole political spectrum, would you like fewer innocent unarmed civilians to die at the hands of the police? All of them will say yes. From the most hardcore gun toting, second amendment patriot conservative to the most lefty blue haired liberal. They'd all say yes. They'd all say yes. Instead you have people arguing over is it black lives matter or all lives matter? Oh, you're racist. You're like, yeah, boom, we got them, we got em. We've got the useful idiots shouting about do we say black lives matter and all lives matter are the same statement? It's the same statement. Black lives matter because all lives matter. Right? White lives matter is also a true statement because if. Because all lives matter. Right? So you've now got people arguing over this instead of having the conversation and holding the correct people accountable and saying, okay, what are things we can do to prevent this type of situation from happening again? Do we need to change the police hiring process? Do we perhaps need to reduce some of the protections that allow a police officer who, you know, has bad misconducts here from, you know, just kind of being shifted into different county or shifted to a different state? Do we maybe need to alter how we do the training or perhaps repeat? I don't know that much about police training in the usa, but my understanding is that there's quite a lot of room for improvement in the standards, both in the recruitment and in the actual training itself. And I think that if you can hire better people and if you can train them better, then you'll have fewer of those incidents. But I think there are people sadly who don't want fewer of those incidents because it's too politically beneficial. And I think that sucks. But that is what I see going on because it's happened so so many times at this point. I can probably off my head name at least 10 of these situations where this has happened. And it's been the same playbook over and over and over again. And it doesn't improve because the goal isn't for it to improve. The goal is to get the people angry. To get people super race conscious again and to keep them fighting each other over dumb stuff.
Brian Rose
Yeah, it gets weaponized, it gets attention, it gets money. And. And you'd like to hope that cycle is not gonna continue. But yeah, I ultimately concluded in mid-2020 that I'm not racist and the world is not getting more racist. And maybe it was good that I had to really think about it, but like, I've been in circles of people all over the world for 20, 30, 40 years and like, I don't remember those incidents happening where people were judging people on the race and I was in some pretty high profile and, you know, high performance jobs. And it was like, can the person perform? And that was. Seemed to be the always thing. So it was interesting to have that introspection, but then I had to come to that conclusion and maybe it was good that people thought about it, but. But yeah, it was incredible to watch. You mentioned astroturfing. I was wondering if you could maybe explain that to people. And you know, do you think that a lot of these movements have sometimes people behind the scenes, like a Soros or people that just throw money because they can hijack the left narrative? Soros just came out and called Trump a narcissist. Na, na, na, na. But we know he did Astroturf and fund a lot of these things. Yeah. What do you think's happening there and how do you explain that to people?
Zuby
Sure. Well, it does exist. How far it goes and how much involvement and how much money goes to each individual thing, I don't know. I'm sure there are people who can speak on that with more facts and authority than I do, but I do know that, yes, there are. Astroturfing is a real thing. There are organizations and groups that fund protest movements not just in the usa, but also overseas in order to. I mean, at extremes it can be to throw over to overthrow an entire regime. That's happened.
Brian Rose
Ukraine.
Zuby
Yeah. Arab Spring. In other situations, it can be to promote certain narratives. Okay, so yeah, Black Lives Matter, for example. Yeah. It's received funding from some of these organizations. I know with George Soros, it's called the Open Society, and it happens online as well. So it's not just. There are paid agitators on the ground or in the street who are informed in certain ways to behave, certain things to say. They could even be given signs, given certain slogans to chant and so on. And so that can happen. And then you get a bit of an organic movement because some people join it as well. And then it's the same online as well. So I don't know what percentage of online users are bots, but it's something percent. Yeah, 30 plus. So there can be arguments going on and the argument is between some real people and some bots, or it's two bots arguing about each other and they're trying to sow discord. This is a very real thing. Some of it is coming from the US Some of it might be coming from China, some of it might be coming from Russia or other foreign organizations. It's always weird talking about this stuff because it makes you sound like you're like way down some conspiracy theory rabbit hole when it's just like these are just facts. Like this is a thing that happens, it's real. To what extent how deep the rabbit hole goes, I do not personally know. And I'm always cautious about saying things that I'm always wary to stay within the bounds of what I know is correct. Or if I'm giving my opinion, I'm clear that I'm just giving my opinion. But I think a lot of this is being. A lot of this ball of worms is being slowly unwound at this point and people are learning more and more about this and more information is starting to come out there. Censorship has less of a grip now than it did a few years ago. Thank you, Elon Musk, for buying Twitter and making it X. Because creating that crack in the dam of censorship has forced the other big tech platforms to reconsider their stances and become less censorious. And look, the only people who want to censor and want to ban and want to deplatform people are those who are hiding something. If you are someone who seeks the truth and stands by the truth and is willing to let information flow and is willing to have conversations and debates or something, you don't feel the need to censor other people, even if you think that they're completely wrong or their idea is crazy cool. Let that conversation happen, let it play out. Don't employ like, you know, fact checking organizations and whatever else it is. All of those things are going to be proven to be part of this web as well. So yeah, I'm just a fan. This is why I'm part of, why I'm a fan of freedom of speech and freedom of expression. It's like, look, let people talk, let people put their info out there. Let people share data. Let people just during the whole early stage of the. And even the later stages of the whole pandemic situation, again, I typically Refer to it as the scamdemic. But the amount of censorship was crazy. Again, if this is what you're saying it is, you know, let. You've got doctors, you've got scientists, you've just got laypeople, you've got people out there, you've got journalists, just cool. Like, let people discuss it and debate it. Debate everything from lockdowns to masks to mandates to the vax to this. Like, talk openly about it. Talk about the potential effects. What you know, what you don't know. Potential side effects, whatever it is, just it should all be out there. Let people have the information and then they can make their decisions. As we do with so many other things. As we do with so many other things. The information is out there. Here's the pros, here's the cons, here are the risks. Whatever it is, if you're going to get a surgery, even if you're just taking an aspirin, look at the sheet, okay, look, here are the potential benefits, potential side effects. One in 10,000 people may have this side effect. One of them just lay it all out, lay it all out and trust the people to make their decisions. And sometimes people, this is this thing about freedom, right? Sometimes people are going to use their freedom in a way that you don't like. It happens all the time. If you can't handle that, you're going to struggle in a world with 8 billion plus people. Because there is no other human being on this planet who shares your exact same views and thoughts and perspectives on everything that doesn't exist. Even within families, even within marriages, even amongst the closest of friends. They still have their disagreements and their different worldviews and their different ideas on things. Whether it's politics, it's religion, it's what football team they want to support, it's who they think is the greatest rapper or athlete. It can be frivolous stuff, it can be important stuff, but you have to allow people to have that freedom and to make those choices. I think people make stupid choices all the time. I'm sure there's some people who think I've made stupid choices. I probably think I've made. I know I've made some stupid choices, right? But we, that's just, that's just how it goes. If someone is harming another person directly or putting them at a, you know, massive risk, then sure that that's a problem. And there's times and places where we need to step in and of course we need laws and things like that. But if you're going to live in a supposed free society society. You kind of have to accept that sometimes people are going to do things you don't like or they're going to do things you don't understand. They're going to do things you think are stupid. They're going to believe things you think are absurd. But you know what? That is better than an alternative where people are completely restricted and they're not able to think, do feel, say the things that they want.
Brian Rose
I think Elon Musk said the test of freedom of speech is when someone you don't like says something you don't agree with. And that's when you are put to the test of whether you're really a believer of free speech. You mentioned Elon buying Twitter, and I agree it was just a massive thing. I think when we look back in 20 years, it could be one of the major reasons why we made that turn. You've interviewed him on your show. What's Elon like?
Zuby
Sure.
Brian Rose
And what's it like watching him from when you had him on I think, in 22 to watching him now in 25 and everything in between?
Zuby
Yeah. So I had him on spring 2023.
Brian Rose
Okay.
Zuby
So when, not long after he bought Twitter, it was still called Twitter at the time. He hadn't done the X rebrand yet. What was Elon like? He was friendly. He was humble, polite, down to earth. Funny. He was as happy to meet me as I was to meet him. And it was cool. During the interview, I had a couple moments where I was kind of like, whoa, is this really happening? Am I just sitting here? Sitting here with Elon Musk, like, this is quite a big deal. But, yeah, I always highlight the humility and down to earth ness. Because I've said before that if there were a man in this world who in this earthly realm were to have a right, quote, unquote, to be arrogant or prideful or see himself above everybody and, you know, treat other people like beneath him, it would be him. And he's not like that. So what's the excuse for. What's the excuse for anyone else? So to me, that's kind of. It's a constant reminder, I think, when you're in the public eye, to whatever degree, we're both in the public eye to some level.
Brian Rose
And.
Zuby
And I think when you're in that position, one of the greatest temptations actually is pride. The sin of pride, I think, is the one that tends to magnify and come for you because you're in a certain position and you Receive a lot of attention and praise and people care about what you have to say and people quite literally are following you. You quite literally have like, you know, millions of people tuning in to hear the things that you're saying. Someone in that position could easily become arrogant, cocky, prideful. Start to think that investment club today.
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I consider it the best investment that I've ever made. We get four projects presented a week by their associated CEOs. Personally, I'm completely blown away by the quality of these projects and I know of nowhere else where I would be given this same opportunity. Each week that passes, I feel more appreciative of the fact that I'm a member of the, this group. The vibe was just tremendous. Everybody's on the same wavelength. We just clicked. Everybody listened to each other, enjoyed their company. It was just magical, magical. Take action. Don't take my word for it. Due diligence you need to do. And I really hope that someday down the road I see you in the club. It far exceeded expectations without question.
Zuby
You know, they're here and everyone else is lower than them. And there are so, so, so many warnings in the Bible against that. And I think a lot of times you don't really know why that's there and why it's repeated so many times until you're in a position or you're entering a position where those forces are kind of working around you. I think it takes a certain, perhaps a certain level of status for certain temptations to become temptations. It's like if you're, I don't know, if you're in some place and you don't have much access to food and food is really hard to come by, then you don't need to worry too much about the sin of gluttony. Right? Like it's not even a risk. But if you're constantly surrounded by food and buffets and everything you'd ever want to eat and drink, and it's constantly around you now, you need to be more disciplined and you need to guard against your limbic system's animalistic desire to just gorge on whatever it is. So that's a bit of a long winded answer, but I like Elon. I like Elon. I'm glad that if someone is going to be the wealthiest and one of the most powerful men on earth, I am happy that it's him. As opposed to many other people who it could have been, who I think would be wielding that weapon far more destructively in a much more anti human direction. I do believe he is pro humanity, which is important to me. And I hope, and I pray that he, as he continues to gather more power and wealth and influence, that he also has the wisdom and the caution to guard against these same issues that I'm talking about. Right. We all know that power and wealth can corrupt. That's always been true. And so I pray for him. I pray that he is wise enough to use that power wisely and to use his influence in a good way, because he's got so much of it that it could be. It could be really destructive in a way that most people. Most people's power is very. Most people's destructive power is very limited.
Brian Rose
Not him.
Zuby
No. Yeah, yeah, exactly. Right. You know, most people, yeah, they can wield a lot of destruction in a small vicinity, perhaps before being stopped. But when people are just in certain positions within or outside of a government, as we've been seeing, there are people who can move things around and manipulate things and, oh, fun this year. And most people can't. Oh, let me just put 10 billion in that. Let me put. Most people can't do that. Right. So when you're in that position, I think there's a whole new level of responsibility that comes with it.
Brian Rose
It's been amazing to watch even since you talked to him less than two years ago, him continue to transform. I mean, he was already one of the wealthiest people in the world. He already controlled major social media platform, electric car, space vehicles and a few others. Then he became best friends with Trump. He campaigned and probably helped him win the state of Pennsylvania. Now he's in Doge and he's in there slashing and burning, you know, with the Trump go ahead and doing some pretty incredible stuff there. Now, some people watching this will say, zubi, he's already lost it and he's using his platform for all of his agendas. But I just still, I still think he is making decisions based on his ideology, and I think he wants transparency and he wants democracy. And I think it's incredible to see what he's doing. And it's an amazing evolution.
Zuby
I think we're at such an early stage of it that it would be. I don't think, honestly, we're yet in a position where we can see the net positive or net negative of it. It's a bit like in 2016 when the Brexit vote happened. I remember people on both sides of the issue were so passionate about it. Some people still are right. And you had the people who were very strongly pro Remain, who are like, this is it, the UK is over, they've destroyed the whole thing. This is gonna be, this is the biggest cock up ever in British history. And then you have people on the other side who are like, nope, this is gonna usher in the new golden era. This is like, you know, we're gonna make Britain great again, da da, da. And I was just like, none of you know. We can't know, right? We can't know. I mean, at that point, the UK hadn't even left the EU yet. The referendum had just happened. It wouldn't be another few years until the UK would actually leave. And it's like people are there with their doomsday predictions and their golden era predictions. I'm just like, guys, we don't know. It's too early. And I kind of feel the same with what's going on now. I think I'm cautiously optimistic, for sure. I mean, the uk, sorry, the US government, the federal government, is probably the most wasteful entity that exists and there's a lot of corruption that needs to be dealt with and unearthed at the same time. Maybe at this point, early stage, some people aren't too worried about this, but there is, there's the meat and there's the fat, right? And you want to be careful with trimming the fat off without, you know, I guess the more libertarian or even anarchist someone is, the more they're just like, let's just blow the entire thing up, right? There's people who pretty much don't think a federal government should exist. But I think that over the course of the past century, the truth is the USA in particular has. I don't necessarily think they should have done this, but for better or worse, they have involved themselves in so many international things. The USA has its tentacles everywhere, just like it has its military bases everywhere. There is US influences. In places people don't even know there's US influence. Some of it I'm sure is good, some of it I'm sure is bad. And look, when you take an ax to something, there's going to be a period of a lot of fallout. Right now I think we're at the early stages of quite a lot of the fallout. It's like a wrecking ball. And I think five years from now, certainly 10 years from now, I think it'll be easy to look back and be like, hey, that was. We had to do that. We had to break those eggs to make that omelette. Look at this omelette we've got now, right? Or, and I hope this is not the situation, it could be like, oh, that was a. That wrecking ball went way too hard. Right. The amount of fallout, this has ended up being a net negative. I do genuinely hope for the former situation. And again, I just. I hope and I constantly pray for wisdom because we can only do so much. We can talk about these issues, but we're not in these positions. We're not the ones making the decisions, deciding what to cut, deciding what to keep. We're not the ones wielding that power. So I constantly pray for the leaders, the people in these positions to make wise decisions, because I know through my life, and I assume for many decades before that I was born, we've had a lot of leaders in a lot of countries making a lot of bad decisions, which has put us in certain situations. So I genuinely hope that this is the shift, the positive shift that we need. So I'm cautiously optimistic, but I'm careful to cheer too hard, too early.
Brian Rose
Okay, understood. I just think it's a win that someone's actually looking at the.
Zuby
This for the first time, 100% talking.
Brian Rose
About, you should look at it. And even, like, Piers Morgan, I'm not so a huge fan, but he tweeted out and saying, imagine if someone like Elon would look at the nhs, how much waste is there, and just the fact that someone's actually doing it. And it was probably an open secret for a long time. I remember there was a movie called the Untouchables about getting Al Capone, you know, back in the day. And it was this group where they were trying to fight Al Capone, who was obviously running liquor during Prohibition. And I think Sean Connery was in the movie. And he said to Kevin, forgot his name. He said, you really want to break this open? He said, it's an open secret that it's happening in the post office here. He's like, you really want to fight this? Then let's go. And he was like, what? He's like, yeah, it's right there. Everyone knows it's right there. And he knocked it down and just went for it. And I feel like there's a similar thing going on here. And so I agree. We'll see. And there is danger. Even Mike Benz came out recently and said, when you throw USA down the toilet, he's like, also, some of those programs actually do support some interests. And he said, just be careful about throwing the baby out with the bathwater. Which, for a guy who's been vilifying that organization for a long time, to say that it makes you okay, let's listen to Mike. So I agree with what you're saying before it's a start.
Zuby
I'm 100% in agreement with you that this needs to happen to some extent. And the fact that it's becoming a conversation in the same way that RFK has made certain issues around American public health a conversation and has just mainstreamed those conversations, that's to me that's only upside. The other thing I would say perhaps is also the way certain things are wound down. So from what I can see, I am not an expert. You just mentioned Mike Pence. He's an absolute expert on all this stuff. Right. I'm no expert on usaid, but I do know for a fact that there is a lot of funding of complete nonsense that is just complete wastage of taxpayer money. But I'm also aware that there is funding of stuff that does genuinely help people around the world. I know that because I know people who work in that sector who have had funding cut off and it's having very negative fallout for them. So I know that. And there is a big, it's a totally legitimate question of should any US taxpayer money be going to, even if it is to genuine foreign aid and helping people in other countries, there's a totally legitimate question about if any and if so, how much should be going to. That. That's a question for the American people. What I would say is there's a way to, given I don't know how many thousands or millions of programs are out there, there's a way to wind things down properly. It's a bit like, look, if you have, if you're running a big company or even a medium sized company and you need to save money and sadly you need to cut some staff, there's a way of doing it that is like both ways. You need to cut staff, but there's a way to do it that is, that lessens the negative impact and there's a way that doesn't minimize it. Okay? So if you were just to come in one day and just send everyone packing with no notice. Oof. Right. Like they do have families and kids and bills and stuff like that. Right? So if you're going to just like cut it, it's like there's a way, okay, look, here's the warning, here's how we're winding this thing down. And so it's coming to a close. But it's just being, but it's not just being sort of cut at the knees. That's something that I have some personal awareness Of. Of certain things that have just been. At least for now, as we have this conversation, I don't know where this will be a few weeks or even months from now, where certain things have been cut off with a lot of downstream negative ramifications for individuals and their families in a way that is unexpected. And I would assume, again, at the highest level where these decisions are being made, there might not even be that much visibility of that. So that's where I'm just. I tend to always encourage caution. Not in the. I mean, it's funny I say this after my position on lockdowns and stuff, but when there is a massive sweeping change being made, I think it quite literally doesn't matter what it is. Maybe this is my more conservative disposition. I think it's always wise to just consider. I'm not saying don't take a wrecking ball to something, but just be aware of the downstream and how.
London Real Investment Club Member 2
What the London Real Investment Club actually does for you is gives you the keys to open that door to the inside deals. In the last three weeks, I've participated in three incredible deals. A layer two, Bitcoin protocol, an incredible AI protocol. The deal flow is beyond what I expected. I don't think I've ever seen a model like this that just gives average folks the opportunity to be behind the deals. And that's exactly what we've done. Not only that, you get to hang out with Brian Rose every week. And for me, that was huge because I look at Brian as somebody who's not only an expert in the space and I think is on the leading edge, but just the leading edge of thought with London Real and the work he's doing there. To anyone who's taking a serious look at this, I know it's a big decision. It was a big decision for me and my family and it is one of the best decisions I've ever made. So I wish you all the best and hope you come join us.
Zuby
How far it swings, I just think that's. Yeah, that just seems wise.
Brian Rose
Yeah, Noted. Another guest you've had in the past was Andrew Tate.
Zuby
Sure.
Brian Rose
I think you had him on in 19 before he became famous. Infamous. I think he back had him back on in 22.
Zuby
That's right.
Brian Rose
When. Right before he went to prison. What's Zuby's view on Andrew and how does that all wrap up into, you know, everything that happened in 20 and 21 and 22? Because it's. It's not independent of those events, is it?
Zuby
No. Yeah. So I first interviewed Andrew Tate, January or February 2019, just. He was the fourth guest on my podcast, Crazy. So it was interesting when I did that first interview because, like, no one knew us to care. I had. Between us on Twitter, we had under 100,000 followers between us early 2019. And so, yeah, some people tuned in and found it funny or thought it was comical, some of the statements that he made and things that. And then, yeah, fast forward into the next couple years, and my profile grows. His profile grows gigantically. And then late 2022. Yeah, I did an interview with him November. November 2022, in Dubai before he went back to Romania. And that's when all the legal stuff that was like, December kicked off with. Yeah, yeah, it was December 2022. So about a month after I'd interviewed him. So I've met him in person a few times, both on camera and off. I met him. I met his brother Tristan, who's also been on my podcast as well. Personally speaking, I've. You know, they've been kind to me. I've never had a. You know, like, on a. On a personal level. Yeah, they. They've been gentlemen towards me. In terms of the legal stuff, I don't really want to. Like, I guess I don't want to speak on it because, again, I don't know. I don't know what. I don't know what's really going on here. There's all these different narratives, and this has been going on for years now. There's conflicting information. It seems like it's going this way, and then something shifts, and it seems like it's going this way. I don't know. And I don't know them well enough to have some insider information on all of this. I'm kind of like, I just hope that the. I hope the truth comes out. Yeah, I don't. I don't really know what more to. I don't really know what more to say on it.
Brian Rose
When I saw Tate getting really popular, first of all, I was like, unless you.
Zuby
Unless you mean, like, the phenomenon around.
Brian Rose
Yeah, I guess I'm asking that.
Zuby
Sure.
Brian Rose
When I first saw him getting popular, first I was like, who's the dude with the sunglasses? And then the more I listened, my conclusion was we should look at this as not as maybe, like, a symptom of a problem, and that is that men are looking for someone to give them a different narrative than they're bad and they're useless and they're evil, and that now there's someone actually speaking up and something deep down inside Young men were saying, you know what, I need this right now. And maybe they were being pushed down by various morphs of the other issues we were talking about. Whether it was, you know, the wokeism. Did you see something similar?
Zuby
100%. 100%. And I thought that it was pretty stupid that more people weren't asking those questions because I saw a lot of people immediately wanting to jump on the bandwagon of condemnation without even attempting understanding. You know, sometimes people take pride. I think it's a form of virtue signaling. Sometimes people take pride and boast about not understanding something. And I don't think that's a good, it's not a good thing, right in the way you have people who are like, they take pride in the fact that they're like, oh, I don't know how anyone could vote for Trump. I'm like, well, that's a you problem if you don't even have the empathy and the brain power to understand the perspective. There's a lot of things I don't agree with, but I can understand where people are coming from. I can understand how they reach their conclusions and make their decisions. But you have, sometimes people don't even want to do that because I think perhaps because they think that by understanding it means that they're condoning or embracing the entirety of a message or the entirety of a person. The thing I found, perhaps like you, the thing I found most fascinating was what has happened socially and culturally that allows for this individual in this circumstance to amass such a following so quickly and so much influence and it's resonating so much with people in certain demographics because that doesn't happen in a vacuum. I found something similar interesting years ago with the rise of Jordan Peterson, right? So I first came across his work in 2016 and I really, you know, kind of watched his rise from a distance. And there was something also fascinating there of like, okay, there is a social and cultural. We're in a social and cultural zeitgeist that has allowed a 50 something year old university professor who is telling you stuff that again, seems quite commonsensical. Things that your father or perhaps your grandfather should have told you, take responsibility, you know, carry a load, look after yourself before you criticize the world. You know, use your words carefully, stand up straight with your shoulders back, like these are, this is kind of old school wisdom, but it becomes this phenomenon. And all these media appearances, you remember the interview with Cathy Newman which went viral and all of this. And you're like, okay, there's something we're in a particular social and cultural situation that. That has accelerated. This same thing happened to me to a different degree. Right. In a more sane time period, I don't think I would have attracted so many followers or people would have been so interested in listening to what I had to say. In fact, I know it because I've been putting stuff out there since about 2006, 2007, and none of it was deemed remotely controversial or even particularly interesting until the mid 2010s because the world had shifted. And then suddenly it was like, oh, who's that guy? He's talking a lot of sense. We need more people who are talking sense. So, yeah, I think an environment was created, particularly amongst young men, but it's not even just young men. I think people like to limit it to young men. Perhaps again, to. I think when people do that, it's a bit dismissive because I think they want to be like, oh, well, it's just these listless teenagers and guys in their early 20s incels. Yeah. You know, they want to frame as if the whole audience is that. So that they can kind of dismiss it. That's not true. There are millions of women around the world who like Andrew Tate's messages of all ages. I know this because I travel a lot and I talk to a lot of people, and I've had some very interesting conversations in this regard with people who people would not consider to be in his sort of typical fan base or follower base, all ages, both sexes. And, you know, he does speak a lot of truths, and that has to be recognized. And you have to understand that, particularly, again, in the modern Western world, men have been emasculated in many ways. The genders have been confused in many ways. A lot of traditional masculine values or virtues and ways of embodying them have been labeled as negative or toxic or problematic or whatever. Men have been just browbeaten from so many different angles, from the media to academia to certain political narratives to just the excesses of feminism and so on. And men aren't particularly happy with the results. Interestingly, women also are not particularly happy. Happy with the results. You know, you have lots of men like, hey, what happened to all the good women? Lots of women, hey, what happened to all the good men? What happened to the strong men? What happened to the masculine men? At the same time, it's, you know, I don't need a man. And you go, girlism, and the future is female and all this. And it's. I think there was just something refreshing to a lot of people. About someone who is just, you know, someone could say that it's a. It's like an extreme manifestation of certain typical masculine qualities, but also. But just the brazen saying what you want to say with not giving a crap about political correctness, not caring about using the right words or framing it the right way or, you know, people have. I think there was just something so refreshing about that to a lot of people. So I think if I look. Try to look somewhat objectively at a lot of the appeal of Andrew Tate both now and previously, it's just like, hey, this is different. This is refreshing. And it. Sure, it could be an overcorrection in the other direction, but when things have been pushed so hard this way, you find a lot of people are okay with the overcorrection because it's like, well, it's been pushed so far that way that just having that makes it feel kind of more in the middle. And I find, like, most people who like his stuff, they. I don't think I've ever met anyone who agrees with, like, everything he says, who's just some, like, mindless. I think, again, I think people like to frame his audience of just like, it's just these sort of mindless drones who will listen to everything that he says and then go and do it right. And that's why in the uk, in some schools, like, you're not. It's. You're not even allowed to say his name. And then, of course, everything from banning him from the platinum, he's dangerous. He's influencing men to be misogynists. And this and this and this. And in my experience, and certainly from people I've spoken to, most people who actually generally, overall, like his stuff will find it compelling. It's almost, despite the things that are passed, a certain line, it's not because of them. It's like, okay, I like this 80%. This 10 or 20%. Yeah, I'm not really with that, but I like the 80 or 20 so much, or I find some truth in it, or I find some motivation in it. And also, again, if you want to talk about not existing in a value, in a vacuum, not a lot of people are doing it. So I see a lot of people who, particularly in the more Christian space, and certainly, certainly in the more conservative space, but certainly in the more Christian space, who are quite sort of bewildered by it all. But I don't think they sense that, at least in the public sphere, there are not a lot of unapologetic masculine role models. And it seems like in the absence of that, people would prefer, how would I put it, A lot of people would prefer an obviously imperfect manifestation of it than just like a limp wristed, weak, like nothing. So that's the part where I think a lot of people don't, don't understand it. A lot of people don't understand that appeal. And again, it's one thing to everyone's entitled to their own opinions and their beliefs, but I think it's always worth trying to comprehend. If something becomes a cultural phenomenon, it's always worth trying to understand why, what happened prior to that, what led up to it, what is the appeal here? What's being tapped into that people are finding so compelling. And I think that's actually a very interesting conversation. And perhaps sometimes people get so focused on the individual himself, rightly or, you know, for whether they're on the pro side or they're on the against side, that they lose sight of the wider social and cultural conversation. And I think there's a very interesting one to be had there because I think both men and women, particularly the younger they are, we're just in a bit of a weird state. Things are weird still and they have been weird. And I'd imagine that if I were like a 20 or 25 year old young man growing up in the UK or the USA right now, I mean, given my family background, I think I'd personally be okay. But if I just see how millions of people are growing up, millions of people, quite literally with no fathers, often no father figures, oftentimes their friends also don't have fathers in their lives. And there's all their teachers, pretty much all primary school teachers are female. Even later than that, most teachers are female, they're being raised by their moms. There's a lot of feminine influence and the absence of masculinity has an effect. It has an effect in all sorts of different ways. Some measurable, some not measurable. And I think that young men, boys, teenagers, they're always going to, they're always going to look for that somewhere. That's not a new, that's not a new phenomenon, that's not new at all. We all know that. So they're going to look for it somewhere and they're going to find it somewhere. So I think my message would be for, you know, for the people out there and the people who are super loud about it, who have a, a massive problem with Tate or people like him, it's like, well, create and present and support what you consider better alternatives, right? You can scream and rant and rave all you want about not liking his influence or not liking this or not liking that. But I'm very much a fan of like, you know, be sounds corny. Be what you want to see in the world, but also promote the. Promote the things and the people that you like. If you spend all day, you know, ranting and raving about, you know, I don't like, I don't like this, I don't like that person. I'm like, okay, cool. But like, what are you presenting that you think is a better alternative and how are you going to make it compelling? And how are you communicating that to people? And I think a lot of people don't do that. They just don't do that mind shift. And I think it's an important one.
Brian Rose
It's interesting, you know, when I look.
Zuby
Back at 14, how do you get out of a rat race? How do you create wealth not only for yourself, but also for the generations to come after? I am absolutely amazed with the quality of companies that we're getting exposure to. We go on to zoom calls with the innovators and the folks who are building new applications in Metaverse, blockchain, artificial intelligence, decentralized finance.
Brian Rose
What's going on, everybody? Buddy, thumbs up if you can see me. We are focusing on early stage investment.
Zuby
And the quality of people that we're getting exposure to, whether it be Dan Tapiero with one rt, Jason Ma from Open, Yatsu from Animoca. It's been a phenomenal experience thus far. It has far exceeded my expectations.
Brian Rose
We are focusing on cutting edge technologies.
Zuby
I view it now as the best investment I have ever made. The upside I view is unlimited. And as a retail investor, I would never get this exposure anywhere else outside of investment club. See you in the investment club.
Brian Rose
10 years at London Real. If I'm honest with myself, it's me searching for alpha male role models. People always used to say, well, why are your guests mostly men? And I used to get a lot of heat that it wasn't half women and half this and half, half that. And I was like, look, this is my show and I'm just picking the people that resonate with me and leave me alone. But it is that search. And it's not like I didn't have an amazing father. I did. But it takes a village, I think, of alpha males to raise a man. And I think maybe we're always searching for that. I think there is a big deficit right now in the world. But if I'm really honest with myself, If a psychotherapist looked at my show, he'd be like, this is what you're doing, Brian. And I think it's probably right. And each one of these men, I learn from, you know, and I learn from women, too, for sure. But there's definitely something going on there which is interesting.
Zuby
You know, there is, I think, also the truth is, now more than ever, the role of both men and women in society is less clear than it's ever been. For better or for worse, in all of human history and most human societies, if you were a boy growing up or you were a girl growing up, it's pretty clear what your role and aspiration is. It's always been clear. In most of the world, it's still very clear. I think people often forget that the west is only like one eighth of the world's population, essentially. And most of the world is not as confused as the Western world is on this stuff. Right. It's very clear what a man is and what a man's roles are and what a woman is and what a woman's roles are. And it's been made blurry. And again, you know, there are pros and cons with this. Again, I think that in terms of laws and rights pretty much speaking, you know, I totally. I agree they should. You know, a woman should generally be able to do what a man's allowed to do, and a man should be allowed to do what a woman's allowed to do. But that doesn't mean that that's actually what's going to happen for the most part, because we're different. We have different interests, certainly as demographics. We have different wirings and different strengths and weaknesses. There are some things that men are generally better at, and there's things that women are generally better at. There's some things that only men can do. There's some things that only women can do. That's just reality. I didn't make it. That's just how it is. And society has always acknowledged this and fit around it. And I think now, particularly as so much work shifts and has shifted online and, you know, the most obvious difference between men and women perhaps is just the physicality, you know, the bigger frame and stronger muscles and so on and so forth and decreasingly, we actually need that. You know, we both work out, we both keep in shape, but like, you know, we don't need to for our jobs. We talk for a living. Right? You don't need to be. You're not working in a field or, you know, and very few Men are doing those jobs. Like, we're not going out and battling physically, we're not. We're very unlikely to ever fight in a war or anything like that. And so we've created a society which is very comfortable and very easy to survive, at least on the minimal level. And most people can. I don't know what percentage, but I think probably at this point most people have relatively sedentary jobs. And it could be a man or a woman or perhaps even an AI behind the computer. And so men and women have become more interchangeable in some ways. The idea even of men protecting and providing, it's not as, you know, most women would still, if they're being honest, say, yeah, they want that. And I think most men, if they're being honest, would still say, yeah, like, I feel like that's my role. But even that has morphed. It's not the way it was before. If women have jobs and, you know, most university degrees are going to women, and under the age of about 30, in many big cities, women are actually out earning men on average, then that whole question around, like, provision becomes a lot more blurry. And even the one about protection, it's like, well, we live in pretty safe societies. Like, it's not like we're living in a cave and I need to stand there and, you know, guard against some wild animal or, you know, tribe coming. It's weird because our biology hasn't changed. Our biology is the same as our ancestors, essentially, but our environment has changed so much. So I think both young men and young women are trying to work out where do they fit in, how. How are they meant to relate to themselves, relate to each other, relate to their communities? What's their place supposed to be? We're sort of straddling. There's one foot in the west in conservatism and traditionalism and Christian values and chivalry and gender norms. And then there's another foot in feminism and egalitarianism and progressivism and blank slateism. And they don't, they don't mesh. They don't mesh very well. And I think it's causing a lot of confusion, confusion and a lot of dissonance for people. And I think this is part of the big reason why fewer relationships are forming. It's part of the reason, not all of the reason, but it's part of the reason why fewer people are getting married, fewer people are having children. And it has, it sounds like, I think on a surface level, it can sound like quite a frivolous conversation. But it actually has very deep ramifications, because if men and women are not attracted to each other and coming together and bonding and creating babies and creating families and so on, like, that's actually a civilizational level problem. And there are nations. Great example would be South Korea, for example. Japan's an example. But they're not as far gone as South Korea, where this could be the greatest issue that they face this century. South Korea's birth rate is down to somewhere between 0.6 and 0.7 births per woman, which means that for every hundred South Koreans that's alive today, at the current rates, there will be four great grandchildren. So that's a 96% decline within a couple generations. So I've never heard a story of a nation turning that around before. That's probably something that should be treated as a. Okay, we need to really, really work out what's going on here. And another part that's interesting about this is the majority of people. I learned this from speaking to Stephen Jay Shaw, who's a demographer who looks at birth rates and things like this around the world. He's an expert in this field. Very interesting guy, actually. You should speak to him if you haven't. He. He brings up the point that. So sometimes when people hear about the decline in birth rates and increasing. Fewer. Fewer people having children, a lot of people think that's simply a consequence of, oh, well, you know, that's just freedom. That's just people making their choices. You know, no one should be forced to have kids and so on. That's not predominantly what's going on. The vast majority of those people did want to have children, both men and women. So what's happening is that people want to, but are either just timing themselves out on the clock or they're having other priorities, or they're feeling that due to economic and financial circumstances, they can't afford it or because of. There's a whole host of reasons why that may happen. Infertility is a big problem. I think about one in three couples now experiences some sort of infertility problems, which is a whole other conversation around what's going on with that. And, you know, I don't know the solution to everything, but these are fascinating conversations. And I hope, you know, one thing that I hope that comes with the decline and hopeful eventual death of the wokeness stuff is we can reprioritize our intellectual energies and our efforts towards important conversations instead of wasting time and wasting some brilliant minds arguing about how many genders there are. And if men should be in women's bathrooms. How about we talk about some of these other issues and we try to see, okay, what potential solutions, what's going on here? Questions around health, some big conversations to be had there. Questions about big pharma and our food supply, questions around this birth rate crisis and fertility issues, questions around our money supply economics, what's going on with these fiat currencies. These are big and important conversations that will actually steer the boat of humanity more than the nonsense. So I hope that we can spend a lot more time and collective energy now having those conversations and trying to come up with some good solutions.
Brian Rose
Yeah, me too. I think the last alpha male I'm going to ask you about is President Donald J. Trump. And I'm just curious what you think about what we've witnessed over the last couple years with him and then what this means for the next 10 years. I think you and I were chatting a couple weeks ago when we first met about how you believe this is kind of like the beginning of a new era and maybe the close to a previous era of maybe the last 10 years or 15 years. And so, yeah, what do you see here and what do you think is going to happen? And is it, is it going to be a 10 year or a 20 year? How do you get your head around that?
Zuby
Yeah, so I think the past decade has been defined by a lot of what we've talked about during this interview. I think if we're looking at the West, I think the past decade has been heavily defined by just the overshoot of progressivism, socially, culturally and politically. And I think that we're having a pendulum swing back towards the center. I think we have to be cautious, again, that it doesn't overshoot. We've been dealing with the far left. I don't want us to deal with the actual far right right, not the, not the Internet version. So I think there's a lot of, there's a lot of great potential. So I think we're, yeah, we've, if I were to say like 2014, 2015 to about 2023, 2024. To me, that feels like a particular decade that was defined in a certain way. And now where that chapter closes, I think there was a massive pushback against it towards the end of last year. I think the Trump Victory investment club.
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Zuby
Politically, both the electoral college vote and easily winning the popular vote. The American people really spoke up and said, no, we don't want to continue down this way. We want to take a different path. We tried that other path, right? We had trouble. You tried the other path. And then it's like, no, no, no. Actually, we want to go back on this track. And so there's a huge amount of potential. I think that the usa, and therefore perhaps the wider west, has an opportunity to return to, I would just say common sense. Some people might call it conservatism. I think before it's even conservatism, it's just common sense. Let's just come back to no more mass censorship. Let's bring back freedom of speech. Let's allow people. Let's get back to those classical liberal values. You have people now who call themselves liberals, who are the least liberal people you're ever gonna meet. Let's get back to those traditional classical liberal values. Let's rein in some of the excesses on everything, the social and cultural excesses and all the goofy stuff, whether it's going on in schools or in universities or with the budget. Let's rein that in. Let's look at that 36, $37 trillion budget, sorry, debt that the USA has and try to shrink that down and bring that in the other direction. You know, the USA is a fascinating country in many ways. It's one of my favorite nations. And the way that it is set up and supposed to be politically is pretty phenomenal. And it's absolutely unique. And I think that if you. My personal view is that politics and the government are working well when you don't need to think about it that much. So I think that we're here in the uae, and I think that Dubai and the UAE as a whole have. It's clear that the governments are functioning well. You don't need to think about it much, right? There's not some big cultural war and constant political. It just runs in the background. I think that's what government is meant to do. It's meant to just run in the background, do a few things and do them very well, and allow individuals and families and entrepreneurs and people to flourish, not impede your ability to look after yourself and look after your kids and look after your family and pursue education and pursue jobs and hire people. And that's where the. The government doesn't make things. The government doesn't even have money, really.
Brian Rose
Right.
Zuby
It's just the government doesn't create anything. Creation happens at the individual and organization level. So if you create the right infrastructure, metaphorically and physically, for people to work, then you can kind of just let them get on with it. And that's where prosperity comes from. When the government starts intruding and involving itself in too many things, that's a problem. So I hope that under this new administration and the ones to come, that it becomes more light touch and they cut the tape and break down the barriers and stop the wasteful spending and so on. Where Americans feel like they're being choked, right? They're being overtaxed, they feel like they're being overregulated. There's having to worry about this and worry about that and worry about that. No, like, you shouldn't have to constantly be worrying about all this stuff. The typical American shouldn't have to worry about the situation at the border. That's not your job. Right? Like, that is one thing the government is for. If the federal government's going to do something like immigration control and maintaining and controlling your borders, that's one of them. So they should just do that and handle it. And then you can go and you can worry about your own health and your children's health and making money and looking after your family and trying to follow God or whatever else it is that you like, the normal stuff. And I think there's just part of the reason people have been so jacked up on politics recently is sure, some of it is pushed by the media, but I think a lot of it is just the sense that, like, it's just not working. It's not doing what it's meant to be doing. It's too. In our lives. It's too intrusive. So I would actually like to see, like, less politics in this next decade. I would like the politicians and the people in power to do what they need to do and take care of some of this stuff and rein in some of the excess and just create the environment. Not giving people things, not handouts, not all of this stuff. Just create the environment where people feel free and Safe and that things are under control and they can then just go and live their lives and not feel. Feel like every single election is a matter of life and death. And that who's in the. You know, they need to be worrying about what's going on in their house more than worrying about what's going on in the White House.
Brian Rose
Yeah.
Zuby
And politics, if we're being real, particularly in the states, it should be a lot more localized. The people who are living in Florida or Alabama should be concerned about their county and their state more than they're worried about what's going on in the echelons of the federal government. And I hope that other. I hope they can model that well and other nations, from the UK to across Europe, Canada, Australia, all the other ones, and perhaps even some non western countries can learn from that. And instead of constantly expanding and increasing the tentacles of the government, just rein it in, have it function. People get on with their lives and chill out and stop being at each other's throats all the time.
Brian Rose
I'm smiling because it sounds more Emirati. You know, both of us are here right now, but it sounds like that type of environment where the government lets you do what you're gonna do, lets you create the businesses, doesn't tax you, doesn't get in your way. And again, one thing I like about when I leave Britain is like, there's no buzz of this policy. This person, this is wrong. It's like it's all just dialed down and I don't have to worry about all the bad scandals happening to the government. And the prime minister said, what? And the whole nation's going down. It's like, like you said, it's just. It hums. It hums very beautifully here in the background and everything functions. And it allows you to focus on what you want to focus on. My family, my business.
Zuby
I've never thought of it this way, this way. But it's like driving a car or another vehicle. You know, like when you're driving a car, you're not. There's so many things going on with that car to keep it moving. So many mechanisms, mechanical, electronic. There's so many things happening. The motor. When you're driving, you're focused on what's ahead of you. The wheel, accelerate, brake, clutch. If it's a manual and you're focused on that and your head is elsewhere. But if you had like a banger and it's making noise and it's fluttering, you're constantly thinking, are the brakes working? What about the engine? Right and you can't. You're now distracted and you can't just focus on getting you and your passengers where they need to go. So, yeah, that's how I look at it. And I feel the same. We both travel a lot and perhaps you're like me, that when you come here, it's hard to explain to people. It feels like a cloud, like a dark cloud sort of lifts off of you. The only way to bring it back is if you spend a ton of time on traditional or social media, consuming all the politics from other parts of the world. But when you're just here, I find, like, I'm just focused on. I'm so much more focused just on, like, what do I. What do I need to do for myself and my loved ones? Whereas when I spend a lot of time in the us, uk, to a lesser degree, but to some degree, there's just so much. Even if you're not seeking it out, there's just an elevated level of tension. And there's always some battle. Yeah, some battle going on. Cultural battle, political battle, and this and this and this. And I think for a lot of people, like, they think that's normal and they think, well, that's just how it is. And it's like, actually, maybe it is from your perspective, but it doesn't have to be. There are places. I don't think Dubai is the only one. There are places where actually you don't even think that way. I would imagine that even in more rural parts of the us, I don't know, people who live in rural Wyoming or Montana, I'd imagine, like, they probably feel a bit more kind of like we do here, where it's just like, yeah, like, we're good. I'm just minding my business and looking after my family and doing my work, and I don't feel like I'm being intruded upon too much. But I think particularly in the big cities and maybe more of the states that are more kind of battleground states, there's that constant cloud and there's that constant tension, and it's just. There's different layers where people are pitted against each other. There's the left versus right, the blue versus red. There's the, you know, there's the racial thing that's kind of in the background. There's the gender war stuff happening in the background. There's just. I don't know, it's. It's. It's too much. It's too much. And I think this is completely unscientific, but I think it's a factor in the whole mental health crisis. Yeah, I think it's part of it.
Brian Rose
Which could lead to the reproduction crisis as well. Yeah, yeah. I've just tuned down all of the UK stuff and I caught a headline the other day and it was like, starmer this. And I was like, oh, I'm tuning that off. And it's funny, it's like not dealing with your toxic ant or whatever. It's like once it's off, it's out, it's out of sight, out of mind. And then I just. I'm not even going to engage with it anymore because it doesn't matter, it doesn't affect me. And it's been kind of nice to dial it all down. What's Zubi doing in five years from now? That's what I want to know. What do you think your life looks like? What do you think you're doing from a business perspective, from a media perspective, from all of that? Are you and are you here as well?
Zuby
Sure. So I think five years from now, I'm doing everything that I'm already doing, and I'm just doing it bigger and better and on a larger scale and reaching in positively impacting more people with it. I'm blessed to be in a position where I already do all of the things I already love doing and I'm able to make a living from it. So I love making music, I love making books, I love putting out social media stuff. I love recording podcasts and doing interviews. I love speaking on stages, I love coaching and consulting people. This is how I make my living. And I'm going to continue doing and I'm going to continue to reach more and more people with it. I think one of the biggest shifts five years from now, for sure, on a personal level will be becoming starting my own family. That's definitely coming in the next few years. So that's going to unlock a new level of. I think it's gonna unlock, like a new level of everything that I do, both personally and professionally. It's gonna be stepping into a new and permanent role. And I'm. I'm excited about it. I'm excited about it and I'm excited about the future. I'm. Yeah, man, I. I put things in God's hands, honestly. I pray a lot, I read my Bible a lot, and I do my best to, you know, live by it. I'm not perfect with it, but I'm hyper optimistic, I'm hyper optimistic, and as far as I'm concerned, I'm just getting started. You know, I'm still in my 30s. A lot of the people I look up to are in their 50s, 60s, 70s, even 80s. So, Lord willing, I'm going to have many more decades to make an impact on this world and leave a legacy. And every day I just try to make a little inch towards it and maybe more importantly, encourage others to do the same and find their own little seed of greatness and start to nourish and water it. That's really what I'm about, man. I think if human beings knew how much capacity and capability and potential they had, man, that's when we take the world and our species to a whole new level. I just think the average man, the average woman, doesn't realize their own potential. It's part of why I try so much to just encourage people, just be constantly encouraging. There's so much discouragement in this world. There's so much darkness. There's so many things to be fearful of, so many things to be angry about if you choose to be. But there's also so much joy and so much goodness and so much kindness and so many wonderful people in this world. It's all true. It's true that the world is very good and very bad and very scary and very exciting. Like, it's all true. And yeah, I just encourage people. I constantly try to push people in the direction of the positive where that they can see the opportunities and, you know, just with minor things. It's part of why I'm so into health and fitness. And just look, if you're gonna start somewhere, just like, hey, man, just try to get yourself in better shape. You know, go, go, go to the gym. Go, go lift some weights, clean up your diet, drink more water, get more sleep. Like, connect with more good people, Consume more good stuff that actually helps you instead of making you angry and frustrated and being divisive. That's really what I'm about. So I want to continue to hone that message and continue to make things creatively that aid in that mission. That's all I'm trying to do. It's been the case for the past 20 years, and I see that for the next 20 as well.
Brian Rose
It's nice. My mom always used to say, brian, you can do anything you want to do. You can be anything you want to be. And some people say that's naive, but I tell my boys, you guys can do anything you want to do. You can be anything you want to be. And I think it's true. So if anybody's Listening out there, I believe it's true for everybody. Human is limitless. And I just had a flashback to 85 year old Zuby doing a podcast back in my day.
Zuby
That'll be fun, man. Matt, I'd love to talk to 85 year old Zubi. Like, I hope you know, one of the chapters in my next book is about making decisions that your future self will be grateful to you for. So actually, as strange as it sounds, sometimes I do think of the 60, 70, 80 year old Zubi and I think of what I'm doing now and I think, okay, is this gonna serve him or is this gonna put him in a worse. This is gonna put him in a worse position. And. And I try to make decisions based off of that rubric sometimes.
Brian Rose
That's awesome.
Zuby
Yeah.
Brian Rose
How do people follow you? How do they get your podcast? Learn about future books, all that good stuff?
Zuby
Sure. So they can Visit my website, zoobiemusic.com that's got links to everything on all social media. I'm ubymusic. Z u B Y Music Z U B Y Music for my people in the uk. You can follow me on X. That's my biggest platform. I'm also on Instagram, I'm also on YouTube and I'm on Facebook as well. All of them. Zooby Music. And my podcast is called Real Talk with Zooby. It's available on YouTube, Rumble, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, wherever you listen. I've just released, I've got over 350 episodes out now. So lots of interesting conversations with lots of interesting people. Real Talk with Zubi. Go check it out on your favorite podcast platform.
Brian Rose
That's amazing. Well, thanks for being you. I was about to say standing up for things, but you were just being you, maybe these last few years. And so thanks for putting yourself out there. Really inspired a lot of people and made a lot of really good conversations happen. And looking forward to what you're going to keep bringing in the next few years. And thanks for talking. Really enjoyed this.
Zuby
Thanks, Brian. Appreciate it.
Brian Rose
I appreciate you, man. Awesome. And just want to say thank you to Web3TV. We will see you next time. Hey, I know investing in crypto is scary.
Zuby
Scary.
Brian Rose
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Host: Brian Rose
Guest: Zuby (musician, author, entrepreneur)
Date: March 12, 2025
This episode features a wide-ranging, unfiltered conversation between Brian Rose and Zuby that explores the collapse of 'wokeism', the state of masculinity, the dangers of censorship, media and corporate narratives, the effects of major cultural movements (such as BLM and COVID), and where Western societies might be headed. Zuby shares his personal journey from musician to viral commentator, discusses the importance of critical thinking and open conversation, and explains why he’s optimistic about the future.
[05:38–18:53]
Genesis of Zuby’s Public Persona:
Zuby recounts his 2019 viral moment, "I keep hearing about how biological men have no strength advantage over women in 2019. So watch me destroy the British women deadlift record without trying. P.S. I identified as a woman while lifting the weight. Don't be a bigot."
— Zuby, 05:38
Cultural Context:
The comment was a satirical response to the rise of gender ideology in sports and broader society. Zuby explains that at the time, mainstream discussion of these topics was taboo—unlike 2025, where common sense has largely prevailed:
"Now, in 2025, you can now say that it's goofy to have pronouns in your bio. ... Most people won't give you that much pushback."
— Zuby, 29:12
Media Explosion:
The deadlift post led to a whirlwind of media, podcast, and TV appearances, propelling him from musician to a prominent global commentator.
[20:05–27:31]
Industry/Community Reaction:
Zuby describes initial overwhelming support and private gratitude (especially from women), with limited organic backlash.
"When the cameras were off...women in particular were like, thank you. Really, thank you so much for what you're saying...but again, in the background, they're looking at these issues and they're just like, this is absurd."
— Zuby, 20:51
Fear of "Canceling":
Brian and Zuby discuss how compassion is hijacked by those seeking to silence dissent. The threat of being labeled (racist, transphobe, anti-vaxxer) stifled even legitimate questions:
"Most people don't want to be called names. It's not pleasant...That's why it's effective."
— Zuby, 30:10
[27:31–33:27; 38:08–49:03]
Framing as Compassion:
Zuby details how movements like BLM and COVID restrictions wrap themselves in empathy to demand conformity—making it difficult to oppose without seeming callous.
"Everything that's under the banner of the WOKE movement...is all wrapped up under the idea of protecting other people and being kind and being compassionate and being empathetic."
— Zuby, 28:02
Black Lives Matter Insights:
Zuby’s criticism of BLM was the most controversial position he took, more than covid skepticism or comments on gender. He underscores the Marxist underpinnings, the financial scandals, and the manipulation of public emotion:
"You are using tragedy to line your own pockets...Again, having their compassion and empathy hijacked by bad actors who are then lining their pockets with millions..."
— Zuby, 35:52; 39:00
Media Narratives & Astroturfing:
The conversation explains astroturfing—artificially manufactured support and agitation via paid online and offline actors.
"There are organizations and groups that fund protest movements...it happens online as well...I don't know what percentage of online users are bots, but it's something percent. Yeah, 30 plus."
— Zuby, 59:12
[58:35–65:26]
Musk, Twitter, and Information Control:
Both praise Elon Musk’s acquisition of Twitter, which forced other platforms to "become less censorious":
"The only people who want to censor...are those who are hiding something...If you are someone who seeks the truth...you don't feel the need to censor."
— Zuby, 59:55
The Value of Open Debate:
Zuby expresses staunch support for the free flow of information and robust debate, even when it’s uncomfortable.
[82:12–107:00]
Andrew Tate/Jordan Peterson Phenomenon:
The rise of online influencers like Tate and Peterson is symptomatic of young men’s hunger for guidance and "commonsense" masculinity after years of demonization:
"Men have been emasculated in many ways...A lot of traditional masculine values...have been labeled as negative or toxic...It's always worth trying to comprehend...what happened prior to that, what led up to it, what is the appeal here?"
— Zuby, 85:37–87:00
Zuby’s Philosophy:
He argues the West, more than anywhere, suffers from gender role confusion, which has downstream consequences for relationships, family formation, and even national birth rates:
"If men and women are not attracted to each other and coming together and bonding and creating babies...that's actually a civilizational level problem."
— Zuby, 100:30
[107:00–115:25]
2025 as a New Beginning:
Zuby and Brian see the 2015–2024 period as an era of progressive overreach and societal confusion (gender, censorship, identity politics) that is now ending with the Trump victory and a return to "common sense":
"Now where that chapter closes, I think there was a massive pushback against it towards the end of last year. I think the Trump victory...the American people really spoke up and said, no, we don't want to continue down this way. We want to take a different path."
— Zuby, 109:27
Ideal Government Role:
Zuby argues for minimal, competent governance that "runs in the background." The less you notice it, the better:
"Politics and the government are working well when you don't need to think about it that much...It just runs in the background. I think that's what government is meant to do."
— Zuby, 111:45
[119:47–124:19]
Zuby's Next Five Years:
He plans to keep scaling his influence—"doing everything that I'm already doing, and I'm just doing it bigger and better and on a larger scale"—and start a family, unlocking a new dimension of life and impact.
— Zuby, 119:47
Optimism & Encouragement:
Zuby closes with a message of hope and human potential:
"If human beings knew how much capacity and capability and potential they had, man, that's when we take the world and our species to a whole new level."
— Zuby, 119:47
On Censorship:
"The only people who want to censor and want to ban, want to deplatform people are those who are hiding something." — Zuby, 00:00
On New Norms:
"You can now say that it's goofy to have pronouns in your bio. You can now say that there's only two genders..." — Zuby, 29:12
On BLM:
"BLM was a scam. You are using tragedy to line your own pocket. It's all wrapped up under the idea of protecting other people and being empathetic. It's the same narrative that they used with COVID..." — Zuby, 00:57
On Free Speech:
"If you are someone who seeks the truth and stands by the truth...you don't feel the need to censor other people..." — Zuby, 59:55
On Young Men:
"There are not a lot of unapologetic masculine role models. And it seems like in the absence of that, people would prefer...an obviously imperfect manifestation of it than just like a limp wristed, weak, like nothing." — Zuby, 93:40
On Potential:
"If human beings knew how much capacity and capability and potential they had, man, that's when we take the world and our species to a whole new level." — Zuby, 119:47
| Timestamp | Topic | |-------------|--------------------------------------------------| | 00:00–05:38 | Introduction – Zuby’s censorship comments, bio | | 05:38–18:53 | Deadlift tweet, rise to cultural commentary | | 20:05–32:13 | Pushback, cancel culture, insidious compassion | | 32:13–49:03 | BLM, emotional manipulation, media narratives | | 58:35–65:26 | Censorship, Elon Musk, free speech | | 82:12–107:00| Masculinity, Andrew Tate, gender confusion | | 107:00–115:25 | Trump, pendulum swing, new era | | 119:47–124:19 | Zuby’s future, message of hope and optimism |
The conversation is candid, unfiltered, and wide-ranging—often delivered with a combination of dry humor, frankness, and encouragement. Both speakers emphasize the importance of common sense, personal responsibility, compassion for individuals, and skepticism of manipulative narratives. Zuby in particular maintains a relentlessly positive outlook, despite discussing weighty cultural topics.
Zuby believes society is emerging from a period of confusion, division, and enforced narrative conformity. The future, he argues, belongs to those willing to think critically, embrace open dialogue, rediscover common sense, and realize their individual potential.